by Mark Tufo
“What did you go to school for?”
“Business administration. What’s that got to do with anything?”
“What’s a more practical skill these days?” I asked. “Running a company or shooting?”
He grunted.
I saw movement to the left; someone was on the move. Someone in the house must have seen it as well because the person running got lit up. A three-round burst sent them immediately into whatever afterlife awaited them. Figured it had to be Tracy doing the shooting because Justin was still visible from where I was. Multiple vehicles were heading to our position. After the shots were fired that was the sound that dominated. Of course, that was right up until Sanders and Biddie unleashed their surprise. I felt my fillings move around inside my head from the explosion.
“What the fuck was that?” I yelled over the ringing in my ears.
“Claymore,” Winters replied.
There was a secondary explosion and then multiple guns firing.
“Winters, we can hold them for a couple of minutes but there’s at least twenty of them. You two had better make your move now!” Biddie shouted over the radio.
“We’re up,” Winters said.
“This is my family; you don’t need to do this,” I told him one more time.
“What kind of jarhead would I be if I ran?”
“A live one, running a business one day,” I mumbled, but we were already leaving the house by a side exit.
I crossed the street at a full sprint, making a straight line for the hedges. In hindsight, I wished I’d picked a different spot. I did a stealing-second base-slide feet first into enough viscera to coat a truck bed, I mean, if you for some reason wanted to do something like that. The second man, whom I had assumed was dead, was not quite gone. He was flat on his back looking up at the bottom of the bush taking shallow breaths, gasping really. There was panic in his eyes as he struggled to get oxygen into his system. I’d put at least two rounds through his shoulder and one in his abdomen; from the sound he was making, one of the shoulder shots had traveled down and ruptured a lung. Blood colored bubbles were forming around his mouth and running down his cheeks, some mixing with the tears that flowed from his eyes.
There was a part of me that felt bad; he was basically a kid, maybe mid-twenties. Maybe in his next life he’d choose a better path, maybe not. Either way, I could not spare him any more of my thoughts. A man and a woman were running from the back right toward me, though I don’t think they knew I was there. I turned my head to see what they were looking at–it was Winters. He was coming, but in a much more methodical, tactical approach, which was usually all great and fine, but this time it was going to get him killed.
I wasn’t quite ready, but death waits for no one. I spun and barely got the pair’s lower legs into my sights before I started firing. I don’t give a fuck how long I live, I am always going to have a problem with female combatants. I don’t know if it’s sexist or misogynistic, it’s certainly not meant to be and it’s certainly not because I believe them any less capable or deadly. There is no part of me that doesn’t believe them to be the stronger of the sexes and perhaps even more adept at fighting. They certainly can be more vicious; just think about the animal kingdom. I think it’s the chivalry in me that finds harming a woman so fucking distasteful. In a world gone to shit, I hold it in my heart, for right or wrong, that women are the ones that will nurture it back, and here I am killing them. My first round hit her square in the shin, severed the bone so that when she tried to come down with her foot it ended up being her splintered bone that cut through her muscle and stuck into the soft earth. She fell over screaming, must admit, I winced at that. My next round hit her in the thigh; the final one traveled up into her chest and silenced her.
For the briefest of seconds, I thought I had disturbed a hornet’s nest as the pests whizzed by me, then I realized it was suppressed rounds. I was pinned down and did not know where the shooter was. The man with the woman had dived for cover. I may not have seen it, but Winters sure did. He was advancing and firing on the man’s position.
“Clear!” he shouted. He was near to the low front porch as I emerged from my spot. There were now shots coming from the house as Tracy and Justin were covering our flanks. “We have got to get them out of there.”
“Let’s go!” I shouted up.
“Can’t, dad,” Justin responded.
Could see the first of the cars making it through Sanders’ improvised roadblock. Had seconds. I retreated or I advanced. It was a no-brainer; I ran for the door.
