Soldier On: Surviving the Zombie Apocalypse (Trudge)

by Shawn Chesser

  Randy Tolliver made a widow of Elizabeth two years ago. Dan was still fond of Lizzie and helped her out when he came down from his cabin in the Sawtooth Mountains. Although the spark was no longer there on her part, the man known as Mountain Man still was compelled to check in on her.

  ***

  Dan kept still and listened, nothing moved in the Aryan’s compound. Considering the amount of empties lying around, the party had been as wild as it sounded.

  Dan was aware that two vicious brindle Pit Bull Terriers normally had run of the fenced in grounds. Stealth was his first priority; he didn’t want to give them any reason to bark.

  Dan heel and toed it past the entrance and hurriedly crossed the open road; becoming one with the shadows again. The man still knew how to move silently, you could take the man out of the Marines, but the learned skills remained. The Colt .45 rode high on his hip, concealed by a black lightweight nylon wind breaker.

  He paused mid-step. Someone was stirring inside the cheaply constructed dwelling to his three o’clock. Go back to sleep Nazi boy.

  The rusty screen door made a long drawn out screech when it opened.

  Dan froze instantly mid stride.

  A squat, shirtless man stood framed in the doorway, he stretched, yawned and scratched his billiard ball head before crossing the threshold into the crisp morning air. He clearly forgot he had three steps to navigate. A surprised look crossed his still drunk face when his foot didn’t contact terra firma instantly, the sudden bone jarring contact with the ground made him curse.

  “Motherfucker, shit...goddamnit.”

  Dan suppressed a chuckle and remained statue still.

  It appeared to Dan that the man was having problems with his fly, the expletives continued. Finally he extracted his shriveled manhood and left the contents of his full bladder steaming on the ground. After fumbling to put things away, the man put his suspenders back over his shoulders, scratched his ass and limped back to the shack. The groaning screen door once again tried its best to wake the camp before slamming shut with a resounding bang.

  The stars dancing in front of his eyes alerted Dan that he was holding his breath. A slow exhale and a greedy gulp of air later, things were back to normal. Dan willed his body to stay still for another five minutes. Satisfied that the coast was as clear as it was going to get, he continued past the cluster of one story dorms.

  The dogs were sleeping in plain sight, right on the same spot where the executions had taken place days prior.

  As silly as it seemed to him, he still recited some words in his head. Do not open your eyes. I am not here. Keep sleeping. He wouldn’t admit it, but deep down he was a superstitious man. The words did the trick, Dan was sure of it. The truth was, the dogs had been slurping up spilled beer all night and were as hung-over as the Aryans.

  The main road snaked from the base of the mountain and ran straight through the town of Stanley. Dan walked along the shoulder, a few times he noticed the smell of death lingering near the road, but quickly dismissed it; assuming it was nothing more than road kill in the ditch.

  It was a twisting three miles before Dan arrived in front of the sign reading, “Welcome to Stanley, Idaho. Population 100.” He was parched, sore and had been walking on the two lane road for ninety minutes. As remote as the mountain town was, he still expected to see the early morning delivery drivers. A refrigerated truck usually brought fresh seafood and meat a couple of times a week from Boise. Dan also thought the absence of the white Econoline van, that without fail delivered daily newspapers to the sleepy town, was a very bad omen.

  Chapter 17

  Outbreak Day 5

  Hanna, Utah

  Rapid fire banging resonated from somewhere downstairs, followed by the tinkling of breaking glass.

  Cade followed in Daymon’s footsteps, down the dimly lit hall to the head of the stairs, while leaving a few feet of separation between the two of them. Daymon padded down the stairs, crossbow aimed over the handrail, cocked and at the ready.

  Somewhere in the house a door slammed, followed by the metallic snick of a deadbolt being thrown. The sound echoed off of the plaster walls, amplified by the narrow confines of the downstairs foyer. Cade noted the focused look on Daymon’s face, locked eyes with him and raised his carbine as a show of readiness.

