by Dave Lund
“Did you feel that way before you took me out of my home?”
“No, but I liked you; especially compared to the last guy. It was our time on the road, fighting to get here, that really did it. If that becomes known, by the way, I will be removed from the program, which would be … bad for me.”
Amanda pulled Clint’s t-shirt over his head. “It doesn’t matter. I’m in charge, and I say you stay with me.”
The Compound
The bodies of the would-be capturers, including Danny and the dog, lay in the far corner of the property, inside the fence. Bexar tried not to look at them, but would glance over and see the buzzards picking at their flesh. He realized that he hadn’t seen buzzards picking at the undead. They smelled bad enough that it seemed like it would have been an all-you-can-eat buzzard buffet, but they avoided the walking bodies for some reason. The flies and the stench were bad enough, and Bexar guessed that adding buzzards to the mix would probably make things worse. He wasn’t sure how, but it seemed to feel worse just thinking about it.
The high desert sun hung low against the western sky. Piles of gear and supplies were grouped in the larger part of the three-car garage, with the door open. Surprisingly, most of the gear they had on the Defender had been recovered by the other group, even the radios, armor, and weapons from the bodies, which Chivo appreciated. He replaced his ruined carrier with his dead partner’s gear. Bexar’s radio components were supplemented with a mix of gear from Apollo and Lindsey, as some of it was damaged in the bridge collapse.
Bexar’s gear and rifle lay on the pavement next to the bus. He lay under the decrepit yellow whale, crawling around and checking the tires, the drive train, and other components as he could. He knew how to wrench, but a diesel guy he was not, much less a school bus guy. He crawled out from under the chassis, arms covered in black grime and old oil; Chivo stood waiting.
“Will it work?”
“I don’t know. It’s fairly fucked, but it’s better than walking for now.”
“How much fuel does it hold, and how far can we travel before we need to top off?”
“I’m not sure, the manual is missing. But I measured the outside of the fuel tank, so everything I come up with is a smooth guess. I’m also going to guess that when healthy, the bus got maybe five to eight mpg on a good day; this bus is far from healthy.”
The smudged and dirty notepad in his hand had a square drawn on it with measurements taken with a tape measure found in a tool box in the garage. Bexar worked the multiplication out by hand, a nearly forgotten skill he had relegated to a calculator on his cellphone.
“Best guess, about sixty gallons. Let’s call it five miles per gallon for easy math, so three hundred miles of loud, black-smoke-belching travel before we need to find a significant amount of fuel.”
Chivo held his hand to the western horizon. “Four fingers to sunset, mano. We need to wrap up, button up, and rest up. Tomorrow we roll, and I think it might just suck.”
Nodding, Bexar walked into the surprisingly immaculate garage and sprayed carb cleaner on his arms, wiping most of the grime off on a dingy beach towel from the house. I bet we top out at forty mph; we’re a bit less than three hundred miles away, so it will take over seven hours to rattle the fuck into Cortez. Shit, I better find some ear plugs.
The Garage
Jessie lifted the heavy box over her head and, standing on her toes, pushed it onto the roof rack. Sarah and Erin had been gone for close to two hours by Jessie’s estimate; there hadn’t been any gunfire that she could hear. She wanted to worry for her new friend and her daughter, but she couldn’t; the worry would garner nothing in return but more stress. She absentmindedly rubbed her belly, which barely pushed against her shirt. Whether they’re back in the morning or not, I leave. I can’t wait; I can’t put my little guy in harm’s way for faint hope, or for other people. The windows high along the roofline glowed red with the setting sun; the interior of the garage darkened with the waning light.
They returned at length and, after some discussion, they decided the three of them would travel together in the FJ, leaving the old motorcycle behind. The gear and supplies they needed increased by a large magnitude. The big canvas wall tent stayed on the roof rack in its weather-sealed box, along with the EMT poles and other associated gear. Sarah wanted to ditch the tent, but Jessie couldn’t let it go—maybe for practical purposes or maybe due to sentimental reasons after all the heartache and loss of the past few months.
All told, it would probably take a few more days of gathering supplies to be fully ready. Canned food and bottled water were high on the priority list. In terms of mileage, there was only a solid day’s drive between their location and Groom Lake, but Sarah agreed that it would take longer, possibly even up to a week due to all the unknowns.
Waiting, sitting on the cold concrete floor, Jessie turned the hand crank of the shortwave for a few minutes before switching it on and tuning to the emergency station where they had found the radio traffic from Groom Lake. It was the same information; it sounded like they had recorded it and played it on a loop. I hope that there are still people behind the loop and that it isn’t just playing automatically with everyone dead.
Scrolling through the frequencies, she stopped on a man’s voice reading numbers, the same from before. Jessie took a notepad and wrote some of the numbers down. All the numbers are odd numbers, but the order makes no sense.