I heard Winters say this was a bad idea as he came in after me. I spun and took a couple of hasty shots at the lead car; fucked up the hood and I think I winged the front seat passenger. The driver veered hard to their right and across the street. Five people poured out of it but we got the door shut before their return fire found us. By the time they were done shooting the door it had been completely blown from its hinges and the holey hunk was laying on the ground.
“Now what?” Winters asked as we saw another car pull up.
“I’m thinking we should head upstairs. Anybody starts poking their heads in the windows on this first floor we could be in some trouble,” I said to him. The only problem was that the stairway was in complete view of the outside considering that the door was now a floor mat.
“There’s like ten guns pointing at this house,” Winters said, having poked his head high enough to see out. You won’t make it up three steps.”
“Who’s up there, Justin?” I asked
“Me, mom, grandma, Angel, Avalyn, and all the animals.”
In terms of being the fastest, most nimble and ready to fight, I had been dealt a bad hand. I let my head rest on the ground for a moment.
“That bad?” Winters whispered.
“One bad-kneed senior citizen, a little girl, a baby, a surly cat, one slowpoke English Bullie and a hyper little dog, my wife, son and one of the dogs can take care of themselves; we’ll have to carry everyone else.”
“Leaves shit little for firepower if we’re busy playing delivery men,” he replied.
“Winters–more coming your way. We’ve had to pull back before we got overrun, we won’t leave you out to dry. Out,” Sanders said.
“He’ll be back,” Winters told me.
“Better be soon,” I said as I saw a large group coming toward the house. They were indeed going to surround us. We were popup targets in a shooting gallery.
“Downstairs.” I pointed behind us.
“I like that idea less,” he said, though he followed me as we low-crawled around and to the door that led down. A few bullets ricocheted in the house; as of yet I didn’t think we were targeted. I reached up and twisted the handle to the door, never even stopped for a second to think about what I would do if there was a zombie or an enemy on the stairs. I suppose I could have slammed the door shut, but I was in a pretty compromising position. I crawled down two steps until I felt confident enough to pull my legs in and get my feet up under me. Winters was right behind me, he pulled the door shut quietly.
“I’ve spent an inordinate amount of my time with you in basements; this a normal thing with you?”
“Not really. You’ve just been extraordinarily lucky.”
“I don’t feel lucky,” he said as he went down a few more stairs.
“Seems like I’ve heard that before.” We quickly went into the basement where we saw shadows moving past some of the windows. I froze when a face pressed up against the glass, the man was peering intently–and overconfidently. Must have had something to do with how dingy the lighting was in here because he never registered the fact that he was staring straight at me. I was slowly raising my rifle; suck place to get shot, the face, I mean.
“Don’t,” Winters whispered. “We’ll lose our element of surprise.”
“Yeah, we wouldn’t want to lose that,” I said, doing my best impression of a statue. The face finally stood. I took a deep breath and we moved away from the sta
ircase and to a shelf stacked high with paint cans and motor oil. “Any chance there’s a bunker in this house, too?”
He shook his head. “Help me move this away from the wall.”
I saw what he doing: we could hide behind it, use it as cover and concealment. “It’s the only thing in the basement. Don’t you think it will be pretty obvious where we’re hiding?”
“Like you said, it’s the only thing in the basement. I mean, unless you want to hide behind the stanchion poles.”
The loaded down shelves were heavier than they looked and the metal framing was flimsier than it appeared. Was more than half convinced the whole thing was either going to tip or collapse as we slid it about a foot away from the wall.
“Yeah, that doesn’t look suspicious,” I said when I looked at our handiwork.
“Well let’s see. Since your actions have directly led us into this predicament, I’m all ears if you’ve got something better.”
