by Tim Moon
Ben sprung up from his hiding place. He was slightly shocked that his target was a tall, husky woman in a loose floral print muumuu, stained red and black by the blood of the living and infected. Her thick hands reached out for him, fingers straining to make contact with his skin.
Batting her hands aside, Ben swung wide with the pistol and connected with the side of her jaw. Her head twisted to the side, but she didn’t stop. The momentum of the large woman forced Ben to backpedal until he ran into the car behind him.
Ben swung again with the pistol, hitting almost the same place. A loud crack sounded. Her jaw cocked sideways and stayed there, but she still managed to snap her teeth at him. Those cold, dead eyes bore into his skull.
Cursing under his breath, Ben felt panic begin to swell up inside of him. He fought it back. The woman’s belly pressed him into the car and made breathing difficult. He shoved her as hard as he could and created enough space to slide along the car. She tipped sideways, bending the side mirror against the car while Ben slid along the edge of the hood.
Ben stepped around behind her. He saw the other infected mere feet away, so instead of attacking, he grabbed her muumuu and yanked hard, pulling her backwards. She stumbled and fell down, creating a barrier between him and the approaching zombie.
The other infected was a young man, probably Ben’s age. However, the disease that made him a zombie negated his youth and agility. The guy’s shirt said, “Beast Mode: On,” but he was currently in turtle mode after tripping over the woman and face-planting on the pavement.
Ben stood just out of reach, thinking how sad and pathetic they looked fighting against each other to get at him. No doubt the two of them could end him, but only if he lost his cool. Staying relatively calm and collected, Ben had them on the brink of defeat. He was faster and smarter than the infected were and it buoyed his spirits.
With both of his enemies prostrate on the ground, Ben stomped down with his heel on the guy’s head until it cracked open like a coconut. Fluid rushed out onto the pavement and his body went limp, effectively trapping the woman underneath. Even now, she was too weak to move him off her.
Stepping around the outstretched hands of the young man, Ben repeated his attack on the woman. She made angry growling sounds. He stomped on her head with force and enthusiasm as if he was kick-starting a motorcycle. To her credit, the woman was able to grab his foot for just a moment before her hand went limp and slid off his ankle.
Both of his attackers were dead - again. Ben checked to see if any others had spotted him or heard the noise. He wiped away the sweat that trickled down his forehead and settled at the edge of his eyebrows, threatening to sting his eyes. With a heavy sigh, he noticed one straggler dressed like a TSA officer headed in his direction, but she was still a ways off. Ben wouldn’t be waiting around for her.
He knelt down to check the pockets of the two he had killed. The young man was probably a tourist, because he had a wallet and a cell phone, but no keys. Looking at the woman’s dress, he quickly concluded that she didn’t have pockets. Zero for two with no keys to show for the effort and no keys meant to no vehicle. Ben frowned as he evaluated the situation.
Checking the area one more time, Ben saw the TSA zombie trudging along in his direction, but she appeared to be the only one. After taking out two infected, he was confident a lone zombie wouldn’t be too difficult to handle. So he paid her little mind and set his sights on the Humvee. He could practically feel himself sitting in the driver’s seat. Not that he knew what that felt like. He’d never driven a military Humvee.
Grinning at the thought, Ben stayed crouched down and edged down the aisle of cars. On the south side of the parking lot was a road that ran around the perimeter of the parking lot. It also led directly to the intersection where his Humvee sat waiting for him. Ben turned before he made it to the end of the aisle. He wanted to stay between cars so that he had some cover on either side of him. Without hesitating, he dashed across the next aisle of cars.
He wiped the sweat off his brow again, thinking that it almost felt hotter among the cars than it had among the rocks. Oliver must be struggling. Ben’s stomach was growling with hunger, he couldn’t imagine how the kid was coping.
Peering over the hood of the car on his right, he was disappointed to realize that the infected woman had apparently spotted him. She was angling toward him. He sighed, but wasn’t too worried.
