Dozens of different forms shuffled and stumbled in and out of the destroyed vehicles, their single-minded search driving them on.
“Jesus, there must be five hundred of them.”
“Quiet, Wilcox,” Seyfert admonished. “We see them.” The SEAL rubbed his wounded leg and shook his head. He wanted to look at his map, but didn’t relish the thought of turning his light on to do so. The moonlight was not enough to suffice.
Rick peered through the dusty window of a blue Honda Civic. He was none too keen to be so close to a horde of infected with no walls between them. He ducked back down and looked up at the smokestack. He shivered involuntarily. The dead still creeped him out.
Seyfert decided it was time to move and he whispered as much to his friends. He, Dallas, Rick, Anna, and Wilcox were making their escape to Cape Cod to find a plane they didn’t know would be there or not. Hope was on full blast.
The group moved as silently as possible to the south, away from the horde of rot. When confronted with a seven-foot chain-link fence topped with razor wire, the SEAL produced a pair of cutters. The group fanned out behind him, covering his back while he went to work. The first snip of the fence sounded like a gunshot and all of the survivors cringed. Undeterred, Seyfert kept clipping, moving up with each cut.
A growl alerted them to an incoming roamer and Wilcox put it down with a stab to the creature’s forehead. Two more came from around the far side of the smokestack and Wilcox and Dallas took them out quietly. A piercing scream rent the night, the thudding footsteps of a sprinting infected giving it away to the team. It came into view, but they were ready. Rick double-tapped the thing as it dashed toward them. He had used a suppressed M9, but the sound had been louder than they would have liked. Whether it was the noise of the weapon or the call of the Runner, the rest of the undead pack threaded among the ruined vehicles toward the living humans, drawn by the sound.
“Hurry up, Jersey, they’re almost on us.”
“Thank you for that,” the SEAL told Dallas as he continued to cut. “That helps me. I need to make the hole extra big for your pasta-slurping ass anyway.”
Anna smiled despite the imminent danger and nodded to Dallas. “You do like the spaghetti, Big Man.”
Rick looked back over his shoulder. “Thirty seconds and we’re dead.”
“Done!” Seyfert pulled the fence off to one side and crawled through. “Come on!” he whispered loudly, holding the fence for the others. When Wilcox came through last, the Army kid and the SEAL produced a few wide cable ties and zipped the fence closed. The vanguard of the horde was still some distance off.
Dallas smirked. “Now, how long do ya think that’ll hold—”
Seyfert rounded on him. “One second is enough! Anything to slow them down.”
The team moved off as a group toward the woods.
The dead reached the fence and they began to shake it. Their cries and moans got louder as they saw their prey disappear into the trees.
Rick checked his watch. “The road is to the north, which is behind us, so we need to circle around. We need to go left.”
Seyfert seemed to be looking in all directions at once. “Yeah, I’m working on it.” He checked his own watch, the dials illuminating when he pushed a button on the housing. A hissing infected crashed through the brush on his left, hitting him. They both went down and Dallas gave the thing a kick in the head. The Texan kicked the creature again to finish it. The SEAL was up quickly with a nod of thanks and the group moved off left at a brisk pace, Seyfert brushing himself off.
Footsteps crunching on the corpses of dead leaves, rustling bushes, and moans all around the humans dissuaded any notions that the tackler had been the only infected in the forest. Things moved close to the group just out of sight on the right side.
The frightening sounds of undead in the vicinity spurred the living group on. The creatures began to materialize out of the darkness, searching for a meal. One such thing stumbled into the path in front of Anna and grabbed her. She gave a surprised shriek, but was able to get the long barrel of her suppressed M9 under the thing’s chin and destroy it before it could bite her. The noises the infected made got exponentially louder with the shriek and the shot. Now the plague-ridden monsters understood in which direction their food was. Seyfert’s pistol sounded, then Rick’s. A nauseating crunch meant Dallas had dispatched an infected with his rebar.
