by Mark Clodi
“I think we are being watched.”
“We haven't seen anything moving. It rained a while ago. Would that set you off? My grandfather could always tell when a storm was coming in, said it was the changing air pressure or something.”
Max shook his head, then said “No, I don't think it was that. I think someone is close by, watching us maybe.” He could see his companions only because they were silhouetted by the very small amount of light creeping in from the outside.
Max eased himself off of the bed, Stewart came awake instantly and had a gun pointed towards the window a moment later. “What?” she asked in a voice that denied the fact that she had been asleep seconds before, “Not your shift yet Max, it is too early.”
“I know, I just woke up, my head is buzzing again. I think something is out there.”
“You see anything Tom? Erin?”
They shook their heads 'no', which was barely visible to Max in the dim light seeping in from outside. Max just shrugged.
“Okay, so you want to check it out?”
“Yeah, we better. Stewart said to trust my guts. And my guts say something is coming our way. Maybe a slow something, maybe a fast something, maybe lots of somethings.”
“Let's hope for one big one. I don't like spending the ammo.”
Max got out of bed and pulled on his jeans, Stewart got up as well, pulling on some khaki shorts and flip flops. She put on her heavy police belt and holstered her pistol, then picked up the shotgun up off of the bed where it had been laying beside her.
“You are going to shoot your foot off sleeping with it like that.”
“No. I had the safety on and there wasn't a shell in the chamber. Get your shotgun. Are we going out to meet them or not?”
Max went to the window and cautiously eased the drapes open with one hand, his other held the stock of the shotgun. “I've got nothing specific from here, I have to go out and look around a little. If I had to guess I would say it is coming from the West.”
“Tom you better wake the others, better to do it like this than with a shotgun blast. Get Cory and Jessica into the bathroom, and have Nick and Erin out in from of the door behind you and Amelia.”
“Okay.” said Tom as he started waking the other four up. Erin, helped get Jessica and Cory into the bathroom, the boy went despite his protests that he was as old as Nick and could shoot a gun too. Once the others were set up Stewart unlocked and eased open the hotel door. Tom pulled the curtains open until there was about a foot of space to look through the broken window, he stood back far enough to stay in the shadows, but close enough to watch Max and Stewart as they went outside.
Stewart held the door open and Max went first, trying to locate precisely where the buzz was coming from. He checked to either side of the door and then moved around to the front of the van and Paul's wrecker, which had been backed towards the hotel doors. Once clear of the immediate building Max rotated around and looked at the surrounding buildings and highway. He paused when he was facing the highway, then continued moving until he was facing more east.
“Towards the highway and west.” he said in a low whisper to Stewart without pointing or moving in that direction.
“Nice, you paused there for a second, but that was good misdirection. Can you actually see anything or do you just 'feel' it.”
“Just feel it, what can you see?”
“Nothing. I can see better in the dark, but if it is hiding I will still have a hard time picking it out. Is it one or many.”
“Hard to tell from here, two or three I think. Yeah, probably three..”
“That is mighty god-damned useful. I mean. If it is true.” They had never relied on Max's hunches to this extent before.
"I don't know how I know, I just do." Max shrugged, “So, how do we do this?”
“Max you know me. Direct is good.”
“Okay. I will lead the way, do we run or just saunter?'
“We better saunter, it is more intimidating. It says 'we not only know where you are and what you are, but that we are not afraid of you'. Now I hope, I really do, that they don't have guns too.”
“Always the optimist.”
“It wouldn't be the first time. I hate the ones with guns.”
“Maybe we could talk to them?'
“Maybe a tasty loaf of bread will fall out of my ass the next time I shit.”
Max shrugged and started walking directly across the parking lot, heading for the south west corner. Stewart was walking beside him on his right. Whoever was up there, they had chosen to stay out of the direct line of sight with the room.
“They see us, or know we are coming. I think two of them are moving to either side of the other one. One is moving to the right, the other to the left.” Max shifted his shotgun to point in the general direction of one of the zombies he sensed moving to the left.
“I see one, on the right. No sign of the others. Just three?”
Max nodded.
“I ain't looking at you. I can't hear you when you nod. You gotta answer me, with real words when we do this Max.”
“Sorry, just three.”
Max felt the zombies to either side of the one in the middle stop and back up, they were in the middle median strip of grass and scrub between the highway lanes. Max whispered this to Stewart and the two approached and climbed over the low barbed wire fence to climb up the embankment. After struggling up the embankment through the weeds and burrs they made it to the highway's surface.
“I hate walking through this shit. Why don't you develop a new power to draw them to us?” whispered Stewart.
“I will give that a try next time, if I remember. I think they are less than a hundred feet away, shouldn't we be quiet?”
“They know we are here, you know that from their movements. What have the flankers done?”
“Moved back a bit, over to the other side of the highway.” The road here was cut into the edge of a low rising plains hill, so the other side of the highway was uphill from them, with a shallow ditch to cross over.
