The light faded at an agonizingly leisurely pace until only the stars and a tiny sliver of moon lit up the street. Still he watched the infected for half an hour after full dark, studying their movements, the way they tripped over low obstacles like fire hydrants and curbs and how most of them simply stood quietly, backs pressed against walls or just lay down on the pavement. When he worked up enough nerve, he unbarred the door, slid back the bolt and opened it at soundlessly as possible. None of the infected seemed to hear the door opening and none seemed to notice him step outside. The closest infected was sitting against a building across the street and gave no indication of seeing him, even though he was looking in his direction. Bailey reached the car and opened the door, causing the dome light to come on. There was an instant reaction from all the infected in close proximity; moans issued from their throats and heads turned in his direction. Those prone began to rise up from the ground and those standing headed immediately for him. Bailey threw himself into the front seat, slamming and locking the door. He fumbled for just a moment with the key, then the engine turned over and he shifted into gear, bouncing several infected off his fenders and running completely over a smallish woman.
He swerved to avoid larger concentrations and plowed individuals aside for the next couple of blocks, then his headlights illuminated a mass of dozens of infected in the road ahead of him, too many to get through. Tires squealing, he jerked the wheel to the left and headed down a side street, bowling over at least ten individuals before reaching the next intersection. He took a street perpendicular to the path the infected had been following and made several miles before the engine began to overheat and he was obliged to stop.
There was no one in sight and he shut off the headlights, grabbed a flashlight from the glove box and got out of the car. The front grill was plastered with blood and gore and torn pieces of clothing, which he unenthusiastically had to clear away with his bare hands. That grisly bit of work done, he restarted the engine and continued driving until he came upon a small stone chapel adjoining a graveyard, both surrounded by a low stone wall into which was set a wrought-iron fence. By that time, the car was dangerously overheating again and he drove it onto the grounds and opened the hood, releasing a billowing cloud of steam. There were two bottles of water in the car and he greedily drank one down and took the second with him. Next, he checked the building, finding no one around but there was evidence that someone had stopped here before him. Unfortunately, they’d left behind nothing useful so Bailey went back outside to make a quick circuit of the grounds before closing the gate. He locked the chapel door and collapsed on one of the wooden pews, falling asleep almost immediately.
Chapter 13: Garth
After spending the night in a second-story room at a motel off the highway, Jerry checked the parking lot for another vehicle. The doughnut-spare he had on the front wheel was low on air and was beginning to look frayed after five days of driving and he dreaded the thought of being stranded at the worst possible moment. In an incredible stroke of good fortune, he found a purse on the floor of a new Expedition that held the key fob. The engine turned over immediately and the gas gauge showed the tank was a little over half full. He dispatched three infected with a large ball peen hammer he’d picked up at a hardware store the day before and, using his siphon hose, was able to draw enough gas from the other vehicles in the lot to fill his tank as well as two plastic five-gallon gas cans.
He’d been tempted to stay on at the motel; the two staircases leading up to the second level could easily be barricaded, but that act would also advertise his presence to anyone who passed by. With some reservation, he transferred his supplies to the Expedition and headed down the road again. Three hours of travel took him past a small town that had been virtually burnt to the ground, dozens of outlying houses with broken windows and shattered doors and hundreds of corpses in various stages of evisceration and decomposition. In all the time since he lost Teddy, he’d spotted scores of infected wandering the road and the surrounding grounds but not a single living human, at least one that didn’t try to kill him.
A lone house stood atop a hill ahead of him, a long, limestone driveway leading up off the county road he’d been traveling. He parked the Expedition near the top of the drive, passenger side facing the house, and exited the vehicle. There appeared to be no sign of life, but Jerry held his .45 in one hand, the hammer in his other and had the .40 stuffed in his belt when he approached the door. When he was closer to the house than his truck, a voice called out a challenge and ordered him to stop. Looking around, he saw there was no nearby cover he could reasonably expect to reach before being shot, so he stopped and lowered the barrel of his pistol.
“I’m not looking for trouble,” he called out. “I’m just looking for a place to hole up. I didn’t know this place was already claimed. If you’ll let me, I’ll turn around and be on my way.”
The door opened and a rugged-looking man in his late sixties stepped out carrying a long shotgun. The man looked him up and down carefully, as if he were trying to make a decision.
“What’s your name?” the man finally asked.
“My name’s Jerry Moran. I don’t mean you any harm, mister; I’m just trying to stay alive.”
“Your name sounds familiar. Come up closer and let me get a good look at you.”
“Look, I swear I don’t mean you any harm! I could just drive away and you’d never see me again!”
“Put that gun in your pocket and we’ll talk about it.”
With a sigh, Jerry put the .45 in his pants pocket and started slowly toward the man on the porch. The man lowered the barrel of his shotgun and studied him, coming down the steps but ready to point and fire at a moment’s notice.
“My wife’s got a CD with your picture on it,” the man said at last, face lighting up.
“Always nice to meet a fan,” Jerry said with a sigh of relief.
“Name’s Bill Moyler,” the man said, walking up to Jerry and extending his hand.
Jerry shook his hand and said he was pleased to meet him.
