by T. A. Sorsby
I hadn’t forgotten about the Ghoul though. It was throwing this wall of zeds at us to keep us occupied, I was sure of it. Bastard was probably running through the building, heading for our rear, or positioning to jump from an upper storey window at us. That was the other reason I called to move back – so we could see the front of the building, and weren’t anywhere near a window.
Look at me. I can outsmart the deceased.
Laurel ran dry first, her magazine the smallest. Without a spare one to reload, she slung her rifle over one shoulder and pulled out her pistol for the next go around. After that it was me and Damian, loading bullets and shells into our weapons one by one. It took longer than I expected, with the other gunslingers having to pick up our slack at the cost of their own surely-dwindling ammo.
Fortunately, there weren’t a whole lot of zeds left by the time we’d reloaded. The mob, maybe forty strong, was now reduced to half a dozen of the slowest, most crippled zeds, plus a few writhing, injured forms on the concrete.
‘Hold fire!’ I shouted out over the ringing in my ears. Be a wonder if we didn’t get tinnitus from all this. ‘We can finish these ourselves. Morgan, cover Damian in case our friend shows up.’
‘Got it!’ she said back, her voice a mix of nerves and excitement. I recognised the tone. Her blood was up.
Bats were recovered from the ground and I put my bayonet in hand. The clubs led the way in, Neville and Lucile picking left and right, splitting the little knot of zeds into two groups, holding their attention on the closest meal, distracting them from my bayonet and Laurel’s hammer.
Anita’s telescopic baton was never going to smash a head without some serious work, but it did just fine for its intended purpose. She knocked a zed to the ground by whacking the back of its knees, subduing the perp.
That made them easy pickings for the rest of us, and with these being the slowest of the zeds, it didn’t take us long to finish off the rest of them. We were well practiced by now. That’s probably why the Ghoul ignored us, and went for Morgan.
That, or maybe it was personal.
The first we knew of its attack, Laurel was still pulling her hammer free of the back of a zed’s skull. I heard Morgan call out the danger, but it was on her before we had a chance to move, appearing from the front of the building with startling speed. We’d moved too far forwards to engage the zeds, lost sight of its approach right at the last moment. Guess it was smarter than me.
Morgan had already put herself between the building and Damian, the injured fighter abandoning his chair to dash towards us, getting out of the way of the fight. He might have been able to shoot in his condition, but tangling with the Ghoul up close in his condition might have been more liability than help for Morgan.
She’d thrust her spear out to meet the Ghoul as it rushed her, jabbing her knife through the remains of its Kevlar, just under the ribcage. Bullet-proof vests don’t do much against knives. It’d been enough to hold it from taking her down immediately, but the ghoul’s arms were longer – he’d either been lanky in life, or changed in death.
It tried to claw for her face and neck, but she’d turtled up, putting her head down and hunching her shoulders. With her hair braided up, it couldn’t find much purchase there either, though she’d probably want to wash her hair tonight.
The whole exchange had taken perhaps four or five seconds, but it didn’t take many more for Neville to charge forwards. He swung his bat underarm, going for the ghoul’s knee like he was whacking the hockey ball across the pitch. I swear the damn thing was lifted off the ground with the force of the blow.
The shattered knee buckled, pitching the ghoul over onto its back as it fell. Neville didn’t let up though, bringing the bat down again, aiming for the head – but it threw up an arm to deflect the blow, knocking the blow aside rather than blocking it.
You’re giving me that look again, like I’m giving these things too much credit, but wait until you see one yourself. They know how to move, they know how to fight. If it didn’t have its windpipe on show I might have believed it was just some psycho too.
Neville recovered from the deflection and swung again, lower, meaning to break the other leg. Again, the ghoul wasn’t going to let this happen, kicking and screaming in wounded rage, but it was for nothing. He brought down my old bat, swung once more in revenge, to shatter the other knee.
It was still swinging its arms, trying to claw out at Neville, when his daughter shot it dead.
Their skulls might have been thick enough to take a solid blow, but a bullet to the brain will still take them out of the fight.