“So just the one is there?” asked Stewart, she slowly cocked the shotgun, the noise was well above the sound of their whispering.
“Yes. The other two are back about a hundred and fifty feet or so. I think there might be more over that hill there, to the west on the highway.”
“Now you tell me. How many more?”
“Lots.”
“Fucking great. We better cut and run. I only brought twenty extra shells for my shotgun, you?”
“Ah, about that, plus I have my revolver.”
“I got my police baton too, if it comes to that. Are the other ones moving?”
Max concentrated, sensing the zombies at the extreme edge of his ability to do so. “No, if I am reading this right.”
“We should still move back, load up and get out of here.”
“If you say so.”
Stewart took another five steps forward, belatedly Max moved up to join her, “I thought we were going back?”
“Maybe it does want to talk.” she started moving forward again slowly. The partly cloudy night did not provide very much light to see by, Max could make out the painted stripes and dashes along the road, but the vehicles abandoned along the side of it and Stewart were just dark areas of shadow.
“Fifty feet. Or so.” Max whispered, “Behind that car there, I think.”
Behind the car in question, unseen by Max and Stewart a zombie listened carefully to their conversation. It cocked its head sideways to get a clearer connection to their voices and slowly nodded to itself before it rose, catlike, to slink away into the ditch on the other side of the road. The zombies two companions waited for him to catch up to them in their retreat, then the trio started jogging back to the west.
“They are moving back, looks like they are heading west.” whispered Max to Stewart.
Stewart set out in a quick jog to the car the zombie had been hiding behind, she made it to the vehicle in time to see one of the zombie'
s head disappearing into the ditch, then watched until she saw three inky shadows in the ditch disappear over the hill they had come down the afternoon before. Stewart had her gun aimed at their backs, but did not fire.
“Too far, huh?” asked Max.
“Yeah, and too dark. And they're too fast. No point in wasting ammo. Max?”
“What?”
“What do you think that was all about?”
“Scouts for a larger group? I think there are more coming behind these guys.”
“Maybe. They seemed...smart. Like Nancy was.”
“Yeah, but why didn't they attack us?”
Stewart shrugged, “We have guns? We knew they were there were and about where they were?”
“So what do we do?”
“I think we just need to be very careful.”
“We leave now?”
“I would rather not, not in the dark, but I don't see any help for it.”
“Well by the time we get everyone fed and loaded up it will be almost dawn. Plus we can waste a little time in town refueling the generators in case any other living pass through here. And grabbing more food.”
“It won't take that long, but yeah, let's get back and get moving.”
Eating and loading up took less time than they thought, Tom had already told Nick and Erin to bundle up everything and he had tossed most of it into the back of the van by the time Stewart and Max got back. Max explained the curious behavior of the zombies to the others and no one had any constructive thoughts about it for now. In less than twenty minutes from when the zombies ran from them they were on their way into town to top off the diesel generators.
They approached the store with caution, even though Max had the feeling no one was inside. Stewart and Tom ducked inside while Max and Amelia kept lookout outside. Stewart had brought in one of the gas cans and used it to refill the generators in the back room. She also poured another can into the wrecking truck.
“What if the generators need that fuel?” Max asked.
Stewart shrugged, “They will run out in another day or three, if no one is here all that fuel in the other tank will go to waste anyway. I haven't seen any sign that there are other people here. Have you?” Max shook his head 'no', “Then we might as well top off the tank. I bet we only have a range of about three hundred miles in this diesel truck, so either we find more or we dump it. I have to look at our group survival first, but that doesn't mean I won't look out for everyone else too.”
“Stewart?”
“What Max?”
“I think there are some zombies in town.” Max pointed down a side street away from the main county road where the grocery store was located, “Over that way.”
“That is a bit west.” she ventured.
“Yeah, but what brings a group of zombies into town?”
She thought a moment, then said, “Humans.”
“Should we go check it out?”
“It could be a trap set by those we met earlier.”
“Or it could be a different group.”
“It won't hurt to run by there real quick, how far away?”
“Maybe a half mile.”
“So? Not even out of town, I will go get Tom, you fill Amelia in.”
Max walked over to where Amelia was sitting in the idling van with the window rolled up to protect against the morning chill, he knocked on it and she hit the button to roll it down, “Yeah?”
“I think there are some zombies over that way. We are going to swing by and check it out before we leave town, just in case there are survivors.”
Amelia nodded.
Tom and Stewart came out of the back doors of the store. Tom was carrying a couple of plastic bags which he deposited into the van while Stewart loaded yet another can of diesel fuel up onto the tow truck.
“Max you lead us off in the truck, I will be next in the cruiser and Amelia will be tail end Charlie.” Stewart said.
Max hopped into the wrecking truck, which had a few more knobs and buttons than the average vehicle, but was still an automatic and easy enough to get moving. Nick sat in the passenger's seat, his door was locked and he had a short barreled shotgun he could fire if he needed to. Max shut the door and said, “How're you doing big guy? You tired?”
