by SP Durnin
"Shutting up now," Jake said, brightly.
Laurel honestly tried not to laugh as she chased him to the knife counter, where they began picking out sharp, pointy things for the others.
Chapter Thirteen
George was visibly upbeat as he backed the multicolored pickup against the loading dock.
Evidently the aging fixer had circled north a couple of blocks before meeting up with Jake's party, to ensure he'd shaken any creatures that had followed. Most of the Ram-tough truck's cattle-pusher was coated in brackish gore, and bits of gelatinous tissue clung to its rusty, green hood when the fixer hopped from the cab.
"Wow." Laurel stared at the sludge-covered steel. "What the hell happened?"
Foster smiled. "Not a lot. A dozen were on the street when I turned east, so I ran 'em down. Most of 'em just stood there as I rolled over their skulls."
"You ran them all down?" Maggie asked.
"Yee-up. That's potentially a dozen fewer shit-bags to deal with down the line." He lit a match on the truck's side mirror and brought the stogie between his teeth to life.
Allen was impressed. "Damn! That's...what? Twelve hundred points?"
The fixer looked at him blankly.
"GTA?" Allen helped Jake muscle the first cart off the dock and into the truck's bed.
"Wasn't that kind of dangerous? Getting into it with those things alone?" Laurel asked.
"Nah. I didn't even need to get out. Jus' backed over the few I wasn't sure about," George replied and tossed a tie-down over the cart to secure it.
Jake was giving the truck a leery once over. "Are you sure you didn't bust anything? The trip back is just over two miles. If we break down, or one of the tires was holed by a ribcage or..."
Maggie snorted as she looked over the aged vehicle. "Is this thing held together with bailing wire and bubble gum or what?"
George's face remained unruffled. "You could always jog behind it, gorgeous. I mean, you never use the treadmill. Too busy pumpin' up. I never get to see those guns of yours jig…"
"Anyway," the writer said firmly. "Back to the subject at hand? Are you sure this thing will make it back without breaking down? Since you decided to go all Road Warrior on the way here, I mean."
Foster smirked. "She may not look like much...but she's got it where it counts, kid."
There were varying degrees of laughter at that comment.
Then a group of zombies that had been slowly making their way south, began passing the mouth of the alley. One of the lead creatures noticed them and gave a deep, gurgling moan. The others looked in their direction, saw five humans, and thirty-one sets of rotting vocal chords joined the first, crying out for their flesh.
"Oh shit," Allen said.
Jake already had his hulking pistol out, as the others brought their weapons into play. The horrors started towards them and the smell of rotting meat wafted into the survivors' nostrils.
"Pick your shots," Foster said, pulling a SIG 716 assault rifle from the cab of the truck and taking aim at the creature in the lead.
They began firing on the pack. Over the last month, George had put them through intensive marksman training in the motor-pool beneath the safe house. Taking into account the utter failures experienced by the military during the frantic pull behind the Rockies, the fixer had bagged the center mass methodology and instructed them to aim only for the head. To insure they obeyed, he provided a single paper plate on a clothesline as their target and whoever missed? Well, just like when the aging sup had gone through basic training, they got to do push-ups. They got to do sit-ups. They got to run laps around the perimeter of the cavernous room. Needless to say, they were all in much better shape at the end of those forty-five days, along with being much better with firearms.
The ghouls began dropping at forty yards and not one of them made it to the twenty yard mark. The five humans decimated the stumbling creatures, sending explosions of body fluids and skull fragments back towards the mouth of the alley. As the last corpse hit the broken pavement with a wet splat, they all paused and swept the area, playing range-finder through the sights of their weapons. Foster had instructed them on engaging targets as a unit. Creating a killing ground that aggressors wouldn't be able to cross, without being torn to shreds by overlapping fields of fire. The process had proven itself now. The survivors hadn't hit with every shot they took. Some of their rounds went into necks, others into torsos, but they'd kept up a steady rate of fire. They'd alternated their shots, giving each other time to reload, while continuing to drop the hideous fucks coming for their flesh. George's face broke into a wide grin at their success and the show of controlled violence the party had displayed, in their first real engagement.
