by Lundy, W. J.
“Keys are in it,” Stephens whispered just as they heard heavy shoes striking pavement in the distance and moving back in their direction.
Jacob ducked behind the grill of the patrol car. Without speaking, Stephens and Murphy moved back to flank him, where they watched and waited. As the footsteps grew louder, Murphy stood straight up, holding his rifle in front of him, the stock in his shoulder and the barrel still pointed down at the street. Stephens did the same, side stepping and using the vehicle for cover. Stephens looked down at Jacob cowering. “Stand up fool; get your weapon out,” he hissed under his breath. “And be ready, just in case.”
Jacob forced himself to his feet and raised the small rifle in the direction of the footsteps just as two figures emerged from the shadows. Both were police officers wearing black body armor; one cradled a shotgun, the other walked with an empty holster. They continued moving forward then stopped as they saw the trio formed up around the patrol car. The officers didn’t speak, or even as much as look at each other to communicate.
Their movements were jerky. One stepped awkwardly to the left, trying to focus on them while the one with the shotgun took a quick step forward and brought the weapon up in his arms.
“Stop; we’re with the Army,” Murphy said in a commanding voice just loud enough to be heard.
Without any warning, the unarmed officer ran at Stephens, a scream erupting from the man’s mouth. Frightened, Jacob stepped back as the other officer raised the shotgun and fired. Jacob could hear and feel the buckshot zip past his head. In tandem, Stephens and Murphy brought up their weapons and fired. Jacob watched the soldiers’ rounds tear holes through the officers’ vests. The policemen dropped to the ground dead; the shotgun clacked as it hit the pavement.
“What the hell was that?” Stephens said, moving forward and kicking the weapon away.
Jacob quickly rounded the vehicle where Murphy was already leaning over one of the officers.
“Holy shit, you guys just killed two cops!” Jacob said.
Murphy looked back at him shaking his head. “I don’t think so,” he said, lifting his gloved hand. The black oily blood clung to his fingers and dripped off in thick strings, like heavy paint.
Stephens pulled out a knife and cut a long gash down the other officer’s arm.
“No! Ahh, what the hell are you doing?” Jacob gasped in disgust.
The skin split open, revealing a dark oozing gelatinized flesh. “Yeah, these ain’t cops. We gotta get the fuck outta here, Sergeant.”
Hearing the sound of tree limbs snapping, Jacob turned his head toward the woods. More were coming, obviously attracted by the sound of gunfire.
“I said we gotta go,” Stephens repeated as he ran back to the patrol car.
Jacob turned and ran after him. Stephens was already in the driver’s side with the car running before Jacob jumped into the backseat. The passenger’s door closed with Murphy slapping the dash and yelling. “Go, go, go!”
Stephens hit the gas, the tires spun, and the car pulled away before the first of them broke the tree line. Jacob watched out of the passenger’s window as several of them ran onto the road and turned to follow the patrol car. They passed deserted cars rolled to the sides of the road, houses with broken windows and doors left to hang open, and the occasional abandoned body on a sidewalk. Stephens drove at high speed with the lights off until he hit a side street and quickly slowed to make the turn in time, the engine roaring with every maneuver. He drove for several more minutes, pulled to the curb of an empty road, coasted to a stop, and cut the engine.
Jacob looked out and knew they were only blocks from the park. There were no homes here; it was a long, empty street. A river ran parallel to the road on the left and he knew they would cross a bridge ahead that would take them to the park’s main gate. To the right stood a high “noise pollution” fence that sheltered the high-priced homes on the other side from the traffic sounds.
Stephens pressed a button, and the cars doors all locked simultaneously. “Looks like a nice enough neighborhood, but why take any chances.” He grabbed the CB radio, clicked the mic, and scanned through all of the channels only to receive interference and static. “Nothing; we can’t get our comms on this radio without the frequencies loaded. Cops must be off the net,” he said, clicking it off and letting the mic hit the floor.
“What the hell happened back there?” Jacob asked.
