Running with the Horde (Book 2): Delusions of Monsters

by Joseph K. Richard

  “You’re making progress, chief. He’s on the ropes. One of these days we’re getting out of here,” Ezra said sarcastically.

  “Let’s hope it’s not in the bellies of those creatures outside,” Muddy said.

  “What creatures? It’s not like we’ve ever laid eyes on them. Could be the Syndicate just messing with us.”

  Muddy laughed, “I doubt even they would do something this elaborate and for this long.”

  “It’s time to go with Plan B. Don’t you think, Mr. President?”

  “More of us could be killed. Maybe even you.”

  “If we don’t do something soon we will all be dead anyway.”

  Ezra had a good point. They couldn’t afford to wait any longer for Clemons to see the light. They had to act now before it was too late. “Okay, Ez, I guess we go with Plan B. How long until you can be ready?”

  “We’re ready now. We just need to wait a few hours so it’s believable.”

  “Okay, we’ll go on your signal.”

  With nothing to do but wait as the hours passed, Muddy listened to the zombies outside the hanger. As it had the previous times, the pounding stopped first and then the moaning began trickling off until no more sound came from the outside. The silence was little comfort, the undead would come back, they always did.

  The signal came in the form of screaming and commotion in the big cell. Muddy ran to the bars and began screaming for Clemons with everything he had. It had to be loud to overcome the pandemonium coming from the others. Clemons and his soldiers came busting out of their quarters in a panic. One guy was still holding a few playing cards in his left hand as he ran.

  “They’re killing each other!” Muddy screamed and pointed at the larger cell. As planned, its eight occupants were in the midst of an awful looking no-holds-barred melee. It actually looked pretty real as Duane tossed Torrey across the room. The two women, Whitney and Dana were attacking Ezra with shrieking gusto. Dana was on his back while Whitney tried to take him down around the legs. Carlos, Geoff and Brian were embroiled in their own three-ring slap-fight circus while cursing up a storm.

  “Stop!” Clemons shouted but nobody listened. If anything the violence in the cell intensified. The cursing and screaming began to morph into unintelligible babbling. Clemons and his men looked fit to be tied as they tried to sort out what was happening.

  “I said stop!” he screamed again. This time, as if on cue, all eight people dropped to the dirty cement floor with a wet plop as though someone had just turned off a power switch in their heads. “What the hell is going on?” Clemons yelled to Muddy who was looking on in horror at the silent people on the floor.

  “How in the hell should I know? Everything was fine and then they all went berserk,” Muddy said.

  “Are they alive?” Clemons yelled.

  “Look at them, idiot, they’re breathing. Of course they are alive.”

  “What am I supposed to do?” Clemons asked. He was starting to tremble. “I have orders to shoot anyone who has the Sickness.”

  “They may not even have the Sickness. You should at least check them for fever before you kill them in cold blood.”

  “And risk my men getting sick?”

  “Killing one at a time as they got sick was easy, Clemons, maybe even necessary but are you really going shoot all of them without knowing for sure? Harrie would be real damn pissed if she comes back and you’ve broken all her toys.”

  Indecision waged war on Clemons’s face until he finally ordered all but one of his men inside the cell to check the prisoners for fever. Muddy had been holding his breath during this time, trying to make his face as red as possible. He exhaled and started muttering curses. Softly at first as the soldiers stepped into the cell and approached the prone prisoners. Then he got louder and his curses went from words to a strange sort of guttural chanting like he was trying to take the world’s largest shit.

  “What are you doing?” Clemons demanded from the other side of the bars. Muddy added a repeated touchdown signal to his routine and began marching in place. “Stop that!” Clemons demanded. But Muddy didn’t stop. Instead he brought everything up a notch. He could see the five soldiers in the other cell staring at him with horror on their faces. The President of the United States had clearly just succumbed to the Sickness.

