by Z. A. Recht
The banging continued for half a minute before they got their first furtive reply.
“Go away!” came a voice from the other side of the door. “Stop shouting! They’ll hear you, dammit, they’ll hear you!”
“What?!” Brewster yelled back.
The column of troops and civilians had moved about a block away, leaving Brewster and Krueger behind, but the pair focused on getting the man inside to open up.
“You don’t understand!” the man shouted. “There’s no one here to help you! And there’s nothing you can do to help me! Just leave me alone!”
“Come on, buddy! Where is everyone?!” Krueger asked.
“They’re . . . still here!” came the frightened reply. “Get out! Get out while you can!”
Brewster’s eyes widened in comprehension. His gaze met Krueger’s, an equally concerned look on his face.
“Oh, shit,” Brewster whispered.
Down the street, Sherman nervously looked back and forth at the boarded-up buildings. Something wasn’t adding up. The town seemed clean once one got past the barricades on the outer streets, but here and there was a knocked-in door or shattered window. Riots, perhaps? Or something worse?
“Used car dealership, sir,” Thomas said, breaking Sherman out of his reverie. Thomas pointed down the block at a small corner lot filled with older model cars and pickup trucks surrounded by a neck-high chain-link fence and a massive banner proclaiming the best quality used cars at the lowest possible interest rates. Sherman nodded.
“Let’s head for it,” he said.
Mbutu had stuck close to Sherman and had been watching the General closely. He saw the older man’s nervousness and it mimicked his own. He took a chance at speaking up again.
“General, I think we should leave, fast,” he said again. “This place . . . it reminds me of the town in the desert.”
Sherman stopped walking. That was it. That was what he had been trying to place in his mind—the factor that didn’t add up.
“Sharm el-Sheikh. It’s exactly like Sharm el-Sheikh.”
That was when he heard shouts from Brewster and Krueger. Sherman spun to see the two soldiers running at a flat-out sprint towards the column, waving their hands in the air.
“What in the name of Buddha are they yelling about?” Thomas grunted.
“They’re here! They’re here!” Brewster screamed. “It’s a trap!”
“Can’t be . . .” Thomas started, but his voice was cut off as the first scream of pain washed over the street. A soldier fell to the ground, tackled roughly by a carrier that had launched itself out of one of the darkened windows of a storefront.
Sherman felt himself paralyzed in shock for a brief instant. These were not the tactics of a brainless enemy.
—This was an ambush.
Carriers poured out of the stores and apartment doorways, crawled out of dank alleyways and moved with single-minded determination towards the column of men and women.
“Fire at will!” Sherman shouted, drawing his pistol and dropping a carrier with a single shot to the head.
Shots rang out all along the column, mostly single shots from pistols, here and there automatic chatter from one of the sub-machine guns. The living carriers seemed to far outnumber their undead cousins. Sprinting infected tore into the lines, tackling those defenders who couldn’t drop them in time.
“Get to the car lot!” Thomas bellowed. “Get inside! Close the gates behind you!”
Brewster and Krueger caught up with the column, pistols blazing. Brewster lined up a shot and caught a carrier in the shoulder, spinning the infected and dropping it to the ground where it began to pull itself back to its feet. A second shot to the forehead sent it to the ground forever.
The unarmed civilians ran with the speed only panic and adrenaline can produce, heading for the car lot. The soldiers played rear guard, forming a decent skirmish line and firing into the ranks of the carriers, whose numbers seemed to increase with each passing second as new ones launched themselves from their dark dens within the buildings of Hyattsburg.
Mbutu found himself cut off from the group of retreating civilians. A dead soldier, throat torn open, lay on the ground in front of him, pistol hanging from nerveless fingers.
He scooped up the weapon.
A snarling carrier jumped in front of him, baring her teeth in a feral expression, saliva and sweat dripping from her chin. Mbutu aimed the gun at her and pulled the trigger, drilling a neat hole where her right eye used to be.
Thomas came running by and grabbed Mbutu by the arm.
“Let’s get a move on!” he shouted, running towards the chainlink gate.
