The Last Town

by Knight, Stephen

  “Excuse me,” Meredith said. “Do you know if the bus to Reno is coming?”

  “Oh, I don’t know about that. Reno’s shut down,” the Mexican woman said. “My cousin lives up there, works in the casinos. They have troubles, too. Sounds like the police can’t control it.” She sighed, her face falling. “I hope my cousin will be okay.” She recovered an instant later, and Sinclair realized that the woman wasn’t exactly a deep thinker. “But no, I don’t think the bus is coming anymore. It didn’t come last time, either.”

  “Last time?” Sinclair asked.

  “Tuesday,” the woman said. “I asked the manager at the McDonald’s. He said the service, it was suspended.”

  “So we’re waiting here for no good reason,” Sinclair said, feeling rage boiling deep inside him. “It was supposed to arrive at eight forty-five! Why don’t they have a sign up?”

  “I don’t know, Mister,” the Mexican woman said.

  Her words were drowned out as a white Chevy van suddenly accelerated through the traffic. It slammed into a car and lurched sideways, engine roaring. One of its front tires blew as the van jumped the curb, and for an instant, its black plastic grille was pointed right at Sinclair. Behind the cracked windshield, he caught a glimpse of a thrashing struggle, as if two people were fighting for the wheel. Then the van’s front tires hit a parking barrier, and the vehicle cut away from him, scraping across two parked cars. Its rear bumper was torn loose in the impact, and half of it dropped to the ground, digging into the asphalt as the van continued accelerating. Its blown front tire flipped and flopped like the tub of a misloaded washing machine. The van plowed into an old pickup truck that was backing out of a parking space and hit with such force that the truck seemed to almost bend in half. The van’s engine died in an explosive rattle, and a cloud of steam billowed from its front end.

  The man in the pickup truck looked quite shocked but other than that was unharmed. He pushed open the driver’s door and eased out. Several people emerged from the McDonald’s, mouths open.

  The Mexican woman put a hand over her heart. “Oh, gosh!”

  “Jock, are you all right?” Meredith asked, putting a hand on his arm.

  “Why, yes. Quite fine, Meredith,” Sinclair said, even though his heart was bucking to a bizarre disco beat inside his chest. “Thank you for asking.”

  The driver of the truck peered in through the van’s windows then tried to open the driver’s door. Even from his position near the street, Sinclair could hear someone frantically pounding inside the van. The pickup driver stepped to the right and opened the loading door.

  Two blood-covered bodies crashed into him, pinning him to the pavement. A startled murmur ran through the crowd of onlookers.

  The Mexican woman moved her hand to her painted lips. “Oh!”

  The pickup driver thrashed and screamed as the two bloody people tore into him. One went for his belly. The other attacked his face.

  “Jock!” Meredith cried. “Oh, Jock, they’re killing him!”

  “Bloody right,” Sinclair said. His voice sounded detached to his own ears. A small analytical part of his mind told him it was time to flee, to turn and run back to the hotel. Instead, he stood rooted to the spot, watching in horrified, slack-jawed fascination as the two people—zombies, he realized—attacked the man beneath them in the most gruesome of manners.

  Sinclair stayed where he was even when a third zombie—a woman—emerged from the van. The newcomer glanced at its two brethren then swept its dead eyes toward the parking lot entrance, where Sinclair stood. For a moment, he peered into the bottomless nothingness of the zombie’s eyes.

  Sinclair released a high-pitched fart. No, no, not me—

  The onlookers by the restaurant doors reversed their course with a communal shriek and dove back inside the McDonald’s. The zombie’s head snapped toward them, its eyes cold and predatory and full of an eternal starvation. It hissed and charged.

  Sinclair was astonished to see that there was nothing slow about the zombie. It sprinted toward the McDonald’s like a marathon runner. The ghoul rebounded off the plate glass window with a bang and fell to the ground. Immediately, it vaulted to its feet and sprang forward again. With the second hit, the window dissolved, parting in a thunderclap of sound as the zombie flew into the restaurant, greeted by a chorus of horrified screams.

  “Jock!” Meredith screamed.