Murphy looked at him over the backseat. “I’d say we got away. Were you hit?”
“No, I wasn’t hit… but he shot at us!”
“Yeah, they do that sometimes,” Stephens whispered. Keeping his hands on the steering wheel, he continued looking straight ahead.
“What do you mean, they do that sometimes?” Jacob asked, frustrated.
Stephens shook his head and leaned back in the seat. “It’s like some of them know. Like if they was cops, they keep doing cop shit. They get smarter the longer they’re out there. I’ve seen soldiers still holding their rifles and walking patrol while surrounded by more of the darkness. Carpenters holding hammers. Butchers with knives. Most of ’em are like what we saw back there, you know… like zombies or something, but sometimes… yeah, sometimes they shoot at us.”
Stephens let out a long sigh. “But I don’t think they want to kill us,” he said. “I think they want to take us; you notice they leave the people they kill? It’s only the living they keep, and their own dead.”
“Why do you think they do that? What do they want?” Jacob asked.
“Us,” Murphy said, turning back and looking ahead to stare out the windshield. “They want to replace us.”
“You guys have lost it,” Jacob said looking away; he knew they were right, but he wasn’t ready to accept it. “What are we doing here? Why aren’t we going to the park?”
“Too dangerous,” Stephens said. “We approach at night and the guards will light us up.”
“So, we just flash the lights or something… so they know we’re normal,” Jacob suggested.
“Bro, you ain’t fucking getting it! The darkness has lights too. They have everything we have; the only way to know the difference is to get up close. You gotta see the shit in their eyes, man. Most of ’em scream and run at you, but some—like those cops back there—those ones will wait until they’re close before they show any sign. No, we can’t go to the park tonight. The park doesn’t allow any traffic in or out after dark anyway.”
Jacob sat back looking at his feet. He looked back up at the soldiers in the front seat.
“This isn’t happening; it can’t be.”
“Oh, it’s happening, Jacob. It’s happening everywhere,” Murphy whispered.
“Everywhere?” Jacob asked.
Murphy reached down and clicked on the car’s FM radio. It scanned over several stations before hitting on one, another public service announcement in a monotonous voice warning people to stay indoors. Murphy pressed the scan button again. The FM dial scanned and hit more stations all relaying the same sort of recorded messages—government spokesmen and small-town officials reading prepared statements of little facts and false promises. Murphy switched to AM, skipped ahead, and stopped on a solemn man’s voice.
“We’re all in a bad way, folks. Judgment day is here. Satan’s army is marching on the White House as we speak. There is still time to repent, people. Won’t you pray with me?”
Murphy hit the button again. The digital numbers scrolled by and stopped. A man was speaking calmly and reading a list of names, one after another, in a steady cadence.
“Davis, Martin, 4. Jones, Douglas, 3, Roberts, Alice, alone.”
“What is he talking about?” Jacob asked, speaking over the narrator.
“Those are the families evacuated; the name of the sponsor and number of family members,” Stephens answered. “With no phones, it’s the only way to get the word out.”
“Riley, Steven 3, Marcus, Joseph, 2, Silvas, Richard, 2.”
“Evacuated where? The park? Is th
at where they took my family?”
“No; the list comes from north of here in Chicago. They’re taking the ferries out on Lake Michigan,” Murphy said.
“Ferries? No way, too many people,” Jacob said.
Murphy sighed and shook his head. He opened a leather tool bag on the floor of the patrol car and found two boxes of 12-gauge shells. He opened the box and started reloading the shotgun he’d recovered from the dead officer.
“Was… too many people; not anymore.” Murphy pressed the scan button again, finding a station just as a fatigued voice was giving a graphic content warning to the listening audience. The broadcaster’s voice faded to a recording filled with static and crackles of background noise. A reporter was on the street, in the middle of chaos.
Jacob listened to the man breathing rapidly as he ran, the microphone clicking and banging off of objects. He heard the man tumble, and the mic went dead with a loud crack before clacking back to life.