Screams from behind the skirmish line caught the soldiers’ attention. A second group of infected had come running from the opposite direction. Some had already penetrated the relative safety of the chain-link fence and the unarmed civilians were doing their best to fight them off with little more than rusted pipes, wrenches, or whatever other bludgeons they could find—but their best was not nearly good enough. As Mbutu watched, a pair of survivors were brought down by a half dozen of the infected, crushed under the weight of gnashing teeth and scratching nails.
“Fall back! Fall back!” Thomas shouted.
Sherman and Denton managed to get into the entryway of the dealership and were blasting away at any of the carriers who thought it might be a good idea to charge the lot.
Brewster took a final shot at the mass of carriers charging up the street before dropping an empty magazine and slapping in a fresh one. He turned and sprinted, followed closely by Krueger and the other remaining soldiers. They managed to pull back into the lot and slam the gates home by flipping the simple latch. The carriers remaining in the lot were put down in moments, but outside the fence the infected built up their numbers, shrieking inhumanly and grabbing onto the fencing, shaking it back and forth, threatening to tear it loose.
“We don’t have much time,” Sherman said, reloading his own weapon and surveying the scene. “They’ll break through real soon. Shoot any of them that try to climb over! Brewster! Thomas! Get in that office and find us keys!”
“Right, sir!” Thomas replied, jogging over to the door of the used car lot’s office and busting it down with one fierce kick. He burst in, followed directly by Brewster.
“Check behind the counter. I’ll get the office,” Thomas said. Brewster nodded, leaping over the countertop and casting about for the ubiquitous rack of keys every dealership had stashed somewhere, the master set for all the models on the lot.
“I’ve got some here!” Brewster yelled, pulling out a clipboard with six sets of keys nailed to it. “Trucks, looks like!”
“Got some here, too,” Thomas said. “Bullshit minis and coupes. Take the truck keys. Let’s get out there and find which ones they start!”
“No worries—plate numbers are written on the keyrings!” Brewster said, yanking the keys off the board and cradling them to his chest with one hand.
“Hurry up in there!” came a yell from outside, punctuated by the sound of gunfire. The carriers were climbing on each others’ shoulders, trying to get over the fence.
Outside, Sherman leveled his pistol at one of the snarling carriers and fired, blowing the creature off the top of the chainlink fence. It cawed as it fell backwards, landing on the shoulders of the other infected, knocking a small cluster of them to the ground.
Sherman had done a quick tally in his head as the survivors had straggled into the lot. Twenty-nine. Fifteen lost.
That was a stupid mistake, Sherman thought. The live ones like to wait for their prey if they aren’t chasing any. Should’ve remembered Sharm el-Sheikh—Should’ve listened to Ngasy.
Sherman fired another round, cursing as the weapon ran dry. He fumbled for another magazine, scowling as he drew out his last one. He slapped it in, glancing left and right at the defenders.
The remaining soldiers had quickly lined up along the inside of the chainlink fence, firing whenever one of
the infected started to pull itself up and over. The tactic was working for now—but there were at least fifty or sixty carriers who had death grips on the fence and were shaking it back and forth. It was starting to wobble, and at their rate they’d have it torn up soon enough.
Sherman saw Rebecca out of the corner of his eye. She was behind the line of soldiers, standing near the knot of remaining civilians, holding the very same pistol she had snatched from Sherman while they were on the ship.
Denton was right up alongside the soldiers, taking careful aim before firing at any of the carriers. He didn’t waste a single round.
Brewster and Thomas burst out of the office, holding up a few sets of keys.
“We’ve got some!”
“Outstanding! Get those vehicles up here!”
“Right, sir!”
Brewster tossed one of the sets of keys to Thomas, who caught them deftly with one hand and took off sprinting towards the line of small trucks parked on the side of the lot. Mbutu came up alongside Brewster, snatching one of the remaining sets from his hands.
“I’ve been driving stick-shift since I was six,” he said, grinning before following after Thomas.
