To Raven, it was the absence of that snippet of memory the dead sometimes acted on that was the difference between undead and twice-dead. Though it was far from the spark of life one saw in the eyes of the living, something was there.
The single round fired from Pirate’s suppressed pistol had created a nickel-sized entry wound. It was equidistant to the Z’s brow and hairline and weeping black fluid. How anything could penetrate that wide, high forehead was beyond her. The bone there looked to be thick as tank armor.
Thanks to the window Pirate had punched out, Raven was able to hear snippets of conversation each time the power tool went quiet.
But it was of no help to her. The dirtbags were speaking in Chinese. The dialect sounded like Mandarin—the same her dad had studied for weeks.
This is no way to gather intel.
Kicking herself for not accepting her dad’s offer to use his language program, she fished her iPhone from a pocket.
Nearly as frustrated as she’d been sitting across the street in possession of a camera fitted with a Hubble-like telephoto lens and finding it absolutely useless, she thumbed the device to life.
Fingers a blur, she entered the passcode, tapped the camera icon, disabled the flash, then selected video mode. Stooped beside the garage door, she started the video rolling, swiped the display brightness all the way down, then stepped up onto Caveman’s broad chest.
Amazingly, she found that the dead man provided a stable base. Way more stable than a bunch of crap with wheels piled atop a garbage can with wheels.
She waited until the power tool went quiet, then, with one hand keeping the SBR from banging the door, she rose to full extension and poked the iPhone—periscope-like—an inch or so above the destroyed window’s lower lip.
Unable to see what was being captured on video, she kept her body as still as possible and moved her wrist right-to-left, in tiny increments.
Right away the conversation inside ramped back up. It went on like that for a couple of minutes, the power tool remaining quiet.
Finally, after staying in that awkward position for several minutes, her extended arm beginning to quiver, Raven stepped down from Caveman. Rubbing her cramping shoulder muscle, she swiped to brighten the display.
Nothing.
She thumbed the Power button, trying to wake the device.
No response.
The phone was dead.
Damn! she thought. The battery level had been near full charge when she left the Antlers. She hadn’t taken stock of the level prior to starting the video rolling. Maybe she had forgotten to turn Wi-Fi and Bluetooth off. Having them constantly searching in a world where very few sources existed was a huge drain on a battery that had already proven to be pretty finicky.
Resigned to the fact she may have gotten only a few seconds of footage prior to the device going kaput, she stepped back up on Caveman, stretched out again, and, using the device’s blank display as a mirror, stole a peek at what was happening inside the garage.
No sooner had the iPhone broken the plane than the rapid-fire Mandarin ceased.
When the power tool remained silent, a cold finger of dread stroked her gut.
The brief look Raven had gotten at the scene reflected back at her, though small and a bit distorted, told her that the trio from the tattoo shop were in fact the ones speaking Chinese. It also showed that they had a big project going on inside the garage.
The project had something to do with a number of metal cans. “Fifty-five-gallon drums” was what her dad called them. Four of them were sealed. Two were open and filled to the top with what looked to her like animal feed.
In the snapshot in Raven’s mind, she saw the trio—Pixie, Snake, and Pirate—standing around one of the drums and pouring in feed from large white bags emblazoned with blue lettering and red symbols. On the ground by their feet was what appeared to be the pair of backpacks that had been weighing the men down. Though she couldn’t be certain, the backpacks were empty.
The last thing that had registered when Pirate stopped talking was the sudden change in the tilt of his head. It had snapped from chin down to level and then panned in her direction.
Fearing she’d been caught spying, and with no way to get down the driveway without being seen—or worse, shot at—she withdrew the hand holding the iPhone and jumped off the corpse.
She felt her pulse rate spike as her mind raced through her options.
Ruling out the bungalow’s backyard as a viable place to hide, she quickly backpedaled from the garage in the opposite direction. Reaching the hedge running the length of the drive all the way from the sidewalk to the garage, she wriggled her shoulders back and forth and wormed her way in.
