They parked the pickup truck, SUV, Jenkins’ jeep, and the Humvee in front of the mansion’s front entrance. Diane Stapleton’s mangled Toyota sat where it had crashed earlier that morning. The two-ton lion still lay embedded in the passenger side of the car and would remain that way from then on.
Billy and Jem removed the metal chest of C-4 plastic explosives and separate crate containing spools of wire, tubular blasting caps, and the signal-triggered detonators up the steps to where Avery and Michelle were waiting. “Time to get to work,” the boy said. With the brunette’s help they began to fasten the first of the two detonators above the doorway of the grand entrance and then link the current wires to the connectors. Avery intended to install the signal detonators in two key positions—at the front entrance and at the basement exit that led onto the back lawn. That way they could detonate the charges from either direction, in case bad went to worse. The two disappeared into the house. Avery fed the wire from the spool, while Michelle followed, toting the yellowed floor plans from the library stuck under her arm.
Levi carried a box of canned and dried goods to the Dodge and secured it in the bed. The snow continued to fall, but not as heavily as before. He believed it was partly due to the number of buzzards circling directly ahead. The birds that left the airborne flocks and descended to the limbs of leafless trees and the eaves of the big house were crusted with wintery precipitation, having taken the brunt of the snowfall.
“Lord have mercy, it stinks out here!” Jem said. The boy was right. The ripe odor of rot and decay hung heavily in the air and grew stronger by the minute.
“They’re almost here,” said Billy. “Listen.”
In the distance they heard the sound of shuffling feet en masse, as well as brittle cracks and crashes as the ancient trees of the forests surrounding the Biltmore were uprooted and sent toppling by the sheer force of the zombie migration.
Jem noticed the Cherokee rooting around in the back of the Humvee. “What are you looking for?”
Billy opened an ammo box and stuffed a fragmentation grenade in each pocket of his coat. “These,” he said. “They could slow them down if they get here before we have a chance to leave.”
Levi and Jem took a few grenades as well. “You think we should take the fifty-caliber?” asked Levi.
“Unfortunately, I don’t believe we’ll have the chance,” said Billy. “Look!”
Levi and Jem looked toward the forest that faced the far end of the rectangular lawn. Several dozen Biters were already emerging from the woods, followed by seemingly endless wave behind them. The towering maples and cedars that stood to the west began to splinter and drop, one after another. A massive oak tree, twice as old as the estate itself, was pushed over by a wall of zombies. It fell with a crash across the road, blocking the stone entranceway and their sole way out.
“Damn!” cussed Levi. A mixture of anger and panic threatened to overcome him, but he fought it down. “Back inside! As much I hate it, we’re going to have to take to foot and hope we can outdistance them.” He took inventory of where the others were. Enolia, Kate, and Tyrone were upstairs on the third floor gathering clothes and possessions, while Diane and Melissa were watching over the children in the dining hall.
“Jem, check with Avery and Melissa in the basement and see how they’re doing,” Levi told him. “If they have a ways to go setting the charges, tell them to abandon it and meet us at the chestnut tree in the meadow.”
“Yes, sir,” said Jem. Soon he had disappeared through a doorway that led downstairs.
“Billy, you head upstairs and get Tyrone and the girls. I’m going to fetch Diane and Melissa and the young’uns and get them to safety.”
“Right!” agreed the Cherokee.
Billy bounded up the curving staircase, while Levi shouldered his shotgun and ran for the dining hall. Outside, the uneven marching of thousands of unbalanced footsteps could be heard, crunching in the snow, scraping upon the cobbled roadway, as well the brittle toppling of timber and splintering of the stables being flattened and torn to the ground.
And above it all, stirred to a frenzy by the stench of rampant death and decay, flew the buzzards, dark and ravenous, anxious to partake of the restless carrion, but seeing no opportunity to do so.
“Where’s the next one?” Avery asked. According to the blueprints, there were eight major support structures within the foundation of the Biltmore. So far, they had found five and affixed six-pound blocks of C-4 to each one. After each charge had been secured to the ancient columns of stone and mortar, blasting caps inserted, and the caps wired for detonation, they moved on to the next.
