“Granddad!” Doug shouted.
Chapter Eleven
Jack stumbled to his feet and crossed to where Telia had fallen off the bridge. He hoped to find her clinging to some part of the structure below but saw nothing but the roaring rush of brown water. In the dim light, there was no sign of her along the banks.
“Telia!” he called out three times as loud as he could.
No answer. With a heavy heart, he returned to his family.
“You didn’t see her?” Kate said while still applying the belt tourniquet to Kerri’s arm.
“No. It’s possible she was swept downstream and survived.”
“Let’s hope.”
“Dad, did that lady die that fell off the bridge?” Brett said.
“I don’t know, son.” Jack put his arms around the boy’s shoulders. “She was a very brave woman who sacrificed herself to save Kerri.”
While they spoke, the black Jeep descended the hill and stopped a few yards from them on the bridge. The driver’s door opened and Doug’s grandfather emerged. With his full gray beard, long hair pulled into a ponytail, and automatic pistol hung in a holster on his hip, the man looked more like a militant Santa Claus than a Marine sniper.
Doug rushed into his arms. “I knew you were okay. It takes more than a zombie apocalypse to kill my bad-ass granddad.”
Tears welled in the old man’s blue eyes as he hugged his grandson close. “Damn, boy, I was just coming to look for you. Thank God you’re all right. You’re all I got, son.”
They ended their embrace and Doug nodded toward the others. “I wouldn’t be here if these people hadn’t saved me back at Cobb’s Corner. Come meet the Garrett family.”
Jack stepped forward and held out his hand. “Jack Garrett.”
He took it in a firm shake. “Max Saunders.”
“To say I’m happy to meet you would be a hell of an understatement.”
“Thanks for saving my grandson’s life. I was scared something had happened to him.”
“Don’t mention it. You paid me back by shooting that zombie I was fighting.”
Max laughed. “You were putting up a pretty good fight against that big sucker.”
“He was tough as hell. I hope we don’t run into more like him.”
“Granddad, you knew that big zombie,” Doug said.
“I did?”
“Frank Cooper.”
Max’s white eyebrows rose in surprise. “Big Frank, no shit.” He tipped the brim of his cap toward Kate. “Sorry about the language, ma’am.”
“Not a problem. By the way, I’m Jack’s wife, Kate.”
“Max Saunders and this boy’s grandfather.” He turned to Jack. “I’m not surprised you were having a hard time fighting big Frank Cooper. He was a tough son of a gun. I watched that man whoop five roughnecks in a bar once. He was also a friend, so I’m glad I was able to give him his final peace. If Big Frank was a zombie, then it’s fair to say the rest of the Cooper clan have met the same fate as well. That’s too bad. They were a lovely bunch of kids.”
“We’re just lucky you showed up when you did,” Kate said. “You’re a godsend.”
Max chuckled. “I don’t think I’ve ever been called that before. I like it, though.” He nodded toward Kerri, who was passed out on the ground. “Looks like you got a wounded one there. How bad is it?”
“It’s my daughter,” Kate said. “She got bit by a zombie back at the station. We put a tourniquet on her arm because she’s lost so much blood.”
Max clapped Doug on the shoulder. “Son, there’s a first-aid kit in the back of the Jeep. You know the one. It’s in a red satchel. Why don’t you go and fetch it for me.”
“Sure.” He took off toward the vehicle, with Brett in tow behind him.
Max knelt beside Kerri. “I don’t need to tell you it has been one terrible day. The world’s gone to hell in a handcart. By the look of you all, I think you know what I’m talking about.”
“We fought zombies all the way here,” Jack said.
“I believe it. After the quake, I thought my major concern would be dealing with the damage done to my farm. I probably got loose cattle spread over half the county. I was out checking fences when I encountered my first zombie. The poor bastard got caught in some barbed wire. His clothes were all bloody and his guts were hanging out, but he was still moving. Needless to say, I was a little taken aback by that. A zombie hung up in my fence was the last thing I expected to find. Then he let out a terrible sound and more of them showed up. Luckily, I never travel far without my rifle and my trusty .45.” He patted the pistol on his hip. “After that encounter, I knew I had to search for my grandson.”
