Scratch just nodded, his eyes never leaving the target zone.
Gunny repositioned his jacket, making sure he had fast access to his Glock, if it came down to that. He didn’t have to ask Griz. He’d seen him angle his magazines just the way he liked them so he wouldn’t waste even a half second during reloads. He was all business. It was killing time.
The doors shuddered open again as the undead slammed against them, pouring out onto the steps. They opened fire when the first runner appeared, the sounds of their heavy guns ripped the morning air. They double tapped and bodies fell, creating an obstacle the others had to climb over. There were masses of them, and they kept coming. The five men were targeting and taking them out lightning fast.
Boomboom, next face.
Boomboom, next face.
Boomboom, next face.
It sounded like machine guns shooting up the courthouse, they were firing so rapidly, almost like the burp of a chain gun.
Heads exploded and bodies crumpled. They were piling up, actually making a wall the undead had to climb and jump over. They did with frenzied abandon. They leaped, fell, broke bones, and bounded up again, ignoring everything except the fresh blood just yards in front of them.
“Shite!” Stabby yelled, targeting two more women with ravaged bodies, torn dresses and hungry mouths. “I didn’t think there’d be this bloody many of them!”
“Magazine!” Lars yelled and Gunny quickly covered his sector while he swapped out, letting the spent mag fall to the marble steps then Gunny was empty himself, the bolt locking to the rear. He swapped out fast, muscle memory bringing it all back. His hands knew the ways of war. His eyes scanned for the next target as his finger hit the mag release. He snap-twisted the carbine hard right and flung the spent magazine aside. Before it hit the ground, he had the fresh one out of his pocket and slammed in the well. He thumbed the bolt release and in less than one fluid second was sending lead into the side of a man’s head who was leaping, arms outstretched, toward Lars.
Stabby had dropped his rifle when the mag ran dry and was going at them toe to toe, his blades slashing and gouging as a group of them roared and followed him, as he was slowly forced down the stairs one at a time. The claws strapped to his arms were flying, punching through faces and ripping open stomachs, putrid coils of guts spilling out and causing them to trip over themselves. They leaped at him and he met them with metal, eviscerating and flinging them aside.
Scratch had run out of ammo and with his arm, he couldn’t reload as fast as the others, so he let his rifle fall to the ground and started swinging with both arms, refusing to give ground. Gunny heard him roar, “Leeeeeroooyyyy Jeeennnkkkkkinnnnns!” as he dove into the fray, the wicked cold spike plowing through heads and the knuckle duster gauntlet exploding skulls with its brute force. He swung wildly, the horde streaming through the doors seeming to never end, black blood spray covering him. They all backed down the steps as one, forced into slow retreat as the undead kept coming. The wall of bullets kept tearing them apart, the thunder of lead louder than their screams of hunger. Lars let his M-4 fall, the barrel jammed through a man’s mouth and out the back of his head, when the second magazine ran dry and he fumbled a reload. He pulled his pistols, the Berettas spitting fire and lead, and started stacking bodies. At this close range he couldn’t miss, even with his off hand. Gunny flicked his third magazine to the side, slid another home and continued to hammer away at the undead. The roar of the solid wall of gunfire was deafening and drowned out the earthly screaming until they were nearly on top of them. They backed down toward the street together, bullets flying, blades slashing, zombies roaring, men cursing, blood spraying, and bodies falling. The fastest ones were down, the undead streaming out of the building now were festering with flies and crawling with maggots in their weeks old wounds. Some stumbled and were slow to recover. All were chewed up and broken, in one way or another. As Gunny and the crew hit the sidewalk, continuing to slowly back up, he and Griz were still blasting away at them. They were flipping magazines aside in combat reloads so fast there was no break in the volley of bullets shattering bones and brains, or spent brass skittering across the pavement. All three of the boys were in hand to hand, blades, spikes and fists flying in blurs of carnage, blood, and spoiled human liquids that stained the stairs. Stabby punched one of his claws through a little girl's open mouth, up into her brain, as he speared to the inside of her ribs with the other and slung her into the arms of the rotting city clerk. Scratch had a woman in a tattered police uniform lock her jaws down on his metal arm as he crushed the side of her head with the 3-spiked knuckle duster. Gray chunks, blackened eyes, and rancid blood exploded outward, drenching him again with foul-smelling slop. Lars boot stomped the back of a businessman’s head against the marble steps, his teeth breaking out and flying, along with an explosion of gloppy liquid from his shattered skull. When his first set of Berettas were empty, he let them fall and grabbed the other two from his drop leg holsters.