Jessie sat on the floor trying to figure out if the numbers lined up with the alphabet or if there was a pattern, but she was interrupted by the low popping exhaust of an approaching motorcycle. She picked up the rifle lying on the floor next to her, tossed the sling over her shoulder, and press-checked the bolt to verify a round was in the chamber. Jessie peered through a small hole in the metal siding next to the roll-up door and saw Sarah and Erin on the bike. She pulled the rolling chain loose and proceeded to raise the door for her friends. Once they were inside and the door was secure, there were more questions than answers to be had. Their clothes were splattered with blood, dusty, and covered with grime.
“You two look like shit! What happened?”
“Found a collapsed bridge north of here—some sort of SUV crushed in the rubble along with the bodies of a black guy and some white chick. Both of them had military-style clothing on, but no gear or weapons. They looked picked clean.”
“That’s it?”
“No. Huge damned herd of corpses came up on us. We had to shoot our way back to the bike and led them on a rounding chase away from here before circling back.”
“How far away was all of this?”
Sarah looked at Erin, who shrugged. “I don’t know, like, maybe a mile, mile and a half. It was a hell of a fight and we had to shag ass. We got nothing on our list today.”
“Think we should take the FJ and all go together tomorrow?”
“No, keep that thing secure and hold the fort. We’ll make another run tomorrow and another the one after that if we have to. Once we’re really ready, we can roll. How many more weeks till you pop?”
“I don’t know … sometime in October most likely.”
“Good, we have time; at least we have that on our side.”
Cortez, CO
The western sky was that shade of dark blue just before the end of twilight; it was Cliff’s time to move. The middle school had provided more questions than answers, except for the one that most likely accounted for some of the survivors. But there were still more people left to be found. If anything, he saw that this cult, or militia group, or whatever they wanted to call themselves, was a serious problem. A bit more recon and then I’ll start mixing up their Kool-Aid for their final journey home.
His truck was close by and the school was a dead end, so it was time to go home, rest, and regroup. Cliff waited and watched, easing towards the open front of the school, and standing in the shadows of the doorway, M4 in his hands. He strained to hear any vehicles or movement of any kind.
Not much undead
activity in the middle of town. The new town leaders probably took care of that; I can’t count on it, though.
Cliff took a deep breath, sprinted out the door, and ran for the cover of the homes and yards across the parking lot and street from the middle school. Just as he reached the edge of the parking area, an old Jeep turned the corner, headlights illuminating his sprint for safety. Caught in the open, all Cliff could do was keep sprinting for cover, the large trees in the yards across his first chance at safety. A low, chain-link fence was the only obstacle in his path—a stutter step in the sprint and Cliff had just reached out to vault the fence when he felt a hard hit on his thigh, causing him to stumble and crash into the chain-link.
With no time to do anything else, Cliff rolled up onto a knee and began firing at the Jeep as it came to a stop. Three shots later and the headlights were out, allowing him to see the figures in the open top Jeep. Three of them, he noted quickly. The passenger stepped down from the lifted suspension to the pavement, and Cliff lined up the shot, concentrating on slowing his breathing. He fired twice, a double tap to the forehead of the passenger. The man in the back, wearing a heavy jacket, lifted a large rifle and laid it on the top of the roll cage. Cliff shot twice, both rounds impacting within a half-inch of each other. The man’s skull shattered outward. The driver put the Jeep in gear and drove forward towards Cliff. Cliff fired six more times, shattering the windshield and striking the driver in the head and throat. Dead, the man’s foot pinned the gas pedal to the floor. Cliff stood to run out of the path of the closing Jeep and fell to the ground, his right leg buckling under the pressure. Rolling onto his back, he flipped the selector switch all the way around and emptied the magazine into the front left tire of the quickly approaching vehicle. The tire shredded from the onslaught, causing the Jeep to pull hard left, passing just inches away from Cliff’s prone body before slamming into a tree. The body of the driver launched through the shattered windshield and landed in the yard. The engine continued to rev at full throttle.
Cliff looked at his thigh; his pants leg was soaked in blood. Shit. This is all I need. Smoke began billowing from under the hood of the Jeep. With no time to waste, Cliff stood on his left leg and used the chain-link fence as a handrail to hold his weight as he limped around the corner of the low, square, adobe-style home. Hobbling as fast as he could, he made his way against the wall of the home just before flames leapt from the Jeep, flickering orange and black shadows into the street.
Before anything else, Cliff made a tactical reload of his rifle, dropping the partially spent magazine into his cargo pocket. Knife in hand, he cut off a long strip of wool from his blanket poncho, along with a few smaller pieces, before cutting the leg of his pants open. Using a scrap of the blanket, he applied pressure to the bullet wound in his thigh, finding that a chunk of flesh was missing from the bullet’s destructive path. He pushed the other pieces of the blanket into the wound and used the strip of wool to tie a tight bandage. I have to get to the truck, I have to get back to the house, and I have to disappear before any others arrive.
Southern California
I-215 joined with I-15 and the convoy continued to make slow time, driving back and forth across the roadway, choked in perpetual rush hour. The homes and businesses sat ravaged by fire, many of the cars on the roadway burned into the pavement. The undead continued to tail them, following in greater numbers the farther they traveled. Night was quickly descending on the convoy, but Aymond did not want to attempt to bivouac in such a built-up area. The last M-ATV’s fifty-caliber weapon’s heavy, thumping, short bursts of automatic fire added punctuation to an already bad situation; Aymond needed to get the convoy away from the cities and back into the mountains where they belonged. Some of the signs were missing, but the one welcoming everyone to the town of Temecula still stood, darkened by the smoke and soot that seemed to cover everything.
