Riker's Apocalypse (Book 3): The Precipice
Page 25
What Riker didn’t see, because he had turned back toward the approaching zombie herd, was Shorty driving the EarthRoamer over the curb and sidewalk to create for the big rig an entry to the lot where there was none.
The previous fight for survival, combined with the stress of being so near to a large group of flesh-eating zombies, was beginning to take a toll on Riker. He took his eyes from the plodding monsters and glanced skyward. Dark clouds were moving in from the south. Rain was about the only thing out of his control that could possibly make this any worse. As if on cue, he felt a single raindrop hit his exposed skin.
While his first, second, and third instinct was to run away from the dead things and the impending deluge as fast as his tired legs would carry him, doing so would put the others in danger. Already, some of the zombies were casting glances in the direction of the mini-mall.
“Stick to the plan,” he told himself. Slowing a bit to let the zombies gain a few steps on him, he resumed the waving and hollering, putting his all into the Pied Piper routine.
***
Yelling at the top of his lungs for the better part of five minutes had left Riker a little lightheaded and his voice beginning to go hoarse on him. With barely a truck length to go to get to the Shelby, he turned away from the dead things and jogged the rest of the way.
The drone was on the hood where Steve-O said he would leave it. As promised, Benny had left the fob hanging off one of the drone’s stilled props.
With the dead still a safe distance from Dolly’s grille, Riker hurriedly stuffed the drone under the tonneau and slammed the tailgate shut. Only when he was in the cab and had the door closed and locks thrown did he relax a little. But it was short-lived, because as soon as he was ensconced in the relative cocoon of silence the cab provided, he became acutely aware of the fierce pounding behind his eyes and dull ache emanating from deep within his stump.
The radio in his pocket came to life. With the volume turned down low, the sound coming from the speaker was but a low hiss of white noise. He dug out the Motorola and upped the volume just in time to hear Shorty say, “I think your new friend is planning on turning your place into a Rainforest Café.”
After having seen the inside of Lia’s house, Riker had a good idea where the man was going with this. Thumbing the Talk key, he responded, “Let me guess. Seeds, clay pots, fertilizer, and potting soil?”
Shorty said, “Bingo. But that’s not all. Your spitfire has assembled on the sidewalk here what looks like the beginnings of a major league grow operation—” he was interrupted by the Shelby’s blaring horn, which stopped only long enough for Riker to tell him to get off the radio and get the stuff loaded.
“Alright, alright,” Shorty flared, “I’ll get my hands dirty. But tell me this: Why do you get to have all the fun?”
Fun, my ass, thought Riker as a pale palm slapped the window glass just inches from his left cheek.
Chapter 39
Trying hard to ignore the leering, rictus grins of the dead, Riker kept his gaze locked on the sidewalk in front of Vern’s. Though the migraine he was currently experiencing was one of the worst he could remember, he continued to lay on the Shelby’s horn. He winced as the screech of fingernails scraping against the outside of his door resounded inside the cab.
After enduring what seemed like a never-ending assault on his once shiny hundred-thousand-dollar ride, the others finally finished loading the last of the supplies into Shorty’s EarthRoamer.
Flipping the assemblage of dead the bird, Riker fired the Shelby’s engine, then placed a call to Shorty.
Talking loudly to be heard over the sonorous gong-like bangs of dead flesh striking sheet metal, Riker asked, “Almost ready to roll?”
A couple of seconds ticked by before Shorty answered. “Getting there,” he said. “But I’m afraid you’re going to need to come and pick these kids up.”
“Not part of the plan,” Riker shot. “I’ll pick up Benny and Steve-O after I turn around.”
“Listen,” Shorty shot back, “your friends just went on one hell of a shopping spree.” There was a short pause. Voice adopting a conciliatory tone, he added, “I picked up a few things myself. Bottom line … Marge is filled to the brim.”
Incredulous, Riker said, “The camper and the crew cab?”
“Affirmative,” said Shorty. “I’m going to need you to take on all passengers.”
Throwing the transmission into Reverse, Riker said, “On my way.”
Fingernails stole more of Dolly’s paint as Riker eased her from the pocket of zombies. He took the same route as Shorty, whipping a quick J-turn, then driving up and over the curb and sidewalk, finishing the utter destruction of the shrubs the EarthRoamer had started.
Pulling the Shelby close to the EarthRoamer’s rugged rear bumper, Riker powered down the curbside window.
Lia and Vern were in the shadowy alcove and engaged in an animated conversation.
On the sidewalk, Steve-O was standing with his arms crossed and watching Benny arranging items in the camper.
Shorty hadn’t been lying when he said the rig was full to the brim. It was crammed floor to ceiling with everything but the kitchen sink. Seemed like half of Vern’s inventory had been transferred over to the big rig. Considering many of the items were not on the list, Riker mused, maybe a kitchen sink was shoehorned in there.
After balancing a pair of indoor grow lights atop of a row of five- and ten-gallon gas cans, Benny tried closing the rear door. Nothing doing. It took some manipulation of the load and a great deal of pushing and shoving on the door to finally get it closed and locked.
