The soldier came out of the second room on the top floor and stopped just beyond the doorway, surveying all the displays. Sarah kept the tiniest fraction of the curtain lifted so she could see, and she read the man's body language a mile away, even underneath all that heavy armor: it was time to start upending tables.
He stepped forward to the first display with his rifle firmly held in his right hand, finger on the trigger. He reached down and lifted the curtain, finding nothing beneath.
Carly was watching too, and she was mortified. She stared at the table Sarah was under, silently screaming at her to look her way, but Sarah was too busy watching the soldier.
Then the stairs groaned again and the second soldier came up. Sarah figured that Ron and Curt must have either managed to get away somehow or they were hiding very well.
Wayne was ready this time, and Sarah could see it in his eyes. His body expanded out from behind the door, moving a step closer to the frame and waiting for the soldier to reach the top of the stairs.
Each step on the staircase cried out one by one, and with each step, Wayne slid himself closer and closer to the open door. Sarah could see the entire event unfold in front of her eyes; she had a full profile view of the soldier now that he was almost at the top, and she saw Wayne in full view, naked to anyone who had the right angle on him. To her it looked like they were both out in the open, but to them, they still had that one last corner between them that was steadily shrinking by the second.
When the final step at the top betrayed the soldier's presence, Wayne sprang into action. He jumped out from the doorway and shot the soldier in the head, point blank, as the soldier had instinctively started to pull his body away in surprise.
The bullet deflected off his helmet and buried itself into the wall. It must have been made of Kevlar, and even at this close range the caliber of Wayne's pistol wasn't enough to puncture it.
But the shot disoriented the soldier and made him stumble back, bumping into the edge of the banister. Wayne lunged forward and drove the knife at his neck, but he regained his composure and caught his wrist at the last moment, hooking Wayne's arm into the air and elbowing him in the side of the neck. The knife flew out of his hand and landed on the floor next to the table Sarah and Amanda were under. The soldier stripped Wayne's pistol away from him as Wayne stumbled backward into the wall and gasped for air. He raised his assault rifle and Wayne dove into the bedroom as the wall behind him was riddled with bullets.
The other soldier rushed around the big room to get a better vantage point as the first one stood in the doorway to the bedroom, looking down at Wayne who was now completely unarmed.
Sarah could see his legs through the open doorway and knew that he was lying on his back.
The soldier standing in the doorway looked over at the other one. "I got this."
Sarah wanted to rush out with her gun and defend Wayne, but with the other soldier standing in the room with her, she knew it was a lose-lose scenario. Her old motherly instincts kicked in and she was fiercely protective of Amanda. She knew if she gave up her position at all, the entire table they were under would be destroyed by a storm of lead.
The soldier with Wayne pulled out a walkie-talkie slowly, almost like he was enjoying watching Wayne on his back and defenseless. He brought it up to his mouth and held the call button. "I got one here," he said.
The other soldier continued checking under each table, growing closer and closer to Carly. Sarah looked in her direction and she had the corner of her curtain pulled up. Tears were streaming down her face and her eyes were so wide that it was a wonder they didn't fall out. HELP ME, she silently mouthed to Sarah in a desperate and miserable plea.
The walkie-talkie squeaked and a muffled voice came out of it. "Do it," it said.
The soldier put the walkie away and gave the thumbs up to the other one. He aimed his rifle at Wayne just as the other soldier had stopped beside Carly's table and began to lift the curtain.
Sarah had to choose between Wayne and Carly, and she had zero seconds to do it. There was also Amanda's safety to consider, and in some faraway realm that she couldn't see, her own.
And then she found herself moving. She wasn't even aware that a single thought had run through her head. She clambered out from under the table and sprinted toward the soldier about to shoot Wayne. She twisted her body and fired a semi-blind shot at the other one behind her, then she pulled the gun around and fired a few shots at the one in front of her. He staggered and Sarah tackled him to the ground, flipping over and kicking the door shut before the other one could shoot her.
Bullets tore through the door in a beautiful shower of splintered wood, and Sarah rolled out of the way. The soldier outside rushed toward the bedroom. As he passed the table that Sarah and Amanda were hiding under, a set of tiny hands came out from under the curtain and drove Wayne's knife through his foot.
He howled in agony and slammed face-first into the floor. He tried to pull his foot away but it was pinned down; the blade of the knife had easily sunk through his foot and slipped into a crack in the old hardwood, wedging nice and tight. In a blind rage he fired at Amanda, who scurried away from table to table.
As the soldier in the bedroom tried to get to his feet, Sarah pulled his assault rifle away from him and whacked him in the solar plexus with it, cracking the bottom of his sternum. Wayne got up and yanked the soldier's helmet off, revealing a frightened blond man with a big beard spilling out over the collar of his uniform. Sarah smacked him across the face with the butt of his own rifle and he hit the floor like a rock, spitting out blood and teeth on the way. He was slumped against the floor and the wall, and he held out a hand defensively as they stood over him.
"No! Please!" he cried.
Sarah pulled the trigger and blew his brains out all over the wall.