And I didn’t. I looked around, but it was one giant square of concrete with hardly any light coming in. I was staying close to the walls, hoping for some sort of crawl space or box of grenades. Didn’t find either. The grayish light was blocked out as someone once again came up to the window. That could only mean they weren’t satisfied no one was in here. I couldn’t tell from my angle if it was the same person. I stayed close to the wall and made my way to the window. I could just see Winters over by the shelves; hard to say, but I don’t think he was all that thrilled with what I was doing. The light was completely gone and then there was a muffled crack as the man had put something up against the glass and then broke it. He was coming in. As soon as he poked his head in I was as good as caught. I reached down and grabbed my Ka-Bar, not at all happy with what was about to go down.
He took his sweet ass time about it; he must have thought he would just sneak in down here and make his way up to where the people were. Winters was shaking his head back and forth with his face pulled in like he was four and I was trying to give him an extra heaping of gross cough syrup. The muzzle of a rifle came through first, then a hand, an arm, finally the crowning of a head, like the world’s largest baby being birthed, gun first, which would be a handy mutation for our next generation. I was in motion the second his head showed; he never even had the chance to register my presence as I drove my knife into his temple. His body went rigid then limp as I pulled it through and dropped him to the ground. His muscles convulsed as I pulled the blade free. I hoped that the action looked as if he had come in on his own. So far, so good; no alarm had been sounded, and no one else was following. Either he’d come in solo as part of a plan to sneak up on us, or there was indeed suspicion and he was the guinea pig. I grabbed his rifle. It was tough to tell without proper lighting, but I think it was an Uzi, and he had a couple of extended mags on him. Well, that was mine now, at least.
“We can’t stay here.” Winters had come over.
I couldn’t have agreed with him more. We were in a shit spot. Just then, the light in the basement went to nearly zero as four of the five windows were blocked.
“Down.” I grabbed him just as all the windows broke out. Dozens, hundreds of rounds were blown through as they shot at every conceivable angle they could, hoping to kill us. I thought my ears were going to bleed with how loud it was in there. Chunks of concrete were raining down on us, dust and smoke threatened to choke our airways. It was so thick I could not see my hand in front of my face. When it mercifully stopped, I was not grateful to be alive, I was angry, like pissed-off hornet-swarming angry. I stood up and pointed toward one of the murky fingers of light filtering in through the window and fired. There was a surprised cry and then a thud as I’d shot whoever had been there. I was able to take out one more in this manner before they realized they had not killed their targets and now they were on the docket.
“Now let’s go,” I told Winters, reaching down and tapping him on the shoulder.
I ran up the stairs and into two men that had the misfortune of being the vanguard. I didn’t even bother aiming, anything that can shoot six hundred rounds a minute doesn’t need much in the way of that. In half a magazine I had riddled them each with half a dozen rounds, more than enough to do the job.
“Up the stairs–go!” I told Winters who didn’t need any more prompting as I switched out magazines. I unloaded the entire new clip out the front door in two, maybe three seconds; didn’t really count. It was enough time for Winters to make it up and gave me a window as those outside had dived for cover as I made my suicide covering fire. I was already on the upstairs landing by the time return fire made it into the house.
Tracy was standing in the hallway, when I got my wind back I gave her a hug that threatened to meld us.
“Took you long enough.” She was kidding. I could see the strain in her features from the ordeal.
“You…you’re fucking crazy. What the fuck is wrong with you?” Winters asked as Justin helped him up off the floor.
“Marines,” I answered calmly. “The Marines did that to me.”
“Bullshit. You can maybe tell that to those around you that have never served but I am a Marine and I can tell you right now you’re fucking certifiable.” He was genuinely upset.
“You get used to him,” Justin said in my defense.
“Or dead,” Winters added.
“Everyone alright?” I asked.
I got nods all around. Henry was wagging his stumpy little tail, his ass shaking he was so happy to see me. If it wouldn’t have cost me some funny looks I would have wagged my ass too in like greeting.
“Good to see you, too.” I got down on my haunches and grabbed his massive head and hugged it tightly and then scratched behind his ears.
Justin got Winters a bottle of water and I hoped a valium–he was still looking pretty stupefied. Carol was looking a little rough; this “on the road shit” was hard on us all, but these circumstances brought it to a whole other level.