‘Thanks.’ Neville gasped, breathing hard, bringing her in for a tight, one-armed hug.
‘You too. Wasn’t worried, not even a little.’ She added with a long exhalation of breath, trying to calm a rapidly beating heart. I knew the feeling, though it was getting less with every fight.
‘Sons of bitches might have hard heads,’ Lucile said, clapping Morgan on the back, ‘but cooler heads prevail, my Pa always said.’
‘Is there something in my hair?’ Morgan asked her with a worried sort of smile.
Lucile had to stand on tiptoe to see, but she picked out what appeared to be a whole nail, somehow snagged off the ghoul in her hair.
‘What was it?’ she asked.
‘Best you don’t know.’
‘Urgh.’ Morgan cringed. ‘Let’s get out of here before we soak.’
‘You heard the lady, let’s move.’ I said, wheeling Damian’s chair over to him.
‘I’ll walk, but be worth putting it in de back.’ He said, taking pained steps towards his big blue monster.
I folded it up, and stowed it in the boot.
‘What’s next?’ Neville asked. ‘We giving Conrad his truck back?’
‘I mean to keep my word – we’d have struggled to get Damian out of GCR without it,’ I said, ‘but let’s get our wounded home and seen to first.’
‘Not sure we can make two trips out and still have enough diesel left to drive to VBC tomorrow, if that is still the plan?’
‘Sachs said they’d be out of there by sunset, yeah. We’ll have to make some fuel stops on the way home. You take the lead, stop whenever you see a vehicle we can tap.’
Neville nodded, and we saddled up. I kept Anita company in the commandeered SUV, Damian having returned to his 4x4 with Lucile.
‘That could have gone better.’ I said, belting myself in.
‘Could have gone worse.’ She reminded me.
‘Yeah. Guess it could.’ I muttered, looking out over the parking lot as we drove by, Katy’s bike covered under that tarp.
*
Forty Six
‘Looks like he’s stopping.’ Anita said, breaking gently.
We were coming through a residential area, not-quite outdated terraces on one side, with wide, open fields on the other – maybe ten minutes out from the hospital, since there was no traffic. I hadn’t been paying much attention, lost in my own thoughts, but at the sudden stop I perked up.
The storm must have been blowing over, as the rain was easing up and I couldn’t remember hearing thunder in a while. The day was wearing on though, the dinginess of cloud cover would soon be giving way to the dinginess of night, but for now, there was still enough miserable grey light to see by.
‘Must have seen a likely candidate for fuel.’ I thought aloud, undoing my seatbelt as we pulled up just behind the 4x4.
Neville and Lucile were getting the pump and bucket from the back, Laurel moving off to inspect a nearby sedan. Morgan was keeping Damian occupied, presumably.
‘Working class neighbourhood,’ Neville said, before we could ask, ‘I’ve seen a few vans and pickups here before, betting they’ve got the fuel we need.’
‘If it ain’t written on the filler cap then we shouldn’t chance it. Good way to kill a car, putting the wrong gas in.’ Lucile said.
‘Owner’s manual will probably be in the glovebox though.’ Anita offered.
&
nbsp; Lucile nodded at that. ‘But if not…’
‘Then no, don’t take the risk. I’ll go double check what this thing uses,’ she added, hooking a thumb at the SUV, ‘be nice of us to return it with something in the tank.’
‘Filling up the truck for the assholes who shot Damian,’ Lucile shook her head, ‘not sure I can forgive him. That Conrad. For being a part of that.’
‘He seemed sincere, that he didn’t want anything to do with how the rest of his squad were acting.’ I said, trying to be diplomatic. ‘But I get it. I haven’t forgiven him really either. In time, maybe, he’ll be able to forgive himself.’
‘Guess we’ll see.’ Lucile sighed. ‘But if he shoots you when you take it back, don’t come bleeding to me.’
It came out harsher than she intended, I think. An awkward silence hung for a moment, before Neville cleared his throat.
‘If this thing with the CDC goes south, maybe we should start scavenging as much gas as possible.’ He suggested. ‘Who knows when we’ll get more? Might have to last us years.’
