Crawlerz: Book 5: Off the Rails

by R. S. Merritt

  “It’s not just the pilots. Finding the mechanics and support people is another major pain in the ass.” Jeff chimed in. Tommy nodded appreciatively.

  “Well we’ve got you there. In case you hadn’t noticed we started out as a bunch of biker gangs. Not like the guys you see on AMC running dope and weapons all the time. Well some of us were the outlaw types but most of the clubs were just guys who liked to hang out and ride. Most of those guys had regular jobs during the week. Welding and working on cars seemed to be the two main things they did. Electricians, carpenters, linemen pretty much all the skilled jobs were represented.” Tommy paused to see if anyone had anything to say.

  “I’m guessing more than a few of those guys were ex-military too, right?” Jeff asked knowingly.

  “Half our guys were cops or some other kind of military. Just guys who liked to ride and hang out. Special forces guys like to go fast. It really hit the veterans and the other military guys pretty hard when the government abandoned everybody. I was in the Marines. I get why they felt betrayed.” Tommy said.

  An uncomfortable silence fell across the small group. The main architect of that betrayal was sitting across from Tommy right now. Not that Tommy had a clue how involved in all of that Jeff had been. Tommy felt a general hatred for them all for being representatives of the government. LeBron wondered if it’d help or hurt their efforts if they mentioned they were the ones on the train who’d dropped off the brochures. The ones who’d gotten into a firefight previously with this same group of refugee militia. He decided to keep his mouth shut. With his luck they’d scored a lucky shot on Tommy’s brother or something.

  There was no more talking possible for a little while anyway once the chinook took to the sky. The big green bird had taken a few hits recently. That made her a little less aerodynamic and a lot louder. The flight ended up only being about ten minutes from takeoff to landing. Tommy smiled at the comical looks on their faces as they set down.

  “Yeah. When you’re trying to escape from someone maybe don’t drive right into their headquarters. We’ve pretty much made Columbia into our hub.” Tommy said as he was unstrapping himself from the harness. For some reason most of the people who’d survived the apocalypse thus far were the people who were also OCD about making sure they fastened their seatbelts. LeBron thought there was probably a slogan or something to be made out of that. Definitely something bumper sticker worthy.

  “We pretty much used up all of our luck getting out of that garage.” Jeff said. His efforts to win Tommy over were pretty transparent to all of them including Tommy.

  “Lucky or not I’m going to have you guys keep those hands secured behind your backs until we get somewhere I can lock you up nice and tight. If you can fight your way through a bunch of crawlerz in your underwear, then at least one of you has got some skills. We like people with skills over here. You should think about signing up.” Tommy said.

  “We killed like seven of your buddies in the last thirty minutes and you’re asking us to sign up?” The question flew out of Drew’s mouth before he could stop it. He was in complete confusion as to why they hadn’t been shot in the back of the head while they were laid out on the road.

  “All you did was create some job openings and show me that you possess a superior skill set to the men you could be replacing.” Tommy said. He ordered the men in the back to escort the four prisoners inside.

  “What if we don’t sign up?” Drew fired off the question as Tommy was walking away. Tommy stopped and turned around to answer it.

  “Those seven men you just killed. Their friends and family are inside the building you’re going to be spending the night in. If you told me that you wanted in right now your next few hours would still be pretty rough. I’m assuming you’ll be willing to swear allegiance to pretty much anything a few minutes after these guys get ahold of you.” Tommy turned back around and left.

  The building they were being marched towards was a concrete block structure that had all the charisma of every government building built in the last twenty years. Walking around the end of the chinook they were met by another guy who was escorting Lynn. She was handcuffed to him. She smiled briefly at them before being tugged along towards the building in front of them. Ugly lettering on the front of the bland building spelled out corrections department. There were randomly placed steel spikes sticking out of the ground all around the main building.

  “What’s up with the spikes?” LeBron asked the man walking along beside them.

  “Slows down the crawlerz. They can’t really get going to slam into the wall if they keep running into spikes. How do you guys keep them from getting in?” Their escort asked curiously. Drew shrugged.

  “Mostly we shoot them and bolt sheet metal over the windows. Stuff like that.” Drew said. He was taking mental notes as he looked around. The random looking pieces of fencing sticking out of the ground would have the same sort of impact on the crawlerz. Here and there was a decomposing corpse but for the most part the area was pretty clean.

  “Sheet metal doesn’t keep them out long. We use solid iron bars. We have lots of guys who can weld. We’re fortunate that way here.” They were halfway to the front doors. Since their escort was so willing to talk LeBron threw out a question.

  “You guys move around a lot to keep the infected from coming at your building in mobs?” LeBron was curious as to how sturdy the structures really were. The only building he’d ever been in that had successfully withstood the infected for a long period of time was Weathertop. Weathertop also happened to be the only top secret base designed to survive a nuclear war that he’d ever been in.