Branches raked her cheeks and neck. Finally, she felt her back come up against something firm.
A fence?
The garage to the house next door?
Trapped, with the toes of her boots still on the drive, maybe an inch or so of the four-tube NVGs exposed, and fully a third of the SBR’s suppressor visible to anyone who looked her way, she held her breath and pretended she was ten again and playing schoolyard freeze tag.
A beat after the branches embracing her body stopped quivering, she heard a door open and close. Then, from inside the garage, Pixie’s sing-song voice: “Shui?”
Though her dad had been having her quiz him, she didn’t recognize the word.
Pixie was repeating herself when Pirate stepped from the passage running between the bungalow and detached garage.
Boxy semi-automatic in one hand, he stopped and scrutinized Caveman.
Raven nudged the SBR’s selector to Fire, slipped her finger into the trigger guard, and found the trigger with the pad of her finger.
As Pirate was looking up from the corpse, the scuffing noise Raven had heard minutes ago was back.
Snake’s face filled up the broken window. He said, “Shui?”
Looking the length of the driveway, Pirate grunted, waved a hand dismissively, and said, “Jiangshi.”
This one Raven knew. Her dad had been practicing it on her a few days ago.
Zombie.
Just when Raven was thinking a Z had, for once, inadvertently paid her a favor, Pirate’s gaze swung her way. As his body went stiff, her finger tensed on the trigger.
Still holding her breath, as well as a few pounds of trigger pull, Raven watched the man’s head and weapon swing to face the steady scuffing coming up the drive.
Chapter 63
Portland
The Pale Riders’ brush with death lasted five minutes, give or take. In the end, no shots were fired, blades remained sheathed, and, after exhaling a collective breath, each of the team members began to stir.
Rising up from the grass, Cade poked his head out of the alley and took a quick turkey peek around the fence. After getting eyes on Cross and Nat, the latter of whom was standing still as a statue and aiming his Mk 46 at the retreating dead, Cade informed them with a whisper that the alley was now clear.
Emerging from between the pair of cars, Griff hustled across 48th. When he reached the rest of the team, he sought out Cade. “That was a close fuckin’ call, Captain.”
Cade stared at the shooter through the NVGs. Thanks to their advanced display, he could see that the SEAL’s cheeks were flushed red. The color continued down the man’s neck, finally fading to pink an inch shy of the collar on his Crye Precision combat shirt. It was the first time Cade had seen the jocular SEAL show any kind of stress. It was also the first time using these particular NVGs in a combat situation. So he dismissed it as nothing.
Still, he made a mental note to keep an eye on the man. For everyone had their breaking point. You just didn’t know when or where the proverbial cup would overfloweth.
The team adopted their previous marching order as Cade led them into the grass-choked alley. He moved slowly, careful to step only on the grass crushed down by the passing herd.
Every few steps Nat would turn a slow one-eighty and pause with
the business end of the MK 46 trained on the mouth of the alley. He’d stay like that for a long three-count before falling back in line.
As Cade reached the beginning of the run of cedar fencing behind the fifth house east of 48th, he halted the team with a raised fist. “This is it,” he said. “I’m going ahead to get eyes on. See if it’s how I left it.”
The team members took a knee, with Cross and Griff aiming their weapons east, and Nat covering 48th with his machine gun.
Cade ranged ahead, stopping only when he was at the mid-point of the fifty-foot run of fence.
Swallowing hard, he let his gaze roam the rear of his former home. Saw that the upstairs windows were closed. Dark curtains hung limply behind the office window on the right. The window on the left was still hung with the same boy-band curtains Brook had bought for Raven when the ones featuring Disney Princesses were no longer deemed acceptable by the tween.
All Cade could make out below the bottoms of the upper-floor windows was the top of the pergola he and a friend had erected the summer before Omega struck.