Or it could've been the smell of cordite hanging heavily in the air that gave his face the maniacal, stop-me-before-I-kill-again look of euphoria.
"Clear," Jake said.
"Clear," Laurel confirmed.
The others sounded off as well, ejected their partially spent magazines, and inserted fresh ones, making sure to chamber the first round to have one ready to go if need be.
"Did we really just do that?" Maggie looked a little shaken up after downing almost nine of the group with her MP4. Jake noted her hands were steady, despite the tremor in her voice.
"That, kids," Foster chuckled, "is what you call a successful fucking engagement. Good job. All of ya. I was a little worried about heading out before, but you all just blew any concerns right outta the water."
He began securing the last of the supplies they'd obtained—read: looted—in the bed of the pickup, while Allen moved up beside his friend to make sure none of the rotting things were still alive. Undead. Whatever.
"That one's twitching," Al said.
"Got it." Jake holstered his pistol and pulled the crowbar from its place between his tac-vest and backpack. He moved around the outside of the piled ghouls and spiked the twitcher in the temple with the weapon's chiseled end, stilling its spasmodically quivering limbs forever. As he wiped it clean on the thing's soiled, Oh-Aich-Eye-Oh jersey, Allen gazed around at the scattered bodies.
"It's a lot different."
Jake looked at his friend. "What is?"
Allen shook his head and let his weapon hang from its combat strap across his stomach. He looked around at the gore-covered cement and stinking meat-bags that, only a minute ago, had desperately wanted a taste of living flesh. "Shooting them. I loved those downloads you could buy for Call of Duty to turn all the characters into zombies? Thought it was a good time. It's not. It's not fun at all."
He turned and walked back to Foster's truck to help the old fixer secure the last of the straps over their supplies. Laurel strode to where Jake knelt, crowbar still held in his fist, when Allen turned away. She dropped the magazine on her Glock, replaced it with a full one and stood watchfully at Jake's side. The sexy redhead had downed seven of the creatures, and from the way she professionally held the pistol in a braced shooters' grip, George's training had taken a root in her as well.
She looked across the bodies and shook her head. "Al's a little messed up. Isn't he?"
Jake nodded, not knowing what to say about his friend's reaction to the firefight. "He's never actually shot at a person before."
"These things aren't people." Laurel said.
"They were. They were all someone's family. Parents, kids, uncles, girlfriends. They all had a history. Before." He came to his feet and looked around at the slaughtered dead. "Now? They're just shells. Hungry, biological, homicidal, robots that only know how to do one thing. Automatons that feed and feed and feed and won't ever stop, unless someone stops them."
She gave him a worried look. "Are you thinking about fighting them? Taking on every zombie we come across?"
"Oh hell no." Jake shook his head, laying his crowbar across one shoulder. "We're hopelessly outnumbered. There's no way we could just go around guns blazing, hunting down every maggot-head out there. I'm sure there's not enough ammunition handy as an
army would need to fight all of them, let alone the manpower. If people are going to survive? Someone a lot smarter than I am is going to have to come up with a plan, real quick."
"So you're saying I could do it?"
Jake looked at her wryly from the corner of his eye and Laurel blew him a kiss. He sighed and shook his head. "Christ, I'm the Rodney-fucking-Dangerfield of the zombie apoc͟‒"
He stopped, cocking his head towards the mouth of the alley and Laurel looked towards the street. They stood, listening silently for a moment. There was... something... but neither of them could place the sound.
The writer moved quietly to the mouth of the alley. He knelt at the corner, lowering his head to waist level to attract less attention and, ever-so-slowly, peeked around. His face paled. Pointing repeatedly back towards the dock doors, he backed away from the street and followed Laurel towards the group on cat-silent feet.
"Everyone?" Jake said in a hushed voice. "Keep quiet. We have a problem."
