by Ricky Sides
“Those are some very good questions, son. I asked the brass the same thing. All I can tell you is what I was told. There is a plan in the works. Our job is to contain it as long as we can. This deployment isn’t going to end until the threat is neutralized, or the powers that be institute another plan that changes things.”
“Can we expect help from the other cities in North Alabama?” asked Randy.
“No. They are busy setting up blockades to stop the spread in their direction,” the sergeant responded.
“How close to Decatur should we go, and when do we begin patrols?” asked Herb.
“We need to keep a watch on the approach of the zombies, so you are authorized to travel to within sight of them, but then you should maintain a healthy distance between you and them. The patrols will begin after chow. The meal will be ready soon. Meanwhile, if there are no further questions, let’s get the men assigned to their teams and draw our vehicles.”
Herb made certain that he and Randy were paired for the mission. They drew one of the unit’s three Humvees. That would have never happened had the full unit been available. Had that been the case, the ranking officers would have utilized them.
The guardsmen ate their dinner, and then half of the teams moved out to their vehicles to begin their patrols. The other half would remain in reserve. They would try to get some sleep and then work the midnight shift. Herb and Randy were going out with the first teams. They stopped by Herb’s house, where he fed and watered the dog. Ox seemed happy to see him, but wanted to go with the men when he went to get back inside the Humvee. “Stay, boy. Guard the house,” he instructed the dog.
Ox walked back over to the porch and sat on his haunches. He watched the Humvee as it backed out of the yard.
As Randy drove away from his house, Herb said, “We can make our plans while we patrol.”
“Okay, but where are we going to patrol first?” Randy asked.
Herb pulled his map the sergeant had given him from his pocket and looked down at it. The patrol route was laid out as a series of grids. “We drew the rural route northwest of Athens as a starting point. Then we cross over through Tanner to link up to Highway 31. After that, we head toward Decatur to determine the progress of the zombies from there. Once that is accomplished, we come back to Athens to patrol the east side.”
“It will be getting late by the time we head south on 31,” Randy observed. “How do you want to handle this? Do we turn back at the first sign of the zombies, or try to get past the first few to locate the main group?”
“We’ll play it by ear. I tend to think we could terminate the first few, as long as there is only a couple at a time. We don’t want to get tied down battling a horde that could surround us.”
“All right. We covered those details. Now what about our long term plans? Are we sticking with the unit until we know what plan the government is going to try?”
Herb frowned. “This isn’t easy, is it?”
Randy shook his head, indicating that it wasn’t an easy decision for him either. “I feel like I’m planning to abandon friends when they need me the most.”
“Yeah, I know exactly what you mean,” Herb said, “but we should plan for our own survival when the zombies get to Athens. And they will. There’s no way to prevent that. In fact, No one is even talking about any plans that would accomplish that goal, and there’s a reason they aren’t. It’s just not possible to stop them.”
“I know. We couldn’t contain them in Decatur, even with the obstacle of the Tennessee River assisting us. Athens is wide open,” Randy observed. “It will be overrun in a matter of hours. People trying to escape will block the roads in and out of the city. So we have to think about what we’re going to do.”
“I haven’t even had time to gather supplies. I know you bought a ton of stuff last night, but you said I’d need ammo,” Randy pointed out.
“We’ve got hundreds of rounds with us now, and two M4s,” Herb pointed out.
“You mean you’re thinking of taking them?” Randy asked.
“The unit has plenty,” Herb said, and then shrugged. “It’s not as if we’d be leaving them with a shortage. When we get back tonight, we could always draw more ammo. We could say we had to shoot a lot of the zombies. We are going to be the team scouting out the leading edge.”
“That’s true. The armory also has a ton of extra magazines. We could say we lost some while changing the empties for fresh ones.”
“Now you’re thinking long-term survival goals, buddy,” Herb said, praising his friend’s ingenuity.
“So the question is, do we leave in the middle of the night, or wait for daylight?”
