Reavers (Z-Risen Series Book 4)

by Timothy W. Long

  I pulled the bag open and found an assortment of weapons.

  “What do you all want?” I asked, because it was a smorgasbord.

  “I’ll take handguns. A pair of something with high capacity. There’s a box in the back and it’s filled with magazines. Put it on the seat so we can match up weapons,” Douglas said.

  “Shotgun for me,” Diane said.

  Christy looked scared.

  I dumped the bag and rummaged around. A pair of matching handguns stood out. I grabbed them, felt the weight and knew they were loaded. These I handed up to Douglas.

  He shot another Z and then fell back inside the vehicle.

  Christy took a deep breath, looked at the assortment, and found a small gun for herself.

  Douglas stuffed guns into his belt while I moved aside larger weapons. I found a shotgun and handed it to Diane. She checked the load, then grabbed a bag from between her feet and took out a number of shells.

  I took another handgun and felt around the back until I located the box. It was heavy, but I muscled it over the back of the seat and dropped it between me and Christy. Frosty sniffed the container, but when she didn’t find dog treats or a raw steak, she went back to staring out the window, hackles rising as she growled.

  “We’re going to have to run for it, but wait until our reinforcements have arrived,” Douglas said.

  “How fucking long will that take? We’re going to be overrun at any second,” I said.

  “Just keep your eyes on the front of the store. We have a surprise ready.”

  “I hate surprises,” I muttered.

  “We need to get the shuffler and start toward the store,” Diane said, and opened her door.

  She jumped to the ground and lifted the big shotgun. It boomed, and a pair of Zs fell away, one with part of its face missing, the other having taken the blast to his upper shoulder. Diane racked another shell and blew the guy off his feet.

  “Do or die,” Douglas said and followed suit.

  “Jackson?” Christy grabbed my hand.

  “Stay put, I’ll go out and help. If we get overrun, just make yourself really small and keep Frosty quiet. With any luck the Zs will move on,” I said.

  “Why the hell would I hide? We’ve been in worse places, ya dork. I’ll go out and help,” she said, and lifted her new gun. She dropped the magazine, inspected the load and then slammed it back home.

  She dug around in the box, came up with a pair of matching magazines for her weapon and stuffed those in her pocket.

  “Be careful, dude,” I said, meeting Christy’s eyes.

  “You too,” she said with a half-smile.

  “You stay here, and eat that shuffler if he gets loose,” I said to Frosty.

  She stared at me with her big brown Lab eyes.

  I thought about grabbing one of the assault rifles and going out shooting. Instead I settled for laying one across the backseat, and placed a pair of fully-loaded magazines next to the gun. 7.62 rounds gleamed back at me as they nestled inside their tight enclosure.

  I’d do this the smart way: a gun and a big-ass wrench.

  Christy swung out of the door, gun lifted, and aimed at the closest Z. She dropped it like a pro.

  Diane dashed around the side of the Escalade and popped the trunk. It rose into the air and the shuffler flopped across the carpeted back. She grabbed for his tarp-wrapped body, but he flailed away from her. She got a hold of a corner and yanked him out. The shuffler hit the ground with a crunch.

  I was going to help her, but I suddenly had other problems: a shuffler landed in front of me. I wasn’t in the mood for his shit, so I swung the wrench around and almost took off his face. The ghoul fell back and didn’t move again. I shot him in the head for good measure.

  Douglas dropped to his knees, lifted the assault rifle and started shooting.

  Unlike the guy I’d met a little while ago, the one who'd acted like he couldn’t tell which end of the gun spat bullets, this one shot a full magazine, and did some serious damage to the Zs around us.

  The reinforcements from the Costco advanced on us, providing covering fire. I got a glimpse of them, and found mostly civilians in regular clothes. Then I noticed there were a couple of guys who were dressed in digital camo and moved like pros.

  But we were far from being in the clear. Zs lurched toward us from several directions, and in force. A few shamblers wouldn’t be an issue. A few dozen were a threat. A few hundred meant we were about to be dinner.

  “We need to run for it!” I yelled.