Ben crouched next to the car and thought about which way he’d go. He could take the direct route, but it would put him in the road, exposed to all of the infected in the area. On the other hand, he could take the indirect route, which meant taking a wide sweeping arc through the parking lot. One meant risk of exposure to the infected he could see and the other mean risking running into infected that he couldn’t see.
Knowing that he couldn’t waste too much time on the decision he opted for the quicker, more direct route. Whichever way he went those bastards would hone in on him once he started the vehicle. As long as he got inside the Humvee before they reached him, he’d be okay.
Then he spotted a pair of dead soldiers not more than twenty yards away. Both of them sprawled out on their backs in an empty parking spot, surrounded by a wall made up of the dead bodies of the infected. Ben felt a rush of hope pulse through him. If he was lucky, the soldiers would have keys. Ben crouched low and sprinted as fast as he could across the next aisle. He reached the other side and ducked behind the first car he came to. Ben slowly bear-crawled around the back end of an old Camry to reach the bodies of the soldiers.
Both men lay on the ground with their innards strewn beside them, exposing gaping holes in their bodies. Flies rose from their corpses and an overpowering odor of rotting meat threatened to choke Ben. He gagged several times and put a hand over his mouth to hold his bile down.
Trying not to stare at their grievous injuries, Ben focused instead on pillaging their gear. He felt awful about doing it, but it wasn’t doing the soldiers any good and it meant everything for him and the group. His hopes were fulfilled when he found an M4 assault rifle lying on the ground. Ben picked it up and took a moment to untangle the sling from around the soldier’s arm.
“I’m sorry,” he whispered to Neal, the man’s name according to his nametape. Moving the dead felt intimate in a way. But he knew that his group needed the gun far more than this soldier did. He’d fought his last battle, stalling the infected so people like Ben could get away. For that, Ben was grateful.
Once it was free of its previous owner, Ben checked the safety. The last thing he wanted was for an accidental discharge that would bring down all the infected on him.
Under the rifle, there was a magazine of ammo, which must have fallen out of the pouches on Neal’s belt. It was still full, so Ben picked it up, but he realized he had nowhere to put it. With a grimace, he began to remove Neal’s load-bearing vest.
As he freed the vest from the body, Neal’s head lolled to the side, staring at him. Ben gasped and fell back. A look of pained shock was frozen on his face. Flecks of dried blood on his lips gave him an eerie look. His eyes were milky and glazed over with death. A fly landed at the corner of his eye and walked around for a moment before taking off.
Ben pushed away and got up into a low crouch. He quickly patted down the remaining pockets on Neal’s uniform, but he didn’t find anything useful. Ben pulled on the vest, slid the magazine he’d found on the ground into a pouch, stepped over Neal’s body, and approached the other soldier. This guy was nearly decapitated. Infected had nearly chewed his head off in addition to disemboweling him. His nametape was unreadable beneath a thick coat of blood. Ben wasn’t sure how safe it was to touch the brackish fluid so he could read the man’s name, so he focused on scavenging.
Of course, there was another rifle and ammunition in the soldier’s pouches, but not nearly as much as in Neal’s. Ben checked the magazines in his pouches and ditched two that were empty, replacing them with full ones.
Ben heard a groan behin
d him and whirled around. The slow moving TSA officer had wandered over and sneaked up on him.
“Shit,” he said in surprise. Ben raised the rifle, but froze. He couldn’t shoot. The infected continued forward, twitching and stumbling like a drunken person.
Cursing again, Ben stood up, holding the rifle in both hands like he’d seen in the movies and smashed the butt of the rifle into the lady’s face. Her head snapped to the side and she stumbled, falling into the car on Ben’s right side. Taking advantage of her misstep, Ben rushed forward to hit her again. Then he was falling. Ben hit the ground hard, scraping his elbows and wondering what the hell happened. Glancing behind, he saw that he’d tripped over Neal’s leg.
As Ben scrambled up, the woman dropped on top of him. He tipped over onto his back, which worked out because he could hold the rifle between them. She couldn’t bite him this way, but laying prone also made it difficult to kill her.