“This is real; they are firing on us right now! Remnants of the Army National Guard are firing on our position. I repeat… members on the Illinois National Guard have joined the protestors and are shooting at us! Whoever—whatever—they are, they are advancing! I don’t know how much longer I can report on this channel…” The microphone again faded in and out as gunfire erupted around the reporter’s position. The sounds seemed to swallow the man’s voice.
“If anyone is listening, we are located at Northerly Island. State Police and the Chicago Police Department are here, but we need your help. You can’t hide anymore; you need to fight. Get out of your homes and come to Northerly Island. Come to the Castle and bring any weapons you have…” More sounds of automatic gunfire and explosions drowned out the recording and suddenly the sound went to static. The broadcaster was back but Murphy reached over and shut off the radio.
“It’s like this everywhere. It started small, with the riots, and now it’s come to this,” Murphy whispered. “When they called me up, they said it was for riot duty downtown—we didn’t last more than a day. We were stupid; we came rolling into town in our trucks. We put up yellow tape and wooden barriers, like it was some kind of peaceful protest. At first, they ignored the barricades and stayed away from the roadblocks; then we watched them take down pedestrians and the weak right in front of our eyes. They ignored us, just staying far enough away so that we couldn’t stop them. We were ordered to hold; to contain the line… that the police were supposed to do the arresting.
“After dark, they started to bunch up together. Their numbers had multiplied. Suddenly they came at us—not trying to get past us—they actually wanted us! They would reach through the shields and snatch people. They’d pull someone back, and they’d pass them deeper into the mob like a baton. I watched many of my own men dragged off, and there was nothing I could do to help them. The normal stuff didn’t work. Tear gas, rubber bullets. Sure, fire hoses knocked them down, but didn’t stop ’em.
“We fought hard, but we couldn’t hold them back. By dawn, we were using lethal ammo… but they still came. We… we were killing them by the hundreds, but they still came and grabbed us.”
Murphy pressed back against the seat and took a long drink of water from his drinking tube. He let out a long sigh. “Just before dawn, orders came to pull back. We loaded up in the trucks and prepared to move out, but…”
“But what?” Jacob asked.
“I saw them,” Murphy whispered.
Stephens nodded. “I know, brother. I saw it too; we all did.”
“What? What did you see?” Jacob asked impatiently.
“The soldiers—the ones we lost, our friends. They were back but changed… still wearing their riot gear. They marched with the mobs,” Murphy said.
Jacob leaned back in the seat. “This is all bullshit. It had to have been something else. Maybe another unit, a group you didn’t know about, in stolen uniforms.”
Murphy nodded and turned his head to look out the window. “Yeah, maybe you’re right.”
Stephens started the car’s engine and put it into gear. “We need a place to hole up.”
Chapter Ten
The patrol car rolled slowly down the center of the empty road as Jacob surveyed the small industrial park that was coming up on their left side. Only a block from the two-lane road that led to the park encampment, it would make for a perfect hide.
Stephens slowed the car until it was rolling just above idle speed, then turned into a paved drive that faced a building with a double overhead door. The wheels crunched as the car maneuvered over broken asphalt. A large sign at the front of the building labeled it a commercial heating and cooling sales shop. Stephens eased the patrol car forward, then stopped it in front of the door—close, but not so close that he couldn’t turn and flee if need be—then reached down and shut off the ignition.
“Why here?” Jacob whispered, still frustrated they were not going straight to the park. He was growing anxious with worry about his family.
“This building looks solid enough: only one door in the front, no windows, steel overheads,” Stephens listed off patiently as he dropped his arm and secured his rifle. He reached up, popped the dome light cover, and removed the bulb. He held a hand on the door and used his other to slowly pull the latch so that the door quietly released under pressure while Murphy did the same on the passenger’s side.
Jacob waited and watched as they quietly let their doors swing shut. Stephens opened the back door, and Jacob realized for the first time that there were no handles on the inside of the rear passenger’s doors. Stephens handed Jacob the shotgun they’d retrieved from the dead cop. “Here take this; it’ll get you farther than that rifle,” he said.