  “Stay cool, help’s on the way,” Douglas assured me.

  He slung his assault rifle over his shoulder and maneuvered around the SUV, drawing a handgun in the process, and shooting at Zs until it ran dry. I provided backup and shot three or four Zs myself, but there were so many, and they weren’t stopping.

  More moved on our position from the street. A lot more.

  They did a poor job of navigating the potholes and many fell, but that didn’t stop a Z, not for long. While not completely ambulatory, the Zs had a way of struggling to their hands and knees--unless they were missing a limb--and rising up again.

  “What kind of help?” I called.

  I shot a Z in the face and knocked another one on his ass.

  Christy covered our six while I shot and bashed. She was pretty good with the gun, and hit more than she missed. Wish I could say the same about my shooting skills.

  “Reloading. Jackson, hand me your gun,” she said.

  I backed up a step and passed the weapon back to her. She handed me a fresh one: a sweet Beretta, if I wasn’t mistaken.

  Douglas and Diane dragged the shuffler around the vehicle and in the general direction of the warehouse. Were they leaving us behind?

  Something zipped out of the entrance: a loader with a huge front end. The lift had been equipped with something like a big cattle prod. A second lift exited the building, and they converged on our location.

  Both of the little vehicles had yellow cages welded over the driver. The cattle prod at the front was shaped like a V mounted on a T-bar. The bar itself was a blade--a huge fucking knife, to be exact, and that made me nervous.

  The first lift tore around potholes and found a pack of Zs in the path of the Costco. It sliced through them, casting bodies to the side. At the same time as it continued to push through the throng, it slowed until it had to back up. The driver, sitting in a constructed cage, roared with laughter.

  “They’re clearing a path for us, come on!” Douglas yelled over his shoulder.

  I leaned into the SUV and grabbed the bag of guns.

  A Z stumbled into me and I nearly fell down. I managed to swing the sack around and knock him on his rear. The rotter had a missing eye and the other, white and milky, stuck out over a half-torn face. The hole in the side of his face allowed his tongue to peek out. Gross.

  Another Z followed, so I moved.

  Christy opened the other door and grabbed for Frosty. The dog came out with hackles at the ready and teeth bared. She flashed in, grabbed a Z and yanked its leg until the woman--dressed in a frilly dress covered in blood—fell down. Frosty went for her throat.

  Christy called to the dog. Frosty left her target and dashed to her side. I followed.

  The mass of Zs coming at us from the starboard side were a gnarly knot of fresh and old. Skin hung in ribbons. Clothes, when actually present, were in tatters. A woman in her seventies--naked as the day she was born, sallow, with hanging breasts that looked like deflated pigskin footballs--was surprisingly lithe. Her limbs were intact, so she made a beeline for me.

  I fired, striking her chest, but that only stopped her for a second. The bullet must have passed through her skinny frame, because a stinker behind her--a dude dressed in camouflage and carrying a backpack that was loaded with who-the-hell-knew what--took the round.

  He struggled to his feet, but I didn’t wait around to see his next move. Fuck that guy.

  The second forklift ripped into
the crowd. The driver came straight in instead of sweeping away the leaders of the pack. Bodies flew aside even as the lift’s momentum decelerated. The driver ran into the same problem when the mass of bodies became too much to just summit.

  The blades were a great idea for doing damage, but I could have told these guys that it would create mass they wouldn’t be able to drive over. Would have been better--like me with my favorite weapon--to bludgeon the shit out of the Zs. Push them aside with the cattle prod, sure, just don’t leave a pile of body parts to get over.

  If I made it inside the building and bullshitted my way into getting a berth, I’d be sure to pass along my brilliant engineering thoughts.

  A pair of Zs latched onto the driver’s cage and reached for him. He backed up and ducked to the side. A gun came up and he blew one of the Zs' heads clean off. The echo of the gun was a hell of a blast. He was packing some serious heat. The gun blasted again, tugging his arm up.

