Seeing that the last of his people were on the bridge and moving east, Yen spun Petal around and galloped ahead to help clear the path. Raoul had switched to a pistol and was taking out the afflicted with nearly the same precision, though not as such great distances as he had with the rifle.
When they came to the east side of the bridge, the horsemen gathered, waiting for the people on foot to finish the crossing. One of the elders named Carlos called out as he came off the bridge, approaching Yen with his hand raised. Yen trotted Petal over to save the visibly exhausted man some effort.
“I will make my stand here, at the end of the bridge,” he said breathlessly, his tone one of finality and resignation.
Yen started to raise his voice to argue with the man, but as soon as he caught a glance of him, he knew better. He could see the exhaustion plainly on the plump man’s face as well as the fire in his eyes. Instead of arguing, Yen nodded and moved away, firing at one of the slow dead that shambled towards them from the guardrail.
He rode alongside Raoul, waiting for the man to take out the last two dead ambling towards them before speaking.
*
Watching from within the relative safety of the Jeep, the events outside descended into chaos in the span of a few heartbeats. By the time anyone had their wits about them to react, the boy came down clumsily through the moon roof, landing heavily, feet first on Tim’s lap. Tim struggled through the pain in his rear as well as the newer agony the boy had caused, trying to shove the boy into the rear compartment so he could help his friend. In the quick snippets he could see, around the boy and over and his wife, he could see that Bjorn was on the ground, wrestling with one of the undead while others moved to converge on him.
By the time he shifted the boy back and managed to free his rifle from under the rigid end of the seatbelt, he could see Bjorn was surrounded. He recognized that he wasn’t a good enough shot to clear the dead from the safety of the moon roof. Before his fears or Laura could stop him, he clicked open the door and limped out into the open. The driven snow bit into his cheeks above the light beard that had grown to cover his lower face over the previous couple weeks, driven mightily by the frigid wind.
“Tim!” Laura shrieked, seeing him step out into the open, fresh blood seeping through the makeshift bandage on his rear.
Two undead that came from the rear of the building as they pulled up, immediately moved to intercept him as he took his first step, gingerly, on his wounded leg. He ignored them, intent on his friend’s frantic screams, sounding over the forceful winds that whipped around the building. His ears, still sensitive from firing a weapon inside a closed vehicle, caused him to wince in pain from the force of the wind, as he moved around the front of the Jeep. Jolts of pain in his hip shot sharply with every movement forcing him into an exaggerated limp. He made a mental note to try and score some pills or booze to take the edge off, so he could function normally when needed. Gritting his teeth through the agony, he moved as quickly as his stiff-legged gait would allow.
He moved around the front, coming clear of the vehicle just as one of the school windows shattered. He hesitated as dozens of undead poured onto the snow, falling from one of the classrooms. Seeing Bjorn’s head hitting the curb a moment later broke his hesitance. He propelled himself off the body of the Jeep as two undead struggled to sink their teeth home in his friend’s prone body. Tim spun the rifle to the ready and fired off a quick shot at a pimple-faced undead, taking half of its face off as the bullet tore through it. A quick pivot of the barrel and he loosed another round into the thing that was crawling up Bjorn’s legs. Fuck! he cursed internally, worrying that he might have hit Bjorn as well. He recognized that his friend may already have been bit and shook the thought from his head.
As he limped ahead, Tim flicked the toggle of the M4 to full automatic and let loose a volley towards the undead that spilled out of the school. The tumbled horde struggled to free themselves from each other to move towards the two men. He heard Sophie and Luna screaming inside the Jeep and immediately jerked his head away from the undead to see what was going on. The little girls had their faces pressed against the windows of the Jeep. Sophie was screaming at the sight of her father lying prone and unconscious in the midst of a horde of undead while Luna was left alone, expressing in no uncertain terms, how she felt about her mother’s absence. Their faces were the epitome of abject terror. Tim saw both Laura and Jen running towards Bjorn’s body. He was thankful for their help as he doubted he would be able to move the man alone. He hurriedly rammed a fresh clip into the receiver to cover them.