Ron and Curt sprinted up the staircase just as Carly started to crawl out from under the table and get away from the soldier pinned to the floor. Ron scampered behind the tables, staying low, and Curt gave him cover fire. The first couple shots glanced off his helmet, then he tried aiming for his torso. His Kevlar vest absorbed all the bullets, but it still broke his ribs and knocked the wind out of him, leaving him wheezing and dazed and bleeding from his foot.
Wayne ripped open the door to the bedroom and stood at the top of the stairs, carrying the soldier's assault rifle. "Come on!" he yelled.
Curt started to retreat toward the staircase, but still laid cover fire whenever the soldier even tried to move.
Ron helped Carly around the tables and Sarah strode out into the middle of the room, falling to her hands and knees and frantically checking under the tables.
"Amanda!" she called.
The curtain in front of her lifted and Sarah saw those haunting blue eyes sunken into that sweet, semi-dirty face.
"C'mere, baby." She clambered over the floor and pulled her out from under the table, hoisting her up against her shoulder and running for the stairs.
All of them left at once, leaving the pinned soldier flat on his back with his arms stretched out to his sides, his condition unknown. Wayne stopped at the front door of the building and fumbled with the lock that one of the soldiers had apparently secured, then he pulled it open and ran out into the street. He checked around them in the darkness for any signs of more soldiers approaching.
Ron and Carly filed out, and then Curt. Sarah was the last one to leave, with Amanda still against her shoulder. Just as she cleared the doorway and stepped onto the porch outside, she felt Amanda twist away from her. The girl fell out of her grip and landed hard on her feet. As Sarah spun around, she saw the soldier that they had left behind standing in front of her. He yanked Amanda away from her, but Sarah managed to grab onto her.
The soldier slashed at Sarah's arm with the knife he'd pulled out of his foot, cutting a wide gash in it. She recoiled in pain and lost her grip on Amanda as the soldier dragged her back through the door and slammed it shut, locking it.
Befo
re Sarah could even react, Wayne uttered, "We've got company," as the headlights from two Humvees poured over the road in the distance.
13
No Way Out
The door seemed to move away from her like a zoom effect from an old movie as reality set in. The bright lights shining from down the street crept into the very edges of her peripheral vision, but she ignored it.
And then she launched herself at the door. She tried the handle, turning it and jiggling it at first, and then tried to rip it off. When that wouldn't work, she kicked at it, trying to bust it open. But it stood sturdy in its frame.
As she pounded on the door, her head swam and her chest grew with such tension that it felt like every muscle fiber was pulled into a tense wire that was ready to snap and fire off. She started to cry as memories of her son being eaten by zombies flashed in front of her. She heard them chew his flesh and swallow what used to be her baby boy. It was those zombies... it was that damn door... that impenetrable barrier that kept her from saving a child. That monster was in there doing God-knew-what to Amanda, and she had to get her back.
Her panic attack overwhelmed her and she lashed out, throwing a fist through the small glass window in the door. It shattered and lacerated her hand, but she didn't care, didn't even notice, as she slapped around the inside for the lock. She tuned everything else out and didn't even hear him when Wayne told her they had to leave and they had to leave now.
Finally, she felt a tight arm wrap around her throat and squeeze her until she couldn't breathe. She was dragged backward as she kicked and struggled until she was across the street and away from the building. The door faded away, getting smaller and smaller, just like her hopes of ever saving the girl.
The Humvees pulled up in front of the building and stopped. Each door flew open and a large crowd of soldiers emptied out into the street, each one dressed in the same gear that they'd seen before. One of the Humvees had a turret mounted on top of it; long, sleek black steel threatening utter destruction to anything it fired upon.
Wayne dragged Sarah all the way to the next block before the vehicles' headlights had washed over them in the darkness. Ron, Carly and Curt stood behind, huddled around the corner of the building and peeking out, scared out of their minds.
As the last sights of the door lingered in her vision before Wayne pulled her around the corner and closed that chapter forever, a sudden wave of resolve came over Sarah. Her legs stiffened and she stood bolt upright in Wayne's grasp. She twisted her body around and made him stagger, then she threw an elbow into his ribs. He grunted and let her go and she fell forward, gasping for air. But she didn't waste a single second as she pulled her pistol out and ran back for the historical center.
"Sarah, no!" Carly cried.
"Sarah, goddamn it!" Wayne grunted. "She's gone!"
Her face was twisted into a tortured scowl and she could barely see through the torrent of tears that streamed down her cheeks. She stopped halfway up the block and fired off the remaining rounds in her magazine, taking potshots at the soldiers in front of the building.
They ducked into cover, glancing around at where the shots were coming from. When they spotted her, they returned fire, and their bullets were a lot bigger and more continuous than hers as they rained automatic fire down the street.
Wayne grabbed Sarah again and yanked her by her slashed arm, and the pain brought her back to her senses. She shrunk away from the gunfire and they fled around the corner to the others.
"There's nothing you can do!" Wayne barked as they went. "Don't be stupid!"
The soldiers behind them ceased fire and piled back into the Humvees.
The five of them ran south out of the downtown core, turning onto streets where they could and trying to lose their assailants. But the Humvees were fast, and every time they slipped into an alley that was too narrow for the vehicles to follow, they simply spun around and zipped down an adjacent road.