  Even over the muted moans from outside, the sound of someone or something breathing heavily downstairs was unmistakable. The gasps for air were interspersed with grunts and groans of pain. It instantly reminded Cade of his class of Ranger hopefuls, sucking wind between evolutions, during the qualifying course at Fort Benning. His intuition told him one or more people were downstairs seeking sanctuary from the walking corpses. The two story house was situated prominently near the entrance to town, which made it an attractive place to hide out.

  Cade noticed Daymon cautiously poking his head around the door jamb. He was positioned at the far end of the hallway which ran from the front door, dissecting the expansive house. Cade kept watch on both Daymon and the locked front door behind them.

  Another loud crash, followed by more breaking glass resounded from the rear of the old farmhouse. Instantly the smell of death invaded the house. With a flurry of motion Daymon raised his crossbow and sent a missile flying down the hall towards the commotion.

  Daymon was in the act of reloading when he was knocked to the floor. The blur of blubber hurdled over him and scrambled down the hall, screaming as he went. The man was severely overweight, yet exhibited speed that belied his girth. He was obviously being propelled by adrenaline, a basic human instinct for survival and a heavy dose of sheer terror. The shirtless man scrambled a few more feet, fingernails clawing and scratching on the hardwood floor. He came to an abrupt halt eye level with Cade’s combat boots. As if in slow motion, the big man swiped a curtain of sweaty hair from his eyes, slowly raised his fleshy head and peered up the barrel of Cade’s M4.

  Between gasps for air, the pasty man begged. “Nooo...Don’t shoot. I don’t want to die...please help me.” It was an embarrassing display. The man grabbed the bannister and shakily pulled himself up from the floor. Cade looked the man over, searching for any bite marks or wounds. The big man was now on his feet with his back against the wall, his head hanging like a spent marathon runner.

  “Oh my God...I came around the corner thinking your friend here was going to put one of those barbed arrows in me. The thing nearly parted my hair.”

  “I’m going to put a few rounds in you if you don’t move it.” Cade shot back while manhandling the sweating middle aged man out of the way.

  From his vantage point, Daymon could see an undead mob surging onto the back porch. All at once they came to an abrupt halt.

  Momentarily repulsed by the closed door, the bloated beings began to amass on the back stoop, it groaned and creaked sounding like it was close to collapse.

  The wretched odor of decay wafted into the house, like the tentacles of a giant squid it sought out and displaced every last pocket of fresh air. Rotten arms flailed in the broken window, sending the few remaining shards of jagged glass onto the tile floor.

  The full pressure from the jostling corpses made the sturdy door flex inward. Daymon knew that eventually the press of flesh was going to splinter the door jamb. He shouted a warning without removing his eyes from the path that the Zs would eventually flood, “There are at least twenty of those things on the porch and the door is about to fail.” Daymon backpedaled down the hall in the direction of the stairs, keeping his weapon trained on the kitchen entryway.

  The crack of splintering wood, followed by the sound of sliding furniture, resonated down the hall.

  The frantic intruder screamed into Cade’s face, “We’d better run man. Those things, they never quit and they don't tire. I’ve been running for blocks.” his jowls swayed and his bloodshot eyes bugged out. He was the poster boy for losing it.

  Cade recoiled from the man’s sour breath. “It looks like you’ve been running for miles not blocks
,” Cade replied coldly.

  The man had on expensive slacks and leather wingtips that were once highly polished. Cade passed quick judgment and pegged him as a politician or lawyer before the Omega virus rendered those titles obsolete.

  Before the outbreak Cade could find little sympathy for people who let themselves get morbidly obese. Sure there were the “medical” situations but Happy Burger didn’t force the grease bombs down their gullets.

  Even after he had been home and out of the harsh environment of Afghanistan for more than a year, at thirty-five-years-old he still found the time to run a few miles to keep trim. Maybe some people didn’t possess the discipline needed to keep fit. It was a totally different ballgame now, run or be eaten was a hell of a motivator. Pretty soon, he thought, there aren’t going to be very many like this guy left alive.

