The Gauntlet_Book Two in the Zombie Uprising Series

by M. A. Robbins

  She leaned out from the trees and peered up and down the track. Nothing moving. "But we can at least follow them for now. We just need to stay near the trees so we can take cover if we spot any trouble."

  She stepped out of the brush.

  Grant frowned. "Who put you in charge?"

  Jen sighed. Not again. "Are you from Anchorage?"

  "Kodiak," Grant said.

  "Then maybe Jen's the right person to lead us since she knows the city," Mark said.

  Grant frowned. "But I'm the authority here. I'm a solider. I know tactics."

  Jen crossed her arms. "How many zombies have you fought?"

  Grant looked away. "None."

  "Then I think we should let Jen lead, son," Doc said. "We're wasting time here."

  Grant kept his mouth shut.

  We need him, so take it easy, Jen. Don't say something smartass and piss him off more. "We can't do this without you, Grant," she said.

  Grant adjusted the rifle in his arms. "I'm good. Let's go."

  "We can't keep using guns," Mark said. "We need weapons that don't make noise and bring swarms."

  "Melee weapons," Grant added.

  "Right," Mark said. "Melee weapons. Car jacks, bats, anything that can bash a head."

  Jen smiled. "Just so happens these tracks run behind one of those big box hardware stores. Think we can find what you want in there?"

  "Now you're talking," Mark said.

  Grant stood off by himself, not saying anything. Jen walked over to him. "How do you think we should travel down the tracks?"

  Grant straightened, his features hard. "Single file. Makes a smaller profile. I'll take point. The rear guard needs to keep an eye behind us." He nodded at Mark. "How about you?"

  Mark shot Jen an amused look. "Happy to take the rear."

  "Good," Grant said. "Jen, you're behind me since you know the city. Doc is behind her."

  They followed the tracks, pausing at every muffled screech or branch snap, but they remained unseen. Thirty minutes later, Grant raised his hand and they came to a halt. He took a knee and gestured for everyone to join him. "The trees are thinning out up ahead."

  Jen knelt next to Grant. The back of a strip mall peeked through a break in the trees. "The hardware store is next to a strip mall. I think that's the one."

  Mark took a couple of steps toward the track and craned his neck. "Our concealment thins out quite a bit before we get to the store, but there's a train wreck on the tracks that will give us some cover—"

  Grant stood. "Follow my lead." He crept forward.

  Jen and Mark exchanged a glance. When was Mark going to let Grant know who the real soldier in the group was?

  They crept to the edge of the trees. A few zombies wandered on the far side of the parking lot, too far away to be attracted by anything but a loud noise.

  "Only ten yards to that wreckage," Doc said. "Best we get going."

  Grant nodded. "I'll go first."

  "Can we quit playing G.I. Joe and just all go?" Jen asked.

  "That's not standard procedure," Grant said. "You have no idea what—"

  Jen sprinted to the train. She didn't look back to see if the others were coming and didn't really give a shit.

  Reaching the train, she pressed her back against it. Mark and Doc darted across the open space, with Grant on their heels.

  "Dammit, Jen," Grant said when he arrived. "This isn't a fucking game. I'm OK with you taking charge when it comes to navigating the city, but I'm more qualified in combat."

  Jen opened her mouth to reply, but caught Mark's expression. He gave her a slight shake of his head.

  I'll bet he doesn't want me spilling the beans on him. Nodding, Jen said, "OK. What do we do next?"

  Grant peered around the wreckage, toward the back of the store. "We'll go in the same order as we did on the tracks."

  He led them past the wreckage and through a broken section of fence. The loading dock's overhead door stood open like a giant mouth. They stopped in front of it.

  "Can't say it looks welcoming," Doc said.

  Grant pulled a flashlight from his belt and turned it on. "Anyone else have one?" The others shook their heads.

  "That's the first thing we should find," Mark said. "That, and batteries."

  Jen nodded at Grant. "Looks like you're still the lead."

  Grant shouldered his rifle and took out his pistol. Shining the light into the loading bay, he swept the beam from one side to the other. "All clear. Stay close."

