by Maxey, Phil
Claire and Kelly walked past him.
“Hey, we don’t know if it’s safe!” said Joel.
They both ignored him and disappeared down one of the aisles.
A crunch noise came from the entrance and Evan appeared, looking happier than he should.
“It’s not illegal to take stuff, right?” he said as he approached Joel.
Joel looked at the checkouts, and open empty tills. “Take what you need.”
Evan walked past and straight to the chips and soda aisle.
Joel had a quick look back to the pickups. Everything seemed quiet, but he couldn’t shake the memory of Jim telling him about the former sheriff that came to Wyatt and never returned.
Well, while I’m here, might as well see—
The metallic smell of blood hit Joel’s senses at the same time as Kelly’s scream. He sprung forward, looking between the aisles for where they were, until he was able to make out open double doors at the far end of the store. He sprinted towards them, through the opening, then skidded to a stop.
In front of him, piled half as high as he was tall, was a mound of human body parts. The odor was intoxicating, and he had to fight the impulse to gorge on what was making everyone else feel queasy.
He cleared his throat. “This is where they have been feeding. We should leave.”
Claire looked at him with distain. “I used to shop here! These were good people!”
Her words scraped the inside of his mind.
“We… should… leave…”
Claire went to speak again, but Kelly grabbed her arm and pulled her back into the main part of the store.
Joel reached out for the wall.
I don’t need to feed. I can go a few more days…
He forced himself to turn away, and closed the double doors behind him. The smell still clung to his nostrils, so he started to breathe through his mouth.
“What’s in there?” said Evan, walking towards him, a bag of scavenged goods in one hand.
“Nothing. You got what you need?”
“Yeah.”
“Good, grab more of those bags, there’s more we’ll need.”
After a short while, Joel and Evan were leaving the store with multiple bags full of mostly bottled water, medical supplies, and batteries. Claire and Kelly were already sitting in their pickup.
Joel’s pickup was the only one with enough space, so the bags were dumped in the rear area behind the back seats. Joel pulled out a street map of Arizona and New Mexico from one of the bags and opened it up. He caught up everyone else in the other vehicles of the route, then walked to the passenger’s side of his pickup. “Any chance you could do some driving, I’m feeling pretty drained,” he said to Marina.
She nodded, and slid across to the driver’s side while he took her place. As the sun’s beams broke across the distant peaks Joel closed his eyes, being swallowed by sleep.
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
Joel quickly looked back at Rick. Blood was pouring from lacerations across his colleague’s arms and face. He was still alert though, which was more than could be said for the CDC agent slumped on the backseat next to him.
“Water…oo,” mumbled the CDC agent under his breath, as his eyes flickered shut.
Ricked leaned closer to him, wincing in pain as he did. “Yeah, we’re almost at the water!” Ricks expression hardened, and he placed his fingers on the mans neck. “I can’t feel a pulse!”
Both scientists dead…
Stanton, the other CDC agent, had died shortly after leaving the store thirty minutes before, when he was taken down by a horde of vamps that were on the roof of the building and descended upon them before they had a chance to react. The rest of them just about made it to the vehicle they were in now.
Joel swerved the silver sedan to one side, weaving between a dead body on the road and a waste disposal truck, and continued down the long, straight road which entered the Marina Del Ray area of LA.
Rick went to beat on the man’s chest, but instead his hand fell to his side. He leaned back against the seat, his breathing labored.
“Stay with me, buddy, we’re almost there. Just half a mile,” said Joel.
Rick didn’t respond. Joel looked back at his friend who’s eyes were closed. He threw his hand back and shook Rick’s leg. Rick’s eyes sprang back open.
“Yeah, I’m good,” said Rick, then coughed. “Just tired.”
A wall of abandoned cars and trucks appeared in front of them, and Joel drove onto the sidewalk, then bumped over a small curb, across a grass verge and onto a parking lot. Vamps emerged from the nearby stores and started running towards them. He slammed into one, while veering back onto the road and roaring across a junction.
The masts and cabins of luxury yachts and boats came into view.
Joel glanced at his watch and the timer he had set a few hours earlier. It displayed two minutes, forty-five seconds.
He pushed down on the gas, while steering left and right around vehicles, large and small, their owners either dead inside or nearby on the road.
“Have to get to the right basin…” said Rick, his words barely audible.
Joel pulled the car into a large parking lot and drove across the ground, skidding to a halt near the water’s edge.
He whipped around to face the back seats. “We made—” Flinging his safety belt off he half climbed between the front seats, and shook Rick, who didn’t respond. “No… no… Come on, Rick.” Climbing further into the backseat, he felt his friend’s neck, but there was no pulse. He started chest compressions, while trying to clear Rick’s airway of blood.
His watch let out a high-pitch beep, which kept repeating.
“Fuck!”
He looked at the dead CDC agent to his right, and the suitcase still handcuffed to the man’s hand.
Climbing over him he kicked the rear door open, got out, then dragged the body with the case and lifted him up across his shoulders. Struggling to carry the weight, he jogged across the remaining ground to the water’s edge and looked out across the bay for any sign of a coast guard boat.
