by B. T. Wright
The sun had yet to rise, but Jake knew it wouldn’t be too much longer. The moon was bright behind them––the only source of light in all the world at that point. After Amy communicated with the aliens, they all found the backroad, and Jake sent her, Mark, and Tyler on their way to Mount Weather. He was running out of time and needed to get going if he was going to be able to meet the aliens’ deadline for making the trade for Jess by dawn. Jake had been adamant that he would go it alone, but Bryan had been even more insistent that he wanted to stay and help. So now they were both hiding at the back of a gas station, peering around the corner, staring at the diner in Amy’s vision.
Moments after Amy’s eyes rolled back into her head out on the highway, she’d begun shaking, just like the other times she’d communicated with the aliens. But when she came around, she’d explained that the experience was very different. Instead of seeing a sort of void while hearing the aliens speak to her, and speaking back to them into the void, Amy said this last time they’d communicated with her by showing her a vision. She said no words had been spoken, simply that a vision had come to her of a building with a red neon sign on top that read “Diner”. Amy said specifically that it was in cursive writing, and that she could see Jess sitting alone inside.
However, one part of Amy’s vision was very different than what Jake and Bryan were seeing. When Jake asked if Amy had seen any infected humans in her vision of Jess and the diner, she’d given a definitive no. But looking at the diner now, Jake could see a sea of aliens to the left, right, and back of the diner. All of them were just standing there, like they had by the dam earlier when Amy froze them, waiting for someone to make a move or tell them what to do.
“Shit, now there’s even more of them,” Bryan whispered. “What the hell are we going to do?”
Jake brought the scope of his AR-15 to his eye, and his stomach dropped when he saw Jess sitting at a booth by herself in the diner, the moon shining on a face full of worry. She looked frightened, but Jake knew it was probably much worse than that for her. On the walk down the large hill where Bryan and Jake had left the truck to get closer without drawing attention, Jake had had time to think about what he was going to do. Bryan was right: from up on the hill, it looked like there weren’t as many of them. But Jake knew it didn’t matter if there were more. There were hundreds of them; what difference would a couple dozen more make? His plan, though probably not the most sane, was either going to work or it wasn’t. A few more alien-filled humans wasn’t going to matter.
Jake had also counted on there being a lot of aliens around. That was why before he let Mark and Tyler drive off with Amy, he’d told Amy to make contact with the aliens and show them one last time where she was—far away—but not before they were well clear of Woodstock and the aliens.
“We have fifteen more minutes.”
“What are you talking about?” Bryan said.
“Amy has Mark’s watch. I synced mine with his. Right now they should be pulling up to the on-ramp to Highway 81. Two exits north of here.”
“Okay . . .”
“In fifteen minutes, Amy is going to make contact with the aliens.”
Bryan shot a look at Jake. “What? The whole point of separating was so they wouldn’t know where Amy is—wait, I thought we outlined the route to Mount Weather avoiding all major roadways. Only the backroads. Why would they be at the on-ramp of the highway?”
“Easy . . . right when Amy makes a short contact with the aliens, showing them where she is while pleading for them not to hurt Jess, Mark will be driving onto Highway 81. As soon as Amy snaps out of the communication, they are going to turn around and go right back down the on-ramp, and follow the backroads we highlighted all the way to Mount Weather. The aliens will see her getting onto the highway when she connects. If they send others after her, they’ll send them where she won’t be.”
Bryan smiled. “That’s some high-level shit, soldier.”
Then Jake could see Bryan’s smile turn to worry in the light of the moon. “But how are we going to get to Jess?”
Jake removed the AR-15’s strap from around his shoulders and leaned it against the wall of the gas station. Then he undid his hip holster, unscrewed the suppressor from his Beretta, and put the gun in his pocket.
“What the hell are you doing?” Bryan said.
Then Jake removed the go bag from his back, axe and all, and held it out toward Bryan. “Hold onto this for me.”
“What? Why? Where are you going?”
Jake nodded toward the diner as he made sure the safety was off on the AR-15, then he leaned it back against the building.
“Without weapons? What good will that do?”
“I’ve thought about this a lot, Bryan. There is only one way I believe I can get to her.”
“You want me to create a distraction?”
“No. That would have worked a week ago. But now, as we saw back at the abandoned house, they would just send a few aliens to check it out first if you made some sort of explosion. They wouldn’t all just go running. Those days are over.”
“What then? How does you leaving your weapons behind help anything?”
“I’m going to be one of them.”
Jake said it like it made all the sense in the world. The truth was, he had no idea if it would work. There had been no time in the last week that he had seen any human be able to interact with them. Much less walk amongst the aliens to know if they could tell the difference between an alien and a human. It was an entirely ridiculous idea, but it was the only one he had. And for a chance to save Jess, he was willing to do anything.
“That is ridiculous.”
“What choice do I have, Bryan?”
Bryan raised his rifle’s scope to his eye, surveyed the diner and all the aliens surrounding it, then let out a long sigh. “None.”
Jake nodded. “There’s a small stream of newly arriving aliens continuously walking up to the horde on the other side of this gas station.”