“How you holding up?” I asked quietly.
“I’ve been better. I sure could use a drink.”
“You and me both,” I told her. “We’ll get out of this and I’ll raid a liquor store for you.”
She grabbed my hand before I could leave. “Michael, I don’t know how much more of this I can handle.” The look in her eye is one I’d seen before, it was of a person giving up, and for reasonable cause. There comes a point in a lot of people’s lives where the accumulated weight of all things lost begins to bow and then break the spirit, few ever recover. Once you start down that spiral the inertia is too great to overcome, especially when you don’t have anyone else depending on you to go on.
“We’ll get out of this Carol. We will get to Etna Station; it will almost be normal.”
“I just want to go home. To be buried on the farm.”
“Nobody is getting buried,” I told her forcibly. It was one thing if she wanted to cash in her chips, but that kind of mood could and would spill over, crushing all morale as it went.
“Talbot, I am getting so fucking sick of you!” This was shouted over a speaker.
“Great, Knox is here,” I said as I tried to get a peek out the window.
“I haven’t quite figured out why you won’t just die. It would make my life a whole lot simpler if you did.”
“Mine, too,” Winters said quietly.
“I heard that,” I told him. He shrugged.
“I’ve lost a lot of good people since coming across your sorry ass. That doesn’t even bring into account all of my wasted resources. Do you have any fucking concept of how difficult and how long it takes to round up that many fighters and zombies? And the rats! I can’t stand rats! But one of my people has this affinity for them; knows how to make them do things. It’s weird, I’ll grant you, but I let him do it because, well, everyone hates rats, disgusting little creatures. If you could just let them peel your face off and maybe chew through your jugular I’d seriously owe you one.”
“This guy might be more off his rocker t
han you,” Winters said.
“I think he was Army,” I told him. Winters made an “Ah.” face.
“You come out right now, Talbot, hands held high. I’ll put one in your head and that will be it. Your people will be decently cared for. Not going to say great, not for a while, anyway; they’ll start at the bottom of the hierarchy ladder just like all new recruits. You can’t just force a former Soviet bloc country to come over to NATO and then hand them the nuclear sequence. They’ll have to prove themselves in a variety of ways. Won’t be easy, but everyone will have their place. Well, except for you, because you’ll be rotting out on the front stoop. But dammit man, those you care for will be alive.”
“He’s serious?” Winters asked.
“You wouldn’t think so, but yeah,” I replied.
“Deneaux said you wouldn’t capitulate.”
I heard the words and this was on me. There was never a part of me that didn’t figure she would cross me, cross us; it was always just a matter of when. Why I hadn’t simply ripped her throat out when she was in my grasp eludes me.
“Time’s up.” Sounded like a battalion’s worth of tanks were driving up on us.
“Zombies.” Justin was in one of the bedrooms as he called out.
“I hope I don’t see you on the other side, Talbot. Not sure why I would, as I’m the one doing God’s work, lifting the helpless up and bringing them along with me. I once read that the meek will inherit the earth; what a load of horseshit that was. It’s the ones willing to take chances, to force others to see their vision. Those will be the ones to own the world and that is what I intend on doing. Going to leave you a few hundred presents; take my advice–just let it happen. Oh, and I got this for you too!” He started laughing.
“No!” Mad Jack yelled.
I ran to the window, heedless of a sniper’s bullet. Mad Jack had been pushed out of the cab of a large pickup. His hands were handcuffed behind him and his face had been beaten badly.
“This loser one of yours, Talbot?” Knox laughed again.
“Run,” I said barely above a whisper. Mad Jack was just standing there. The dozens of zombies in the general vicinity had not noticed him yet but it was only a matter of seconds. “Run!” I yelled, he looked up, his eyes pleading for help. I turned and was heading for the stairs. Winters and Justin were right behind me. By the time I got to the front door, MJ had only moved enough to try and get back into the truck.