  Cade ceased the one sided conversation with an open palm to the man’s face. He raised the rifle, aiming down the hall past Daymon.

  The first moaning zombie filled the opening, one of its eyes dangled and bobbed, swaying to and fro by its useless optic nerve. The remaining good eye was intently focused on the meat it so hungered for. Its pale arms were outstretched, straining to reach Daymon.

  Both men fired at the same time. The crossbow bolt embedded four inches into the ghouls remaining eye. A millisecond later a triple tap from the silenced M4 punched the crossbow bolt the rest of the way through the zombie’s head. Tumbling lead, shredded fiberglass, bone and brain matter splattered the cupboards.

  Daymon shouted, “Hurry, get up there and look for anything big and bulky to fill the stairwell, anything to slow them down.”

  The shirtless man labored up to the second level close on Daymon’s heels.

  Cade stayed behind for a moment to provide rear guard. He hoped the two men wouldn’t get overzealous and start raining antique furniture down on his head.

  There were twenty-seven rounds of 5.56 left in the magazine. Cade was used to keeping a mental count, it was an invaluable lesson learned in basic training and later perfected in combat. The need to conserve ammo was real, so he switched the selector from burst to single fire. Making all of his rounds count would be tantamount to surviving the day.

  It was a humorous but deadly scene as the crush of walking dead jammed through the four foot wide hallway. The two ghouls at the head of the pack were tripped up by the fallen zombie Daymon and Cade had double teamed. The undead pileup provided Cade with clean kill shots; he popped off two rounds at the prone monsters. Five downrange, twenty-five rounds remaining, Cade’s inner voice told him. The impacting 5.56 lead split their heads wide open, showering the rest of the ghouls with hair and rank cerebral fluid.

  More undead filled the far doorway, blocking out what little light there was. The horde clamored over the three carcasses, moving much too fast for Cade’s comfort.

  About to be trapped downstairs, Cade grabbed the bannister, careful to keep his weapon from banging in his wake and hauled ass up the stairs three at a time. He was halfway up the stairs when something heavy grazed his heel.

  Daymon watched with concern as the piece of furniture shattered with an ear splitting crash on the stairs right behind Cade. The old bedside table, built a century ago bounced all the way to the bottom of the stairs.

  “Look out below,” Daymon cried.

  “A little late,” Cade countered.

  The second wooden missile was much bigger and sturdier. The ladies vanity, Edwardian in origin Cade guessed, came crashing down on top of the moaning swarm. One of the ghouls took a direct hit. The two hundred pound piece of furniture pinned its body to the stairs, its head protruded from underneath while its arms and legs flailed in a futile attempt to get to the meat upstairs.

  “Sorry dude, that was close. If it wasn’t for the incredible Hulk here,” Daymon said gesturing at Hoss, “that thing wouldn’t have gotten over the hand rail.”

  “No worries. No blood no foul,” Cade replied.

  “What’s the situation Sarge?”

  Since Cade was still wearing his desert camo it was obvious that the question was directed his way.

  “I have a sinking feeling there are way too many of those things for us take down.”

  As soon as he finished his sentence, the stained glass inlay on both sides of the ornate front door burst inward and fell with a heavy thump onto the wood floor.

  Tattered zombie arms probed the new breach. Soon multiple heads, their lifeless eyes darting about, explored the openings. One of the creatures squeezed its body into the small gap next to the door, sacrificing both breasts in the endeavor before becoming hopelessly stuck.

  The big man exited the master bedroom with three bronze lamps clutched in his hands. After depositing them over the side he went back into the room for more to add to the mound.

  “Give me a hand.”

  Cade followed Hoss into the room where he had apparently been trying to rend the footboard off of the sleigh bed. It only took one kick from Cade’s boot to finish the job for him. The dovetail joint failed and the side rail of the bed broke free. Cade was pleased to hear the loud crack, especially since it wasn’t the front door failing.

  It only took the big man two stomps before his weight shattered the second bedrail letting the massive King footboard fall freely to the floor. The two men pushed the curved footboard through the doorway and muscled it over the railing. The slab of mahogany sailed into the throng of walkers; all of whom were already having a difficult time navigating the growing pile of corpses and broken furniture.

