There weren’t any towns along the 1 and even fewer road signs so it would’ve been difficult to find our location on the map. We could only make educated guesses. Suddenly, a noise erupted from a back room. It came from a doorway at the end of a hallway. We were instantly on guard. California looked at me and I motioned him toward the noise.
At the entrance to the hallway, California stood back while I leaned up against the frame. He nodded and I whipped around the corner and aimed my rifle down the hallway. Nothing. At the end of the hallway there was a door to a room, “Office” was labeled across it at eye level. I could see light escaping out through the bottom and something was quickly moving back and forth. California entered the hallway behind me as I crept toward the door. Slowly I put my hand on the doorknob and twisted. I looked back at California one last time, he raised his rifle ready to shoot anything that came out of there. Then with all my strength I threw my shoulder into the door and it burst open. Whatever it was, was startled by me and ran through my legs. It caught California off guard too as it scurried past his foot. I rushed to the doorway just in time to see Charlie fire his rifle once toward the ground. He took a few steps then knelt down. I lost track of him below the empty shelves. A second later he stood back up and raised his arm. In his hand was a fat raccoon that he had shot.
“Hungry?” Charlie asked.
He threw the raccoon onto a pull-out shelf on the side of the APC then pulled out a large knife from his hip sheath.
“You’re really going to cook that?” I asked him.
“You have a better idea?”
“Aren’t you afraid of it having rabies?”
“It’s clean. Look,” he said and pried open one of its eyelids. “No sign of disease in the eyes. And,” he pulled open the mouth and peeled back the lips exposing its gums. “Gums are clean, no sign of infection, plus, even if it did have rabies the virus would be killed when we cooked it.”
“I don’t think that’s right, but I guess there are worse things that could happen to you these days,” I said.
Declan was standing next to the driver’s side door. I handed him the postcard. “You ever been here?”
Declan studied the postcard.
Around the back of the APC California had lifted Emily out of the back.
“I think I saw some jeans and a sweatshirt for sale in the shop,” I said to her.
“Souvenirs,” she said and headed toward the shop. California followed her.
I headed back to Declan.
“So, where are we?” I asked.
“Not far,” he said shuffling the map
“From home?” I said.
“I wish. I’d guess we’re only about two hundred miles from Los Angeles.”
“Only?”
“I know where we are now at least.”
“That’s true.”
I was looking across the street and noticed a hobby shop on the opposite corner of the tourist shop.
“Find us a way there, I’ll be right back,” I said.
“You got it.”
Inside was just like the other stores, the shelves were picked clean. I guess people thought they would still have time for model cars and RC airplanes. Truthfully, I’m not sure what drew me into the store or why, and I was starting to think I should have ignored that impulse.
Behind the main counter I found the cash register on the floor. A few other items were scattered along the floor and covered in sand. I knelt down next to the cash register and examined some of the items on the floor. Nothing of real use. Then I saw it. On a shelf under the front counter was a desktop CB radio. I couldn’t believe it. It probably didn’t work, but I had to give it a try. It was all there, receiver, microphone, and cords. The only problem is that it needed to be plugged in and I had no power. I took the entire unit off of the shelf and hurried back to the APC.
“Open the hood,” I shouted to Declan as I shuffled toward the front of the APC, awkwardly carrying the radio. He looked surprised as he hopped down from the driver’s seat.
Declan unlatched the hood and lifted it up exposing the engine. I placed the radio on the front wheel well.
“Find me some tape,” I said. Declan hurried away.
I pulled out my knife and cut off the end of the electrical plug then cut away the protecting plastic, so the frayed wires stuck out at both ends.
California and Emily came out of the store. She was holding a couple of articles of clothing.
Declan came back up to me with a roll of black electrical tape in his hand. He tore me off a piece. I grabbed it and tapped one end of the wire to the positive terminal of the APC’s battery. I then tapped the other end to the negative terminal. A little bit of smoke snaked its way from the terminals. The battery was pumping too much power into the unit and it wouldn’t be long before it would be fried. I took a moment to collect my thoughts and maybe say a little prayer. Everyone was watching me nervously.
I held my breath and turned the power knob. I expected it to be more dramatic. The only thing that happened was a small red light by the knob lit up.
“What’s the emergency band?” I asked Declan.
He told me and I twisted the knobs to the appropriate frequency. I looked around at everyone then pressed the talk button.
“This is HK-1 broadcasting over emergency channel. Do you come in? Anybody read? Over.” I said.
There was a moment of tense silence. There was a small crackle over the speaker then:
“HK-1, this is SRC we read you loud and clear. What is your position?” the voice said.
An immense sense of relief washed over me. We weren’t out of the woods, but at least we weren’t alone.
I clicked the talk button on the side of the microphone, but before I could say anything Charlie’s hand slammed down over mine.
“What the hell are you doing?” I asked.
“Something’s not right,” he said.
