by J. W. Vohs
The last hunter was leaping even as his pack-mates died, and though he landed belly-first on the roof of the Hummer he managed to grab the carry-rack on top and pull himself to his feet faster than Luke would have thought possible just a week earlier. The monster’s strength, speed, and motor skills were continuing to rapidly improve, Luke realized, as he whipped the axe from his belt and spun the blade completely through the hunter’s neck, watching the black-red spray from the decapitation with righteous satisfaction. After looking around to make sure Gracie had the cyclist and there were no more hunters about, Luke climbed down and took a long look at the neatly severed head. The eyes still flickered, and the mouth continued trying to bite for almost a full minute as the skull rested against what had been its body’s feet in the middle of the road.
Luke knew that long-term plans included capturing, observing, and dissecting hunters, but right now he just looked at the still-living head with revulsion. Before finally falling still, the creature’s jaws snapped in Luke’s direction, and the black eyes bored into his own with what seemed like intense hatred. The teen knew the hunters were biological creations, but he sensed deep within his soul that they were evil as well. So were the people who’d created them, and Luke had dedicated his life to killing creator and creation. He’d gotten a good start over the past few months, but it wasn’t until the heel of his combat boot crushed this monster’s skull that he added one more kill to his total.
Back at the guard tower Gracie was waiting patiently as the cyclist guzzled water and lay gasping in the shade. A few minutes after Luke pulled up, the man, who looked to be in his mid-twenties, finally recovered his breath enough to explain, “I’m looking for a guy named Barry Stergen.”
Luke knelt down beside the exhausted stranger and helped him take another drink, “Slow down, mister, we’ll figure it out.” He looked up at Gracie, “You radio The Castle yet?”
She nodded, “Jack’s on RRT right now, and he’s on his way here in the Jeep.”
The cyclist wheezed, “What’s an RRT?”
Luke pushed the man’s hair back from his forehead and pressed a damp rag there as he explained, “Stands for rapid response team. Three people on duty at all times, ready to rush to any emergency that comes up.” He smiled gently, “I guess you’re the emergency today.”
Twenty minutes later all of the leaders at The Castle were gathered in the dining area to hear the new arrival’s story. The exhausted man had eaten a couple of granola bars and polished off about a gallon of water, and he had finally regained enough strength to sit up in a chair and quietly explain why he was there. “Right before phone service went down for good I got a call in the middle of the night from a contractor I’d done some business with named Barry Stergen. He told me about this place and said that if we needed help in the future we should come over and introduce ourselves.”
Jack nodded gravely, and there was a lump in his throat as he informed the newcomer, “Barry died on the east wall during the battle for The Castle. I think I know who you are though. Are you from the Mormon Church in Columbia City?”
Obviously surprised, he nodded, “Yeah, how’d you know?”
“I was standing with Barry outside the courthouse when he suggested calling you guys. Told me that all Mormons are taught to store a year’s supply of food, and that he figured many of you would gather at the church for mutual support.”
The stranger nodded again, “Yeah, well, only about a hundred managed to reach the church, but we’re still there. My name is Gabe Fox, and my father is the bishop of our ward over there.”
Jack smiled, “Hi Gabe, I’m Jack Smith. Barry helped us build the safe-houses that protected our people when the outbreak was going on, and when thousands of the infected came pouring over these walls he died trying to save one of his men during the retreat. He’d lost his wife to the creatures early on, and he did everything he could to help us survive before he joined her. I haven’t been able to shake the feeling that he didn’t intend to survive that battle.”
Gabe smiled sadly, “He was a good man, and I’m glad to know that he went out with his boots on. Too many died without much of a fight in those early days.”
A chorus of “amen” and “yep” sounded from around the room before Gabe continued, “Well, we boarded up our church and sat tight. The zombies come sniffing around all the time, but they haven’t launched an attack on us or anything.”
He took another deep drink and explained, “We’ve been baking in that building since summer kicked in. Now we’re really low on water. We literally had hundreds of gallons stored, and we filled up the baptismal and sinks and every other container we could think of before the power went out. But now it’s almost gone, and we decided one of us should make a run for this place before it was too late.”
Carter asked, “Why didn’t you drive?”
“Well, when everyone was coming into the ward they just parked all helter-skelter in the lot. Plus, we didn’t know what vehicles had enough gas, or which ones would start after sitting for so long. And we weren’t sure about the conditions of the roads and bridges—thought there might be some road-blocks in place between us and you.”
Andi handed Gabe another granola bar and smiled, “That must have been an adventurous ride.”
Gabe couldn’t help but grin back, but his eyes reinforced his words as he declared, “Like paddling a canoe through a lake full of giant alligators and pythons!”
He shivered before continuing, “I went out on Highway 30 to try to get to Highway 9 about two miles down the road. I knew that 9 would bring me right to your doorstep, but I probably made it less than a half mile down the road before I saw a pack of about twenty of the monsters heading toward me. I turned around real quick, but they’d seen me and they started howling and running after me, then even more came running out of the woods along the road. I had to go back past the church, and for some reason most of the zombies stopped there. I’m guessing that my dad saw me being chased and yelled at the creatures to draw their attention. Only a handful followed me. For awhile I stayed ahead of them easily enough, but they just didn’t tire like I did. They were right on my heels for the last mile or two, until Luke came roaring out of nowhere and killed the critters.”