Griz double tapped the clerk still struggling to free himself from the little girl’s spilling intestines, then looked for the next target. The stairs were littered with corpses two and three deep, a small river of blood streamed down and pooled on the sidewalk.
The runners were dead.
The shamblers were dead.
Now came the crawlers. Whispered screams from torn open throats, clawing and ravenous for meat, with bodies too damaged to do much more than pull themselves along. There were dozens of them spilling out of the doors, scrabbling like chitinous venom-filled worms on bone broke arms and splintered legs. Lars stomped and stabbed, his pistols empty and forgotten, wallowing in the gore of the ruined and crippled. Stabby slashed, his powerful strokes cleaving heads from bodies and spearing skulls. Blood sprayed Rorschach patterns and Jackson Pollock paintings on everything around him. Scratch was brutal in his attacks, flailing and slicing and pounding them into motionless heaps of twice-dead flesh. Their frenzy was high, their bloodlust and rage had them pumped to the nth degree and adrenaline raced through their veins.
They were invincible.
Unstoppable.
Ready to fight for hours. Berserkers slashing a path toward Valhalla.
Savage Zulu Warriors crushing everything in their path.
Royal Gurkhas carving down the dead with bloody kukris.
But finally, after hours of the sun standing still for them, there were no more coming from the darkness beyond the doors. They felt like they had battled for days, for eons, and they still weren’t ready to quit. They wanted more.
Griz and Gunny waited, scanning, carbines shouldered, elbows tucked. Behind him he heard someone throwing up and a quick glance showed him it was Bastille in the cab of Griz’s Kenworth, hanging his head out of the barred window, puke running down the side of the door. His camera was still running.
“Wasn’t expecting quite that many,” Gunny said.
He dropped the half-empty magazine and slapped in a fresh one, still scanning. Waiting for the second wave.
They heard the sounds of boots slapping the pavement as some of the teams that had gone to clear houses ran to their aid. They were there within minutes of hearing the eruption of sustained gunfire.
“Sumbitch,” was all Hot Rod could say as he eyed the river of blood and the ripped, torn piles of corpses. They stared in disbelief at the hundreds of bodies spilled all the way from the doors of the courthouse, down the wide stairs, and onto the sidewalk.
Griz whooped at the top of his lungs in a victory roar. “Man!” he bellowed to the heavens. “I haven’t seen this kind of action since Ramadi!” then stepped back out of the pooling blood, not wanting to get his boots dirty.
Deputy Collins ran up and skidded to a halt beside him, her pistol drawn and gazing at the massacre. She’d heard the wall of gunfire and when it hadn’t stopped after a few seconds, like the rest of the teams, she knew they had uncovered a huge nest of them. They’d all come running to help. She was two blocks away and she was
afraid by the time they got there, it would be too late. With that much screaming and roaring and the unending explosion of guns, she knew they would be overrun. Knew they would be taken down and ravaged by the horde. That big, dumb jerk Griz was going to get himself killed.
But there he was, larger than life, grinning at her like he had just won the biggest teddy bear at a county fair. Nothing special. Like anybody could have survived an onslaught of a hundred undead. She knew if it had been anyone else other than him and Gunny, they would have been shredded. She didn’t know whether to collapse in relief, or punch him in the face for being so careless.
“Idiot,” she said, scowled at him and stomped off.