“I think we play it by ear,” Herb responded.
“You’re getting in a rut. You’ve been saying that a lot lately,” Randy explained.
“I know, but it’s the truth. A lot depends on what happens tonight. If we see that the zombies could reach Athens before daybreak, of course, I’d favor leaving sooner rather than later. Hell, if it’s looking bad enough to warrant leaving even earlier, we may not even go back to the armory.”
The friends saw nothing for the first forty-five minutes of their patrol. That changed when they reached Highway 31 and began driving toward Decatur. Six miles south, they saw a lone zombie walking up the road. They knew he was a zombie because of the obvious mortal wounds he had suffered as a man.
The zombie was walking toward a child who was kicking a round red ball in the front yard of a single level dwelling beside the highway.
“Stop the car,” Herb instructed his friend as he prepared his rifle for the encounter. The moment the Humvee came to a stop, Herb opened the door and stepped out with his rifle. He rested his left elbow on the hood of the vehicle and aimed at the zombie, which was across the median from them.
The creature had been walking down the northbound lane. It ignored the vehicle and stared at the oblivious child with single-minded intensity as it continued to approach the little boy.
“I’ve got a bad angle!” Herb shouted to Randy. “The kid is in the line of fire. Blow the horn. Let’s try to distract it.”
Randy sounded the horn, which had the desired effect on the zombie. It stopped in its tracks and turned to face the Humvee. It took two steps in the direction of the men. Herb needed it to take a couple more steps before the child would be out of the line of fire, so he waited.
Then the unexpected happened. The front door of the house opened and a woman ran outside, permitting the screen door to slam shut behind her as she raced across the yard toward the little boy. “Tommy!” she yelled with a shrill tone of voice. “Come to mama, baby!”
The zombie whirled around and started toward the woman.
“Get down, lady,” Randy shouted as he bailed out of the Humvee with his rifle.
“I can’t make the shot,” Herb warned Randy. He started around their vehicle, moving along the passenger side toward the rear. He bolted past the Humvee the same instant that Randy fired his rifle. His bullet hit the zombie in the back and it fell to the ground.
“Don’t risk another shot! I’ve got the angle here!” Herb exclaimed. He sighted on the side of the zombie’s head and took the shot as it crawled toward the woman who had reached her son and pulled him down to the ground.
Herb walked up to the zombie and examined the wound to see if he needed to shoot it again. He didn’t. The bullet had entered the side of the zombie’s skull and exited the other.
“Are you okay, lady?” Randy asked the woman.
“No! That thing could have hurt Tommy! Why aren’t you people out there stopping these things?”
“Ma’am, there are thousands of them and only a handful of us. We’re doing our best,” Randy tried to explain.
“Well, your best isn’t good enough, is it?”
“Lady, you need to take your son and leave this house,” Herb said. “This zombie is just the first to get here. There are a lot more headed this way.”
“Where the hell
am I supposed to go?” she asked. “My husband is at work. I can’t just leave our house.”
“You’d better rethink that, Ma’am, because soon this highway is going to be full of those things, and when they get here, they will finish what this one started,” Randy explained.
“I don’t have anything packed. Can you men stand guard while I put some things together?” she asked, sounding more reasonable. Herb thought she looked pretty when she wasn’t dead set on reaming them out for things beyond their control. The blonde haired woman had shoulder length hair. He estimated that she was in her late twenties. She stood five-foot-three, had a good figure, and deep blue eyes. Her son had inherited her hair and eyes. Herb thought he might be five or perhaps even six years old.
Randy looked to Herb for the answer to her question. “Just grab any medications your family will need and a set of clothes for each of you. Throw your canned food in a bag and get out of the house. I can’t tell you where to go, but it’s not safe here. And, no, we can’t wait. We have to keep going toward Decatur to locate the main group of zombies.”
“You can’t just abandon us!”
“I’m sorry, but there are a lot of people along this highway that need help. We can’t get tied down with just one family,” Herb responded.