  Douglas hit a wall and opened up with his assault rifle. He must have panicked, because the shots were aimed at the Zs, but they also crossed the path of some of our rescuers. He fired one-handed, rifle tucked under his right arm. His left arm was wrapped around the bound shuffler.

  Diane struggled to keep up, and had to shoot with her left hand.

  I dashed around our crowd, intent on helping my new companions, but a shuffler had other ideas: he leapt out of the horde and landed a few feet to my side.

  I fired, but my shot went wide. When the shuffler came for me, I gave him a face full of green seabag. The weight of the guns shoved the shuffler off his feet. I swung with my wrench and caught just a tad of skin. A man would have yelped in pain. This guy, with his green eyes, just snarled.

  Then I noticed he wasn’t dressed in rags. Jesus Christ! He was dressed in some kind of armor that would have been in place on a cop going into a riot situation.

  Guns scattered as the Z shoved the bag aside. I shot him, but my aim was off and I struck him in the chest.

  He fell back again, but the bullet must not have penetrated the Kevlar or whatever the hell he was covered in.

  The guy was about my age, and big. His burly arms extended from ripped blue sleeves that had been torn off at the shoulders.

  I could stay and fight this fucker, maybe write an epic about it later, but I took the smart way out and ran.

  The shuffler didn’t pursue.

  I risked a glance over my shoulder and found he was pawing through the remains of the gun stash. He lifted a long rifle and snarled at me.

  The fuck!

  The shuffler had a weapon, but didn’t seem to have full control of his appendages, because the barrel wavered all over the place. That didn’t stop him from figuring out the trigger mechanism.

  A spray of bullets made me hit the deck.

  I rolled on my back, and fired from between my legs.

  I must have emptied half the magazine, but only a few struck home.

  The shuffler spun having taken damage. A chunk of his arm had been blown off, and I was pretty sure I got him on the side of his exposed neck.

  I noticed something in the near distance. A jeep had come to rest near the entrance to the Costco. It was red, but not military--more the kind of SUVs you used to see on the road every day.

  I rolled over, heaved myself to all fours, and found my feet.

  The shuffler dug out another gun, and that made my damn blood run cold. These things were Z-s--smarter than the milky-eyed fools, but still undead fucks. They might have shown some kind of intelligence, sure, even used a rock.

  This guy knew what he was doing, and that was scary.

  The new gun blasted, so I dove left and took the ground’s impact on my shoulder. Rolling away, I managed to find a new Z, so I kicked it into the path of the bullets. The Z took a round to the lower torso and bent over.

  I fired back, emptying my magazine at the shuffler.

  Christy and Frosty stopped in their tracks. The dog turned and growled at the ghoul.

  “No, go, keep on running!” I yelled to them.

  Christy nodded, then seemed unsure. I didn’t blame her. I would never have deserted her, but she'd been left behind before.

  The forklift managed to extract itself from the mass of Zs, and came around to help. It plowed into a trio of rotters who had their eyes on me. Thanks, dude. I’d have to find out his name later.

  The shuffler leapt for me. He had a handgun in one hand and a knife in the other. I swung at him with my wrench, but he moved aside at the last second and I hit air. The momentum of my panicked swing carried me almost around in a circle.

  The shuffler tried to shoot, but there must have been a safety on the gun, because nothing happened. I swung again, and the head of the wrench cracked into his side.

  Another Z found me, and latched onto my back. I shook him off and found the shuffler right in my face.

  The Z that had been trying to find my neck with his mouth got around my legs, and I was suddenly on top of him, scrambling with everything I had to avoid his bite. Teeth ripped at my jeans, so I kneed him in the face.

  The goddamn shuffler was right there. He leaned for me, and that’s when he looked suddenly very surprised. A bullet hole appeared in his forehead and blood blossomed out. The shuffler dropped to his knees and fell over.

  The gunshot echoed loudly around the building. I caught a glimpse again of the jeep, with a silvery barrel extended from the driver's side window.

  Thank god for whoever was in the jeep, because they had saved me. I would make it a point to thank him and the forklift driver if I survived the next few minutes.

  I kicked the Z in the face and rolled free, found my legs, and ran like my ass was on fire.

