The Last Town (Book 6): Surviving the Dead

by Knight, Stephen

  “You know, this thing could probably take care of a lot of zombies,” Victor shouted.

  “No kidding,” Corbett replied.

  The loaders rumbled down the street, completely overwhelming the packs of stenches that challenged them. As they neared the airport entrance—itself just a narrow, walled corridor that led directly to the airfield—more stenches milled around. The approaching loaders caught their attention immediately, and they surged toward the oncoming machines with a dull roar that Corbett could only guess he heard above the bellow of the ACERT engines. Klaff pulled past the entrance, then backed up, alarm keening as the loader reversed. He did that a couple of times, weaving back and forth.

  “Klaff, what’s up?” Corbett asked over the radio.

  “Got to make sure there aren’t any zombies left to come after you folks,” Klaff replied. “Making this as fast as I can, Mister Corbett. Hang tough for me, okay?”

  “Do whatever you need to do,” Corbett replied.

  A minute later, the loader ceased its gyrations. Klaff radioed that he was lowering the bucket, and Corbett returned to a seated position. The hydraulic arms came down, and the bucket rotated once again. Corbett was on all fours by the time it hit the street.

  Ahead of them, a flood of zombies appeared.

  “Everybody out!” Corbett said, getting to his feet and stepping out of the bucket. He pointed to the entrance to the airport. “Run! Run right now!”

  Victor steered Suzy out of the bucket and pushed her toward the entrance. “Go,” he told her.

  “Come with me!”

  “I will, but I’ll hold back and make sure the others make it in,” Victor said. “You need to go. Right now.” He turned to Meredith Sinclair. “Please see that she makes it to the plane.”

  “I will.” There was something cold and predatory to the former model’s face, something that even Corbett thought was chilly. This woman had changed in such a fundamental way that she no longer resembled the person who had arrived so long ago.

  “Sinclair, go with them,” Corbett ordered.

  “What about you?” Sinclair asked. He turned the camera on Corbett at the same time, of course.

  “We’ll be along,” he said. “Get going. Get some pretty pictures of the jet. Then get aboard and have a drink. There’s a bottle of Remy Martin Louis XIII Jeroboam in the galley. It’s yours.”

  Sinclair raised a brow. “What the hell would I do with almost a gallon of cognac?”

  “Enjoy the takeoff, and probably not care about the quality of the landing. Get moving, you prick!”

  Sinclair sniffed. “There’s the Barry Corbett I know,” he said, but not without some humor. Then he turned his borrowed camera toward the airport entrance and lensed it for a time before moving forward. Meredith took Suzy by the arm and guided her along, but the smaller woman twisted and turned.

  “Uncle!” she cried.

  “Come with me, and you’ll see him soon,” Meredith said. “Get out of his sight, and he’ll stop worrying about you!”

  “Go,” Victor said, his face stonelike and emotionless. To put finality to the statement, he turned his back to his niece. He raised his rifle and began hammering at the approaching dead.

  “Mister Corbett, can you hear me?” Klaff asked over the radio.

  “Klaff, go ahead,” Corbett responded. He grabbed his rifle’s pistol grip with his other hand, levering it into position. Great thing about AR-style weapons—they were pretty light. He capped off a couple of rounds and sent a zombie tumbling to the deck.

  “If’n you people wouldn’t mind, step aside and let me make a pass with the bucket,” Klaff said. “I can hold these bastards back for a bit.”

  Corbett shoved Victor to one side. “Come on, move!” Once he and his security team were clear, he radioed to Klaff, “Do it!”

  The loader’s big diesel roared, puffing up black smoke. Consuming approximately two dead dinosaurs per minute, it rumbled forward, scraping its bucket across the road top as it charged into the approaching zombie horde at over twenty miles an hour. While the bucket wasn’t wide enough to clear the entire street, it certainly scooped up more than a few zombies, while leaving scores more writhing on the asphalt in its wake. The loader’s big tires were almost weapons upon themselves, crushing bone and flesh beneath their craggy treads. Corbett, Victor, and Corbett’s security team opened up, taking down as many of the zombies that had eluded the loader’s crushing embrace as possible. More people streamed past them—the Bookers, Mike Hailey, Gemma Washington and her elderly live-in boyfriend named Lance. They had a six-hundred-foot walk to the airfield, then another several hundred feet to the tarmac. Corbett hoped they made it.