Hate to be the person to pop that door, thought Riker. In his mind, he saw the door flying open and Shorty backpedaling away as an avalanche of stuff poured forth.
Suppressing a grin, Riker looked across the lot to his left. The dead had already made it off the boulevard, up the curb, and over the sidewalk. Two, maybe three hundred feet to go, he figured. No doubt in a minute or two they’d be here causing problems. Already he could hear their raspy vocalizations preceding them. Leaning across the center console, he called out to Vern. “You sure you want to stay here? We can take you to your house. Probably be safer there.”
Vern had put on an olive Army surplus jacket. It was old and worn on the elbows and collar. Covering his wispy gray hair was a new red hat stitched with the words Vern’s Hardware. Turning away from Lia, the proprietor said, “Vern Rossi is afraid of no man … living or dead. I survived the battle of Ia Drang Valley. If those NVA Regulars couldn’t kill me, no way these mindless things are going to.”
Riker put his hands in the air. “I wasn’t questioning your bravery, Vern.”
Lia crossed the sidewalk. She stepped onto the Shelby’s running board. Head filling the open window, she said, “His Jeep has two flat tires, Lee.” She bit her lip. “I talked him into coming with us. Is that all right with you?”
Riker looked skyward. He sighed, then said, “A little late to be asking for permission.”
Adding a slight tilt to her head, she said, “He’s a sweet man. We could use someone with almost seven decades of life experience.”
“Agreed,” Riker said. After stealing a glance at the man in question, he whispered, “Vern’s seventy? Damn spry for a man his age. I figured he was sixty or so.”
“He’s sixty-nine, Lee.” Her brows lifted. “He said he was a medic over there. Worked as an EMT all through the eighties and nineties. He knows more about medicine than all of us combined.”
While Riker was on the boulevard and waiting for the loading to finish, he had been filling rifle and pistol magazines. Now, as he mulled the decision, he slapped a fresh magazine in his AR and stowed the rifle by his feet.
Breaking the uneasy silence, Lia went on, saying: “I had to tell him about my dad being an airline pilot. How he went missing early on. No call. No text. Nothing. There’s more to it.” She shook her head.
Riker looked up and thought he saw tears.
/> Swallowing hard, she continued. “I mentioned how the airport brought infected people here.” A short pause as she wiped her eyes. “He was still in denial about a recovery until I told him about the FEMA facility. How all the dead things escaped from it. Lee … he already knew about the unmanned roadblocks and empty streets. He finally came around to my way of thinking when I told him what I saw with my own eyes at the county detention center.”
Riker nodded slowly. “You’re riding with us, Vern,” was the only thing he could say. The right thing to say. No way he was going to leave another person alone to fend for himself. Especially someone who had already been so generous.
As everyone climbed aboard Dolly, the sky opened up. At first, the rain fell big and heavy, the gray impenetrable sheets pummeling the approaching dead and sounding like a squadron of tiny warplanes strafing Dolly’s roof and hood. By the time they were moving again, the Shelby leading the EarthRoamer off the lot, visibility was near zero and a thin layer of condensation had collected on the insides of the windows.
***
Leaving the mini-mall behind, Lia directed Riker through an old part of Santa Fe. After following the boulevard for a few miles, and seeing only a handful of dead along the way, she had him turn to the north and traverse a mostly deserted thoroughfare hugging the city’s east side.
Finally, with the northernmost part of Santa Fe drawing near, Lia had them turn back to the west. She took them on a tour through a part of the city on whose warren of streets she liked to run. The circuitous route culminated with them reaching a dirt road that shot due north for a couple of miles, to a T, where they again motored west through a couple of miles of fenced range marked as private property.
Three times they used Shorty’s bolt cutters to lop padlocks and unchain gates blocking travel on the unimproved single track. A sign on the third gate had indicated they were entering federal land. The lone, well-worn horse trail that had been paralleling the road through the private tracts of land ended there.
Leaving the scrub- and cactus-flecked range behind, they continued westbound, through a fledgling development dotted with numerous homes in different phases of construction. At the eastern boundary of the new development was a street lined with freshly painted two-level homes. Gleaming white sidewalks and driveways fronted the homes. For Sale signs sprouted from lawns still somewhat green thanks to recently laid sod.
The eyes of the smiling agents on the signs seemed to follow them as the two-vehicle procession made a slow-rolling right onto an unlined side street.
“Place is deserted,” observed Benny. “We should have gone through here this morning.”
“All those zombies at the roadblock had me spooked,” Riker admitted. “The Randoms sprinting at us from behind the dump trucks sealed the deal for me.”
Benny was seated behind Riker. Matching his friend’s gaze in the rearview mirror, Benny said, “‘Randoms’? You mean Bolts, right?”
Riker looked the question to Lia. She repeated her observations to the others, finishing with, “So long as you remember there’s no rhyme or reason as to which ones don’t diminish like the others, I don’t give a rat’s ass if you call them Randoms or Bolts or Flo-Jos.”
“They’re all monsters to me,” stated Steve-O. “They aren’t people anymore. I shot one today. It didn’t cry or scream. I think it didn’t even know what it means to die.”