“Come on into the house and meet my wife; she’ll be tickled.”
Bill led Jerry into the house where he found a second, younger man with a hunting rifle and Bill’s wife, who was thrilled to meet him.
“This is my wife, Cara and my nephew, Garth.”
Jerry shook their hands, Garth eyeing him cautiously while Cara hugged him and told him how much she enjoyed his singing.
“If you want, you can stay here with us,” Bill offered. “We’re way up here where nobody can get close without us seeing them and we got a well out back.”
“Uncle Bill,” Garth butted in. “We don’t hardly have enough food for ourselves,” he reminded him, stepping closer. Jerry noticed the odd way he walked and looked down to see a metal prosthetic where his right foot should have been.
“Land mine,” Garth said when he saw the way Jerry looked at it. “I lost my leg below the knee two years ago.”
“Sorry, I didn’t mean to stare. And I’ve got supplies in my car. I’ve been on the road a while, scrounging while I looked for a place to stay. I probably have enough food for all of us for a couple weeks, and I’ve gotten pretty good at finding more.”
“I guess having an extra hand would be pretty helpful,” Garth allowed. “I didn’t mean to come off so unfriendly, but people have to look for themselves now. I don’t think there’s any government or law left anymore.”
“I think you’re right about that. There hasn’t been anything but static on the radio for a long time now and I sure haven’t seen any signs of law and order out there; just the opposite, in fact.”
“I figured some people would turn bad after this all started,” Bill said.
“Most of the people I’ve run into have been outlaws. I have to tell you, I’ve got blood on my hands; I’ve killed five people who tried to do me harm.”
“Yeah, well, we killed three last week who tried to take our home,” Bill sighed. �
�They killed Garth’s brother and his wife before we could stop them, so we’re no strangers to violence ourselves. You have to do whatever’s necessary to protect yourself and your family. You’re still welcome to stay.”
“Thank you. I’m getting awfully tired of being on the move all the time. I haven’t stayed more than a few days in the same place since this all started. I’ll bring the car up and we can unload it.”
It took several trips to bring everything into the house and Jerry noticed that Garth made it a point to carry at least his fair share and a little more beside. There was a level area about a hundred feet square behind the house upon which sat a small barn and a couple of sheds. Beyond that, the ground tapered off rather sharply for another hundred fifty feet before leveling off again. There sat the well, an old, pulley and bucket affair that probably was little used in the last fifty years, but was still functional. Two barrels sat on the back porch, between which the family alternated, using one until it was empty before switching, then filling the empty by carrying water up the hill. Inside the house were kept five seven-gallon tapped plastic water jugs, which they used for cooking and drinking. Rainwater, when available, was used for most washing and for flushing toilets. Jerry mentioned that they seemed to have a good system set up, at which Bill beamed and admitted it was his idea. The only problem of any note was that, with the deaths of Garth’s brother and sister-in-law, it became quite difficult to lug that much water up the hill; Bill’s health was deteriorating, Cara was a month away from a scheduled hip replacement when the outbreak started and Garth obviously had trouble negotiating the hill carrying two full water buckets.
“This is a big house,” Jerry commented after Bill gave him the grand tour. “Five bedrooms, a full basement, plenty of room here.”
“My grandfather built this house,” Bill told him. “He had nine kids, including dad; six boys and three girls. Back then, this was a three hundred acre farm and he needed a lot of help to work it. But, one of my uncles died storming Omaha Beach, another was on a helicopter that went down over Korea and the youngest lost both legs in Vietnam. My aunts all married and moved away and the others weren’t interested in spending the rest of their lives working the land. Grandpa’s will left each of his kids equal shares in the farm, but all the others just wanted to sell it off. Long story short; there’s the house and twenty acres left now. I can’t farm it myself anymore and can’t afford to hire help, but I’m going to hang onto it as long as I can.”
“That’s a shame,” Jerry sympathized. “I hate to see something like that happen.”
“Well, it is what it is. It might not be a working farm anymore, but it’s been a good home for Cara and me. Take any bedroom you want. Cara can’t make it up the steps anymore so we sleep in the parlor and Garth is set up in the back room. You can have the whole upstairs to yourself.”
“None of your neighbors survived?”
“Not a one. The closest lived a quarter mile away and made it almost half way here before they took him down. Other than the ones that killed Frank and Emily, we haven’t seen a living soul since then; an uninfected one anyway.”
Over the next few weeks, Jerry became a part of the family and he and Garth made a number of supply runs to nearby farms, houses and a small town, scavenging anything they thought might be useful. They also took Bill’s truck to cut firewood at a stand of trees a few miles down the road. He occasionally let Cara talk him into singing for her while she played an old, somewhat out-of-tune piano. Truth be told, he enjoyed singing for an audience again, no matter how small; it called back better times when the world was still normal.