His friends looked at him with varying levels of nervousness.
"There's a big fucking pack of those things moving this way."
"How many are we talking about?" Allen asked.
"Lots. A couple hundred, maybe."
The others, except for George, gaped at him in horror.
Foster spit and shook his head. "How much ammo does everyone have? Two, three mags, maybe?"
The others nodded and looked nervously at the mouth of the alley.
"We don't have enough to take on a crowd like that." The fixer scratched at his sandpaper-rough cheek. "No way. We'll have to circle way out. Maybe we'll be able to find a way around."
"I'm going to draw them away." Jake motioned for Foster's sidearm. "The rest of you head home and meet me at the back gate. Don't keep me waiting."
George tossed him his silenced Glock without hesitation, which Jake secured to his left thigh with two lengths of duct tape—use one thousand and three.
"Yeah, that's not happening," Allen said.
"Too fucking right it's not!" Laurel piped hotly.
"We don't have time for this." Jake removed his Alice pack and wedged it between the wall of the pickup's bed and the rest of their supplies. "I know you guys could keep up, but I need you to offload fast and be ready for me when I get there."
Laurel didn't move as the others got in the cab. "I'm not letting you go alone, O'Connor," she said, hip cocked, and looking pissed.
"I can do this, but not with anyone else along." Jake stepped close. "You've got to trust me."
"I do! But you can't expect me…"
Jake kissed her, cutting off the argument. When they broke apart, she looked at him, half-smiling, half scared sick over his crazy plan.
"I'm going to get you for this later," Laurel said.
He grinned. "Looking forward to it."
She pulled out the secure radio and shoved it into the left lower pocket of his Tac-vest.
"We'll wait for you ta call," George said. "Just in case any of those things are close by. Don't want yer radio squawkin' and drawin' em in."
"Are you sure about this, man?" Allen asked. "You know I run a lot."
"I've got a plan. Don't worry." Then Jake smiled tightly and jogged to the alley's mouth. Laurel and the rest watched as he crouched, and then ghosted slowly around the corner and out of sight.
"He's a little crazy, isn't he?" Maggie asked, locking her door.
"Hell," George rolled his window down slightly, so he didn't choke them with his stogie, "It'll be a walk in the park. What could go wrong?"
* * *
Jake's was fucked.
He was sure at that point that whichever little shit-head of a god was in charge of his life was so stupid that he was the one who handed out mints in the afterlife's bathroom. Probably due to the fact that none of the other gods wanted to be the one responsible for sending their moronic cousin to help out down in Hades. He'd break a pipe or something, then the underworld would flood with feces. So, said insipid deity was kept busy torturing Jake. That was the only explanation for how quickly his KISS (keep it simple, stupid) plan went from simple to FUBAR (fucked up beyond all recognition) so quickly.
He was going to make it a point to sucker punch the halo-wearing little shit, when he went to the pearly gates.
The writer used abandoned vehicles littering the sides of the street to stay virtually out of sight, as he approached the oncoming crowd. The things were slow as hell, but that didn't make them any less dangerous. Or frightening for that matter. When he reached the corner half a block south, the infected were just beginning to spill into the intersection from the opposite side, slowly making their way past the crosswalk. He sheltered behind a burned out mail truck and considered his options.
It didn't make sense to waste ammunition drawing the creatures. Counting the eleven rounds in George's pistol, he only had thirty-eight left and he needed to save them, just in case. After taking a quick look around, he scurried left to a silver Honda Civic and began smashing out its windows.
The crowd turned, almost as one, and he stepped a couple of paces into the street. "Hey, you ugly fuckers. Hungry?"
A hundred plus dead jaws dropped and let loose gurgling moans, sending a spike of fear up Jake's spine. He turned and jogged east, every now and then busting out a car's window or striking a light pole with his crowbar to cause some noise. The dead followed as best they could, shuffling awkwardly on unfeeling legs and reaching out in his direction. Jake sped up. He widened his lead to a hundred yards, leading the horde for two blocks, stopped at the far side of an intersection, and waited for them to catch up.
