Midnight (Adrian's Undead Diary)

by Chris Philbrook

  Patty woke me up with a knock on the door at 4am sharp. She’d made me a cup of coffee just exactly the way I like it. Light cream, smidge of sugar. Granted it was powdered creamer, but I won’t bitch. That was the first time I’d been woken up with a cup of hot coffee since mid June. Cassie used to do it for me if she got out of work early. She’d get home and brew some and wake me up with it. I miss that. It’s weird how your brain works after violence. I’m reminiscing about Cassie and morning breakfast after everything that happened today. Too funny.

  Downstairs Patty and Randy had woken up early to make us all a big breakfast. With no eggs we’re scraping the barrel for breakfast options, but they did a good job. I’ve got a few frozen bagels left over, and they’d gotten those out with jam and jelly. Cream cheese is long since history. There was cereal and rehydrated milk, as well as poor man’s bacon. Patty had taken some of the fatty venison and cut it super thin. It was amazing. Gilbert ate like a beast for an old guy. I get a kick out of old people with big appetites. So many elderly folks eat like birds, but not Gilbert.

  We filled our bellies, geared up like every other day, and headed out. There wasn’t much waiting today. We had company within the first hour. Abby had just gotten over to my position to give me a travel mug of chicken soup when I heard something. It was like.. a brushing or swooshing noise. I can’t describe it. I grabbed her by the waist of her pants and yanked her down into my cover and started scanning through the scope.

  It took me about a minute before I saw the bastard. He was dressed in mostly white skiing gear, and was trucking down the road on cross country skis. Strapped across his back was a rifle. I had already measured out my range and the wind was calm, so I leveled off the crosshairs on his chest and watched him come down the road. He slid along at a decent clip until he got to the area where we were set up, where the spike boards were. I don’t who to thank, but the route he took slalomed him right around the boards, and between the nails. I had my left hand on the nylon rope too in case I had to yank them out of the way.

  He stopped almost dead nuts in front of me, 25 yards away. The guy undid his poles and got his rifle out and started scanning campus through his own scope. I was praying Chuck didn’t let into him with shotgun. It was just starting to get light out though, so there was a good chance he didn’t even see the guy. Captain Snowpants surveyed campus and did a really shoddy job of checking his 9 and 1 o’clock, where we were hidden. Once he’d seen enough, he slung the rifle and whipped out a small walkie talkie. It was a cheaper one, like the kind you get in stores for vacations, or concerts. He radioed someone up, and started skiing back up the hill towards Auburn Lake. He got about halfway to the Prospect turn off and stopped to wait. Once he settled down I sent Abby away.

  I told her expressly to not use the snowmobile, and to get the fuck back to Hall E. Patty had the .38 revolver there, and I told her to get everyone into the basement because shit was going to go down. Abby was shaking from the cold and adrenaline and fear like a motherfucker. I steeled her up though, and she got herself under control quick. She was off and I was left alone to do my wet work.

  Captain Snowpants stood in the middle of the road like fat fucking bullseye for me. I kept the scope on him as the sky continued to lighten. After maybe 15 minutes I could hear oncoming vehicles coming up and over the crest of Auburn Lake Road. In total they brought 4 vehicles. The first vehicle was exactly what I feared they might have; a giant blaze orange state plow truck. Big ass diesel truck with heavy duty steel plows on all three sides. I could see two people in the cab. Behind that was a Ford Explorer, a Nissan Xterra, and bringing up the rear was a jacked up redneck special Chevy pickup. I couldn’t get a head count out of the SUVs on the account of tinted windows, but I could see two men in the rear vehicle.

  Captain Snowpants talked to the passenger in the plow then slid back and did the same to the passenger in the Explorer. After that he backed away, and the convoy of assholes rolled forward slowly. There was perhaps 75 feet of real estate before the plow hit the spike strips, and as they crept forward, I got my shit ready. I already had four sets of reloads for the rifle in front of me on the blanket on the ground, and to my direct right I had both the .22 and my 12 gauge. On my hip was the .45, but that was a clear last ditch weapon because I couldn’t afford the time to reload it in the middle of a fight. To my left was the chainsaw should I need to cut the trees. I laid the four nylon ropes out connected to the spike boards and got ready to yank them.

