Zombies! (Book 5): Greater Love Hath No Man

by Merritt, R. S.

  The driver stuck his arm out and waited for the Zombie to notice it. The Zombies eyes lit up like those of a pit bull seeing a toddler waving a steak around in the air. The Zombie made a beeline for the side of the truck. It was moving impossibly fast. The driver realized his mistake and jerked his arm back in the truck frantically pressing the button to send the window up while simultaneously trying to swerve away. If he’d stayed calm, he might have made it. As it was, he screwed up the window going up automatically by pressing it repeatedly to try and make it go faster.

  The Zombie got inside the cab of the truck. It pulled itself through the window using the driver’s arm and shoulder like a ladder. A few moments later gun shots rang out. The driver and the Zombie were both kicked out of the front of the truck. Krantz slid over into the driver’s seat and knocked on the window behind him to let the guys in the bed of the truck know that one of them was welcome to come sit up front. One of the soldiers in the back hopped out and ran around to jump in the passenger’s seat. As soon as he was in the truck Krantz started driving again. They drove past the bullet riddled bodies of the Zombie and the soldier Krantz had kicked out of the truck.

  On top of everything else going on Krantz had just rang the dinner bell loud and clear for any Zombies within a couple mile radius. He hadn’t had much of a choice in the tight confines of the truck as to whether to pull the trigger or not. Knowing Krantz he’d probably considered trying to slide in with a knife while the Zombie was busy munching on his driver. What’d stopped him from trying that was how fast the Zombie had moved to get in the cab in the first place. This Zombie was obviously one of the gifted ones the virus had strengthened by unlocking some evolutionary gifts.

  Special or not the Zombie had just had a significant impact on the possibility of them surviving the drive up the interstate. At least they knew a section of it was nicely cleaned up which should help with dodging Zombies. They should be good all the way to the Tennessee border as far as the road went. Once they hit the border there may be some issues if they hadn’t found the plane yet. He wondered if the Tennessee border was guarded the same as the one that he’d crossed coming down I-95 to get into Georgia in the first place.

  Kyler figured they’d cross that bridge when they came to it. He just hoped whatever militia had taken over Tennessee was friendlier than the one in South Carolina had been. The men in South Carolina hadn’t attacked him but they hadn’t helped a lot either. He’d stuck to I-95 like it was the yellow brick road to avoid being shot and left to rot. At this point the border to Tennessee seemed about a million miles away. A quick glance behind them showed a few of the adrenalized Zombies already trying to catch up with them as they barreled down the on ramp to the interstate. He turned and looked in front of them and saw more Zombies coming at them from the front.

  They needed bigger trucks. The little pickups Petty Officer Steven had provided from the fire station were the ones middle class kids who lived in the country got as their first car. Small and light without much power. They were light enough that they did have decent acceleration and a good bit of ‘zip’, but they definitely weren’t built for steam rolling through a mob of hyperactive infected humans. If it’d been Kyler’s call, he would’ve pulled over and ditched the trucks and taken a little break from the mission. There was probably a nice place in the woods nearby for a team picnic.

  Unfortunately for them Krantz was in charge and he acted like his next promotion depended on them finding that plane before anyone else did. Kyler didn’t know what they had on the guy, but he was enthusiastically loyal, and duty bound. Most of the people in the people’s army and even the ones elevated to the Brotherhood weren’t trying to die for the Brotherhood. They were trying to survive in a world gone mad. Most of them didn’t have the luxury of time to consider where they thought their ideologies best fit in. They lived in Georgia or Florida and didn’t want to be drugged up and treated like slaves, so they joined up with the group that was in charge.

