Deadrise 2: Deadwar

by Steven R. Gardner

  Each abandoned vehicle they passed was a potential piece of salvage. So were the zombies when you got right down to it. Many of them wore jewelry, and Smitty surmised that would always be valuable, regardless of the state of the world. Many zombies were also carrying prescription medicine and illegal drugs in their pocket and purses, holdovers from their lives before they became walking dead. The potential for power and profit in this new world boggled Smitty’s mind. All one needed was the tools and the gumption to use them, and anything you wanted was there for the taking, like a great big pussy just waiting to get fucked. It brought a smile to Smitty’s face every time he thought about it.

  Two miles outside Green River they came to a tiny airfield with a small control house at one end and a row of barn-sized hangars on the other. Half a dozen zombies could be seen staggering about, but they would be easy enough to deal with. Smitty signaled a halt to the bikes, and they all pulled to a stop on the access road beside the control station. Smitty wanted to assess the situation one more time before they advanced into the city. Green River was about the same size as Evanston, with a pre-dead population of about eleven thousand. But whereas Evanston had been primarily a mining and refinery town, Green River was an important railroad hub and major tourist center year round. At any given day of the year, there were one to five thousand visitors, which would translate into a larger number of zombies.

  Smitty climbed out of the truck, stretching his knees and back until they popped. Augie and Wild Billy had dismounted from the bikes and were approaching the nearest zombie, a naked, bloated woman, with machetes in hand. Smitty pulled his last joint from his cigarette pack and lit it up while Angel and Chico approached. Bear stayed up in his gunners perch.

  “Those two are going to get themselves eaten.” Chico said with a laugh as he watched Augie and Wild Billy hack down the female zombie.

  “Your one to talk. You always egg them on.” Angel said.

  “Like they need much convincing.” Smitty said, exhaling smoke and passing the joint to Chico.

  “So how are we going to do this?” Angel asked.

  “There’s going to be a lot of deadfucks. More than we can handle if we go right at them. But if we try and sneak into the outer edge, maybe into a residential district, we might be able to hit a few houses. Even if we can’t make a full on raid today, we still scouted a few other prospects along the way. Not to mention the contacts we made at Mountain View.”

  Augie and Wild Billy finished hacking down the few remaining zombies at the airfield, and then they all set about searching the hangars while Bear kept watch in his gunner’s perch. They found a pair of gas pumps that proved empty, a couple of small Cessna crop dusters, (airworthy or not they couldn’t tell) a junked helicopter, a backhoe-bulldozer combination, and a WW1 style biplane. Of all three planes, the biplane looked in the best condition. As Smitty examined it closer, he noticed it was not an old airplane from that era, but rather a modern replica, engineered from lightweight, space-age materials.

  “I think Jenkins would be interested in this.” Smitty said.

  “You and the General getting to be awful close.” Angel teased. “You gonna invite him into the pack?”

  “Gimme all the shit you want, brother, because I know what’s what. The General is the true power in Rainbow Lake. Forget about that Council bullshit, because that’s all it is, is bullshit. The General has all the guns and ammo. The General has the tank. And don’t think for a second that the rest of those Militia pricks won’t back his play one hundred percent. They know where their bread is buttered. So we have to play the game. Me and the General are going to be friends.”

  “It never hurts to have friends.” Angel said, and they all got a good chuckle out of that.

  They left the hangars, walking back toward the truck and bikes.

  “We need to get us a forty foot flatbed with a ramp. Transport a forklift on it as well.” Smitty said when they were all assembled.

  “What are you talking about?” Augie asked.

  “All this good salvage. I know the Council will want those crop dusters. And I’m sure they can get a spare part or two for the helicopter from that junked bird back there. What about all those vehicles we passed on the way up here? We ain’t going to get any of it for ourselves unless we get a way to transport it back home. The Council sure as shit ain’t going to cut us a finders fee.”

  “I’m sure we can pick one up back in Evanston.” Wild Billy said, trying to lighten Smitty’s suddenly dour mood. Raids were supposed to be a good time. Rape and pillage baby, rape and pillage.

