Six Feet From Hell: Books 1 - 3

by Coley, Joseph

  No more running away.

  It was time to make a stand.

  * * *

  Balboa cussed under his breath and shook his right hand as he once again pricked his finger with a loose end of wire as he tried to twist the end of the cord the way he wanted. His hands were shaking slightly, some from the sheer exhaustion that he felt from so many nights of no sleep, and some from the mounting frustration that the radio was giving him. The SINCGARS radio sat to his right, waiting to be hooked up to a bigger antenna. He took the Gerber multi-tool that he was using and fine-tuned the workings of the connector. Still no luck. He began to get flustered and intensified the work for the SINCGARS, desperate to get it functioning properly. He took the wire and started again in earnest to attach the connector. He tried to connect the antenna with the progress that he had made so far, gingerly attaching the cord with the SINCGARS. He leaned over and tried scanning through the frequencies, listening to anything that might signal help. He trained his ear to the tinny speaker on the radio when…

  …tch Doctor…USC…Joshua…

  Balboa’s heart leaped, causing his hands to shake more than they had previously. His eyes grew large and he reached behind the radio to fine-tune the connector of the radio. He waited, hunched over, to hear the voice again, and prayed that it was not another automated message from the USS Carl Vinson telling him what he already knew. Balboa closed his eyes and turned the knobs ever so slightly and waited to hear the voice again.

  Jamie came busting through the service door, causing Balboa to slip and shove the knob further than he intended. His nerves shot through his hands and the shaking intensified. He released the grip on the radio and looked down to the stairwell access door. Jamie was bounding up the stairs, with Ashleigh, Buffey, and Rickey close behind, looking as if they were being chased.

  “Come on, come on! Let’s go! Get to the top of the landing and wait there!” Jamie commanded as he ushered the three of them through the doorway.

  Balboa achingly got up. He had not changed positions in the last twenty minutes, and now felt the effects as his muscles had cooled and settled. His knees rebelled against him as he stood to see what the fuss was about.

  “What’s goin’ on?” Balboa said excitedly. “Where’s the rest of ‘em?”

  Jamie trotted up the last few steps, exasperated. “Joe is…trying to save…Lucy.”

  “Son of a bitch what is he trying to prove?” Balboa said as he grabbed his rifle and started down the stairs. He was interrupted by a crackling of the SINCGARS. It was static-y but he could make it out what it was saying.

  Witch Doctor, this is the USCGC Joshua James please repeat your last traffic. Over.

  (garbled) ..where over Alabama… hurricane kicking up something bad…fuel level is three five mikes to bingo. Over.

  Jamie rushed past Balboa to the handset of the SINCGARS and keyed up. “USCGC Joshua James can you hear us?”

  “This is the Joshua James, we can hear you. Who is this? What is your location and status? Over.”

  Jamie’s heart leaped in his chest. He was shaking so bad that he nearly dropped the handset. He fumbled with it and grabbed it firmly. “We are on the roof of the Monroe County Hospital in Monroeville, Alabama. Please send help! We have thousands of undead bearing down on us right now!”

  “Calm down, caller; we have a Jayhawk approximately fifty miles to your south. Witch Doctor, can you copy their traffic? Over.”

  “Witch Doctor copies all. How many do you have in your group? Over.” The chopper pilot sounded a bit peeved, but was willing to make the trip to aid them in any way possible.

  Jamie paused momentarily before responding. In all the chaos, he had not managed to take stock of exactly how many people they had. He counted them out on his hands.

  Myself, Balboa, Buffey, Dakota, Rickey, Ashleigh, Chris, Curtis, Joe, and Amos

  Jamie answered the chopper designated as Witch Doctor back with an accurate head count, explaining that Dakota was an infant and Rickey was a child. The pilot paused and acknowledged.

  “We are gonna head your way, but we can only hold seven people, tops. Eight if you include the infant,” The pilot answered back. “We will make it to you and figure it out. Be advised, caller - we have an eighteen minute ETA and thirty five minutes worth of fuel, so have your people ready. It will take a little luck to get everyone aboard. Witch Doctor over and out.”

  The Joshua James keyed back up after the chopper signed off. “Be advised caller, our UAV showed well over two thousand undead in your area before going offline. We have been tracking them from Birmingham, headed south. Be advised that they are irradiated and considerably more dangerous. Take all necessary precautions and we hope to see you soon. Joshua James over and out.”

