Dawn Patrol

by Camille Picott

  A sick knot of dread forms his stomach when Todd’s phone goes straight to voicemail.

  Fuck.

  Niles cranks out a few desperate texts to Todd and Celeste. He doesn’t get a chance to see if they go through before a duet of new screams rend the morning air. The revving of an engine follows.

  A beat-up blue Toyota truck peels backward out of a parking spot, tires spewing up dirt and gravel. The man in the driver’s seat slams on the brakes, the Toyota jerking to a halt as the vehicle points its way out of the lot.

  Twenty feet away, emerging from behind a metal garbage dumpster, comes the source of the screams. Two women, both of them bloody in ripped clothing, cry out for the man.

  “Help us!” one screams.

  “Stop!” cries the other. “Wait!”

  The man doesn’t hesitate. Ignoring the women, he floors it. The little Toyota leaps forward, flying over the gravel—and straight into three of the feeders. The man plows through the bodies, sending them flying. He never looks back. The Toyota bounces up the hill, a shoe and tarp flying out of the back.

  Half a dozen feeders tear after the truck, moaning and stretching out their arms. Anytime one of them stumbles and goes down, he gets right back onto his feet and continues.

  “Wait!” cries one of the women. “Come back!”

  Niles senses the feeders as their attention shifts, honing in on the frantic women. Those closest to the pink flannel don’t move, but others do. They break into a lope, charging en masse toward the wounded women.

  “Look out!” bellows the hunter in the tree. “Run! Hide! Get on top of something so they can’t reach you!”

  The women shriek. Turning, they race back in the direction of the metal dumpster where they’d been hiding. Their feet are bare, and the taller one limps.

  They’re overtaken in seconds.

  The feeders bear them to the ground, ripping into them with their teeth. Blood is everywhere. It slides over the gravel, sprays into the air, and covers the mouths and faces of the feeders.

  The shrill cries of the women are like poisoned razors sinking into Niles’s skin.

  The hunter in the oak tree pounds his fist in rage, screaming and shaking the tree branches. Niles’s mouth hangs open in a silent scream, unable to peel his gaze away from the horror.

  The entire event took less than sixty seconds, though it felt like years. He should have helped the women, but it had all happened so fast. He’d never had a chance.

  Neither had they.

  The world is ending. The thought flits through his brain. It’s the only true explanation to what he’s seeing. The world as he knew it ten minutes ago is gone. He doesn’t know how or why, but it’s gone.

  Feeders still ring the hunter’s tree, clawing at the bark with bare fingers and heedless of the damage to their flesh. Niles is determined to figure out a way to help him. They might be the only people still alive out here. They’re a two-man team against dozens of crazies, even if the hunter doesn’t know it yet.

  Niles scans the campground, mind frantically working to find a way to lure the feeders away from the hunter’s tree. He considers using himself as bait; he’s a good sprinter when he has to be, and there’s a chance he could make it to the roof of a car before they got him.

  But what good would that do him? He might help the hunter, but he would be trapped.

  The feeders, though blind, are drawn to sound and movement. That’s the key to all of this. Niles scans the scattered supplies strewn across the camp. Twenty yards away is the vast expanse of the group pergola. Beneath it are at least a dozen tables.

  Staying along the hillside beneath the campground, Niles crawls to the pergola. Once there, he studies the scattered mess from the shelter of another lupine bush: paper plates blowing in the wind, a smashed jar of relish, wet pancake batter in a gelatinous pile on the cold concrete, and a bottle of ketchup still upright on a table as if the picnic could begin at any moment.

  Then he finds it. An old-fashioned radio. It’s half buried under scattered napkins, but he sees it. Small and black, it looks like the sort of thing someone might carry around to listen to a baseball or football game. He doesn’t see a plug, which makes him think—hope—it runs on batteries.

  Only one way to find out.

  He shifts and licks his lips, checking the location of the feeders. Only one mills around in the pergola, having gotten stuck on a laundry line. It moans, arms closing around empty air as it attempts to pull free of the taut string. White eyes roll discordantly in sockets.

