by K. S. Black
Tears stung his eyes. Thousands of bodies lay in the state of advanced decomposition in the heat. An oily queasiness rose in his stomach as cold sweat trickled down his chest and between his shoulder blades chilling him in the afternoon sun.
Why did this have to happen?
He turned away and tried to redirect his thoughts to getting to Phoenix. But the image burned behind his eyes.
* * *
He exhaled through his mouth when he reached the Land Rover. “Shit!” He laughed at his word choice as he wiped the tears from his face. The vehicle was covered in bird shit. The bottoms of his boots were covered as well. He scraped the muck onto the running board before getting inside.
The windshield wipers smeared a mixture of bird shit and wiper fluid in front of his face. He kept squirting the fluid until he could see.
When he reached Phoenix, whole city blocks had burned to the ground. The roads were littered with debris and wreckage, but the Land Rover easily cleared a path. He didn’t see anyone but couldn’t shake the feeling he was being watched.
* * *
His destination was a large warehouse garage called Tricked-Out-Trucks, one of top places in the country for custom work on large vehicles and his best bet to find something that suited his needs. He was happy to find it untouched. He had heard of the place from his days in NASCAR.
If anyone was there, he hadn’t seen them. His anxiety was through the roof without Cooper around to watch his back. As much as he hated to admit it, he wished he hadn’t come alone.
The double doors to the entrance were chained closed and secured with a sturdy padlock. Beware of Dog signs posted outside. He shook the doors and listened for movement inside. Not a sound except for him. He set the XM8 against the building. With a sledgehammer and a crowbar pilfered from Cooper’s tool collection, he broke the padlock with two well-aimed swings. He pried the door open, not worrying about setting off alarms. He expected company with all the noise he was making, but no one came.
His footsteps echoed inside the warehouse-sized garage, every breath exaggerated inside his head. Two SUVs in different stages of bodywork were parked in the first bay. He stopped at the next one.
Jackpot! The vehicle looked something like an armored Jeep/Land Rover/Humvee hybrid. From outward appearances, it was better than anything he could have hoped for.
He opened the heavy driver’s side door. No seats, no gauges, not even a steering wheel. He let out a long sigh. “Okay—no problem. I can fix this.” He had never been able to shake the habit of talking to himself when he was working on a project. It started when he was a kid and annoyed his father to no end—maybe that’s why he kept doing it until the behavior became ingrained. His father was not the only one who got annoyed, but he couldn’t stop.
“What’s under that hood of yours, beautiful?” He released the hood locks on either side. The hood must have weighed a hundred pounds and was difficult to lift even with the hydraulic assist. “Shit.” He stepped back and crossed his arms over his chest. “I may have a problem if I can’t find the engine.”
There had to be a bay where engines were assembled or stored. The engine paperwork was probably in the main office somewhere, finding it would help him locate the engine. He moved through the warehouse looking for an office and an engine assembly bay. He passed several bays with vehicles in various stages of completion.
After his tour of the garage, he figured that the engine must have been on special order or it would’ve been mounted on a stand, but he kept looking. He inspected a large parking bay with various types of finished vehicles lined up against the wall. He almost missed the one on the end. In the dim light, it blended in with the shadows because of the flat black paint.
He pulled out his flashlight and gave it a thorough once over. “Holy crap, Batman!”
The vehicle was an armored military vehicle on steroids. Someone had used a white grease pencil to mark the future placement of decals. S.W.A.T. was painted towards the rear. He tried to enter from the driver’s side but stopped short. “Where the fuck is the door?”
He walked to the back. There were two large doors with footholds. A ladder was attached to one of the doors, and it led to the top of the vehicle. He climbed up until his head almost touched the ceiling. There had to be some sort of hatch on the roof, but the lack of ceiling clearance kept him from checking it out.