  Jamie nearly pissed his pants he was so happy. He turned to tell the good news to Balboa and the rest of the group when he noticed that Balboa was gone. “Where the hell did he go?”

  “He just ran past, I don’t know where he’s going!” Buffey said, a combined mix of enthusiasm and worry crossed her face. She nervously looked back down the staircase and back up to the roof several times.

  Jamie looked down at his watch anxiously.

  Eighteen minutes until rescue.

  * * *

  Joe could hardly hold himself up. The combination of nervousness, anticipation, and copious amounts of sugar and caffeine were wreaking havoc with his senses and his ability to focus and control his situation. The weather outside mimicked his emotions as he brought into his sight the four Marines; out of control and haphazardly going in all directions simultaneously. He walked down the causeway towards the four Marines. Two of the Marines were kneeled down on either side of the two who were obviously higher rank and in charge. Joe watched the Hispanic Marine that was standing beside of the one that he guessed was Lieutenant Wyatt. He held Lucy by her right elbow as she squirmed and fought with the Marine as he viciously jerked her back towards him. Joe sized up his foes, and he was still grossly outnumbered simply by training. He remembered from earlier that it was a Marine Recon Unit, not to be taken lightly especially by someone like Joe who was, by his own words, just a “weekend warrior.” Chris and Amos had taken up positions on the hill leading down to the road, out of sight of the unit but still within the range for a clear shot if there was one to be had. Chris walked a few paces behind and to Joe’s left to make sure that his back was covered. Joe and Chris got to within fifty feet of the Marines when Lieutenant Wyatt pulled his sidearm and pressed it firmly against Lucy’s chin.

  “That’s far enough there, cowboy,” Wyatt said as he took the pistol from Lucy’s chin and aimed it directly at Joe and Chris.

  Joe stopped at the threat and did not remove his hand from his rifle. “Lieutenant Wyatt I presume? Thought you were coming to lend us a hand, not take our people hostage.”

  Wyatt grinned devilishly and slowly moved the pistol back to Lucy’s chin. “Well you know how Marines work; improvise, adapt, and overcome. I had no intentions of having to kill anyone to get what I needed.”

  “And what exactly do you need?”

  “I think there is supposed to be a ‘sir’ after that, don’t you? I know you have a military background from the radio and the way you wear that M4,” Wyatt responded.

  “I only call those who are worthy of that designation, and you are not Wyatt” Joe insulted Wyatt, he did not have time for mind games. A couple thousand zombies bearing down on you put things into fast-forward. Joe got down to business. “What do you want for Lucy? I'm sure that we can come to some kind of understanding – soldier to soldier.”

  “You know what I want. One of those people knows where that silo is and I intend on finding out which one it is; hell maybe you know and just need a little,” Wyatt said, a flash of something going across his face. He was mad with power, off the chain of command and operating on his own set of orders. He had lost all sense of right and wrong, no sense of reality and it had scarred and cracked his mind. There may hav
e been a missile silo, maybe there wasn’t, but no one was going to tell him that now.

  “Look, for the last time. There is no silo; even if there was, what makes you think that we would know where it is?” Joe said, his hand gripping the M4 tighter. The wind whipped around and came to a slow settle, finally dying down some. Joe squinted at Wyatt, trying to figure out his next move.

  “Well then you are just as useless as that other bitch, Brittany,” Wyatt said.

  Joe immediately realized what Wyatt’s next move was, and before he could react on it, it happened. The world went into slow motion for a brief few seconds. Joe grabbed and raised his M4 as quickly as his arms would let him, but he was mired in glue, unable to reach up fast enough. The Marine to Wyatt’s right raised his rifle in near-perfect unison with Joe, causing Joe to switch targets swiftly from Wyatt to the Hispanic Marine to his right. Joe swung the rifle around, placing the red dot sight squarely in the face of the Hispanic Marine and fired two shots in quick succession. The shots landed just south of where Joe had aimed, piercing through the Marine’s neck. Blood immediately flowed from the massive, blown-open wound that the 5.56mm rounds made as they tore through him.

  Ruiz managed a single shot off before the rounds passed through his neck, severing his spine and dropping him like a bad habit. The single round that had left the barrel of his M4 passed through Joe’s right shoulder, spinning him back and to his right. Joe instinctively ducked down as his cohorts in the bushes and his lone sniper on the roof dropped the other two Marines that flanked Wyatt.

