Legacy of the Living

by Sean Liebling

  Johnny was still remembering their earlier conversation when the next guppy climbed over the wall and reached for him. All he could think was, I'm going to be a Daddy. Remotely he noticed this guppy was another ex-college chick gone bad, and felt his arms gripped by its grasping hands while it drew him closer to its gaping mouth. Then he was splattered with red and yellow gore as the head exploded and it slumped half over the parapet. What the fuck? He shook off his temporary paralysis.

  A deep roar sounded in the distance and, looking down the road, he watched in amazement as four huge machines drove into the side of the wave of guppies. Even from well over a block away, he could see clouds of shredded guppy erupting from the fronts of the loud devices. Behind two of these, he saw large metal boxes on wheels being towed. Each box or trailer appeared to hold quite a few people, all firing at the guppies before them as well as those attacking the wall. Help had finally arrived!

  *****

  "Fuck. We're not making any headway against them. Too Goddamn many of them. They're clogging up the shredder wheel, and also starting to close up behind us!" Brad shouted into his two-way radio to Frank, who was driving the shredder beside his. Both of them had bogged down several times now as they vainly attempted to advance against the zombies.

  "I know. I was almost stuck a minute ago. Thank God for reverse," Frank replied as he deftly wove his zombie shredder back and forth while moving backwards and forwards continuously.

  "This isn't going to work. We need something to break them up. Something big. I have an idea. Ernest, Merlin. You guys listening?" A chorus of yes Sirs greeted his words and he continued. "Back at the Interstate 31 bypass there was a huge highway grader down below for that expansion they’re working on. I want you guys to go get it. The tires on that thing must be six feet tall. Bring it back and we'll see if we can roll them back a bit before Sparta and the others get here. Frank, you and I will stay here and keep whittling away at them. The guys strapped to the top of our rigs can keep shooting at them near the center's walls. Best we can do right now without more support.”

  "Roger that Brad."

  *****

  Johnny watched in confusion as two of the huge red machines turned around and disappeared around the corner two blocks down. The other two remained, but were not advancing in their direction. What the Hel is going on? he wondered as he impaled another guppy through the throat, spearing its spine and twisting savagely, severing it. Two people on top of each of the remaining machines were steadily firing at the guppies in front of the wall. That helped but it wasn't enough. The others needed to come back. Oh man, they were so dead! Beside him Celeste paused after swinging her sword, her head cocked sideways as she obviously listened to sounds he couldn't hear.

  "Why are they leaving, Johnny?" She was frowning and he swore he saw tears at the corners of her eyes.

  "I don't know, baby. Maybe there are too many guppies."

  "Or maybe they’re getting more help. Don't get hurt, Daddy!" With that, she started swinging again. Johnny ducked and rolled his eyes.

  "Quit rolling your eyes, Johnny!"

  *****

  Travis was running the civilian Humvee at close to forty while the Reaper reloaded their magazines. It was convenient having the same ammunition, and it gave the Reaper time to think and pray as his hands did the work from muscle memory. They were currently on Highway 46 in Muskegon headed west, about two miles out of from Mercy Hospital with the Sirens in a double column ahead and behind them. In any other situation it would have been an impressive caravan but in the here and now the Reaper knew they were not enough. Alison still had her arm around Travis, and from his comments, she was stroking his face just to embarrass him. Cars dotted the road here and there, but there was nothing they couldn't negotiate around. Travis nudged Alison and pointed over his back. Alison in turn looked over her shoulder, then turned to Jason.

  "Look behind us."

  The Reaper turned. Coming up fast were a multitude of those off-road vehicles, several dozen at least. Their riders were dressed in camouflage and bristled with guns loaded for bear. As they drew alongside, the foremost ATV rider raised a microphone to his mouth then lowered it and signed the number twelve. The Reaper looked at Alison, who pushed a microphone into his hand as she adjusted the dials on the CB radio screwed to the dash. She gave him a thumbs up and the Reaper turned back to the ATV rider.

  "Come in?" The Reaper spoke into the radio as he depressed the talk switch.

