It was kill or be killed.
And every man for himself.
Don’t forget that one.
And it was time for Ron Cutter to go on patrol.
**
He had been spending more and more time in his house on the roof of the Caine Building. The place had once housed various offices of lesser attorneys, realtors, at least two bail bondsmen and some guy who’d run a skip-trace outfit. Ron often thought of the place as The Circle Jerk Building. There had to have been a lot of inter-office businesses being run there with that combination of professions. In days when it had seemed relatively safe and he was bored, he had gone from office to office figuring out what each one was for and doing his utmost to secure the building. Zombies rarely ever got into it. He figured that the smell must be from the lingering stench of the folk who had worked there.
Ron had safe houses and panic rooms set up all over a roughly ten-block area. When all was said and done, and he had finally made his way to his old house and realized that his wife and daughter were likely gone forever, he had retreated to the familiar streets where he had worked. From time to time, he had considered moving out, away from the rotting urban remains of Charlotte, but when he had ventured out into the countryside, he had discovered that it was at least as infested with the roving dead as the city. And there were fewer places of refuge to be had in the boonies than in the city. Whenever he had spoken to survivors straggling into the city limits, he had pretty much gathered the same from them:
They were ready to take their chances in the bad old city rather than in the good old countryside. Live and learn, he thought. He knew that the more he learned, the better able he was to continue to live.
He had exactly six places stocked and secured that he considered as his homes. They were all apartments and offices that he had converted to the needs of any well-intentioned survivor of the death of modern society. Each of his refuges was above ground level, but none higher than the third floor of any building. Higher than that and he got too nervous about finding himself completely backed into a corner from which there might be no escape at all. Third floor he could always rig up and rappel down if the situation called for it. A couple of times, he had been in such a fix. Of all of his houses, though, this one was his favorite. The fact that he could see his old workplace from here—only two blocks away—was just a coincidence. In fact, he’d never been back to that place since the day he’d left it. You don’t go anywhere you don’t have a reason to go, he’d learned. And everyone knew the old saying about curiosity and the cat. He damned sure didn’t want to be a dead cat.
Peering up at the sky, he saw that it was clear and the only clouds were high ones. There would probably be no rain at all today, so it was definitely going to get pretty hot with no cloud cover at all to cut the heat. He would have to take plenty of fresh water with him. Three quarts should do it. Ron had a mesh cap that he wore on days like this. It let out at least some of the body heat produced by his scalp, and he would just have to grin and bear the discomfort of the earflaps that he knew he would have to cinch tight around his chin, which would also be protected by a plastic cup. It was going to be hot, humid, and nasty, but there was nothing to do about it. He had been waiting three days for cool weather, before he went out scrounging, but cool weather did not seem to be in a hurry to get there.
On the gravel roof that served as his front porch, he stopped and went over his outfit. His high-top boots were securely tied and his gaiters were tight to his knees. He had on his pair of Kevlar pants that could stop a chain saw blade going 9000rpm, so zombie teeth were no match for them. He had on layers on his torso in the form of breathable long underwear and good old flannel, a bland washed-out blue that didn’t draw too much attention to his movements. And a pair of gloves that had been intended as liners, but which did a fair job of protecting his hands and fingers, but allowed free movement and decent flexibility. He had his prescription sunglasses on—the only thing that had made him return to his old apartment. The only part of him that was largely unprotected when he went out on a day like this one was his face from the cheeks down to just above his chin. He figured that someday, some deader would bite him there, but so far he had avoided that possibility.
Once his clothing was secure, he checked the pistol he kept in the leather shoulder holster that had the weapon riding high and tight above his left rib cage. A Sig-Sauer .357 caliber pistol that was loaded with original ammo was his gun of choice. Ron had learned to reload his own cartridges and even how to make his own gunpowder, but he’d never had to repack the ammo for this, his favorite pistol, so he liked to husband that ammunition carefully. Other options were available that he used to keep from blowing those charges.
Chief among those reasons was his rifle of choice, the .220 Swift that he had slung over his back with a good padded sling. Sometimes it made the going a little hotter than he liked, but that gun had been his favorite type since he was a kid. And everyone who knew dick about firearms was aware of the speed and accuracy of the 22.220 cartridge. Ron could fire it at a bobbing geek at 300 yards and its head would explode before he could so much as chamber the next round. It was that good a weapon, because Ron was only a halfway decent shot.
On his hip he kept a little Saturday night special .22 pistol that held six rounds in its reliable chamber. He had used that shitty little pistol on a hundred different occasions and only twice had it misfired. That had been because of poorly packed ammo before he had figured out how to do that right. Since then, he had shot maybe forty of the walking dead folk with that little gun, and each time he’d put them down for the count with single shots. It was what helped him avoid wasting the precious ammunition for his Sig-Sauer .357.
As he got ready to descend to the streets, he checked the knife in its sheath on his right shin, the Buck knife with its four-inch blade in his left pocket, and his weapon of almost first choice when it came to close combat—his reliable and very blood-soaked 16-ounce ball peen hammer. If there was a better hand-to-hand weapon against the geeks, he had yet to discover it. Of course, it was perfect for smashing stubborn window and damned locked doors that he encountered almost every time he had to go out shopping.
