Hunger Driven (Book 2): Fight the Hunger

by Allen, William

  Trying to ignore the stink now ground into my clothes, I hurried back around to the front of the truck and secured the cable to the pillar under the front, not the bumper, and heard a fresh flurry of suppressed shots. Thank you, Casey, I thought as I locked the cable into place. Standing back up, a quick glance showed where another three zeds now littered the asphalt.

  By the time I made it back to the Ford, Casey had brought down another four zombies and I could see movement in the distance. Behind, I could also make out the sound of big engines as the rest of the convoy approached at a steady pace. No sense in rushing into a tangle of vehicles with the road still blocked.

  “When this truck starts moving,” I warned Casey, “it is going to get loud, so be ready and shoot straight.”

  “That’s all the pep talk I get? ‘Shoot straight’? Brad, you would suck as a motivational speaker. Any other pearls of wisdom before we get swarmed?”

  “Yeah,” I said, my smart ass attitude rising to match her own. “Don’t miss.”

  With that, I started reeling the winch cable, and the sound was as horrible as I advised. Not quick fingernails on a chalkboard, since the grinding and crashing sounds were much deeper—more bass than that. Still, I’m sure we managed to rouse any hungry zombie for at least a mile in all directions, which meant all zombies that could get here under their own power.

  Casey opened up and started taking down zombies as I worked the controls, gradually dragging the crumpled truck out of the metal embrace of the other wrecked vehicle. No, the space might not be big enough for one of the big trucks to fit, but those reinforced cow catchers should be able to brush aside the now separated trucks. Gesturing to my trainee, I hopped into the truck, pulling back another twenty feet until the cable was tight again and repeated the process.

  By the time I was done, we’d managed to attract quite a crowd of dead folks. Casey paused to change yet another magazine and I joined her, killing three more before she got a new one seated and a round chambered. We still faced nearly a dozen by the time the lead truck, carrying Bill and with Mike Brady driving, pulled up.

  Bill, still a warrior despite his age, bailed out of the passenger seat and laid down a barrage of fire that tore through the heads of our enemies as the last few dropped. He reloaded as he stalked toward our position. He moved like the Marine Corps trained him, rifle shouldered and leaning forward slightly as he moved in a rapid heel-to-toe shuffle.

  “Think you can get through?” I called out as Bill drew even with us. I was just finishing up respooling the tow cable and attaching the hook for later use.

  “Oh, yeah,” Bill replied. “We’ll follow you all through and push this one out of the way.” He patted the dented sidewall of the Toyota truck bed and I nodded.

  “That will do,” I agreed.

  “What does it look like ahead?” Bill asked, trying to peer past the two trucks still obstructing a full view.

  “Bunch of zeds,” I replied, “Around twenty to thirty but still scattered. If we get rolling now we can push through. My opinion, but you are welcome to take a look,” I continued, gesturing to the binoculars suspended from a durable cord around my neck. I hated the idea of giving the zeds another handhold to jerk me around in a fight, but I also needed the binos if I was going to do my job.

  Bill grunted, then looked around, taking in the scene for the moment. “You got a pretty respectable track record for a civvie,” Bill said, “plus we can’t waste the time for me to crawl up on top of that wreck to sightsee. Just pull back a bit and let me get Mike up here with the Bull.”

  “The Bull?”

  “That’s what he calls the cowcatcher welded on the front of his truck,” the old Marine explained and I had to step on the chuckle. I didn’t want to lose my reputation as a humorless, unfeeling bastard, after all.

  “Let’s get it, then,” Casey added, her head still moving on a swivel as us oldsters gabbed. “We’re burning daylight.”

  Bill started to laugh, then thought better of it. I just gave the young lady an acknowledging nod and climbed into the truck. Little Grasshopper was learning all the lessons I had to teach. The biggest one, the most important lesson for being a zombie exterminator, remained to be taught, but that could only come when the time was right.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  “Wow,” I said, taking a moment to look around. We were stopped in the back parking lot of a CVS distribution center, refueling our rigs and going over the plan one last time. Well, I was refueling the truck, while Casey sat in the driver’s seat and looked at the maps. All of the trucks were pulled into a defensive square of sorts, and I saw a few folks armed with rifles walking the perimeter.