  Krantz’s enthusiasm got him about half a mile down the road before the second Zombie who ran into them busted through the windshield. Krantz tried to swerve and lost control rolling the tiny truck into the ditch on the side of the road. The man who’d been in the back was thrown out of the truck. The truck then rolled over on top of the guy before coming to a rest. The driver of the truck Kyler was in skidded to a stop beside the overturned truck. They all sprang out to help. Everyone except for their driver who took it upon himself to be the person responsible for staying in the truck and repeatedly yelling at them to hurry up. As if they were trying to take their time.

  Zombies were converging on the crashed truck from multiple directions. Rodriguez setup on the side of their pickup with his AK and started blasting away at the ones closest to them. Kyler and another soldier ran towards the pickup to see if anyone had survived. Kyler slid on his stomach up to the driver’s window and poked at Krantz’s bloody forehead. Kyler was sure he had to be dead based on all the blood. His eyes popped open making Kyler involuntarily let out a yelp like a scared little girl.

  Pushing the deflated airbag out of the way Kyler pulled out his Gerber and hacked away at the seatbelt. He succeeded in cutting through the tough material without cutting through any critical parts of Krantz. Krantz tumbled down to the ceiling of the truck. The other soldier came back around and helped Kyler pull Krantz out.

  “Anybody else make it?” Krantz asked trying to stand on his own and mostly succeeding. Kyler looked to the other soldier for confirmation.

  “No sir. People need to start wearing seatbelts.”

  Taking that information for what it was they all moved up the hill towards where Rodriguez was now laying down a steady stream of fire. The driver had gotten out of the truck and was doing the same. Hearing the screeches of the Zombies rising above the roar of the assault rifles encouraged Krantz to quickly wrap up the recovery process from rolling his truck. He let go of Kyler’s shoulder and ran on his own to hop in the back of the pickup waiting for them. Kyler followed behind with his finger on the trigger of his shotgun watching for any Zombies that might make it past Rodriguez and the driver.

  The soldier who’d helped Kyler rescue Krantz began to climb into the back of the pickup after Krantz threw himself painfully in. As the soldier stood to step over the side of the pickup, he was knocked off by a Zombie that’d launched itself through the air at him. The Zombie rode the soldier like a sled down the steep incline towards where Krantz’s totaled pickup was. Ignoring Rodriguez yelling for him to get in the damned truck Kyler ran to see if he could help the guy. He got close enough to see the Zombie rip out the man’s throat with its teeth. Seeing he was too late to help he fired a couple of shots into the Zombies back and turned to run back to the truck.

  The truck was gone. Kyler stared at the spot the truck should be sitting at. His peripheral vision caught some movement and he saw the green pickup swinging around the interstate and back over to where he was. They must’ve done a quick loop to lead some of the Zombies away from the area. Kyler ran as hard as he could to meet the pickup and jump in. He saw a Zombie running towards him from the opposite direction but judged he didn’t have time to take an accurate shot at it. Instead he just focused on putting even more effort into getting to the pickup as fast as he could.

  He almost jumped completely over the bed of the truck he was running so fast and jumped so hard when he got close. Krantz was leaning over the side shooting at the Zombie chasing him. The truck accelerated before Kyler had even landed in the bed. Krantz grabbed for Kyler and caught him before he flew out over the tailgate. He slammed him to the ground to keep him in the truck. Not having the luxury of time to just lay in the bed of the truck they forced themselves to sit up. Kyler took the left side and Krantz took the right side. Kyler’s head still ringing from slamming into the wheel well when Krantz knocked him to the ground. Krantz was nursing a mild concussion from the accident he’d just ran away from.

  The next few miles were straight
out of a virtual reality first person shooter set in hell. The adrenalized Zombies were all over the place. Their slower moving cousins in the large herds still working their way towards the sounds of gun fire and screeches. Zombies slammed into the front of the truck and either rolled over the top to land in the bed with Kyler and Krantz or got stuck in the windshield. Rodriguez invented a new tactic for driving straight into a gauntlet made up of the adrenalized Zombies. He shot out the front windshield and shot the Zombies as they came at them.