  “I demand that you stop this instant!” Clemons yelled. Muddy could see the man had his sidearm aimed at him. He braced himself for the inevitable gunshot. He was committed now, for good or for ill. Muddy took two steps back, raised his arms in the air and ran screaming into the cement wall to the rear of his cell. The impact was jarring as he recoiled from the wall and did a backwards somersault on the ground but he didn’t lose consciousness. Blood flowed from his nose into his mouth as he hopped to his feet. His body was a livewire of pain and his teeth felt loose in their sockets but he prepared himself for a second go at the wall.

  “Get in there before he kills himself,” Clemons screamed. The last thing Muddy heard before he hit the wall a second time was keys jingling in the lock of his cell door. Then there was a flash of facial pain and instant darkness.

  He awoke in agony still lying on the floor of his cell. The air above him was hazy and he thought he smelled gun smoke. People were shouting but he couldn’t hear what they were saying over the ringing in his ears. His eyes were swelling shut but he could still see a little bit through them. He cringed at the pain as he turned his head to see a body lying next to his on the floor. It was a soldier. The man was obviously dead with a bloody hole in his forehead. The dead man held a ring of keys in one hand and a forgotten pistol in the other. He looked surprised to be dead.

  “Hold still, Mr. President, you need to stay awake so we can have Dana take a look at you.” A voice said into his ear. He turned his head to find Ezra kneeling over him.

  “Did it work?” Muddy mumbled.

  “Well, I am in here with you so, yes, it worked,” Ezra got a concerned look on his face and called into the next cell, “Dana, hurry the hell up. I think he is really hurt.”

  “I’m fine,” Muddy croaked. “I just need to sit up.” Instead he closed his eyes and fell asleep.

  …

  The next time he awoke he found himself on his cement slab with his head supported by the softest pillow he had ever laid on. When he noticed his surroundings he thought perhaps the entire plan had been something he imagined but the pain in his head and face begged to differ. The clatter and moan of the zombies was back. Good to know some things never change. “Ezra,” he called out weakly.

  “I’m here, Mr. President.” He answered.

  Muddy looked towards his feet and saw Ezra sitting on the far end of the slab. “Just call me Martin if you don’t mind.” Muddy forced himself to sit up and didn’t protest as Ezra helped him.

  “It went just like we planned though I don’t think you needed to sell it so hard. You could have killed yourself on that wall. As it is, Dana had to set your nose and she says you have a nasty concussion.”

  “I’m fine,” Muddy growled even though he felt awful.

  “You started acting nuts. The soldiers in our cell forgot all about us. While they were focused on you we surprised them and took their weapons without much of a fight. Truthfully, I don’t think their hearts were really in it. The guy that was in your cell panicked and Torrey had to shoot him. He feels pretty bad about it. He’s never killed anyone before.”

  “And Clemons?”

  “He didn’t do anything, just stood there in shock. I walked up and took his gun. He is resting peacefully in the other cell with his guys.”

  Muddy turned to the other cell. Sure enough, Clemons and his five remaining soldiers were all sitting silently watching him and Ezra talk. Clemons was looking but not seeing. He seemed small and lost. “Where is everybody else?” Muddy asked.

  “Scrounging the hanger for supplies and food,” Ezra replied. He was silent for a moment before turning back to Muddy with a concerned look, “Phase one is
complete but now we have two other pretty big problems.”

  “And they are?”

  “The zombies for one. As you can hear, they are back and blocking the hanger doors.”

  “And the other problem?”

  “Even if we do get past the zombies where are we going to go? Seems like it would be suicide to go out there.”

  “There is a plane,” a creaky voice said from the big cell. Muddy and Ezra looked over to see Clemons standing by the bars looking in at them with a helpful smile on his face.

  “What kind of plane?” Muddy asked.

  “Air Force Two,” Clemons said.

  Ezra laughed, “And who is gonna fly that?”

  “I will,” Muddy said with a grin. “You ever heard of Operation Desert Storm?”

  “Sure,” Ezra said, “I did take several history courses in school you know.”

  “Well I saw it firsthand from the cockpit of an F-117 Nighthawk. Air Force Two should be a breeze compared to that.”

  “Really? I never knew you saw active duty.”