  “What?” Casey prompted, as I was checking the tree line one more time.

  This rally point was suggested by Mr. Fletcher, who said he used to drive by this exit all the time. The actual building, a monstrous masonry structure several football lengths in size, appeared to have been untouched since the First Wave rose. The trees hid everything but the curved roadway leading in, and someone had strung up a chain gate across the entry way. That was an easy fix and then our convoy wheeled in and set up shop. Other than a few abandoned cars littering the voluminous parking lot, we had the area to ourselves.

  “Just thinking ahead. If we survive this run, Fletcher will want to come back here. With lots and lots of trucks. That distro center could be a goldmine,” I said, and then grunted as I finished emptying the five-gallon fuel can and stowed it in the truck’s bed. Two emptied, and three more in reserve.

  “Or a death trap,” Casey replied with a snort.

  “Probably both. That’s the reason I leave salvage up to the young and crazy.”

  “Ha! Mr. Fletcher is older than you.”

  “Yeah, but he doesn’t lead the clearance teams, Casey. Leaves that to the experts.”

  “But you work with the salvage teams, too. I heard folks talking, you know,” Casey replied with a snotty, know-it-all tone common to the female of the species.

  “I provide cover and distraction services, Little Miss Hard Case. Big difference. I’ll climb up on a building and shoot the infected from a distance, sure. Draw them over so Fletch’s teams can breach from a back door or something like that.”

  “Hard Case? Really? I get my own code name?” Casey enthused, and for the life of me I couldn’t tell if she was being sarcastic or not. Really, men and women use the same words but speak different languages sometimes.

  “No, not really,” I replied, clamoring into the driver’s seat yet again as Casey scooted over. “I’m just trying that one out. On account of your hard head, you know?”

  “Hey, no reason to be mean about it,” she half barked in what I took to be mock dismay. “Words can hurt, too, you know.”

  “Yeah, yeah, I get it. Can’t insult the special little snowflake. Might damage her self-esteem,” I shot back. “Doctor Gooden might have to put you on some kind of medication for the trauma.”

  Just then, Bill’s voice over the radio distracted us from our play. We were going with Plan C, he said, and when I checked my cheat sheet I saw that meant hitting the storage center first. Despite what one might assume, incorrectly, the plans weren’t in any kind of order of importance or priority. The wily old Master Gunnery Sergeant didn’t want anybody listening in on our communications to get a chance to set up an ambush based on where we were going, or when we might arrive.

  “Copy,” I replied and pulled out of the lot and took the truck exit out onto the county road running behind the complex. It paralleled Interstate 45 for about four miles and allowed us to head south without exposing ourselves too much. Should we get separated, the CVS center would serve as a rally point for retreating vehicles as well. I didn’t like the idea of going back to someplace we’d already been, but Bill made a compelling argument since our drivers already knew this location.

  Our truck ranged far to the front, leading the pack by at least a mile, and other than trashed houses and a trailer p
ark that looked half burned, we saw nothing suspicious. No movement, other than the dead.

  Eyeing the map, Casey warned me the next left would take us through an old subdivision and eventually to a bridge over I-45. I slowed, and Casey lifted the CB mic to announce our proximity to Waypoint Sigmund as a sudden movement registered in my peripheral vision and I jerked the truck hard to the right. A flash erupted from the trees at the verge of the intersection, first one, then what looked like a flight of fireflies headed our way.

  The bullets struck the windshield like hail and I braked hard, slamming the transmission into reverse even as I pressed down on the gas. The truck wailed in protest but dutifully began a rapidly building roar as I sped us into retreat. More shots, and my driver’s side mirror disappeared in a shower of sparks. Glancing back, I saw a large brown UPS delivery truck lurching into the road behind us, apparently emerging from a big red barn near the road.