  “We move around every few weeks. The infected can mob our buildings if they want to. Unless they start using blow torches they’re not going to get in though. Sure doesn’t stop them from trying.” Their escort stopped at the door and let them go through first. LeBron glanced up at the sky as he went in. After everything they’d been through, he’d have thought it would be later. It looked like they still had a good hour or two of daylight left. At least they had a place to spend the night. It sounded like it might even be safe.

  A screaming woman with long blond hair grabbed LeBron by the throat and slammed him into the wall. She started slamming her knee into this crotch and stomach. She raked her nails down the side of his face as he struggled to get away from her. He couldn’t even tell what she was screaming at him about. Ten steps into the building they’d been rushed by a trio of pissed off women. They were all screaming and crying and very violent. Their escort had tried to stop them then just backed up when he started getting hit.

  The only one not subjected to the abuse was Lynn. Her escort had disappeared with her before the others were even all the way in the building. The assault was gradually slowing. LeBron was on the ground doing his best to get in the fetal position with his hands cuffed behind his back. Drew and Jeff had both managed to spin around, so they were just getting hit in the back. Billy had decided to go on the offensive. An approach that was probably not going to end well for him.

  When one of the berserker women clawed her fingernails down the side of Billy’s face he stepped right into her personal space and headbutted the holy hell out of her. The woman went backwards hard enough that her feet went over her head in an awkward somersault. Her face was covered in blood from her shattered nose. Even Billy was a bit shocked by the outcome of his wild head butt. He’d thought he’d just knock her away from him. She must have stepped forward right at the wrong time. The other two women saw what’d happened and instantly charged.

  In for a penny in for a pound Billy side kicked the first one right in the face. Then he went tumbling to the ground when the other woman dropped under his leg and punched him hard in the crotch. Face contorted in pain he looked up in time to see that same woman’s combat boot smashing into his face. The woman beat him unconscious. The vicious beating would’ve continued indefinitely if a guard hadn’t finally pulled her off of him. The guard was worried he mig
ht get in trouble if he let the women actually kill one of the prisoners.

  The women were escorted out by friends who held them as they sobbed. If Billy hadn’t already been unconscious, he wouldn’t have lasted long based on the looks he got when their primary escort pointed out which one of the prisoners had knocked out the one woman. A couple of men carried her out on a stretcher someone pulled out of the back of the building. The comatose woman’s nose was leaking blood all over the place.

  “You guys can get up now. Those were the wives of the enforcers you killed today. You made them widows. Not only did they lose their men they’ll lose their status too. You’re all lucky to be alive honestly. We checked them for weapons but it’s not like we had a metal detector or anything.” The man kept talking while he waited for them to pick themselves up off the ground.

  “I don’t think he’s getting up anytime soon.” Drew said looking down at the unconscious Billy.

  “I guess he learned his lesson about hitting girls.” Jeff said.

  “Yeah, don’t hit ones that can hit harder than you can.” Drew said smirking.

  Their escort and another guy picked badly beaten Billy up off the floor to drag to the suite that’d been reserved for them. The suite turned out to be a small conference room with one door that’d been setup so it could be locked from the outside. The door was solid wood. The roof inside the room was solid so there wouldn’t be any ceiling tile tomfoolery. The whole space smelled vaguely of piss and body odor. There also wasn’t a working light inside the small room. When the door was shut and locked, they were left standing in total darkness.

  “This sucks.” Drew summed up their situation pretty well.

  There was no escape from the little room. They shoved Billy to the side once they verified that he was still alive. A little later they used him as a pillow to try and get some rest. Jeff was paranoid that the door would open to let the weeping widows run in and start beating the hell out of them again.

  “Is it weird that this isn’t even the scariest place we’ve had to sleep?” LeBron threw the challenge out there.

  “Well the top of the roof in Fayetteville was pretty bad.” Jeff said. They’d been stuck in tiny metal sheds with crawlerz ripping away at them the entire night. Snipers on towers surrounding the building had taken shots at the infected to try and clear them off. A few of those shots had gone through the sheds they were trying to sleep in.

  “Better not mention that one with the girls around. I think they’re still pissed at you guys for setting yourselves up in the glamping shed.” LeBron said referring to how Drew and Jeff had ended up in one shed while the rest of the team had all piled into another one. The shed Drew and Jeff ended up in had been outfitted with pillows and blankets. It hadn’t been the Ritz but compared to how everyone else had spent the night they’d been sleeping in the lap of luxury.

  They lay in the darkness after that in companiable silence. Each of them exploring the different parts of their bodies that’d been hurt during the day. LeBron was pretty sure his ankle was going to fall off the end of his leg. Drew and Jeff had taken plenty of hits in the hallway from the pissed off widows. Drew especially was in a lot of pain. A lot of those punches had landed on the spot his brother had used as target practice earlier that week. Physical pain was a constant companion in their journey.

  They were all used to being in pain. They typically self-medicated themselves to sleep when injured though. They’d lost all of their belonging multiple times in the last few hours. They were wearing random clothing taken off dead bodies. They hadn’t had time to build up any pharmaceuticals in the pockets. Despite the lack of pain killers they were each on the way to sleepy town when the door opened letting in the bright light from the hallway.

