Finally, we blew right past Elm Street. It was literally the last place to turn and it was the place we had to stop. Karen slammed on the brakes and we came to a stop just beyond a railroad warning sight that had an additional sign warning of a “rough crossing.” The road ahead was densely packed with the dead. They had been oriented towards the train and downtown Marietta. But as they became aware of our roaring engine they turned in unison to face us.
“The trains!” I exclaimed.
“What?”
“They are blocking the road up ahead and these Zombies are cut off from the rest of town!”
“What should we do?”
“Take a right,” I said. “Let’s go through the neighborhood and get around the trains!”
“There’s a problem!”
“What?”
“We’re surrounded!”
We all turned around and looked behind us. The road was rapidly filling in with a shuffling horde of the dead. There must have been dozens and they were all shuffling our way.
“Run ‘em over!” I yelled excitedly. “Run ‘em over!”
“Yes, do the needful and squish them like bugs,” a voice from the backseat advised.
Karen slammed the Camry into reverse and stomped on the gas. The acceleration surprised us. But, we heard the whack-whack-whack of zombies against the back bumper. We plowed through about thirty feet of them. Fortunately, the relatively high trunk kept them from rolling up and into our rear window. We lurched to a stop again and Karen slammed the transmission back into drive, then cranked the wheel hard over, and floored it again. The Camry’s tires chirped, the traction control kicked in for a moment as the tires struggled for grip on the blood slick roads, and then we started picking up speed. With four people on board, the four cylinder wasn’t fast. But, it was moving deliberately and picking up speed. We darted into the neighborhood. While there were still plenty of zombies wandering through the historic suburb, they didn’t have the numbers to completely block the road. They’d look up, recognize human prey, and barely have time to turn before we whizzed right by them. With us rolling along at 30 to 40 miles per hour, there was nothing they could do. In the rear view mirror, they formed a grotesque parade shuffling slowly along behind us and fading into the distance.
The streets of Marietta were at once familiar and strange. We generally only rolled through the neighborhoods once every year or two around Christmas to see which houses still put up nice light displays. Off of the vanity thoroughfares, the homes were a hodge-podge of small brick ranch-style houses, colonial-style cottages, and traditional Victorian homes with turrets and comfortable looking wrap around porches. In some yards, you could see that the homeowners were condemned to wander as zombies behind white picket fences, trailing their entrails behind them, until they would eventually rot away into fertilizer for wonderfully green lawns.
We roared down the back streets zigging and zagging around the wandering dead. Along the way, we wondered if some of the houses might actually be occupied by the living, but there was no time to stop. There were enough zombies that any stop would have given them time to surround us and our vehicle. We finally made our way over to one of the major thoroughfares and headed back towards our neighborhood. But, there was one place that might be worth a stop: Gun Mart.
Chapter 50
If there was any place in Georgia that would still be open during an apocalypse, it would probably be Gun Mart. The place was a converted department store filled wall to wall with hundreds or thousands of guns, tens of thousands of rounds of ammunition, and lots of camping supplies. It was the big box store to end all big box stores. It would also have been a big target for any organized group of survivors and all of the shooting would have probably gathered zombies from miles around.
“You aren’t thinking about stopping at your gun shop?” Karen asked.
“No,” I replied. “I wonder if we should even drive by it?”
“I’m not interested in trying to weave through the neighborhoods to get over to Atlanta Road.”
“Yeah, I’m not totally sure which roads to take until we pass the gun shop.”
“I kind of want to see what it looks like,” Karen confessed.
“Well, keep on driving,” I told her. “But, drive like the wind!”
We always chased fire trucks or looked to see who the police had pulled over. The Zombie apocalypse didn’t change any of that. We still wanted to see what the gun shop would look like. We secretly hoped it was wide open with ammunition free for the taking. But, we honestly didn’t know what to expect. But, since Cobb Boulevard was a big wide road, we could easily hit 70 miles per hour on sections that weren’t clogged with wrecks and abandoned vehicles.
We kept our eyes peeled for the big gun store. We seldom approached it from this direction.
“Where is it?”
“It should be coming up!”
“What are we looking for?”
“A big ass sign with crossed pistols and GUN MART in big blue letters.”
The anticipation was palpable. What if it was empty? What if we could get some ammunition and other supplies? The store could literally contain everything we would need. But, I also envisioned a smoking ruin surrounded by Zombies. Suddenly, we saw the sign. The store was coming up! I didn’t see too many wandering Zombies. But, there was a little smoke up ahead just beyond a thick row of pine trees that separated the various strip malls of Cobb.
The smoke was coming from a big pile of debris in the parking lot. The store was intact. There might be something to salvage. We might be able to reload.
“Should we go?,” Karen asked whipping the car into the parking lot.
“There’s people up there!” I shouted.
There were people on the roof with guns. Guns that were aimed our way. Karen whipped the Camry back to the left and accelerated in the parking lot. The tires howled in protest and the Japanese sedan leaned way over. But, we were moving and they weren’t shooting. We were about 150 yards from the building and driving parallel to the main road. Karen turned violently back out of the lot and onto the main drag. The right rear tire hopped across on the sidewalk and up into the air. For a few feet we were on two wheels, but the car regained its footing before we got to the median.
