Battlefield Z

by Chris Lowry

The soldiers from the trees moved in closer in a loose perimeter from the back of one truck to the other. Three soldiers from each truck lined the truck beds, weapons held at the ready.

  "He raises that pistol an inch, kill him."

  He took a step closer and examined us, stopping on me for a long up and down.

  "You're telling me this sorry looking pile of crap took out my second in command?"

  "Yes sir," drawled one of the soldiers.

  "He don't look like much does he?"

  "He's wily Sir."

  "Wiley?"

  "Like a fox."

  "I think you mean coyote son," the General moved within a pace of me and glared into my eyes. "Is that it? Are you the roadrunner to my coyote?"

  I could tell by the glare the man was bonkers. Totally checked out. It wasn't just the crazy eyes, one of which didn't bother to even look at me but darted off in a completely different direction, which made glaring back even harder because I wasn't sure which orb to stare into. Add to that that the roadrunner pretty much always beat the coyote in the cartoons, so the whole intimidation vibe was just a little bit off. Kind of like his eye.

  I wasn't about to correct the gentleman though. He was backed by twelve automatic rifles and the .45 he had belted to his BDU's looked well worn and used. I didn't gulp either which maybe he expected and I didn't flinch when he reached one hand over and yanked the bowie knife out of my belt.

  "Now that's a knife, he grumbled and drew back his hand.

  I knew what was going to happen next. He was going to stick me and let me bleed out.

  Then he'd take the girl I just rescued, her mother, Anna, and Peg and turn them into sex slaves or worse. Like Brian they'd be dinner or entertainment.

  His arm arced out behind him and he grinned.

  "Huh?"

  His cock eye went wider and he turned his head to focus. Julie stepped between two of the soldiers in the perimeter, lifted a grenade off one of their belts and dropped it on the ground.

  "Grenade!" one had time to scream before it exploded.

  The concussion knocked our group down and took out Julie, the two militiamen plus another in the back of the truck. The others were distracted.

  "Stay down!" I screamed and hoped their ears weren't ringing enough to miss it.

  I aimed my last bullet at the giant gas tank under one of the trucks, the one next to the still smoking crater where three people had once been and pulled the trigger. The bullet ripped through the metal with a ping and tore out the other side of the tank. Gasoline poured from the two holes, but the detonation I expected didn't happen.

  Damn movies and special effects.

  The General kicked me in the stomach to roll me over and plopped down on my chest. I clicked through the empty chambers and he laughed like a megalomaniac madman as he lifted the long blade over my face. I heard the racking of a slide on one of the weapon's as a soldier recovered and covered me.

  "It don't blow up til you get a spark," the General's rancid breath wafted over my nose. "Bullets are just projectiles. Blunt objects that punch through things. Like this."

  He lifted the knife higher.

  "Hey!" Anna screamed.

  We both turned to stare. She rolled over twice and kicked a smoking piece of charred clothing into the stream of gasoline spilling from the truck. It hissed and sputtered out.

  The General turned back to me.

  "Guess you're all a special kind of stupid, aren't you."

  He lifted the knife again. I bucked, but he squeezed tight with his knees and held me down.

  Flames licked up from the smoldering piece of cloth and flesh and raced up the puddle like a fuse. It hit the vapor in the tank and exploded, tossing the back end of the truck over upside down.

  The General was knocked off me ass over tea kettle and lay stunned on the ground. I crawled up, my ringing ears going off like the bells of Notre Dame, but so used to it I barely noticed. I grabbed as many arms as I could and shoved everyone toward the cab of the remaining truck.

  The General struggled to all fours and I took three steps and did my best impression of an opening kick off from a football game. It connected with his stomach and launched him three feet over his side. He lay gasping and clutching what I hoped were broken and shattered ribs.

  The militiaman next to him tried to get his gun up while on his knees.

  I punted between his legs and lifted him up to his feet. He made an animal like noise, a cross between a whine and groan and passed out. I yanked his rifle and aimed at one of the soldiers in the truck bed.

  It clicked dry.

  I re-racked the slide and aimed again just as he recovered and sent a three round burst my way. It spit up dirt in front of me, peppered my face with the crumbly grit from the asphalt. I shot at him. It went wide, but the buzz next to his ear made him duck, just as Brian fired up the truck and rocketed forward. It pitched him over the side and he landed on his neck with a loud crunch.

  I ran after the truck firing wild rounds toward the confused and disoriented soldiers. They scattered and tried to return fire, mostly hitting the giant moving truck and the metal bed in pings and ricochets.

  I grabbed the side of the truck and jumped on the running board as Brian took the turn. It popped up on two wheels but settled quickly and he fought through the gears to get it moving down the two lane as fast as the pedal would take him.

  Bullets buzzed through the air after us. I hoped they wouldn't hit a tire or the gas tank, but we were out of range a few moments later.

  "Anyone hit?" I yelled at Brian.

  He pointed at his ears.

  "I can't hear you."

  "Your eardrums are busted.

  "I think my eardrums are busted."

  I nodded.

  "Peg!" he shouted. "Is anyone hit?"

  "I can't hear you," she shook her head. "My eardrums are popped."

  She checked on Anna, Hannah and Harriet. No one was shot at least, though Julie's sacrifice had cost us the ability to communicate effectively for a little while.

  "We need to get rid of this truck," I screamed through the open window still clinging to the mirror, feet planted on the running board.

  "We should probably ditch this," Brian answered. "Find something faster. Less conspicuous."

  I nodded.

  Right now I didn't care about conspicuous. All I cared about was how the cultists found us and how the General found us. There were a lot of roads we could have taken on either side of 75 North. Something did not smell right in the state of Denmark. I chalked that up to the stench of Z and focused on what the hell was going on in Florida right now.