Michelle held a flashlight over the folds of the blueprints. “There should be another one sixty feet behind you,” she said, squinting in the sparse glow, trying to decipher the floor plan. “After that, we have two more at the north end of the basement, beneath the dining hall.”
Suddenly, they heard Jem’s voice from the head of the stairs. “Avery?”
“Down here, brother!”
“Hurry it up, will you?” his twin hollered. “We’re switching to Plan B. The Biters are already here… crossing the lawn and nearly at the house!”
“Aw hell!” growled Avery. “Of all the blasted luck! Where are the wheels?”
“Out front with the zombies,” his brother told him. “No chance of getting to them and, if we did, we’d be half eaten and full of black bugs before we could get inside.”
“Dammit!” Michelle had grown up in the desert outside Tucson and absolutely hated the cold. And now it looked like they would be traipsing through ankle-deep snow for no telling how long.
“Papa said if you’ve still got a ways to go, forget the explosives and get your butt up here.”
“We’ve got three more to go and we’re done!” Avery called. “We’ll be up as soon as they’re done!”
“Well, you’d better make it fast!” Somewhere upstairs they heard a splintering crash, then another, as the fortified windows at the front of the house began to give away beneath the weight of the hungry dead. “Sounds like they’re already in the house!”
“We’re a-coming!” his brother promised. Avery hefted the bag of remaining C-4 over one shoulder and his AR-15 over the other, then looked at the girl next to him. Michelle’s face was pale and drawn in the glow of the flashlight. “How are you holding up?”
“I’m okay,” she said.
“Scared?”
He could feel her bristle at the question, rather than actually see it. “Hell no!”
“Me neither!” he proclaimed in his customary swagger. “Let’s get those other three columns and head on up. Lead the way!”
As Michelle used the old blueprints to navigate, neither one of them said another word as they made their way through the gloomy cellar. Truth be told, both were more afraid that they had ever been in their lives, although neither would have ever admitted it.
Becky Stapleton began to cry as Levi knelt to fasten her coat. “It’s okay, sweetheart,” he told the four-year-old soothingly. “We’re just gonna bundle up and go out and play in the snow for a while.”
The four-year-old’s face screwed up into a frightened mask as she stared the lanky Tennessean in the face. She began to bawl uncontrollably as he slipped her pink mittens over her tiny hands. “Please… if they hear you crying, they’ll want to come inside.” Worried, he looked over at the child’s mother, who was working on her son’s winter clothing.
She shrugged apologetically. “Becky is… well, she’s frightened of men with beards. Sorry.”
“I’d sure have shaved this morning, clean as a whistle,” he told her, “but there was no predicting that I’d need to.”
Diane was about to answer, when a crash sounded from the boarded windows of the adjoining pool room. They could hear the splintering of wood, the shattering of glass panes, and the guttural growls and groans of Biters, where they had only heard faint echoes a moment before. “Oh dear God! They’re inside!”
“Melissa?” he asked. The dark-haired teenager nodded. “Jessie, you got your little brother?”
“Yes, sir,” she replied, holding the blanketed baby tightly to her chest. “I’m ready, too.”
“Then let’s go.”
Together, the seven left the dining hall and made their way past the winter garden to the entrance hall. Several Biters were already inside. They caught sight of Levi and the others and started toward them, their black teeth snapping savagely. Levi pumped his shotgun and drove them back with three blasts of double-ought buckshot. Melissa and Diane fired as well; the girl cut loose with the Uzi that Kate had left with her and the mother with her 9mm Beretta M9.
“Go!” Levi told them. They herded the children ahead of them and headed for the French doors that led onto the rear veranda. Before they got there, the doors opened and Jem was there. Melissa rushed into his arms. “Thank goodness! I didn’t know where you were.”