Karen drove like a bat out of hell until we were at least 1000 yards further on down the road and then she stopped. She was ghostly white and her hands were trembling.
“Holy crap,” she cried. “That was close.”
“Did you see that the big pile of stuff they were burning?” Chiran asked from the back seat. “All dead people! They were burning dead people.”
“They had tents on the roof,” Vijay chimed in. “Many people living there.”
“Do you think we should go back and talk to them?” I asked.
“I am not going back there,” Karen said. “No way!”
“But, they might have things we need.”
“Water, I need water,” she stammered with a dry mouth and veins full of adrenaline.
“Here, here,” Vijay said passing a plastic bottle forward.
Karen took a small swig. Put the bottle down in the center console and put her head down on the steering wheel. She took a deep breath.
“I hate Atlanta,” she said.
Suddenly we heard the roar of un-muffled engines. Motorcycles. They came up fast. Before Karen could raise her head from the wheel, before I could turn in my seat, and before the guys could turn around, we were surrounded. We had a motorcycle on each side of us and two more directly behind us. Each one had a banner flag for “Gun Mart” bolted onto the rear. We remembered them from when the big blow out sales the store used to have during the summer.
The cyclist beside me made a cranking motion with his fist and I complied by rolling down my window.
“Hi, I’m Mack,” he said. “We don’t mean to scare you guys. But, there is something you should know.”
“What’s that?” I asked.
“We�
��re open for business?”
“Open?” I said. “How is that EVEN possible?”
The cyclist smiled and rubbed his hands together.
“We still have the supplies that everyone wants and everyone needs. We still have some ammunition and we still have some reloading equipment,” he replied. “Heck, we still have camping supplies, coolers, and smokers!”
“How can we pay you?” I asked. “It’s not like credit cards work?”
“Barter and trade!” he said. “You bring us stuff we need and we give you stuff we need.”
“The world may end,” he said with a smile. “But, the free market never dies.”
In truth, I had seen that smile before. Usually I saw it when I was selling them an unloved firearm to raise a little much needed cash. I always got what I needed, but sometimes I really wished I had kept my old guns. The boom in H1B contracting had been a bust for my once vast gun collection.
“That’s awesome!” I said. “What are you guys looking for?”
“We need food, fresh produce, meat, eggs, water, first aid and medical supplies, and ….uh… women’s products,” he replied lowering his voice to a whisper. “We need almost anything in the basic staples category.”
“If you bring stuff to us,” Mack continued. “We’ll assess what you bring in and offer you survival equipment, guns, or ammunition in exchange.”
“That would be most helpful,” Vijay chimed in from the backseat. “I believe we can trade.”
I thought it would be really interesting to see how Indians would try to bargain with skilled American pawnshop types. Let the games begin.
“In a few months,” he said. “We’ll be able to offer all kinds of merchandise. We’re trying to get some crops going and we’re trying to get some chicken coops up and running.”
Ka-chink, Ka-chink, Ka-chink. We were startled to hear the clanking bolt of a “silenced” firearm. Three zombies dropped about a thirty feet behind the lead merchant.
“Listen Mack,” I said. “We best be going before the Zombies get to thick. But, we will be able to trade for supplies soon.”
“We might be able to trade food for ammunition,” Karen said overcoming her shock. “There is lots of stuff we need.”
“Alright,” Mack replied. “I expect that we’ll be seeing you around.”
As the motorcyclists roared off, I realized that the world had changed. While the old world of credit cards, monthly bills, and readily available food was gone, a new world was rising in it’s place. As ugly and smelly and deadly as the new world was, the old burdens were gone and the slate was clean. All the old world burdens were gone. All we had to do was survive and thrive.
Karen pressed the pedal down again. As the Camry picked up speed, I could tell she was thinking about the future. As she effortlessly glided by wrecks and zombies, her mind was elsewhere. It was clear that she was already shopping.
“Do you think they have a dehydrator?” she asked. “We could make beef jerky.”
“I think they do,” I answered. “I just can’t remember what part of the store it was in.”
“Where would you get a cow?” Charan piped up from the back seat with an obvious question.
Chapter 51
We were lost in our thoughts for much of the rest of the trip. We had seen a lot and we were tired. We also wanted to see our dog. Fortunately, the once busy roads were ghostly quiet. We made good time and the trip from the gun shop that used to take about twenty minutes didn’t take much more despite patches of free range zombies. As we got back into our old neighborhood, we started to get nervous. We slowed to a crawl and decided to retrace our steps back to Chattahoochee Ridge through the back roads.
All of us got our weapons out and ready. Karen set her weapon in her lap. We weren’t sure what to expect. We wondered if the complex would still be standing or if it had been sacked by the gang. They were mostly young punks, but they could be crafty and they could be waiting for us. We didn’t want to roll into an ambush. At the same time, we didn’t want to sit in the middle of the road waiting for one. I held on tightly to the Glock while carefully keeping my booger hook off of the trigger. To be safe, I let my trigger finger rest alongside the frame where it would be available, but outside the trigger guard.
