Murphy's Law (Roads Less Traveled Book 2)

by Dulaney, C.

  Another vehicle, a large black SUV, shot out of the garage after the pickup.

  And the pickup cut a sharp right outside the gate and came barreling up the outer side of the complex, straight towards Michael and the other men on the roof.

  The three riders waited patiently on the other side of the stable, their horses stomping and pawing at the ground. They had their sidearms drawn and their eyes glued to the back doors as Kasey spoke to them. She was too far away for Michael to hear her words, but no doubt she was keeping them calm and giving them last minute instructions. He felt a pat on his shoulder and turned to see Jonah hustling the other three men into line, one of which was already climbing down the cable.

  “Stop starin’ and get ready,” Jonah reminded him.

  Michael shook himself from his reverie and took up his place in the rear. Forgetting the riders and their safety, he focused on the pickup speeding through the field towards them, and the beagle in the front seat.

  “Holy shit, that’s Nancy!”

  Jonah just shoved another man to the ledge. The first was already dropping to the ground below, and the second was halfway down. Michael tried to ignore his sudden urge to puke, and his fear of heights, as he watched the last of Jonah’s shooters drop to the ground. Nancy had come to a jerking halt below them, and the three men were climbing into the bed, stumbling and falling over the supplies that filled the back.

  “C’mon, Michael, get down that cable!” Jonah was saying as Michael tore his attention away from the ground and the long drop in between.

  “No, man, you go,” he said and shook his head frantically, causing his hair to flop into his eyes.

  Jonah simply grinned, casually took the cigarette from his mouth, stubbed it out on the ledge, then suddenly grabbed Michael by both shoulders and jerked him forward.

  “If that’s the way you want it, I’ll just throw your ass over.” He then proceeded to move one hand to Michael’s jeans, taking a firm hold of his waistline and pushing him further over the ledge.

  “Okay, okay!” Michael shoved with both hands against Jonah’s arms. The cowboy let go, then extended one arm out towards the cable.

  “Ladies first.”

  Michael took a deep breath, glanced back at the barn, and saw the first of the runners explode from the stable. The riders opened fire and jerked their horses around, running at a full gallop in the opposite direction of the south road. Just before Jonah gave him another shove, he saw the three riders move as one, circling around to catch the attention of more runners who had just come screeching from the barn. As Michael bent to grab the cable, he finally realized the organization of their distraction. Once all the runners were clear of the stable and committed to pursuing their mounted prey, Kasey and the others turned east and rode on, with nearly a hundred runners hot on their tails.

  “Be safe…” Michael whispered, then flipped himself over the ledge and down the wall, Jonah’s boot heels following right above his head.

  Part Three:

  Backups and Contingencies

  Chapter Eleven

  March 25th: Mid-afternoon

  “This was a horrible idea!” Jake wailed.

  He was twisted sideways in his saddle, firing on the runner who had caught up with him on his right side. Between each shot he would scream obscenities, loud enough to be heard over both the horses’ hooves and the wild screeching of the runners.

  Since leaving the prison, we’d employed the same tactic we had used when escaping our first experience with the runners: alternating our speeds over and over, to keep a safe distance between us and them, yet staying close enough to hold their interest. During our last period of hard running, we’d finally decided to stop and rest the horses at the edge of the woods. We’d put at least a mile between us and the runners, but unfortunately a large group had broken away from the main swarm and flanked us, a little fact we had been unaware of until it was too late.

  Now we were riding hard to put some ground between us and the ambushers. They couldn’t run any faster than a healthy man, which was a good thing too, or the horses would have dropped dead underneath us some time after crossing into Ohio.

  “Shut up and ride!” Mia snapped back to him. She was riding between Jake and I, her bridle reins wrapped around her saddle horn so she could take out the runners ahead of us with her rifle.

  Yes, the bastards had figured out the art of working together. More were appearing out of nowhere, popping up over the sloping hills on our right side, and running from the trees on our left. Twice they had flanked us, and twice they had somehow gotten ahead of us. Now Mia rode with her eyes front, while Jake and I protected our sides.

