by Dirk Patton
I’m not the jealous type and wouldn’t have thought twice about a visit at a reasonable hour. But showing up at my door at 11:30 on a Tuesday night is not a good way to endear yourself to me. Katie had talked him down and sent him on his way before I bounced him into the street.
We drove for a few more miles, the curves in the road ending as we started a long, straight downgrade. I opened up the Charger and we surged forward, the speedometer swinging to nearly 150 with the help of gravity on the downhill stretch. Katie seemed to be lost in thought and I was focused on the road ahead.
I cut my eyes up to the mirror and she turned and looked into the backseat when Dog whined. There were two more quick whines and I could feel him bumping into the back of my seat.
“What’s wrong with him?” I asked, already lifting my foot off the gas.
“Dreaming,” she smiled. “He’s running like hell right now.”
I smiled and put the accelerator back to the floor. For five minutes Dog was lost in a dream world. Whining, legs twitching, feet slapping against the seat backs, even barking a couple of times. Then he let out with a low, mournful wail that for some reason was the funniest thing I’d heard in a long time.
It started as a chuckle that quickly became gales of laughter. A moment later Katie joined me and I had to slow the Dodge for fear of losing control. Our mirth must have woken Dog who a few moments later stood up in the back seat, shook, sneezed and thrust his head between us for attention.
The sat phone rang while Katie was scratching his ears and he snorted when she took her hand off his head.
“It’s Jessica,” she said as she accepted the call.
“Sir, you’ve got a group of infected wandering across the pavement two miles ahead!” She said as soon as the connection was made.
I hit the brakes, hard, our speed quickly bleeding off. Flipping the switch to kill all of our external lights I hoped we’d shut down before being noticed.
“Have they seen us?” I asked, coming to a complete stop in the middle of the freeway.
“Females coming your way, and there’s too many to push through with the car. I’m looking for an alternate route. Hang on.”
Katie and I exchanged looks and once again I was thankful for the young woman sitting in Hawaii.
“Two miles behind you is an exit for US Highway 89. Take that north into Ogden and you’ll be able to get onto I-15 in a few miles.” She said.
Turning the lights back on I shifted into reverse and hit the throttle. The Charger shot backwards, gaining speed. Letting off the gas and yanking up the parking brake I spun the wheel. As the rear tires locked up the front swung, pivoting around, completing a sliding 180-degree reverse turn. Releasing the brake I nailed the throttle and roared back east towards the exit.
“Enjoyed that, didn’t you?” Katie asked as she slowly released her death grip on the grab bar mounted to the dash in front of her.
“Sir?” Jessica asked. She was still connected.
“Nothing, Jessica,” I said. “Just some sarcasm from the passenger seat. Any luck on an outfitter or am I stopping here in Ogden?”
“I haven’t had any success, sir. I think you had better stop. Should I text the directions to your sat phone?”
“Yes, do that. And what’s the infected population around the mall like?”
“It’s still heavy. Software is counting 384 visible to the camera. Of course there could be more that I can’t see, just like at the truck stop.”
“Understood. What’s the status on the Bradley and Idaho?”
“Still limited to thermal in Idaho and no change since we last spoke. I’ve got the archival footage but I’m having problems getting it to load properly so I can view it. That’s why I didn’t give you more warning about the infected on the freeway. I was working on it.”
I saw the exit coming and just to tweak Katie I didn’t slow down and make a gentle turn. Pulling the brake I cut the wheel, spinning the car around before thundering forward and down the ramp. At the bottom I made a sliding right to head north on US 89. As soon as we stabilized on our new course Katie punched my arm. Hard.
“Nice driving, sir.” Jessica said a moment later. “Hope you don’t blow a tire with all that fancy maneuvering.”
I looked over at Katie and she was beaming that someone else had chastised me for a change. How she managed to keep her mouth shut, I’ll never know. Realizing the two women were right and I had been acting like a foolish teenager, I grinned sheepishly and rubbed my arm where Katie had hit me.
“I hope not, too.” I said, still massaging my arm.
46
We drove north into Ogden on what had once been a rural US highway. It had been gobbled up by urban and suburban sprawl, widened repeatedly, turn lanes and traffic signals added and lined with businesses of every stripe. Now it was just like any major arterial route in any large city.
But there wasn’t any traffic and no power for the stoplights so I blasted along at close to 100 miles per hour. A year ago if I had driven like this on this road I would have had a dozen cops behind me, a police helicopter in the air and been the subject of most of the evening news broadcasts across the country. Now I was just trying to survive and save someone that I wasn’t even sure was still alive.
“The mall is five miles ahead,” Katie said, interrupting my musings. “What’s your plan to get inside the store?”
“Depends on what we find when we get there,” I said. “If it’s only males we’re going to fight our way through. Females, I’m thinking a loud distraction.”
Katie nodded, rubbing Dog’s neck. He had picked up on our elevated tension and knew something was up. Alert, he kept his head pushed through from the back so he could see what was happening.