Brewster ran after the pair, glancing down at the set of keys in his hand, quickly reading off the license plate number and scanning the line of vehicles for matching numbers. He spotted it: a flat-painted brown Ford pickup. He shrugged, unlocking the door and clambering into the driver’s seat.
Thomas pulled out in front of him as he started up the truck, driving a modified utility worker’s truck with a heavy box-like rear bed. Brewster pulled out behind him as Thomas’ truck groaned to a halt in front of the chainlink gate.
“Think this baby can ram through that gate just fine, sir,” Thomas growled out a half-lowered window at Sherman. He pointed at the carriers. “Better get in before they do.”
“Right!” Sherman said. He holstered his pistol and cupped his hands around his mouth and yelled, “Everybody get on a truck and hang on! We’re going to try to force our way through ‘em!”
Mbutu pulled up behind Brewster, bringing up the rear of the little convoy.
One by one the soldiers fell back from the fence, turning and bolting towards one of the three trucks. Rebecca ushered the frightened civilians over to the vehicles, shouting and pointing.
Denton slammed the door shut on the back of Thomas’s utility truck, closing up the people inside, then bolted back to Brewster’s truck, opening the passenger door and jumping in.
“Just like old times, eh?” Denton asked, grinning.
“Yeah, except we had assault rifles that time,” Brewster fired back. “And my truck was a lot bigger.”
“But you didn’t have a CD player, or AM/FM radio.”
“Yeah, well, there’s a shortage of leather interiors and heated seats in the Army, ok?”
Brewster tapped a finger on the dashboard impatiently, whistling an uneasy tune to himself as people climbed into the bed of the truck, settling in and holding on tight to anything solid. Brewster glanced down, going over his own mental checklist. Weapon? On the seat, ready to fire. Passengers? Ready to move. Gauges?
Gauges?
“Shit,” Brewster cursed, eyes going wide as he stared down at the dash. He thumped a fist off the plastic a couple times, staring intently at the gauges with a look on his face that screamed murder. He rolled down the window as fast as he could manage, then stuck his head out and shouted, “General! Hey! We’ve got a problem here!”
Sherman was in the middle of climbing into the passenger’s seat of Thomas’ truck, but he halted, turning to face Brewster.
“What is it?!” he yelled back.
“I’m running on fumes here, sir! No gas in the trucks!”
Thomas had stuck his own head out the driver’s window to listen, and then cursed, ducking inside the cab again and looking down at his own gas gauge.
“He’s right, sir, got a little less than an eighth of a tank here,” Thomas said, shaking his head and reaching into a BDU pocket to pull out a crumpled pack of cigarettes he’d been saving. He lit one up as Sherman ran up and down a litany of swear words.
“We can get away on that much!” Mbutu yelled from his own driver’s seat. “We don’t need to go on a cross-country drive—just away from the carriers!”
“Then what?!” Sherman yelled back. “We’ll just be stranded somewhere else!”
“Much better than being stranded here,” Mbutu countered.
“Agreed!” Sherman shouted, climbing into the cab of Thomas’ truck and shutting the door. He pulled on his seat belt, buckling it and tightening the straps. Across from him, Thomas did the same, strapping in securely. He glanced over at Sherman.
The General nodded.
“Hold on to your ass, sir,” Thomas murmured, shifting into gear and flooring the accelerator. The truck’s tires squealed and thick white smoke whirled up around them before gaining traction, slamming the vehicle forward. It smashed through the fence, sending the infected standing on the other side sprawling. A pair were hit head-on by the truck and flung back into the street, skidding across the pavement until they came to a rest, bloody and unmoving. The gate bounced off the windshield of the truck, sending a spider web of cracks through the glass and causing both Thomas and Sherman to flinch. The truck roared through the mess of infected, tearing off down the street.
Brewster was right behind them. The soldiers on the open bed of his truck leaned over the cab, firing at the infected that had started to move over from the fence when Thomas’ truck had broken through the gate. The truck rolled over the remains of the carriers floored by the first charge, and skidded a bit on a piece of the torn-down fence, but Brewster straightened it out with a wrench of the wheel, earning muffled curses from the passengers struggling to hold on in the back.