  There was a puzzle I needed to figure out because if I didn't, these enemies were going to keep me from helping my kids. And I wasn't going to let that happen.

  CHAPTER THIRTY THREE

  The truck ran out of gas twelve miles or so later. One or six of the errant shots had punctured the tank, projectiles moving at great speed so that we left a splattered trail of gas along the highway. We walked a mile further to find a simple farm house with a pickup truck in the carport and after a careful inspection, no one home.

  Brian found the keys hanging on a hook by the back door, and Peg raided the cabinets to uncover cans of soup and boxes of crackers. We spent twenty minutes eating, then Anna and Harriet gathered what was left of the pantry into the tablecloth and folded up each corner so we could carry it. We scored with two cases of bottled water sitting on the floor under the shelves and eight two liter bottles of soda.

  Brian and I explored the rest of the house and hit upon another treasure.

  There was a gun cabinet in one of the bedrooms turned shrine to hunting. It didn't have .38 ammo, so I traded the silver pistol for a rifle and six boxes of ammunition, and Brian grabbed three shotguns with two rounds of shells each.

  "We still need pikes," he said.

  I agreed. Our little makeshift weapons were the perfect piece of equipment for fighting Z, but I was more worrie
d about the human element we kept running into. I have heard you can judge a man by how he reacts in a crisis, that true human nature will win out. There were stories of heroism during natural disasters that once played on the news, as if the newscasters were saying "Hey, sure a thousand people died, but look, this lady rescued a puppy from the hurricane." I think those people died trying to help a Z and all we were left with were dregs.

  I'm not sure what that says about me.

  Or the group I was with.

  The contents of the gun cabinet would sure help with who was left though.

  Brian rooted through the closet and grabbed seat cushions like you use at a stadium, and I wandered through the other bedrooms and stripped the pillows off the beds. We put everything into the back of the truck while Hannah showed up with clothes from the master bedroom.

  "What's that?"

  "We stink," she crinkled her nose. "You stink."

  I gave my pits an overdramatic sniff and exhaled, something I used to do with my kids a lot and it brought the ghost of a smile to her face. She was right, I smelled ripe. Guess my twenty four hour deodorant had worn out three days ago.

  Peg brought out a bowl of water from the back of the toilet and we took turns with sponge baths, women first, then men. Hannah had a good eye. The clothes weren't our exact size, the Dickies pants hanging loose off the hips for both Brian and I because of the weight we were dropping, but she had brought belts and we cinched up the waists. The sleeves on the long sleeve shirt fit him, but were long on me. I didn't roll them up though. We were still following the rule of keeping skin covered.

  We wouldn't win any fashion shows but these would do for the next three days or until we could run across something better.

  "Better?" I asked.

  She took a dramatic sniff of her own in my general direction and gifted me with another ghost smile as she nodded. Something twitched in my heart. My little girl would be like that. All of these kids, an entire generation would be lost, forced to grow up fast in a world that they were not prepared to face. People bitched about helicopter parents raising entitled kids who thought the world revolved around them, but that was sort of the point right? If you taught kids there was magic in the world, and that they were special enough to find it, then the Universe conspired to make that happen.

  But it didn't happen. The Universe conspired to teach a harsh lesson that the world didn't owe you crap, that bad people got away with things and you had to fight for everything up to and including your life.

  Hannah learned that lesson. I wondered if my kids had learned it yet.

  Brian led us through the door and into the packed truck. He climbed behind the wheel with Peg in the front seat. Anna, Harriet and Hannah jumped over the tailgate and settled into a nest of pillows that made riding in the truck bed comfortable. I leaned my back against the cab and held a loaded rifle across my knee. Brian gave two taps on the window, fired the truck up and pulled out on the road. He kept it locked at twenty five miles per hour, the wheels making a whispering slick sound as they crunched across the leaves on the blacktop.

  CHAPTER THIRTY FOUR

  We crossed over into Georgia. I could see the sign. On the Interstate it would be a huge blue monstrosity letting me know the visitor's center was just a mile ahead. We could stop and rest.

  On this road the sign was brown with white lettering and the only difference was the type of asphalt used as we stepped into the new state.

  Florida had not been kind to the little group. Only six of us lived. We were being hunted by a military madman. But we were one state closer to finding my kids, or at least finding out what happened to them.

  The rumble of the engine echoed through the trees as we cruised along at twenty miles an hour. If we could keep this speed up, it would only take two days to reach them.

  But the four days to get out of Florida made me think I was being optimistic and there was too much danger in that.

  Up ahead there were obstacles we hadn't countered yet. Behind us was tragedy. But right now the sun was shining through the trees, we had enough gas to make it a couple hundred miles and we were in Georgia.

  Not a bad way to be in the apocalypse.

  THE END

  Thank you for taking the time to read BATTLEFIELD Z. If you enjoyed it, please consider telling your friends or posting a short review. Word of mouth is an author’s best friend and much appreciated. Thank you. Chris.

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  About the Author:

  Chris Lowry is an avid adventurer and ultrarunning author. He divides his time between Florida, Arkansas and California where he trains for 100 mile Ultramarathons. He has completed over 68 races, including 18 marathon's and 12 Ultramarathons and is planning a Transcontinental Run across the United States from Los Angeles to New York City in 2017. He has kayaked the Mississippi River solo, and biked across the state of Florida. When not outdoors, he is producing and directing a documentary film about adventure and writing. His novels include Sci-Fi thrillers, Spy thriller's and mainstream fiction. He loves good craft beer and meeting with reading clubs and running clubs, especially if the aforementioned beer is offered.

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