As we approached the mall I had to slow. Infected began appearing on the road in small numbers and I didn’t want to smash into one and damage the front of the car. Even a slight aerodynamic change could cause a lot of problems when our speed began exceeding 80.
The road began to curve to the west as the ground on that side dropped off slightly, then we emerged from a thick stand of trees and spied the sprawling mall to our left and below us. There was nothing special about it, just another massive collection of stores surrounded by acres of asphalt. Wanting to get a good look I pulled to a stop by a low guardrail.
There were a lot of figures just standing in the parking lot. From my vantage point I couldn’t tell if they were males or females, nor did I have any idea why they were just standing there. Conserving energy and waiting for a fat, juicy snack to show up? Maybe.
“There,” Katie said, pointing.
Following her extended hand I saw an exterior entrance to a Dick’s Sporting Goods. I was thankful we weren’t going to have to go into the mall proper, and might very well have abandoned the location if we had. Too many hiding places for infected and too easy to get trapped. Not that the store would be any better, but at least it had been built on a corner and there were two exterior doors at ninety degree angles to each other.
“That’s too many to fight through,” Katie said quietly.
“Agreed,” I said, checking the mirrors and looking around to make sure there weren’t any infected in the immediate area before I stepped out. “Time for a distraction.”
I shifted the Dodge into park and stepped out, opening the rear door when I stood up. Dog jumped down, ears up and a growl coming as soon as he caught scent of the infected. He looked around and not seeing anything close enough to attack, headed for the guardrail and gave it a good sniff before lifting his leg.
There were close to a hundred vehicles scattered around the parking lot below me. Most were cars, but there were a few pickups, one large motor home and one of the giant city busses that bend in the middle so they can make tight turns. Katie stepped out and came to stand next to me, looking down at the parking lot.
Leaning in to the car I retrieved the Russian grenade launcher and the bandolier from the back seat. Opening the
cylinder I inserted two high explosive grenades into the empty chambers from when I’d fired the weapon in Dodge City. The cylinder is spring operated and I rotated it as I loaded in the new shells, resetting it for full rotation.
My first target was a large Chevy pickup, parked on the far side of the bus from the entrances to Dick’s. I hoped to draw them around beyond the larger vehicle, which would screen their view of the store. Raising the launcher, I aimed, adjusted a little high to compensate for the distance and pulled the trigger.
There was a thump and I tried to track the grenade’s flight with my eyes but it was too dark. A couple of heartbeats later there was a large explosion when it struck the asphalt a good ten yards short of the Chevy. Hey, it’s not like aiming a rifle.
All around the parking lot infected began moving in the direction of the blast. There were more females than I had expected as nearly half of the static figures suddenly began sprinting towards the sound. Adjusting aim I fired again. Even though I couldn’t see it I pictured the parabola the grenade followed, its path ending in the bed of the pickup.
I don’t know exactly where the shell did strike the Chevy, but I hit it, the blast lifting its side into the air a split second before the fuel tank ruptured and detonated. The explosion was truly impressive. Flaming fuel was scattered for thirty yards in every direction as a ball of roiling fire consumed the vehicle and climbed into the night sky. A wave of hot air washed across my face.
“It’s working,” Katie said, watching the infected move as one towards the violent sights and sounds of the explosion.
I waited, giving time for the small herd to collapse in on the area of the burning truck. They passed the city bus then crossed open asphalt before flowing around the motor home, which was being charred on the side closest to the burning Chevy. The fire was intense and the females stopped at a safe distance, beginning to cluster next to the RV.
The males continued forward, apparently unaware that they were walking to their death. One after another they stumbled on, ignoring the fire that began to consume their clothing and flesh. Crawford had told me about seeing the same thing at Tinker when males kept walking towards burning jet fuel until they were killed.
Shaking my head in amazement I adjusted my aim to the motor home, which now had at least a hundred females standing within only a few yards of it. They appeared to be mesmerized by the fire as they were just standing there watching. Grinning, I pulled the trigger twice and sent two grenades rocketing towards them.
The first one punched through a side window, detonating inside the living area of the RV. The whole vehicle shook when it went off then the second one arrived. I couldn’t tell where it struck but it added its force to the already expanding blast. The motor home disappeared in a giant fireball that instantly consumed all the infected within a large radius.
I checked the parking lot in front of Dick’s, happy to see it clear of everything other than a few slow moving males. They were focused on getting to the sounds of the exploding vehicles. Turning back I saw that most of the females had been outright killed in the initial blast, the rest scattered across the asphalt with gruesome injuries.
More were coming from the opposite direction and wanting to keep them busy I picked out two more vehicles even farther away from our destination and lobbed a grenade into each. They both erupted, spreading more burning gasoline and killing any infected unlucky enough to be within twenty yards.
I took a moment to reload the launcher, this time selecting fragmentation grenades, which are designed to cause maximum damage to the human body. Tossing it into the back seat I got Katie and Dog into the car and headed for the exit ramp in front of us that was clearly marked as mall access.
Driving without lights I kept the speed down to make as little noise as possible. Even though I’d just taken out most of the infected that had been hanging around the parking lot, I’d made a hell of a lot of noise in the process. I didn’t think for a second that there weren’t more in the area that were already zeroing in on the blasts.