“This shit is beginning to get thick,” whispered Seyfert into his mic. “We need to pick up the pace.” The SEAL began to move quickly, the others straining to keep up. He looked back to make sure they were close and tumbled down a small hill into a wet area. He stood and flicked his hands to get rid of whatever was on him. It was too dark to see what he had fallen into, but the trickle of a small creek meant it was just water. There were suddenly many splashes coming from relatively close by.
A half-dozen rotten dead crested a small hillock on the right and descended on the group. There were dozens following behind them and now two moved toward them from the front. Seyfert and Rick both fired at the same time, Rick missing his target. The thing stumbled on a root and Seyfert shot it in the back of the head. The group continued forward at close to a run, the infected on their heels. They broke through the trees in a moment of confusion.
Dallas was breathing hard when the team broke through the trees, climbed a small embankment, and spilled out onto the asphalt of a road. A huge mob crashed through the brush behind them.
“I’ma need…t’ take…a breather soon,” the Texan heaved.
Wilcox pointed back at the woods. “You stop to breathe and you’ll stop breathing!” The first of the undead had broken through the tree line and were stalking toward the tired survivors. Across the street were more woods, the darkness between the trees both menacing and welcoming at the same time. A screech ripped through the night and the team knew they would have a sprinter to deal with shortly.
“Down the road half a mile then into the woods on the other side,” Seyfert said as he pulled on the much larger man’s arm. “Move, Hillbilly!”
They ran.
Scores of the dead followed. The piercing cries and wailing moans trailed after them as well. Infected began to pour from the woods on the right side of the road in front of them. Dallas stopped to fire into the crowd with his shotgun, but Wilcox grabbed him. “Are you nuts? Keep moving!” The kid pulled the significantly larger man forward by his shirt and got the big man moving again.
A jackknifed tractor-trailer sat abandoned across the small rural road, half a dozen cars rested forgotten with their doors open on the nearside. The band of friends wove between the vehicles, looking for a way around the truck without entering the woods just yet. Dallas put his hand on one of the smaller cars and leaned over a bit, gulping the cool air in giant drags, his weariness apparent. An emaciated hand darted out of the open window of the Hyundai Elantra he was resting against and latched onto the hip pocket of his BDU’s. He backed up quickly, but the creature was still belted into the vehicle, preventing him from escape.
“Nope!” he grunted a bit loudly and brought his forearm down across the wrist of the dead thing. He pulled for a moment and the thing was dragged almost halfway out of the car window. He twisted and the dry, rotten arm came off at the elbow. The creature began its dry rasp as Dallas pried the desiccated fingers off him with disgust.
“You can have it back,” he told it and flung the arm back in the window.
Seyfert rubbed his injured leg again. “Under the trailer and keep running!”
Rick put his hand on the SEAL’s shoulder and advised calmly, “This isn’t going to work. You’re broken and he’s almost done.” Seyfert spun and looked at Dallas, the big guy sweating and breathing heavily.
“Thinkin’ I shoulda stayed back in the basement.” It started to rain and Dallas looked up. He blinked as the drops hit his face. “Are you…kiddin’ me?”
The SEAL frantically searched for an egress. A Runner’s howl came from in front
of them someplace and two more answered from the woods behind them.
“Up! Up on the truck. They can’t see us and they’ll walk past!”
“What if they don’t?” asked Anna.
“Then we’re fucked! Get up!” They climbed the front of the huge vehicle and the skies opened up. Each of them hopped across the gap to the top of the trailer and got as flat as possible on their stomachs, except Wilcox, who chose to lie on his back.
The horrible noises the dead made preceded the arrival of the horde by mere moments. The team on the roof heard and felt thuds against the side of the tuck’s body as dozens of infected bumped into the vehicle. Scratching sounds down the side of the aluminum made Anna’s skin crawl and she silently shuddered. She looked left and saw Rick shuddering as well.