  It wouldn’t work with a herd since they’d just crawl into the small truck through the windshield. With the Zombies moving in singles and small groups though it was going to work for as long as Rodriguez had ammunition. Knowing Rodriguez, Kyler felt safe assuming the ammunition supply should be pretty substantial.

  In the back of the truck Kyler wondered if there was a church nearby so he could officially be wed to the little black assault shot gun he’d been given. The shot gun seemed to aim itself it was so easy. Light and with minimal kick he’d been blasting Zombies out of the air as easily as if someone had handed Mr. Miyagi an actual fly swatter. The shorter barrel and wide spread of the buck shot made it easy to hit the target versus having to do all that aiming crap like you did with a rifle. Aiming while driving in the back of a bouncing pickup truck at Zombies who came screaming at you out of nowhere was pretty much impossible.

  Krantz was managing to hold down his side of the truck but Kyler had caught him eyeing his shotgun a few times. Krantz was rocking an AK he had dialed down to semi-auto. It required aiming and didn’t pack the same kind of punch that buck shot did. That meant even when shooting accurately into the Zombies they didn’t necessarily sway from their original course after he shot them. He’d had a couple of them land on him already. Kyler had to jump over and help him fight them off until they eventually died from the holes Krantz had already put in them.

  Kyler’s whole world shrank down to the back of the bouncing pickup. He kept track of the number of time’s he’d fired the shotgun to make sure he knew when he needed to reload. He kept his eyes on his side of the truck watching for the unnaturally fast Zombies to appear and make the leap to get at them. He’d track the Zombie and fire once they got close enough for him to get the maximum result out of pumping either the shot or the slug into it. He aimed for center of mass and most times the Zombie disappeared in a riot of flailing limbs after he pulled the trigger. Occasionally he missed and had to shoot the same Zombie twice.

  If it’d just been the Zombies coming at Kyler, then they’d have been good. It wasn’t though. Krantz was having a rough time keeping up on his side given his inferior weapon for this kind of fight. The nausea and weakness associated with the concussion he was suffering from weren’t helping either. Rodriguez and the driver up front kept getting hammered by Zombies trying to jump through the windshield to get at them. Even when Rodriguez plugged them full of lead their carcasses still slammed into them. That meant they were driving at a snail’s pace compared to how fast the adrenalized Zombies were coming. Rodriguez and the driver were both barely conscious from all the abuse they’d been taking up in the front seat.

  Everyone was rapidly running out of ammunition. Pretty soon they’d be pulling out pistols followed by knives and machetes. Seeing the writing on the wall Krantz began looking for a place for them to ditch. They’d need to break contact with the Zombies they were having the running fight with now and see if they could disappear on foot into the woods.

  “If we keep going the cars that we left beside the road should show up at some point!” Kyler said raising his voice to carry over the wind and sporadic gunfire. He’d been looking to see if they passed where they’d had to leave their cars before thinking they probably would need to switch vehicles soon. This pickup wasn’t going to take much more abuse. He’d feel a lot better in the bigger, beefier, more powerful pickups they’d driven here in the first place.

  “Ok. Let’s try and disengage and get into the woods!” Krantz yelled back at Kyler over the wind.

  Kyler leaned forward to let the driver and Rodriguez know as soon as the coast looked clear to drive them over to the side so they could bail out and make a run for it. The driver nodded and Rodriguez looked relieved. They’d spent the last ten minutes having partially dead infected cannibal bodies slamming into the cab with them. They were both covered in blood, guts and other bodily fluids. Bruised and battered beyond belief they were more than ready for the nightmare to be over.

  Plans made Kyler spent more time looking forward then beside them. He was hoping to spot the lull they needed to get over to the side and make their escape. They had a few Zombies coming for them immediately but after that it didn’t look like any more were currently on the horizon. Kyler pounded on the hood and the driver sped up. All three of the Zombies dove straight in the windshield. Kyler heard Rodriguez shooting like crazy and screaming along with the screeching blood thirsty Zombies.