He climbed down and pulled open the heavy back doors. Inside were two rows of troop seats that could hold a twelve-man team. Five gun ports lined both sides in between the seats along with two ports in the back that would allow guns to be fired through each door. A small gun turret with an access port in the roof was located behind the two front seats.
He made his way to the front. “Oh baby, you are going to be one sweet ride.” The front passenger section was set up as a command post with three radios, two laptops, and other equipment Kevin didn’t recognize. Whoever ordered this vehicle spared no expense.
He got into the driver’s seat, trying to get a feel for what it would be like to drive the huge behemoth. The key wasn’t in the ignition or anywhere inside. He figured they must have kept all the keys in the office.
He found a set labeled Las Vegas S.W.A.T. hanging on a peg board inside the main office and spent an additional thirty minutes going through everything in the room. The engine he had been looking for was not even in Phoenix. It was scheduled for a delivery that might never happen.
Kevin tossed the engine paperwork on the desk. “If I can’t have the Ferrari of armored vehicles, I guess I could settle for the Rolls-Royce version.” He pocketed the keys to the S.W.A.T. vehicle.
Sitting inside his new armored vehicle, he held his breath as he turned the key. It started with no hesitation. The clack-clack sound of the diesel engine echoed inside the warehouse. He opened the folder and read through the specs and other information about his new acquisition: a 2011 Casspir MK6 RG Protector from South Africa purchased by the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department and Clark County Sheriff Department for their joint S.W.A.T. unit. It had taken an RPG in the engine compartment.
Kevin moved the flashlight around the interior to take a second look. “Oh, you are a beautiful thing!” Everything inside was brand new from the troop seats in the back to the state of the art technology in the front section. The paint was fresh inside and out, and the vehicle was returned to better than mint condition.
* * *
He’d never been behind the wheel of anything this big or heavy. It was going to take a little time to adjust to the size and power. The warehouse was dark through the tinted windows, so he turned on the headlights. A red light on the dash indicated that the fuel tank was nearly empty.
He pulled forward slowly. There was about a foot of headspace between the ceiling and the top of the vehicle, but he ducked his head as he crept towards the roll-up door. He stepped on the gas pedal and shifted twice. The truck belched out a large cloud of black exhaust. The engine screamed as he plowed through the roll-up door like it was paper.
Even through the tinted glass, the sun was bright. He wasn’t sure where he was coming out in relation to where he came in and smacked into the Land Rover hard knocking it backward about ten feet before it came to a stop.
“Fuckin’ idiot!” He climbed down from the vehicle and wasn’t sure whether to laugh or cry. He opted for laughter as he inspected the damage. The Land Rover was totaled. It didn’t matter anyway. He traced his finger along a six-inch scratch on the front of his new truck.
He transferred all of the supplies from the Land Rover and drove around the building in search of the fuel tanks he had seen on the map inside the office. After he located them, he inserted the hand pump that was on the ground into the ground tank and filled up his new vehicle. He found an empty 50-gallon drum and secured it in the back of the truck and filled it with diesel since he wasn’t sure if he’d make it back to Tucson on one tank.
* * *
He parked in front of a Bass Pro Shop a
fter a short and uneventful drive south to Mesa. He put on his mask and kept his sunglasses on. In his excitement, he almost forgot about his leg, but he stopped himself before he attempted to jump out. His leg felt much better, but landing on it with his full weight wouldn’t have been good.
As he approached the store, a familiar high-pitched screech brought him to an abrupt stop. Three nearly naked, infected men ran towards him from inside the store. He raised his XM8 and pulled the trigger without aiming. The one directly in front of him was thrown backward by the impact and fell into the one behind him. Both men went down in a tangled heap. The third one climbed over the two on the ground and launched himself at Kevin.
The man landed on the cement behind him. Kevin turned and aimed, but when he pulled the trigger, nothing happened. How was it possible that he had already unloaded thirty rounds? He dropped the magazine out and fumbled to get another one loaded as the third infected charged at him again knocking him to the pavement. His sunglasses flew through the air.
