by Bryan Way
I remain hidden for a moment, listening to the fire alarm as I attempt to recall the scene by the doorway. Three bodies. No one standing. No movement. I glance around the corner and confirm they’re gone. “CLEAR!” I shout, standing up and pointing my pistol into the hallway as I reveal myself. After taking a moment to reattach my belt, I turn hard into the opposing wall, flattening my back against it and breathing heavily as I push toward the doorway. I hold my breath and glance through a pane of glass at the stairwell.
When one of the bodies moves, I jerk the pistol over and plug my last shot into the center of his chest. I look back to see Rich slump out of his perch and roll to the ground, then hear the clatter of Ally’s rifle as she dives across the tile toward him. I turn back to the door and push it open, sliding one foot after the other a few inches at a time while gasping for air and keeping my pistol pointed at the ground. It’s empty.
I fumble at the catch and quickly release the spent magazine, slipping it in my belt before slapping in a new one and chambering. I glance over the balcony; nothing below. As the fire alarm continues to blare above and below, I press my back into the railing against the wall and duck walk down the steps, keeping the pistol in both hands next to my head so that the warm slide of the Colt grazes my ear. I make it to the first landing, switch my pistol to the other side, and start easing myself along the railing when PANG! A shot rips off below, glancing off the railing and punching a hole in the opaque window behind me. I dive to the left, smarting from a ricochet that was loud enough to rattle my fillings. “Grey?!” It’s Mursak.
“It’s me, check your fucking target!”
“Are they gone?!” He continues.
“What happened?!”
“Anderson’s down!”
I try to breathe, but I vomit so fast I almost lose consciousness. There isn’t much for me to barf up, so I gag a few more times before yanking myself away from the puddle of my stomach contents toward the next set of steps. Four suspended shots ring out from the front yard, causing us all to duck as someone screams in fright. I bolt down the stairs and push past Mursak. “What the hell was that?!” Jake asks, startling me. He’s perched over Anderson’s motionless body.
“GET OUT OF THE WAY!” I scream. Anderson is completely limp and bleeding. Two bullets have blown through his burly chest and a third has punched a hole in his helmet. I rip off his lid and immediately confirm that he hasn’t been shot in the head. The two bullets in his chest appear to have smoked into the body armor, but not through it. “It’s not his blood…” Jake murmurs. Not only is he not bleeding, he’s still breathing.
“Jesus, get Karen down here NOW!” Jake picks up his radio to relay my command as I run back toward the steps, slipping on the hot bullet casings and almost falling on the two camouflaged bodies seeping blood by the door. Jake launches into a coughing fit as I sprint upstairs, losing my footing and nearly falling on the bodies once again.
“Jesus, can we turn the alarm off?!” I shout. “NOW, GOD DAMMIT!”
“Sak’s on it!” Jake yells from downstairs.
“Rich got shot!” Ally wails.
I run over and slide to my knees as Rich grits his teeth, waving his hand dismissively.
“I’m fine…” Rich moans.
“Ally, get the kids… we gotta move!” I shout.
“Where’s Mel?” She screams.
“They took her, we gotta move, NOW!” Ally takes off and I turn to Rich. “Are you good to go?!”
“Give me a minute…”
“Mursak! Get that fuckin’ alarm off and get to the gate…” I scream into the radio, turning my head to shout after Ally. “Get on the PA!”
Staying hunched over, I snap up my rifle, katana, and trench coat on my way back to the stairwell, sliding on the coat and fixing the weapons to my body as I jog down the steps. When I get to the bottom and enter the hall again, I hear Ally repeat my command through the noise as Karen examines Anderson. The hallway lights have been turned on, revealing that the smoke from the gunfire is still chunky in the air.
“Is he okay?!”
“He’s unconscious! I have to…”
“Move him to medlab…” I shout.
“I don’t know if we can!”
“MOVE HIM TO THE GODDAMN MEDLAB… SAK!”