He wanted as many of the things as possible to see him cut north again, hopefully drawing them away from the noise Foster's pickup would make. That way, when the others reached the safe-house, the surrounding area would be free of the creatures. They could offload by the time he jogged back, so Jake could just pop in. As he watched the crowd move slowly towards him, he dropped the point of his crowbar against the manhole cover in the middle of the intersection repeatedly.
The dead kept moving onward and, judging by their speed, he had almost a good five minutes before he'd have to make tracks. Jake pulled the secure radio out of his vest and flipped it on. "You guys there?"
"We're here! Are you all right?" Laurel's voice was strained and full of fear.
"Don't worry, I'm fine. Just playing Pied Piper to a really messed up group of hungry rats." He watched the dead as they moved towards him up the block. "Tell George to head out. It should be safe now, since I seem to be so popular. I'll circle north. Be nice if someone was there to let me in, okay?"
"We'll be waiting." Jake could hear the trucks engine come to life in the background over the mike. "Be careful."
"Who me? Out." He killed the radio and put it back in his vest pocket.
As he secured the Velcro tab, glass shattered behind him. Jake spun around to find over a dozen infected pushing through the front window of a BW3s. Fully half of them were wearing employee shirts while the rest were ex-customers. They ignored the shards of glass that sliced at their grey flesh and crowded through the broken window. A couple lost most of their fingers from clawing at the sharp edges in their haste to get through, but the missing digits didn't affect them at all. He noted that the fingers didn't continue to move after being sliced from the creatures' hands, and then filed the factoid away for later consideration.
One of the employees, closer than the others—due to not tripping over the windowpane on the way out—moved slowly towards him, lips drawn back showing his blackened gums in anticipation of feeding. Jake considered the awful thing for a moment, strode forward and brought the hook end of his crowbar down through its skull. The zombie slumped bonelessly to the road and he kicked it in the face, jarring the weapon free.
"Sorry. I always liked Hooters' wings better. Their waitresses were hotter, too."
The rest of the group began rising to their rotting feet and it was time to go. He walked qui
ckly north, sticking to the center of the road, watching every window he passed for signs of hungry occupants. Many had already been broken out. The few that hadn't were so covered in grime and gore, that there was no doubt the interiors of those storefronts were the last places in the world he'd ever want to see.
The B-Dub group was absorbed into the shambling crowd, once it reached the intersection. Even half a block away, the sight of that many hungry dead motivated Jake to move a bit faster. He started jogging, moving steadily north two blocks, then turned west for the longest leg of his return trip. Two miles isn't that great a distance really, but under stressful conditions (like say, zombies roaming around, wanting to eat your ass) it can seem much, much farther. Fear, adrenaline, and stress could steal your strength and cognitive abilities in situations like that, making it impossible to carry out even the most basic plan.
It was called tunneling. Seeing only what was right in front of you and never taking notice of the guy with the gun to your temple, three feet to your left. So, relying on training the old frog had drilled into him during his time with the SAS, Jake started to slow his breathing and carefully scanned his surroundings. He saw a few zombies along his path in the distance, but reasoned he could dodge them easily. While even one was enough to kill you, as long as he kept his head, making it to Foster's bolt hole wouldn't be too difficult.
So of course, half-way back, the gods began throwing speed-bumps in his way. As he came within thirty yards of an intersection, a second horde began trickling into it from the north. This one matched the group he'd lead away from the others and then some in numbers. There were so many that the creatures were almost shoulder to shoulder as they flooded into view. There wasn't time to take cover—read: hide—and many of them saw him right off the bat. Their moans were terrifying as they began stumping in his direction, yellow eyes focused on his flesh. Jake sprinted for the southern side of the intersection, staying just out of the lead ghoul's grasp as he cleared the corner at top speed. The hungry pack was way too close for comfort, so he made like a fugitive and fled for his life.