The man latched onto the XM8 with his teeth, and the fiber reinforced plastic that covered the barrel cracked under the pressure of the bite. He pushed Kevin backward onto the ground. He struggled as he tried to reach the Smith & Wesson in his belt. Without it, he was as good as dead. The only way to get it was to let go of the XM8 with his right hand. When he did that, the rifle slammed against his chest.
On the ground and face to face, the infected man released the rifle from his teeth and tried to bite through Kevin’s mask. Kevin’s vision narrowed to a small point in front of him. Motion slowed as the instinctual part of his brain kicked into overdrive.
The recoil from the gun startled him. The infected man’s head disappeared in a puff of red. With the pressure and the weight gone, Kevin could breathe again. His ears were ringing, but the screeching noises behind him were loud enough to catch his attention.
The remaining infected sped towards him on all fours like a spider to a fly. Still on his back, he used both hands to raise the revolver above his head.
* * *
Kevin took a large swig from a bottle of Sailor Jerry and chastised himself for letting his guard down. He couldn’t stop shaking and threw up twice in the parking lot. He had stripped out of his leathers and wiped them down with disinfectant along with his mask and sunglasses that he had picked off the pavement in front of the store.
He was scared. But if he was going to find everything he wanted, it would be here. With his guns loaded, he took a second gulp from his bottle of liquid courage, swished it around in his mouth, and put his leathers back on.
Inside the store, racks had been knocked over and merchandise was scattered across the floor. Looters most likely, taking what they wanted. He was doing the same thing. Some of the inventory had already been picked through, especially in the guns and ammo section, but he felt like a lucky man.
Almost three hours after he arrived at Bass Pro Shops, he finished loading the back of the truck from top to bottom with everything from freeze dried food and camping equipment to weapons. He was especially pleased with the three compound bows, three crossbows, and the extra sets of arrows he found. Cooper and Hayley were going to appreciate these. He had gone a little crazy in the clothing and boot sections picking up everything he thought the three of them could use.
By the time he secured the back doors and climbed in through the Behemoth’s roof it was late afternoon. He could barely squeeze his way to the front but managed to get into the driver’s seat. Secured inside the truck, he was surprised that his leg didn’t hurt at all, but he was exhausted. He closed his eyes—only for a minute.
When he opened his eyes, dusk was slipping into night. Something moved outside, but what he didn’t see scared him more. The three dead men were gone. He started the truck and turned on the headlights. The lights illuminated a group closing in on him. Some of them froze in place several yards in front of the truck. They rubbed at their eyes. More were trickling in from every direction, almost fifty by his estimation, like a swarm.
He ran over at least a dozen of them before he got out of the parking lot, their bodies flattened against the road by the large nubby tires. Four of them had climbed on the back of the truck and over the roof. They banged their heads against the windshield trying to get to him. He stomped on the brakes, and they flew forward onto the road.
The infected were roaming the streets in town as he retraced his route back to I-10. Some chased after him. Others stepped out in the road in front of him and ran straight at him. A few were swept underneath the tires. A quick peek in the side view mirror made him wish he hadn’t. A woman clung to the side of the vehicle, blood spurting from her torso where her legs should have been. When she couldn’t get to him through the window, she pulled herself onto the windshield and used her head as a battering ram. She held on to the windshield wipers for several seconds until her eyes closed and she let go.
He couldn’t remember any zombie movie scene worse than the one he just witnessed for real. His heart took several minutes to resume its normal rhythm in his chest.
After driving for another hour, he pulled over on a lonely stretch of dark highway. He took out the food that he had packed, ate a smaller than usual dinner, and finished off the bottle of rum. He tried to watch a DVD on one of the laptops, but his thoughts replayed the horrors of the past several hours and a short time later so did his dreams.