  "Sweet rides you guys have. Where’re you headed?"

  "Muskegon."

  "Us too. Clinic with the kids?"

  "Yeah. Who are you?"

  "Kent City. Doing our thing. You?"

  "Reaper and Travis with the Siren's from Grand Rapids on our way to join the party."

  "Oh my God, the Reaper. This will be one to tell the kids when I get back."

  "It ain’t done yet, and none of us will probably survive."

  "Yeah, I heard about your attitude, man. God loves us."

  The Reaper chuckled at that before he could stop himself. "Who is this?"

  "Larry, and a pleasure to meet you."

  "You guys talk too much about me, Larry," the Reaper replied as Larry grinned at him while giving him a thumbs up.

  Travis was slowing down and the Reaper looked forward again. They were passing the interstate, and ahead was an extra large excavator with two large red machines in front of it. The excavator was a huge machine built around four even larger tires with a large blade in the center and a smaller one attached to the front. Something caught his eye and the Reaper did a double take. The excavator appeared to have fleas. Men and women were strapped all over it while holding various guns and other objects. They started waving like crazy as the Humvee and ATVs approached. Travis pulled alongside while slowing down to their thirty miles per hour, and signed twelve to the passenger next to the driver, who nodded.

  The Reaper spoke again.

  "And you guys are?"

  "Merlin and crew from Coopersville. We were also invited to the party, but we ran into trouble so had to come back for heavier equipment."

  The Reaper nodded. "Reaper here, with the Sirens out of Grand Rapids and some boys and girls from Kent City."

  "Wow. Reaper. Glad to meet you. Heard about you. A pleasure, Sir."

  "Don't know about it being a pleasure, son. If it's as bad as we're hearing, we're not enough."

  "Look behind you, Reaper."

  The Reaper turned again, looking over his shoulder. Coming up behind their growing column was a long line of huge snowplows and dump trucks. The tiny dots of individual heads could be seen above their beds and cargo compartments as well as the tiny stick forms of weapons. The Reaper considered them for a moment before turning back to the driver of the Excavator.

  "And they are?"

  "Sparta! We're all here to save the clinic and those in it if we can. If not, we'll all be toasting marshmallows in Hell."

  "We're doing the Lord’s work Merlin. We'll be with our families in Heaven if it comes to that."

  "Reaper!" Larry had spoken again and Jason looked over on his other side and saw the ATV sliding close.

  "Yeah."

  "Don't give up because your crew is on the way man. It'll be cool."

  "What crew?"

  "Why, Newaygo, of course. I talked to your governor myself. They're on the way, man, and you know they'll be bringing the good shit. We'll stomp them zombies."

  Jason sat back while nodding. If Jay knew about the babies and people in trouble, he would undoubtedly be on his way. Slowly the Reaper smiled as he finished loading their magazines. He knew he could count on his friend.

  *****

  Chapter 16

  DAY 12: 1630 ET TUESDAY NOVEMBER 15TH

  "Drop us off here Alicia," the Reaper ordered.

  She and Travis had traded seats in anticipation of the Reaper and his protégé disembarking. They had made it within almost two blocks of the center before the mass of zombies b
ecame too great to go any further without shooting them. In the rear of the Humvee, the .50 caliber M2 gave off burst after short burst as the girls there used it to clear the undead immediately around them. The Sirens on Trikes had a rotating carousel maneuver going on where they would loop back and forth, then around while firing into the masses before them in an attempt to drive the creatures back. So far, they had been only moderately successful.

  "But we're not close enough yet. We're still almost three blocks away," Alicia said as she pulled the Humvee over to the west side of the road, following the Reaper’s pointed finger.

  "Three blocks is good shooting for Travis and me, and this building here offers a good view of the front of the center where the majority of Hell’s minions are concentrated. Just pull up under that fire escape there." She nodded at the Reaper’s words and watched as they disembarked near an emergency escape ladder system that ascended the side of what was obviously an apartment building. By climbing into the back of the Humvee, they were able to reach the bottom of the ladder and began ascending, lugging their rifles and ammo-laden backpacks with them.

