Zombie Crusade

by J. W. Vohs

  Marcus climbed a ladder to the guard-posted on top of the station and gave Maddy a radio with instructions to let him know if any zombies got through the wire. None had quite made it through yet, but the weight of the corpses was beginning to provide tangle-free approaches for those that were following. In other places the zombies caught in the wire had thrashed about so much that they had pulled free many of the stakes. Bruce figured that the attackers would breach the wire in less than an hour.

  Jack looked over the scene and quickly decided to send two squads with Marcus and Bruce to guard the wood lines while he and Carter led a squad to the perimeter wire to dispatch the zombies still alive and try to repair some of the damage they had caused. After fifteen minutes he was satisfied that they had done all they could for the wire and headed over to the other side of the station to assess the situation there. Marcus and Bruce had decided to move their fighters into the woods as far as possible, killing zombies as they went. Jack arrived just as they were emerging from the trees, all of them dragging the largest branches they could handle. Once they dropped their loads they immediately returned for more. They were obviously trying to place some obstacles in the path of the zombies that made it out of the woods, and Jack was proud of the initiative shown by his men.

  Both of the Rangers took a moment to tell the others to continue their work while they went over to update their leader on the situation. Marcus explained, “They’re thick in the woods Jack, and I do mean thick. We couldn’t see the back of the woods from the furthest distance we went in there, which was about a hundred yards, so we don’t know how many are in there or how many more are moving in from that direction. I can say there are hundreds of them in there, though we did thin them out a little bit.”

  “Lose anyone in there?” Jack asked.

  Bruce spoke up, “No, but several close calls. Some of these guys won’t close with the zombies, and some of the others are too reckless. Hope they get it figured out soon.”

  Jack looked at his watch and declared, “Three-thirty now; about five hours till dark. If we’re still here when the sun sets things are going to be really tough. Far as I know those things move as well in the dark as they do the light, while our people are going to be blind.”

  “Hey,” Marcus interrupted, “this is a fire station. I bet they have spotlights in there somewhere. Probably have a generator too, in case we lose power like we lost the cell phones. Let’s see if we can set up some lighting on the roof.”

  Jack grinned at the burly soldier. “You know, you’re not as dumb as Bruce looks!”

  They all enjoyed a good laugh, and Jack encouraged them to continue with what they were doing. Returning to the bays where the volunteers were working on the transportation, Jack gathered the crew together and asked how much time they would need to modify the vehicles. One of the men shook his head and said, “Two or three days.”

  Jack responded, “Give me a better answer.”

  Another man spoke up, “We’ll get those ladders off in two or three hours, but rigging up a stable platform to load these people on is going to take a while. We could probably have something that won’t get a bunch of us killed ready by tomorrow morning.”

  Jack shook his head, “Guys, I seriously doubt that we have that long. Make sure your modifications are stable, but keep it simple and work as if your life depends on it. It does. If you need any more bodies we’ll pull some people off the guard.”

  Jack remembered Marcus’s suggestion, “Also, I hate to take any more of your time, but we need to get some lighting on the roof if at all possible. Do you have spotlights here?”

  All of them nodded as if Jack was stupid for asking the question.

  “Great, how about a generator in case the power goes out like the phones did?”

  Again they all nodded, and the man who’d been explaining the time needed to complete the work said, “We have all that stuff, but we should keep working on this. George Lattimore is out there with your guards and he’s an electrician. If you can get him in here with a few strong backs we can show him where all the stuff is and he can set it up.”

  “Good idea, I’ll go round them up.”

  Two hours later the ladders were off of the trucks, adequate lighting was in place, and zombies were now too thick in the woods for patrols to safely enter. Marcus and Bruce had their squads waiting a few feet outside of the tree line so they could pick off the creatures as they stumbled out onto open ground. Well over a hundred zombies were lying dead in and near the woods, but Jack suspected that hundreds more were following their trails. Out in the wire the story was little better, where more of the creatures were falling to Carter’s team and smashing the strands with the weight of their corpses. In the soybean fields beyond the wire were perhaps a hundred zombies shuffling toward the station, and their numbers were increasing as others emerged from distant woodlots to join the march toward the safe-house.

  Jack called The Castle and found Andi answering the calls. She was excited to hear his voice, “Hey, what are you up to out there?”

  “Just the usual.”

  “Surrounded and on the verge of annihilation again?”

  Jack chuckled, “You know me.”

  “Yeah, I do, and you better be in a safe place.”

  Jack feigned surprise, “Why Andi, I’ll have you know I’m right in the middle of Fire Station 2, one of our county safe-houses.”

  Andi wasn’t fooled. “Maybe the other two are fine, but I’ll bet the one you’re in is having problems.”

  “We’ll be all right over here. I actually have backup this time.”

  “So why are you calling us?”

  “What are the dispositions of the RRTs right now?”

  “One is here on call, two of the others are out rescuing neighbors who got through on the land lines we ran a few days ago, and all of them are exhausted. But you know we can round up help here if you need it.”

  “How many zombies in our neighborhood?”