  We were miles from West Virginia, and it was probably safe for us to turn and head back, find route 18, and meet up with the others. But we hadn’t been able to figure out how the hell to shake the sonsabitches long enough to do that. We could put plenty of distance between us and them, yet every time we did that, more would show up right next to us.

  These couldn’t be the prison runners. They had to be moving in from all over the area, swarming like buzzards.

  We also hadn’t been able to get a count of how many still followed. Sure, we’d taken down at least half during our exodus, and I was fairly certain none had turned back towards the prison. We had to do something, and fast, before the horses dropped dead on their feet.

  I turned gingerly in my saddle, favoring my left side now more than ever, to look behind us and was a little shocked to see how many prison runners were still left. Not as many as I thought there would be, but they were a helluva lot closer than they should’ve been. Not good. That meant these new arrivals were slowing us down way more than we’d thought.

  For the twentieth time since leaving the prison, I wished for some sort of explosive. Whether to blow us up or the runners, I hadn’t decided. Either would’ve been a sweet relief. Everywhere I looked, near and far, there they were. Snapping their dead jaws and rolling their dead eyes, reaching out with their dead arms while their dead legs pumped harder than they probably had in life because now they didn’t give up. They never stopped coming.

  Unfortunately, most had run out of their clothes, which brought a whole new level of torment to our eyes.

  “We have to shake them! Look for anything that will slow them up!” I squeezed off a few well-placed rounds at three runners who threatened to take Daisy’s legs out from under her.

  “Are you shittin’ me?!” Jake screamed. “We’re in Ohio!”

  Three more shots, then he turned around and reloaded. It occurred to me how well their horsemanship had come along just in the past thirty minutes. To shoot a rifle and reload while sitting on top of a horse running as hard as it could was a skill, one most people couldn’t learn given a lifetime. I suppose it’s surprising what a person can learn, and how quickly, when they’ve got a dozen horrors appearing out of nowhere and screaming down their back.

  “Goddamnit!” Mia cried.

  I snapped my face forward for only a second, trying to find the source of her outburst. A second was all it took. Ahead of us, two hundred yards or so across a vast, grassy field of nothing, stretched a deadhead swarm, much like the one that had followed us to the prison last time we were in the great Buckeye State.

  “What the hell is with Ohio?!” I shouted.

  We couldn’t slow down, or the runners would catch us again.

  We couldn’t turn and go around; the horses would slow down, if only a fraction, and as close as the nearest runners were, we’d be toast.

  We couldn’t keep moving forward, or we would run head first into the swarm.

  Or could we?

  “Head straight for that swarm! And don’t spare the horses!” I gave Daisy another kick. I felt her muscles bunch underneath me as she pulled on her last reserve of strength to rocket forward.

  I slid my rifle into its saddle sleeve and grabbed a handful of mane, gripping it tightly with the reins in both hands and gritting my teeth when anot
her bolt of pain coursed through my side. Mia and Jake both looked at me with huge eyes, saw what I was doing, and copied my actions. Their horses bolted forward as well, the three of us coming astride of each other and riding headlong for the swarm ahead of us.

  This is insane, this is insane, this is insane!

  I was sure the other two were thinking it as well, except Jake was probably adding some color to his. The huge horde swelled in size as we got closer, though I was relieved beyond words to see the mass wasn’t very deep. If it had been, we’d have been riding to our deaths. Hell, we might have been anyways, but at least our chances were looking better.

  “This was a fuckin’ horrible idea!” Jake repeated his earlier gripe.

  “You’re getting soft, Jakie!” Mia cackled.