  Quickly they reached the roof six stories up and sprinted for the corner overlooking the front of the rehabilitation clinic almost three blocks away. The roof had a parapet a foot and a half high, and instantly both men threw sandbags down on its concrete surface, then sat cross-legged side-by-side. With deft movements they laid their magazines out beside them, then the extra cases of rounds, and finally slipped their earplugs in. As they leaned forward, resting their forearms and the stocks of their rifles on the padded rests, Travis spoke.

  "Well Reaper, I make it roughly seven hundred yards."

  "Closer to seven fifty, so give it another click." As both men peered through their high-powered scopes, the Reaper examined the front of the block wall and spoke again, “See that front entrance?"

  "Sure do."

  "You take the field south of the gate and I'll take the north."

  "Got it."

  "Make your shots count and be careful of the over penetration."

  "I'm always careful, and I know what I'm doing. I was taught by the Reaper after all."

  Jason grunted as he spoke again. "Make every shot clean, they’re counting on us, son."

  "I will, Dad," Travis responded, and the Reaper could hear the grin in his voice.

  With another grunt, the Reaper pulled the trigger of his Remington, and seven hundred and fifty-five yards away a zombie’s head exploded as the body it was attached to was climbing over the wall. Beside him, Travis fired almost simultaneously, and both men settled into their established routine of killing the undead.

  *****

  Merlin cursed as he drove through never ending waves of the undead. It was slow going, for as big as the huge excavator was, the mass of zombies was greater; they even bogged down this giant machine. He swerved to the right as he felt his wheels start to spin in the blood and gore of killed and crushed zombies, and headed up a side street.

  The Reaper had taken one look at the never-ending tide of undead mere blocks from the clinic and instantly created a new battle plan for them. There was no way they would be able to drive straight up the front and rescue the people trapped within the facility’s walls. The crush of zombies was simply too great for that. They would all become stuck, even the snowplows. They had killed so many already that the blood, bone, and gore were a foot deep or more in most places, and traction was proving impossible to find. The clinic’s CB transmissions estimating thirty thousand undead were obviously way off, as Merlin figured they faced at least three times that many.

  The Reaper’s plan was simple, yet time consuming. They had to take a side and hit it from multiple angles, keeping the zombies back as the line of rescuers drew closer to the walls of the rehabilitation clinic. Easier said than done for the bastards were everywhere, and if you slowed down, they instantly got behind you. Merlin's job was to drive forward and back, crushing zombies, while the shredders cleared them out to either side. They had dropped the dumpsters for lack of maneuverability and were making some progress, but it was slow going. He cursed again as his tires started slipping and threw the transmission into reverse. Fucking zombies!

  *****

  "Watch out Rod!" Larry shouted as he wove around large groups of the undead at close to forty miles per hour, his gun blazing. He wasn't trying to conserve ammunition exactly. He had his carbine angled slightly upward and was praying his spray of bullets hit them in the head as he drove around them.

  "I got it, man. You watch your own back. We're kicking ass!" Rod shouted back.

  Larry cursed as he saw Rod try to repeat Jaime's trick of jumping the bodies to flatten oncoming ones, but what Rod did not seem to get was that this wasn't a few dozen zombies. This was thousands. This was the wrong place at the wrong time to be trying something like that. Christ no! Larry watched in horror as Rod’s bike overturned and a wave of undead swept over his friend’s fallen figure in seconds. With a scream of rage, he slid his ATV to a halt and directed a stream of automatic fire at the zombies in front of him. Bill joined him, then another. When the slide in Larry's rifle locked back, he inserted a fresh magazine and kept firing.

  "We've got to get them off him Bill!" Larry shouted again as his gun ran dry. There were six, no, eight of them now, firing at the zombies where Rod had fallen, but it was no use. Fresh meat did something to these creatures. They seemed to come from everywhere, converging where his comrade lay. Larry could no longer see Rod but he could hear his screams, and tears coursed down Larry's cheeks as he emptied magazine after magazine into their bodies and heads.