“Leave!” the woman yelled at Herb. He stared at her in surprise. “You heard me! I said get off my property!”
“Good luck to you. Don’t wait too long. You could have fifteen minutes, or several hours. The truth is, we don’t know yet,” Herb responded, and then he turned and walked back toward the Humvee.
The two friends got back inside their vehicle. “I’d better call this in to the armory,” Herb said. “Get us headed toward Decatur. You can drive the speed limit in the straight stretches with plenty of visibility, but slow down for the blind spots. It wouldn’t do to round a curve and run into the main body of the zombies.”
“Right,” Randy agreed.
While Randy drove the Humvee, Herb called in with his cell phone and reported the incident with the zombie. When he completed his report he asked, “Why isn’t anyone trying to evacuate?”
“You’re telling me they aren’t?” the sergeant asked.
“No. We’re not seeing any northbound traffic that looks like people evacuating. Actually, we aren’t seeing much northbound traffic at all. We’ve only seen a couple of cars since we got on Highway 31, and we haven’t seen any sign of law enforcement.”
“That’s odd too. You men be careful. It sounds like something’s wrong out that way. The zombies may be closer than you think,” Sergeant Shannon said, and then he told them to call back when they had additional information.
As if the sergeant’s words were prophetic, Herb was putting away his phone when the Humvee lurched forward. The tires screamed in protest as the large vehicle slid to a stop.
“Damn, Randy, be careful! You almost threw me through the windshield!” Herb carped as he glared at his friend.
Randy didn’t answer. He was looking at something down the highway, so Herb turned his head to see what had caused his friend to stop the Humvee so abruptly.
Three hundred feet from their position, all four lanes of Highway 31, and the median that separated the north and southbound lanes, was covered in zombies. Several hundred feet beyond the leading edge of the zombies, situated at the top of a small rise, the two friends saw the strobing lights of several law enforcement vehicles.
“Look over there,” Randy said and pointed to the left. A house on the left side of the road was under siege by dozens of the zombies. The sound of gunshots was coming from the home. The sounds emanating from the undead horde were unnerving. The individuals were making that typical zombie moan, but with so many being placed together in such close proximity, the sound merged into an undulating bass harmony, not unlike cattle lowing.
“Turn us around. We can’t help anyone here,” Herb instructed Randy.
“What about the people in that house and the cops?” Randy asked.
“They’re already dead, or soon will be, and so will we, if you don’t turn this thing around before they reach us. Now, get moving.”
Randy took his foot off the brake and drove through the median as he executed a U-turn. The excited zombies began to run in an attempt to catch the Humvee, but Randy floored it and left them behind.
Herb called Sergeant Shannon and reported the approximate position of the main body of zombies. “Yes, I’d say it’s likely that they’ll reach Athens late tonight or well before dawn,” he responded to the sergeant’s question.
“We’re coming up on the house where we killed the zombie,” Randy informed Herb.
“I’ve got to go for a bit, Sergeant,” Herb said and then he hung up his phone. “Slow down. I want to see if the woman’s car is still there.”
“It is,” Randy said seconds later.
“Damn. Pull over, but stay in the car. I’ll try to warn her. You keep the motor running.”
As soon as the Humvee lurched to a stop, Herb jumped out with his rifle. He ran toward the front door he’d seen the woman use to exit the house earlier. His sprint took him past the car, and he could see that she had thrown several bags and articles of clothing into the back seat.
At the door to the house, Herb banged on it with his fist, shouting for the woman to come outside. She opened the door in a matter of seconds, but it seemed an eternity to Herb.
“What do you want?” she demanded angrily.
“Where’s your son?” Herb demanded. Get him. You’re leaving, and I mean right now.”
“I’m not ready yet.”
Randy blew the horn and pointed behind the Humvee. In the distance, Herb could see the first of the zombies topping a small hill and beginning to rush down the grade. “Get the boy, right now,” he said, and then he shoved the woman back inside the house.