Hearing plaintive moaning and a set of crunching footsteps in the snow behind him, Tim remembered the two coming from behind. He spun, pressing the trigger as the first came into sight. The M4 hammered into its shoulder, still on automatic, the machine gun pumped half a dozen rounds into the thing’s head before the barrel heaved upwards and he had the presence to let off the trigger. He spotted the second undead crawling in through the driver’s door of the Jeep that he had left open.
“Tim!” Will screamed, still seated in the passenger’s seat of the Jeep.
Tim watched in horror, as Will struggled to keep it at bay as it reached across the driver’s seat towards Luna. His blood ran cold, and he ran as quickly as he could, slipping and falling as his wounded leg gave out when he stepped on a patch of ice. He swooned and would have lost consciousness, but for the sound of Laura’s panicked screams as she too, saw the undead moving toward their daughter. He crawled along the snowy ground for a few feet until he could grab the undead by the ankle. His head and chest were under the driver’s door, lying on his side in the deep snow. He yanked the leg as hard as he could, just as a shot exploded, sounding from inside the Jeep. Blood and gore poured down from above, covering his hands, arms, and face as the body slid back out of the vehicle. Looking over the ruined skull of the undead he could see Will leaning over the center console, pistol in hand. The body of the thing continued its descent, landing heavily on Tim’s chest, pouring more viscous, foul-smelling gore across his torso. He did his best to push aside his revulsion at the fluids he was now covered in.
He sat up and peered desperately inside the Jeep, looking to his daughter. Once he was sure she was unharmed, his only thoughts were for his wife and friend. Standing erect, he could see that countless undead were converging on as the three as they continued spilling from the bowels of the high school. He struggled to his feet, vomiting in stride at the stench of the gore that soaked through his layers. He leaned heavily on the corner of the Jeep as he came around, where he could see Laura and Jen were dragging Bjorn’s slender, unconscious form back to the vehicle. Will had turned his attention out of the rear window and was covering their rescue with his pistol. They were only a few feet from the vehicle but the undead were in such large numbers that he immediately shifted his focus to help Will cover their return.
His first burst from the M4 cut into the ranks of the dead, taking out a few of them and spinning many others to the ground. He fired another burst, emptying his clip before it was clear that the women would have enough time to load Bjorn and clamber in themselves before the undead descended on them. He used the front hood of the Jeep as a crutch and limped painfully back to the driver’s side and eased himself down onto the blood-soaked seat. By the time he pulled the door shut, he could see the women struggling to load Bjorn’s limp form onto the floor of the Jeep. Sophie was in the back seat, holding Luna tightly, who was struggling to get to her mother, screaming with every breath she took. Adrenaline still coursing, he leaned back into the rear of the Jeep and helped pull Bjorn inside while Laura and Jen piled in.
“Tim, go!” Will yelled.
Tim sat back upright in the driver’s seat and hit the lock-doors button, preventing the undead from accidentally opening the doors. The pain, stress, and exertion overtook him, and he drifted into unconsciousness. He was awoken a short while later with the entire group in the Jeep screaming at him to get up. The sounds
of dead hands, slapping at the metal and glass, helped clear the haze out of his mind. He twisted the key in the ignition and slid the Jeep into gear, barely conscious of his actions. He couldn’t concentrate to pay attention as the heavy SUV pushed slowly through the assemblage of living dead. Slowly, the Jeep crept back down the hill, moving clear of the herd.
*
“Carlos is done. He is staying on the bridge,” Yen called as he rode towards the group.
Raoul looked at him earnestly and took a moment to digest the statement before he nodded, looking back at the mass of afflicted moving like a maggot-ridden wave towards the bridge.
“Let’s try and give him an advantage at least,” Raoul said, moving toward a car near the end of the bridge. “See if we can’t narrow their approach.”
Yen stopped him momentarily, to pass the man his rifle. He knew the weapon would be put to better use in his hands.