  Setting up a kill zone is an art form. If you set it properly, and they panic, you will slaughter your enemy. A kill zone is often referred to as the X, or the Box. To survive a properly planned ambush the first thing you need to do is get off The Box. Get out of the kill zone, fast. The best ambushes leave you without that choice. My plan was to exhaust their retreat option first off, and let the fuckers flail around like turkeys in my barrel. The second thing you can do to survive an ambush is to assault into it. Literally attack the ambush with more ferocity than they are attacking you with. Couldn’t do much about that if they managed it, but I was betting they wouldn’t be prepared for what we had for them.

  We had another huge stroke of good luck when the plow drove over the first nail boards. The tires didn’t blow out, they just slowly deflated and the truck made it all the way past the last board before the driver realized his truck was fucked up somehow. He also totally missed one row of the boards, which left them on the road, and still dangerous to the other vehicles. The big truck shuddered to a halt and kicked slightly sideways in the few inches of snow. They were on a slight downhill right there and because he didn’t stop early, the Explorer and the Xterra drove right onto the boards. The Explorer’s passenger side tire blew out with a loud POOMPH! I watched the driver shit a fucking brick and duck from the noise. I smiled. Idiot.

  The Xterra driver was much calmer, but he still didn’t stop his vehicle in time. Quick as a mongoose I grabbed the rope connected to the board nearest his front tires and gave it a tug with every ounce of strength I had. Through the snow the rope went taught, and pulled the board maybe 6 inches in my direction. It was just enough to get both his front wheels to blow out with their own POOMPH! We’d been pretty fucking clever with the ropes too, bending them around one tree each so when the ropes went taught it sent the line in the wrong direction, so it looked like they were being pulled from a different direction then where we actually were. If they saw the straight interruption in the snow from the rope, they’d fire in that direction, and that might give us a few seconds to return accurate fire while they wasted ammo shooting at ghosts.

  Anyway, the motherfuckers had three vehicles dead in the water with at least one flat tire or more. The rear truck caught on and came to a skidding stop at the steepest part of the little downhill, and sat motionless. I put the crosshairs on the grill of the truck and leaned back slightly to watch everything unfold.

  The people in the vehicles spilled out pretty haphazardly. Most of them got out and immediately started looking at the flat tires like a bunch of morons. Two of the guys got out, dropped to their knees and actually pulled security, and I made a note where they were. They die first.

  Sean and his shiny round glasses got out of the passenger side of the Explorer. Even from 30 yards away his facial expression was priceless. At first he was stone faced, completely blank of expression. Then, as he stared at the flat tire on his SUV he slowly started to smile, and then he looked up and around, surveying the area. The sun was just about up in the sky high enough that we had a nice dawn blue hue to the world. The temperature was already starting to rise too. You could feel the warmth coming in over the horizon.

  Sean actually started to laugh, building and building until it was damn near maniacal. The men around him slowly and carefully backed away as he visibly started to lose his mind. I mean, he clearly fucking snapped. He didn’t go nuts, but the look in his eye told me everything. This was a guy used to outsmarting people. He’d made a living out of always ha
ving the upper hand. Guess what motherfucker?

  Pwned.

  He smashed the butt of his rifle into the hood of the car a few times and it was everything I had to not laugh and cackle in my little victory over him. (Writing this is cheering me up big time Mr. Journal, just wanted to insert that while I realize I’m smiling again finally.) Sean spun around, looking for me, and eventually one of the other guys pointed to the rope line in the snow, heading directly towards my 9 o’clock, well away from me.

  Sean started yelling, screaming really, and literally foaming at the mouth, “ADRIAN! THIS ISN”T A GOOD WAY TO DO BUSINESS MY FRIEND!”

  Yeah fuck you buddy.