“He’s in my car,” the woman said fearfully. She opened the door and came back outside.
“I didn’t see him when I ran past your car,” Herb explained as he led the way back toward it.
“Oh, my God! Tommy! Tommy, where are you?!” the woman shouted fearfully when she saw that he wasn’t inside the car.
“Herb, they are getting pretty close,” Randy warned.
“Get in your car and turn it around,” Herb instructed the woman. “I’ll check your backyard.”
She ignored him and ran around the house herself. Behind him, Herb heard Randy’s rifle fire. “Go ahead. I’ll try to hold them off. There aren’t too many yet, but hurry. That’s not going to last long.”
The sound of Randy’s rhythmic firing accompanied Herb as he raced around to the back of the house. He stopped abruptly when he saw the two zombies on the ground eating the little boy. The child’s mother was only a foot from them when Herb rounded the corner of the house. She dove at one of the zombies, knocking it off her little boy. The woman fought fearlessly, clawing at the face and neck of the zombie on the ground beside her, but it turned its head and bit into her forearm. She screamed in pain. That drew the attention of the other zombie and it left the body of the boy to attack her.
Herb swallowed the bile in his throat and shot the woman in the head. Then he turned his rifle on the body of the boy, fired once, and then he left the two zombies to their grizzly feast. There wasn’t time to kill them too. As it was, he and Randy would be lucky if they could get away before they were swarmed by the horde.
“Hurry!” Randy screamed as he shot another zombie that had closed to within forty feet of the Humvee.
Herb shouted, “I’ll cover you! Get in, and be ready to drive!”
He fired half his magazine into the growing numbers of zombies that were rushing down the grade toward him.
Herb had forgotten about the two behind the house, and that oversight almost cost him his life. “Look out behind you!” Randy yelled.
Herb spun around and shot a zombie that was six feet from him. He turned his rifle toward the other, fired, and then he jumped
inside the car. They were already in motion when he managed to slam his door.
Randy floored the accelerator, but let off the gas when the tires began to spin. He then accelerated at a more reasonable pace, and soon the zombie pack had disappeared behind them.
“The woman and boy?” Randy asked sadly.
Herb was breathing hard. He slammed his fist into the dash of the vehicle and cursed. “They’re dead. The two zombies you warned me about were behind the house. I guess the kid got out of the car and went around back. She fought them and was bitten. I had to do it,” he explained. “I didn’t want to, but I had to shoot her.”
“Shit. I’m sorry, man. That had to be rough. Are you okay?”
“Hell no, I’m not okay. I may never be okay again. She was still human when I shot her, Randy,” Herb explained. Randy noted the tormented look in his friend’s eyes and the troubled tone of his voice.
“We both know that wouldn’t have lasted. Once bitten, there is no cure,” Randy said sympathetically. Then he said, “You’d better warn the Sergeant. At the rate these things are moving, I’d say they’ll reach Athens earlier than you told him.”
Chapter 7
Washington reacts
The President and his top advisors held an emergency meeting that wasn’t listed on any itinerary with the Secretary of Defense and Secretary of Homeland Security. They were meeting to discuss the developments in the zombie outbreak that originated in Decatur, Alabama, but had since spread to other areas in the region.
“At this point, Mr. President, the problems are contained within a 120 miles radius in Alabama and a 20 mile radius in Nashville Tennessee,” explained the Secretary of Defense.
“How bad is it?” asked the President.
“It’s worst case scenario, Mr. President. Once bitten, there is no saving the person from the parasites. It is spread through contact with the body fluids of the infested. If a host bites someone, then they pass the parasites through their saliva to a new host. The microscopic creatures then take control of the victim’s body and shut it down. After the victim dies, the organisms reanimate it. Nothing remains of the original person. All that’s left is a mindless puppet with just two goals, which are to eat and breed the microbes. The human body is a perfect breeding ground for them,” explained the Secretary of Defense.