  36 – Reavers

  19:00 hours approximate

  Location: Somewhere near Vista, CA

  I had an idea for my gravestone: “Never a dull moment.”

  I wanted it set in granite and big letters. I wanted AC/DC playing from a stack of speakers the size of the USS McCluskey. I wanted dancing girls, and kegs and kegs of beer. That’s how I wanted to be remembered: in style.

  There was a spot on my right shoulder that didn’t hurt and wasn’t too sore. The rest of my body felt like freshly-ground taco meat. I had scrapes on both hands and arms. My left knee hurt from slamming it into a shuffler. My head hurt because I’d been banged around so much over the last few days I was sure I had either a brain hemorrhage or multiple concussions.

  All I really wanted to do was collapse next to Christy and Frosty and sleep for a few days. Make that a week. Wheel in the fucking cart of fruit and meat, a case of shitty beer, and I’d call it a vacation paradise while I was in a coma.

  The lifts returned to the building and rolled to a stop. The driver who had saved my ass whipped his vehicle around in a circle until it was facing out. Blood, bits of clothing, and pieces of Z hit the ground.

  Men and women moved around the entrance, keeping it clear of Zs. A couple of guys carried bows with quivers of arrows over their shoulders.

  “What a mess. Thanks for watching our backs while we got this guy inside.” Douglas clapped my shoulder.

  I nearly spun and decked him.

  “You didn’t exactly give me a fucking choice when you and Diane took off running,” I said.

  “Easy. We had to get this guy inside. We spent a lot of time and a lot of lives securing one of these shufflers,” Douglas said.

  They’d dropped the tarp-wrapped body next to a wall. The shuffler struggled against his bonds and keened through his gag. I had the urge to pick up my wrench and silence this son of a bitch for good. I wanted to be sloppy about it too, miss a few times and do some damage before I bashed in his head.

  “You need to kill that fucking thing before it brings an entire army of Zs here. That little soirée just now might be an expeditionary force. Imagine if ten thousand of those undead things converged on this location. You won’t be going anywhere for a while,” I said.

  “Good
point, my new friend,” Douglas said, and nodded toward the front doors.

  They were rolled closed and then locked. Another pair of lifts, these larger and mounted with some metallic contraptions that looked to have been constructed out of old shelves, wheeled toward the doors and nudged right up against them. Another guy--dressed in a set of brand-new clothes--urged the drivers to press forward a hair until the doors were completely braced. They set brakes, turned off the machines, and hopped out.

  “That’s real neat, but how long would it keep out a force of well-armed soldiers?” I asked, because I was pretty flabbergasted at how well the defenses had been thought out and I was in a pissy mood.

  “Hopefully we don’t have to, but if we do we have an escape route planned,” he said, but didn’t elaborate.

  Frankly, I’d be surprised if anyone tried to take this place. With the clear line of sight from on top of the Costco, they’d be able to pick off individual soldiers at a hundred yards. Of course, that wouldn’t stop anyone in a fucking tank.

  “Like I was saying,” I continued. “Don’t keep that shuffler alive. Kill him and cut him up or whatever. They’re smart, you know, they have a way of communicating with their brethren. I know it sounds crazy but…”

  “We are well-aware of their strangeness,” Diane said.

  “Strangeness is one way to put it. I heard one of these things talk a week ago.”

  “You had a conversation with a ghoul?” Diane asked.

  “More of a one-sided one. He wanted us to all die. We shot him in the fucking head.”

  “It is passingly strange, how they are evolving. We have a contingency plan for this ghoul,” Diane said in her monotone. “Our team has been standing by since we captured the creature.”

  “Where are they standing by?” I deadpanned.

  No one laughed.

  Frosty advanced and stood over the shuffler. She growled and threw the thing a feral look.

  “Come on, buddy,” Christy said.

  She patted Frosty’s neck, but when the dog didn’t back off she put a firm hand on Frosty’s neck and grabbed a little skin. Frosty didn’t take kindly to shufflers or Zs. She looked like she wanted to rip this thing’s throat out.