Jacob nodded his acceptance and stepped out of the car.
Stephens moved to the rear of the car and used the key to open the trunk. A large black gear bag was inside; Murphy reached in and opened the zipper.
Inside were a police carbine and a black tactical vest already loaded with three, thirty-round magazines. Murphy removed the rifle and set it to the side, then pulled out the heavy vest and placed it next to the rifle. The rest of the bag was filled with road flares, a protective mask, and a baton. Another bag was filled with tools and other emergency gear. Murphy closed the bags and pushed them aside. Searching the rest of the trunk, he found nothing further of use.
He waved Jacob forward and placed the vest in his hands. It was heavy. Police was stenciled across the back in white, bold letters, and an embroidered badge patch was affixed to the front center. Several loops held zip ties and other bits of equipment. Jacob pulled the vest tighter and let the weight adjust in his arms. Murphy took the rifle and opened the sling, hanging it over Jacob’s back.
“Come on, man; what am I, a mule?” Jacob whispered, protesting.
“Just until we get inside; then I’ll show you how to put the gear on,” Murphy said.
After one more sweep of the trunk, Stephens slowly lowered the lid and pressed until he heard the latch click. The soldier reached up and dropped his NODs over his eyes, then gave Murphy a thumbs up. Murphy looked at Jacob. “Just follow us in and press your back against the wall.”
Jacob nodded back to the man as Murphy pulled down his own goggles and followed Stephens to the front door of the business.
Stephens moved to the right of the door with Murphy standing just behind him. He reached out an arm and felt the handle move in his hand. The door pushed in easily and glided open, staying that way. Stephens sidestepped to the lip of the door, lowered the barrel of his rifle, tapped it twice against the doorjamb, and then pulled back. The three of them silently stood, holding their breath and listening for any sound of movement.
After several agonizing minutes, Stephens stepped into the doorway and dropped into the room with Murphy close behind him. Jacob moved in quickly after and, as instructed, pushed his back to the wall and waited. Murphy reached back and closed the door, the room quickly falling pitch black. Jacob couldn’t see a hand in front of h
is face; he pressed against the wall and began sweating while holding the heavy gear in his trembling arms.
He could hear the soldiers’ footsteps as they moved deeper into the space. Their sounds of movement reflected off walls and played tricks on Jacob’s mind as he tried to imagine the layout of the room. The soldiers’ steps continued to move away; then, suddenly, the room flashed in bright light. Jacob squinted, pulled up a hand to shield his eyes, and heard men yelling from a loft. Jacob watched as his friends peeled off their night vision devices and raised their hands.
Bright handheld spotlights painted them in blinding beams. Armed men chaotically yelled for them to show their hands. Jacob dropped the gear and thrust up his arms. He was ordered to move forward and online with the others. Whoever held the spotlight was using it effectively; they hit Jacob right in the face with the beam, and he couldn’t see anything while blinded by the light. He tried looking away but found it impossible to escape the beam. Jacob stepped forward, nearly bumping into Murphy who was speaking low, trying to identify himself to the unknown men in the loft.
Jacob heard boots clank as they ran down a set of metal stairs. The other men continued to order them to keep their arms up. A man approached, pushing a barrel into Jacob’s chest and yelled for him to look straight ahead and open his eyes and mouth. Jacob struggled to peel open his eyes against the blinding light. He heard the man yell, “Clear!”
The lights’ beams were directed away and shut off. Small portable lanterns filled the room with a softer glow. A man in jeans and a Carhartt work coat stepped forward. He held a military-looking rifle in his arms and had a revolver tucked into his waistband.
He looked Jacob over and moved to the soldiers as more men, still holding their weapons on them, walked down the stairs.
“Where in the hell did you all come from?” the man asked.
Murphy began to speak, but the man held up his hand and pointed at Jacob. “Nope, I’m asking him.”