  “WE CAN TAKE WHAT WE WANT ADRIAN, YOU CAN’T KILL US ALL!”

  Try me you cocksucker.

  Sean motioned for his people to start moving towards campus, and I decided I’d had enough. I dropped my eye down to the scope, and confirmed it was still on the grill of the truck. I flicked the safety on the Savage, and sent a .30-06 round screaming into the engine block.

  They couldn’t move the plow forward or the truck backward. If they moved into either tree line they’d run into me, or Chuck.

  They were on my X. If they didn’t assault into us to escape immediately, they were fish in a barrel. My barrel.

  As soon as I killed the Chevy’s motor they opened fire in random directions. One of the most important rules of gunfights is called fire superiority. Basically gun battles are won by whoever can get their enemy to duck. It is really that simple. If you shoot at them more than they are shooting at you, they duck, and you can maneuver and fire until they lose their cover, and you kill them or they retreat. I was already ducked in my heavy cover, and had clear avenues of fire so no matter how much they shot at me, there was almost no chance they’d hit me unless they got really fucking lucky. I swiveled the rifle back around as they sprayed rounds everywhere. All sailed high into the trees, and most of them went into the woods in the direction of the rope line. I heard a few zing near me and snap as they broke the speed of sound. Bits of tree were raining down as the gunfire clipped branches and burst chunks of bark all over the place.

  I searched out the two men who’d taken a knee in the proper fashion and found one right off the bat. I put the crosshairs on his sternum and blew his back out on the side of the Explorer. He got tossed backwards in a heap and was dead immediately. He’d be up as a zombie in a minute or two, and I was counting on that to add to their confusion. I found the upper torso of the second guy within a second after that. He was leaning over the hood of the Xterra and was laying down reasonable effective and professional suppressing fire with what looked to be an M4 or AR-15. Mentally I licked my chops for his gun and I sent one more round straight through his skull, completely decapitating him. I saw a huge chunk of his skull cartwheel into the trees behind his vehicle, spinning end over end trailing hair and blood.

  I felt really good once those two were down. I’d gotten the feel they were the ones with experience and the people who were the greatest threats to us. Mind you, a random bullet can kill you just as effectively as a well aimed one can. I had five shots in the Savage and fired the last two into the first two warm bodies I saw. One punched a hole in a younger guy that was pumping a shotgun and mauling the shit out of a defenseless tree, trying to hit me where I wasn’t. He went down. I slid the bolt fluidly, maintaining as flat a barrel as best I could. Keep that sight picture I thought to myself. The last shot tore one man’s left shoulder loose and spun him like a top, eventually flopping him face down in the snow. He let loose a blood curdling howl as he realized his arm was more or less gone. I threw the bolt back and tucked my head down. I reloaded.

  Chuck and Gilbert knew that they were supposed to wait to fire until I’d shot five times. I knew Gilbert would wait, and I knew he would be listening for the distinct sound of precise fire from me. They were counting for five shots, in smooth succession, each resulting in a casualty. Chuck should be able to see the people dropping, and as soon as I stopped firing, he was supposed to start shooting. That’s fire superiority in a nutshell. Never have a lull in the shooting.

  When I started snapping more .30-06 rounds in the Savage’s magazine I heard the buzzing of Gilbert's snowmobile coming from my right. Once the buzzing stopped I heard a rapid barking from that direction, maybe 50 or 60 yards away. Rifles and shotguns have a pretty distinct sound, and that’s all the gun play we’d had so far. This was a pistol firing. As soon as I heard a few of those rounds pop off I knew Gilbert had joined the firefight. Not gonna lie, I was torn between excitement and worry. I knew he’d be putting good rounds downrange at these assholes but if he got shot as a result I’d be devastated.

  No time to worry about that. I can mourn after.

  The funny thing about idiots is they don’t think about ammo conservation. The other funny thing is most commercially available firearms have very small magazine capacities. Remember when I was talking about how a shotgun that held 8 shells was way better than one that held 6 Mr. Journal? That’s what I’m talking about. Two extra shots can be the difference between life and death. These guys had generic hunting shotguns, and rifles. Most of those hold 5 or 6 shots at best. As soon as I was done reloading, those of them left alive were running dry.