“I noticed that from back up the hill myself,” Bryan said. “What are you going to do?”
“Wait till there are only a few stragglers in the back, then try to fit in behind them. If they balk at me being there, at least I only have to fight off a couple before I make a run for it.”
“I can’t believe I’m saying this, but that kinda makes sense. Especially since I can cover you from here.”
“And TW will be ready with the truck.”
TW had insisted he help get Jess back any way he could. Jake hadn’t dared turn him down. Tyler was willing to do the same, but Jake thought it would be best if TW came instead. He wasn’t as emotionally attached to Jess as Tyler was, so his mind would be clearer when it came time to make a tough decision.
“Okay. That’s a good backup plan if they catch on to you. But what if what you’re going to try actually works? Then what?”
“No idea, my friend,” Jake said as he shrugged his shoulders. “But it doesn’t matter. I’ll either get her out of there, or die trying.”
“It has to be said . . .” Bryan turned toward him and held out his hand for Jake to shake it. “I don’t agree with any of this.”
Jake smiled, took Bryan’s hand, and gave it a firm shake. “I really don’t give a shit.”
33
Before walking to the other side of the gas station from Bryan, Jake radioed TW back at the truck and told him to be ready.
“Ready for what exactly, Jake?”
“I have no idea.”
Jake handed the radio to Bryan. “Don’t get yourself killed for this, you hear me?”
“That what you always tell your Delta operators before a black ops mission?”
“No,” Jake said.
“Then don’t you dare say it to me. The mission will dictate what happens to me, you, Jess, and TW. The way I see it I don’t have anything else to live for but you sorry sons of bitches anyway.”
Jake nodded. “Okay. Then be ready to shoot, Marine. I’m not sure what�
��s going to happen, but I’m certain that no matter what, I’ll be coming in hot.”
“I would expect nothing less.”
Jake took the hat he’d confiscated from the back of the pickup truck from his back pocket, put it on, and walked to the opposite corner, but still behind the gas station. In front of him was a main road, a CVS pharmacy, and a McDonald’s on the corner. It occurred to him then, even through all that was going on, that he would probably never have a quarter pounder with cheese from there again. Jake peered around the dumpster to the left of the McDonald’s, toward the diner where Jess sat, and saw the tail end of the mass of aliens. To his right, around forty yards from him, a few infected were walking toward the diner, then twenty yards behind them, a couple more. After that, the road that wrapped around the hill looked clear as far as he could see.
Jake assumed, of course, that the human bodies walking along the road were also aliens. However, at this distance, with only moonlight providing visibility, there was no way to actually tell if they were aliens or not. And that was why the idea had come to him earlier. He’d had the same thought when he noticed them walking up when he was up on the hill. If he couldn’t tell they were aliens, how would they be able to tell he wasn’t? It was a thin hypothesis, but again, it was all he had. And for him, it was enough.
Jake pulled the John Deer ball cap down low over his eyes. According to everything he knew, other than behavior, the black eyes were the only real giveaway. His hope was that if he kept his head low, and walked slow, that none of them would notice. He waited patiently for the last two bodies to walk by him. With one last look down the road showing no signs of more walkers, he took his first couple of steps out from behind the cover of the dumpster.
Jake didn’t look to his left to see if any aliens had noticed him. He didn’t look up either. He simply watched his black boots go one in front of the other until he was on the right side of the road. Then he turned left and maintained his slow walk toward the crowd.
Toward Jess.
He didn’t have to look up to know he was getting close to the aliens. The smell grew stronger with each step. It was like someone opened the door to a truck-stop bathroom, and the closer he got, the more body odor, urine, and shit he could smell.
Until the back of a pair of legs appeared just under the brim of his hat.
For a moment, he froze. It wasn’t intentional; just a reflex. Millimeter by millimeter, he raised his head until he could see that so far, none of them were paying him any mind. He was standing in something like a line for a roller coaster. Aliens stood two by two for about twenty yards, then the crowd was more like a mosh pit at a concert, all spread out.
Jake took a step to his right and took his first real chance at getting caught. Some of the aliens were still moving, but he was moving right by most of them. It’s impossible to realize how hard it is to walk slow when the heart is thumping and adrenaline is rushing. But it was all Jake could do to keep his feet from moving faster. The adrenaline had nowhere to go, so it started pouring out of his body in sweat. He didn’t dare wipe his brow, and he did his best not to make any movements he’d not seen these things make themselves in the last week.
Low grunts and groans from the aliens surrounded him as he began closing in on the mosh pit. Now things were really going to get tricky. In order to get to the door of the restaurant, he either had to walk around them, or through them. He didn’t feel like walking around them was an option. He would look out of place to every eye in the vicinity. If he walked through them, slow as molasses through a half-tipped jar, then only a few at a time would notice him. That, if nothing else, made the decision easy.
Jake had his right hand down by his side. Feeling the bulge of the Beretta there in his pocket gave him some comfort. Though he only had eleven bullets in the gun, and one spare ten-round magazine, he at least felt a little better knowing he had a fighting chance.