  “Nobody did. It was classified.”

  “When is the last time you flew a plane?”

  “Have you ever heard of Operation Desert Storm?” Muddy said with a grin.

  …

  It was cold on the roof of the hanger with the wintry wind whipping through his dirty long hair. But to Muddy it was best feeling he’d had in months. The sunlight stung his blackened eyes as he leaned over the side of the hanger and took in the scene below. “What would you guess? Maybe a few hundred?” he asked as he stared at the zombies clustered in front of the hanger door.

  “That seems about right. Mostly Air Force personnel it would appear,” Duane said.

  The entire compound was completely fenced in with spooled razor wire running along the tops of the extra high security fence. “Doesn’t look like there have been any breaches. Those poor fools must have been inside already when they got sick.”

  “That or someone turned, attacked the others and it spread so fast that nobody escaped,” Ezra added.

  “So where is Air Force Two?” Muddy asked.

  “It’s in that hanger,” Clemons replied and pointed to a similar building located about a football field away from their current position.

  “If we had a rope, y’all could lower me down and I could get the plane ready,” Torrey said. The young man with bushy blonde hair had a gleam in his eye that said he’d be willing to take just about any kind of risk.

  “Can you fly a plane?” Muddy asked.

  “Nope! But I’d sure love a go at it.”

  “Okay, we will put that idea in our back pockets for now. What else do we have?”

  “We put one guy in the control room to activate the doors. When they open up we let the zombies chase us to the back where we exit via the cargo doors in the loading bay. The guy in the control room closes up the front end and dashes out before the hanger doors close. We secure the back door behind us, effectively trapping all the zombies in the hanger,” Ezra suggested.

  “That would give us plenty of time to figure how to get into the other hanger which I imagine is completely secured,” Muddy said.

  “We’ve got plenty of C-4, that should get us inside,” Clemons offered.

  “Can we trust your men to cooperate?” Muddy asked.

  “They will do as they are told. At this point we all realize our options are limited. They will fall in line if it means getting out of here.”

  Muddy smiled, “Gentlemen, I believe we have a plan.

  The group on the roof made their way back down the access ladder and filled in the others on the plan.

  The hanger was essentially a large rectangle. The planes had been moved out and the space had been retrofitted to accommodate the holding cells, several offices and the control room. The rest of the area was used to warehouse supplies and weapons. The space in the back had a cargo bay. The entire hanger was completely enclosed from the outside world with the exception of a handful of small windows scattered high above the ground throughout the entire building.

  It was determined through a series of footraces that Torrey was the fastest and would be the person in the control room to open and close the hanger doors. Clemons led him off to show him how to do it.

  There were plenty of weapons in the hanger so each of the remaining fourteen people were issued an assault rifle, a sidearm, all the ammo they could safely carry and a few grenades. The handful of novices in the group were given a quick tutorial on gun safety and instructed not to shoot unless their lives depended on it. The remaining food and water were distributed as well.

  Muddy insisted on being part of the team of three that would lead the zombies deep into the hanger while the rest of the group stood at the ready by the loading docks next to the exit door.

  The team of three spent 20 minutes making as much racket as possible to draw the entire zombie crowd to the right place in front of the hanger doors. They moved twenty paces away and signaled Torrey in the control room. Duane, Muddy and Ezra braced themselves to meet the undead for the first time. It was time to open the doors.

  The motion of the doors started with a subtle moan as the giant doors began to fold back against themselves. When there was barely two feet of open space the zombies started pushing in like they were being shot from a cannon. They were much faster than Muddy would have imagined as he barely had time to scream and start running before they were almost on him. He felt Ezra keeping pace as he heard a scream and a torrent of gunfire from behind him and almost tripped but Ezra kept him from going down. As they dashed past the control room the look on Torrey’s ghost white face plastered against the window said it all. Duane had either fallen or frozen. Either way his brother wasn’t coming.

  “Run faster!” Ezra screamed.