This wasn’t how he imagined his final visit to the Grayson home would go down. He always imagined Brook and Raven would be left alone, without him, his final visit as ashes in an urn. He never expected to outlive Brook. Hell, in his line of work, he never expected to live past thirty.
Heavy of heart, he let his rifle hang from its sling, hooked his fingers over the top of the fence, and performed a chin-up.
The entire backyard was a jungle. Brook’s prized shrubs and once meticulously manicured flower beds were now choked with weeds and migrating grass.
Cade saw his bike propped up where he had left it; however, thanks to the out-of-control lawn, only the seat and handlebars were visible. Even the wheelbarrow he’d used to get over the fence that Saturday in July remained where he’d left it: pushed against the fence a few feet from his neighbor’s property line.
Still feeling a bit of trepidation over revisiting his old home, he called the team forward.
Making a stirrup by interlacing his fingers, Nat bent at the knees and nodded to Cade.
Saying, “Please don’t catapult me onto the roof,” Cade stepped up and planted a Danner on Nat’s clasped hands.
“Contrary to popular belief,” said the towering Fijian, “I know my own strength.” He stood straight and, with ease, lifted Cade—all hundred and eighty pounds, plus another eighty in gear—until he was balancing on his stomach atop the fence.
Once Cade located the wheelbarrow in the thicket, he tightened his two-handed grip on the top of the fence.
“Now,” he said, and with Nat’s aid, he got both legs over the top of the fence.
It wasn’t easy, but he got his hands turned around and managed to lower himself onto the wheelbarrow.
Apparently, Murphy was still on the clock, because the second Cade trusted the wheelbarrow to accept all of his weight, its front tire went flat and it toppled sideways, spilling him into the long grass.
Cade was a bit embarrassed, but not hurt. To spare the others the indignity, he hefted the wheelbarrow over to Nat, who took it with one hand and lowered it to the ground with ease.
One by one the rest of the team scaled the fence and joined Cade in his own backyard.
Griff turned a slow circle, surveying the fifty by fifty parcel of land. Regarding Cade, he said, “What a cheapskate, Captain. You could have at least paid the neighbor kid to cut your lawn while you were away.”
Gesturing toward the sliding glass door, Cross said, “Wyatt’s no cheapskate. Lookie there … he sprang for a house sitter.”
Cade had turned and stared at Griff but said nothing. Then, when Cross spoke up, he was reluctant to look and see who or what the house sitter was. Part of him thought the SEAL was messing with him. Then he remembered that the wholesome California surfer boy wasn’t prone to pranking anyone, let alone someone who outranked him, someone he had never before shown disrespect to.
Seeing as how Cross always operated “by the book”, Cade turned toward the sliding glass door, expecting to see a Z standing in his kitchen.
Sure enough, a first turn had parted the vertical blinds. It was shirtless and staring out into the backyard, its ample gut and both pale palms pressed against the glass.
“I got it,” Cade said. “I’ll clear the house, too. I know the floorplan and all its blind corners.” In his voice, the message as clear as the wail of a police siren: This I must do alone.
“Understood,” Cross replied.
“Two minutes, tops,” Cade indicated, flashing the team a reversed peace sign.
“A second longer and we’re coming in for you,” Griff quipped. Voice going serious, he added, “Sure I can’t help with the bloater? Get your six once you’re inside?”
With a slow wag of the head, Cade shot him a look. It could only be interpreted one way: Thanks, but no thanks.
As Cade approached the door solo, he recalled the frantic rush to get gear and weapons loaded into his Sequoia. How the neighbor kids, Ike and Leo, were so helpful in accomplishing a task he should have done hours before fleeing the house.
With gunfire sounding across the street, he remembered hearing the noise of glass breaking then turning around just in time to see one of the dead things ride the shards of his destroyed picture window into his living room.
With all that going on at the time, he wasn’t certain if he remembered to throw the sliding door’s latch and replace the wooden dowel in the channel before leaving his old life behind.
Hell, he thought as he grabbed the handle and craned to see if the dowel was in place, every door in the place could be hanging wide open.