They thrashed on the ground, each of them fighting for an advantage to end the other. The woman was surprisingly strong, just like Eric had been. She snapped her teeth at him and clawed at his face and neck. Her chipped nails succeeded in slicing the side of his neck, but with adrenalin racing through his veins Ben barely felt it. Twisting the rifle, he forced the magazine into her gaping mouth as she groaned wildly. Shoving with all his strength, he chipped her teeth, wedging the metal into her maw.
Ben drew up one leg, into a sit-up position, and pushed hard. Her weight shifted forward and to the side. As she slid off the top of him, he kept the rifle pressed firmly against her head and twisted his body until they had switched positions. Now Ben was on top. He found that it was much easier to avoid her hands. Still, she managed to rake her dirty nails down his arms, leaving scratches like a wildcat.
He slammed her head against the pavement as he stared into her blackened eyes with all the fear and anger coursing through him. Half a dozen slams later and she still struggled under him. His arms burned with the effort and sweat trickled down his face, stinging the cuts she’d opened up on his neck.
Ben looked down at the vest he wore. There was a small pouch near his left shoulder. It looked like it held either a knife or a flashlight. Letting go of the rifle was risky, but he went for it. Tearing open the Velcro flap, he was disappointed to find it was neither. The pouch was empty.
“Perfect,” Ben said, growling.
He raised the rifle with both hands, turned it vertical and smashed in her head with the butt of the rifle. Ben rose from his knees to a crouched position and drove half a dozen hard strikes into her face until her arms flopped to the ground and she stopped twitching. The woman’s face looked like a bowl of burnt chili.
Ben was sucking air as he stepped away from her and sat down. A powerful desire for water sprung to mind. Enveloped in humid heat, Ben was now drenched in sweat. His arms were burning with lactic acid from all the work and a lack of water. Fighting the infected couldn’t have lasted more than a few minutes, but it’d been all out effort and it left him drained.
Ben knew that whether he liked it or not, others were relying on him. He was close to the Humvee, and with the weapons, they now had a greater chance of surviving long enough to get to the Quarantine Center. At the QC, they could get all the help, food, water and showers that they needed.
Blood covered his hands. It looked like Ben dipped his hands in tar and the smell was…unbelievable.
No more time to waste, he thought.
Ben started forward. The Humvee was in his sights and he could almost feel the steering wheel in his hands. Ben shook his head, in awe of all the death and destruction around him. He continued his hunched over walk toward the vehicle that would save his friends. His heart raced with excitement and he wondered where Ty and Anuhea were. He hoped they hadn’t run into as many infected as he had. Ben ducked behind another car for a few moments to catch his breath. Sweat trickled from behind his ear and down his neck.
Just as Ben was about to continue on his mission, a section of roof collapsed on one of the buildings. Smoke billowed out, the embers stoked by the exposure to fresh air. One infected that Ben could see immediately turned toward the noise and began to meander over. He was a younger man, maybe in his 30’s, and like the woman he’d just killed, wore a blue TSA uniform.
It seemed strange to him that so many TSA officers had turned into infected. What had they been doing? Maybe they’d been caught off guard by the exploding airplanes? There was no telling. A thought struck him. Why had Neal and the other soldier not become infected? In his rush to loot the bodies, he’d overlooked the fact that they’d clearly been bitten, yet were not zombies.
Questions for another time, he thought.
Several other infected began to move, following the sound of the crash. Ben already knew that sound and light could attract their attention. What was interesting was that didn’t have enough knowledge to realize that if they walked into the fire, even they would die. Perhaps their vision was hampered by the change in their eyes?
In any case, the infected were aware enough to zero in on him if he wasn’t careful. The noise of the renewed fire was accompanied by popping sounds and a hiss that sounded strangely like air leaking out of a tire, and it helped to cover the sound of Ben’s movement as he dashed from car to car with a rifle in his hand, the other rifle slapping against his back.