Rain continued to pelt the survivors during the exodus of the dead. Seyfert moved to the edge of the truck and peered over the side. Hundreds of the things plodded along the road, weaving in and out of the abandoned vehicles in the darkness. A flash of lightning showed the SEAL that the creatures were moving through of the woods as well. At least one of them was of the faster variety, dashing past its shambling cousins, pushing them out of the way in the search for something uninfected to eviscerate. The thing, or one like it, screamed in the distance, with several more screams echoing from other directions.
Anna looked at Wilcox. Through the darkness, she could barely see that the kid was on his back with his hands covering his ears. She decided to follow suit. She covered her own ears and the sounds the dead made were diminished. The rasps and moans were terrifying, especially now that she had no hardened concrete and steel walls around her. Stealth would be her only salvation. She tried to make herself as small as possible and think about something else.
It was still raining, albeit significantly less, when dawn peeked through the trees over the eastern horizon. Infected stragglers, intent on following their brothers in search of a meal, still meandered past the vehicle crash scene. Wilcox gave a substantial snore and Rick elbowed him in the ribs hard.
“Shut up, dumbass!” the former policeman whispered. Chastised, Wilcox nodded vigorously.
Anna wondered how the soldier was able to sleep through a passing horde of insatiable living dead, while it was raining, and he was on the roof of an abandoned eighteen-wheeler.
A lone figure stalked the center of the street moving away from them when Seyfert whispered it was time to go. The SEAL looked over one side of the truck while Rick and Wilcox checked the other.
“We need a boat,” announced Rick. “A boat would keep most of the things off of us until we got to the Cape. Then we make landing and find the airfield.”
Seyfert nodded and rubbed his leg. He sat up. “Not a bad idea. How far to the coast?”
“Maybe two miles? Three?” Rick shrugged. “But that’s not the important question, is it?”
Wilcox stretched and glanced at Seyfert. “What’s the important question?”
Anna gave the young soldier a smack on the back of his head. “Duh. Will there be a boat? Can we figure out how to start it and drive it? Will we get eaten on the way?” She thumbed at a rebuked Wilcox and gave an exaggerated eye-roll. “This kid.”
“That was three questions,” he said, rubbing his neck.
“Whatever we do, we might wanna do it now,” Dallas drawled. He pointed back behind them. Two figures stumbled out of the trees and headed for the compound, following the track the survivors had just taken, in reverse. Another shuffled into view as well, trailing those in front of it.
Seyfert stood and the rest of the group got up as well. The SEAL climbed down between the front of the trailer and the cab, checking under and between things as he did so. When the group was all on the ground, they moved off at a brisk pace to the east.
It was easy to tell that a horde of infected had just been on the road. Bits of filthy cloth, a stained running shoe, and an eyeball were indicators, as were the muddy footprints which moved off into the woods. More cloth and nasty bits of the creatures themselves draped from the thorns and bushes where the throng of dead had entered the forest.
Seyfert made a quick gesture, pointing down the street to the east. The group moved forward through the morning.
High above Broadway, San Francisco
Masta G gripped the polycarbonate housing of a pair of Steiner Marine binoculars. The power of the binoculars was such that he could easily make out individuals in the throng of infected that had swarmed the armored truck. There had to be at least a few thousand creatures, all clamoring for a taste of what was in the vehicle. The road was thick with the undead. From the broken pastry shop windows to the west, to the office building across the street, there wasn’t a square inch of real estate not covered with the moving mass of dead people. For a quarter-mile in both directions, the dead were all fighting each other to get to the tasty morsels which undoubtedly resided in the box in the center of the mass of them.
The truck had stopped in the worst possible place. Whether the driver stopped it, or the sheer mass of bodies, or the tires slipping on fluids, the truck was doomed. The driver tried several times to rock the vehicle back and forth, but it wouldn’t budge. Masta G passed the binocs to Cyrus, who was standing next to him on the twelfth floor of a burned-out skyscraper. “They didn’t make it. Look at the wheels; they’re full of dead freaks.”
Cyrus put the glasses to his eyes. “Indeed. It would seem those unfortunates in the truck didn’t study physics, or they would have known that their vehicle couldn’t possibly pass through so many bodies. It matters not, however, as we need to speak with those inside. Options?”