The Humvee with the turret pulled into the lead and a soldier climbed up and manned it. When he saw each brief flash of the survivors through the buildings and the trees lining the sidewalks, he unleashed his fire, drilling gigantic .50-caliber bullets into the concrete around them. Huge plumes of pulverized concrete exploded out from the buildings with each shot and trees were cut cleanly in half.
"What do we do?!" Carly sobbed.
"Come on!" Sarah yelled, leading them through another alley.
They found themselves on a street on the other side with nothing but a grassy field and an old bottling factory beyond it. A chain-link fence surrounded the building and locked in a huge swarm of zombies that milled around the property, most all of them still in their tattered work uniforms. Aside from the factory, the road they were on stretched out in either direction with no more places to hide behind or slip through to escape their pursuers.
"In there!" Sarah said, pointing at part of the chain-link fence that had been ripped away from its post by a couple feet at the bottom.
"Are you crazy?" Wayne cried, looking over the teeming mass of zombies.
The Humvees appeared on the street behind them and slowed down, taking a moment to search for them. When they found the five of them, the gunner opened fire again. The bullets ripped into the grassy field behind them, kicking up huge spires of dirt into the air, and that was all the convincing they needed to run for the broken fence.
The hundred or so zombies filling the area stared at the commotion coming through the fence and beyond, not knowing where to turn their attention. The closest ones to the survivors came after them, loosening their jaws and swiping their arms at them. The survivors formed a conga line and weaved their way through, Wayne taking point and using the automatic rifle he took from the soldier to cut down the ones in front of them. When he ran out of ammo, he turned the rifle around and used it as a club to knock away the last remnants.
The Humvees stopped outside of the fence and the gunner mowed down the dead. The .50-caliber bullets shredded them to pieces mercilessly. Gobs of diseased flesh and discolored, nasty blood flew through the air in an unholy shower.
The survivors reached a door leading into the factory and found that it was locked. Wayne stepped back and kicked it repeatedly, beginning to bend the steel frame. Sarah stood behind him as the others huddled in between, and she shot the approaching zombies in the head as the turret fire continued to tear them up. Wayne threw another kick and the frame bent beyond repair. The door flew open and slammed into a concrete wall, inviting them into the dark and acrid factory.
They ran through a long and dusty room with old coats hung on hooks, corkboards filled with yellowed papers, and computer stations long unpowered, coffee mugs still half-full sitting on them with yellow lip stains on the brims. Ron clicked on his flashlight and stayed just behind Sarah as she led the way through the darkness. They went through a doorway and found themselves on the huge factory floor.
The place seemed abandoned, with the only undead outside in the yard. The air was oppressively musty and huge particles of dust sifted through the air in the glow of the flashlight.
"We can't stay here for long," Ron said.
"They won't follow us with all of the zombies around," Sarah replied, glancing back at the doorway they came through.
"Don't be so sure," Ron warned. He stepped over to some of the machinery next to them and inspected it, looking up and under and around it with his flashlight like an archaeologist poring over a new discovery.
"We'll have to look for a way out in the back," Wayne added.
"I don't want to go back out there," Carly said, frightened.
"You're not going to want to stay in here, trust me," Ron said matter-of-factly.
Sarah gave him a suspicious look, but she quickly forgot about it; she was still overwhelmed by leaving Amanda behind and her heart wrenched at the thought of what her fate would end up being in the hands of the soldiers... of the Shadow Man. "We have to go back and get Amanda," she said.
All of them were
quiet.
"Did you hear what I said?" Sarah snarled.
"We're not going to do anything if we don't get out of here first," Wayne reminded her. "There's too many zombies in the front, and I'm afraid those cowboys will be waiting for us. We're going to have to look for a door on the other end, hopefully somewhere we can slip away outside of the fence without being seen. But I have a feeling we might even be locked up tight in here."
"I think I see an office over there on the right," Curt offered, pointing. "If one of you good folks'll give me a flashlight, I'll go check it out."
Ron looked at him, but he seemed quite content to hold onto his flashlight, so Curt took Carly's and went off, his dark silhouette fading into the distance behind the light.
"Ginger ale."
They all looked at Ron.
"What?" Sarah asked.
Ron held up an empty old bottle that he picked up from one of the conveyor belts, holding the flashlight up to it to shine on its label. "They bottled ginger ale here," he said. A smile crossed his face as he cradled the bottle against his forearm and looked down at it wistfully. "I'd do just about anything for a tall one of these."
"Seriously?" Wayne said. "Put it down and let's go."
The smile fell off Ron's face as he remembered himself. "Oh, sorry."
"Hey! Guys!" Curt called from somewhere behind a big machine. "You oughta get a look at this."
They went over to see what he was talking about and found him standing outside the office he set off to explore. A metal door with only a few flakes of blue paint still stuck to it sat open and he pointed the flashlight in the open space. There was a look of some sobriety on his face that took all the excitement out of his discovery.
Zombie Apocalypse Series Box Set, Vol. 2 [Books 4-7] Page 13