  “Victor, you should go with them,” Corbett said.

  Another loader rumbled past, veering to the right and scraping that side of the road clear of the dead. But not before Corbett caught a glimpse of zombies clambering up onto the boarding ladders of Klaff’s rig. The stenches were about to gain the upper hand.

  “Klaff, you’re getting too far out into the horde!” Corbett radioed.

  “Well, I know that now, sir,” Klaff responded. “They’re right outside the door—”

  There was a crash downrange, and Corbett sidled to his left the see what was going on. Klaff’s loader was about four hundred feet away, and the cab was swarming with stenches. The loader was jerking left and right as hard as it could, and was butting up against the walls, knocking the big metal panes out of alignment.

  “Oh, hell,” Corbett said.

  Klaff’s loader suddenly turned hard to the left and slammed directly into the wall at full speed. Corbett figured the zombies had managed to get into the cab and were attacking the foreman as he drove. A large section of the wall exploded outward, and the tire loader rumbled right through the opening. It disappeared from view, but Corbett could hear its engine revving as it continued on, likely bouncing across the desert. There came a loud crashing noise, and he figured the titanic machine had wound up in one of the zombie-filled trenches.

  Zombies roiled in through the breech in the wall.

  The loader that had followed Klaff’s began backing up, its backup alarm sounding. The zombies honed in on it, and looking past it, on Corbett and the rest of the people around him.

  “Time to go,” Corbett said. He resumed firing, picking off several zombies that had managed to escape being crushed by the loaders.

  “The rest of you, get going!” Victor shouted to the remaining folks who had been part of the convoy. Carl Bremer, the heavily mustachioed fire chief, stopped and pulled out a massive revolver. He pointed it at the approaching dead and fired, pelting Corbett and Victor with powder as the big handgun barked.

  “God damn it, Bremer, stop playing around!” Corbett yelled. “What the hell’s wrong with you, bringing a damn wheel gun to this fight!”

  “Sorry!” With that, Bremer was gone, dashing down the corridor after the others.

  “Sir, we need to follow!” shouted one of Corbett’s security team. Like the rest of his peers, he had been on his rifle the entire time, methodically taking out the dead as they shambled forward. The road was littered with bodies, but there was only so much they could do. The loader before them grated to a halt, and the Asian man in the cab threw open the door and gestured at them frantically.

  “Go on, get movin’!” he screamed. “What’re y’all waitin’ for, engraved invitations?” His Texas accent was incongruous with his looks. Without waiting for an answer, he returned to the cab and resumed backing up. He was obviously going to use his vehicle to block the entrance. Behind them, the driver of the last loader, a broad-shouldered Hispanic man, bailed out of his vehicle and darted toward them.

  “Okay,” Corbett said. “Let’s go.” He turned and jogged toward the entrance, moving far slower than he would have liked. His back was killing him, and so were his knees. He was in great shape for a man in his seventies, but all the running, climbing, shooting, and general rough-housing were taking
their toll. Victor paced him and reached out, putting an arm on his shoulder.

  “Barry, you all right?” he asked.

  “Doing fantastic, Vic. Yourself?”

  “I’m—oh, fuck!”

  Ahead, zombies crested the walls. They fell to the road ahead of them, bouncing and rolling and moaning. Corbett’s heart felt heavy. In the span of time it took to take three steps, there were over twenty stenches between them and the airfield, and more coming over every moment. Lured in by the sounds of combat and the commotion with the loaders, they had been mounding without any kind of harassment. Now, the tsunami of corpses had reached its zenith, and it was spilling over the twenty-foot walls.