He almost smacked her backside again, still high from the rush of cheating Lady Death, but then thought better of it at the last second.
Lars, Stabby and Scratch were covered in oozing slime. All three of them were trying to fling or wipe various bits of guts or flesh off of their blades, claws and hair. Their clothes were soaked, their faces were spattered, and they reeked of death two weeks old. The people that had run up, quickly stepped away from them, waving their hands in front of their faces to shoo away the stink.
Gunny placed his foot up on the low boy and used a corner of his shemagh to wipe a dot of blood from his boot as Griz looked himself over to see if there were any errant bits of splash on him. He pretended to shoot his cuffs, then flicked an imaginary piece of lint from his sleeve.
“Dang,” Gunny said as he examined his boot. “That left a spot. Any of y’all have some shoe polish?”
They both grinned at the boys who stood glowering at them, still panting heavily, covered in gore and smelling like something the dog drug in and the cat left alone.
20
Jail
The boys hustled over to the fountain in the town square as Gunny and Griz reloaded everyone’s magazines and cleaned the gunk off of the weapons that had been discarded in the heat of battle.
“Wish we’d find a good gun store,” Griz complained as he thumbed fresh rounds into the magazines. “I could really use a Mag-Packer. My thumb ain’t used to this.”
Gunny was using a few of Griz’s polishing rags to wipe down the mags he’d fished out of the bloody soup.
“Maybe you can ask Collins to kiss it, make it feel better,” he said. “But I would like to find some more magazines, at least. These old Mil Specs are about worn out.”
“Yeah,” Griz agreed. “I’d rather have some Magpuls over these things. They’re probably twenty years old.”
Their team was the only one in town that had more than one mag each, the rest had to make do with reloading on the fly, if needed.
Bastille had recovered and was complaining under his breath as he wiped vomit off the truck with a rag Griz had tossed him. They kept an eye on the doors, ensuring nothing else came out.
The boys used the slightly scummy water still in the bottom of the fountain to splash the worst of the muck off of themselves, then hurried back to the lowboy. Everyone loaded up on magazines, smeared Burt’s under their noses then mounted the steps, trying to avoid the most disgusting of the rotting bodies and not slip on the spilled innards. It was fouler than any killing floor in the nastiest slaughter house. The worst of it had to be over though. Now they hoped it would be just ones and twos trapped in offices to deal with.
They took the stairs all the way to the top floor, the fourth, and started clearing room by room. The offices and courtrooms were empty and they soon found themselves turning on flashlights and descending into the basement. They could hear them at the far end of the building, still moaning and scratching at a door. They made some noise and the broken remains of the few who were too damaged to even climb the stairs started toward them. It was a pathetic sight, there was very little left of them. With sighs of resignation, they lowered their weapons, met them in the middle, and put them out of their misery with blades. The noise of rifles in confined corridors was deafening and these sad excuses for zombies didn’t warrant it.
“They were clawing at the door at the end of the hall,” Stabby said. “Probably some survivors in there.”
“Could be,” Griz said. “But we clear as we go. Don’t want any surprises popping out behind us.”
They made their way down the corridor, knocking and checking each room until they finally stood in front of a steel door with a faded black and yellow sign reading ‘Fallout Shelter’ affixed to it. Shining their lights around, it was obvious from the bits of torn clothes, spilled blood, and occasional clumps of hair, the teeming pack had been gathered here.
“That’s a good sign,” Gunny said, trying the door and finding it locked. “If the people inside have turned, I doubt that horde would have still been hanging around.”
“Fingers crossed,” Lars said, and pounded out ‘shave and a haircut’ on the door.
They waited, listening for a moment or two, then he pounded it out again, yelling, “Anybody home?”
This time there was a response. ‘Two bits’ came back and he hollered back. “It’s clear out here, you can open up.”
The response was muffled through the heavy fallout doors that had been installed during the cold war. Probably in the ‘50s.
They had to strain to hear, but made out, “Who is it? Who are you? What do you want?”
