LZR-1143: Evolution

by Bryan James

  “I didn’t know you swung that way,” she said, and I chuckled, releasing the poor dog. His tail thumped once and then was still.

  “I blame blood loss,” I said quietly. “Where are we?”

  “We didn’t want to lead thousands of zombies into our carefully crafted entry route, so we drove around the Metro yard on the small road circling the station. We disappeared into a huge warehouse for several hours, until they had passed us by. When we were in the clear, we snipped the lock off the utility gate, drove in, and locked up behind us. Now we’re taking a siesta inside the first tunnel. It’s the only one between here and D.C. proper, so we figured it’d be a good resting point.”

  “So we’re in the Metro lines?” I asked, shocked that something had gone to plan.

  “Yes indeed,” she said, hand on my arm. “How are you feeling? Any dizziness?”

  I nodded in the dark, then realized that nodding in the dark was a waste of effort.

  “Yes, but that’s all. My shoulder seems fine, and there’s no pain. But I guess blood loss isn’t as quickly cured.”

  “I suspected as much,” she replied, voice clinical. “It wouldn’t be—that’s a process that the body would be hard-pressed to accelerate. But at least we can rely on the other effects.”

  “What time is it?” I asked, disoriented.

  “Around four in the morning. We have a few hours until we need to get started.”

  I lay my head back and closed my eyes, suddenly exhausted and relishing the thought of sleep. She put her hand on my chest and I smiled.

  “See you in the morning,” she whispered, a soft kiss landing on my cheek.

  I didn’t even remember falling asleep, but I drifted off. Thick and dreamless, my body created the rest I so desperately needed.

  The morning came early, and we rose quickly and quietly. There wasn’t much to say as we dressed, and I crudely sewed up the large tears in my flight suit. The charred fabric on the edges attested to the heat of the metal, and the size of the gashes made me shiver. If I hadn’t been juiced up, that piece of metal would have ended my life.

  Then again, if I hadn’t been juiced up, I might have died several times before now.

  George hopped into the driver’s seat and I went up top. We had decided to have one person ride recon on the roof and, after assuring Kate many times that I felt perfectly fine, I was the lucky volunteer. She wanted to stay with Ky and man the shotguns inside while helping George navigate, and I was happy for the fresh air.

  We were inside a small tunnel, not really even underground. It was an elongated underpass that crossed under several large roads near the station. I was impressed at the group’s ability to elude the massive horde that had been bearing down on us yesterday, and marveled at how close we were to that scene.

  Behind us, I could barely make out the New Carrollton station, at the end of the tracks. Before us, the tracks bent to the left and the view was blocked. On both sides of the tracks, we were surrounded by fencing, and protected from roving herds by the thick chain link. We weren’t concerned about the large numbers of zombies grouping together and crushing the fence, since, in theory at least, they should try to follow the bus as it moved. If we didn’t give them a reason to try to overwhelm one particular section of the fence and crush it with pure numbers, we should be able to move through the tracks quickly enough to prevent incursions into our little safe-haven.

  I sealed the hatch beneath me and moved to the front of the roof, looking down at the puncture in the steel where the shard had skewered me and feeling the ghost of an ache in my shoulder as I settled down, securing myself to the roll bar with an extra belt looped around my arm like a shoulder harness, just in case. I carried the MP5 and an extra clip, hoping not to have to make the noise of using it.

  Beneath me, the bus roared to life and I cringed at the sound, which echoed in the soundless morning air. As we started forward, I noted with satisfaction that we were moving along the tracks as we had planned, albeit not entirely comfortably. The off-road tires on the bus gave it the lift necessary to clear the metal rails on either side, and the bus straddled the rail furthest to the right as we moved forward. Our biggest concern, and one that seemed to have been obviated, was that somehow the Metro would still be drawing power, and that we would be unable to drive along the tracks, since the massive rail in the center of the two train tracks provided a high enough electric charge to turn any of us into a human torch.

  But as we moved forward, wheels bumping over the ties in the tracks, I still slightly regretted the plan. It wasn’t so all-fired comfy up here.

  I scanned the way forward for danger as we emerged from the small underpass. The tracks ahead were clear, and I looked to the sides to see if the engine noise and clattering were attracting attention.

  On the left side, through the chain link, a landscape of factories and run-down apartment buildings sat, bereft of any signs of life. A large banner, probably a sheet in its better days, had a message scrawled on it and hung out the window: “Alive inside, need help now!”