  My lips twitched and curved upward when details of the deadhead swarm became clearer. They were a rotting mess, barely on their feet. Most were naked, but there wasn’t anything to show. Flesh had long since fallen away, along with certain anatomical parts, the muscle underneath was decayed so badly it was amazing they could still put one foot in front of the other. Tendons and ligaments shone white against the afternoon sun, eyeballs hung loose from their sockets, jawbones and teeth were blackened from something I’m sure I didn’t want to think about. Basically they were walking skeletons with just enough soft stuff still clinging to their bones to make my stomach flip over.

  Another good sign: no fast bastards running with this swarm.

  And the ones trailing us were quickly falling behind.

  “Spread out, ride straight through! Don’t slow down no matter what! Ride, ride, ride!” I ordered just before we hit the front line of deadheads.

  Mia and Jake did exactly as ordered, fanning out at the last moment and slicing through the front of the swarm like a knife through butter. I noticed they pulled their feet and legs up and were nearly sitting on their boots while the horses fought their way through, so I did the same, grunting in pain and lecturing myself all the while for not thinking of that ahead of time. The horses plowed their way through and over the walking corpses, something that would have never worked back when these bodies were fresh and strong. Now they were like stinky, disgusting dominoes, and as long as we kept our legs pulled up and away from a lucky mouth that just happened to graze our skin, we’d be alright.

  Behind us we could hear thump after thump as the runners crashed head-first into their slower brethren. Bones cracked, guts spilled, thwump-thwump-crack-crunch. I didn’t dare look behind me, it was taking all my focus and strength just to keep my ass in the saddle. I glanced every few seconds over towards Mia and Jake, to make sure they were still on their horses and heading in the right direction. I was worried that somewhere in this shitstorm of death, we’d lose our sense of direction and, for lack of a better term, get lost.

  True, the mass wasn’t very deep. However it’s very easy to get yourself lost when all you can see are assholes and elbows flying all around.

  “There!” I pointed straight ahead, then instantly regretted letting go of the saddle horn when I swayed wickedly to the right.

  My hair, which should have been pulled back but wasn’t, got caught on the collarbone of a very tall zombie. I screamed again, a little from fear, mostly from pain, as my grip on the saddle horn and Daisy’s forward plunging ripped a chunk of my hair out. I turned my eyes to the right, to make sure I hadn’t picked up part of a hitchhiker (my stomach was very relieved to see that I wasn’t carrying half of a collarbone in my hair), then fixed my eyes on the prize: a farm, straight ahead of us, equipped with a barn large enough to ride the horses inside. The runners would be slowed up enough for someone to dismount and open the large front door.

  “I’m on it!” Jake shouted.

  He was the first to peel out of the swarm, his horse limping but still running hard. Mia came out next, her horse no worse for the wear, with me and Daisy bringing up the rear. I ran my eyes over Jake and Mia as best as I could, considering they were ahead of me and running at a high gallop, and couldn’t see any visible signs of injury. I checked myself over, and with the exception of missing a bit of hair, I was fine as well. The horses didn’t even look that bad, if you could get past the blood and other random gunk that was now matted into their hair.

  “Never again. Jesus Christ, never again.” My words were swept away by the warm midday air whipping past my face.

  The farm was closing in, so I turned my head and finally chanced a look behind us. Some of the runners were still on their feet, but they were having more trouble struggling through the swarm than we’d had. I couldn’t tell what had happened to the others, whether they had been trampled to pieces, or had broken their legs trying to fight their way through. And to be honest, I really didn’t give a shit. Their numbers were thinned, they were a couple of football fields away from us, and that’s all that mattered.

  “Come on!” Jake screamed.

  I looked back and saw Jake had already made it to the barn and opened the door for us. His horse was standing off to the side, heaving and panting so hard I was sure the old girl was going to die before we could get her inside. Mia didn’t even slow when she neared the doorway, she simply ducked and let her horse sail in. I figured what the hell, and let Daisy dive inside as well. Mia was already off her horse and running back towards the door to help Jake, who was pulling on his mare, cussing the whole time, trying to drag her inside. After they finally made it in, Mia yanked the door shut.