A few seconds later, the alarm shuts off and Mursak comes running from the main office. I’m hyperventilating, my mouth is full of dust and bile, and I have a raging headache. I try to breathe deep and exhale between spitting out sips from a nearby water fountain. I feel a momentary intrusion of consciousness that begs me to think through my next actions, but those thoughts drown in adrenaline as I turn to the gate with Mursak in tow.
“Karen, you’re in charge until we get back…”
“Where’s Helen?!” She asks.
“They took her too…” Sak mutters.
“…then we’re gettin’ ‘em back…” I reply.
“God… Jeff…!” Karen shouts. “BE CAREFUL! JEFF!”
I turn into the doorway, hearing Karen’s voice fade as I discover Rich already at the gate. I lead the charge through the door and run to the edge of the bus; the M35 is already gone, but I can hear the engine echoing down the street. “God dammit!” Rich shouts. I turn around and grasp my katana handle, following Rich’s eyes to see that they’ve shot out the bus tires on the left side. “Come on!” I spit. The snow is still pouring out of the sky as I trek to the Outback, which is stationed surreptitiously at the end of the crashed cars by the stockade. I take the passenger seat, Mursak gets in the back, and Rich takes the wheel. “Okay… take a breath.” Rich says.
Once I’ve finished reloading my Winchester, I turn around to see that Mursak brought his survival pack. “You got ACP in there?” Mursak nods and hands me the box. “Give him your rifle.” I say, nodding at Rich. He hands it to Mursak, stifling my attempt to rush us with a simple hand gesture. I listen to the sound of us all breathing heavily as Mursak refills Anderson’s rifle from the bandolier while waiting for Rich to speak.
“Okay…” Rich starts. “What are we doing?”
“Get ‘em back…”
“Okay…”
“They’re gonna make tracks…” I interrupt, spinning my finger to illustrate. “Keep the headlights off, go slow… the car’s white so we oughta blend in… come on…”
“How are we getting them back?”
“First we gotta find ‘em. Punch it.”
Rich purses his lips and starts the car. I look around frantically, trying to make sure none of them stayed behind in anticipation of us following them. Once he makes it out to the main road, I relax a bit; I can’t see their tail lights, but the plow tracks make it clear they were headed toward the reservoir. The road has a few big curves, so Rich takes them easily to avoid the possibility of an ambush. Not only are our headlights off, I don’t see the reflection of our running lights against the surroundings. I consider the possibility that Rich disconnected them.
“Anderson okay?” Rich asks.
“Don’t know. How ‘bout you?”
“Got my left shoulder… it’ll heal… anyone else hurt?”
“Don’t think so.”
“Jeff…” Mursak starts. “What are we doing?”
“…we’ll figure it out.”
We continue silently down the road as I try to eliminate my preconceptions of what can happen next. More than ever, I have to be both vigilant and open to lateral thinking. It occurs to me now that I’m not dressed warmly enough for this, though I’m grateful I kept the lining in my trench coat and put on a flannel shirt earlier. Having left my toothpick fob in my trench coat pocket, I can’t resist slipping one in my mouth. “Stop…” Mursak says quietly. Rich and I look around frantically as he takes his foot off the gas. “Stop-stop-stop! There!” The car continues to inch forward as we look in the direction of Mursak’s extended arm.
“What?” Rich asks.
“I don’t see anything!” I growl.
“Th
ere…”
Rich rolls down the window. We follow Mursak’s finger as he points ahead and to the left, across an unremarkable snow covered field that ends in naked trees and dense brush two hundred feet away. It takes a moment to focus on anything other than the specks of white and gray bleeding through the branches, but I eventually spot a soft, reddish light close to the ground. When I move my head, I can see it’s a pair: tail lights.
“I’ll be damned…” Rich mutters.
“What are we looking at?” I ask.
“The car…”
“No shit… where are they stopped?”
“DC cubed… the parking lot…”
The community college. We spent a night here and moved on two and a half months ago… is it possible Dave and his paranoid minions are responsible for this? If they’re paranoid…
“Pull over.”