Jake took that small amount of comfort and pushed inside the mosh pit. It was the first time he’d touched one of the aliens outside of when he was killing one. He was moving so slow, he thought there was no way he would make it to Jess by dawn. The contact he made as he slothed his way in was minimal, and so far, none of them had turned to look.
His skin was on fire—crawling like a thousand spiders were walking across his entire body. The stench was almost unbearable. What made it worse was he couldn’t help but smell it. The adrenaline flowing through him was making him breath harder, letting all that terrible smell in. But he just kept his head down, and his eyes on the toes of his boots as he slithered through the dozens of aliens blocking his path like a python sliding toward its prey. Only he was the prey in this situation. And so was Jess.
Body by body, inch by inch, Jake was closing in on the door to the diner. Just about ten feet now. He was so close he could feel his body yearning to run for it, to just plow right through these things and shoot his way out with Bryan’s help back by the gas station. But he couldn’t. And so far, his slow and methodical pace hadn’t tipped any of them off. His painful pragmatism was working.
As Jake was moving his foot past a man with a large shoe, he misjudged the length and tripped over him. He was going so slow that he didn’t knock the body over that he’d plunged into, but it was enough to warrant a hiss. The large woman he’d run into squared up and lunged for him. He was forced to push-kick her in the stomach to move her back. That was when the circle of aliens that was surrounding him all turned to take notice. Jake reached inside his pants for his Beretta. The infected alien man on his right lunged at him. Jake threw his right elbow and knocked the thing in the side of the head as he brought his gun forward. The last thing he wanted to do was pull the trigger. If he did, there was little chance any of them would survive all of these aliens. He slid his index finger around the trigger as the alien moved forward, and just before he squeezed, the alien’s head shot up toward the sky and its mouth gaped open.
Jake swung the gun to his left where two more aliens were approaching, and their heads did the exact same thing—turned toward the sky. All the rest of the aliens then followed suit. Jake glanced down at his watch. The fifteen minutes he’d told Bryan they had before Amy tried to communicate with the aliens was up. And without knowing it, she had just saved his life.
For now.
Jake only had a matter of seconds and he knew it. The only instruction he’d given Amy was to make her communication with them as short as she could.
His time to make this happen was right now.
34
As the hundreds of aliens surrounding all sides of the diner looked up to the heavens to receive Amy’s communication, Jake sprinted through the last two rows of them like a running back blasting into the end zone. He raised his Beretta and shot out the large panel window on the right side of the building and jumped through the falling glass as Jess’s scream met his ears. She stood, startled, then glanced to her left, behind a wall that blocked Jake’s view of what she was looking at. When something walked around the corner, Jake skidded to a stop on the slick tile floor.
The same alien that had dragged Jess into the woods outside the abandoned house earlier reached out and grabbed her by the throat as it looked right into Jake’s eyes. There were a lot of things that Jake didn’t understand in that moment, not the least of which was how that one particular alien was able to keep from being frozen by Amy’s communication. But it wasn’t time to ponder the new world’s problems, and the alien holding Jess by the neck had made a terrible mistake by not already killing her.
Now it was going to die.
The alien opened its mouth, but before it could make a single sound, Jake squeezed the trigger twice and half of its head disappeared in a bloody mist. Jake sprang forward, and just as he reached Jess he heard consecutive bangs of bullets outside the diner. When he hooked Jess’s arm, he looked toward the front entrance and could see that the aliens were no longer looking skyward––they were looking at him. The bullets were from Bryan’s AR
-15, and he was taking out a line of aliens just outside the entrance in an attempt to clear a path.
Jake raised his gun once again as he pulled Jess along behind him. He shot seven times through the glass door at anything he could hit. He slid to a stop, ejected the empty magazine, and replaced it with a fresh one, then immediately fired in front of him as several more aliens moved toward the entrance.
“Keep your hands on my shoulders and hold on tight. Don’t let go!” Jake shouted.
When he felt Jess’s hands on him, he rushed through the door where the glass used to be as he fired at any head he could find. Bryan was still trying to make a hole for them, but he couldn’t fire directly in Jake’s path for fear of shooting Jake. That was going to be up to Jake, and he continued firing straight ahead as the wave of aliens collapsed around him. He was almost at the last of them when he felt Jess’s hands rip from his shoulders.
“Jake!”
Jake kicked the alien woman that was clawing at him on his left, turned, saw a large man pulling Jess backward, and let out a breath as he raised his gun and pulled the trigger. The alien man’s forehead exploded, and two more aliens grabbed at Jess from the left. Jake shot twice more and hit the first one, but the slide locked back on his Beretta. His gun was empty.
Jess rushed forward, narrowly escaping two aliens that had moved in from the left and the right. Jake shucked one alien man’s grip on his arm, push-kicked another on his right, and the two aliens that were about to grab Jess once again both dropped to the ground as Bryan rained a string of bullets their way. Jess reached out for Jake, and he punched the alien man on her right so hard that he thought his hand had broken. Jess made it to him, but when they turned to run, several more aliens had moved in onto the main road to block their path to the gas station.
What made things worse was that Jake had no ammo. And judging by the silence from the gas station, Bryan was also empty.
“Run, Jake!” he heard Bryan shout. “Run!”