Doug returned and handed the first-aid kit to Max. “We blew up Cobb’s Corner, Granddad.”
“You blew it up?” Max said.
“All to hell. Ka-boom! About a hundred flaming zombies went flying everywhere. It looked like something out of a Hollywood movie. It was totally sick. You would have been proud, yo.”
“That must be the plume of smoke I saw rising from that direction.”
“Yeah, we had us a zombie barbecue, didn’t we, Mr. G?”
“Son, you should address him as Mr. Garrett,” Max said.
“It’s okay. I told him he could call me that,” Jack said. “He earned it by helping us escape Cobb’s Corner.”
“Then that’s fine.” Max zipped the kit open. “This new generation of kids with their video games and Facebooks don’t know the proper way to speak to someone. They’re too busy texting to have a real face-to-face conversation. I’ve been trying to teach the boy proper manners and respect.” He placed gauze, bandages, and antibiotic spray next to Kerri. “I’m a certified combat medic and patched up a few wounded soldiers back in Nam. So with your permission, I’ll bandage up your daughter’s hand.”
“I’m a practicing dentist, but my medical expertise lies in the area of root canals, not combat trauma. You go ahead.”
Max unwound the cloth to reveal the bloody wound. “That’s a nasty bite. A zombie did this?”
“Yes,” Kate said.
“I’ll field-dress it here and we’ll take her up to my farmhouse.” He applied antiseptic to the bloody bite, and Kerri moaned but remained unconscious.
“Your farmhouse is near?” Jack said.
“Yep. Just up over that hill.” He continued applying medicine to the wound. “It’s equipped with a running generator and stocked with food and water. Plus, I got a ham radio.”
“Really? Have you been in touch with anyone on it?”
“Yep. I’ve been in contact with a few radio operators since the quake.”
“What’s the story with the rest of the nation?”
“I wish it was good news,” he said while winding gauze around the wound. “The country is in a state of emergency and under martial law. It’s not just the United States that’s been affected. It’s an apocalypse on a global scale. I’ve received reports of mile-high tsunamis in Japan and out-of-control wildfires spreading across the forests in Canada. Half of California has slid into the ocean, so you can kiss Hollywood goodbye. The world’s major cities are in ruins. Moscow, Paris, New York, all of them.”
“What would cause such massive destruction?” Jack said.
“God only knows.” Max finished wrapping the bandage. “If you ask me, I think the planet suffered a magnetic shift of some kind. My field compass seems to be pointing the wrong way north. Whatever the cause, it’s something so huge it happened on a global scale. And to top it off, we have this weird twilight and hordes of zombies everywhere. The entire world is fighting them now, but their numbers keep growing exponentially. I fear the human race is facing a mass extinction like what happened to the dinosaurs. Only this time it’s our dead eating the living.”
“It sounds beyond hopeless,” Kate said. “Maybe this is the end of the world.”
“If I thought that, I wouldn’t have gone out to look for my grandson. I’ve been in radio contact wit
h pockets of survivors. People are banding together everywhere to fight the dead. The National Guard has a small armory at Watkins, Oklahoma, and I picked up a broadcast from them. They’ve set up a rescue station for survivors.” He stood and adjusted his gun belt. “Mankind might be on the ropes, but we’re not out of the fight yet.”
“Watkins, Oklahoma? Is that far?” Jack said.
“Twenty-three miles.”
“That’s not too far away. I guess we’ll try to make it to the rescue station.”
“No need. You’re welcome to stay at my farm until things get better. Your daughter needs rest to heal. I’ve got cows and chickens for food and fresh well water to drink. I’m also a bit of a gun collector, so there’s weapons and ammo, too. If we all work together, we can survive this thing. I’d love to have you all.”