  Sinclair shoved the portly Mexican woman and her four bags of junk food out of his way. “Sorry, must be going!” he chirped, his voice high and panicked. He grabbed Meredith’s arm and hustled her away from the restaurant.

  As they ran down the sidewalk, a McDonald’s employee climbed out of the drive-through window and made for the street, screaming. There was a hollow pop from inside, followed by more screams, then two more pops. Someone inside had a gun.

  Meredith gasped. “Where are the police?”

  “Look at the traffic, Meredith! They’ll get here, but only after it’s too late,” he said, pushing her along. “Keep going. Don’t stop. Just keep going!”

  They ran three blocks before Sinclair slowed and looked behind them. People were fleeing from the McDonald’s, but he was surprised to see a few hurrying toward it. Sun glinted off oiled metal. They had guns. A couple of seconds later, a fusillade of gunshots rang out. Then silence reigned, aside from the rumble of slowly moving traffic and sporadic car horns. In the distance, a siren wailed.

  “All right, I think it’s over,” Sinclair said, stopping. He bent at the waist, panting.

  “We have to get out of here,” Meredith said. “We have to get to San Francisco!”

  “Meredith…” That was all he could get out between gulps of air. He felt light-headed and nauseous.

  “We have to get out!”

  He straightened and tried to level out his breathing. “Meredith, if it’s happening here, then it’s happening in San Francisco. Worse, even. You heard that Mexican biddy. Even Reno is in trouble. We can’t get the car fixed, and even if we could, we’d only make it as far as whatever gas is in the damn thing could get us. What do you suggest we do?”

  Meredith looked at him with her big eyes full of terror. “So what are you suggesting, Jock? Do you have a plan?”

  “We go back to the hotel,” Sinclair said, trying to sound firm.

  A police car was threading its way through the heavy traffic on Main Street, lights flashing, siren blaring. It could only go about two miles per hour.

  “That’s the best you can do?” she asked.

  “No,” Sinclair said. “I might be able to do one better than that.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “That man I was talking to in the diner, Barry Corbett. Do you remember him?”

  “The Indian man who gave me his phone?”

  Sinclair shook his head. He grabbed Meredith’s arm and began hustling her down the sidewalk, casting an occasional glance over his shoulder to ensure nothing was following them. “No, not him. The old man. He has a plan to turn this town into a fortress. Maybe it’s in our best interests to stay right here, in Single Tree.”

  Meredith stopped. “You must be joking!”

  Sinclair yanked her along after him. “Darling, I’ve never been more serious about something in all my life.”

  ###

  Doddridge laughed when Shaliq was brought into the small police station holding tank by an old, fat cop with a boozer’s nose. The kid was covered in dust and sand. He looked as if he’d been trying to dig his way through the desert.

  “Where the fuck you been, dawg? Been tryin’ to play a real-life game a Dig-Dug?” Doddridge asked from his place on the plastic bunk that had no mattress.

  In the cell on the other side, Auto was lying on his back, snoring up a storm. His face was swollen as if he’d taken a beating, which he probably had.

  Shaliq didn’t answer. There was a bandage on his right forearm that extended from wrist to elbow.

  “He was in the desert,” the cop said
. He opened the door to the cell next to Doddridge’s and pushed the sullen Shaliq inside, positioning him off to one side of the doorway. Reaching through the bars, he grabbed the kid’s handcuffed wrists and held him in place then slammed the cell door closed. Once he was safely separated from the prisoner, he removed the handcuffs.

  Shaliq gingerly pulled his arms back and rubbed his wrists. “Damn things were too tight. I can’t feel my fingers.”

  “How’s the arm, kid? You feel that?” the cop asked. His nameplate read Lasher, and Doddridge made him to be a big city cop who’d retired and joined the force in this podunk town.

  “What do you care, man?” Shaliq asked.

  “I don’t. You get a painkiller in three hours, so stay quiet until then. Lunch is at eleven thirty.”

  “I’m Muslim, man. I need halal food.”

  “You’ll get a burger, fries, and a Coke from Carl’s Junior and be happy about it.” With that, the old cop turned and went to a desk down the short hallway. Beside that was a locked metal door that had to be opened from the outside. Lasher collapsed into his chair and picked up an iPad.