  Wyatt watched as his Staff Sergeant, Ruiz, dropped backwards with three shots ringing out and two of them passing through Ruiz’s neck. Wyatt grabbed Lucy quickly and shoved the 9mm hard against her chin as his other two Marines dropped from unknown shooters that he never got a good look at. Muzzle flashes from his ten and two o’clock gave away their positions, but it did not matter. Wyatt decided to spend his last bargaining chip and go out guns blazing. With lightning quickness he fired a single shot into Lucy’s brain through the underside of her chin, blowing bits of dark red brain matter and skull fragments into the breeze.

  Joe fell to the ground, the intense pain in his shoulder starting to burn, then giving way to a piercing throb almost immediately. He spun around, desperately trying to raise his M4, but his right arm would not do what he told it and refused to work. Wyatt had just taken out Lucy with a single well-placed shot point blank under her chin.

  “NOOOOO!” Joe screamed as he switched the rifle to his left hand side, his weak side, and tried to steady the rifle with his left knee. He started to aim the M4 at Wyatt as he dropped Lucy and began firing off rounds towards Joe and Chris, who had dropped to one knee and started to fire. Wyatt emptied his clip at the two men, sprinting towards the line of irradiated undead that was still coming through the streets and spilling over in droves across the road from the hospital. Joe noticed that Lieutenant Wyatt was not being hit or going down when he realized that Chris was not shooting at him. He was concentrating his fire elsewhere. Wyatt disappeared down the street without even taking a round, the faint sound of 9mm fire following him as he ran. Joe raised his head up in time to see what Chris was firing at.

  Zombies.

  Hundreds – thousands of galloping, sprinting undead were coming across the road less than a hundred feet away. Chris was firing off round after round to his immediate left and center, shredding a pair of irradiated zombies as he did. The irradiated undead were a hell of a lot faster than the run-of-the-mill shambling creatures they had been used to. Chris slung his rifle and went to help get his best friend up. Joe’s shoulder was bleeding profusely; the single round had passed through his subclavian artery in his shoulder, and was spewing forth bright-red blood. Joe hastily grabbed his friends hand in assistance and stumbled up as the moans of the undead gave way to a concentrated, throaty roar. It sounded like a herd of man-hungry lions were after the two men.

  “COME ON GUYS! MOVE YOUR ASS IF YOU WANT TO LIVE!” Chris screamed at Amos and Curtis, sprinting away from their respective hiding spots in the bushes. Amos scrambled down from a wall that was adjacent to the ER entrance. As he was scrambling down, he noticed movement in the Humvee. Amos squinted at the figure in the front seat, scrambling to get through the vehicle. It was Balboa, who busted out of the driver’s side of the Humvee toting the Ma Deuce. The big machine gun was impossible to fire with just one person, but Balboa was a big enough boy to at least carry it. Amos sprinted over to where he was at, hollering to Balboa as he did.

  “We gotta move! What the hell are you doing?” Amos shouted over the dull roar of zombies and hurricane-force winds.

  “Grab the fifty cal! We got eighteen minutes until the chopper gets here, less than that now! We gotta get to the roof and hold the sons a’ bitches off for a few more minutes! Grab this thing and give me a hand! Grab the tripod too!”

  Amos did as he was instructed and grabbed the business end of the fifty cal and grabbed the tripod in his other hand. The Ma Deuce weighed about 130 pounds with the tripod and all, not by any means light. Balboa grabbed the other end and the two men trotted away from the Humvee, leaving it to the dead. The weight of the gun slowed them down considerably, but it was a necessary risk as far as Balboa was concerned. The swarm of zombies that was bearing down on them saw to that.

  The irradiated undead that stormed after them did not look any different than the zombies that they had previously encountered, except that they were fast. They were really fast, actually. The sprinting zombies were still not as agile on their feet as their regular undead counterparts, but the fact that they were so quick and had no predictable movements was of great concern. They bounded over the curb across the road from Balboa and Amos as they tried desperately to shuffle away as fast as their feet would take them. By the time they got up the hill near the front entrance, both men were near muscle failure. The approaching undead spotted them as they were rounding the corner and making their last mad dash through the front door.