Jack frowned, “I don’t like the fact that most of them stopped at the church. You got any way to contact your people back there?”
Gabe shook his head, “You think they’re all right?”
Jack grimly declared, “If everyone in there stays quiet the hunters should get bored with the place and take off after a while, but if enough of them show up and are convinced there’s food inside . . .”
Gabe looked around the room with panic in his eyes, “We’ve gotta help them! Please!”
Jack looked over at Carter, “RRTs one through seven.” He then turned his gaze to David, “Grab three of your people and join us.”
Ten minutes later, twenty-five fighters were completely armored up and waiting by the vehicles. Jack hopped in the Hummer and led the convoy out of the gates with Gabe riding shotgun in order to guide them to the church. As they drove Jack radioed the other vehicles and told them the plan for rescuing the Mormons if they were indeed trapped by the hunters. “We’re gonna go in hard on this one, warriors!”
Carter cut into the transmission with a loud, “Whoop!”
“I’m glad the hillbilly agrees,” Jack responded when he was able to transmit again. “Form into a laager like we’ve been practicing as we pull up to the church. David, send your folks up on top of the Hummers with guns and bow. Bobby, Todd, and Bruce get up there with your guns too. The rest of us keep the hunters out of the circle with halberds. John, Marcus, stay in the middle with your maces in case any of the creatures get over the vehicles. Gabe, you stay with John in the center and only use your gun if he tells you to. Everybody clear on the plan?”
After a moment, Carter cut in with a mock voice, deep and serious, “Ya’ll command, we obey, mighty Caesar of the Hoosiers
!”
Laughter could be heard over the radio until Jack was able to get a word in, “Hey, next time I’ll stay at The Castle and let you lead the charge, butthole!”
Carter came back over the speaker, “We got it, Jack. Everyone knows the drill.”
In the lead vehicle Gabe looked over at Jack and held up two fingers. “All right you guys, Gabe says we’re two minutes out. Keep those visors down, and let’s kill ‘em all!”
Suddenly they crested a slight rise and the church appeared to their left, surrounded by hunters who were trying to pry the plywood off of the windows. The flesh-eaters quickly turned their attention to the line of noisy vehicles pulling into the far side of the parking lot and forgot about the people in the church, which was exactly what Jack wanted them to do. The Hummers and Jeeps pulled into a tight circle, bumper to bumper, until the last SUV had to pull in at an angle to close the opening in the impromptu wall. Fighters were still exiting the vehicles even as David’s team was scrambling onto the roofs and opening fire on the attacking hunters.
Luke was releasing an arrow every four seconds, and he didn’t miss. Lori and Gracie were deadly with their handguns; the .22s spitting death every time they pulled the triggers. Around the makeshift fort the shooters on top of the vehicles were steadily mowing down the monsters, while the rest of the fighters were chopping and stabbing the flesh-eaters who tried to jump and crawl across the hoods in a frantic effort to reach their prey. John and Marcus watched the massacre from the center of the circle, glad to see that their comrades were so deadly that they needed no backup, but disappointed when the one-sided battle ended a few minutes later with their weapons still clean.
When the last of the hunters fell, Jack and the others hopped over the hoods of the vehicles and quickly dispatched the creatures still alive on the ground. Finally, Jack gestured for Gabe to lead the way to the door once they were certain there was no remaining threat to the unarmored young man. As they approached the church the fighters removed their helmets, which, along with the sight of the bishop’s son, encouraged the people hiding in the building to open the doors to the strangers who’d just wiped out at least fifty of the creatures that had kept the congregation cooped up for so long.
A man who appeared to be about sixty-years-old strode forward from the wary crowd and proudly declared, “I knew you could do it, Gabe! Which one of these people with you is Barry?”
After fiercely hugging his father, Gabe stepped back and explained, “Barry died in a big battle these folks fought up in Noble County. Let me introduce you to Jack Smith.”
Jack moved up beside Gabe and stuck out his hand, “Nice to meet you, sir. After Bob Gates was infected he asked me to serve as interim sheriff of Noble County, and Barry helped me construct safe houses for the people when the outbreak really kicked in. Barry was in command down at the court house, but eventually we had to evacuate everyone from the safe-houses out to our compound on Baseline Road.”
The Bishop’s eyes widened a bit as he exclaimed, “You’re the guy who built that castle out there, the one they wrote about in the paper?”
“Yes sir,” Jack shrugged with a hint of embarrassment. “I told the world that I was trying to recreate an old English castle, but in reality I was building a survival retreat. When I was a Ranger in Afghanistan I faced the infected once, and when I came home I was determined to have a safe place for family and friends if the virus ever went global. Several of the people behind me here were there too. Anyway, once we had every uninfected person in the southern part of the county safely behind the walls, we used fire trucks with sirens blaring to draw the zombies to us. About ten thousand showed up, and we had a pretty rough go of it. That’s where Barry died, along with too many others.”