As we turned the corner, the road seemed clear. Then we saw a semi-circle of vehicles parked in a semi-circle at the intersection of Mount Johnston Road. There were people lounging about there. They saw us just moments after we saw them. I could see them scrambling for their rifles and hopping into cars. Karen floored it. The gangbangers and our group were at equal distances from the entrance road into the complex. But, we were already rolling.
As we got to the entrance road, they started to take the first shots at us. But, they were poorly aimed. The “Chattahoochee Run – Luxury Apartments” sign loomed large ahead of us. But, we were trying to shrink down into our seats. Karen threw the car around the corner like she was a professional drift circuit racer. As we raced towards our own front gate and home, I was struck with a thought.
“They don’t know it is us!” Karen and I yelled simultaneously.
Ahead of us, we saw our gate crew leveling their rifles at us. But, behind us were three cars full of punk ass little gangster. Karen stomped on the brakes and we were all thrown forward as our car came to a stop behind the front gate call box. We looked up just in time to see muzzle flashes directly ahead of us.
“Guys, drop your guns!” I yelled to everyone in our car.
We all tried to become some very low part of the floor boards. But, no shots came through the car. No glass was broken. No mirror knocked askew. We spent a minute or two regaining our composure and verifying that we weren’t perforated in a thousand bleeding places.
“You can come out now,” a gentle Indian voice said from outside. “The gangsters are gone.”
We crawled—unarmed—from the Camry. Karen walked over to the flower arrangement and statue in the circle in front of the rental office and puked her guts out. I stayed low on my hands and knees while looking around. Vijay and Chiran got out of the back seat and ducked behind the Camry.
“Darshana saw you up on the main road,” said the soft-spoken gate guard we now recognized as Aniruddha or A.G. for short.
He waved up at the pedestrian staircase just outside the main gate and a young Indian woman with tea-stained sari and a big pair of binoculars smiled and waved down. Two swarthy Indian men with rifles stood beside her. We hadn’t even seen them. SWAT Cop Larry came walking up the hill.
“We weren’t sure you were going to make it,” Larry called out. “You were gone for awhile.”
“We didn’t think we were going to make it either.”
“Why don’t you bring your car in before those little gangsters come back?” SWAT Cop ordered in the form of a question.
“We’ll go back to our building for awhile and then come make the rounds.”
“Sure. You are home now.”
We reluctantly climbed back in as they pulled the gate open for us. The Camry had indeed brought us home. We dropped Charan off at our makeshift hospital where our pharmacist and his girlfriend Saina could help him mend. Then we slowly drove around the horseshoe back towards our apartment, we could see that the place was busy. The old Indian grandfathers and grandmothers who had no sense of how to be a pedestrian were now hard at work planting food gardens where shrubbery or lawn had once been. On a corner of one of the smaller buildings, a crew was working to redirect a gutter downspout into a barrel for water collection. Everywhere people were moving with purpose to prepare the complex for the long haul ahead. But, while there was hope, there was also a sense of foreboding in the air. Something was about to happen and the people were getting ready.
But, this afternoon, the most important thing was that we were going to see Dale. We made a bee-line for our building to see Preston and to see our dog. Preston and his family were converting the flower garden in the front courtyard of our building int
o something more practical and more edible. Dale was laying down on the brick entrance walk trying to take a nap. He looked up when we rolled in and when we got out. The golden retriever basset hound mix could barely contain himself. He ran to end of his leash and leaped at us. We rushed up to keep him from choking on his collar. The dog would barely contain his joy. Even in the midst of a zombie apocalypse, it was good to be home. Home is where the dog is.
Chapter 52
After playing with our dog and relaxing in our own space for awhile, it was time to assess the situation. We had trading partners and potential allies. We knew where at least some access to medical care might be. If we could keep our footing, we might be able to scratch out some kind of existence. But, we were also surrounded by criminals and desperate survivors who might want to steal what little we had. We were a big and lucrative target. We couldn’t sit around in our apartment with that knowledge. We had to make sure that we were ready.
I left Karen to stay home and hang with our old pup while I went around to check on defenses. First I went downstairs and talked to Preston. The whole family was just sitting down in the courtyard to clean their guns. They were using cut up old t-shirts as cleaning patches.
“In this world,” Preston said. “You either have too damn many patches or no patches at all.”
“You got that right,” I agreed. “Of course, I just lose my guns in a mob of zombies and get new ones.”
“That’s one way to do it,” he laughed. “What are you carrying now?”
“I have a Glock now,” I replied and then I proceeded to tell him about what we had seen on our journey to Marietta and beyond.
“What have we missed?” I asked.
“Well our little gangster friends have been keeping a close watch on this place. They’ve been watching us day and night and they’ve been shooting at us or throwing fireworks into the complex.”
Zombie Complex | Book 1 | The Battle For Chattahoochee Run Page 12
