Further west we went, until we finally hit gold—but only because the horde had run into something that seemed to have even more draw than whatever kept them together: food. As we topped a rise, another broad valley opened before us, and across the lower plateau there they were, feasting on what remained of well over fifty cow carcasses. I wondered if those had been “our” cows that we’d tracked a few days ago. There was of course no way of telling, but we weren’t too far from where we’d started chasing the herd. That meant that the settlement that hadn’t given us the time of day was close, too. I wondered if I should have spoken up in favor of trying to reach them via radio to warn them, but considering that I was the only one in the car with just a single mark on my neck I held my tongue. Besides, with luck the zombies would continue heading in their previous direction, and that would lead them past the settlement, not toward it. There was a good chance that the radio still wasn’t working. It hadn’t, last night before we made camp.
Burns didn’t leave the car up on the rise but let it roll back as soon as we’d all gotten a good look at what lay beyond, then reversed and drove a good two miles back the way we had come, over to a small barn we’d seen by the side of the road. Nate and Pia got out to check it for squatters, and five minutes later the car was safely stowed away, with the four of us making the way back on foot. I’d brought my Mossberg, as usual ignoring Nate’s gripe, but didn’t intend to use the shotgun much, if at all. Today was all about working from a distance, so my sniper rifle would hopefully be all I needed. It had been a few weeks since I’d shot it, but I had a certain feeling that I’d get to use most of the forty spare rounds of ammo that I’d packed.
As we closed in on the rise, Nate gestured us to spread out—me and Burns toward the north, him and Pia south. By the time I got a glimpse at the valley below, the other two were barely visible through the high grass anymore, blending in well. Burns gave me a bright grin that made some of the flutters in my stomach quiet down, and together we crawled the last yards to make sure not to stand out silhouetted against the sky.
Exhaling slowly, I settled into a comfortable position on the ground and adjusted the scope before I started scanning the crowds below. The valley was a good four miles wide, and with the gentle slope of the grassy hills I could see most of the area from where I was. There was no telling how many more zombies were further south or beyond the rise and swell that I could take in—but the knowledge that we were once more so close to so many of them made my heart thud with fear. Around the larger lumps of the cow carcasses they looked almost like flies.
Static crackled in my ear, followed by Nate’s voice on the open com channel. “Remember what we’re here for. Report anything unusual that you see. Do not engage at all if all of them look just the same to you. Actually, do not engage unless you really have to.” That last bit was likely not meant for me. I usually wasn’t that trigger happy.
I didn’t acknowledge his order, knowing all too well that he expected it to be followed. Remaining as immobile and silent as possible was key.
It took me a little to achieve that quiet focus needed to clear my mind, for my hands to stop shaking, until my view finally evened out. I started at the closest carcass, a good three hundred yards away. The bones of the massive ribcage were showing, making me estimate that the cow had found its end during the night, maybe the early morning. It was hard to guess. So far I’d never paid attention to how quickly zombies decimated food, always trying to get away as fast as possible myself. They were moving slow and sluggish as they continued to tear at flesh and viscera, but that was likely both from the fact that it was daylight, and they’d had ample time to gorge themselves. All of the ten zombies at the carcass that I could at least partially see looked just as we’d gotten used to—none too fresh, with obvious signs of decay marring their bodies, but all-over still intact and moving. None of them looked what I would have described as newer. Their clothes were tatters only, making it obvious that they’d been out and about for a long time.
I skipped over to the next carcass, then the next after that, the results remaining the same. Glancing at Burns, I wondered if he had more luck, but he answered my silent question when he noticed my movement. “Just a lot of undead fuckers down there,” he said, agreeing with my assessment. Unwilling to give up so soon after spending hours to get here, I looked back through my scope, trying my luck a little further down the valley.
It was Pia’s low curse that made me stop again. “Third cow from the oak tree, south-southwest,” she whispered. “Two are wearing body armor.”
That sounded suspicious enough to warrant closer investigation. It took me half a minute to locate the right carcass, seeing as our positions were so far apart, but when I found it, there was no mistaking that she was right. Two of the zombies that were squatting around the dead animal were clad all in black and muted camouflage tones, the gear still mostly intact, only torn in a few places. They carried no packs, weapons, or other gear, but when the one half-hidden by the carcass reared up, I could see plainly that her—its—formerly blonde hair was still looking like it belonged to a woman who was alive. A lot of the more decayed ones had only clumps and strands left, and that tangled as hell. Hers had partly come free from a braid, which would have been much worse had she—it, I reprimanded myself again—been out and about for more than a month. Through the scope I saw that one of the eyes didn’t look quite functional anymore, and part of the cheek and ear on that side were torn out, but the overall movements were almost as fluent as mine would have been. The second walking corpse had its back toward us, so no judging about the state there, but as it bent over, I got a glimpse of its neck, and the three dark x-shaped marks visible there.
“The male one’s juiced up,” I reported, needing a moment to get the saliva flowing in my mouth again. “They both look mighty healthy.”