  One?” Smitty snapped back. “You’re all going to start driving one. This is the last time we take the bikes out on a raid.” There were groans of protest, but none of them dared defy him. The one that came closest was Angel. He stared Smitty straight in the eye, his tattooed face set in stone. But Smitty met his cold gaze with one of his own, and after a few seconds Angel nodded and lowered his eyes.

  “Don’t you think I wish it could all go back to the way it was? The endless party, the open road, I miss it as much as any one of you. But those times are over! The world has changed! Back in the old world, we were outlaws and outcasts! But in this new world we can be kings! Just like our Name same! ” Smitty glared at them all, daring them to back talk…but they all nodded, lured by the promise of riches and power.

  As they started back to the vehicles, the crack of a rifle rang out, and Angel let out a scream of pain and fell to the ground clutching his left leg. Another shot rang out, whizzing by Smitty’s ear.

  “Take cover!” Smitty screamed, pulling a 9mm pistol from his hip and charging for his truck with Chico right on his heels. Augie sprinted for his bike while Wild Billy reached down to help Angel to his feet. More gunfire rang out, chewing up the ground around the fleeing figures.

  “Behind you!” Bear screamed from his gunners pod and began firing over their heads. Smitty chanced a look over his shoulder as he ran, ice filling his veins at the sight of a superzombie, clad in full military combat gear, clutching an M-16. He turned his eyes forward; putting everything he possibly could into running. Even as he did, he almost froze in his tracks at the sight of another superzombie stepping out from behind the trailer of his truck. He aimed his 9mm and fired as he ran. It took three shots chewing into the side of the trailer to track his aim to the creature, and he continued firing even as he ran forward, screaming a battle cry at the top of his lungs. The superzombie raised its M-16 to fire at him, but by pure chance one of Smitty’s shots hit the base of the M-16’s barrel housing, shattering the plastic casing to pieces, rendering the weapon useless.

  Augie reached his bike and jumped on, freezing for a moment as he saw the superzombie charging towards them along the row of hangars, M-16 raised and firing. Just as he started up his bike, a bullet from the charging superzombie caught him square in the chest, drilling through his sternum and out his back. He let out a gurgled yelp and fell from his bike.

  “Augie!” Wild Billy screamed as he set Angel against his chopper. Wild Billy pulled his AK-47 from the sidecar and spun to fire at the advancing superzombie.

  Chico reached the passenger door of the truck and heaved it open, climbing up into the cab and pulling the door closed behind him. He lay flat on the seat just as the windshield of the truck shattered, showering him with shards of broken glass. He reached for his sawed-off shotgun that he had left on the cabin floor.

  The superzombie coming from behind the truck tossed the useless M-16 aside and reached for a sidearm, charging Smitty. Smitty emptied the remainder of his clip into the head and chest of the superzombie, blowing away chunks of flesh and spraying thick black ichor, but it did little to stop it. The superzombie would be on him in seconds, and Smitty made a futile attempt to reach across his body with his free hand and pull his machete. He knew it wouldn’t be in time, and the superzombie would get its hands on him and implant him with a slug or worse.

  The sawed-off barrel of a shotgun suddenly
jutted from the driver’s window and fired. At less than two feet, the blast pulverized the superzombie’s head like rotten cabbage. The body staggered aside, stumbled and fell to the ground. Losing its head wouldn’t kill it, but it would disorient it for some time, which was just the opening Smitty needed to climb into the driver’s seat of the truck.

  “Augie!” Wild Billy screamed again, squeezing off several more 3-round bursts. He stood over his fallen comrade, his face a mask of murderous rage.

  “He’s dead Billy! Let’s go!” Angel called from his bike a few feet away. He had climbed into the saddle and started up the engine.

  “He’s not dead!” Wild Billy screamed, seeing Augie’s eyes look at him and his bloody lips move.

  “Get on board or get left behind!” Angel screamed, revving up the engine of the bike.

  “Motherfucker!” Wild Billy screamed at the top of his lungs, emptying his AK-47 at the advancing superzombie before jumping into the sidecar. Angel gunned the engine, and the motorcycle sped away, its tires squealing on the pavement as Angel raced for the interstate.