Gunny rolled his eyes. “What is it with people nowadays?” he asked no one in particular, a little annoyed at the lack of appreciation for their efforts.
“Nothing,” he yelled back at the door. “We’re going to finish clearing your town while you cower down here in the dark. We’ll see you up top, if you decide to come out.”
He shook his head and started back toward the stairs.
“C’mon, boys,” he said. “Let’s hit the police station next, see if they have any goodies to get.”
They went out a side entrance, not wanting to wade through the charnel house on the front steps.
The station was typical of a small town. Open floor plan, with a reception area on the main floor and holding cells on the lower level, offices on the second story. When they opened the door a dozen undead came stumbling at them. They let them come outside, then put them down with quick, merciful thrusts. They cleared from the top down, finding nothing still alive. Or dead, for that matter. The building was completely empty. The cells were a different story. The oversized metal door was propped open and weak light filtered down to the bottom of the staircase.
They had noticed the smell before they descended the stairs and Scratch called to the zombies as they clicked on their flashlights. They readied themselves, rifles shouldered, waiting.
None of the lifeless came keening for them, but they could smell the decay of the dead. They were going to find prisoners trapped in their cells. Gunny lowered his rifle.
“Do we even want to go down there?” Stabby said. “We can leave it for the cleanup crew.”
They all looked to Gunny, the same look of sad dread on their faces. What a way to go, dying of thirst or starvation because you chose the wrong night to have one too many at the bar, or get arrested for outstanding parking tickets or something. The biggest crime in a town like this was probably littering.
“Might be a survivor,” he said. “Or some crawler with its throat ripped out. We can’t chance someone getting bit because we got lazy.”
They pulled their shemaghs and bandannas over their noses then started down the steps, still being careful and watching out for a silent creeper waiting to take a bite out of them. Half way down, their light beams darting, they heard someone speaking angrily… or probably urgently, to the other prisoners.
“Hey!” a single voice croaked out in the dark, but was quickly joined by a few more. “Help! Get us out!”
The Lakota County Detention Center was laid out in a single long hallway, concrete block walls fronted by steel bars down both sides. On the left was the temporary holding cells for people who were only going to be there for a few hours, or maybe overnight. They
were just cages with a drain in the floor for easy cleanup and a bunk bolted to the wall. The drunk tanks, as they’re called, and not a lot of taxpayer money went into them to make them comfortable. The cells on the right were for longer-term prisoners. People awaiting trial who couldn’t post bond, or those sentenced to thirty days by the judge. The smell was coming from the first cell on the left. There were two men in it, lying on the bunks, their clothes stained with corrupting liquids that had seeped out of their bloating bodies. Clouds of flies buzzed around them.
Everyone else seemed to be alive, hanging weakly onto the bars and waving at them, pleading to be released.
Gunny was surprised there were so many people locked up, but remembered this was the county jail, not just the local jug for some small town.
“Hold on, fellas,” he said. “We’ll have you out in a minute. Any idea where they keep the keys?”
The general consensus was “upstairs” so he sent the boys back up to search for them while he and Griz reassured them everything was fine, they’d get them out soon and all the zombies in the building were dead. The men were weak with hunger, it had been nearly two weeks since they had eaten anything, but they had the sinks for water and that was how they’d managed to survive this long.
“Lord Lifting, I ain’t never been so glad to see another human face!” one of the men said and reached his hand through the bars to shake.
“I’m Dutch,” he said as he pumped Gunny’s hand with enthusiasm. “And I swear I’m never getting into another bar fight again!”
Gunny grinned at the big Indian, thin and frail, but standing and excited. “Fire Water getcha?”
“How’d you guess, Paleface?” he asked, still pumping his hand, his smile huge in the dim light.
“Cause I know you jarheads can’t hold your liquor,” he said.
Dutch paused for a second then realized Gunny had seen the Eagle, Globe and Anchor tattooed on his forearm.
The Zombie Road Omnibus Page 49