  “Where they get you, boy?” Doddridge asked Shaliq.

  “Desert. Sent some dogs after me.” Shaliq held up his bandaged arm. “One of ’em did this, so I shot it, and then the guys following beat the shit outta me.” He nodded toward Doddridge. “What happened to you?”

  “A girl beat him down,” Lasher said from the end of the hall, finishing off the statement with a reedy laugh.

  Shaliq smiled briefly. “For real?”

  Doddridge ignored the question. “Hey, man. I asked for a lawyer last fuckin’ night. When am I gettin’ one?”

  “Yeah, I want a lawyer, too,” Shaliq added.

  “When they show up, you’ll get them,” Lasher replied. “Public defenders are up in Bishop. No one’s coming down from there anytime soon. You can count on that. My advice? Keep things cool and pass your time counting the bars.”

  Shaliq sat down on his plastic bench. “Man, do I get a blanket?”

  “Yeah, when it’s time to sleep,” the cop said, staring intently at his iPad.

  “White cracker motherfucker,” Shaliq said.

  Lasher nodded absently. “Uh-huh.”

  “Hey, kid. Cool it,” Doddridge said. “We are where we are.”

  “Yeah, you a fucking genius, man. Your powers of observation are overwhelming.”

  Doddridge snorted then stretched out on the bunk and laced his fingers behind his head. He stared at the ceiling, waiting until he could catch a nap. Things were going to shit out in the world, so he thought being locked up might not be so bad after all.

  LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA

  The Guard fought sporadically throughout the night, but Reese still slept through most of it until he was roused for duty. The sheriff’s guys, along with a fresh-faced lieutenant dressed in a dirty Army Combat Uniform bearing the old universal camouflage pattern, gave a quick security briefing. Reese had already been told a new style was in the midst of being fielded, bearing the more efficient operational camouflage pattern. It made no difference to him, and he was pretty sure the zombies didn’t care, either. Neither uniform style blended in with an urban environment any more than his LAPD blue tactical gear did.

  The situation hadn’t changed very much, which was a little surprising. Most of the zombies were sticking to the highway. The terrain and vegetation surrounding the Bowl had somehow managed to mask the presence of several thousand people. Strict noise discipline was being enforced. Even folks who snored when they slept had to put on a gas mask, which pretty much either cured sleep apnea or made sure the person wearing it passed out from lack of oxygen. Crying kids were a problem, and the fact that they were in an amphitheater didn’t help matters. But the night being torn apart by screams, gunfire, helicopters, and the odd explosion didn’t exactly make for a night conducive to sleeping anyway. Reese figured that kids would have a tough time of it, but children were more adaptable than adults. They’d get through it, one way or the other.

  Reese was curious about the zombie movements along the freeways. He’d been told during the briefing that most of the traffic was dead, not going anywhere. There were people trapped in their vehicles, surrounded by hordes of ghouls, but there was no helping them. The Guard had its hands full dealing with the new refugee camp being set up in Griffith Park, a much larger area with hundreds of possible infiltration points. Even the observatory, from which the Guard helicopters were operating, couldn’t be fully secured. There were just too many hiking paths leading to it.

  “That mean we’re in danger of losing air support?” Bates asked. He directed the question more toward the lieutenant than to the sheriff heading up the briefing.

  The Guard officer stirred uneasily. “No, sir. I don’t think so. A separate airhead’s been established at Ontario airport—”

  “Yeah, that’s like over fifty miles away,” another cop said. “I mean, I know helicopters can fly pretty fast, but that’s still going to be, what? A fifteen- or twenty-minute wait?”

  “Aircraft are in the area at all times, sir,” the lieutenant said. “We’re keeping a rotation of guns and ass haulers over Los Angeles twenty-four seven.”

  “All right. If it’s okay with the LAPD, maybe we can stay focused on the here and now, and not worry about what may or may not happen,” the sheriff said.

  “Sure, let’s get back to how we’re going to get all these people out of here when the zombies figure out we’re in a great big serving dish,” Bates said. “They’re really pretty good at overrunning positions. Ask Colonel Morton. He can tell you all about that.”