  See, this is why you avoid the major highways. Why do you think they call them highwaymen? I spun the wheel hard, angling to get around the nose of the heavy truck, and it was a race to the finish as I poured on the speed. I had a quarter of a mile to cover and the big truck already had nearly half of the road obstructed.

  “Get your heavy gear out,” I snarled to Casey, “and get ready to smoke these assholes.”

  My young minion dove for the back seat like she was spring loaded, not asking any questions. I should have told her to call this in to Bill since that was our job, but I didn’t hesitate. Her safety was suddenly more important than issuing such a warning. From a more practical standpoint, this matter would likely already be decided before the cavalry arrived.

  “Ready,” Casey announced, hefting her M4 as a signal.

  “Get up in the hatch and dump a mag into the driver’s side of that truck,” I ordered, “and for God’s sake, stay low.”

  Quick as a monkey, Casey hopped up on the seat and undogged the hatch. The truck came with a sunroof, but Ken had replaced the useless sheet of safety glass with a square steel door that locked from the inside and hinged up. Of course, her body quickly blocked much of my view as she shoved open the thick metal door and unleashed a storm of fire on the other driver. I tried to look through and around, and mostly I succeeded.

  Automatic fire is often un-aimed fire. That is a truth as old as infantry warfare. Ken stressed this over and over as he worked to teach me how to operate the military weapons we scrounged up. Aimed rifle fire usually beat spray-and-pray, but sometimes, rarely, you just needed a shit storm of lead headed the other way.

  To her credit, most of Casey’s shots seemed to dance around the door and side window glass, which exploded into a silvery spray for almost her first shot. She was shooting four- and five-round bursts, instead of using her rifle as an uncontrolled bullet hose. Empty brass rained down inside the cab, and I felt one roll down, working its way inside my tight neck collar. That burned, but I barely noted the pain as my attention stayed on what little I could glimpse of the rapidly approaching obstruction.

  Shit, I thought, this is going to be close, as I aimed for the far shoulder. Casey, God bless her, ducked back down into the cab and ejected her magazine, going for a reload. Instead, I grabbed the back of her load-bearing vest with my right hand and hauled her down as we hit the shoulder and raced down into the ditch.

  Casey gave a harsh squeal, and a primal roar erupted from my lips as we struck the bottom of the ditch and continued past the now smoking truck. I tried to guide the truck back up the steep side of the ditch, but a concrete culvert half buried in the weeds caught my eye at almost the last second.

  Standing on the brakes, I got the truck stopped before we suffered a fatal impact with that twelve-inch concrete pipe. The truck was canted to the side, and everything in the cab slid to the right, including Casey. We were stuck for the moment, but I wasn’t down yet.

  Grabbing the microphone, I gave a Mayday call at our last location and warned of an ambush then dropped the handset and crawled over to the left. Fishing my M4 out of the foot well of the passenger side, I tried the door to find it jammed into the dirt of the ditch. Going to have to do this the hard way, I thought, as I swam back up and popped the driver’s side door.

  “Where are you going?” Casey cried out, trying to push her way to me. I stopped, grabbing a handful of M4 magazines and stuffing them into my vest.

  “I need to get out, so I can make sure we aren’t going to get hit again.” I held up my hand, ready to forestall any protest. “You need to stay here, guard the truck, and give Bill and the rest of the crew updates on our status. That is your job. We have to protect the convoy from any more attacks.”

  “But you might get killed out there,” Casey cried out again, and this time I thought I might have heard tears in her voice. Hard Case Casey, getting emotional over me? Crazy thinking, I decided.

  “That’s why I need you here,” I countered quickly. “Need you to watch this side of the road, from inside the truck. I’ll cross over and see what’s on the other side. Wait for Bill to get here. There’s really nowhere else for the trucks to turn around. That’s why they are so far back, ’cause it is hard to back up a big rig for miles if the road’s blocked.”