“Take this road. Take the exit … drive up the damned embankment, I don’t care. We need to get west and into the mountains,” Aymond said, pointing towards the horizon and the setting sun.
Still on the wrong side of the highway, the convoy threaded the needle between burnt-out vehicles and drove up the on-ramp to turn on Rancho California Road. The bridge stood high enough for the big trucks to drive back and forth through the traffic.
They were trained for urban warfare, and as operators they were good at it. But at the heart of every MSOT member is a Force Recon Marine. The natural habitat of a Marine in Force Recon is the woods, mountains, and faraway places where they can hide in cover, observe, report, and direct forward action.
The sprawling shopping and office complexes finally gave way to a simple two-lane road into the mountains. Aymond could feel the tension beginning to fade from the other Marines in the lead truck.
“Shake it loose back there. A few more mikes and we’ll circle the wagons for the night. How are our following friends?”
“Still pursuing, Chief, but we’ve lost a few of them.”
High ground is happy ground, and after a few turns driving higher into the mountains, a gravel road appeared to their left. A chain across the entrance held a sign warning that trespassers would be prosecuted.
“Just drive through it then follow the path. Let’s see what we find.”
The truck turned and drove through the chain, the tension against the front bumper causing it to snap and whip into the dirt. The convoy followed as the clearing gave way to a smaller gravel road pointing up from their position. Taking a left at the next “T” the convoy found themselves in a clearing above the road. What was left of the burned trees and desert shrub blocked the view from the road below.
“Davis, position to block the rear. Everyone else dismount and take defensive positions.” The Marines climbed out of their vehicles, taking positions giving the group full 360-degree protection. The engines off, Aymond climbed onto the roof of his M-ATV and, with the binoculars to his face, watched their entourage of undead continue to follow the road, but they shambled past the turnoff.
At least they aren’t that smart, but their being in front of us means that we’ll run into them again.
For nearly ten minutes, the undead passed below their position, never aware that they were being watched from above. There was no other movement on the mountain; the smell and the flies were impressive, even to the Marines who’d had multiple deployments to Iraq and Afghanistan.
Aymond climbed off the truck and motioned for the Marines to circle up on him. “OK, I estimate that there were four to five hundred Zeds following. They passed by, so we at least know they’re not thinkers. We can move off course and they’ll keep following their current direction as long as they don’t see us. The bad news is that they’re still walking in the direction we’re driving tomorrow. From now on, we’re going to stay away from the Interstate. That was brutal, and we would have made better time without it. Tomorrow we reach Camp Pendleton, but this time we’re going to set an FOB and run night patrols to recon the area before charging in like we did at The Palms. Set security, same rotation, eat and rest.”
A series of quiet “Hoo-Rahs” and “kills” came from the small group as they set to work.
Cortez, CO
By his watch, it took Cliff four hours to stagger, limp, and crawl his way back to his truck, being forced to conceal himself and wait on more than a few occasions. During that time, the burning Jeep exploded behind him, causing a big increase in vehicle activity. First, a patrol showed up that he presumed went to the wreckage; the others he had to assume were looking for him. If the bodies survived the blast, the others would find that there were bullet holes in the skulls of their comrades. If they hadn’t thought so before, they now knew that a saboteur was in their town. Cliff knew he needed to get back to the house, clean his wound, and have a couple of days to heal up a little and to let the cult settle back down into a routine. His worst problems were further detection and any infection, which could kill him now. Then he had to find the survivors and kill the c
ult members. After the fire call of slaughtered men and an explosion, his opportunity to take his time to recon other sights had now dwindled to nearly nothing.
The Compound
Bexar watched the buzzards continue to pick their captors clean. After a few minutes of heated discussions, Chivo relented that they should take another day or two to scavenge more supplies and test the bus’s ability to run reliably, watching during that time for another vehicle that they could have more confidence in.
With their captors dead and no other activity in the area, they agreed upon a simple sleep and security rotation. At this point, neither of them believed anyone else would try to attack, especially with the number of undead milling around outside the gate. But Chivo didn’t want to chance it. Bexar couldn’t argue with him; Chivo had been in more shit storms than Bexar thought possible. In the morning, they would have to figure out a way to lure the undead away from the gate, but for now, Chivo slept in the house on the filthy couch while Bexar stood on the roof of the bus, watching the moon and the shadows of the corpses bouncing off each other and the fence below.
CHAPTER 28
March 9, Year 1
Outside of Temecula, CA
The sun illuminated the city below. A scout/sniper pair left before dawn to take position to scan the city for any signs of survivors. After a discussion with the team, it was decided they would remain in a defensive position for another day and run some recon outside their makeshift Forward Operating Base. With some Hesco, they could have turned their hilltop into a legitimate FOB, but they were still too far away from their first objective: Camp Pendleton.