by JT Sawyer
“There’s nothing that says we have to follow a rigid schedule. The sun will still rise tomorrow. We can be airborne whenever you want.”
She wiped the sand pattern clear and tamped it down with her foot. “Two days from now it is, amigo. I’ll have everyone ready and then you can fly us back to the land of the free.”
“You got it, mi Hermana,” said Matias.
Carlie felt heart-warmed to be referred to as a sister and it lightened her movement as she stepped away.
Matias called to her. “Hey.”
“Yeah.”
“You’ve done well to keep our heads above water for so long. You’ve gotten us far, Carlie. Muchas Gracias.”
She smiled and bowed her head slightly at him. “It’s been a team effort and I’m sure glad you’re on mine.”
****
The next evening, after a steambaked dinner of sea bass and crab cooked up by Alejandro, Carlie went over the route and plan one more time with the group. Shane and Matias re-iterated their familiarity with the north-central region of Mexico and their plan to locate one of the federale airstrips for refueling.
The rest of the time was spent doing weapons inspection, loading magazines, and stocking their packs with food, water, and medical supplies. When they had finished everyone relaxed around the upper level of the lookout, sipping on their wineglasses in between recounting stories from the past seven weeks followed by an awkward silence, gazing out into the inky black night as the cacophony of cicadas kept match with their own internal dialogue of what was to come. Before retreating to their sleeping areas, each person bade Alejandro farewell with hearty embraces and the promise of a brighter future when their trails might cross again.
Chapter 25
Eliza emerged from her teal sleeping bag and looked around. Willis was already up and standing watch to her left, his foot keeping the door slightly ajar. As she slithered out from her bedroll, she immediately grabbed her Sig-Sauer pistol and shoved it into her belt. Eliza stood up and pulled on a winter jacket that they had scavenged from an RV a few days earlier and walked over to Willis.
“Morning, Eliza.”
She nodded at him. “Is it my imagination or is it getting colder? Last night was chilly.”
Willis thrust his chin towards the window. “That mountain range in the distance only had a little snow on it a few days ago. I think winter is rolling in heavy now at the higher elevations.”
“I was so used to the heat of Tucson that I forgot what wintertime felt like. It’s only mid-October though. Do they usually get snow here that early?”
“I once did an evasive driving course in Salt Lake City south of here and it snowed on us in September. The western states are always unpredictable given all the mountain ranges and canyons which seem to create their own unique weather systems.”
“How much further to Fort Lewis from our present location?”
“It’s another 400 miles,” he said, squatting down by the baseboard to grab a can of pinto beans laid out next to their backpacks. “We need to commandeer another vehicle and be on our way before it gets any colder.” He tossed her the can and then glanced back through the miniscule opening. “Grab some breakfast and then we can be on our way,” he said to her. “I saw a police impoundment lot on our way over here yesterday. Those vehicles may be our answer if they haven’t had their fuel tanks tapped out already. Besides, isn’t it time you learned some vehicle acquisition skills?” he said with a grin, passing his hand through her hair.
“You know, if I had asked you about any of this stuff a month ago, you would’ve said something like, ‘Sorry, that’s for Secret Service eyes only’ or some James Bond shit like that. Now I can’t get you to shut up about it,” she said, kissing him on the cheek in between a spoonful of beans.
“Yeah, well, a month ago I wouldn’t have even looked your way except to make sure your personal space was secure and now I’m thinking about treating you to a proper date when we get to Fort Lewis—strictly off the books, of course.” He paused and pulled his eyes away from her. Willis reached forward to grab his MP-7. “We should get packed up. While you’re grabbing some chow, I want you to run through your dry-fire pistol drills and then your knife-fighting moves again. Remember that the novice practices until he gets it right while…”
“While the expert practices until he can’t get it wrong…I know…I know,” she said, smiling at him as she tossed the empty bean can in the corner.
Willis was standing near the door, which was partially ajar, letting some cool fresh air into the otherwise stagnant storage compartment, when he heard the muffled sound of a woman shouting.
He opened the metal door an inch further and peered out. A lady clad in jeans and a green sweater was running down the hill to the west, heading towards town. Her stumbling gait revealed her fatigue and she kept turning back over her right shoulder and screaming.
Behind her were three men on ATVs. All three were dressed in mismatched cowboy jean jackets and camouflage fatigues. Mounted on the handlebars of each rig were M4 rifles. As the woman crested the hill and ran down the gravel road away from the weather station where Willis was standing, she lost her footing and somersaulted down the opposite side, landing in a thicket of rabbitbrush, her long brunette hair getting tangled in the branches.
The three men sped up and came to a halt before her then disembarked from their vehicles. They surrounded the young woman, who was backpedaling in terror as she squealed for help. She was clutching the right side of her ribs, which revealed a splatter of blood.
Willis had already stepped outside the door with his rifle and scanned the area to his right side and rear for other hostiles. He moved up to a low boulder on the left side of the road, kneeling on one leg and aiming his rifle. As the first goon slumped forward with a rear headshot, the next man was struck in the side of the jaw, swiveling his torso as another round caught him in the neck. Willis saw the third figure, an overweight thug with long sideburns and a green bandanna, turn and pull out his pistol. Before the man had raised the weapon, Willis planted two rounds in the right shoulder region. This caused the portly figure to topple backwards into the shrubs.