“Options? Our options are to get gone before that group of freaks figures out we’re here. That truck may as well be on the moon.”
“That is but a single option, David. It is imperative we speak with the surviving humans in that truck. They can lead us to William.”
Cyrus continued looking at the mired vehicle, but Masta G had turned to look at the two thugs behind him keeping watch on the office corridor. One looked away quickly, but the other just shrugged. Masta G sighed and whispered to Cyrus, “Doc wants you to call me Masta G instead of David in front of the New Society.”
Cyrus looked surprised as he lowered the binoculars and looked at his escort. “Of course, Masta G, my humble apologies. Do you have any ideas on how to get the people out of there?” He nodded toward the truck without removing his gaze from the gangster.
G stuck his hand out and Cyrus returned the binoculars to him. He gazed at the truck, the swarm and up the street in both directions then shook his head slowly. “No. Anyone going down there ain’t coming back. Live bait would work, but the moment that swarm moves away, the truck will drive off and then we’re back to square one. We need to incapacitate the truck before we lure the freaks away, or block the street somehow. Problem is, that’s an armored truck. It’s made specifically to repel thieves. We have a couple of rocket launchers, but they could kill the poor bastards inside, or worse, blow a hole in the truck and let the freaks in.”
Masta G heard growling behind him and then a suppressed shot. He turned to look at the two guards and one of them nodded and held up one finger.
“It appears that we have some time to decide what to do, Masta G. That vehicle isn’t going anywhere.” Cyrus sat at a desk and moved a phone out of the way. He pulled a paper bag from his small pack and placed it on the table, removing two peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. He handed one to an incredulous Masta G, who accepted it. Cyrus stood and strode to the two guards, passing them the bag with two more sandwiches. The guards looked at each other for a moment, shrugged, and leaned their rifles against the door frame. Cyrus smiled as he walked back to the desk and sat down. Masta G just stared at him as he unfolded the wax paper to get at his sandwich. Cyrus was about to take a bite when he noticed the banger staring. “I make a mean PB&J, I assure you…”
Masta G rolled a wheeled office chair over and sat next to Cyrus, unfoldi
ng his own wax paper. “I still got nothin’.”
He took a bite, as did Cyrus. “It will come to you, Dav…ah… Masta G. It always does.” The men finished their sandwiches and each opened a bottle of water. G took a long pull and stood up, taking the binoculars. Cyrus smiled and wiped his mouth with a napkin.
The banger peered up and down the street, high and low. He was moving the binoculars back to the left when he jerked them up and seemed to focus on something. He smiled and turned to Cyrus. His smile got wider, his eyebrows raised, and he began to nod. “Done and done.”
He motioned for Cyrus to join him at the window and pointed high above the city. Masta G handed over the glasses. “Up there, second building over, on the roof.”
Cyrus focused on what G had pointed to. “Yes. Yes, that just might work.”
The Woodrow Wilson School, San Francisco
Truck 8081 pulled up in front of the Woodrow Wilson School. A lone infected woman came toward them walking down the center of the street. A discussion between the living people egged on the dead one and she sped up when she saw them exit the vehicle.
“We can’t just leave them there!”
“I know, Abbey, but what do you want me to do? Do you wanna walk into that swarm and knock on the door?”
“We’ll figure something out,” Dave coaxed and grabbed Tony’s bat. He strode up to the approaching zombie and caved her skull in with two whacks.
“Dave, you gotta stay with me! Don’t go—”
“I’m tired of being a kid. Being a kid is going to get me killed. Or you, or her.” He pointed to Abbey. “I can kill them just as good as you can.” He wiped the bat with a rag which he discarded on the street and tossed the bat to Tony, who deftly caught it with one hand.
Billy was smiling and looking at Dave. “Let’s not dilly-dally. They’ll be here in a few minutes and I want them gone before we leave in the morning.”
Run_Book 3_Long Road Home Page 7