  Swallowing, Niles darts in on cat feet. He snatches the radio, crouching beside a picnic table. Fear makes his heart hammer.

  The feeder in the laundry string continues to moan and struggle but doesn’t appear to have heard Niles. None of the other feeders have changed position either.

  Not daring to indulge in even the slightest sliver of triumph, Niles turns the dial to a local rock station. With any luck, something loud with lots of drums will be playing. He adjusts the volume to full blast, then situates the radio on the edge of the campground before slipping back onto the hillside.

  Niles takes a moment to steady himself, to dig the tips of his shoes into the soft earth and position his body for flight. If he ignores the fact that he might die in the next few minutes, he can almost imagine he’s toeing the starting line of a race.

  He focuses on the treed hunter, readying himself. Then he flicks the on switch and runs.

  3

  Lottery

  NILES ONLY WON THE lottery once in his life.

  It wasn’t the type of lottery most people think of when the word comes to mind. It wasn’t the Mega Millions, or Power Ball, or even a scratcher.

  It was the Western States Endurance Run lottery.

  Every year, thousands of runners from around the world enter the Western States lottery, all of them hoping for a chance to toe the starting line in Squaw Valley and make the one-hundred-mile trek through the mountains to Auburn.

  Entering the Western States lottery isn’t as simple as buying a ticket at the local gas station. The only way to get a lottery ticket is to run a qualifying race. There are a handful of designated races that enable a runner to earn a Western States lottery ticket. All of them are tough races in and of themselves, ranging from one hundred kilometers (sixty-two miles) to one hundred miles.

  It took Niles five years before his name was drawn in the lottery. Five years of running long, tough qualifying races.

  But it finally happened. When his name was announced at the annual lottery, euphoria made him dizzy. He punched the air with his fist, then grabbed Celeste and swung her around, whooping with joy. It was really happening. He was being given a chance to be part of the running community’s most iconic race.

  Now, as he crouches low and rushes toward the treed hunter, he feels a little like the lottery winner of another kind. The type of lottery where losing isn’t merely a disappointment; losing is death.

  It’s an inverted lottery, Niles decides, and it sucks.

  All across the campground, feeders turn toward the sound of the blaring radio. Metallica’s “Hit the Lights” pounds through the campground, the pulsing song drawing the attention of every feeder. Many of them lift their noses, scenting the air. They lope toward the sound, bumping into things and tripping, but never slowing their inexorable forward progress.

  Even the feeders clustered around the dead bodies and those around the treed hunter are drawn. Niles crouches on the edge of the campground, watching the area beneath the tree drain of the crazed people.

  He darts forward, putting the fat tree trunk between himself and the horde of feeders.

  “Come on!” he half whispers, half hisses to the hunter.

  The camouflage figure above him shifts, and for the first time, Niles gets a good look at him. It’s a kid, a boy no older than thirteen or fourteen. He’s a big kid, with the broad shoulders and muscled build of a young man, but the face looking down at him still has the plump
ness of youth.

  “We don’t have much time,” Niles says, casting a paranoid look around the tree trunk toward the feeders. They’re rampaging through the pergola, tripping over one another and the various obstacles there. Their growls and moans rise above Metallica.

  The boy hesitates only for an instant before shimmying down the tree. He drops to the ground with the grace and noiselessness of a cat.

  Niles blinks in surprise. He remembers what it was like to be thirteen. He was fat and covered with pimples and was anything but noiseless. This kid must be a natural athlete.

  He’s dressed from head to toe in gray-and-black camouflage, an empty quiver at his belt. Sturdy hunting boots cover his feet. A matching camouflage pack is snug against his back.

  Niles, in contrast, wears black running shorts and a long-sleeve gray shirt. His shoes are neon green, his running pack a bright yellow. He feels oddly dorky next to this youth in slick camo gear.

  “We gotta get out of here,” Niles says.

  “My mom—” The boy catches himself, eyes sliding to the bloody mound of pink flannel ten feet away. He blinks rapidly, pushing back tears. His entire body trembles.