“You cover us, I’ll get the cars moved,” he said.
He moved over to the nearest of the handful of cars strewn about the roadway. One of the afflicted raged inside, still strapped into its seatbelt. He ripped the door open before his nerve failed him and fired his pistol point-blank into its head. Gore soaked the inside of the windshield and passenger’s seat as its heat-softened head exploded. Yen reached in over top of the dead thing, grabbed a road map off the seat, and popped the shifter into neutral. By the time the mass of afflicted had made it halfway across the bridge, Yen had just finished moving two vehicles to form a “V” shape, narrowing the approach of the creatures. This way, if Carlos was strong, he might be able to delay the herd and help the rest of the fleeing Ute, before they overtook him.
By the time the meager defensive preparations were made, more people had decided to join Carlos. In all, seven people that chose to end their journey on the end of the bridge, all of them with the exception of Joseph, over the age of sixty-five. Joseph, having been bitten by one of the afflicted, was suffering the throes of a terrible infection and was too weak to continue. He and Carlos were joined by two other men and three women, all grim-faced and tired. Brief thanks and farewells were exchanged before the procession departed, continuing eastward.
Yen led his group down the road away from the ensuing rout, hoping they would remain strong and allow the rest time to escape. No one looked back to see the battle; they had said their goodbyes. Only a couple flinched as the first of many gunshots rang out.
They moved off Route 40 after the bridge, staying to the north of it in order to avoid the afflicted that lingered among the stalled traffic moving across both lanes out of Jensen. Yen unfurled the road map he had taken and, after much discussion, they decided to go backcountry through Point of Pines recreation site. They planned to meet back up with Route 40 as it swung north near Elk Springs, in the more open country of western Colorado, but figured that course would save time as well as potential trouble on the road. The next few days went smooth, and they were able to put many miles behind them. The slowest of the group had remained on the bridge out of Jensen, and their pace was quickened greatly.
It was on their third night out of Jensen, in the wee hours of the morning, when the sound of moaning drifted to them, riding on the chill winds from the west. It was the first sign since Jensen had faded into the distance that the afflicted still followed behind. Raoul and Yen hurriedly woke the group and set off again at once, at just after three o’clock in the morning to stay ahead of the dead. When the sun finally crested the horizon to the east, Yen’s second cousin, Esteban, rode back to find out how distant they were. They looked back over their shoulders the rest of the day, but Esteban never returned.
The next three days were a blur of exhaustion. They pushed each other and the rest of their people well past the point of delirium. Their rest periods came in two or three-hour naps before returning to the road. They traveled as deep into the night as they were able to, stopping only when terrain or exhaustion forced them to. They continued traveling off of the road, avoiding the cars and the dead that seemed to linger around them. They kept the road in sight, off to the north as they moved through central Colorado. They figured if they were set upon by the afflicted in any significant numbers they would be able to flee at greater speeds on the smooth surface of the road. On the morning of their fourth day of flight since leaving Elk Springs, they spotted the Rocky Mountains for the first time. They pushed on through the town of Craig without incident, and in the late afternoon stumbled wearily into the outskirts of Steamboat Springs.
The afflicted attacked shortly after stopping to rest. They were so delirious from the many days and nights of running that it took too long for them to realize that the afflicted were among them, devouring those unfortunate enough to have drifted off to sleep too quickly. In the chaos of the surprise attack, with many awoken by the afflicted atop them, savaging them, guns fired all around. Yen watched helplessly as the panic-fueled gunfire claimed the lives of friend as often as enemy. It was during that desperate fight, as the living fled into the countryside, scattered in all directions from the afflicted in their midst, that Yen and his people recognized the afflicted for what they truly were: the undead. In the aftermath of the gunfight, only twenty were able to escape, gather, and flee from the outskirts of Steamboat Springs.