Nate took a little while to reply. “Burns, keep tabs on them. They’re a little too far into the mass to take them out comfortably, but might be a good target if we don’t find anything closer.”
We continued to search, but didn’t find anything. Quite disappointing, although it should have come as a relief. It was a good hour after we’d gotten here when Nate gave us new orders. “Zilinsky, Burns, you stay here and continue to canvas the area. Lewis and I will go further south to see if we find us some better targets.”
I didn’t protest—didn’t think of it, really—as I reached over to Burns to lightly clap him on the shoulder to let him know that I was out of here, then folded up my M24 and started crawling backward until I could get up safely. Within minutes, I joined Nate where he was already waiting for me, his own rifle slung across his back but his assault rifle at the ready. I followed him as he set out in a southward direction, walking about a mile before we found a good surveillance position once more.
The valley was narrower here, the slope down almost as steep as it had been around Harristown. That gave us a better vantage point, and with fewer zombies below it was easier to make them out. The bulk of the horde seemed to have been where we’d checked previously, if not further north. That probably meant that most of the fast ones—juiced or just fresh—would be up there, too. More possible targets would mean higher danger, and I wasn’t too disappointed that Nate didn’t send us straight there. Reasonable man, him.
More searching ensued, and within the next ten minutes we picked out five more zombies that looked a little fresher, for lack of another term, than the others. Two of them were hunched over something not far from the end of the slope, and after a moment of deliberation Nate called Pia and Burns over. As soon as they joined us he told Burns and me to cover them and he and his second in command took off down the slope, creeping toward the zombies.
I’d never had to cover anyone with a sniper rifle, and really didn’t care for having my people in my scope repeatedly as I checked on their surroundings. It was one thing to hit a zombie that was a mile away, but quite another to possibly blow one of my people’s head
s off. Even if they occasionally annoyed the heck out of me, I’d rather avoid that.
“If you gnash your teeth any louder, you’ll alert the shamblers,” Burns whispered to me, following that up with one of his usual snickers. I didn’t take my eye off the scope yet would have loved to retaliate physically, but he was too far away from me that I could have tried kicking him. Which, case in point, I wouldn’t have attempted. Triggers were fickle things when pressed sometimes.
“I just hate this,” I replied, my voice low enough to lose most of the emotion swinging in it.
“Would you rather be down there?” he asked. Just then Nate reared up from his crouch, grabbing one of the zombies from behind. A quick motion was enough to break its neck, making the now permanently dead body sag to the ground. Pia managed the exact same maneuver with the other one. If I hadn’t been watching them, I would have missed it. A few shamblers looked up at the sudden motion, but none of them made a move to come after the possible new meal. Fresh beef beat everything, even for the undead.
“Nah, I’m good,” I mumbled, swallowing thickly. Sometimes it was all too easy to forget that they were really good at what they’d been trained to be—killers.
Nate and Pia remained right where they were, looking the bodies over with quick, precise motions. Within minutes they were done, retreating about halfway up the slope before Nate reported in.
“No needle marks, no tats. My estimate is that they got infected three months ago. There was more decay from up close. Part of their gear is winter clothes. Moderately well-nourished, but not too bright or strong. How far over to the next promising targets?”
I checked and did the calculations in my head. “About half a click out, to your two. You have to sneak by about twenty of them.”
He and Pia quickly debated in hushed, rapid-fire Serbian, then took off with the same instructions—for us to cover their asses. If watching them before had been bad, now it was worse, with more than a quarter mile of open, zombie-littered ground between where they had to get out of cover and their targets. But like before, the lone zombie they picked out went down without drawing attention. Sadly, the results were the same here, too.
Even with the temperatures lower today, I was drenched in sweat by the time they returned to us, making it all the way back without a hitch. Nate was barely winded, although I could tell from how tense he was that sneaking through a field of zombies was not what he liked to do for fun. “Have you found any other targets?” I shook my head, as did Burns. He traded glances with Pia, then looked back to me. “You’re so not going to like this.”
“Why are you singling me out?” I asked, a little offended. All this had been my idea, after all.
“Because it concerns you.” To all of us, he explained what he wanted to do next. “The two further north are our best bet, but they are too far into the horde for us to just sneak up on them and finish them off. I’m not sure I could take one of the stronger ones on with my bare hands, and I’d rather not bite it because I got too cocky. The idea is, we try to take out as many of those that might, maybe, be juiced up, and while you two,” he nodded at the others, “provide a distraction, we go down there and search them.”
“We what?” I asked before anyone else could speak up. “That’s it? First we get them all riled up and aggressive, and then we go toe to toe with them? What’s not to like about that?”