  Niles is careful not to look at the pink flannel. It must have been the boy’s mother. He wants to say something comforting, but words are inadequate. The best thing he can do is help the kid stay alive.

  “My name is Niles,” he whispers, trying to distract the boy. “What’s yours?”

  “Ra-Rayford.”

  “Rayford, it’s time for us to get out of here.”

  “My dad. He’s out here somewhere,” the boy replies, hiccupping around a suppressed sob. “He went out to scout tracks and promised to come back and get me at sunrise.”

  That explains why the kid is fully dressed and outfitted with a crossbow. He was waiting for his dad to take him hunting.

  Niles shakes his head. “We can’t wait. It’s not safe. We—”

  He stops, realizing he doesn’t have any sort of plan. He hadn’t thought past getting the kid out of the tree. Now that he’s out, Niles realizes his dilemma.

  If he were by himself, he’d take off into the woods. Put wilderness between himself and the crazy people. Niles’s car is on the far side of the lake in an isolated dirt parking lot. With any luck, he could run back around the lake and get away.

  But that’s another twenty miles. Rayford might be in shape, but twenty miles is a long way for most people.

  That only leaves the exit road, but it passes through the entire length of the campground and by a popular boat launch. Niles isn’t optimistic enough to think the way will be clear.

  “Let’s get away from here. Then we can regroup and figure out our next move,” he tells Rayford. “We need to put some distance between ourselves and these people.”

  “Zombies,” the kid says, voice strained.

  Niles ignores the word. It’s more than he can digest.

  The boy is stiff, staring at the mashed up remains of pink flannel.

  Niles’s throat tightens. “I’m sorry for your loss.”

  “She was running to find me when—when—” Rayford purses his lips, eyes blinking as he fights back tears. His shoulders tremble with the force of the sobs he holds at bay.

  Niles squeezes his shoulder. “We have to go.” There’s no telling how long Metallica will distract the zom—the crazy people.

  Rayford nods, wiping his nose on his sleeve.

  Niles leads the boy down the sloping embankment, away from the campground. Everything is going fine until the boy steps on a loose rock. He slips backward, landing hard on his back. Beyond a sharp huff when he hits the ground, the kid doesn’t make a sound.

  But his crossbow flies out of his hand. It lands on the trail at the bottom of the embankment, clattering against a cluster of rocks half embedded in the dirt.

  All things considered, it’s not a loud clatter, but it may as well be an air horn. The Metallica song has just ended, and in the brief silence between songs, every head whips in their direction.

  Shit.

  Niles doesn’t think; he just acts. He grabs the boy’s wrist, yanks him to his feet, and hauls him down the slope. Niles’s feet dance nimbly over the terrain, accustomed to the uneven ground, rocks, and roots.

  His hand is an iron grip over Rayford’s wrist as he drags him along. Every time the boy stumbles, Niles keeps him upright.

  They burst onto the trail. Every instinct screams for him to go north, deeper into the wilderness, but the feeders are on a direct trajectory toward the northern end of the trail. There’s no choice but to turn south, to head back in the direction of the main road and boat launch. He breaks into a sprint, leading Rayford back up the trail.

  The music has changed, a new song blaring out of the portable radio. This time it’s “Born to Run” by Bruce Springsteen. Any other time, Niles would have smiled at the irony.

  The music cuts off, the abrupt cessation punctuated by a cacophony of howls. Niles takes his eyes off the trail just long enough to chance a look back at the campground. A tense cluster of feeders converges on the spot where he’d left the radio. It looks like a football dog pile, only with blood and body parts instead of team uniforms.

  Good-bye, radio, Niles thinks. With nothing left to distract the feeders, they’re in more danger than before. Those loping after them let up keening cries, drawn by the soft tapping of their feet on the hard-packed dirt.

  “Come on,” he huffs to Rayford. “This way.”

  The kid follows him without argument, breathing hard. The trail widens enough for them to run side by side. As Niles has suspected, Rayford is in good shape. He keeps up as Niles tears down the dirt trail. Based on his build, Niles guesses the kid probably plays football or some other sport. He’s probably good at it too.

