by Ricky Sides
Herb nodded in agreement. Three rounds fired in rapid succession in that manner was a well established signal for help. He had only a couple of minutes left to decide what to do. The zombies were closing the gap that separated them from the guardsmen at a rapid pace.
“Get beside your vehicles. We’ll hold them off until the last moment, and then lead them down the road slowly. Once they get strung out enough, we’ll turn back and take them on again. Okay, drivers, start the engines so the vehicles are ready to go when you have to leave,” Herb instructed his men.
As he ran for the Humvee, Herb saw the last of the contractors boarding the bus. The dump truck drivers had already left with those vehicles. The forklift trucks would have to be left behind. There was no time to load them on their trailers.
The engines of the three National Guard vehicles started and Herb had them close up their gap a bit. Then it was time to meet the coming threat with their rifles. The guardsmen faced the zombies with their rifles to their shoulders. Each of the men examined their potential targets to confirm that they were indeed zombies. “Oh shit!” yelled one of the men. “I’ve got a human female running in the lead. I think she is trying to escape them.”
“How can you tell she’s human?” someone asked.
“She looks scared to death, man,” the private responded. “The zombies never look like that. “Run, girl!” the man screamed encouragement at the top of his lungs.
A moment later, Herb’s rifle fired and a zombie who had been gaining on the woman fell, tripping up several others and gaining the female precious seconds. Herb fired again. His shot hit one of the zombies in the head and he fell in the path of others, once more causing a slight delay.
The other guardsmen fired as well, but the presence of the woman at the head of the pack made shooting the zombies much more difficult because of the care the men had to take not to hit her.
The woman gained a few more seconds on the zombie pack behind her as the creatures struggled to disentangle themselves from their dead cohorts. “Get in the back of the truck!” Herb shouted as the woman raced across the street toward the guardsmen.
She wasted no time in complying with his instructions. She reached the back of the truck, climbed up on the bumper, and clambered into the open truck bed where she crouched down next to the cab.
“The bus is leaving, Herb,” Randy reported from his side of the Humvee.
“Drivers, mount up and prepare to drive!” Herb ordered. The remaining guardsmen increased their rate of fire to take up the slack. As their weapons ran dry, they climbed into their vehicles and reloaded with fresh magazines.
The zombies were less than twenty yards away when the three National Guard vehicles got underway. The drivers followed Randy’s lead and kept their speed down to a level that would encourage the zombies to follow them.
“That’s good,” Herb said. I want to empty Ridgedale Road of the zombies. If this works out, then we can go back to try to locate the person in need of rescue.”
“God, it must have been bad back there for whoever was trapped by so many of the zombies,” Randy observed.
“We’ll see if we can get to them, but before we can do that, we’re going to have to eliminate this threat,” Herb replied. Then he said, “You keep a close eye on the zombies and our people for a minute. I need to contact Sergeant Shannon about this and see if he approves the mission. This is too risky for me to authorize it on my own.”
“It’s a good plan. You go ahead and make your call. I’ll be watching in the rear view mirror,” Randy replied.
“Thanks.”
Herb put through a call to Sergeant Shannon who listened to the briefing of the new developments on the highway. “Do you need reinforcements out there?” the sergeant asked.
“That would be great. We’ll be trying to clear the highway of the zombies, but there are a lot of them. We already rescued one refugee, so it’s possible that there are several more back there.”
“I’ll see what I can do, but we’re working the Walmart thing right now. More rats turned up with the parasites. It’s bad there. About thirty of the damned things cornered some employees in the break room. Everyone in the room at the time was bitten, and some tried to hide that fact, so now we are dealing with irate relatives that showed up demanding their kin be released,” Sergeant Shannon explained.
“Okay, I see the problem. Just leave this to us. I think we can handle it, although we’ll probably use most of our supply of ammo doing it,” Herb explained.
“That’s fine. Frankly, I’m glad you think you can handle it. This is turning into a mob scene here. Oh and don’t worry about how much ammo you use. We got a shipment in this morning. The Governor wanted to be sure his guardsmen didn’t experience a scenario where we run out of ammunition.”
“All right, then you’re approving my plan?” Herb asked for formal clarification.
“Yes, as you laid it out to me. I think it’s a solid strategy. Just don’t get separated. If it gets too hairy, forget about attempting the rescue until you can be reinforced.”
“We’re on it, Sergeant. Good luck at Walmart.”
Herb put away his phone. “We’re a go for the mission,” he said to Randy.
“Are you ready to stop now for the first attack set?”
“Just as soon as I reload your rifle,” Herb said as he reached for Randy’s M4.
“Thanks, I haven’t had the time to do that.”
“At least now I know where all the zombies went,” Herb said as he slammed home a fresh magazine in Randy’s rifle and then worked the charging handle, chambering a round. He checked the safety, saw that it was set to fire, and then set it to safe.
“You’re good to go. Weapon hot, safety engaged,” he said.
“Ready to stop?” Randy asked.
“Yes, let’s do this,” Herb responded. “I’ll pass you your weapon once we stop, and then we bail out and light up the zombies. Leave the vehicle running though.”