47
The ramp curved sharply and dropped to pass under the highway. Following the pavement I steered us into the parking lot, bypassing a series of speed bumps as I aimed for the entrance to Dick’s. Several males were still in the area, turning and heading for us when I pulled to a stop.
“We’re going to need flashlights inside,” I said, shifting into park and shutting off the rumbling engine. “Going to be lots of tight spaces and hiding places. Take your cues from Dog.”
Katie was adjusting well to the new world we were living in where you didn’t go shopping without at least a rifle, but she hadn’t been in many tight spaces with the infected. I didn’t want her learning the hard way just how easy it was for them to surprise you inside a dark building.
We all stepped out and I took a minute to put down the half dozen males who were closing in on us. A quick look around and I was satisfied that, for the moment at least, we hadn’t been spotted by any of the others. For good measure I grabbed the grenade launcher and bandolier before softly closing the back door.
The doors into the store were the automatic sliding kind and made of glass set in a metal frame. Without power they didn’t open as we approached. Katie took up a position to watch our back as I worked on getting us inside. I was glad to see Dog stayed next to her, looking out into the momentarily empty parking lot.
Automatic sliding doors are equipped with hinges that allow them to be pushed out in the event of a malfunction or power failure. Unfortunately they don’t swing in as well, and when I clicked on my flashlight and looked closer I could see that the deadbolt style lock was engaged. Taking a step back I pulled the rifle to my shoulder and looked into the dark interior through the night vision scope.
The area I could check was very limited, really not much more than a few cash registers. Right past them was a large display of women’s yoga pants and that was as far as I could see. Pulling the trigger three times in burst mode I punched nine holes through the heavy safety glass that protected the entrance.
Kicking with my steel-toed boot I began working on creating an opening large enough for us to get through. The glass was really tough and since I was trying to be as quiet as possible it took several minutes to clear the lower half of the doorframe. Calling Dog, I waved at the opening I’d created.
He stepped up to it, immediately growling as he got a sniff of the air from inside the building. Great. Infected inside.
“Let’s go,” I said to Katie in a low voice.
I tapped Dog on the back and he jumped through the hole. Bending, I stepped through and stood with the rifle up, scanning with the night vision scope. I nearly shot a female mannequin posed in a running shoe display, then did shoot the male that stepped around her.
He was dressed like a store employee, half his face missing from some gruesome injury. Katie appeared next to me and brought her rifle up as well, both of us firing at two more males as they stumbled into view. I was hopeful there weren’t any females in the store, expecting them to have already shown up at the noise I made breaking in.
Not seeing any more infected for the moment I scanned until I spotted a large display for snow skiers. Grabbing several oversized plastic bags from one of the register areas I pointed and began moving towards that part of the store, Dog at my side and Katie right behind me.
The flashlight attached to my rifle was on, as I didn’t want to try and navigate with just the night vision scope. I quickly learned that moving through a dark store full of mannequins could be a bit nerve wracking. I managed not to shoot any, but Katie did drill one of them dead center in the forehead when we stepped around the corner of an aisle and it suddenly loomed in the beam of our lights.
“Nice shot,” I mumbled.
“Oops,” she said quietly with an embarrassed grin.
While I kept watch, Katie loaded up the bags with about five thousand bucks worth of Under Armour cold weather gear. The stuff isn’t cheap but in my e
xperience it’s worth every penny. Fortunately I wasn’t going to have to swipe a credit card on the way out the door.
“Ready,” Katie mumbled, stuffing dual layered gloves into the top of the bulging sacks.
Dog growled before I could take a step. Glancing down I wasn’t happy to see him looking intently in the direction of the doors. I turned my flashlight off and motioned for Katie to do the same. Moving forward I looked around the corner of the aisle, using the night vision to scan.
Five females were standing near the registers, and as I watched another one pushed her way through the opening. What the hell had attracted them? We’d been quiet and careful with the lights. Had they been coming to investigate what all the noise was from the vehicles I’d blown up and seen us go into the store? I shook my head. It didn’t matter. What mattered was getting out and back to the Dodge.
In the few seconds I’d been thinking about how they found us, two more appeared. Eight, probably more coming, and there was a lot of cover for them to use when I started firing. I didn’t think there was any way to easily take them out with the rifle.
Lowering it, I raised the grenade launcher, aimed for the counter where they were clustered and pulled the trigger. The instant I fired I pulled back around the corner of the aisle in case any of the shrapnel made it this far.
The explosion was ear shattering, preceded by a bright flash of light when the grenade detonated. The pressure wave blasted over our heads and dust and smoke began filling the air.
“Move!” I shouted at Katie, my ears ringing so much that I could hardly hear my own voice.
We ran, Katie with heavy bags swinging from each hand and me with my rifle up. Dog raced ahead and I saw him attack a crawling female. There were two more still alive but so badly damaged they couldn’t even drag their bleeding bodies towards us as we passed. The rest were dead, several of them having had limbs amputated by the blast in the enclosed space.