Kate jumped up and hugged the old man.
“Praise the Lord,” she said with tears in her eyes. “Max, you’re more than a godsend. You’re an angel from heaven.”
“The Lord might have a different opinion of that, ma’am,” he said.
“Everything was so hopeless until you arrived,” she said, sobbing against his chest. “I almost gave up. I thought there was no way we would survive the rest of the day.”
“I’m just glad I’m able to help your family,” he said in a choked voice.
Kate released him with tears running down her cheek. “Sorry. I don’t know what came over me.”
“I don’t mind a pretty woman hugging me if her husband doesn’t.” Max pulled a handkerchief out of a camo pocket and dabbed at the tears misting his blue eyes. “I’m supposed to be this tough old fart and here I’m crying like a little baby.” He blew his nose. “It’s been a stressful day on everyone. Let’s get your daughter moved before more zombies show up.”
Doug turned to Jack. “I told you my granddad would have a plan for what to do. You all get to stay with us on our farm. How sick is that, Mr. G?” He raised his hand. “Give me a high-five.”
“Pretty damn sick,” Jack said and slapped his palm.
Max opened a rear door of the Jeep and motioned for Jack to put Kerri in. Jack picked her up and eased her into the backseat, while Kate and Brett climbed in beside her. He was about to shut the door when he turned once more toward the bridge. A tingling settled in his gut.
“What’s wrong, dear?” Kate touched his arm.
“It’s Telia. It wouldn’t be right for us to just leave her. She sacrificed herself for us. She may still be alive out there.”
“What do you propose to do?” Kate said.
“Search for her.” He turned to Max, who was on the other side of the Jeep. “I have one more favor to ask. I need to go and look for Telia.”
“Telia?”
“She was the biker girl we picked up down the road,” Doug said.
“Was she the one firing a pistol? The sound of gunshots made me drive over here as fast as I could.” Max looked around. “What happened to her?”
“She fell off the bridge while fighting Frank Cooper. I have to find out if she’s alive or dead.”
“Or she could be worse.” Max opened the rear hatch of the Jeep and removed a black pump-action shotgun complete with pistol grip from the rear compartment. “There’s no telling what you’ll find, so take my 12-gauge Mossberg.” He worked the pump action and tossed it to Jack. “You have eight shots. It’s a close-range weapon, so just aim at anything in front of you and pull the trigger. You do know how to shoot one?”
“I’ve hunted with shotguns.”
“Good.” Max removed a walkie-talkie and handed it to him. “Keep in contact with this.”
“Okay.” Jack clipped the radio to his waistband. “I’m sorry, but it’s something I have to do. I need to at least look for her.”
“A man has got to do what a man’s got to do. John Wayne said that, by the way.” Max pointed toward the creek. “A hundred yards downstream from the bridge, there’s a bend. It makes a good place for someone to wash up if they survive the swim.” He reached out for another handshake. “I’d check there first.”
“Okay.” Jack felt the calluses on Max’s hand as they shook.
“We’ll be up at the farm. Radio me when you come back so I don’t accidentally shoot you, thinking you’re a zombie.”
“I will.”
“I hope you find her,” Max said. “Alive.”
“So do I.”
CHAPTER TWELVE
After the Jeep carrying his precious family disappeared over the hill behind him, Jack felt completely alone for the first time since the apocalypse had begun. His only hope was to find Telia and return to his loved ones as quickly as possible.
He walked down to the water’s edge and waded through the high weeds searching along the bank. Ragged fingers of lightning laced the dark clouds overhead and illuminated the landscape in strobe-like bursts of silver and shadow. Again no thunder accompanied this strange phenomenon. Also absent was the ambient noise of insects and croaking frogs one expected along a creek bank. The eerie, haunting silence set his nerves on edge.
Jack kept the shotgun at the ready while walking for another hundred yards. He soon reached the spot where the creek widened enough to bring the current to a slow crawl. Max had said this was the most likely place for someone to wash up, and he stopped and scanned the shadowy bank. Something made a gurgling sound in the shadows.