  He led them between stacked boxes and a forklift to a door. Looking back to the others, he shined the light on his face and put a finger to his lips.

  The door opened outward without making a sound. The light shined up and down the back aisle. Nothing stirred, undead or alive.

  Grant led them down the aisle that lay in front of them, its shelves stacked with cables and electrical gear. He swung the light back and forth in front of him. Jen clasped him on the shoulder and he stopped. "Back to the right," she whispered.

  The beam swung to the right and rested on a display of flashlights next to a rack of batteries.

  Jen took three flashlights and handed one each to Mark and Doc, then gave them each batteries. Loading her flashlight, she strained to hear anything in the huge store, but it remained quiet. She turned the flashlight on. Perfect.

  Grant crept down to the main aisle. Jen joined him, and her beam lit up a large poster at the end of the aisle they'd just left. It had a guy in overalls carrying lumber on his shoulder and looking happy about it. Like hauling wood is fun. Mark and Doc joined them, and four beams of light moved across shelves and displays.

  Jen whispered, "How about the gardening section?"

  Mark nodded and Doc gave a thumbs up. Grant led the way down the main aisle, with Jen pointing her light down each side aisle they passed. Damn place was as dead as a morgue.

  Something hit the floor and bounced twice. They all stopped. With the echoing, Jen couldn't tell the exact direction it came from. She tilted her head, listening over the pulse pounding in her ears.

  A bang came from an aisle two or three rows ahead. All the flashlights pointed that way.

  "I believe that discretion is the better part of valor," Doc whispered. "I suggest we take our leave."

  Grant took a couple steps forward and shined his light down the next aisle. "No growls. No screeches. Let's get what we came for." He pointed his beam at the end of the next aisle, which was labeled Garden Equipment.

  Jen liked Doc's idea, but she wasn't going to leave anyone on their own. She readied her pistol and took position beside Grant at the same time Mark and Doc did. Together they crept to the Garden Equipment aisle.

  Pointing their flashlights down it at the same time, they lit up a half dozen milling zombies, who turned as one and let loose with a screech that bounced off the floor and ceiling. The whole bunch raced toward Jen and the others.

  "We've got to get out of here," Jen yelled. "Back the way we came."

  Screeches rose from every direction. They'd walked into a hornet's nest.

  13

  Jen aimed at the lead zombie, a bearded guy in a ripped flannel shirt heading straight for Grant. A squeeze of the trigger and a solid kickback and the zombie went down, his momentum sliding him across the floor to stop just in front of Grant. Grant shook off his shock and aimed his pistol at the group of zombies. Other shots went off, and the zombies in the aisle were dropped before they could reach them.

  "Follow me," Jen yelled. She pointed her flashlight down the main aisle they'd come down. Several zombies rushed toward her and were eliminated by the group.

  Growls came from behind her. Mark yelled over them. "Five more on our asses."

  Jen turned and took out two of them. More growling came from all sides. "There's a shit-load more in here. We can't stay and fight."

  Doc fired over Jen's shoulder. "Damn, Doc. My ear." She didn't hear his reply.

  Jen spun and lined up her sights on an old la
dy zombie who came at her so slowly that Jen almost felt sorry for her. She took off half the back of her skull with a shot.

  The way back was clear. She grabbed Doc by the arm and pulled him along. "Go."

  Jen shined her light down aisles as they passed. The first two were empty, but the next one had a mob of zombies heading up it. She didn't take the time to fire.

  Grant took position in front of her. "Where the hell is the aisle that leads to the door? Anyone remember?"

  Mark fired to the rear. "I think it was aisle fourteen."

  "No," Grant yelled. "It was a single digit aisle."

  Jen pointed her light at the end display of each aisle they came to. Must've passed it. Couldn't have been this far away.

  Two aisles down, she caught the grinning face of the guy in the overalls. "Aisle ten," she yelled. "Take it."

  Mark made several rapid shots. Jen glanced over her shoulder. The main aisle overflowed with undead.

  "Are you sure that's the right way?" Grant asked.