  Muddy could hear what sounded like a pack of galloping horses on his tail but fought the urge to look behind him. The open space began to narrow to a wide hallway as they neared the loading bay. Eleven people stood in a tight bunch staring over Muddy and Ezra’s shoulders in shock.

  “Go! Go! Go!” he yelled as more gunfire erupted behind him followed by a loud explosion. He should have never allowed Clemons to give Torrey a grenade.

  Dana was the first to jump to action followed by Whitney and the others. Muddy saw her scramble to the door and bounce right off the door bar in surprise. It was locked somehow? Hadn’t they tested it first? She was right back at it pushing with all her might. Geoff and Brian joined her while Clemons and his team prepared to engage the zombies as soon as Muddy and Ezra were clear.

  Muddy began to slow so he could get at his rifle but Ezra was still heading full throttle for the door, screaming at the top of his lungs. Carlos and Whitney saw him coming and pushed the others out of the way. Ezra hit the door at full speed just as the soldiers started firing into the zombies.

  Ezra was at least twice the size of Dana and he had built up quite a head of steam which meant he plowed into it with enough force to knock himself out cold and bounce backwards a solid five feet. To make matters worse the door was still not open.

  Ezra was down and not moving. The people by the door were in full panic mode and the soldiers just kept on firing. Muddy wasted a second to panic himself before he glanced up to see a small catwalk. The catwalk had a ladder near the back corner wall and there was a small window up there they might be able to reach with some luck.

  “To the window,” he screamed and pointed. Dana, Whitney, Geoff, Carlos and Brian looked up and spotted the window before dashing into action. Muddy pulled up his rifle just as the first zombie reached him. He took its head off with a three-round burst and then switched his ammo selector to fully automatic. It took around two seconds for him to empty his gun as he backed up. He threw it down in disgust and yanked out his pistol. The soldiers surged ahead a few feet to give him a little room to operate. He had made it to Ezra by feel not wanting to turn his head on the horde. He spent three seconds shooting zombies with his right
hand and slapping Ezra’s face with his left. When he felt him start to stir he yanked him up by the collar as hard as he could and shoved him toward the ladder.

  “Get up there!” Clemons yelled into his ear.When did we get so bunched up? Clemons was down to two soldiers and himself. The situation was looking dire. Ezra was pawing at the ladder like he was in a daze as Muddy arrived behind him.

  “Let’s go, Ezra. Gotta move it,” Muddy yelled and started pushing on the larger man from behind. Carlos scaled down from the top and pulled. Together they got Ezra moving up the ladder.

  Over the roar of the zombies Muddy heard an all too human scream. He looked down from his position halfway up the ladder to discover Clemons was completely surrounded by zombies with his men nowhere to be seen. He was holding them off for the moment by using his rifle like a club but he wouldn’t last much longer.

  “Shoot them goddammit!” Muddy yelled to the people on the tiny catwalk. A moment later the loading bay erupted in thunder, muzzle flashes and smoke as the survivors started mowing down the undead. But it didn’t matter; there were just too many zombies. Muddy locked eyes with Clemons for one awful moment just before the man was completely swarmed. The last thing he saw was Clemons’s fist thrust high in the air as the zombies pulled him down. Clutched in his hand was an olive green object a little bigger than a tennis ball.

  Muddy had just started climbing the ladder again when he realized what Clemons had been holding. “Grenade!” he screamed as a large invisible wet hand swatted him into the ladder like he was nothing more than a rag doll. His chest, legs and arms took the brunt of the force. His face was spared additional agony by sheer luck. Somehow he hung on tightly to the ladder and didn’t fall but the others weren’t so lucky.

  Whitney and Carlos had been knocked off the catwalk and swarmed almost immediately. Brian was hanging over the edge by his fingertips while Dana and Ezra tried to pull him up. Geoff had been impaled by the barrel of an assault rifle. He was sitting on the platform staring off into space, already dead. Everyone was covered in gore from the grenade explosion. Muddy’s entire backside was wet. The back of his head felt funny. His probing fingers encountered what felt like hot sliced watermelon chunks stuck in his hair. He pulled one free and examined it, unable to determine what it was.