“What?” Rich asks.
“They’re waiting… we can see them, they can’t see us… pull over.”
“That’s quite an assumption…” Mursak adds.
“Shh…”
Rich obliges, keeping the window down to monitor how much sound we make. Judging by the movement of the light as we creep forward, they’re a little over five hundred feet away. I slip on my gloves. “Do we have binoculars?” I whisper. Mursak goes into his bag and produces a pair, handing them off to me. I pull the catch and open the door slowly until I can barely slip out. “Grab the weapons… leave everything else.” Keeping low, I creep forward until I have a decent sightline with good cover.
The M35 is ahead and to the right, parked about a hundred feet from the lot entrance on a declining hill. The driveway they occupy is both long and narrow with concrete curbs on either side, so if we’d followed them, we would’ve pulled into a bottleneck. I turn back quickly when I hear a sound, but it’s just Rich and Mursak. Sak gets down on one knee, pulls his rifle tight to his shoulder, and continually sweeps a 45° field of view with the truck in the center. Rich sidles up next to me, popping the cap on Anderson’s rifle scope.
“What are you doing?” I ask.
“Sighting.”
“Don’t shoot.”
“Of course not. Colin… make sure we’re covered 360.”
“What? Why?” Mursak replies.
“Zombies.”
“Dammit…”
I return my eyes to the binoculars and look at the back of the covered truck. After a moment, the wind picks up and one of the unclasped flaps kicks open to reveal a man in camouflage with his weapon pointed toward the driveway. “Incoming…” Mursak says. I reach for my pistol as I look back, but he’s pointing down the hill toward the college. I pick up the binoculars again to see a Humvee driving up the college’s unnecessarily gigantic parking lot toward the M35.
When the vehicles are nose to nose, two guys get out of the Humvee and one exits driver’s side of the M35. It’s impossible to make out everything at this distance, especially with the amount of brush in the way, but think I see what looks like Helen being guided toward the far side back door of the Humvee.
“There’s Helen…” I say.
“What about Mel?” Rich asks.
“…wait…”
The Humvee windows are only tiny squares, so it’s impossible to see what’s going on in the car. After a brief conversation, the two from the Humvee return to their vehicle and reverse it, backing into one of the lots for a two-point turn. For just a moment, the two back windows line up in my point of view and I see what looks like three people in the back, one of whom has long hair. The Humvee turns left and drives down the hill toward the college until I’m unable to follow it thanks to the brushwood in front of me. “Fuck…” I mutter, dropping the binoculars.
“Did you see ‘em?” Rich asks.
“I don’t know…”
“What do we do?”
“Stop asking me that!” I spit. “We get down there…”
“How?”
I stand up and trek back along the barren undergrowth as Rich and Mursak follow wordlessly. I cut through some trees and a broken fence, walking until I find a sign directing us toward the college. I stop to look down a two-lane road, sliding my bandolier over my shoulder so I can grab my inhaler. I take two quick hits and hold my breath; the parking lot is divided into eight strips surrounded by a two-lane road on a slope leading down to the college, with each smaller lot separated from the next via a series of sloping, snow-coated hills.
“The M35 is parked on the road at the opposite side of the campus.” I point toward it from where we stand. “On this side, there’s a thicket… dense, but we can use it for cover.” When neither of them objects, I jump down into the road and run up a snowy hill into the thicket. I try to keep away from the brush and branches closer to the road, but we’re so deeply in shadow that I don’t think they’d see us even if were cutting them down.
Once we make it to the fourth parking strip, I lift the binoculars to see if I can find the Humvee, following the tracks along the road until I spot it parked directly in front of the shattered window of the main campus building. “Come on…” I huff. At the bottom of the hill, the road around the outside of the lots intersects on our side before crossing a drainage ditch; from there, travelling straight leads to the back entrance, and turning right leads to the main campus building.
