Day One (Book 2): Choices

by Michael McDonald

  The Guard’s screams for mercy filled my ears as I ran down the hallway. I tried to block them out, but I knew what they were doing to him and it wasn’t right, no matter how vile he was or how warped his mind had become. No one should have to endure the death he was experiencing, especially one just following orders.

  It took all of the fortitude I had to keep moving. There was nothing I could do for him now. He had ultimately sealed his own fate the moment he moved into this complex and let others seduce him into their wicked deeds.

  Chapter Nine.

  Johnny had the chopper running. Its huge blades swept through the air in an endless circle, blasting the turbine exhaust toward the roof and kicking up years of debris. He had strapped Kember into the seat beside him and took turns scanning the instrument cluster, and then the roof ahead of him. The bird sat facing the roof access, allowing him a perfect view if anyone were to approach them, giving him ample time to pull his weapon and defend them if needed. The Guards would have to scale the walls of the complex or use another roof access in order to get to them from a different angle.

  Johnny scanned behind them a few times and turned to catch Kember looking at him. Her little face appeared to hold an expression of concern, as she looked in the back seat for her daddy and couldn’t find him.

  “Hey, your daddy’s’ going to be okay little one. You’ll see,” he said to her.

  Kember looked at the familiar face staring back at her and seemed to understand what Johnny had said. “Daddy,” she said and smiled.

  “Daddy’s coming,” he said and looked away, mumbling under his breathe. “I hope he is, anyway.”

  I shot down the second hallway like a bullet. The maze of hallways had me confused and running blindly in no certain direction. I was desperately trying to find the correct one that would lead me to the roof access and the chopper that was waiting patiently for me. I just hoped I reached them before the Guard’s did. I pushed harder.

  Down a second hallway I passed a large cafeteria with perfectly placed tables, organized in ten rows with three long tables per row. In the far back were the food lines and several openings to the kitchen, at least that’s what I was guessing anyway. As with other parts of the complex I had been to, it was barren and appeared to have been that way for some time.

  At the end of the hallway I spotted a narrow door to the left. Upon further inspection I found a flight of gray stairs ascending out of sight. These had to be the stirs I had frantically been searching for. I spun a few times and knelt near the door, listening for the slightest sound of an ambush, as I had met no resistance thus far. Something told me they had a special present waiting for me, maybe just up those stairs where I would have no cover from their fire and would be an easy target.

  I pulled the SBR close to my body, holding it by the magazine, and withdrew my pistol. In an enclosed area, such as a stairwell, my SBR would burden my movement and if they were waiting for me just out of sight, I wanted to be able to at least get a few of them before retreating, and then as they came down for me I could finish them with the short rifle.

  I could sense the inherent fear trying to pulverize its way back into me, yet I remained focused on each of the landings as I came to them, instead of worrying about the fast approaching emotional state that was trying to chase me down. I moved with precise confidence and watched the floors above me like a hawk.

  At the top of the stairs I could see the metal door leading out onto the roof and still hadn’t run into any Guards. Where were they? I knew they heard the chopper and that’s why they left me, but it didn’t explain why I had not heard anything from them since. My gut said that I had killed to many of them and they were going after Johnny and my Daughter to get me to cooperate with them, or give up. If they reached them first, I’d have no choice but to surrender and the moment I did, they would probably still kill Johnny and Kember in front of me as revenge for Smith.

  “Maybe I took the wrong stairwell?” I said aloud. It was a possibility since I didn’t really know the layout of the school complex. My Ex had never placed me on the list to pick up my own child if something ever happened… how thoughtful of her. The Guards on the other hand would know this place, every stairwell, hallway, and cranny like the back of their own hands, so where had they gone?

  No resistance equals the element of surprise. My mind told me, although I wasn’t completely sold on that idea or that it would be in my favor. It was a fifty-fifty chance at best, but one I was willing to gamble upon.

  I switched back to my short rifle and gave a few seconds of thought on how to open the door. Should I do it forcefully and rush into the unknown, or quietly and creep into it? Both ways held their own set of rules and consequences, which meant I had to take the lesser of two evils in order to ensure my survival, and those depending upon me, to live a few minutes longer.

  “How do I get myself into these things?” I asked and softly put my ear to the door. I registered no noises from the other side and considered it to be safe, however, there could have been countless handguns pointed directly at the door just waiting for me to burst through it before they put me down once and for all. “Here goes nothing,” I said, psyching myself up for the unknown. “I swear to god that if I get out of this, we are flying to a deserted island somewhere and staying there, just the three of us until this thing is over with.”

  I burst through the door, choosing to take the quicker of the two choices and make my presence known instantly; maybe I could catch a few of them of guard and drop their numbers even further before the bullets started flying.

  I swung left to see the barren rooftop, and then quickly the opposite direction to see the same picture painted there. No one but me was on the rooftop and I was relieved. I swung back to my left to see the chopper and my jaw suddenly dropped when my eyes focused on the Guards just feet from it with their weapons up, ready to shoot Johnny and my Daughter to death.

  My blood began to boil and I wanted them all dead.