Ben peeked at the infected again and quickly counted eight of them, twice as many as he’d seen before. The sight of them set his teeth on edge. He became aware of just how vulnerable he’d be once he reached the vehicle. Although the Humvee was still about sixty yards away, Ben was certain he couldn’t run to the vehicle in time without having to fight off at least one of the bastards.
Smoke began drifting in Ben’s direction. The smell was dreadful, but what worried Ben the most was that it began to tickle the back of his throat. Suddenly, he wondered if he should even continue in that direction. He looked around for Ty or Anuhea to see if they were close to finding anything useful. Unfortunately, he couldn’t see either of them. Ben hoped they were okay, but nothing he could do would help them more than focusing on his mission to secure the Humvee.
The Humvee sat almost kitty-corner in the intersection with the driver’s side door on the airport side, furthest from Ben. He’d have to run around like he was doing a Chinese fire drill to get to the door. Ben hoped the keys were inside. If he had to look around for them, he may not be able to get away before the infected grew tired of the building fire and wandered back.
Ben saw another soldier lying on the ground. All around her was a semi-circle of at least ten bodies, presumably the infected that she’d gunned down. They were piled on top of each other, like a poorly stacked woodpile. The soldier still clutched her rifle in her hand and it was clear she’d fought to the end.
The soldier was young, like Ben. Her face was contorted in fear; her mouth locked in a silent scream that was stained by blood. Her face was covered with grime and soot from the fires that had raged the night before.
Ben approached carefully, hoping that none of the bodies would move. He couldn’t help but stare at the face of the soldier. Tracks extended down the side of her face from the corners of her eyes, evidence of tears.
Ben swallowed hard and approached the body. As he knelt down beside her, he realized that she’d shot herself under the chin. The rifle still lay there clenched in her hands, resting under her chin. He swallowed down the bile that burned his throat and slowly reached for the rifle. She’d made her choice, rather than die a horrible death at the hands of infected. Under those circumstances, surrounded by infected, alone and without hope, it almost made sense.
Seeing so many horrible injuries and death was quickly numbing Ben’s heart. The soldier’s death was less shocking to him than others he’d seen before, and certainly less horrific than others. Without time to waste, Ben focused on what he had to do which at that moment meant taking her gear. Carrying three rifles was going to be ridiculous, but he didn’t think he shou
ld leave the rifle behind. Three weapons were enough for nearly everyone to be armed. All he had to do was carry them to the Humvee. After that, if all went well, they’d be riding like bosses in their new ride.
He searched quickly for extra ammunition. There was only one magazine in a pouch on the soldier’s vest. Ben also found a grenade and a canister that read “smoke.” Ben had never actually seen a grenade in real life and thought it looked rather small, about the size of a tennis ball, but much heavier. He carefully pulled the grenade out of its pouch and stuffed it in a pouch on the vest he wore, along with the smoke canister. Smoke might not kill infected, but if it helped them escape at some point, it’d be worth lugging it around.
Like the second rifle he carried, Ben slung this one on his back. Walking would have to be slow because they would make noise, but he was satisfied that it was worth the risk. Finally, he began to pat down the pockets of the soldier looking for the keys.
No luck.
What the fuck? Do they not need keys?
He wasn’t sure, but now that he thought about it, it’d be kind of dumb to need keys to drive a military vehicle. Under fire from an enemy or returning from a raid, it’d be pretty stupid to be stranded because someone lost the keys. Since none of the three soldiers he’d come across had keys, he concluded that they must be unnecessary.
So far, he’d collected weapons and ammo, checking off two of the most important things their group needed. Now it was time to get the final one so they could get away from the smoking graveyard that was the airport.
Ben’s way was clear, so he sprinted toward the Humvee with the rifle in his hands. The weapons on his back jostled and clanked, scrapping against each other and his skin. He ignored everything other than what was in front of him. He only stopped at the edge of the parking lot, mere feet from the Humvee. Its big boxy rear end rose about as high as Ben could reach. The rear door was ajar.