  “Secure the door!” I pulled Daisy to a stop and practically fell off. I was still pumped up and feeling like my skull was about to split wide open. At least the adrenaline rush was numbing the pain in my side and my face for the time being.

  The barn door was already equipped with a large sliding plank that, once pulled down, fit inside another sturdy piece fixed to the barn wall itself. After Jake got his horse moved around towards the back with ours, he helped us move a stack of hay bales in front of the door. It wasn’t much, but with the large plank already in place, we figured it would be enough to buy us some time. We were panting as hard as our horses. I glanced around the barn, getting a quick layout of the place before the runners converged on our location. There were no other doors or windows that I could see, and the only way out was through the loft window above us.

  That was good, we didn’t need another way out.

  “Grab your gear,” I said, this time in a considerably lower tone of voice than before. We had to get our nerves under control if we stood any kind of chance of getting out of that barn alive.

  “Alright. I’ll stow the horses away, you two get up top,” Jake said.

  The three of us pulled our rifles from our saddles and scrambled to carry what ammunition we had left over to the hayloft ladder. Jake set his gear at the foot of the ladder while Mia and I climbed it, rifles slung over our shoulders and arms loaded with two boxes of ammo each. It would be enough, as long as we made each shot count. Mia had the least amount; she’d been clearing our front most of the afternoon. Between Jake and myself, there would be enough. There had to be.

  “Here they come!” Jake warned.

  Mia had just cleared the ladder and was setting up on the right side of the window when the first of the runners slammed into the barn door. I jerked myself up the last few rungs, crawled on my knees to the loft window, and set up on the opposite side from Mia. Jake, being Jake, joined the party making as much noise as possible.

  “Ouch, goddamnit,” he mumbled, catching his shirt sleeve on a nail while climbing the ladder. “C’mon, you bitch.” His rifle barrel jammed against the corner of the ladder opening. “Stupid motherfucker.” He dropped a box of ammo. “Shit!” He tripped again, and made some more inaudible grunting sounds as he crawled over to the window.

  “Nice of you to join us,” Mia said.

  “Bite me, goddamnit, I’m tired,” Jake mumbled again and loaded his weapon.

  I was enjoying the interaction between my friends, something I hadn’t been able to en
joy for a long time. I slid the bolt of my rifle into place and caught both their nervous stares.

  “Why so serious?” I asked.

  Sure enough, Jake leveled his rifle and made his first shot while doing his best Joker impression. I shook my head and began firing, using my knee as a gun rest. We coordinated our gunfire almost immediately. The runners below us continued to throw themselves against the barn door. We took down the ones farthest out first, the few stragglers who had finally jerked themselves from the writhing dead swarm that was almost completely out of sight. We worked our way inward, taking our time, picking our shots. We missed, several times, but more often than not we hit our targets. We dropped thirty runners in total, not counting the mosh pit underneath us. Mia was out of rifle ammo, Jake was down to his last reload, and I had ten shells left.

  “Sidearms,” I said and pulled my pistol. We emptied our clips into the ten runners below, just as I heard the large plank inside the door buckle from the stress.

  “Holy shit…that was close,” Jake whispered beside me.

  I was shaking so badly, I almost lost my handgun out the window. Of the three of us, Mia was the most composed. Or rather she was, until her eyes rolled up in her head and she fell backwards, passed out cold. Jake chuckled. It was the sort you hear when someone isn’t quite sure whether they want to cry, puke, scream, or laugh. I didn’t dare let myself relax yet. I stared out as hard and as far as I could, making sure we really had killed all the runners. After several minutes of nothing but harsh breathing coming from both me and Jake, and the weak moaning from the swarm growing fainter and fainter as they moved away, I turned, slid down onto my butt, and looked at him. He had already sat down and was staring at me. Mia was still passed out.

  “You okay?” he asked.

  “Yeah, you?”

  “Yeah. They too far gone to come after us?” he referred to the slow deadheads and their advanced state of decomposition.