  I rushed forward and knelt near a low railing, where I could steady my rifle for more precise shots. It was not set up to be a long range rifle like a normal sixteen inch barreled rifle. It was built for close encounters, no more than a few hundred yards, and even that was pushing it. If I was going to engage them, then I need to be sure I could hit my targets, not miss and alert them that I was near. Superiority in a gunfight was key or you’d risk the lives of those closest to you getting hurt. With the weapon steady I used the optic and began studying the Guards positions and looking to see if there were any patterns in their movements. A pattern was something I hoped for as it gave me the ability to predict what they would do next, therefore I could use that to my advantage and exploit them, putting a bullet in flight and knowing my target would simply walk into the shot.

  There was no magnification to my optic. It was a simple red dot used for close quarters and quick engagements of targets, and being that they were almost half a football field away from me, I would have to take my time, control my breathing, and squeeze the trigger with each shot, and between heartbeats. Easier said than done, and given the fact the fear was now with me, and that I had just mounted several flights of stairs in under a few minutes, which labored my breathing, made things even harder. Just holding the weapon steady on anything was a chore.

  I had my work cut out for me.

  I figured that my best bet would be to take out Officer Morris and the rest would more than likely run away. From what I had seen on my stay at the complex, the Guards had a relaxed form of structure amongst them, so killing the leader should put the rest of them into a chaotic state and give me the necessary time I needed to get to the chopper and fly away without further incident. This of course was all just theory, but I was about to test it.

  I lined up the closest Guard to the chopper, considering him to be Morris, and did my best to slow my breathing. I got the red dot to stay near his mid-section, although he was standing sideways in relation to my position, I hoped that the
bullet would enter through his ribcage and exit on the opposite side. That should be more than enough to permanently take him out of the fight, then all I had to do was hit one or two more as they scattered. The darkness concealed my position from sight and the suppressor would allow me to remain that way until I chose otherwise. The only unseen problem that could arise, is when I started shooting, I was concerned they may do the same, only not at me.

  Finger on the trigger, I exhaled slowly and when my lungs were empty, let the first round go. Within a split second the presumed Lead Guard doubled over and fell out of sight. I quickly targeted another one and let another one fly. The remaining Guards did not scatter as I had hoped; they simply found cover and began searching for my position.

  I targeted another unlucky Guard and fired. I saw the pink mist near his face as his head jerked backward and he slumped out of sight.

  For the moment they were no longer a threat to Johnny and Kember, or so I thought. One of the Guards, using perfect cover, was able to stick his weapon toward them, probably giving them orders to exit the chopper. I fired a few rounds with no luck and realized that from my point of view I had them pinned down, unfortunately, it wasn’t even close to true.

  They still held the ability to take out my pilot and Daughter while I watched. I had to get closer if I was going to make a real difference. The only problem with that was there was no cover past my current location to where the Guards were, which meant if they saw me I’d be in a lot of trouble.

  “I really don’t have much of a choice at this point,” I said softly and rose over the small railing to get a better view of the unleveled roof before me. “I’ll have to run as though the devil himself is chasing me and stop for nothing.” I laughed a moment at my own comment. I found it funny that I was going to run from the devil, when I was in fact acting that very moment as the devil. I have a weird sense of humor, I know.

  Although I was concerned with how slippery the roof appeared under the barely visible moon, once I put my feet on it I was able to determine that it was not any more slippery than the rooftop or stairs had been. I shot forward as fast as my legs would carry me.

  Officer Morris, who had not been shot, stood in the doorway of the stairwell with his Glock trained on Johnny, screaming for him to exit the chopper. Johnny looked at the vile man with anger in his eyes and his right hand slowly reaching for the M-4 between the two front seats. He figured that if he could get his hands on it and get it pointed quickly enough, he could take out several of the Guards and ensure that I made it safely to the aircraft untouched.

  “Get out of the fucking chopper, or I’ll shoot you!” Morris screamed.

  Johnny simply held his left hand up to his ear, alerting the guy that he could not hear what he was saying. His hand touched the folded butt-stock of the rifle and it gave him a burst of courage. “Keep your head down, little bit. It’s about to get really crazy!”

  Kember watched Johnny slide the rifle up in an angle that Morris could not see it until the moment it was being employed against him. She giggled.

  Morris fired two shots past the chopper and screamed his commands again. The Glock stove piped on him, meaning that the last round he fired did not clear the ejection port, so when the slide slammed forward to strip a new round and load it into the chamber; the stuck casing stopped the slide. Johnny saw the Guard look at his weapon and instantly pulled the M-4, so as the guy cleared his weapon and looked again at the chopper he was now staring down the barrel of an assault rifle.

  One of the Guards still under cover, just happened to spot movement in the darkness and looked closer. At first he was unable to make out what the movement was and was about to brush it off as seeing things, when a part of the moon light hit me from behind and lit me up like a roman candle. He drew down and was about to fire when bullets hit the narrow wall in front of him.