I thought about it. “Explain,” I said.
“An unknown voice comes over the radio and the first thing they calmly want to know is your location? I would want to know who the hell I’m talking to or show some excitement. This is not right. Under normal circumstances I’d be all for this, but there is a lot of weird shit going on right now.”
“HK-1, this is SRC we read you loud and clear. What is your position?” the voice said again.
I put the microphone down and ripped the power cords off the battery.
Everyone protested.
“Charlie’s right,” I said.
“What are you going to do?” Emily asked.
“I don’t know yet,” I said. “Let’s set up a camp here. Continue to search the buildings, see if you can find anything useful.”
That night California took watch. We had set up a shelter on the back side of one of the shops. It gave protection from the added cold of the offshore breeze constantly coming in. Charlie didn’t do half bad with the raccoon. We had also found some cans of beans and corn in one of the shops, so we had enough left over to give some scraps to our prisoner in the back of the APC. He refused us at first, but I had a look in later and the food was gone. Declan and Charlie were asleep against the APC. I found myself not being able to sleep again. Luckily someone was up to keep me company.
“So how did you get involved in all of this?” Emily asked.
“I survived,” I said.
“I mean becoming a soldier of whatever you guys are.”
“I was a firefighter before this all began. My station was one of the last firehouses that were responding. The last call we did was responding to a YMCA camp in the mountains behind the city. A group of survivors had been attacked by some zombies. They had taken some wounded. We got there and did the best we could, but some of them had started to turn. The leader of that camp went around and killed everyone that had been bitten. Afterwards, he said that they were staying at the camp and we should join them. The city was lost at this point, the entire country was, but I still needed to find m
y family. I ended up heading north and found another camp just outside of San Francisco and because of my qualifications as a firefighter, I was awarded control of this unit here.”
“How does someone become a hunter-killer?”
“Well, some sort of experience is required. Most of us have suffered loss, it’s what give us motivation.”
“Haven’t we all?”
“I suppose that’s a good point, but it’s something different. It’s something that drives you. Eats at you.”
“Things that aren’t good.”
“Yes.”
“And you lost your family.”
“Yes.”
“There’s something more, isn’t there?” She looked at me peculiar. “I remember you; I saw you on TV. You were there.”
I nodded.
“What happened?”
It was the first time I had talked to anyone about it. Surprisingly, it felt good to get it out there.
“It was a hot day that day. We had gotten calls about the virus before, but they always turned out to be false alarms. We still took every precaution when we arrived though. The hospital was quarantined while the surrounding buildings were evacuated. Streets were blocked off. We thought everything was fine. All we had to do was wait for the CDC to show up.
“A rookie of mine came up and informed me that there was a passage underneath the street joining the two hospitals. The police didn’t help us at all so I decided we needed to watch the tunnel until we could get someone down there to seal it off. We were down there when the power went off.
“Moyer had a big heart, but he was in over his head. I should’ve brought someone more experienced with me. We were at the tunnel and we didn’t see anyone at first. Shortly after the power went out someone showed up at the other end of the tunnel. I should’ve stopped him, I mean I did try, but not well enough.
“I just remember her eyes. Glazed over, lifeless, yet not. When they’re fresh they’re incredibly strong. She overpowered him no problem. Bit him on the shoulder first. They were on the ground when I got to them. He was screaming. I knew she wasn’t human anymore, so I kicked her in the face, hard, to get her off of him. She went sprawling across the linoleum floor then I grabbed him by the collar and dragged him screaming back to toward the tunnel entrance. At the end of the tunnel we were met by soldiers in black uniforms and masks. They separated us. By that time Moyer was already turning. I don’t think he ever made it out of the tunnel.
“They brought me up top just as the zombies had broken through the barricaded doors. That became more important to the soldiers than whatever they were going to do to me. It was a massacre.”
“But they were all infected,” Emily said.
“There could’ve been a cure.”
“You know as well as I do the virus kills the person it infects.”
“They didn’t know that at the time.”
“You said they were soldiers. From where?”
“I don’t know. They weren’t military I can tell you that.”
“Have you ever seen them before?”
“No. And I haven’t since either.”
“You know it’s not your fault.”
“What isn’t?”
“Your partner’s death. None of this is. You can’t control any of this.”
“I could’ve stopped him from going down there.”
“And then what? Wait for her to come to you? Then you would’ve been dead and not him. Then these guys would’ve had no one to lead them.”
“I’ve still lost men.”
“Did you put the bomb in that scavenger’s hand?”
“No, but I should’ve stopped Johnny, or let him stay with his brother, who would have stopped him.”
“He sacrificed himself to save me and who knows how many else.”
I suppose she had a point, but I didn’t feel like getting into it. “You should get some sleep,” I said.
“So should you.”
Declan found us a path back to the Highway. Despite its weight, the APC could travel pretty fast once on open terrain, so we made up for some lost time.