When they left the mini-mall, Vern had claimed the center spot in the backseat. Tapping Riker’s shoulder, he asked, “Was my boy one of them? Was he a monster?”
Riker heard pain in the man’s voice. To keep from having to see it reflected in those hazel eyes, Riker kept his gaze locked on the road and shook his head in response.
“He was still dead?”
Again Riker shook his head. “I’m sorry, Mr. Rossi. The virus turned Shane into one of them.”
Vern was a short man, maybe five-seven in shoes. Still, he had almost half a head on Steve-O. Upon hearing his worst fear put into words, Vern seemed to shrink, the back seat swallowing him up. Voice bereft of the bravado previously on display, he said, “My boy’s plan was to go down there and let nature take its course. I couldn’t let him do it. Nobody should ever die alone. So I sat with him in the store. We reminisced about Little League. I coached his team, you know. We talked about his mother. That led to a discussion on why he never got married. He wasn’t gay, you know. Not that that’s bad or anything. He … he just could not commit. I suppose that was my fault, with all the moving around. A different post every few years. Shane was always shy and quiet.” Vern swallowed hard. “The store, though … Shane gave it his all when he was there. Could talk to any woman no matter how stunning she may be.”
Lia said, “Your son was a nice man. Shane was always helpful.”
Riker blurted, “Shane was never a monster, sir. I released his soul from the shell that was his body. He didn’t feel any pain. I can guarantee that.”
Benny was staring outside the truck, scrutinizing the darkened windows of the homes flitting by. “None of them feel pain,” he said absently.
“Or feel happiness or sadness or get mad,” Steve-O added. “I take back the monster thing, Mr. Rossi. I’m sorry. Shane was not a monster. He just got sick and stopped being himself.”
Nobody responded to that. A heavy silence descended on the cab.
Without realizing it, Riker had allowed Lia to have him drive through the same residential area he had seen from the roadblock on 84 earlier in the day. If his bearings were correct, they were still somewhere south of the roadblock. Which meant he had to decide if stopping to siphon gas from some of the hundreds of cars in the northbound lanes was worth the risk. On one hand, the target-rich environment meant they would only have to stop to exit the vehicles one time. The problem with the roadblock, though, was that the presence of dead things was assured. And scattered amongst the Slogs, he knew, were untold numbers of Randoms. He’d already seen them with his own eyes. Conversely, if he were to pull over on one of these side streets, not only would they be a draw for any dead in the vicinity, the group would also be exposing themselves to anyone holed up in the surrounding homes—be they hostile or not.
He was about to take an informal survey, see who wanted to face the Bolts and who preferred to, perhaps, be shot in the back by a terrified shut-in protecting their hood, when Shorty came on over the radio. “Lee, this is Shorty. You reading me?”
Instinctively, Riker flicked his eyes to the mirror, where he saw the man behind the wheel of the massive rig. Though the EarthRoamer was following a couple truck lengths back, the big rig still blotted out the road behind them. Worried friends of the kids they’d left dead in the cul-de-sac had somehow caught up with them, Riker said, “You’re coming in loud and clear.” Before releasing the Talk button, he asked, “How’s our six? We still alone?”
“Just us and my dust,” answered Shorty.
“What’s up?” Riker asked.
Lia gestured for a left turn.
“Let’s find a street with a diesel rig and a couple of cars. Fill up those gas cans Vern sold me.”
Sold? thought Riker as he turned west onto a block occupied by run-down homes fronted with unkempt lawns. Turns out Vern’s a true capitalist after all. Nothing wrong with that. Glad that Shorty was the one who broached the subject, Riker said, “Agreed. I didn’t want to venture into the tangle at the roadblock. Lots of cars to choose from. But it looked like people were tailgating while they waited on the road to open. Which means there are lots of deaders roaming around.”
Without allowing Riker much of a heads up, Lia stabbed a thumb to her right.
Loyally following her input, Riker hooked a hard right turn. No sooner had he begun to straighten the wheel than he found the road in front blocked with a slow-moving mass of dead things. Just as the others took notice and a babble arose in the cab, Riker stood on the brakes.
Chapter 40
Rapid-fire, Lia shouted, “Stop! Stop! Stop!”
When the pickup finally came to a halt on the slick pavement, all that the stunned occupants could see through the windshield were the swaying forms of several hundred walking dead.
Following a little too close, Shorty was forced to swing the EarthRoamer wide left. Though the quick reaction kept the bigger vehicle from rear-ending the Shelby, it also created another set of problems.
Faced with plowing into the front end of a tiny blue and white Smart car parked against the far curb, or trying to squeeze the EarthRoamer between the parked car and the Shelby—a tricky maneuver that would no doubt damage all three vehicles—Shorty put his trust in his rig’s massive wraparound bumper.
Having just gotten the Shelby wrestled to a complete stop, an explosion of sound from behind and left stole Riker’s attention from the parade of zombies, most of which were beginning to about-face in unison.
Immediately following the screech of twisting metal and crackle of shattering glass, the tiny car Riker had just passed overtook the Shelby. Only it wasn’t rolling on its undersized tires. It was now airborne, the stunted rear end sweeping by Riker’s window, just about eye-level to him.