  He recalls his one childhood attempt at a team sport. Wrestling. A few practices with the older kids making fun of his fat rolls had been enough. He’d quit without ever going to a single meet and never attempted any other sport until he met Celeste.

  The feeders canter along behind them, a few letting out high-pitched keens that grate against Niles’s bones. He picks up the pace, glancing to make sure Rayford can keep up. The kid does, his heavy boots pounding on the dirt.

  Way too much shoe, Niles thinks. Rayford is expending precious energy lifting those heavy things. And all that padding around his ankles is going to lead to chafing.

  They manage to put some distance between themselves and the feeders, but still the horde stumbles along behind them. Some trip and tumble off the trail, but it doesn’t take them long to right themselves and rejoin the group. A few go down on the trail itself, but they always get right back up.

  “Zombies,” Rayford huffs between strides. “They’re real.”

  Niles has a visceral reaction to the word zombie. Spots dance in his vision. His stomach clenches. He bites back the urge to snap at the teenager beside him.

  There are no such things as zombies.

  Don’t be an idiot. Zombies aren’t real.

  These are the things he wants to say but doesn’t. What if Rayford is right? What if the people following them are zombies? And if a small place like Liberty Glen campground is overrun, what are things like back in town? At the winery where Celeste works? What—

  Niles skids to a halt as they round a bend in the trail and come face-to-face with a man well over six feet tall. He’s built like a linebacker and dressed from head to toe in gray-and-black camouflage. His head is covered with a knitted black ski mask, only his mouth and eyes visible. He carries a crossbow in one hand and a bloody knife in the other.

  Niles grabs Rayford, hauling him to a stop. He jumps in front of the boy and snatches up a fist-sized rock, cranking back his arm to smash it into the face of the feeder.

  4

  Hunter

  THE HULKING THING IN front of them raises his crossbow, pointing it at Niles’s forehead. His eyes are a clear, fierce blue, not the milky white of the monsters behin
d them.

  “Stop!” Rayford hisses. He wrenches himself free of Niles’s grasp, leaping between Niles and the enormous man. “Dad, this guy saved my life.”

  Dad. Niles lets out a shaky breath, lowering his rock.

  “Sorry,” he says to the creepy man with the bloody knife and crossbow. “Gut reaction.”

  “Good instincts,” the big man rumbles, nodding in approval. “You jumped in front of my son, prepared to defend him.”

  Niles ignores the brief flash of pleasure from the man’s words. He’s not a high school kid anymore yearning for approval from the cooler kids. He doesn’t need this man’s approval, even if he does look like a card-carrying member of the badass club.

  The hunter hangs the crossbow from a hook on his belt and extends a hand. “My name is Steve.” Clearly, Rayford’s teenager-in-a-man’s body comes from his father. Rayford actually looks like a normal-sized teen when standing next to Steve.

  “Niles.” He takes the big man’s proffered hand. A keening sounds behind them, sending a spike of panic through Niles. The creatures are still in pursuit. “We have to go. Liberty Glen is overrun with monsters. Some of them are after us.”

  He can’t bring himself to use the word zombie. Just thinking about it makes him feel like a geeky teenager, the sort that gets stuffed into garbage cans. That really did happen to him a few times, even though he didn’t go around using the z-word.

  Steve, seeing his gaze, nods. “Same at Bummer Peak Campground. Overrun. Zombies. A group of them is following me.” Steve’s flat calm is unnerving. “They’re blind, but they don’t seem to feel pain. I stabbed a few of them, and they just kept on coming. The only way to stop them is with a head shot.” His hand rests on his crossbow. Niles is relieved to see a few arrows in his quiver. “If they catch us, they’ll eat us. If there’s anything left, we’ll turn into one of them. I saw it happen.”

  “The zombies . . .” Rayford swallows, tears welling in his eyes. “Dad, they got—they got Mom—” His voice breaks. Rayford wipes his red-rimmed eyes with the back of his hand.