  “We actually killed three of them about a quarter-mile down the road an hour ago. Then there’s been a number of calls from people trapped inside their houses. The RRTs always report some that they weren’t able to stop to eliminate. They’re around, but no large numbers yet.”

  Jack quickly thought through the options and decided to take no chances with The Castle’s security. For all he knew it was the safest place on the planet right now, and he intended to keep it that way. “Well, I’m going to keep Carter’s team with me for the night. These folks at Station 2 don’t have things together and need our help. Just keep taking care of the neighborhood and keep our guard rotation on the walls.”

  “Everything’s ok here, Jack; I’m just worried about you.”

  “Hey, no worrying about me allowed, especially when I have Carter with me. Don’t forget that I have Bruce and Marcus here as well, and they are better Rangers than I’ll ever be.

  “Well, I don’t know about that, but I do feel better knowing you have them with you. Listen, somebody’s calling on one of the lines. You keep us posted tonight.”

  “I will,” Jack began, but she had already disconnected. For a moment he felt very, very alone in the world and wished with all of his heart that he was sitting down to dinner at The Castle with Andi and the girls. His thoughts were quickly interrupted as Marcus called over the radio and asked for Jack to come over to their zone immediately. Maddy had been relieved of her guard duty and was trying to be inconspicuous as she waited for Jack to finish his call, but she overheard the plea from Marcus and stuck close to Jack’s side as he headed in that direction at a run. Rounding the corner of the station, they witnessed a vicious skirmish taking place between five or six of the guards and at least a dozen zombies. One of the guards was on the ground, thrashing about as zombies clawed and bit at his body. The other guards were fighting a desperate battle to free their comrade, but with more zombies leaving the wood line and heading into the fray the struggle had essentially become a stalemate.

>   Jack quickly appraised the situation and saw that although Marcus was with the group trying to save the fallen guard, he had been wise enough to leave the rest of his squad posted at their regular intervals along the line. Jack told Maddy, “Put on your helmet and follow me.”

  The girl did as instructed. Jack led her around the scrum taking place near the downed man, hitting the zombies coming out of the woods in the flank with his halberd. Jack immediately cut down three of the monsters and took a position directly between the wood line and the struggle taking place to save the fallen guard. He shouted at Maddy, “You cover my back!”

  Sensing the girl’s presence behind him, Jack felt free to pull the .22 loose and open up on the charging zombies. The creatures were so close that each of Jack’s first seven shots dropped one of the monsters, and whenever he had a second’s respite he double-tapped the fallen just to be sure they stayed down. The mindless predators paid no heed to their fallen brethren as they continued to press their attack. Jack took a moment to switch out magazines and then began to fire at targets further out which caused his kill ratio to fall to half of what it had been. When he finally heard a ‘click’ from the trigger signaling another empty clip, he decided it was time to holster the pistol and switch to the halberd again.

  He briefly turned to check on Maddy, shocked to see her pulling the spike-end of her halberd out of the eye socket of what appeared to be the third zombie she had killed while Jack was shooting. With no others threatening them, Jack grabbed Maddy’s shoulder, “You all right?”

  She gave a muffled, “Yes,” from under her helmet.

  “All right. Stay by my side now and we’re going to push these monsters back to the wood line.”

  Standing about five feet apart, Jack and the high school soccer star advanced on the remaining zombies with bloodied blades and bad attitudes. Maddy matched Jack’s body count as they moved forward slashing, chopping, and stabbing, and within two minutes there were no more targets for their weapons. They turned around and headed back to Marcus and his guards. They found them pulling dead zombies from a pile on top of their fellow guard, and as they reached the bottom they found the man curled into a protective ball, clutching a mangled wrist to his chest in a feeble attempt to stop the blood spurting from the wound.

  Marcus yelled at his men to return to their positions, and Jack asked Maddy to keep an eye on the wood line for them as they dealt with the injured guard. They removed his helmet and helped the stricken fighter lie down, lifting his wounded wrist above his body in the hope of slowing the bleeding. The man was turning pale-blue and Jack wondered just how much blood the man had lost from his nearly severed wrist. Then he looked below the waist. The guard had worn Kevlar and leather biker pants, but for some reason had decided to wear a pair of hiking shoes on his feet. At some point in the struggle one of the zombies had managed to pull the pants far enough up the leg to take a huge bite out of the poor man’s calf. As Jack made his gruesome discovery he heard Marcus say, “Forget it man, he’s gone.”

  Jack just nodded and mumbled, “For the best, I suppose. Wouldn’t do these people any good to watch him turn and then have to take him out. Just get back to your men; I’ll have Maddy help me take the body inside.”

  Marcus touched his shoulder, “Sorry, Jack, they had him down before I could get over here. It was like a big wave of them just emerged from the woods at the same time.”

  Jack looked his buddy in the eye, “We’ve been to war together, man. You know you don’t have to explain anything to me.”

  Marcus grimaced, shrugged, and added, “Seems like we shouldn’t lose people to these creatures. They don’t move that fast; all they have are hands and teeth.”

  He stared off in the distance before continuing, “We lost friends in the wars Jack, but it wasn’t like this. Most of the time they were here one moment and gone the next, IEDs, snipers, whatever, but we didn’t have to watch them get eaten alive.”