Yen led them the remnants of his group, possibly the last twenty from his reservation, high into the mountains. He hoped that the rougher terrain would favor them, being fleeter of foot and more agile, while stalling the undead. The forest was heavy and the terrain difficult. The horses became as much a hindrance as a help as they worked their way ever upwards, having to backtrack when they reached any kind of climb, to find a gentler course. Their exhaustion caused them to stumble often that first night.
*
When the sun rose over the mountain just east of them, there were eighteen men and women left, including Yen. They had no idea of the whereabouts of the two that disappeared in the course of the night. The exhausted minds could only concentrate on putting one foot in front of the other. No one spoke. They rarely lifted their heads from the ground in front of them, and every time they paused, the sounds of countless undead shuffling in pursuit issued loudly from behind them. They could not yet see the dead, but their feet sounded clearly, crunching through the brush and snapping tree limbs. When the wind was right, their moans drifted up to them, sounding like an eerie wind through the narrow passes.
The ground grew rockier and more difficult. By noon, they had dismounted from the few remaining horses and were scrambling more than walking upward. The horses struggled with the terrain and more than once, one lost its footing and slid down a distance on the scree. The view that their height provided them did little to reassure them. The foothills and mountain below them swarmed with undead. The sounds of low moans rose up to them along with the occasional burst of noise from a corpse tumbling down the mountain. For the first time, they were able to appreciate the size of the horde that followed behind. The sight of many thousands of the dead sapped whatever hope was left in the survivors; only Yen’s constant prompting kept them moving onward.
It was early afternoon, they scrambled atop a rocky outcropping to see a cliff in front of them, extending in either direction for as far as they could see. They stood breathing heavily staring at one another shaking their heads in disbelief of their fortune. The horses were lathered and bleeding from the cuts and scrapes of many stumbles. As tired as the horses looked, the men and women looked worse. Their haggard, sallow faces stared blankly ahead. Their sunken eyes lacked that spark of hope. Finally, upon truly appreciating the dead end before them, Yen spoke.
“We’ll have to leave the horses here. I’m ashamed that we brought them this far,” he said, stroking Petal on the side of her neck.
The remaining four that rode started stripping the tack from their horses, setting it on the ground. Those who still rode atop their own horses, rather than having acquired it from the death of the owner, took a moment to say goodbye. Yen stro
ked the mane of his mare, with his forehead pressed against her while feeding her an oat bar he had saved. He hugged her fiercely, hiding the tears that flowed freely from his eyes. She was a gift from his father on his sixth birthday. The memory of his father, smiling around a cigarette in his mouth with a can of Pabst in his hand as he led Petal over to him was the only clear memory he had of the man. His father had left a few months later and he had cared for Petal ever since. Abandoning her, especially in this terribly hopeless situation for her, shattered his heart.
Within the span of a minute, the forward phalanx of dead appeared, scrambling up the rocky slope. They snarled and shuffled forward, eager to taste flesh.
“Yen! It’s time,” Raoul called.
Yen snapped his thoughts away from his moment with Petal and saw that his brother already halfway up the cliff face, urging him on. He whipped his head around to see that the sea of dead was only fifty yards from him.
“I’m sorry, Petal, thank you for your companionship, I will never forget you,” he choked out through a cracking voice
Yen stroked her neck one more time before slapping her on her hindquarters to set her off. He turned from his friend and closed the final ten paces to the cliff face, struggling to even out his breathing. Tears streamed down his face as he climbed, the dust from the wall stealing the moisture as it leaked out, leaving his face streaked with gray. He forced himself to concentrate entirely on the climb, hoping to block out the terrified and pained neighs and whinnies that drifted up from below. He winced at every one, convinced he could discern which of them came from Petal. By the time he reached the top of the cliff, he was a wreck. He knelt in the dirt and cried for nearly a half hour before he was able to pull himself back together. Finally, he stood and turned to see the mountainside fifty feet below. It was a writhing sea of undead. Thousands upon thousands of the things reached hungrily upwards at the men.
Harvest of Ruin (Book 2): Dead of Winter Page 17