  “Run!” Victor shouted, pulling Corbett along with him. “Run, it’s the only way!” He let go of his rifle and pulled his pistol instead, firing at the corpses that struggled to rise to their feet. Two went down, leaking ichor across the blacktop. Corbett raised his rifle and fired as well, careful to choose his target. The others were still ahead of them, and while he might have enjoyed accidentally shooting Sinclair in the back, he didn’t want to hit anyone else. The driver went down with a cry as one of the zombies landed right on him, and Corbett slowed, trying to turn back. But Victor still had him, and he pulled him along with almost fanatical strength. More zombies landed on and around the fallen man, and there was no hope from him. Farther back, Corbett caught a quick look at the Asian with the Texas accent as he was hauled from his loader while trying to exit the cab. He kicked and screamed, but the dead were already swarming the rig.

  Ghouls fell all around Corbett, launching themselves at him from the top of the wall. Another member of his security detail went down, yelling as he fired point-blank into the bodies that enveloped him. One round stuck the wall beside Corbett and ricocheted away with a whine and a brief burst of sparks. A stench grabbed at his right foot, and he shot it in the face. Another pawed at his back, trying to snatch up a handful of his jacket. Corbett twisted at the waist, causing the grotesquerie to lose its grip and fall. A runner suddenly caught up to them and went straight for Victor, knocking him off-balance. Corbett snarled and turned his rifle on it. His first shot missed, and then it was all over Victor, trying to grab him up, teeth glinting in the afternoon sunlight. Corbett snatched a handful of its hair and yanked its head back. A patch of hair came off right in his hand with a dull ripping sound, exposing bloodless scalp beneath. Victor fought back, yelping. He fired his pistol into the corpse’s pelvis, driving it back, then fired another round through its head. The ghoul fell and lay still.

  And behind them, hundreds of stenches filled the walled alleyway leading to the airport. Corbett knew they’d never make it in time, especially when he saw the runners picking their way through the horde. Even in death, their speed and reflexes were extraordinary.

  “Guess you wasted those prisoners a little early,” Victor said. He fired his pistol into the oncoming mass until it was empty, then dropped it and pulled his rifle back into his hands.

  “I’ll hold them back,” Corbett said. “You get going! Your niece, she needs you!”

  “Not any more, Kimosabe,” Victor said. He shouldered his rifle to fire, and as he did, Corbett saw the ugly bite wound on his friend’s left hand. Victor’s blood was bright and red as it gushed from the wound, severed tendons gnarled up and moving without any real coordination. Droplets of scarlet fell to the roadway, splashing in the dust there.

  Corbett despaired. Of all the people in Single Tree, he had intended Victor to live. If he’d been forced to choose one person to save, it would have been Victor. And now, his friend had been bitten. He was a walking dead man.

  His fate was sealed.

  “Victor,” Corbett said, and his voice was small and puny against the staccato blasts from Victor’s rifle. Sudden tears made his vision blurry at a time when twenty-twenty was most definitely called for.

  “Go on, Barry,” he said. “Please, save my niece. I’ll hold them here for as long as I can.”

  “Victor, God damn it—”

  “Barry, please!” Victor snapped. “Please get out of here!”

  The dead were only thirty feet away. Victor swapped out magazines, and Corbett covered for him as he did so. It took only seconds, but seconds were what counted now; the time for minutes and hours had long passed. Now the only thing left remaining were magazine capacity and rate of fire. Everything else was as useful as a month-old afterthought.

  “Go on!” Victor shouted as he slapped the carrier release on his rifle. “I’m dead, Barry—get out of here!” There was no fear in the tribal leader’s eyes, only hard, flinty dedication. Victor Kuruk saw his future coming head on, and it didn’t faze him in the slightest.

  Corbett took a step back, still firing. He fired until his weapon ran dry, then stumbled away, heading toward the airfield. By the time he made it out of the alleyway and saw his Gulfstream on the run-up pad, he was blubbering full on. The air stair was extended, and through the big oval windows in the aircraft’s side, he saw people moving about inside. A few armed men stood on security near the big jet. As soon as he came into view, they sprinted toward him. The jet emitted a low rumble that climbed into a shrill whine as the right engine spooled up. The bi-fold door on the hangar he’d had built for his jet was open. Inside the wide, tall structure were dozens of people. More individuals, townspeople and his remaining staff alike, were frantically transferring the contents of two nearby semitruck trailers into the hangar. They pulled heavily laden pallet jacks to the structure, hurriedly unloaded them, then darted back to load them up again.