As Willis stood and re-examined the surrounding countryside for other hostiles, Eliza burst past him and ran down the hill towards the woman, her rifle slung on her shoulder.
The disheveled woman was crawling away when Eliza came up alongside her.
“Hey, it’s OK. They can’t hurt you anymore.”
The woman tried to get up but tripped on some loose gravel and plunked straight down. She was holding her side and moaning while retreating against a pile of rocks. She reached back and grabbed an oblong stone, raising it up. Eliza stepped back and motioned with her hands that she wasn’t a threat.
The woman glanced over at the three men slumped on the ground. She started to lower the rock when she saw Willis standing over the injured thug in the bushes.
“We’re not going to hurt you.”
The woman lowered the rock and began fluttering her eyelids as she began to faint and slump backwards. Eliza rushed forward and caught the woman before she collapsed. She was pale and struggled to lift her head as Eliza tried to support her limp figure.
“Where did you come from?”
The woman slowly raised a grimy finger and pointed to the east. “You have to go. There are more of them coming. They’re luring more zombies back this way again.” She sat up, wincing as she held on to her side. “They’re coming.” She gasped in air and tried to speak as her chest quaked with spasms from her internal injuries. “Get to Yakima. You’ll be safe. Tell my people there that Jennifer told you to…to come.” The woman’s eyes became glassy, the irises reflecting a passing cloud overhead.
Eliza looked behind her and saw Willis standing with his boot on the injured man’s shoulder, asking questions. The man was clearly in pain but only responding with racial slurs and threats about what his friends would do to him. Willis slid the heel of his boot along
the man’s throat. Eliza averted her eyes and then heard a crunching sound as the thug went silent.
Willis walked up beside Eliza and squatted down. “We need to get out of here ASAP. Let’s use those ATVs to head back towards town to the police impoundment lot I mentioned. From there we’ll see about acquiring another vehicle and being on our way.”
As the woman lay lifeless in Eliza’s arms, her long brunette hair fell back from her face and shoulders, revealing a leather collar around her neck identical to the one that she had seen on the mutant that killed General Adams.
Chapter 26
Shane tapped the surface of his scratched wristwatch and looked at the time: 0820—we should be good on fuel for another hour and arriving at the federale airstrip by then. Let’s hope that place is still intact. The last three hours since they left their island sanctuary near Cancun had seen them flying over desert landscape that was interspersed with burnt-out cities, homesteads, and entire regions devoid of human life. The endless trudge of the undead flowing over the countryside below, like currents of hungry fire-ants, provided the sole indication of movement in the arid topography. If any people were alive, they were deep in some wilderness bunker or in an underground lair in the city. It looked like the dead still ruled the daylight hours and man had been reduced to a low-level scavenger dwelling on the fringes of their once great urban centers.
The scenes below reminded Shane of many missions in war-torn nations in Africa but this time there were no eager village children rushing through the streets awaiting military aid. This time only the undead provided a skyward gaze as they greedily pawed at the air.
By mid-morning they had reached an abandoned airstrip that was nestled in a valley choked with Saguaro and Organ pipe cactus, their columnar forms the only signs of life in the otherwise barren region. As Matias circled the region, they saw a small Quonset hut hangar, two Cessnas, and a tan jeep.
“Looks good so far,” said Shane. “Now let’s hope there’s fuel and no tangos, eh.”
The helicopter landed softly on the helipad near the rear of the tarnished metal hangar. Everyone hopped out and formed a defensive perimeter around the platform while Matias checked on the gas pumps.
“These look full but they’re locked.”
Jared came over and glanced at the hefty padlocks securing the main activation lever that was at the base of the pump. “These would take me some time to pick even with the right tools. What are the chances of locating the keys?”
“Let’s find out,” said Carlie. “Matias—you and Pavel stay here while the rest of us check out the hangar.”
The half-moon-shaped structure was two hundred feet long by eighty feet wide and made of corrugated steel that was bolted to a cement slab. It had one main bay door wide enough for a plane to fit through and two doors beside it.
As Carlie approached she peered through the dust-covered security window. “I can’t see anything.” She grabbed the handle and turned it while the others prepared for a dynamic room entry. As she yanked on the handle and began to push the heavy door in, a rotund creature with wrinkled cheeks flung itself at her. Its ulcerated face was yellow with oozing red sores. It snapped its mouth viciously at her as she slammed the butt of her rifle into its hip, causing it to spin towards Jared, who quickly thrust his fixed blade into the side of its skull.
“Shit,” Carlie yelled as she looked through the doorway to see a half-dozen creatures rushing to the entrance. She reached back and grabbed the handle, yanking the door shut. “What are those things doing inside there? We’re in the middle of nowhere.”
“Probably the flight maintenance crew or mechanics,” said Amy. “Maybe they were trying to make it to a plane here and got infected?”