“It’s Miller Time,” he said to no one but himself.
Turning, he locked the door of his favorite safe house. It had been a simple twenty foot by twenty-foot workroom on the roof of this office building. Once upon a time, it started as a kind of penthouse, before the building thought better of that, and never quite finished it. Thus, when he’d first come upon it, the blocky space had been just three spaces; a big open room with a concrete floor, a small space that he’d made into a bedroom that could be locked from inside, and a simple bathroom that had a toilet and a shower. There was no water pressure these days, but Ron had rigged a rain catchment and big plastic containers that served as a series of cisterns. He never drank that water, but it was good for washing and for flushing the commode. Best of all, it was high above the wandering deads, but not too high. He could get down if he wanted to or if he had to.
Right now, he wanted to get down; it was time.
**
Cutter always exited this particular safe house, the same way; by a rooftop door that opened into a very narrow and very steep stairwell. Although he had pondered it over the months, he’d never figure out why the architects had put that set of stairs just where they had. He was glad of it, but damned if he had ever figured it out. Just another access point, he supposed. It was the one that he kept open; having successfully blocked the other stairs with debris that none of the zombies had been able to pierce.
Sometimes the shamblers did get into the main section of the building, but they never stayed for long and none of them had been able to advance beyond the second floor. Ron had scattered the stairs with all manner of metal debris that wouldn’t burn, and with barbed wire and razor wire that he’d scavenged from different places around the neighborhood. It wasn’t pretty to look at, but so far it had pr
oven to be effective.
He unlocked the door and shined an LED light into the well. The stairs plunged down at an alarmingly steep angle and the first couple of times Ron had stood at the top and looked down he’d actually felt vertigo. Once you got used to them it was no big deal. He just had to make sure that the narrow confines were free of the roaming dead. None had ever figured out how to force their way in, but if they ever did, the space was so confining that, a single man could stand at the height and pick them off one by one with gunfire or even with something as simple as a hammer. In no time, the shaft would become so plugged with dead flesh that nothing could push through. It was a good defense point, he knew.
Quietly, he descended the stairs until he was at street level. In addition to the stout lock that he had installed himself, the steel door at the bottom had a good, old-fashioned metal bar that held it closed. He had also put in a peephole and he used that now to peer out. He could see straight down the street for about a hundred yards. There was a deader mucking about. Something had obviously upset the thing and it was searching for prey, but its back was to him so Cutter figured it was all right to unlock the door and step out.
He slipped the bolts and pulled the door open slowly. The well-oiled hinges didn’t make a sound as he stepped out and locked the door behind him. All the while, he kept one eye on the dead thing that still had its back to him, and as soon as the door was secure, he moved off to his left and if the shamble ever turned around to look toward Ron’s escape route, he wasn’t there to see it.
Stuffing his keys into a thigh pocket of his pants, he buttoned them up securely and moved off. Ron knew exactly what he wanted to achieve in the way of scavenging, and he wanted to check up on some of the local citizens in what he had begun to think of as his turf. One of them, a bit of a smart ass, had started referring to Cutter as The Mayor. Others had picked up on the nickname and there were any number of the living, who eked out an existence in this part of downtown Charlotte, who called Ron by that term. He let it ride. A part of him liked it. Despite his general demeanor of his loner existence, he had gotten to a point where he cared about most of the folk who—like him—were trying to survive what was going on.
At some point, it would come to an end, right? It would run its course and the ones who were left would pick up the pieces and move on. That’s what they all seemed to be hoping for. The main thing was just to live through it.
Coming to the intersection, Cutter hunkered down low to the pavement and looked around. Off to his right there was any number of deads milling around. To his left, the streets were completely clear of any obvious sign, except for a few stragglers who weren’t doing much but stumbling around near the walls of the old Union Tower. Once upon a time, that place had been one of the biggest banking centers on the planet. Now, it was just a place where some of the living held out and the dead wandered around, raving for someone to kill and eat.
He knelt down very low, ducking his head until the scruffy weeds and shrubs that had grown out of the pavement and sidewalk in the intervening months broke up the lines of his body. What he needed were some small canisters of propane. He knew where some were stored in a small trucking firm about four blocks away. However, to get there he was going to have to make a move, and the clot of shamblers to his right was probably going to see him. They were going to get agitated and make some noise, that would get a lot more of them in a state, and they would zero in on him. He would be left to make a series of dashes to get to where he needed to be, but that was just something he’d have to do. Already the heat and humidity were getting to him. Sweat was tracing down his face, down his neck, down his back. It was going to be a long day, he knew.
In addition, he wanted to check on Old Lady Hartwell and the kid who lived two blocks west. How either of them had survived, he didn’t know. In the case of the old woman, it had to be either pure blind luck, or maybe there really was a God and he was watching over her. Some of the things he had seen her get away with just didn’t make any sense at all. She didn’t have a gun, she couldn’t fight, and she couldn’t even walk fast. In fact, she didn’t quite seem to know what was going on, but somehow there she was every time Ron encountered her; still alive.