‘A year, at best.’ Lucile corrected him, thankful for the distraction, ‘Fuels have expiry dates. Diesel’s better than petrol, but all gas goes bad eventually.’
‘Well, I just learned something new.’ I hummed, scratching my chin. ‘The number of post-apocalyptic films I’ve seen that now have gaping plot holes is staggering.’
‘So if we can’t get with the CDC, long term we need to be somewhere with solar panels, or a wind turbine.’ Neville said.
‘Then our biggest worry will be calm, cloudy days. Geothermal would be dandy, but now we’re pipe dreaming.’ Lucile grunted, ‘We’ll get to searching anyway. We definitely need this for the short term. See if we all survive through to the long game.’
I looked over my shoulder, where Anita was flicking through the SUV’s manual, checking the fuel type. ‘No, Lucile, why don’t you stay? Neville can go with Anita.’
I suggested it not because I suspected Anita and Neville were growing closer, but because I knew it’d stress Lucile too much to not be with Damian right now. She’d saved his life. I think that earned a few minutes respite.
‘Appreciated.’ Lucile said, flashing me a tense smile, ‘Don’t want to leave him while we’re out here like this.’
‘Think he took down at least as many zeds as you, and that was while sitting down.’ I smirked.
Anita and Neville went off with the bucket and pump, gun and bat in hand. We’d burned through a lot of ammo in the fight outside the hospital, but as far as I could tell, there was no reason for the zeds to have stuck around here once they left the city centre.
This route would lead to Castle Towers in a near enough straight line, so the horde that’d passed by last night might have even come through here. Between that and the sight lines we had over the open fields, it felt as safe as anywhere.
Laurel was keeping an eye out for us from atop the sedan she’d been peeking at, standing up on the roof with her rifle up, scanning windows and the like. With her out there, I felt confident that nothing was going to sneak up on us, so climbed into the front passenger seat in the 4x4 – Morgan, Lucile and Damian in the back.
‘How’s it feeling?’ I asked him.
‘Think I be a lot worse if not for de local,’ he managed a strong smile, ‘but not that good besides. Could sleep for a week.’
‘Straight to bed with you when we get back.’ Lucile said.
‘That a promise?’ he grinned back.
She snorted, while Morgan looked down to hide her expression.
‘Yeah, he’s fine.’ I chuckled. ‘What about you?’
‘Me?’ Morgan asked. ‘Peachy.’
‘Yeah,’ Lucile joined in, ‘you handled yourself like a fighter in there. Where’d you pull all that from?’
She shrugged, not meeting anyone’s gaze. ‘Everyone else has been fighting, all week. All I did was make tea and stuff. So…I guess you could say it’s been brewing for quite a while.’
Damian started the opening notes of a belly laugh, but cut them short with a drawn out ‘Oooh…’ – I couldn’t help but laugh myself.
‘One liner puns?’ Lucile asked, incredulous. ‘Girl takes out a couple zeds and thinks she’s action hero material.’
‘Glad to see it hasn’t affected you. Big man there was throwing chunks after our first close encounter.’
‘You get used to it.’ Damian nodded, settling down into the seat, getting comfy enough to nap.
‘Hope so.’ Morgan quietly spoke. ‘Don’t mean to be a burden on anyone. When it comes to the fighting, I’ll be there with everyone else.’
‘Proud of you. Your Dad is too, I bet. He hasn’t nagged me about you in a while.’
‘He do that a lot?’ she asked.
‘Maybe not anymore.’ I smiled. ‘Right, I’m going to keep an eye out. Shout if you see zeds.’ I told them, pointing at Morgan. ‘No taking them on by yourself, Morgan the Barbarian.’
I left them to it, and approached Lucile’s vantage point atop the car. It was parked on the other side from us, away from the houses, overlooking the playing field. It looked like a decent enough area, worn but well maintained – the paintwork on the swings and slides in a nearby playground was all chipped, but there was no broken glass or damaged equipment.
Neville said this neighbourhood was working class, and it did remind me of where I grew up, a little. People might not have polished the silverware every day, but they took care of their space in the ways that mattered.