  "Larry, we have to get back. It's no use, he's gone, and they’re coming after us now." Bill's face was wet with his own tears, and Larry cursed himself ineffectually as he screamed at the zombies. "Fucking bastards!" One of his best friends was now dead, and Larry blamed himself for allowing Rod to come along.

  *****

  "Dude, we need like a thousand of us instead of eighty!" Jeff was bitching at Henry as he curved the snowplow through the intersection, trying like hell to separate out a group of zombies for extermination by the gun crews riding in the back of the dump trucks.

  Henry remained silent as he normally did. The man simply didn't speak unless he had to. Henry's wife was fond of saying they never argued as a married couple because Henry never talked enough to get one going. He would just nod and do his thing, ignoring most everything around him. Just then he started pointing straight ahead. "What's happening there?" he asked, instead of answering Jeff.

  A hundred feet ahead, another snowplow was sitting in the middle of the road. The eight shooters in back were firing as fast as they could pull their triggers as the huge truck lurched back and forth a few inches.

  "Don't know. Let me find out. Hey Ed! What's going on? Move it will ya? Them zombies are swarming all over you."

  "I can't! Truck’s stuck." Ed responded, and the big snowplow lurched forward again a few inches only to rock backwards.

  "Stuck on what? It's a paved street, Ed!"

  "Don't know. I'm stuck. I think I have a flat tire. Push me outta here will ya? They're starting to climb the sides."

  "Will do. Hold on!" Jeff pressed his foot down harder on the gas pedal, propelling the big truck forward, and rode up behind the stopped snowplow then hit the brake only to slide forward twenty feet, hitting the back of the other vehicle with a thump, pushing it forward several feet. The street was a foot deep in zombie mush; blood, brains, and bones were clumped everywhere creating a reddish-yellow slush. Looking through his rearview mirror, he saw the half dozen Sirens gang members on Trikes turning in tight circular patterns behind him while firing non-stop into the closing ranks of the undead, and knew he had to get moving quickly or they were all dead.

  With a grinding of gears, he quickly backed up several feet, then drove forward again as he pressed the gas pedal to the floor. A loud grinding crunch was heard as he smashed into the back of Ed's snowplow, propellin
g it forward another thirty feet and slewing the vehicle at a slight angle before they came to a stop again. What the fuck was going on? The roar of automatic weapons around and above him was continuous as zombies surged around both of their stalled vehicles and started climbing it. It was then that he noticed what they were carrying. Rods, poles, and parts of chairs, all metal; they were jabbing them at the undersides of their vehicles from the side. He also noticed from this new visual vantage of the snowplow before him that both tires on the driver's side were flat. Instantly he was on the radio, shouting.

  "Sirens! Get the fuck out of here. The zombies are using metal poles to puncture the tires, stopping us. Save yourselves, now!"

  "We're not leaving so calm down and figure it out, Sparta boy," an unknown woman's voice answered him back, and he looked again in the rearview mirror to see another half dozen Trikes joining the ones behind him. Quickly they spread into two V-patterns and swept up the sides of the stopped vehicles. Actually, bounced would have been a better description, as the bodies were over two feet deep in some places. The unknown voice spoke again, this time slightly breathless and choked.

  "Keep moving ladies, if you stop you're dead, we just lost Jolene. Don't stop for anything, keep circling the wagons. Sparta boy, get that damn truck out of here, push it if you can, or have them climb onto yours if you can't. They've closed in behind us and we need your plow to get out of here! Now, move it!" The last was said in a shout, the roar of gunfire almost a solid wall of noise.

  Jeff slammed the truck into reverse again and backed up another twenty feet, then gunned it forward again with another bone-shaking crunch, driving the other snowplow thirty more feet down the road into the next intersection. Zombies that had been clinging to its sides like swarms of cockroaches fell off at the impact, and the Sirens quickly picked them off as they kept circling. Steam rose from the top of his smashed-in hood and Jeff cursed as he realized he had driven the plow into the radiator; he quickly spoke into the radio again.