“Which way did Thomas go?!” Brewster yelled.
Thomas’ truck was nowhere to be seen; they’d made a turn somewhere.
“Left! I saw him go left!” Denton shouted, pointing wildly at the street and hanging on to the door handle with a clenched fist.
“Left it is!” Brewster said.
The soldiers on the back of Mbutu’s truck covered their escape as Brewster’s had done, firing into the infected, who had spread out considerably, some taking off after the retreating trucks while others tried forcing their way into the gate to get at the last vehicle.
A carrier fell, drilled neatly through the head by a pistol round, and Mbutu edged to the side as he burst out of the gate to avoid the corpse. His truck slammed into yet another, knocking it to the ground. It went under both sets of wheels as Mbutu swung the front end around and accelerated away from the car lot and the mess of infected.
Then he slowed a bit, furrowing his brow.
He cursed under his breath.
Where had the other trucks gone?
Two streets over, Brewster squealed tires around a corner, just fast enough to catch a glimpse of Thomas’ truck making a right turn three blocks down.
“Where the hell is he leading us?” Brewster asked.
“No clue,” Denton said. “Maybe Sherman is back-seat driving?”
“Ha,” Brewster managed, concentrating on the road. Here and there an abandoned car dotted the streets, and Brewster wove skillfully between them at speed, making for the turn he’d seen Thomas make.
He turned the wheel, bringing the truck around the corner and right into—
“Jesus! Look out!” Denton yelled.
Brewster had time to catch a glimpse of a group of a half-dozen infected that had wandered away from the entrance to a nearby building in pursuit of Thomas’ truck before he slammed into them going forty-five. The bodies collided with the trunk and bounced up onto the windshield. A skull smashed into the glass, taking a chunk out of it. The steering wheel jerked out of Brewster’s hands, and the truck spun sideways.
Brewster felt the world twist as the truck rolled end-over-end before slamming into the side of a buildi
ng. He felt his face smash into the driver’s side window, and his vision went bright white for a moment before everything crashed into nothingness.
Edge of Hyattsburg
0912 hrs_
Sherman braced himself as Thomas took them around their third turn, exhaling in relief as he saw open road ahead. They’d cleared the town. The truck passed the last brick store and apartment building and rolled off into the countryside. Sherman sat back as Thomas slowed the truck to a cruising pace, loosening his seat belt as he did so.
“Jesus,” Sherman muttered. “I really screwed the pooch on that one.”
“How do you mean, sir?” asked Thomas, taking a long drag on the cigarette that had sat, forgotten, between his lips during the entire flight through the town. Ashes tumbled off the end and onto his lap, but he either didn’t notice or didn’t care.
“Did you hear Mbutu before we even went in there? He smelled that ambush. Should’ve listened to him. Got good people killed.”
“First of all, sir, this is war. People die. Secondly, you really think these pus-bags have the foresight to plan an ambush? Nah, they were just lying in the shade until some food walked by—then they came at us.”
Sherman grunted, but after a moment looked over at Thomas with a curious expression. “They waited until we were in the middle of town and then jumped us all at once. I’d call that an ambush, Thomas.”
“They jumped us when Brewster and Krueger started yellin’ like retards in heat while running down Main Street, sir,” Thomas replied.
Sherman took a moment to consider, but before he could offer his opinion, Thomas swore loudly and slammed on the brakes. Sherman braced a hand against the dash as the truck slid to a stop on the pavement.
“What is it?” Sherman asked.
“The other trucks aren’t behind us,” Thomas said, concern on his face. He opened his door and dropped out of the cab, looking back in the direction of Hyattsburg.
Sherman snapped his head around to the side-view mirror. All he saw was the off-white paneling of the truck and open road behind them, the little town off in the distance through the leafless trees.
“Where are they?” Sherman asked, incredulous, taking off his own seat belt and jumping down out of the truck. He circled around the hood to where Thomas was standing, peering off down the road, scratching his chin with one hand.