He hugged her back, then ushered the others outside. “Be careful going down those back steps. They’re a mite icy!” He gave Melissa a quick peck on the lips and pushed her toward the others. “Get them under that chestnut tree. We’ll be down directly.”
As he turned to join his father, a tremendous crash sounded and the vast oaken doors at the front of the hall caved in. With it came the Humvee. The military vehicle was smashed and battered and had been flipped onto its roof. A wall of Biters was behind it, pushing it through the barrier and into the circular foyer. A steady stream of zombies climbed over the Humvee and pushed past it, filling the entrance hall.
“Get back!” Levi yelled. He took a grenade from his coat pocket, pulled the pin, and tossed it beneath the stumbling feet of the invaders. He and Jem ran and made the veranda as the grenade went off. The explosion took down a dozen or so zombies, throwing dismembered limbs and scorched flesh and bone in all directions. But it did little to show the flow of Biters as they moved onward, seemingly unstoppable.
“Where’s your brother and Michelle?” Levi asked him, sending another blast or two of buckshot toward the approaching zombies. The shots were as ineffective as battling a herd of rhinos with a fly swatter.
“They’re finishing up,” he told him. “They should be wiring the detonator above the basement door right about now.” At least he hoped what he was saying was true. To be honest, he had no idea where the two were at that moment. “Where’s Tyrone and Kate and Enolia?”
“Upstairs,” Levi said, his voice heavy with despair. “God help them… they’re still up there.” He looked toward the winding staircase and saw a steady stream of Biters climbing toward the second-floor landing.
“Papa! We gotta help them!”
“We can’t, son,” he told him. “We’ve got children out there in the cold…plus Melissa and Diane. We can’t leave them to fend for themselves. I’m afraid we’re going to have to go, whether we like it or not.”
The zombies were halfway across the entrance hall. Fifteen seconds more and the two would be completely overrun by the bug-ridden hoard.
Jem and Levi turned, closing the French doors behind them. They knew the barrier would give away in a matter of seconds, but perhaps it would be the seconds they needed to make it to the snowy stretch of lawn below.
Billy Tauchee found his wife and the others in a corridor on the third floor, toting backpacks and bags of clothing and other belongings. “We’ve got to get to the first floor!” he told them. “They’re already in the house!”
“Do you think we can get past them?” Enolia asked him. “Oh dear God… Jessie and Austen!”
“They’re fine,” her husband assured her. “They’re with Levi… probably down at the tree by now. Is there another way down from the third floor? A service staircase?”
“Yes,” said Kate. “But we’ve already tried it. There’s a door between the corridor and the back stairs, and could hear them coming up. There’s no getting out that way.”
“Then we’ll have to take our chances down the main staircase.”
“We’ll get down there,” Tyrone declared. “Because I got this here mutha!” He lifted the M2 Browning his huge hands. A long band of .50 ammunition hung from the loading port of the machine gun and dangled over his left shoulder, while the Thompson machine gun was slung across the right. “I ran upstairs and fetched it while Kate and Enolia packed their stuff.”
“I could kiss you, Tyrone,” Billy said with a grin. “Since you’ve got the heavy artillery, you can take point.” The Cherokee jacked a round into the breach of the M416 he had taken from Harley Jenkins during his raid at the winery. “I’m second and you ladies take up the rear.”
Enolia looked at Kate. Given what they had been through together, the two were more like sisters than friends. “We’re ready,” said Kate. She pulled the two Glocks from her coat pocket and held them loosely beside her lanky legs. Enolia pulled a Magnum revolver from her own coat—Nell’s nickel-plated Colt Python, the one she had attempted to fight her attackers off with. She raised the .357 and held it aloft, muzzle aimed toward the plaster ceiling.
As one, they descended the staircase that led from the third floor to the second.
Halfway down the steps, a dozen zombies crowded into the narrow channel between the railing and wall. As their bloodshot eyes spotted the four coming down, they surged forward, arms outstretched, bug-blacked teeth snapping and yearning for warm, living flesh.