“You’ve got it,” Randy said. He braked the vehicle, but let off several times to let the team members behind them know they were about to stop, and then he brought the Humvee to a smooth stop.
The doors on the National Guard vehicles were thrust open and the men emerged ready to fight. Herb saw that they were about 200 yards from the zombies, which was well within the operational range of their weapons.
He spared a moment to look at the female they had rescued. Someone had given her a bottle of water, which she sipped as he stared at her. She wasn’t aware of his inspection. Her attention was riveted on the approaching zombies. Her eyes held a haunted aspect, causing him to wonder what she had seen and endured in the days since the creatures had overrun her community.
“Don’t let them get me,” she said to no one in particular as she stared at the zombies.
“We won’t,” he promised.
Herb and Randy stood side by side and prepared to take the fight to the zombies that were approaching. “We leave when they close to within forty yards. Fire when ready,” Herb said, and then he shot a zombie. His optical sight was set for 100 yards, so he had to compensate for that by aiming high. He didn’t compensate enough. His first shot hit the zombie he was targeting in the neck and was not a clean kill. Other members of the team fired as well.
The men settled into a rhythm of acquiring a new target and firing. Their minds took in the information supplied by their eyes regarding the placement of the bullets with regard to their sight pictures through their optical sights and they made corrections automatically. They functioned as a good fire team, and were able to keep pace with the zombie advance for a few seconds, but as the slower moving main group reached the kill zone, they were forced to abandon their position and lead them further along the highway.
“Let’s go about a mile and stop again,” Herb instructed his friend.
This time when the men emerged, they saw that the zombies hadn’t fanned out along the highway as they had before. “They stayed
together this time,” Private Sutton observed.
“Yes, they did. I think we killed the fastest ones already,” Herb pointed out.
This time, the men fired more accurately than they had the previous stop because they were more familiar with the ranges they were firing from and the sight pictures they needed to acquire. Zombie after zombie fell to their rifles, but then, during a lull in the firing while several of the men were reloading their rifles, the frantic screams of the woman alerted them to danger.
Herb spun on his heel in time to see several zombies coming across the median and heading for them. He fired as rapidly as he could, downing most of the zombies, but one made it to the truck and reached across it for the woman. None of the men could shoot at the creature because the woman was between it and them.
Randy slung his rifle over his shoulder and ran toward the truck. The terrified passenger had moved her body as far from the zombie as possible. Randy caught her under the arms and lifted her from the truck, pulling her over the side.
The woman reacted by fighting him. Her elbow slammed into the side of his face as she struggled to extricate herself from his clutches. “Calm down, lady!” he shouted.
Herb stepped around his friend and fired a shot into the forehead of the zombie that was attempting to climb into the bed of the truck to get closer to its prey. “Mount up, everyone!” he shouted as a glance told him that the remaining zombies had already closed the gap to within forty yards.
“Where the hell did those things come from?” asked Randy as he lifted the woman back over the sidewall of the truck.
“Later. Let’s go. Don’t wait for us this time,” Herb instructed the other drivers who had already scrambled inside their trucks.
The two trucks drove past the Humvee as Herb and Randy were closing their doors. Herb could hear the eerie moaning sound that the zombies were making quite clearly. “Floor it,” he urged Randy.
A zombie’s hand pounded on the driver’s side window beside Randy’s head as he put the transmission in gear and pushed the accelerator to the floor. The Humvee fishtailed a bit, causing its rear end to slide sideways and crash into the zombie beside Randy as they rolled forward.
“That was too damned close,” Randy said as they closed the gap between the others and their vehicle.
“These things always seem to stray off roads and into the countryside for some reason,” Herb noted. “We’ve seen it in the past, and I was aware of it, but didn’t take it into account with our strategy. I screwed up.”
“There was no way you could know they’d do that. The last time could have just been a fluke. These things aren’t supposed to be intelligent,” Randy countered.
“I don’t think they are. Who knows what could have set them on that path. I think they are just easily distracted by any form of prey. Once they start moving in a certain direction, they may detour from it only if forced to do so, or if they spot other prey,” Herb replied as they sped past the other vehicles that had slowed to permit them to pass.
Herb reloaded their rifles with fresh magazines. “We’re going to run out of ammo at this rate,” he observed.
They soon pulled over again. This time, Herb instructed Randy to give them a 300 yard gap. “Get the woman into the back of the Humvee,” he instructed Randy as he got out.
“Come with me,” Randy said as he offered the woman his hand. “You’ll be safer in the back seat of the car.”
The woman nodded her acceptance and permitted him to help her down to the asphalt, but then pulled herself free and walked over to the car. She stopped before she got in and said, “I’m sorry about earlier. I thought you were one of them.”
“I know, and I understood that. No hard feelings,” Randy responded.
Without another word, the woman entered the Humvee and closed the door behind her.
“Is everybody still good on ammo?” Herb enquired.
“I’m down to four magazines,” Private Sutton said.
“Same here,” Randy stated.
“Okay, this time we try to finish them. From the looks of it, there are only about thirty left, but let’s not forget to keep an eye on our flanks.”