  The truck turned hard to the left and felt like it was going to tip over. Instead it drifted off the road and ran into a tree before coming to a stop. Up front Rodriguez was screaming like a madman and shooting into the pile of Zombie flesh sharing the cab with him. Looking through the back-window Kyler watched the Zombie on the driver’s side sinking it’s teeth into the side of the drivers head. At least the man had been knocked unconscious so wasn’t having to experience being eaten alive. Kyler put his shot gun up to the glass and blasted into the cab twice. The drivers head exploded leaving his decapitated body up front next to an equally dead Zombie.

  Screeches sounded from behind them reminding Kyler there was never time to rest if you wanted to stay alive. He followed Krantz as he rolled out of the truck bed. Rodriguez popped out of the passenger door followed by an avalanche of cadavers. He was literally dripping with blood.

  “You look like the chic in that Carrie movie.” Kyler said.

  “Save your breath. We need to commence running for our lives.” Krantz said. His eyes had gotten big looking over the top of the truck.

  Rodriguez started to spin to look but changed his mind when Krantz turned and hauled ass for the woods. Not wanting to be the idiot who died turning around to look for the monster in the scary movie when everyone else took off running Rodriguez limped as fast as he could behind Krantz. Kyler did glance up the hill then immediately sprinted past both Rodriguez and Krantz in the race for the woods.

  At the top of the hill a group of about thirty Zombies had gathered. They’d come looking for the source of all the gunshots they’d heard echoing up and down the interstate. One of them noticed the three men running for the forest and let out a long roar before jumping down the incline to give chase. The others immediately zeroed in on them and let out their own fierce hunting cries leaping after their comrade.

  Kyler hit the woods and didn’t slow down. Limbs and briars ripped at his skin. Behind him he heard Rodriguez and Krantz busting through the brush hot on his trail. All around them the woods were erupting with the screams of their pursuers. The infected who’d been supercharged by a demonic virus and now wanted to rip them apart. Kyler spun around with his shotgun to see how far behind him Krantz and Rodriguez were. They were right on his tail, so Kyler turned the spin into a complete circle and kept beating his way through the woods.

  The woods ended abruptly where a subdivision began. Kyler hurtled a short fence without even thinking about it and noticed a shed on the corner of the property. Changing course abruptly he ran over to the shed and flung open the flimsy front door. Rodriguez and Krantz caught up and ran towards him. Rodriguez had some issues getting over the fence but Krantz helped him over. The three of them all crammed into the shed and Kyler pulled the front door shut right as Zombies began appearing out of the woods.

  Most of the Zombies kept right on running. A few walked more slowly with their heads shaking as they searched for the prey they knew must be nearby. One cocked it’s head and just sat there listening. Within seconds of the shed door being closed t
hey were surrounded by their pursuers. The Zombies shuffled around the shed searching for them for about twenty minutes before wandering off in different directions in pursuit of new prey. Kyler kept the door shut for thirty minutes then slowly cracked it open. Once he’d confirmed there were no Zombies outside the three of them climbed carefully out of the shed and started marching north in parallel to the interstate.

  Once they’d gone about a mile, they cut into the woods so they could walk beside the road again. They were hoping their vehicles were only about a ten mile hike up the road. If they could make it to their trucks and get moving again then they may be able to stay on task for the mission. They’d even have a real radio system to communicate with again.

  Motivated or not their bodies weren’t able to handle much more that day. Krantz finally called for them to stop and rest for a few hours when Rodriguez fell forward into the grass and didn’t appear to be trying to get up anytime soon.

  “If we stay here until dark it’ll be a hell of a lot safer walking down the side of the road.” Kyler whispered to Krantz.

  “Yeah. I guess this mission is pretty much FUBAR at this point anyway. We get the truck tonight and drive north to the border to show we tried and then call it in.” Krantz answered.