Then he saw it. A small rigid-hulled boat, its stern being the only part visible, bobbing up and down amongst the waves, twenty yards from him. Alongside, were bodies wearing orange jackets.
He slumped to his knees, letting the body and the suitcase fall to the ground behind him, and blinked at the sun glittering off the waves. In the distance, smoke rose above north LA and, behind him, the sound of screams and things hungry to feed filled the air.
“Joel!”
Uh… What…
“Joel, wake up!”
He opened his eyes and dragged his head upwards, looking across at Marina, who looked afraid. “What’s wrong?”
A subdued growling came from Flint.
“Look!” she exclaimed to him, looking outside.
As his eyes focused on the green and beige hues made up of bushes, sand, and dirt around the three vehicles, other things started to come into view. Humanoid shapes, most flat to the dusty ground, but others standing in awkward positions sat every few yards as far as he could see. He swung his head around, looking out of the side, and then the rear windows, and the scene was the same. They were driving through a sea of motionless figures.
Marina nervously looked around them, keeping both hands on the steering wheel. “Are they vamps? Some are standing? Are they refugees? I can’t see…”
Joel knew what they were. He could smell the blood wafting from their mouths and drifting across the highway. “They’re vamps… Just drive slow and steady.”
He pulled the map out of the glove box and went to study it when his radio sparked into life making them all jump.
“We’re surrounded by friggin’ vamps!” shouted Claire.
Joel clicked on his radio. “Be calm. They’re hibernating, or just sluggish, if we keep a constant speed and don’t do anything stupid we can get through this. Over.”
No response came, so he looked back
down at the map.
“We’re on the I-40. Went through a small town about thirty minutes ago,” said Marina.
“Are they sleeping?” said Jess.
“Yes. It will be fine. Just look at the road ahead, don’t look into the… shit,” said Marina.
Bodies lay on the highway ahead of them. The convoy slowed.
“Slow… real slow. Drive around them. Real smooth,” said Joel. He looked down at the map and traced his finger along the route they were on. “Next town is about an hour away. We just keep going.”
As Marina veered left and right around the vamps, their bodies blistered by the sun, and their faces distorted into more angular shapes, Joel’s radio came alive again.
“It looks like some kind of migration. You seen this before, Joel? Over,” said Anna.
“I’m not an expert on vamps, Doc. I don’t know what this is. Over.”
Marina nodded to the road in front. “It looks clear ahead, I think we’re nearly past—”
Before she could finish, a loud bang heralded one of the vamps being hit by Claire’s pickup. It spun around and started to fall. Before it had hit the dry hot concrete every one of the few thousand creatures sat up or flicked their heads towards the slow-moving vehicles.
“Mom?” said Jess, her voice trembling.
“Floor it!” shouted Joel, and Marina slammed her foot down on the gas and the pickup jolted forward as everyone was pushed backwards in their seats.
The two vehicles behind did the same, as a swarm of vamps scampered towards the source of what woke them. Like flies, the creatures slammed into the sides of the vehicles, making them veer left and right across the highway, but soon they were all looking back at the horde desperately pursuing them, but not making any progress.
Marina looked in her side mirror. “Are we clear?”
Joel took a breath, then nodded. “Yup.”
*****
“Do we think it’s a good idea going through this town,” said Marina in the passenger’s seat.
Block-like buildings, with large parking lots out front nestled amongst the almost complete flatness of the desert.
Joel clicked on the radio. “Park out back of these stores on the left. Over.” He then swung the pickup across multiple lanes and pulled up a slight incline and parked outside a wall of bland white doors which presumedly led into the back of a row of stores. He turned to Marina. “We’re almost out of ammo, this is as good as any other place to try and find some, and I’m not sensing anything around here.”
The other pickups pulled in behind.
Joel looked to Jess in the rear seat. “Want to take Flint for a walk?”
“Is it safe?” said Jess.
“As long as you stay with us, and don’t wander off. It’s safe.”
She nodded. “Okay then.”
Joel looked at the panting dog. “Behave.” Joel briefly smiled at Marina, then got out. He walked up to the others that were getting out of their vehicles and stretching. “I’m going to try and find some extra ammo.”
“I need to take a leak,” said Evan.
Anna looked at Joel. “And you’re sure there’s no vamps around here?”
“Haven’t sensed any for over seventy miles.”
Hardin looked at the other buildings in the distance. “I know this town, there’s lots of residential areas. They have to be here.”
Joel looked at Jess and Marina and they all headed towards the closest door. “Well if they are, I’m not sensing them.” He held up his radio. “Stay on comms everyone, and be back here in twenty minutes.”
Anna briefly looked at Bill, then followed Joel, while Gabe, Dawn, Claire, and the others stayed in their vehicles.
Joel walked down the gloomy corridor.
“I can’t see a thing,” said Anna.
“Oh right, sorry I forget you—”
“Us humans, you mean,” said the doctor.
Marina smiled.
“Well you can’t see like I can. Just keep going straight, and we’ll soon be at the doors to the stores. How you holding up back there, Jess.”