We stopped that night just outside San Luis Obispo. We watched the sun set behind the horizon, but as the night went on the orange glow along the horizon never disappeared. California watched the orange glow move rhythmically in the distance.
“Fire?” I asked.
“That’s my guess. Oil pumps on fire,” California said. “Should we move on?”
I looked back at everyone else setting up camp for the night. “It’s too dangerous. I don’t want to risk another encounter with whoever set those ablaze at night. No fire tonight. We should be close enough that the heat will reach us.”
The next morning Charlie had been fiddling with something he had found in the dirt.
“What is that?” Emily asked.
“It’s a GPS,” he said.
“Does it work?” California asked him.
“It looks like it. It’s been used recently.”
“By who?” Emily asked.
“Probably the same person who set that fire,” Charlie said. “They could’ve dropped it.”
He fiddled with it for a few more seconds, until the screen lit up his face.
“It works,” Charlie said and held up the unit to show us the screen. It looked like an antiquated cell phone. “There we are.” He pointed to a triangle on the screen.
“Hopefully the satellites orbit hasn’t degraded too much,” Declan said.
“Looks ok to me” Charlie said.
“Don’t trust it too much.”
“Shit.” Charlie threw the GPS in the dirt. “Batteries died.”
It was my watch that night. I sat on the hood of the APC and tried to count the stars. The night passed without incident.
The next morning Declan stopped the APC in front of a sign that read “Vandenberg AFB.” Military bases were the last installations to fall. That’s where everyone went for refuge. Lucky for us the state was littered with military bases.
Declan drove over the chain link fence and entered the base. Through the window I could see damaged and rotting vehicles of all types. A large cargo plane, or what was left of it, sat at one end of the runway, it had long since been picked clean of its valuable parts. Rows and rows of empty hangars, some were torn apart and there was debris everywhere.
The APC slowed to a stop.
“What is it?” I asked through the partition.
“Come take a look at this,” Declan said.
We had stopped in front of the last hangar. It looked like all the rest except that it still had its large doors closed and they were locked. Just like the one at SFO.
“I want everyone extra vigilant,” I said, glancing at Charlie.
California appeared with a large set of bolt cutters and cut the lock off. It fell to the ground with a clunk. He dropped the cutters and looked at me nervously. I grabbed one of the doors and he grabbed the other. Charlie aimed his rifle at the opening doors, waiting for whatever might be in there to spring out.
I think we both held our breaths as we opened the doors. A blast of cold, dank air erupted from the hangar. The doors slammed open with an echo. It was empty, save for one thing, an airplane.
This thing was pristine, like it had just rolled off the factory line. If airplanes had odometers, I had no doubt it would say zero. It was only a two-seater so it wouldn’t have enough room to carry all of us.
We all entered the hangar.
Slowly, like a blind man imagining something new, Declan moved his hands over the plane. “I hope the flight computer is intact.”
“I bet it isn’t,” Charlie said.
Declan glared at him. I nudged Charlie telling him to lay off.
The side window on the cockpit was now open and Declan was climbing in. “Instrument panel looks intact.”
“Declan,” I said.
He stopped whatever he was doing and jumped back down. “It’s not functional,” he said.
<
br /> “Of course,” Charlie said.
“It won’t start?” I asked.
“I don’t believe so,” Declan said.
Emily snuck in behind Declan climbed into the plane.
“Why wouldn’t the other one start?” I asked.
Declan feigned confusion. “What?”
“Why wasn’t the other one functional?” I asked again.
“There were a number of reasons.” He was trying to find excuses to back his argument, trying to remember what he had said before. “The flight computer was fried,” Declan finally said nervously.
I looked to Emily who was poking her head out of the door.
“There was no flight computer,” she said.
“Yes, there was.”
“No, I saw the relays, there was no computer.”
“Yes, there was. What do you know, you’re just a college student, or biologist, or whatever the fuck you want to be.”
“Microbiologist,” she corrected. “My dad was pilot. I grew up in planes.”
“Well sweetheart, when was the last time you peeked into the relay box of an airplane? When you’ve actually flown one, or have fixed one on the battlefield, you let me know so we can consult you.”
“Declan, tell the truth,” I said.
“I am telling the truth,” he said getting more desperate. “You’re going to believe her over me? Someone you’ve known for years?”
“What reason does she have to lie?”
“What reason do I have to lie? For all we know she could be a scavenger.”
“Give it a rest, Declan,” California said.
“Fuck you, California,” he said lurching forward.
At that, California flicked the safety off of his rifle.
Declan saw this and stopped. “What, you’re going to shoot me now?”
“I don’t want to,” California said.
“Cap, are you going to let-” Declan noticed that safety was off on my rifle as well. “So, this is what it’s come down to?”
“Tell me the truth,” I said.
Wanderer (Book 2): Hunters Page 10