  Not giving Casey any chance to respond, I laid my shoulder into the door and muscled it open. All that extra weight from the armor made this sucker feel like I was prying open a sewer grate, but I got the job done and rolled out. It might have looked tactical, but really I was just off balance as I hit the ground. Crawling up, I checked my surroundings and noted the big truck appeared to be stalled in the middle of the road. Either Casey managed to Swiss Cheese the driver or the engine was blown, and maybe both, given the white smoke I saw drifting up from under the hood of the big truck.

  Bending low, I darted across the road and felt the burn in my hamstrings as I asked my forty-year-old body to do more than it was capable. I exercised and kept in what I thought was great shape, but my body was made for long distance running, or jogging, and not sprints. Gonna pay for that in the morning, I realized, and then I was hoping to still be alive to experience my body’s payback. Well, it was important to have goals.

  Sliding into the tall grass on the other side of the road like a ballplayer stealing home was almost my last mistake. The crawler I rammed into was missing its legs from above the knees, but nothing was wrong with its weathered claws, or those snapping teeth. Before I knew what was happening, I felt those chompers dig into my jacket at the shoulder, and I was suddenly spinning, trying to get away as friction-worn bones tore at my face and neck.

  Roll over, bump, roll over, bump. I felt the pinching pressure of those impossibly strong jaws wrenching at the back of my shoulder, and then something tore as I wrenched away. I was free for a second, and then I brought my rifle around.

  Despite what you might see in movies, striking anything in the head with the butt of an AR-15, or an M4, only resulted in that adjustable stock being reduced to plastic splinters. Instead, I gripped from the butt and barrel, using the impact-resistant rubber of the barrel shroud cover to push the thing away until I could orient myself. One last shove with the rifle, then I let go and drew the knife from my belt, plunging the thick blade into the rotted left eye of my attacker with a savage overhand thrust. The zombie bucked, hissed through its nose one last time and fell motionless. Finally dead. And maybe taking me along for the ride. I pushed that thought out of my head for the moment.

  My shoulder still hurt with that blood-vessel-bursting pain only a vicious pinch, or a bite, can bring. I didn’t have time at the moment to check, not with real live enemies out there still trying to kill me. Wiping the black goo and unidentifiable tissue off on the ground as best I could, I sheathed my knife and took up the rifle. I figured the optics were fucked, skewed by both my tumble and the rumble of the fight, but a quick check of the action told me the carbine would likely go bang when needed. Nothing jammed in the barrel, either, so I was ready to move.

  I hate being on the gr
ound for this kind of action, and I wished we’d taken time to uncrate the tactical radios so I could talk to Casey. They were still boxed with my other extra gear in the crossbed toolbox I’d mounted, doing me so much good there. Next time, I reminded myself, and started worming my way along the ditch toward the still smoking truck.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  The truck was trashed, and abandoned. Well, except for the two dead guys sprawled in the bench seat. Casey must have hit the driver four times and the passenger twice, maybe three times with a pass through from the driver. I couldn’t see where anyone disturbed the dead, as both men still retained their weapons. Cheap AKs, I thought, but I still took them and their sidearms as I stripped the cab of anything useful. I’d only approached the truck after checking both sides of the road carefully and then scouting the big barn that sheltered the brown delivery truck that had tried to close the door on this ill-fated ambush. Empty.

  Both dead men wore camouflaged jackets over black tee shirts and camo trousers, but hunting outfits rather than anything military or surplus. RealTree brand, I thought. I left them their clothes at least. Too many holes to be used as anything but rags.

  I did find a couple of maps stuffed in the glove compartment, heavily annotated with indecipherable script. Maybe Bill could figure them out, but I recognized the areas depicted, anyway. One was for North Houston and the second, the Woodlands, torn from what could have only been some kind of atlas.

  When I heard the familiar heavy diesel engines pull up, I dropped out of the cab and took up a position in the ditch nearest where the first shooters were located, coincidentally the same ditch my truck was occupying. I felt rather than heard the pair who came up behind me, and when I glanced back I was unsurprised to see Bill and Casey tromping up the ditch.