  As loud as the engine noise was, Corbett never heard Victor scream when the firing stopped and the dead overwhelmed him. He went stoically, just like a Hollywood hero.

  The jet was full when Corbett scaled the air stair, out of breath, his face wet with tears and sweat. His hands shook, and his legs felt weak and rubbery. He felt older than he had ever felt before. One of his men cut through the cabin, moving people aside as he led Corbett to his customary seat in the rear of the airplane, where the second compartment was. Corbett looked behind him to the flight deck, where both pilots were bringing the big jet to life. Another sat on the jump seat, while a person he didn’t recognize—possibly a family member—sat in the crew rest seat.

  “Sir, is anyone else coming?” the relief pilot asked.

  “This is it,” Corbett said quietly, before turning to his right and walking through the well-appointed galley. Behind him, one of the security men ran up the air stair and closed the cabin door behind him. As Corbett moved through the cabin, the left engine began to wind up. Cool air whispered from the hidden vents. Frightened faces turned to look up at him as he picked his way past. The cabin configuration allowed for sixteen passengers. There were almost thirty people on the plane. Children sat in their parents’ laps, and four and five people were sitting on divans designed to seat three. At the four-place dining area, Danielle Kennedy sat with her father, across from two women with children on their laps. The table had been removed. Danielle held a child on her lap as well. Corbett evaded her gaze as he pushed into the VIP cabin at the tail of the jet. There was another three-place divan there, across from the single principal’s seat. The single seat was empty, and a blanket and pillow sat on its buttery leather cushions. A bottle of chilled water stood in the cup holder, placed there for him by his ever-thoughtful flight crew. Lined up on the divan were the Sinclairs. Next to them was Norton’s mother, and next to her, by the aft bulkhead … Suzy Kuruk. Mike Hailey stood by the open lavatory door, sweating profusely. He had a hand on Suzy’s shoulder.

  Corbett took in a quivering breath as he bent over his seat and removed the blanket and pillow. He handed them to Sinclair, who took them wordlessly. His camera was on his shoulder, and he pointed it at Corbett as he sank into the confines of his wide seat. Corbett ignored him and looked at Suzy. Tears were already welling up in her eyes.

  “He sacrificed himself,” Corbett told her, his voice thick and
husky as the jet began to move.

  She nodded. “I knew he would.” Her voice was barely a whisper over the mounting roar of the jet engines. The pilot announced they were going to take off immediately, and that everyone needed to secure themselves as best as they could. Corbett fastened his seat belt and raised the writing table, stowing it into its wall recess. He motioned for Hailey to step into the lavatory.

  “Hailey, go sit in the lav. There’s a seat belt on the toilet.”

  “Can’t, sir. Mister Norton’s in there.”

  Corbett pointed at the floor before his feet. “Sit here, then. Put your back against the bulkhead. This is going to be a full-power takeoff. Arthur, you belted in?” he asked, as Hailey did as instructed.

  “Oh, yes,” came Arthur Norton’s voice from around the walnut-veneered bulkhead. “I’ve never sat on a toilet as luxurious as this one, Barry!”

  Corbett wiped his eyes with the back of his hand and looked out the large oval window beside him. The hangar door was closing, sealing off over a hundred souls from the rest of the world. For the next few months, it would be their home. And just in time. From the entrance to the airport, an invading army of the dead boiled onto the airfield. More of them came over the walls surrounding the installation, a flood of carnivorous corpses that turned toward the taxiing plane with slack-jawed hunger. Several runners broke away from the herds, bolting toward the G650 as it lumbered along the taxiway. As the jet turned onto the runway proper, the engines began to spool up. This wasn’t just a final run-up. The pilots were transitioning from taxi to takeoff power without running any final checks. Corbett unfolded the personal entertainment system beside him and thumbed through the menus, activating the camera that sat atop the Gulfstream’s tall T-tail. The end of the runway was already saturated with dead, and they streamed toward the jet like ants scuttling toward a dropped peanut butter and jelly sandwich.

  “Jock, you get that drink you wanted?” he asked over the mounting roar of the engines.