“Why did you attract all of those monsters to your place like that?”
“Well,” Jack frowned, “at the time I thought it might be a good idea to clear the area of infected as quickly as possible so we could begin reclaiming Albion and setting up agricultural operations.”
The bishop noticed the sadness in Jack’s eyes and asked, “Do you regret that decision?”
Jack hesitated for a brief moment before slowly shaking his head, “No, especially considering how the infected have evolved since those early days. But, I do wish we could have defeated the creatures without any losses, and I especially regret that we don’t have Barry and his expertise to help us out anymore.”
David, who’d stayed at the laager with the rest of his team keeping watch over the area, came running up and breathlessly declared, “I don’t want anyone to panic, but Lori says it looks like there are at least a hundred hunters heading this way.”
All of the members of the congregation retreated into the church while Jack’s fighters rushed back to their laager. The hunters were loping along the highway behind several leaders, howling and snarling as they headed directly for the people they’d seen moving toward the vehicles. The creatures hit the laager all at once this time, and although Luke and the gunners on the roofs of the SUVs managed to take out over a dozen of the hunters before they reached the fighters’ positions, the infected swarmed over the vehicles after at least sixty of them survived the initial impact and made it inside the wall.
Jack’s soldiers had trained for this type of situation, and all of his people on top of the vehicles immediately leapt down and cut their way through the hunters to join the shoulder-to-shoulder circle formation that had saved their lives numerous times before. Luke and Lori, on the other hand, instinctively stayed on what they considered to be the high ground, and in seconds found themselves surrounded and trying to kick off dozens of hunters attempting to climb up on top of the trucks to get at them.
Lori killed at least five of the monsters and was holding her own until her clip emptied, at which point she went for the mace hooked to her belt. One of the hunters pulled her from the roof of the SUV before she could even lift the weapon for her first swing. Luckily for Lori, she was taken to the ground on the outside of the laager while almost all of the hunters were now inside the defensive works and attacking the circle of fighters trying to hold them off. Still, Lori was under assault from three large males, and all she could do was writhe in the dirt as she kept twisting her body to try to keep her helmet on as the monsters frantically tore at her armor with their hands and teeth.
David saw Lori go down, and he immediately shoved the tip of his halberd into the nearest hunter’s face, pushing the beast away so he could pull his mace and step from the circle as he prepared to go to his comrade’s aid. He never made a second step in her direction, however, as the stranger fighting next to him roughly grabbed him by the shoulders and literally tossed him back inside the circle, screaming for him to stay in the ranks, “We never leave the line! Sometimes they make it back to us and sometimes they don’t, but individual rescues don’t work—we just end up with two dead!” David looked around and saw another soldier on the ground holding what appeared to be a broken arm up to his chest, but he didn’t have time to think about it as another pack of hunters crashed into the line and he rose to join the soldiers fighting desperately to keep the monsters at bay.
Luke hadn’t missed a beat as he found his position swarmed by the infected. He dropped his bow and pulled his trench axe in one fluid movement, taking off the top of the nearest hunter’s head with a back swing as he completed the weapon switch. In just a few seconds he smashed the skulls of three monsters intent on climbing the vehicle he was standing on, and he finally had a moment to look around and see what was happening to the rest of the fighters. He was surprised to see that he was cut off from the main group now struggling to keep their circle intact inside the laager, and then he let out a roar of anger when he saw the three hunters trying to rip Lori apart three trucks away.
In his peripheral vision, David saw Luke jump nimbly across the hoods and roofs of the vehicles with not a wasted movement as he cut down two more hunters on the way to his friend’s side. As he drew within ten f
eet of his destination, he saw that one of the massive hunters had pulled Lori’s helmet several inches away from her neck, uncovering a small strip of flesh between her leather collar and Kevlar-laced jacket. The beast’s face was moving down toward Lori’s neck, and Luke knew he wasn’t going to make it in time, so he threw the axe at the creature just before its teeth reached exposed flesh.
Luke had spent countless hours practicing throws with his axe during the long weeks when they were basically trapped in his grandparents’ house as hordes of zombies moved west in their attempt to escape the fires of Cleveland. He had never missed his target on a hunter, until now. He hit the monster in the shoulder instead of the head, but the force of the blow knocked the creature sideways a few feet, giving Luke the chance to make a desperate leap from the hood of the closest vehicle and smash into the monster with a flying tackle that sent man and beast tumbling in the dirt. The massive hunter was operating on instinct, while Luke relied on training and physical ability. It was no contest. Even before they stopped rolling from the impact of Luke’s daring jump, the teen was pulling his dagger free and thrusting the wicked tip of the blade into the flesh-eater’s face. As he regained his feet, Luke hesitated only long enough to pull his dagger from the hunter’s eye socket before running over to help Lori.
By the time he reached her side she had taken advantage of the removal of two hundred pounds from the mob on top of her to pull her short sword free and bury the blade to the hilt in the side of one of the hunters tearing and pulling at her armor. She didn’t kill the creature, but as she twisted the sword viciously inside the torso of the beast the hunter did seem to slow down a bit as Luke approached.