  With no time to answer him, Jen dashed around the corner to aisle ten, then stopped short. Another mob of zombies stood in front of the door leading to outside. Her flashlight beam hit them and they screeched, then ran, limped, and hobbled toward her. There had to be twenty of them.

  Holding the flashlight pointed at them with one hand, she lined up her sights on the lead zombie and dropped it with one shot. Too many. Too fast.

  She aimed and squeezed the trigger again, but it wouldn't move. "Shit." The magazine was empty. She hit the eject button, stuck the flashlight under her arm, and pulled another magazine from her front pocket. She slapped it in, released the bolt, and fired.

  More of the zombies fell as Grant and Doc stood alongside her. Someone backed into her and Mark yelled, "We're about thirty seconds from being overrun in the rear. There's at least a hundred of them closing in."

  Half the zombies in front of the door were down. Jen holstered her pistol and pulled the rifle from her shoulder. "We've got to push through. Follow me!"

  She sprinted toward the zombies, holding her rifle with both hands, ready to strike. Another fell when its head exploded, leaving a twenty-something girl zombie in her path.

  The zombie ran at her full tilt, and Jen held the rifle so the butt faced outward. As soon as the zombie leapt at her, Jen cocked the gun back and slammed it into the girl's face.

  The zombie went down, but wasn't out. Didn't matter. Jen sidestepped it and aimed the butt at the ear of a middle-aged man in white painter's overalls. He grabbed her arm as she got close, but lost his grip when the rifle butt slammed home.

  Grant leapt in front of her and took out another zombie with some fancy close quarters rifle work. Damn, he's good.

  Doc hit one in the shoulder, knocking it off balance. Jen bull-rushed it and took it to the floor.

  She scrambled to her feet and glanced over her shoulder. Mark still faced the rear and launched a constant barrage at the horde behind them at the entrance to aisle ten. They were running out of time.

  Four zombies remained between them and escape. Jen launched herself at one and pushed it back into a light bulb display. It tripped and flipped over onto its stomach.

  She twirled and brought the rifle butt crashing down on another zombie's nose. It crumpled. Doc struggled with one remaining zombie, and Grant shot it through the forehead.

  "Way's clear," Jen yelled. She pulled the door open and prayed there weren't any outside waiting for them.

  Mark sent a fusillade of bullets at the incoming zombies, grabbed Doc by the collar, and yanked him through the door. Grant followed, and Jen jumped through, pulling the door shut.

  Undead fists pounded on the door. Jen stood, bent over with her hands on her knees, and panted. Mark put a hand on her shoulder. "We should go. I don't think they can get through that door, but there's been a whole lot of things happening lately that I would've thought impossible."

  Jen nodded and straightened. Grant led them back through the loading dock and to the train cars. "Let's take ten," he said. "Need to figure where we're going from here."

  Jen sat on the ground. "Grant."

  He turned to her. "Yeah?"

  "You kicked some ass in there."

  He nodded at her. "And you're a nut. You ran right at those zombies." He grinned. "You'd make a good soldier."

  She shook her head. "No, thanks. I just want to get somewhere normal. Get back to the internet, lattes, and hiking in the mountains without a corpse trying to eat me."

  Doc patted her on the back. "If you hadn't rushed the zombies, we wouldn't have made it out. Sometimes crazy is the only thing we have."

  "How about you, Doc?" Mark said. "This is a little more strenuous than what you're used to."

  Doc wiped his forehead with the back of his hand. "I may work in a lab, but I run a half marathon once a year. Don't worry about me."

  Grant walked out from the train cars and peered up and down the track. "Better take this chance to reload. How's everyone's ammo?"

  Jen checked her pistol. "Two more magazines for the pistol. Haven't touched the rifle."

  "I'm low on rifle rounds," Mark said. Jen tossed him a full magazine and he caught it. "Thanks."

  Grant frowned. "We can't take many more situations like that or we'll be without ammo before we get halfway to the base."

  "And we still need the close-combat weapons," Mark said. "The rifles are better than nothing, but not by much."

  Jen put her head in her hands. There wasn't another hardware store in the direction of the base for miles, and she didn't want to veer off course if she didn't have to.