Tyrone braced himself and sent a burst of 50-caliber rounds into the knot of Biters. The slugs ripped through their decayed bodies, obliterating bug-infested skulls and cutting bloated abdomens in half. The four hung back, attempting to avoid the spray of infested blood and mangled tissue.
When the first wave had fallen, Tyrone looked over his shoulder. “Step over them… just try not to step into them!” They did as he said, stepping gingerly over the heaps of torn, decomposing muscle and bullet-shattered bone.
They reached the second-floor landing. As they turned the corner and approached the stairs that led to the ground floor, a flood of zombies surged up the steps and filled the landing. Tyrone stepped to the side, allowing the other three room to fire. Full and semi-auto weapons filled the air with a deafening staccato as bullets drove the Biters back. They dropped limply to the landing floor and fell backwards down the staircase.
We’re going to make it, thought Enolia. She looked over at her husband, but didn’t see the same confidence in his face. His features were stern, but she saw concern and apprehension in his dark eyes. It was as though he was staring into the future and seeing something that he didn’t like at all.
Midway through a burst, the Browning jammed. “Damn!” Tyrone cussed and flung the M2 to the floor, grabbing over his shoulder for the Thompson.
“My turn for point,” Billy said, raising the M416 to his shoulder and sighting down the barrel. He stepped forward and headed for the staircase.
“Billy!” Enolia called out. Fear seized her heart as he started down the steps, firing in short, concentrated bursts. A bee swarm of 5.56 mm rounds drove the zombies backward at first, then the sheer number of Biters prevailed, surging over their comrades and continuing upstairs.
“Get back up here, man!” Tyrone told him. He raised the Tommy gun and fired over the Cherokee’s head, taking six or seven down… which was immediately replaced by two dozen more. “It’s getting too thick!”
“I can route them,” Billy said as he fired his weapon. “I can clear the stairs and we’ll be in the clear… across the lobby and out the back doors.”
As they paused at the top of the curving staircase, they saw the zombies closing in on Billy, despite the amount of ammo he expended on them. A couple of them reached past the M416 and sank their fingers into his jacket.
“Billy!” screamed Enolia. “Come back, baby!” Then his own jargon came to mind. “Retreat! Retreat!”
But it was too late. The Biters were already on him. Billy refused to scream as teeth slashed at him, tearing away shreds of clothing
and tatters of flesh and muscle. He dropped the assault rifle. It clattered beneath churning feet. The Cherokee attempted to take a couple of steps back up the stairs, but death-stiffened fingers punched through the flesh of his chest and abdomen, refusing to let go.
“BILLY!” Enolia shrieked and stepped forward, but was restrained by Tyrone and Kate.
Painfully, Billy Tauchee turned his head and looked at them. The right side of his head been stripped of its flesh, leaving only raw muscle and tendons, and stark patches of naked bone. “Back across the landing!” he yelled. “Take cover behind the corner! Now!”
As the three retreated, Enolia saw her husband bring his arms up out of the milling sea of angry, ravenous zombies. In each bloody hand he held a grenade.
“Billy… no!” she screamed. She fought against the hands that held her and, for a second, slipped free. She was nearly to the staircase, when the black man’s massive arms entwined her, making escape impossible. “No, Billy…. no.”
Before she was pulled away from her final glimpse of Billy, he stared at her. Their eyes locked and his torn lips mouthed two things, two parting gifts from her husband. One was I love you. The other was remember.
She saw him pull the pin from each grenade with his teeth and then pull both hands down to crowd level.
Enolia and the other two were around the corner, sheltered by sturdy timber and plaster, when the grenades detonated. The scent of burning flesh and gun powder filled their nostrils. The awful sound of rampant hunger and feeding grew silent.
“Come on,” said Tyrone.
“No!” shrieked Enolia. “No, I can’t… I can’t… see…”
Kate took the woman’s tear-streaked face in her freckled hands. “Just take hold of my waist. Just hold on and close your eyes. We’ll get you down. Okay?”
The Buzzard Zone Page 26