  Jack just listened for a moment, waiting for more if Marcus needed to continue to vent. When the big man remained quiet, Jack responded, “Hey, the bottom line is that we’re still the good guys, and we have people counting on us to protect them. These folks aren’t civilians any longer; all we have now are humans and zombies and this is going to be a war of extermination. You and I know we’re going to lose a lot more people before this is over, and in the end it doesn’t really matter how we lose them, they would want us to close ranks and destroy these monsters. Can you live with that?”

  Marcus looked at Jack for a few seconds before answering, “You’re right. Dead is dead, and we have to do what we can to prevent more death. Don’t worry man, I’m all right.”

  Jack stood up. “Just get your guys squared away, and I’ll be back in five. If you can get a look into the woods do it, but don’t take any really stupid chances.”

  Marcus ruefully grinned, “Just potentially stupid chances, huh?”

  Jack grinned back, “Chances are only really stupid when they don’t pay off.”

  Jack and Maddy pulled the guard’s body around the corner of the building, where Jack double-tapped the head to make sure he would stay dead. Then they rolled the corpse into a tarp and went to see how Carter was doing along the wired perimeter.

  Jack found his old buddy standing on a small platform made from cinder blocks and four by fours, surveying the entire field and sending a few runners out with orders to his squad leaders. Jack didn’t need to ask Carter for a situation report on this side as they could see for hundreds of yards in every direction. What the woods hid on the other side of the building was clearly visible here; the sight was unnerving to Jack and terrifying to Maddy.

  CHAPTER 18

  Standing next to Carter, Jack and Maddy could see several hundred zombies tangled in the wire. Most were still, but some were rolling about in an effort to free themselves. In those places Jack could see some of Carter’s guards gingerly working through the strands of wire until they could reach the zombies and destroy them with halberds and spears. Those creatures were no longer a problem, but the hundreds more shuffling toward the safe-house through the fields beyond the wire were obviously going to be trouble. Jack looked up at Carter and asked, “What do you think?”

  Carter scowled as he thought for a moment before answering, “Well, we gotta couple problems that are goin’ from bad to worse. Ya can’t see it as well from where yer standin’, but that wire is a mess out there. All them corpses have weighed down the strands, and we ain’t been able to repair it as fast as the zombies have been messin’ it up. In another hour or so most of ‘em are just gonna walk right in, and we’re gonna be outnumbered about fifty to one.”

  Jack looked unfazed and wondered aloud, “So what’s the second problem?”

  Carter didn’t answer, he just reached out a hand, pulled Jack up onto the platform beside him, and handed him a pair of binoculars. “Here, look over them zombies comin’ through the fields and tell me whatcha see.”

  Jack looked for a few moments before replying, “Same thing I saw from the ground; hundreds of them are heading this way.”

  Carter shook his head, “Naw, that ain’t what I’m talkin’ about. Look at the way they’re movin’. Some of ‘em are walkin’ a lot faster than the others.”

  As Jack scanned the field he began to notice the difference. Some of the zombies were shuffling along at the pace he had become accustomed to seeing, while others looked like power-walkers in the park. The ones that were moving quickly were obviously in better physical condition than many of the others, but they also seemed to have better coordination than any of the zombies Jack had faced so far.

  Jack simply muttered, “What the hell?”

  Carter asked, “Whatcha think is goin’ on?”

  Jack lowered the binoculars and thought for a moment. “If I had to guess, I’d say they either move faster after feeding, or maybe the virus is mutating in some way. Have they shown any signs of higher-level thinking?”

  “Naw, the
y fall right into the wire traps the same as the slower ones, but they cause more damage when they try to get loose. Seems like they’re definitely stronger as well as faster. It’s gonna be a problem when they break through.”

  “Yeah,” Jack agreed, “we’re all used to the way they move and attack, and now some of them are going to close on us really fast when we’re fighting them.”

  Carter nodded, “That’s what I’m worried about. Marcus and Bruce seein’ this on their side?”

  Jack pondered the question before replying, “Maybe. They lost a guy a few minutes ago, and Marcus said a whole group of the zombies just came out of the woods like a wave and had the guard on the ground before they could get to him. Now that I think about it, the guards seemed to be having an especially hard time getting the zombies off our guy once they took him down.” He put his hand on Carter’s shoulder, “Keep them in the wire as long as you can, and call me immediately if there’s a problem. I’m going to let Bruce and Marcus know about the changes we’re seeing, and I’ll call The Castle and the other safe-houses too.”

  Carter managed to look cocky when he replied, “Will do, sheriff.”

  Jack barely hesitated before confiding in his friend, “We have big problems on the other side. The zombies have pushed our guys out of the woods so we really don’t know how many more are coming in from that direction. If it’s anything like what you’re seeing, we’re going to have a really hard time stopping them over there.”

  Carter immediately asked, “Ya need to take a few of my guys over there?”

  “No, I don’t think a few more people are going to make a difference. The station has a couple of steel doors back there, and if they break our line we’re going into the building and locking the zombies out. At that point you’ll have to get your people in fast before you’re flanked and cut off.”