CHAPTER 36
May 25 – Double J Ranch
At noon the next day, Jake brought Michele a plate of cured ham slices, scrambled eggs, fried apples and a tall glass of water. She had slept for fourteen hours.
“I would’ve knocked but my hands were full.” He set the tray on the bed next to her and moved the water to the bedside table. “I was getting a little worried.”
Michele’s good eye opened wide; the other was even more purple than the day before and swollen shut. “Oh my god! It wasn’t a dream. You’re the damn marine who tried to kill me.”
“You’re kiddin’, right?”
“Yeah.”
When she pushed herself up against headboard, she cried out. She took a deep breath and looked down at the oversized t-shirt and unfamiliar underwear. “Please tell me you didn’t take my clothes off.”
“You asked me to.” Jake hesitated for a moment. For Chrissake! She was looking at him like he was a pervert. “I mean you asked me to help you get your boots and pants off. You were having trouble doing it by yourself.”
“What?” Her voice was shrill.
“Wait let me explain. Don’t you remember? After you fixed my arm up, you took some pain meds. You said your ribs and your head were hurtin’ bad. I took you upstairs and you asked me to help you take off your boots and your pants. You did the rest. I swear. I practically had my eyes closed the whole time.”
“Oh my god.” Her eyes filled with tears.
“I swear. Closed.” He closed his eyes to illustrate.
She took a few deep breaths. “It doesn’t matter. Thank you for helping me. I’d like to eat breakfast and take a very long shower.”
She started to cry again, and Jake moved towards her.
“Please don’t touch me.” She used her feet as leverage to scoot away from him under the covers.
He stepped back but moved the tray closer to her. "I'm sorry." He opened his mouth but stopped. He had no idea what else to say to her.
“It smells really good.” She wiped her eyes with the sheet. “Where are we again?”
Before he could tell her, she had a mouthful of eggs and was cutting into the ham.
“Oh.” She closed her eyes. “After what I’ve been eating for the past three weeks, this is a gourmet meal.”
“We’re just outside of Austin at my parents’ ranch.” He walked over to a wardrobe and opened it to reveal a few shirts and a couple pairs of jeans hanging inside. “I think you’re the same size as my sister, except you’ll need to roll up the pants. She’s a lot taller than you. If you need anything else, her
room is next door.”
“Are they still here?” Her voice was almost a whisper.
“You mean my family? My parents had the virus. I have no idea where my little sister is or if she’s even alive. I started looking for her, but I have no idea where she is. Most places around here are empty but some of the neighbors are infected.”
“I’m sorry.”
Jake shrugged his shoulders. “What about you? Where’s your family?”
“Northern Virginia. My dad’s stationed at the Pentagon and was getting ready to retire from the army this year. My mom teaches middle school science, and my brother is a senior in high school.” She dabbed at the tears forming in her good eye with the bed sheet. “The last time I talked to them was about a month ago. I have no idea what happened to them.”
“I’m sorry.” Jake’s eyes moved down to the floor. “I’m going to let you eat. There’s towels and stuff in the bathroom. The water’s warm.”
CHAPTER 37
May 25 – Phoenix to Tucson
Kevin dubbed his new machine the Behemoth. After he finished with her, she’d be better, meaner, and possibly faster. He had figured out the concept of the Tom Ogle Black Box by studying Cooper’s Humvee and planned to use the notes to modify the design to work on the Behemoth’s large diesel engine. As he drove, he brainstormed about design modification ideas and made mental notes about what tools and equipment he’d need to get the job done.
With the town of Marana in his review mirror, he entered the northwest corner of Tucson. Up ahead, black smoke rose in the air.
A few miles later, he hit a massive road block that had been erected in the center of an overpass he had traveled on the day before. Two rows of cars ran across all eight lanes of the highway from one shoulder to the other, stacked two cars high with piles of burning tires positioned in front of them. Some tires burned while others smoldered. Through the noxious black smoke, he thought he saw more piles of tires on the other side.