  Smitty started the engine of the truck and pulled away with a squeal as well, casting one last long look at Augie’s fallen form. He was writhing on the ground, trying to sit up but his body was unresponsive to his brains commands. He was as good as dead; Smitty only wished he could put a bullet through Augie’s brain to spare him the horror of reanimation. Why the hell Billy or Angel hadn’t he didn’t know.

  From his gun pod up top, Bear continued to fire his fully automatic AK-47 at the superzombie. It paused in its tracks, Bears bullets impacting with its torso as much as the ground around it. The superzombie raised its M-16 up at Bear and he barely had time to see the puff of smoke from the M-203 grenade launcher attached to the bottom before the grenade impacted with the roof of the truck less than two feet from him. There was a blinding flash and a deafening roar and his entire world turned to a raw current of pain. He became aware of someone screaming, and realized it was his own voice. His vision slowly returned, and through a bloody haze he could see a large piece of metal protruding from his stomach, and a jagged, bloody stump where his right hand used to be.

  When the superzombie reached Augie, he was indeed still alive. He was trying to scream, but all that would come out were coughs of blood as he slowly drowned on his own fluids. But he was coherent enough to notice the superzombie as it knelt down beside him and laid one of its black leathery hands upon his chest, holding him flat to the ground. Its lidless eyes were an amazing shade of blue, red rimmed in blood. Its lipless teeth worked back and forth, clacking together around its black, swollen tongue. Augie tried to close his eyes, but found that he couldn’t. The superzombie opened its mouth wide, and stuck its tongue out, holding its head over Augie’s chest. Through the pain and haze of his impending death, Augie saw something wriggle on the tongue, something green and slimy, no more than two inches long. With a final flutter it dropped from the creature’s mouth and landed on Augie’s chest. The pain from his bullet wound suddenly flared white hot, stealing the last breath Augie would ever take right from his lungs. His eyes rolled up into his skull and his body began to convulse as his veins began to swell greenish black…

  “Get up top and get Bear!” Smitty snarled to Chico, who disappeared through the access hatch into the trailer. The wind whipped through the cabin, a few jagged shards of glass around the edges was all that remained of the trucks windshield. Angel’s bike was about fifty yards ahead, and he could see Wild Billy trying to tie a tourniquet around Angel’s wounded leg, much to Angel’s discomfort. The bike and sidecar would rock and swerve across the four lanes of the interstate as Angel fought bouts of pain, but after a minute Wild Billy sat back, his task finished.

  “Holy Christ! Smitty! Bear don’t look so hot!” Chico screamed from the trailer. Smitty could barely hear him over Bear’s own screams. He chanced a quick look into the trailer, seeing Chico lowering a bellowing Bear to the trailer floor.

  “Shut him the hell up!” Smitty screamed. He could barely concentrate as it was. He heard the crack of knuckles against skull as Chico punched Bear upside the head, knocking him out.

  “How bad is he?” Smitty called.

  “His right hand was blow off! And he’s got a chunk of steel sticking out of his gut!”

  “Don’t pull it out.” Smitty cautioned. “And get a tourniquet around his arm!” Smitty turned his attention back to the road, trying to stay focused, but after a minute was distracted by wild gesticulating from Wild Billy in the sidecar. He appeared to be pointing behind them. Smitty glanced in the side view mirror, and saw a black pickup truck speeding up the highway towards them. It was still quite a ways back, but it was traveling considerable faster than Smitty’s truck and would be upon them soon. To make matters worse, a motorcycle swerved into view from behind the truck. Even though it was nearly half a mile behind them, Smitty could make out the general shape and style of the bike…it was Augie’s bike.

  “We got trouble Chico.” Smitty called to his partner.

  “Talk to me!” Chico responded.

  “A truck and Augie’s bike coming up behind us.”

  “Augie made it?” Chico asked incredulously.

  “Superzombies! And they are coming up fast.”

  “Fuck.” Chico was frayed to the edge.

  Smitty gave Wild Billy the signal to accelerate, then pressed the pedal further to the floor. In the side mirror, he could see that the bike had pulled ahead of the truck, the driver hunched low to cut wind resistance, preventing Smitty from getting a good glimpse of the creature. Was it Augie? It looked as though it was wearing black leather, but it was still too far away to tell. But that would change.