When we arrive at the bottom, I realize we’ve only covered about half the distance; we could walk along the ditch to get to the main building faster, but we’d be completely exposed. If we continue in the thicket, we flank another six parking strips perched on an ascending hill. “Do we have a plan yet?” Rich wheezes behind me. “Jesus, Rich!” I whisper back. “We don’t know anything yet… that’s no way to make a plan.” I glance to the right as we finally set foot on something resembling a path, and then look left to see a tiny creek beyond the underbrush.
Mursak turns suddenly and lifts his rifle; an elderly, bald Zombie is stumbling toward us from the back of a residential neighborhood by the creek. I lower the stock of Mursak’s rifle, unsheathe my katana, leap over the creek, and whack his head off. “We don’t have time for that.” I say as Rich joins me. “They’re on the move.” He responds. I lift the binoculars to get a better look at the M35 coasting down the hill, then look back along the drive to see if I can spot any men in camouflage wandering around.
“Maybe they were just waiting for the-” Rich grabs my shoulder. “Get down!” I oblige without thinking and Mursak does the same. While I was staring at a snowdrift, the M35 hit the bottom of the descending lots and turned toward us. The headlights grow, staring us down through the thicket as we listen to the tires crush the fresh snow. I put my head down, and a moment later, the headlights waver across the snow in front of my face.
They’ve stopped. I hear the engine running, and nothing else. If they’ve spotted us and have radios, we’re screwed; Mursak, Rich and I might survive a shootout in the woods, but whoever lives will have lost the element of surprise. Since they have automatic weapons, surprise is the only thing we have going for us. Suddenly, the M35 turns right, giving me enough time to look up and see it hanging another right as it crosses the ditch to head off toward the main building. “Clear.” I say, returning to my feet and leaping back over the creek before taking on the binoculars again. Rich sidles up next to me and sights with Anderson’s rifle.
Once the M35 stops, the engine cuts out. Two men exit the cab, and the one I saw hiding behind the flaps jumps down from the back. All three of them head directly inside.
“Karen said there were eight?” I ask.
“Yep.” Mursak confirms.
“And we got?”
“Five.”
“Okay… so let’s assume there’s at least five left. Over there, about 500 feet?” I hold my arm out in a diagonal to the left, where one of the lots will give us the high ground above the Humvee. “That’s the best cover we’re gonna find… once we get there we figure out how we get in. Good?”
They both nod. I ke
ep my head low as I emerge from the thicket, running alongside it at the top of the hill as long as I can. When there are enough trees between me and the front entrance, I cut across the road and bolt toward one of the snow covered hills, zig-zagging behind the sparse trees. If they have someone on lookout in one of the corner windows, this might be the shortest and least successful rescue operation in history, but if the fact that they lost five guys while shooting at cinderblocks is any indication, they’re nowhere near as smart as us.
As I run along the parking strip, the trees ahead of me obscure the lights of the main building. I finally slow down, very much out of breath when I reach the edge of the blacktop. A concrete path from this point leads directly into the red brick courtyard where we parked the bus for our brief visit two and a half months ago, and now there’s a man armed with an M-16A1 pacing around that same spot. Great. They posted a sentry. They can’t be that dumb. Rich and Mursak join me after a moment, and the three of us catch our breath while the sentry occasionally looks off toward the ditch, which is now about five hundred feet to our right.
“They think we’re coming up the ditch…” I say.
“Let’s hope not.” Mursak mutters. “That means they know we’re here. If anything, he’s watching the road.”
“Rich… check the windows.”
I don’t tell him, but I follow the same command as Mursak surveys the grounds. Using the binoculars, I instantly spot a man with a rifle perched in an open window on the third floor of the main building; the windows beneath it, including the one broken through, are floor-to-ceiling, two high, in two banks of three, and four across from right to left. Our potential assailant is in the fourth window from the right on the third level. I sweep left and right again, looking through the breezeway connecting to an adjacent building with smaller windows, but I don’t see anyone else. While I wait for Rich, I notice a curiously tight cluster of parked trucks and SUVs to our left.