“No, not that bad. I don't need that much sleep dad. Once I am up I am up.”
“Up and grumpy, yeah, but up.” Max teased, tousling his son's hair. “We are going to check out this road here, I think there might be some zombies up ahead, and maybe some people too.”
“Okay.” said the boy sitting up more straight and peering ahead into the darkness.
Max drove slowly down the street, he did not have his head lights on, but the parking lights cast enough light for him to see ahead a little way and at the speed he was going he didn't think he would have a problem seeing a wreck. It was still dark and gloomy out, which gave the zombies an advantage; darkness didn't seem to bother them in the least.
“Stop! Dad stop!”
“You see one?” Max asked, wondering why he couldn't sense the thing.
“Yeah, right ahead.”
Max slowed the truck, edging it towards one side of the street so Stewart could pull up alongside of him. As he stopped a man stumbled up to the side of his door. The man was clearly dead, his right shoulder was oddly shaped and the cruiser's running lights revealed bone sticking through black colored flesh.
“Shit!” Max swung his truck door open and bashed the tall zombie to the ground as the cruiser pulled to a stop. Getting out Max grabbed his baseball bat and slammed the driver's door shut, “Stay in the truck Nick!”
Taking a step forward Max brought his bat down on the zombie's head while Stewart hopped out of her car and circled around behind it to join him.
“He the only one Max?” she asked.
“I don't know. I lost it, I had it for a minute, but I didn't sense this one coming. I don't know where they are.”
“Fucking useful talent. Well, better sometimes than never I suppose. There!” she gestured with her gun at another zombie coming into the small circle of light, “I will point them out while you bash them.”
This worked out well and Max managed to kill several more slow zombies that Stewart pointed at coming out of the gloom. Then she hopped into the police cruiser and used the spotlight to scan the area. She highlighted about a dozen zombies mobbing one house. They had gotten through the front door, but several were gathered along one side of the building at a small basement window, those zombies were on their hands and knees trying to break through the window. Stewart got out of the car and balanced the spotlight on the hood, pointing it at the group by the side of the house. The spotlight was not mounted to the car, but plugged into the car's power supply to be used as needed. Max stepped up to the zombies and started killing them one by one, they were too stupid and slow to realize the real danger, and another source of food, was behind them.
Stewart fired her shotgun, which startled Max so that he missed his next swing on the second to last zombie that was trying to crawl through the window.
“Fuck!” he swore softly, “Super zombie?”
“Crawling right up on our asses too. Watch it!” Stewart yelled as one of the two 'slow' zombies bounced up in front of Max.
Max swung at the zombie, who grinned and caught the baseball bat with one hand. Kicking the thing in the balls didn't do much good, but it did force it back over the slower zombie on the ground, causing them both to go down in a heap. The faster zombie spun away like lightening and Stewart's shotgun blast hit the other one in the stomach.
“Shit. He is fast!” Stewart said tracking the thing as it spun and evaded her. The zombie threw the baseball bat at the officer and Max's hand reached out and caught it while Stewart raised her shotgun defensively. “Nice Max!”
Looking at the zombie, which was still bouncing around in the vegetation between the houses Max decided he had enough time to bring a blow down on the other zombie who was at his feet. T
he zombie's head crunched like an eggshell, adding yet another dent to Max's bat. Stewart's shotgun roared again and the fast zombie went down on its back.
“Watch him Max, that wasn't a clean shot!”
Approaching the still twitching zombie Max watched for some sort of deception. He took the last three steps running and leaped over the form on the ground, thinking to circumvent any treachery from the zed. The thing had been faking, but only a little bit, one bloody pale arm reached up to try and grab Max as he flew over. The hand missed and when Max landed he brought his bat down square on the zombie's nose. This was not a death blow either and Max had to hit it three more times until he felt sure that it was dead permanently.
“What the fuck was that? I mean, why didn't you just use your shotgun or pistol?”
Max shrugged, “I don't know. I guess I was saving a bullet.”
“Well next time; don't. We don't need any heroes. You got kids to take care of for Christssake.”
“Yeah, okay. Like I said Stewart I don't know why I did that. I didn't think.”
The woman nodded in the dim light and called to Tom, “Did our fire draw more?”
“Not yet.” he yelled back, “but I can't see that far, so whatever you are going to do, do it quick.”
Turning back to Max, she asked, “Check the house?”
He nodded, “The zeds were here for a reason.” Bending down he called through the window, “Hello? Any living people down there?”
“You sense any dead there?”
Max looked up at Stewart from the ground near the window, he wrinkled his forehead intently, “No. Nothing. I don't sense...wait, it is like, like there are a lot of them...not hear, but over there.” Max pointed west, and a bit back towards the interstate. “It is like there are so many of them there I can't get a reading on what is here.”
“Should we go take a look?”
“I am not too keen on that. If I am right there are a lot of zombies coming our way.”
“Well there is nothing here...” Stewart was interrupted by a cry from the basement.
“We are here! You aren't the bad guys are you?”