“We need those keys,” said Shane as the zombies inside slammed themselves against the door frame, rocking the corrugated panels to either side.
“Jared and I will go around to the other side and see if we can sneak in that way while you keep them distracted here,” Carlie said.
After trotting around the back, Carlie slowly opened the elephant-gray door to peer inside. She could see the cluster of creatures still frantically pawing at the door on the far side of the hangar. She looked back at Jared while lowering her rifle. “We can’t risk using firearms inside as there are probably a lot of volatile fluids we could set off.” She slid her machete out and coiled her arm into a fighting position while getting ready to open the door further.
Jared grimaced as he withdrew his blade. “If I never had to slice open one of those rotting cantaloupe heads again, I’d be a happy man.”
“Such is life, eh?”
Once they were inside, they slid past a truck and made their way along the left wall, ducking between oil drums and crates of airplane parts. Thirty feet from the zombies was a wall-mounted cabinet with a clipboard beside it. Using hand signals, Carlie motioned back to Jared for him to move forward while she provided cover. He lowered into a hunch and crept over to a workbench then up to the white cabinet. It was locked so he slid the tip of his blade under the lip of the door and began prying. A second later, the flimsy lock broke, causing the door to swing open, sending a few dozen keys clanking onto the floor. The six creatures immediately stopped clawing at the door and turned with interest towards Jared.
He looked back at Carlie who tilted her head and smirked. Without hesitation she lifted a heavy lug-wrench off a nearby table and used an overhand serve to fling the chunk of steel at the nearest zombie. The yielding flesh on its forehead made the sound of a fist sinking into dough, the beast quickly collapsing onto the gritty cement floor. Jared was busy scooping up all the keys while Carlie began engaging the others.
“A little help in here,” she shouted as she whacked another across the top of its skull, removing four inches of its dome like it was a lid on a sugar jar. Shane and Amy burst through the door and attacked the others, dropping one each with overhand machete strikes to the back of their putrid heads. Then Shane shuffled forward like a fencer, moving after a lanky creature wearing greasy coveralls that was headed towards Jared. Shane grabbed a steel mallet off the workbench and vigorously slammed it down on its cranium, which made the sound of a tree branch splintering.
Carlie had just finished slaying the last beast when Shane walked up to her, tossing the goopy mallet aside. “You know we could’ve skipped you two sneaking around and just done this from the get-go,” he said, grinning.
“Don’t look at me—it was boy genius over there who wanted to try a new lockpicking method.”
Jared stood up with a palmful of dusty keys. “The end justifies the means, my fellow castaways.”
Chapter 27
After Willis hotwired a green Subaru in the police impoundment lot, they quickly headed north of out of town. “This only has half a tank of gas but that will trim some miles off our feet at least,” he said, speeding along the two-lane highway past sagebrush flats that extended to the horizon. As they crested a steep incline, he slowed the vehicle as they saw a vortex of black to their right. Thousands of ravens and vultures were circling overhead near a small depression just below a low field of boulders two hundred yards out from the road.
“Wonder what that’s about,” he said, bringing the Subaru to a halt. He got out and raised his hand over his eyes to block the sun. The raucous vocalizations from the birds was deafening as he walked forward a few feet and stepped up on a slab of sandstone for a better view. Eliza hopped up beside him.
“Is that what I think it is?” said Eliza with her face contorted in fear.
Willis was silent and went back to the car and pulled out his binoculars, scanning the sight of a distant mound that the birds were gathered at. His cheek muscles grew taut with each passing second of studying the sight below. He slowly lowered the binoculars while biting his lower lip.
“Dear God.”
“What is it?” said Eliza, yanking the binoculars from his hands and raising them up to her eyes. Before her was a heap of men in cowb
oy clothing, their bullet-riddle corpses jumbled together amidst their tangled limbs. “Jesus, there must be over fifty people. They…they…” She swallowed hard and struggled to steady her breathing. “They don’t even look like they had turned. Those men weren’t zombies.”
“This was a systematic elimination of the able-bodied men in the region. I’ve seen this happen in other parts of the world. Whoever did this had the numbers and the firepower to round everyone up and dispose of those who would be a threat.”
“That army jeep back there and all those spent rounds—I wonder if some group posing as the military came through here and did this. That would have given the locals reason to lower their guard enough.”
“By the looks of those bodies, this probably unfolded in the last few days. We should be on the move tomorrow.”
“What about the women and children?” said Eliza. “Where did they go?”
Willis looked at her and then back out at the desert below. “There are some fates worse than death. When we get back to Ft. Lewis and I can muster the forces, we’ll see to it that these sons-a-bitches pay.”
As they turned to walk back to the Subaru, the rumble of a heavy truck rolling up the road caused them to stop. Two hundred yards away was an olive-drab army truck with a white star on the side door. Willis and Eliza rushed for their vehicle. A burst of gunfire riddled the back panel, flattening both rear tires as the large truck kept coming and plowed the Subaru into a ditch.
As Eliza ran back alongside Willis, they started backpedaling towards the rock slab they had been standing on as four heavily armed men jumped out of the vehicle that had just come to an abrupt halt.