“Telia,” he called out in a hushed breath. “It’s Jack.”
Fearing the worst, he turned and watched transfixed as a dark female shape stood straight up from the water.
“Telia?” Jack said with his finger poised on the Mossberg’s trigger.
The weird lightning illuminated the being for a mere fraction of a second, but that was all the time the zombie needed to forever haunt his nightmares. Before him stood a teenage girl who, judging by her denim miniskirt and jacket, had met her demise on the way to high school. Her abdominal cavity was ripped open and her milky eyes stared back from a face missing half its flesh. Jack surmised that she was one of the zombies that had fallen off the bridge while trying to follow Frank Cooper.
The girl belched out a waterlogged croak and staggered through the shallow water toward him. Jack pulled the trigger. The shotgun kicked in his grip, and everything above the undead girl’s shoulders disintegrated into flying bits of brains and bone. The headless corpse fell back into the water as more zombies rose behind her.
“Shit!” he said, ejecting the spent shotgun shell.
The undead mob continued wading in his direction. He counted six zombies in the dim light. The first to reach him was a thin elderly man in jeans and pearl-snap cowboy shirt. The man’s right arm was a bloody stump at the shoulder, and something had eaten out his throat. Jack fired the Mossberg. The point-blank shotgun blast did devastating damage to the man’s chest and punched a hole through his center mass. The zombie staggered back as he jacked another round and blew off his head.
Undeterred by his shotgun, the zombies kept coming. In near panic, he retreated up the creek bank while pumping and firing the weapon. The muzzle flashes lighted a horrific myriad of undead faces a microsecond before buckshot blew them apart. Spent shells flew from the Mossberg as decapitated corpses fell before his feet. He screamed but couldn’t hear himself above the thundering gunshots. Suddenly, the weapon clicked empty, leaving his ears ringing in the silent aftermath. To his surprise, one zombie remained unscathed by the shotgun’s assault.
She was a big woman in a ripped black dress and a gory flap of meat where her right breast should have been. Her matted gray hair hung down in her face, and her skin had the texture of withered prunes. She let out a choked gurgle and rushed him before he could swing the shotgun at her. Together they fell to the mud, with her on top and clawing at his flesh with broken fingernails. Jack managed to jam the shotgun into her wide mouth before she had a chance to bite a chunk out of his face.
“Get off of him, you bitch!” someone shouted from beyond his sight.
The zombie woman’s skull cracked from the impact of something hard. She fell inert atop Jack, muddy creek water leaking out of her mouth. He rolled the horrid thing off and sat up to look for who had saved him. Telia stood a few feet away holding a broken tree limb in both hands. Her dark hair was a tangled wet mess, and she no longer wore her leather jacket, just a ripped and muddy white tank top that accented her busty curves. Black leather riding pants and boots made up the rest of her attire. At that moment, she was one of the most beautiful women Jack had ever seen in his life.
“Thanks,” he muttered, breathless. “I seem to always need someone to save my ass at the last moment.”
“Don’t mention it.” She dropped her club and sat on the bank next to him. “You handled yourself pretty well with that shotgun. From now on, I’m going to call you Jack the Zombie Killer.”
“I like the name, but I’m so tired right now I couldn’t fight off an undead squirrel.”
She chuckled. “That makes two of us. I bet I swallowed half the creek before I swam my way here. I had to ditch the jacket because it was too heavy in the water.” There was a slight quiver in her lips.
“Are you cold?”
“I’m freezing,” she said through chattering teeth.
“Here, lean against me.” He put an arm around her shoulders and pulled her close. “Better?”
“Yes.” She shivered against his chest. “Don’t think this means we’re hooking up, Jack. You’re a nice guy, but you’re not my type.”
“No tattoos?”
“Married.”
“Point taken.”
She snuggled closer, her wet top soaking through the side of his shirt. “Why’d you come looking for me?”
Undead Flesh Page 10