He was met with a mixed bag of news. The bad: the door was locked. The good: the person who had thrown the latch—likely Ike or Leo—had forgotten to drop the dowel in place. It was still propped up inside the channel.
Rising from the crouch, Cade averted his gaze from the bloated male Z and delivered three hard blows to the siding beside the slider.
After a long ten-count, with no other dead things joining the one grinding against the glass to his fore, Cade grabbed the handle with both hands. Simultaneously, he lifted up and jerked the handle hard to his left.
The lock giving way to brute strength produced a gunshot-like pop. As the door started moving right-to-left in its track, the glass sliding against the Z’s fingers and face made a sound eerily similar to that of a squeegee being dragged across a wet windshield.
With the squeee sound making the hairs on his neck stand to attention, Cade opened about a foot-and-a-half wide gap. Stopping the door’s slide, he let go of the handle and took a half-step back.
The squeee was followed by hollow rasps as the Z angled sideways and thrust its face and both arms through the opening. Stuck between the jamb and bowed-out slider, its fingers brushing Cade’s chest rig, the Z emitted a long, drawn-out moan.
Taking advantage of the Z’s predicament, Cade stepped forward, wrapped the fingers of one hand in its tangled mop of graying hair, tugged up and back, and quickly buried his Gerber into one of those vacant, searching eyes.
Saying, “Allow me,” Nat approached and hauled the twice-dead corpse away from the slider.
Without acknowledging the assistance, or even regarding his team, Cade stepped across the threshold. As he entered the kitchen, his gaze was drawn to the side-by-side refrigerator. On it were pictures of their family drawn by Raven when Cade was deployed. Most were in crayon and consisted of crude stick figures standing before a lopsided house. Birds and sunshine featured in some. Most had dark rain clouds hanging over the small family.
Coincidence? Cade thought not. He hated being away from them, but it had been necessary to keep them safe. It was his job and, like now, he gave it one hundred percent when he donned the uniform.
Next to the refrigerator was the whiteboard. It was still propped up on the granite counter and filled with the kind of home repair honey-dos that he loathed back then. God, what he wouldn
’t give now to have Brook back and telling him to “Remember to take your vitamins.” Or reminding him that “Sleep is more important than the Mariners’ replay.” Or constantly nagging him to “Drink more water.”
As the flood of emotions accompanying the triggered memories hit him like a ton of bricks, he left the kitchen behind and gripped the handle to the door leading to the open mudroom and garage.
He tried the handle.
Unlocked.
Three hard knocks, followed by a ten-second wait, drew nothing to the door.
He pressed his ear to the door and listened hard. Still nothing.
Cade worked the handle, gave the door a gentle tug, and stepped back a pace.
The door swung open, real slow, and bumped against the doorstop affixed to the wall.
Setting foot in the mudroom, Cade learned two things. First, though he didn’t recall hitting the remote as they drove away, the pristine condition of the garage told him he had indeed started the door closing on the way out. Second, he was relieved to see that Brook and Raven’s mountain bikes were still hanging upside down from the ceiling, their front and rear wheels threaded over big rubber-coated hooks screwed into ceiling joists.
Emerging from the mudroom, Cade settled his gaze on the walnut table in the nearby dining room.
Three summer-themed placemats still sat before their predesignated spots at the table.
Realizing he would never share another breakfast with his family intact, his eyes glazed over with the threat of tears. Blinking away the tears, he willed open the lockbox inside of him and stuffed everything back down in it. Every ethereal thought that had slipped out. All of the pangs of regret he still harbored for not accompanying them to Myrtle Beach. His resentment of those who still had a partner in whom they could confide, whose embrace they could get lost in, and whose unconditional love they could expect no matter what happened in this crazy, ruinous tangle of circumstances life had become to him.
He told himself there would be a time and place to process all he was seeing and feeling.
Surviving The Zombie Apocalypse (Book 14): Home Page 33