  “Which one of you assholes headbutted the girl?” Tommy asked conversationally.

  Chapter 21: That Ship has Sailed

  Jeff woke up wondering where he was. He immediately reached for his weapons. A second or two later he’d figured out he was naked as far as weapons went. Sitting straight up he fumbled around in the darkness in a panic. It was dark and the room he was in smelled like a port-a-potty on a hot day. A hand came up and brushed his stomach. Someone asked him if he was ok. Jeff started swinging.

  “What the hell!” Drew had caught one of the punches right in his forehead. Jeff had woken him up when he started fumbling around. Jeff finally emerged out of his sleep fugue. He recognized Drew’s voice and stopped throwing his fists around.

  “Sorry. I thought you were one of the infected. It’s dark in here.” Jeff said softly. He realized how lame his excuse was. There was no need for anyone to point it out. Drew was absolutely going to point it out regardless.

  “Crawlerz don’t talk. Where the hell have you been living? How are you still alive?” Drew was pretty worked up. He’d been awake for like five seconds when Jeff had tagged him with a right hook. Drew was never going to be a morning person and that’d just amplified his hatred of getting out of bed. Even if the bed happened to be the floor of a urine soaked conference room. It didn’t help that his pillow was an unconscious widow beating warrior with a skull tattooed on his face.

  “What happened?” The weak voice came from their pillow. Billy had survived his beat down after all. He’d finally decided to make his return to the land of the living.

  “You decided to pick a fight with a bunch of crying women.” LeBron answered when no one else spoke up. The words echoed in the enclosed darkness they were in.

  “Did I win?” Billy asked after a few seconds of silence.

  “We used you as a pillow last night. What do you think?” Drew asked.

  “I remember head-butting that one woman then it’s all just a big cloudy ball of pain.” Billy said.

  No one had a response to that. It sounded about right. Everyone except Billy was flashing back to the conversation with Tommy the night before. Billy talking about winning the fight had brought that morbid conversation screeching back to them. Today was the day Tommy had said they were going to have to prove themselves. Today was the day at least one of them was going to die. Billy was the smart bet for being the one to have to atone for the group’s numerous sins.

  “On your feet!” The door flew open letting a flood of fluorescent light spill into the cramped space. Jeff and the others struggled to get to their feet. LeBron ended up needing help to get up. Billy was only able to manage getting himself into a cross-legged sitting position. The three of them that were mostly mobile were ordered into the hallway. A burly man wearing a combination of camouflage and leather went in the room to get Billy.

  “Get up or I’m going to just shoot you right here.” Burly man said. That was the right kind of motivation for Billy. He was up and walking a minute later. He was staggering around like an alcoholic aunt after a day of winery tours, but he was mobile. Hands bound behind their backs they were marched down the hall to the lobby.

  The lobby had uncomfortable looking plastic chairs all around the edge of it. A couple dozen people were currently occupying those chairs. None of them seemed over interested as their escort pushed the four of them into the center of the room. Tommy was sitting in a large leather recliner that’d been put in a prominent position. He was drinking a cup of coffee and chatting with the man sitting beside him.

  The people sitting in the chairs looked like a Sons of Anarchy episode guest starring the cast of Duck Dynasty. Camouflage and guns mixed with leather vests and tattoos. Billy may be at the top of the list to die today but that didn’t stop the people in the room from admiring his facial art. Jeff personally thought Billy looked like one of those kids from the Karate Kid movie when they jumped LaRusso with their skeleton costumes on. The low murmur of conversation in the room died off when Tommy turned to face the prisoners directly. He coughed loudly and stood up to make sure he had everyone’s attention.

  “These four traitors are here to be tried for their crimes. They already paid for their first insult to us by running the ga
rage gauntlet. First people to ever make it down off that thing. In case that isn’t enough they attacked and killed seven of our enforcers. They took them out while still limping around in their tight whiteys. The warrior sprit lives in these four.” Tommy stopped and looked around to see if anyone wanted to refute what he’d just said. He took another gulp from his whisky laced coffee amidst the hushed conversations taking place around him in the room.

  When no one said anything, Tommy continued speaking what was on his mind. He didn’t really have an agenda with these four. He kind of liked them now that he’d met them. He definitely admired their spirit. He still wouldn’t hesitate to kill them though. Taking a deep breath he continued voicing his thoughts. Everyone in the room was leaning forward waiting to hear what he was going to say. Tommy wondered if they’d be surprised to find out he was just as curious as they were as to what he was going to come up with.

  “These men came to our home and ordered us to be their slaves. They represent the men who launch missiles at people who refuse to do their bidding. They’re representatives of the government that abandoned us. They thought we’d all be killed by the demons. We didn’t die though. They show up now wanting to use us to try and rebuild their brand of bullshit. What do you think about that?” Tommy yelled the last part of his diatribe. The smooth way it rolled off his tongue indicated he’d made this kind of speech many times.