However, someone else was out there that Ron wanted to see first, so he stood and began to move quickly off to his left as fast as he could without actually running. The crepe soles of his combat boots made hardly a sound at all. Glancing back, he saw that the scores of dead folk had yet to spot him at all and there was a possibility, he’d get down to the next corner without them seeing him.
Then, suddenly of course, there was the appearance of a shambler from out of the broken front of a jewelry store directly in front of him. The thing had been a big man in life and it was now quite the sight. He was a big ol’ boy, standing roughly six and a half feet tall in his bare, bloodied feet. What clothes remaining on him were in tarry tatters black with rotting gore from a hundred different feasts. However, none of that living flesh had satisfied it so far and as soon as it zeroed in on Ron, it gave out with a hoarse moan and set into a kind of stumbling trot.
The deads seemed relatively harmless when you looked at them from a distance, but the thing was that they could move at a decent pace when they wanted to get you, and they never got tired. He didn’t understand why dead flesh could even move, and he certainly would never understand why the normal rules of exertion failed to apply to them. What he did know was that they would come at you when they saw you and that nothing but bashing their brain in would stop them. And God help you if one got its mitts on you. The absence of pain meant that they knew no limitations when it came to combat. Their hands were like vises; Cutter could account for that from too many personal experiences to list.
“You sneaky fucker,” he whispered to it. Already it was halfway across the street. A half dozen other admirers of the jewelry store’s wares came staggering out of the shadows of the broken storefront. Off to his rear, the tens of others that he had initially spotted had finally turned to see what excitement was going down and as one; they gave out with that hideous wail a crowd would always give up.
The chase was on, and there was nothing to do, but to go with the flow.
Cutter ran. The sun was up, high in the sky. The weather was really bad for this kind of shit, but you couldn’t choose every situation. Sometimes you just had to bite the bullet and run. What he needed were a couple of those canisters of propane. Ron made his own rounds these days and he had to have a good fuel source to smelt his lead and brass. He was running low on the fuel and it was a must-have item. If not now, then later, and nobody knew what another day might bring.
If he could keep the dead at his back, he could make a good go of it. It was when they put you into a gauntlet situation where you found the odds stacked almost totally against you. If all you could do was run from one clot of deads to the next, fighting and shooting, creating more noise and attracting more of them, then the situation could deteriorate into an end game from which you most definitely could not emerge. Ron had seen better men than him fall when that happened. They would put up a good fight, but in the end, the numbers would win out. He had to keep that from happening.
The street in front of him was mainly clear, so he headed off at a good clip in that direction. He seemed to ring as he trotted. No matter how well you secured your gear, as long as some of it was metal and plastic it always sang when you had to move fast. He could only hope that the sound of his movement wasn’t going to attract any attention from quarters he had to pass. At least, he had a good start on the monsters behind him, and he had a several safe houses and panic rooms secured and stocked in the immediate vicinity. They weren’t long-term security, but they would serve as refuge in an emergency. Of course, he preferred avoiding having to use them.
With a quickness that the dead sometimes showed, and which always bothered him, even if it no longer surprised him, Ron watched as the buildings along the route he wanted to take suddenly disgorged
of what looked to be an entire company of the walking corpses. They were of every shape and size—enormous hulking women who had been hideously overweight in life, to raving males with pendulous beer guts moving side to side, to what looked to have been the remains of some kindergarten class demoted to undead status. Young kids, especially, seemed to be able to move quickly in the zombie state. In seconds, the street before him was a crawling wreck of a space, moving with the stinking animated meat.
“Goddamn it,” Ron hissed. He was almost surrounded. Cutter had, perhaps, a couple of minutes to make a decision, and then all choice would be out of his hands. It was obvious to him that the zombie population in this part of Charlotte had increased in the days since he had decided to hole up and rest in his favorite spot. If he had gone out on a few patrols he would have noticed the ballooning population and been better prepared for it. They were spilling out of the countryside now, headed toward the looming spires of what had once been a busy metropolis. Despite what everyone in the burbs claimed, they actually subconsciously enjoyed the city. Old desires dictated the movements of zombies, so if they were here, it was because they wanted to be here in life.
“Fucking wannabes,” Cutter grunted as he broke into a full run and headed for an alleyway that waited at his left less than half a block away. It had once been used for the movement of delivery vehicles and garbage trucks. Even now, it wouldn’t have been easy for gas vehicles to maneuver the narrow spaces, and Ron hoped that the way was at least partially clear of zombies so that he could make his way to a place that he knew would be relatively safe:
The Kid’s place!
Under normal circumstances, Cutter looked forward to see The Kid. He was a trip. He’d been on Ron’s visit list, so he’d just be making a stop earlier rather than later. His real name was Oliver, but Ron called him just, The Kid. He had told Ron that he was fourteen, but Ron knew well the boy was no more than twelve years old, and not even a mature twelve. He was exactly what he looked like—a lost kid all alone in this Hell. But the boy knew how to handle guns, and he was really careful when he moved around, and Ron had to admit, the place he’d chosen as a home was pretty cool. In fact, he was headed there—it was his best option to keep from having to start using up precious ammunition.
The Coalition: Part 1 The State of Extinction (Zombie Series) Page 4