“I’m good.”
Joel pulled the handle down of the eventual door, and pushed it open to reveal another corridor, that was just as dark as the last.
“Screw this, I’m using a flashlight,” said Anna, pulling the small light from her pocket and switching it on. A number of doors appeared along the corridor, as well as signs above them. Joel walked to the one with ‘CASH FOR GOODS’ printed on it, and tried turning the handle, but it remained stubbornly locked. He took a step back and slammed his fist through the wood. The three watching tried to hide their reactions. He then reached around, unlocked, then opened the door and walked inside.
The others caught up quickly and peered around the corner to a large storage room of floor to ceiling shelves, each with numbers.
Joel was already searching through the contents. “Help me find any ammo that’s in here. Especially anything with ‘M855’ written on it, but just anything you can find.”
Jess enthusiastically looked through a pile of plastic toys, while Anna was looking intently at what looked to Marina like a mobile defibrillator.
Marina looked at all the shelves of forgotten items that were once important to someone and wondered if they would ever find new owners.
“Can I have this?” said Jess, holding up a foot-high plastic dragon.
“Sure.”
Marina walked along the aisles until she found Joel. In his hand was a backpack that he was piling ammo boxes into.
“Just one box for the M4, but plenty for everything else.”
She walked up to him, looking back to see if Jess was close by, she wasn’t. “When you were sleeping…”
“Yeah?”
“You were talking. Most of it I couldn’t understand, but you mentioned the name R—”
Joel momentarily paused, and he was sure his heart did the same.
“— Ick. Was that someone you knew?”
He continued packing the backpack with green boxes of different sizes. “Just someone I knew in LA.” He couldn’t fit anymore in and heaved it onto his back. “I got what I need.” He saw she wasn’t carrying anything. “You don’t want anything?”
She looked around the shelves. At the end of one, all by itself was a samurai sword in its sheath. She walked to it and slid the blade out. “Russell used to keep these. Man, he loved his martial arts movies.”
Conversations with Russell of who was the best Kung-Fu actor came flooding back to Joel. He looked away pushing the guilt back down.
Marina lifted the sheath, slung it over her back, and walked away. “I’m done.”
Joel followed. When they got to Anna, she was holding her radio in her hand.”
“What is it?” said Joel.
“It’s Gabe, he’s not doing too good.”
“Is he going to die?” said Jess.
“I don’t know.” Anna looked at Joel. “If he should change, while we’re driving…”
“You’re suggesting we just leave him?”
“I’m not saying that. I’m just saying, he’s got a high fever, and he’s heart rate is erratic. That wound on his shoulder is not healing. The virus affects some more than others. In Gabe it’s being quite aggressive.”
“What does he need?” said Joel.
“Rest. Somewhere where I can monitor him. I saw a sign for a hotel. I think it’s just a mile further along the highway. If we—”
Joel shook his head. “The only way I know to keep you all safe is to keep moving.”
“I can’t guarantee Gabe won’t change while you’re doing that.”
Marina looked at Joel. “If it’s safe, why not hole up in this hotel for the night? If he changes, we can deal with it.”
Joel slid his hand over his beard. “Okay, fine. We’ll check it out.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
Joel looked through multiple layers of glass doors which led to a hotel foyer. All were clo
sed, and across the tiled floor in-between were a number of ripped magazines extolling Arizona’s tourist attractions.
“We could just drive one of the pickups through these,” said Hardin, peering through the glass.
“These doors look pretty secure. Let’s keep it that way. No, we’ll find another way in.”
“Over here!” shouted Evan, pulling upwards a ground floor window on the large five story building. Everyone walked across to him. “It was already open, I guess they never got a chance to close it.”
Marina looked at Joel. “You sensing anything?”
Evan froze with his foot already inside the gap.
Joel shook his head. “I’m not sure.” All of his improved human senses weren’t picking up anything, but there was something else, almost like an itch in his brain, that was telling him otherwise.
Evan squeezed through the gap. “This room looks empty,” he said from inside. His hand then emerged, and Bill handed him a shotgun.
Joel handed his rifle to Marina and blew out his cheeks. The afternoon sun was feeling particularly warm on his forehead. He looked up at the burning yellow circle. He was sure it was larger than normal. He climbed through the gap and retook possession of his rifle.
The room they were in was large, easily thirty foot wide, and was completely empty of bodies or furniture. At the opposite side to the windows was a long counter with glass cases, and beyond that, just visible in shadow, what looked like a kitchen area. Joel took one step onto the plush carpet then realized the crunchiness wasn’t due to its design but rather the copious amount of dried blood which had soaked into it. “There’s been death here.”
Evan looked down. “Wait… I thought it was just a patterned carpet.” He stepped off the dark circular crimson patch he was standing in the middle off.
“Nope.”
Evan raised his gun, in no particular direction.
Kelly’s feet, then head and body appeared through the window gap. “How’s it looking?” she said, standing upright.
“Vamp’s have been here. I just can’t tell if they still are,” said Joel.