  Our plan was working. They had all figured out the rough direction my fire was coming from, and as they reloaded they moved to the opposite side of their vehicles for cover. That was the side Charles was in cover on. When their fire started to slow, he opened up. To be honest, Gilbert and I were afraid he’d pussy out on us and hunker down in his hide and let it all happen. I could see his muzzle flashes as he bucked all six rounds into their group, doing some serious damage. I don’t think he killed anyone, but he sure as shit put a few of them down for the count.

  I didn’t have any clear shots so I sat still and let them shit their pants. I could hear them yelling out in panic and pain in between Gilbert’s steady pistol fire. From what I could see he had the two assholes from the truck last in the line either pinned or wounded. Just as soon as I saw what was happening, one of the two guys rolled around the front of the truck and took cover near the grill, behind one of the giant tires. He too had a pistol, and was leaning around the tire, shooting back at Gilbert.

  Oh hell no.

  Two seconds later his head was a fine red mist covering that giant tire. The other guy was in heavy cover behind the truck, and I saw pretty clearly his shotgun getting tossed on the hood. He raised both of his hands straight up in the air and stayed there like a statue. He was out of the fight. I threw the bolt, reloaded, listened and watched. You could see them bickering as they reloaded and debated what was going on. The only thing I could think about was splitting that prick Sean’s wig. I scanned down the length of the vehicles looking for his greasy prick head but I couldn’t see it. Gilbert’s pistol had gone quiet, and Charles had ceased fire as well.

  All told the exchange of gunfire up that point was less than five minutes long. My heart was absolutely throbbing in my chest. I mean shit, it was beating so hard it actually hurt every time I felt it pump. Made me wonder how poor Gilbert’s ticker was handling it. Charles had held up amazingly with his barrage of shotgun fire too, which changed my opinion of him drastically.

  They’d gone silent. So had we. I think they knew they’d been had, and the fight was over. I saw more hands appear over the tops of the trucks and eventually they started to stand up, showing that they were surrendering. Just as they started reaching for the sky though, the dude I shot in the chest started to get up as a zombie. He was stumbling to his feet and turning towards them, reaching across the hood to get at the two or three people closest to them. One of the assholes scooped up a rifle off the hood and drew down on his dead buddy. I didn’t do anything, because it was what had to be done. The guy squeezed off a single round and blew his dead friend’s head off.

  Unfortunately Chuck responded. From the opposite tree line I saw Chuck’s shotgun belch out the entire magazi
ne as fast as he could pump and squeeze the trigger. The entire group of people closest to him crumpled to the ground, blasted apart by the buckshot. I just dropped my head and swore to myself. These guys didn’t have to die, they were trying to surrender. The guy who first threw up his hands must’ve seen the muzzle bursts as well, because he grabbed his weapon and drew down on Chuck’s location. I snapped a fast shot off in his direction and hit him in the head. He went sideways into the snow and out of view.

  Silence after that. No movement either. I tossed the bolt back and topped off the Savage. After a solid five minutes I finally sat the Savage down and picked up the shotgun. I needed to go down and see up close what was happening. Once I was most of the way out of the trees I hollered out to Charles and Gilbert that I was moving. I walked down through the snow drifts and made sure to avoid stepping where the un-hit spike boards were.

  It was a bloodbath. I counted ten bodies in various states of death. The poor bastard who had tried to surrender first was still alive. My head shot had gone a little wide, and clipped him in the jaw. Unfortunately for him, the force of the round had torn his jaw clean off. His upper teeth and tongue were wagging as he laid on his side, bleeding slowly into the snow. He rolled half over and looked up at me as I approached him. We made eye contact and I noticed he was crying. His face was destroyed, and with no medical care to speak of, he was just waiting to die. He gave me a slight nod and closed his eyes. I put a .45 round through his eye and swallowed the rising bile in my throat.