Hundreds of infected passed by the house during that time, both individually and in packs, staying mostly on the county road. None of them, so far, felt inclined to climb the steep hill and the group took care to do nothing to call attention to themselves. They also took care to avoid the infected whenever possible on supply runs and woodcutting missions, though the noise of the chainsaws inevitably attracted any nearby. Having lived there his entire life, Bill was quite familiar with the area and full of advice on which of his former neighbors did a lot of canning or had weapons in their homes, where every store and small shop was located and alternate routes to get to virtually every destination. With parts taken from a farm supply store, Garth rigged up a hand-cranked pump they could use to siphon fuel from underground tanks at the lone gas station in the area and they filled as many gasoline and diesel cans as they could find. Life settled into a comfortable, if lonely routine, but they never gave up hope of finding others like themselves to expand their tiny band; people who could be trusted to work together with them toward the day when civilization could reassert itself.
Chapter 14: Bailey Finds a Home
Bailey awoke in a foul mood. He was hungry, thirsty and full of aches and pains after sleeping on a hard wooden pew. Fortunately, there were no infected in sight when he came out of the chapel and he got into his car and started down the road again. An unfinished housing allotment yielded nothing useable and he continued on until he found a cluster of storage buildings. In one of the units, he found a case of soda cans and he guzzled one down immediately. Further searching brought him a few small packs of crackers, which he ate, and a discarded cigarette pack with four very stale cigarettes left. He lit one and sucked in a lungful of harsh smoke, which he immediately expelled in a violent fit of coughing. He dropped the cigarette and ground it into the floor with his heel, remembering why he quit in the first place. Darkness was approaching rapidly now and he closed the gate on the chain link fence surrounding the units and made a bed of discarded clothing, pulled the door shut and spent another uncomfortable night.
Stomach rumbling loudly and uncomfortably, he drove into a small town where he found dozens of corpses near a burnt-out auto, apparently dead from gunshot wounds, though it was difficult to be sure after they’d been picked over by other infected. Among the bodies, he found a twelve-gauge shotgun, but the stock was cracked and the mechanism was dented and bent. A minimart still held a few stale loaves of bread and a small amount of boxed and canned food and he filled his stomach for the first time in days. On the floor near an overturned cooler, he found three bottles of water and a few cans of energy drinks. He drank one bottle and put everything else in his car.
Again on the road, he stopped a few times to check abandoned autos for food or weapons but was disappointed at every turn and finally abandoned the effort. Late in the afternoon, he stopped to relieve himself by the side of the road and decided it was a good spot to stretch his legs a bit and get something to eat from his meager stores. He was eating a cold can of chili, washing it down with one of the energy drinks when he saw the first infected approaching. It was a tall brunette, apparently only recently turned, and wearing a pair of cut-off jeans and a tight t-shirt. The lower half of her face and her upper chest were smeared with blood, but that didn’t disguise the fact that she’d been a very attractive woman before suffering an ugly bite on her shoulder. Bailey smiled appreciatively as he watched her approach, wishing he could have run into her under different circumstances. He ogled her until she was about twenty feet away before sighing and turning back toward his car. Too late, he realized that he should have been paying more attention to his surroundings. Several infected were already between him and his car and more were closing in from two directions.
Bailey drew his pistol and killed the nearest ones, including the distracting brunette and tried to clear a path to his car. The slide of his Colt locked back, empty after a half dozen shots and he had to give up hope of driving away to safety. He’d neglected to bring any other weapons with him, not even the tire iron he’d found in the trunk, and he had to retreat up the road. The infected were easy to outrun but they followed him with a relentless, single-minded determination and there were more behind him every time he looked back. There was nowhere to hide, no place to get out of their reach, all he could do was to keep moving. More than an hour later, he’d lost the original
group, but was continually picking up fresh stalkers as he travelled. He couldn’t stop to rest, had nothing with which to put up a fight and was tiring rapidly. He’d long known he was out of shape and kept promising himself he’d spend more time at the company gym, but, for one reason or another, that never seemed to happen. Now, when it was far too late, he desperately wished he’d listened to his doctor, his co-workers, even his ex-wife.
A handful of buildings started to appear, mostly abandoned and boarded-up homes and he dared hope he might find some place to hide, but he found more infected milling about the buildings and only with the greatest difficulty did he avoid being surrounded and trapped. Now in headlong flight, panting, wheezing and sweating profusely, he despaired of surviving this latest encounter. A trio of infected stepped out into the road ahead of him and he stumbled in his haste to change direction and his ankle twisted painfully. He hit the ground hard and felt the shock between his shoulder blades, momentarily paralyzing him with pain. When he tried to get to his feet, he found he had only limited use of his right arm and his ankle wouldn’t bear any weight at all so he began crawling painfully away from the infected who, to his eye, seemed to have speeded up exponentially.
A shot rang out and the nearest infected suddenly sprouted a bloody hole an inch from his left eye, dropping dead to the ground. A series of spaced shots brought down one after another of his pursuers until Bailey was left alone, surrounded by fallen enemies.
Laughing and crying at the same time, Bailey got to a sitting position and spotted a man with a rifle walking cautiously toward him through the field of bodies.
“Have you been bitten?” the man asked.
“No, no, thank God! You saved my life!”
“What the hell are you doing out here all alone, without a car, without a weapon? What the hell were you thinking?”
The Complete Lethal Infection Trilogy Page 57