‘Something in the trees.’ Lucile said, not taking her eye from her rifle scope.
Across the open field, at most two hundred yards away, was one edge of Cemetery Park – I suppose the field was technically a part of it as well. The park hugged a huge swath of suburban Greenfield, and went a long way towards winning the city the “Greenest City In Voison” award on a semi regular basis. The trees there were old, towering things, the park a mixture between maintained recreational centres and wild greenspace, fit only for hikers and foxes.
‘What is it?’ I asked, hand reaching for my gun.
‘Movement,’ she muttered, ‘could be people, or Ghouls walking like people. I’m at the edge of my scope range and they’re moving through tree cover.’
‘Come down from there, just in case.’ I urged her, offering a hand down. She stepped onto the bonnet, then took it, jumping back down to the road.
‘Who do you reckon? Best guess?’ I asked.
‘People hiding out in the woods. That’d sound right to me. Getting away from any looters, and hopefully the wandering dead. It’s not a bad idea – especially if you knew your way around Cemetery Park and could fix up a decent rabbit snare.’
‘Can you?’
‘Hah. I got this rifle from a hunter, but I ain’t one,’ she shook her head, ‘could shoot you a buck at that range – on a good day. But don’t count on me to skin and butcher it.’
‘I think they only have deer at the animal farm corner, in captivity. It’s not quite that big of a park.’
‘Wasn’t suggesting it, just…illustrating the point.’ She shrugged. ‘Wonder what happened to the petting zoo. If dogs go all weird, maybe other animals can catch the virus too.’
‘The people who work there don’t do it for the money. They’d have come to get the animals out.’
‘Maybe that was them,’ she said, tilting her head back to the woods, ‘outdoors types, working in the park so they’d be familiar with it. Wouldn’t rate any buildings in the park for defensibility though.’
‘Don’t suppose you need a fortress if the enemy will never reach the gates. Hmm…’ I thought, trying to put myself into the position of someone making their home in the park.
‘What’re you thinking?’ she asked. ‘You want to make contact with them?’
‘No…I’d rather play it safe. We’ve got wounded and if they’re not friendly, or not human, then we’re running a risk. I was just thinking what I’d do if I were them.’
‘Reckon we’ve seen enough crowbars in action to hazard a guess at what left those marks.’ I said to her.
‘People then. Living people.’ She said, taking in a deep breath.
‘Always a relief to know they’re out there.’ I said, stepping back closer. ‘Especially…with what you’ve been through?’
‘Wasn’t quite so emotionally invested in that first group,’ she said, meeting my gaze with a pained look, remembering the one she did love. ‘But yeah. Would suck hard to lose any more people…’ she trailed off, looking over to the treeline. ‘And…knowing there’s more people out there…that’s nice too. You know?’
‘I know.’ I said, standing by her, looking to the trees myself. ‘She might not be dead. Still got hope.’
‘Me too.’ Laurel quietly said, finding my hand with hers.
I didn’t say anything, but when she squeezed, I squeezed back.
We stood like that for a moment, looking out over the trees and fields, a breeze passing over to rustle the grasses that were already starting to look a little overdue for the council’s mowers. Eventually, we drew our hands apart, both folding our arms.
‘Ghost dogs. Maybe ghost cats too.’ Laurel muttered, ‘Ain’t seen any cats around. Birds neither. And you’d think with all the rot and dead about that carrion feeders would be having a ball.’
‘Maybe they can tell the meat’s tainted, flew away from the cities to be clear of it.’ I suggested.
‘Either that or we’re going to get a murder of zombie crows swooping down on us one of these days.’ She shivered. ‘Now that was a bloody horror film.’
‘Ugh, don’t remind me. Katy made me watch that when we first started dating, I hated it. Sound of cawing made me twitch for days.’
‘Wonder if we’ll get to see another movie again…’ Laurel said, looking thoughtful.
‘If we have enough fuel for the generator, which will apparently expire in a year or so, then we could watch one tonight. Sit down as a group. Popcorn and everything.’