He gave me a sharp look that made me shut up. “That wasn’t the part I was talking about.” Back to the others, he looked toward the direction where the barn with the car was. “While we get into position, you get the car. As soon as I give you the ‘go,’ you drive down there and lead them on a merry chase. That way they’ll hopefully get distracted and leave us a limited time window to check up on the ones we took out before. Just stick around long enough to give us maybe ten minutes, then you beat it. If they come after you too strongly, get the hell out of there immediately. We’ll take care of ourselves. Plan is to rendezvous five miles down this road, at the second intersection. If you can’t make it back, we’ll meet up in camp.”
I did a quick estimate in my head. Even subtracting all the zig-zagging we’d done to get here, camp wasn’t just over the next hill.
“It will take us hours to make it back there on foot,” I objected.
Nate shrugged. “Likely closer to a day, if we don’t walk through the night. Got any better ideas?”
I shook my head. Neither Burns nor Pia protested, so it was decided. They left us most of their spare sniper rifle ammo before they moved out. Studying Nate for a second to get a better reading of his mood, I gave up. “Let me guess. This is still not the part I won’t like.”
He held my gaze evenly, but I didn’t care for how the corner of his mouth turned up. Humor in these situations was never a good thing.
“Even if they’re great at distracting the zombies, maybe half of them will give chase. That still leaves us with the other half.” He paused, his smirk finally appearing. “We’ll have to disguise ourselves so we don’t stick out. We know that they try to discern whether we are food or not by scenting us, so that shouldn’t be too hard.”
And that, ladies and gentlemen, was not the most brilliant idea of the century.
“Fuck, no! I’m not going to literally roll around in zombie guts!”
Nate didn’t even do me the courtesy of denying that this was his plan.
“It’s the only way. I can’t go down there and expect to survive. You won’t get halfway there. Even if they’re too dumb to pinpoint our location from the shots, they will be on high alert when they notice that some of their own are dropping dead. The cows may have fed them enough to buy us some time to go investigate, but I don’t doubt that within the first half hour, the corpses we produce will be all but gone. Trust me, it’s not the event of the day for me when I get to smear zombie parts all over you.”
“We both know that it is!” I accused, but after suffering that smirk for another three seconds, I let my breath out in a rush and looked at the horde below. “So, how exactly are we going to do this? I presume we’ll have to move out as soon as we’re done taking them down, so the most macabre paint job in the history of the apocalypse will happen before that?”
He nodded. “I’ll sneak down there, grab that one over there that’s already looking a little unsteady. Drag it back up here. We try to get as much of the juicy parts all over us. The gore should stick. By then, the others will be back with the car. We start taking the ones out that look the most promising while they drive down there to confuse the remaining ones. Once the zombies start giving chase, we go have a look at the bodies. If we find something, great. If not, we only have this one shot. I’m not going to risk your life or my own again on the off-chance that there’s one shambler down there that might have an injection mark on its arm or neck.”
I still didn’t like this, but there was no sense in protesting. “How do we find the best targets?” The two that we’d singled out were a given, but we had enough ammo for another hundred, if I didn’t botch too many shots. “One shot, one kill” might be the sniper motto, but I wasn’t quite there yet, not even on my best days.
“We try to single those out that have gear on that still looks like more than rags,” Nate proposed. “I’ll take the long range, you the short. Once the car is down there, we concentrate on those that react the fastest and give chase. At Harristown the entire mob only moved after the juiced ones took off after us. I don’t think we can rely on that to happen again now, but if there are some of them hiding down there, we might be able to single them out that way.”
“Lots of ‘ifs’ in that,” I noted.
“Let’s just say that if we’ve miscalculated and they come after us, we likely have less than two minutes left to live. A quick, brutal death is still better than what’s happening in camp right now, don’t you think?”
My nod was a reluctant one, but I had to agree with him.
“Let’s do this,” I said after allowing myself an
other moment of asking myself why the ever-loving fuck I was doing this. Not like my ego would have let me back down.
“Damn straight,” Nate replied, giving me a real grin. “Get your gear ready while I take care of our camouflage. When I’m back, it’s on.”
Chapter 11
I had never been so disgusted in my entire life.
Over the course of the last year, I’d come to terms with a lot of things—no running water. No warm water of any kind for anything that wasn’t food. Cat food and stale crackers for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Sleeping everywhere, in every position, with gear and weapons that weighed just about half as much as I did, strapped to my body. Living with shy of twenty people in a space that usually would have been crowded for more than four.
But nothing could have prepared me for being rubbed down with zombie goo.
It wasn’t just the stench, although that in and of itself was bad enough, breathing mask notwithstanding. It wasn’t the latent fear that if I got into contact with too much of that gunk I’d get infected. There was the consistency of the bits and pieces that adhered to my arms where I could constantly see them. Squish them between my fingers as I dumped the lot of it across Nate’s body armor. It wasn’t just like dead or decaying meat. It was too elastic, too slimy overall, but at the same time strong enough that just tearing off chunks didn’t work. We had to cut them. Stick them under buckles and straps. I wasn’t even sure if dismembering a normal human corpse wouldn’t have been ten times easier, and that was saying a lot.
Green Fields Series Box Set | Vol. 2 | Books 4-6 Page 15