  Joe and Chris were already inside the main lobby. Joe was sprawled out on a couch in the front foyer, being tended to by Chris. The round that Joe had taken through his right shoulder was still bleeding profusely, causing Joe’s color to turn a shade that was close to the hue of the undead that now pursued them. Chris was trying desperately to stop the flow of blood coming from his shoulder. Unfortunately for Joe, the shoulder was a notoriously bad spot to try and stem blood flow from. There was not an appropriate place for a tourniquet to be placed to get bleeding to stop. Chris grabbed a towel from one of the packs lying about and tried desperately to tie it around Joe’s armpit and tied it off as best he could.

  Balboa and Amos burst through the doorway, dropping the Ma Deuce; the heavy machine gun thumping loudly on the floor as they did. Balboa snatched the tripod up and, despite the burning in his arms and the lack of them wanting to work properly, set up the tripod and motioned to Amos to set up the .50 cal on it.

  “Come on Amos! Now or never, brother!” Balboa hysterically hollered.

  Amos grabbed the 80-plus pound machine gun and hoisted it onto the tripod, slamming it down accidentally, a little harder than he would have liked. His arms were like Balboa’s – starting to feel the burn of total muscle failure. Balboa knew the feeling of not being able to hold yourself up from sheer exhaustion from his days at Basic Training. Drill sergeants were notorious for giving you a task that was impossible to do, just to see how you would react to it. Total muscle failure was one of those tricks, telling you to push when your body physically could not do any more work.

  Amos’ arms gave out as he set the gun down, and Balboa wasted no time getting behind the gun and racking the first round, jerking the handles with both hands and preparing for the worst. Amos stumbled behind of Balboa, tired and sweating profusely. Chris was cinching up the makeshift bandage around Joe’s arm and fashioning a half-assed sling from another towel that he procured. Chris got Joe to his feet and motioned for Amos to give him a hand. Amo
s obliged, grabbing under Joe’s left arm and staggering him towards the stairs. Chris flung his rifle around to his front as he stepped backwards.

  “Balboa! Come on, dude! We don’t have a lot of time! Those things are gonna bust through here any second,” Chris screamed as he continued towards the stairs, pacing backwards with his rifle raised.

  Balboa did not take his eyes off the front door as the first of the irradiated undead stormed around the corner, spotting him immediately. “Get out of here Chris! The chopper is gonna be here in just a few minutes!”

  “Chopper? What chopper?” Chris said as he stopped in his tracks.

  “The Coast Guard is sending a helicopter! Get to the roof, it will be here in just a couple minutes!” Balboa said.

  Chris looked up the stairs and back to Balboa several times before giving Balboa one last piece of advice. “Don’t get overrun! Get the hell out of there as soon as you can! We will wait as long as we can!”

  Balboa slid his thumbs over to the butterfly triggers on the Ma Deuce and grinned ever so slightly. “GET SOME!” he screamed at the top of his lungs as the zombies started spilling in through the entryway. Balboa opened fire with the full force of the Browning M2 as the first zombie got to within ten feet and was immediately turned into zombie sausage.

  The deafening roar of the .50 cal could be heard throughout the hospital, even by Jamie and the rest of the group that was at the top of the building, just outside of the doorway. Jamie shot through the doorway and trained his ear to the sound. He had no clue how the Ma Deuce had gotten into the building, and did not care. It meant that there was plenty of firepower to keep the approaching horde at bay, but it also meant that there was a distinct possibility that they would be overrun before they could be rescued. Jamie looked down at his watch again, timing the helicopter once more.

  Six minutes to rescue.

  CHAPTER 16

  Chris sprinted up the stairs and caught up to Amos as he was reaching the landing on the third floor, still toting Joe with him. Joe shuffled his feet unsteadily as he tried his best to help his own cause by getting to the roof. He had overheard Balboa say something about a helicopter, but he couldn’t tell exactly. His vision was blurry and everyone that was talking to him or around him sounded as if they were in a barrel. Spots of black appeared in front of him as stars and other odd shapes pervaded his vision. He was dizzy and still losing blood; it dripped down his right arm as it hung slack against body, held up by the makeshift sling. Chris darted up behind of him and Amos and grabbed up under Joe’s bad arm. Joe winced and his vision became momentarily clearer as the pain shot through his arm. Chris stepped with Amos and Joe, half-dragging him up the steps towards the roof.