  "Jen?" Doc said. "Any ideas?"

  Jen took a deep breath and eased it out, puffing her cheeks. It would have to be some place other than a hardware store, but where?

  She stood and glanced up the tracks. The tracks went north across 100th Avenue then on to Dimond Boulevard, where they crossed it on a bridge. Plenty of stores along the way, including a mall, but no hardware.

  That's it. She turned to the others. "I know exactly where we can find the weapons we need."

  14

  Thirty minutes later, Jen lay on her stomach across the train tracks, scoping out the mall. Big and multilevel, it stood like a silent monument to the old world.

  Packs of zombies gathered at every entrance visible, except one. But to get to that door, they'd have to cross the huge parking lot without being seen.

  Next to her, Mark pointed to a double line of campers. "Looks like the dealer had a sale going on when the shit hit the fan. We can get halfway to the entrance without being seen if we use them as cover. Just go in between the rows."

  Jen bit her lip. Groups of three to twenty zombies wandered through the parking lot. She watched them, trying to predict their routes, but they'd turn at random, sometimes doubling back the way they'd come. "There are a couple hundred of them that are visible. Who knows how many are on the sides of the mall we can't see."

  "I don't know if it's worth the risk," Grant said.

  Jen had always been good at maze puzzles, but none of them had pieces that moved. This looked more like a 1980's arcade game. "It's worth the risk, unless you want to go miles and hours out of the way, and maybe find there's a worse situation when we get there."

  "You never did say what store we're going to," Grant said. "How do we know if it's worth it?"

  She eyed Grant. He was no dummy. She'd be asking the same question. She squelched the urge to say "trust me" since she didn't trust him just yet, either. So far he'd shown up and fought when he was supposed to, but the stakes were too high to take any chances.

  "It's worth it," she said. "Besides, I see an easier way in."

  Grant frowned, looking out over the parking lot. "Where?"

  She pointed to the RVs. "We follow Mark's suggestion of the campers. That gets us halfway. But there's no route the rest of the way that doesn't expose us at some point." She pointed to a row of Armed Forces Recruiter vehicles. "Twenty feet fr
om the RVs to those. We can use them as cover, which will leave us twenty feet in the open to get to the door."

  "I don't know how they don't see us then," Doc said.

  Jen shrugged. "Then I guess it's a good thing you trained for those marathons."

  "What if the doors are locked?" Mark asked.

  "What?" Jen asked.

  He got up on one elbow. "The doors. What if we run, attract all that attention and bring a horde down on us, and the mall door is locked? Then we're trapped."

  Shit.

  Grant snorted. "Yeah. Just what I thought. Look at her. She hadn't thought of it. Would've led us into a trap. Why don't you just let me make the tactical decisions? I'm trained for it."

  Mark glared at him. "We don't need your macho bullshit right now, Mr. Communications Specialist. Her idea's still good, we just have to assess the risk."

  "Assess the risk? And why the hell do you think you have room to talk? You're just a rent-a-cop."

  Mark's face turned red, and Jen hoped he'd blow up at Grant, maybe even kick his ass. But he took a deep breath and the red disappeared from his face.

  "Yeah, that's what I thought," Grant said.

  Doc cleared his throat. "Let's look at this logically. We need close-combat weapons or we have to use the firearms and draw more swarms. If we survive that, we'll be out of ammo before you know it. If we have to go somewhere else to find the weapons, that increases the risk we'll run into just that situation, plus it's taking precious time we don't have."

  "I don't remember the colonel saying we have a time limit," Grant said.

  Doc cleaned his glasses with his shirttail. "They left behind one plane with its crew and some support. They can't guard the whole base, so they probably have a perimeter around the flight line. Even then, they're stretched thin. How long do you think they can hold it?"

  Grant pounded a fist into the ground. "Shit."

  Jen slid back until she was in a depression behind the tracks and stood. "So I guess that means we go in. Right, Mr. Tactical Decision?"

  Grant mumbled something under his breath as he crawled back to the depression with the others. "Everyone check your gear and your ammo. Make sure you're ready for anything."