  “Here, he’s on the right side!” He shouted, but the turning blades drown his voice out to everyone but two other Guards who were looking at him. He motioned with his hand and drew their attention toward me. They began firing and I was forced to continue, as there was no cover, zig zagging all over the roof as I shot back. Thankfully they couldn’t shoot for shit and with me closing the gap upon them, I could.

  I saw Johnny stick his head out of the left side of the chopper and see me. He was brandishing his M-4 and quickly began shooting at the Guards shooting at me. One by one they went down and I quickly waved for him to take off and go. I tried yelling instructions to him, but I knew he couldn’t hear me. A bullet hit one of my side pouches on my chest rig and I fired a concentrated burst on where it had come from. Once again, my well thought out plan was quickly unraveling before me and there was nothing I could do to stop it.

  Johnny finished the last of the Guards off, as Morris had slammed the stairwell door shut as the first bullets ripped through the night, a few hit the door that had just shut, no doubt sending Morris down the stairs.

  “Hurry up!” Johnny shouted into the radio, which came to life in a small pouch.

  The radio, shit! Why hadn’t I remembered it? I was going to use it earlier when I was jumped in the hallway and I guess I was so concerned about finding them that I had simply forgotten about it. I yanked it free.

  Sparks exploded off the side of the chopper, followed by several more Guards who rushed out onto the roof. I managed to gun two of them down before they retreated back into the stairwell, but continued to shoot at the chopper.

  “Get out of here!” I screamed into the radio. “Take off and get the hell out of here before they cripple the bird!”

  “Keep coming you’re almost here,” Johnny shot back.

  “Go! You can pick me up further away from the school, far out of the range of their weapons. Now go, god dammit!”

  A gap loomed out of the darkness out me and being that I was in a full sprint and could not stop on a dime, I figured with the momentum I had built up I could easily clear it, but the landing might be a bit tricky. I launched myself into the darkened void only to realize that the gap was far greater than I had anticipated and all of my gear was weighing my down.

  “Holy shit!” I screamed as I flew through the air and could almost see the opposite rooftop pulling away from me. Almost three stories below me was the ground and the undead were everywhere.

  My time was up.

  I’d run out of luck.

  The only thing that kept the Guards from shooting at me and quite possibly hitting me in mid-flight was the fact that Johnny did as I instructed and lifted the chopper off the roof. The down wash from the blades blinded the Guards and all they could do was fire blindly at the chopper and at me.

  The rooftop suddenly reached out for me and I slammed into the edge so hard that I was almost certain I had been sliced in two and my legs were now lying helplessly on the ground below. Had that been the case though, I would have had a better chance at keeping what little hold of the rooftop I had. I could feel the weight of my lower body pulling me toward the edge and as hard as I tried, I could not stop myself. I was going to fall.

  Bullets hit the rooftop just inches from me. Some whizzed past my head close enough for me to almost feel the wind disturbed by their passing. I was in the worst spot imaginable and it was getting worse by the second, if that was even possible.

  “If you can see him, shoot that bastard!” I heard a voice command. It was Morris telling them to finish me off.

  The SBR was useless to me, as I would have to release half of my grip in order to use it, and going for my pistol would only place more weight on my lower half. I was vulnerable and could no longer defend myself. I prayed that death would find me quickly and that I wouldn’t fall three stories, breaking every bone in my body only to be eaten alive by the undead.

  The chopper cut to the right and I could see Johnny looking at me, knowing there was nothing he could do for me. If he stayed around too long there was a good chance they could hit him and the chopper would crash, and I could not let that hap
pen. When it came to the life of my child and their safety, I did what any real father would do if given the choice.

  “Kill him and shoot that damn chopper pilot!” The voice added. “Make sure none of them make it out of here alive!”

  More gunfire erupted. My Daughter’s safety was being challenged. I waved Johnny to leave the area, lost my hold and fell backward off the side of the rooftop. The ground rushed up to meet me and I hit hard.

  Johnny watched in horror as the young man fell to his death. Rage enveloped him and he cut the chopper so he could fire at the Guards, unloaded his weapon and killed several of them, and then cut off toward the East carrying with him a sadness that could not be cured.

  The closest Guard rushed to the edge of the roof and glanced over.

  “Is he dead?” The voice asked, to which the Guard looked back and nodded.

  “Those things are all over him,” he said with a smile. “If the fall didn’t kill him, which I highly doubt, then those things definitely will.”

  “Those two got away in the helicopter,” another Guard said in an angered tone.

  “They won’t come back now,” Morris said. “Not after losing one of their own. They’d be stupid too.”

  “We really could have used that guy’s gear. These handguns don’t have much stopping power, and if they do come back, we’ll be in a shitload of trouble.”

  Morris moved to the edge of the roof and glanced over to see the undead practically throwing themselves upon the guys limp body. “They won’t be coming back, I promise you that. But he did have some pretty cool gear, didn’t he?”

  The nearest Guard nodded.

  “Maybe sometime tomorrow, when those things have thinned out, we can get someone out there and try to recover all of his things. I’d really like to know who he was.” Morris added, and then walked away. He only got a few feet from the edge when the radio on his shoulder crackled and came to life with the voice of the Female Guard, Tawny.