  Smitty pulled his radio from his belt and called home. When the dispatch officer came on, Smitty relayed the situation as best he could, screaming at the top of his lungs to hear his own voice over the roaring wind, concluding with the fact that superzombies in vehicles were pursuing them.

  “I’m dispatching Bravo One and Three to assist you immediately. Hold tight Tucker.” The radio went silent and Smitty tossed it onto the seat beside him. The wind drowned out most the message, but Smitty got the thrust of it; help was on the way, good luck.

  As they rounded a bend in the interstate near Jamestown, the road ahead was suddenly filled with zombies. They mingled about, looking more confused than usual. The sight of the motorcycle and truck brought them to life, causing them to grow agitated with the anticipation of warm human flesh.

  “Get behind me!” Smitty screamed to Angel at the top of his lungs, but his voice was drowned out by the roaring wind that whipped through the cabin like a minor tornado, making even vision difficult.

  Even though Angel couldn’t hear Smitty’s shout of warning, he knew what he needed to do. He swerved to the far side of the highway and applied his brake, slowing considerably. Smitty’s truck sped past him at 70 mph and Angel punched it, falling in line right behind the trailer, letting the drag add to his acceleration.

  Smitty gripped the wheel tightly, keeping to the centerline of the highway. “Hold on Chico!” he hollered over his shoulder just as the flat nose grill of the truck smashed into the first zombie, sending it flying back twenty feet where it skidded and tumbled to a shattered halt. Out of the corner of his eye Smitty caught movement, and looking to the side of the road he saw a superzombie step out from behind an abandoned car. Its fatigues were tattered, and its lower jaw was missing. In its hands it held an AK-47, which it began firing. Bullets crashed through the open cab of the truck, peppering the empty passengers seat and door, one grazed the back of Smitty’s neck and another winged the top of his left shoulder, causing his to lose momentarily control of the truck, careening it to the side of the road. In the back, Chico was tossed against one side of the trailer with a bone jarring crash before being dumped to the floor stunned.

  Angel saw the truck swerve, and went into offensive driving mode, gunning the engine and weaving through the dead
fucks that had been scattered by the trucks passing. Up ahead, he saw the superzombie standing in the road in front of an abandoned sedan. Wild Billy saw it too. With a scream of rage, Wild Billy opened up with his AK on full automatic, spraying short controlled bursts. Wild Billy was as good a shot with the assault rifle as one could ask for, and his bullets chewed into the deadfucks upper chest, throat and head. It didn’t drop the superzombie but it staggered back, throwing its aim away from the cab of Smitty’s truck. Then Angel gunned the engine again and they shot past the sedan and the superzombie.

  Smitty gritted his teeth against the pain and wrestled the truck back under control just before it impacted head-on with the guardrail, scraping the side of the truck with a sparking screech of metal on metal before he had it back in the center of the road, plowing through the last of the crowd of zombies and falling in line behind Angel’s bike. But he had lost a lot of speed, and Angel continued to pull away from him while the motorized superzombies behind drew nearer. By the time Smitty had the truck back up to 70 mph, Augie’s bike had drawn to within a quarter mile. It was close enough for him to make out details…the creature definitely was wearing black leather, with spikes running up the outer edge of each forearm. It had to be Augie. Could he have survived? No, it was impossible. He was damn near crippled, choking to death on his own blood. The superzombie had come upon him and put one of those things into him, turned him into one of them.

  The glare of the Flaming Gorge reservoir could be seen to the left, south, while to their right were gently rolling hills, covered with scrub. The highway here sloped noticeably downhill, which brought their speed upwards of 90 mph. It was as they passed the Highway-30 north exit that Augie’s motorcycle drew to within twenty yards. The superzombie driving the bike raised its head high, giving Smitty a good look in the mirror. Its skin was blackened leather, withered against a skeletal face. The eyelids and lips had either dried up or melted during the transformation, leaving the eyeballs and teeth exposed. It looked into the mirror, looking Smitty right in the eye, and Smitty felt a cold shiver run down his spine. The superzombie pulled an AK-47 from the gun rack Augie had mounted to the side of his bike, took aim at the rear tires of the truck and fired.