  The sheriff glared at Bates. “Who do you report to, Sergeant?”

  “He reports to me,” Reese said tiredly.

  “You might want to have a talk with him about professional conduct during a law enforcement operation,” the sheriff snapped.

  “Bates, stop being dick,” Reese said then turned to the sheriff. “There, that ought to do it. What’s next?”

  The sheriff shifted his glare from Bates to Reese. Reese stared back, too tired to be affected by a brother law enforcement officer’s pissed-off attitude. They gave each other the stink eye for a moment before the sheriff broke eye contact first then finished up the briefing by detailing the LAPD patrol area along the wall.

  “So, it’s another day in paradise,” Bates said as he got up from the folding chair. “I’ll have a double helping of shit on the side.”

  “Try not to go full-on retard with the sheriffs,” Reese said. “We all depend on each other right now. Sheriffs, LAPD, Guard, we all have to figure out how we’re going to keep the civilians alive. Right?”

  “Right,” Bates said.

  “Just the same, keep an eye on that truck.”

  “Fuck, yeah. You can count on that, Detective.”

  The sun started to rise over the San Gabriel Mountains, and through all the smoke in the air from East Los Angeles, it still looked glorious. There was no marine layer to speak of so late in the year, so Reese was able to watch the molten orb slowly crawl over the tan peaks. Helicopters buzzed around overhead, and people still screamed from the freeway, though that was becoming less regular, since the easy prey had apparently been hunted out. From the west, several loud explosions echoed off the hillsides. The whoosh-whoosh of whirling rotor blades underlay the thunderous reports.

  “Hear that?” Bates asked. “Apaches. Using Hellfires.”

  “Okay. Is that good or bad?” Reese asked.

  Bates shook his head. “It ain’t good.”

  The LAPD was organized along the rear barrier wall of the Bowl, and from there they could look over the entire amphitheater. It was full of people, tents, sleeping bags, and stadium seating. Porta potties lined the edges of the camping areas. The Guard and a few FEMA folks were handing out MREs. No food preparation was allowed, for fear the smells of cooking grub would bring the dead their way that much faster. Reese wondered if the zombies
could smell. They were dead, so they had no need to breathe. But they moaned and hissed and even roared when they were closing in on prey, so clearly, they were still able to fill their lungs with air.

  He checked his watch. It was 7:16 a.m. They would be on shift until eleven, then they got another meal and rest break. Standing atop sandbag revetments, National Guard troops kept watch over the sound barrier wall, which had been reinforced in several places with more sandbags and lumber. Coils of razor wire topped the walls, and the metal gleamed in the sunlight. Not that it mattered. If the dead managed to come over those walls, they weren’t about to stop because of some razor burn.

  Overall, the LAPD’s role was to provide a secondary defensive layer while also remaining in sight of the civilians below. The general theory was that the civilians would gain confidence by seeing that they were being protected by LA’s finest. Reese thought that was laughable. Most of the people in Los Angeles hated the LAPD. The last thing they thought kept them safe was the thin blue line.

  The temperature climbed from the high fifties to the mid-seventies as the morning matured toward afternoon. It would hit the eighties before the day was through, but Reese didn’t care. All he wanted was to find a place to take a nap. An eight-hour nap. They all felt the same way. The cops were exhausted and demoralized.

  “Hey, Reese,” Renee called. She walked along the line of LAPD until she stood in front of him.

  First Sergeant Plosser was with her. The big NCO looked a little better than the last time Reese had seen him. The two men exchanged nods.

  “Renee. What’s up?”

  “Not a lot. Plosser here wanted to talk with you about what’s going on over in officer country.” Renee nodded across the Bowl, where the mobile command posts sat.

  “Okay. What’s up, First Sergeant?”

  “Morton is trying to arrange for another element to be flown in, but it looks like it’s not going to happen. There’s a big force of zombies moving south from the Valley. It’s working its way through Van Nuys, heading toward Studio City. Initially, the plan was to, uh, get them onto the 101, but the activity that’s already on the freeway is preventing that. The stenches, they’re dumb, but they’re not so dumb as to stand in line, waiting to get on a freeway. So they’re deviating. The Guard command’s trying to figure out how to stop them.”