“You’ve got that right,” Randy said. “That last ambush was way too close for comfort.”
“Okay, let’s light them up!” Herb said as he brought his rifle to his shoulder.
One by one, the zombies fell to the rifle fire of the guardsmen until only a handful remained. They still had plenty of ammunition, and the creatures were over seventy yards away. It looked as if they were about to enjoy an easy victory when a truck came roaring up the highway from the south.
“What the hell? Is that a zombie standing in the back of that truck?” asked Private Sutton.
“That’s what it looks like to me,” Randy said. He raised his rifle to his shoulder and got the zombie in his sights, but the driver of the pickup truck slammed into three of the zombies standing on the highway, which rocked the truck and caused the creature in the back to fall over the side.
The man driving the truck slid to a halt near the guardsmen and jumped out of the cab with an antique M1 Garand chambered in the venerated .30-06. The man looked into the back of his truck, saw it was empty, and then proceeded to finish off the five remaining zombies.
“Whew,” the man said when he turned and wiped the sweat off his face. “The air conditioner doesn’t work on my truck, and with that thing in the back, I didn’t dare so much as crack a window.” Then, he looked at the guardsmen curiously and said, “Are you the guys I need to thank for getting those demons away from my house so I could escape?”
“Was that you firing somewhere back of Ridgedale Road?” Herb asked the man.
“Yep. I saw the demons leaving and figured some people must be nearby. I waited for a bit and then fired two sets of three shots, figuring that would draw a man’s attention. That way, anyone in the area should see them coming before it was too late.”
“We were about to come looking for you. Are there any other survivors back there?” asked Herb.
“It’s possible, I suppose, but I don’t much think so. I only managed to survive because I stayed up in my attic and stayed quiet. Those demons broke through windows to get to anyone they spotted.”
“You weren’t bitten were you?” Herb asked.
“No. I managed to avoid that, but that thing in the back of my truck scared the hell out of me as I drove off the highway to get around some of them that you boys must have killed down the road. It came from out of the brush along the side of the road and managed to get in the truck bed as I was trying to get back onto the asphalt.”
“We’re heading into town. There’s a road block set up there. Stop and get the police to clear you and you’ll be fine,” Herb said.
“I’ll follow you men to the roadblock then,” the stranger said.
Chapter 11
Armageddon
The team stopped at the civilian roadblock, located beneath the overpass on Highway 31 and explained to law enforcement officials that the community on and around Ridgedale Road had been overrun by the zombies. The two civilians would be examined by EMTs inside a modified bloodmobile, where samples of their blood would be drawn for testing. If the emergency medical technicians gave them a clean bill of health, then they would be permitted to enter the community. If not, then they would enter quarantine. Both the man and the woman had seemed eager to take the test to prove that they were not carrying the parasites, so that they could move on and get further away from the zombies. Therefore, Herb felt certain that they were clean or at least that they believed they were.
As he headed back for the Humvee, Herb saw two men in decontamination gear hosing down the front end of the pickup truck the man had used to escape the Ridgedale Road community. They gathered the larger chunks of flesh and threw them inside a burn barrel where they would be burned by the propane-fed fire. The authorities at the blockade used the drum to dispose of anything they felt was a contamination hazar
d.
The guardsmen were loading up into their vehicles when Herb got a call from Sergeant Shannon. “Corporal, we’re going on lockdown,” Sergeant Shannon explained on the phone as Herb’s team was making the drive back to the armory.
“What about the mission on Highway 31?” Herb asked.
“It’s being scrubbed. Look, I don’t know what the hell is going on any more than you do. Just get your ass back to the armory.”
“Sure, Sergeant, but I need to stop by my place to feed my dog,” Herb explained. He knew the Sergeant had a soft place in his heart for dogs and felt sure the man would approve the request.
“Negative. Get back to the armory at once. I’ll try to let you go tend the animal later today, but we have to assemble in the main room ASAP for an important briefing with a Homeland Security agent.”
“But, Sergeant...”
Don’t argue with me, Bennett! I just left a full on riot at Walmart because of this recall order! You get your team back to the armory immediately! That’s an order!”
“We’ll be there in minutes,” Herb said, and then because he was irritated, he killed the connection.
“Did you just hang up on Shannon?” asked Randy.
Herb glanced at his friend sheepishly. The broad smile on Randy’s face was infectious and a matching smile soon flitted across his face, but that smile was brief. “Yes, I guess I did. Did you hear what he was saying?”
“Some of it, yes. It sounds like something big is in the works.” Randy shrugged. “I’m sure he’ll let you go feed Ox after the assembly or later tonight. You know he is crazy about dogs.”
“Yes, but he also ordered me to shoot him on the bridge that first day we saw him.”
“That was when he thought the animal might be carrying the disease. I think he would have died by now if that had been the case.”
“That’s what I think too,” Herb stated. “You’d better step on it, buddy. Shannon is already irate as hell. There’s no sense in antagonizing the man.”
“Right,” Randy said as he increased the speed of the Humvee, even though they were only a half mile from the armory.