  “How many people live in this little burgh?” Cade asked as he poured accurate rifle fire into the moving wall of dead flesh.

  Over the increasing moans, he could have sworn that he heard someone say two hundred.

  “Come again?”

  The obese man yelled to be heard over the grunts and groans of the stinking corpses. “I said, two hundred, maybe more, because it’s summer and the lake draws vacationers here from the big city.”

  “That’s bad news; I only have two magazines left. The rest are in the saddlebags of my bike.” Cade changed the magazine and charged the gun in one fluid motion. The former Delta Operator was back to dropping undead before the empty clip clanged to the floor.

  Their situation seemed to be going from bad to worse. Cade thought about the satellite phone tucked in his pocket and decided he would use it as a last resort.

  Their garage sale sized barricade was growing larger. The footboard served as a good foundation for the other assorted crap that Daymon was heaving onto the mound.

  The big man was sweating profusely while he worked on freeing the headboard. Finally, after breaking off the long side rails, he was ready for assistance once again.

  “Sarge, Skinny...help needed.”

  Daymon was out of ammo for his crossbow so he hefted the machete and went to lend a hand. It took a lot of grunting and dragging from both men but they finally succeeded in carting the headboard to the rail and hefting its weight over the top. Three undead were crushed flat and immediately stilled by the falling chunk of old growth.

  The remaining zombies thrashed about, tangled up in the bedding that Daymon had ingenuously floated over the railing.

  There was only a few feet of open headroom left in the stairway. Cade went looking for a cherry to put on their sundae. “In here big guy and grab those bed rails.” Cade bellowed to be heard over the moans of the dead.

  A brilliant white, cast-iron claw foot tub sat against one wall of the master bathroom. Cade decided that it was going down the stairway even if it killed him. The long boards preceded the big man as he entered the bathroom.

  Cade stepped aside to make room.

  “Put yours here,” Cade pointed at the six inch gap between the tub and the wall and then he inserted his the same way at the foot of the tub. The added leverage of the bed rails allowed the men to easily uproot the clawed feet from the tiled floor. Cade lithely moved out of the way as the tub crashed over onto its
side. The big man was not so fast, he howled out in pain while jumping around on one foot and holding onto the injured one, all the while his pale white flab jiggled with each hop. The tub left a deep indentation on his wingtip shoe.

  “It’s broken...broken. Owwww.”

  “Suck it up and help me or I’ll break the other one.”

  Whimpering, the big man helped push the weighty tub out the door. It took them a little bit of finessing to get the vessels feet to cooperate allowing them to wiggle it through. Cade kicked five of the carved balusters out of the railing and then returned aft to help push the tub over the edge. It barely squeaked through, fell six feet and lodged upright fully blocking all access to the second floor.

  “We’re effed now,” Daymon grumbled, looking at Cade, while trying to ignore the panting, sweating, shirtless mound of flesh.

  “If we’re going to die here together, we might as well be on a first name basis. I’m sorry I called you Sarge and Skinny.” He extended one sweaty mitt towards Daymon, hoping to forge a detente.

  Daymon’s hesitation was obvious.

  After wiping his right hand back and forth on his black slacks, the man extended his hand once more. “My name is Hosford Preston, Attorney at Law.”

  “I knew it. Let me guess they call you Hoss...right?” Daymon joked with the man.

  “Only my friends,” the lawyer replied as he rubbed his ruined toes, “and I’m sure they’re all dead now.”

  Daymon couldn’t hold back. “Newsflash...nearly everyone in this town is dead and currently banging on the pile of shit that’s clogging the stairs.”

  “You can call me Cade, Sarge is a little below my pay grade.”

  “Tell me then Cade-where is the rest of your army? I’ve been holed up in the attic of my law office for days and haven’t seen any authorities. Those freaks had me treed until they heard you and that other guy roll into town. That’s when they began wandering away from my practice. I waited for them to leave the front door area and then I made the dash here.”