  There was no telling how old the message was, but I doubted its veracity now.

  The sun was spreading morning light over the overgrown concrete parking lots and narrow roads that were passing slowly by. This portion of the tracks wound through the suburbs and commercial and industrial areas east of the city, and one of the benefits of our plan was the low population centers we would pass through on this line before reaching the city.

  On the right side of the tracks, trees covered a portion of the landscape, relieved only by breaks for roadways. We passed under several more overpasses, and as we moved underneath the last, I spied a single zombie staggering across the bridge, eyes swinging down to the noise of the bus, large scraggly beard obscuring what I was sure was an open mouth, moaning in desire. Had there not been a four-foot guardrail on the ledge, I was certain he would have tumbled off the overpass, intent on finding his next meal.

  For hours, we paralleled Route 50, and through breaks in the tree line between the tracks and the highway, I could see packed cars and a housing subdivision past the road. A thin tendril of black smoke rose from one of the homes within, and as we passed, I thought I saw the movement of a vehicle. I hoped I had, as signs of life had been far too sparse in the last few days. It made me despair of being able to deliver any meaningful change in the spread of the disease this late in the game.

  As we approached the first station after New Carrollton, I stayed low on the bus roof and scanned for danger, knowing that the stations presented our highest likelihood of encounters, and our largest vulnerability. If a train blocked our pathway, or if a large herd hemmed us in, the stations would be the highest probability of weakness, as they were narrower, and not surrounded as effectively by fencing. We had to assume all the stations were open and operational when the outbreak began, meaning that, unless someone had maintained their shit well into the storm, all the doors were still wide open to roving packs of creatures.

  As George pointed out, the Metro did have access gates and turnstiles, which might prevent all but the most opportunistic and curious creatures from wandering in, but I wasn’t as convinced.

  I breathed easier as we neared the Landover station, noting that the parking lot was halfway full of cars, but that the station appeared deserted. No trains were stalled out, nor was it packed with wandering undead. I noted several decomposing bodies on the brick floor in random intervals, and wondered whether they had been zombies or real people.

  But then again, I guess they had all been real people once.

  We clattered along the tracks through a heavily wooded stretch, continuing to parallel a crowded and bumper-to-bumper Route 50, passing several isolated industrial buildings which were devoid of movement or life. At one point, Kate called up to me and tossed a power bar to the roof, which I hungrily snarfed down, realizing we had been driving for two hours.

  As we neared the next station, my ears perked up with an unusual sound and I
called down to ask George to slow the bus. We were between two wooded areas, but a large portion of the tree line was gone to our right, and I caught the telltale sounds of gunfire, now far more pronounced with the bus at a standstill.

  Kate’s head peeked up from below.

  “What’s up?” she asked, curious.

  I looked back at her, then scanned again, looking toward Route 50.

  “Not sure. Thought I heard gunfire,” I said distractedly.

  Then I saw the movement. It was a small black sports car, trying to thread itself through the thickly packed cars in disarray on the highway. A man sat on the open hatchback, firing to the rear. They weren’t able to gain much speed, as they plugged through, struggling to find the few gaps in the traffic as they plowed forward. I squinted into the sun, but it seemed blindingly bright as I looked to the West.

  The car shot toward a small gap, and it felt like the scene was converting to slow motion, as the pack of zombies, several hundred strong, came into view. They were far closer than they had any right to be, and I could only imagine that the packed cars were slowing the flight consistently along the way. They shambled forward, arms splayed out, bodies slamming into parked vehicles and moaning the constant, spine-tingling refrain that had become so familiar.

  The small car was aiming for too small a gap; we could see that from where we stood. But the driver, either too tired or too careless to notice, floored the accelerator, seeing a short expanse of open median on the other side.

  His front right fender slammed into the rear of a parked truck, bouncing the left side of the car hard into the front of a minivan, and I heard the crunching of steel as the car lifted up from the rear and flipped into the air, landing hard on its roof in the grass beyond the stalled cars. The rider in the back spun awkwardly in the air, cartwheeling and then flying forward, landing with a sickening crunch on the dark pavement. He didn’t move again.

  I broke my stare, and lurched unthinkingly toward the rear ladder, even as Kate dropped to her stomach and shouted inside for a weapon. Nearly falling down the ladder, I started toward the fence.

  The passenger started to pull himself from the wreckage, slowly and painfully. Shattered glass covered the ground near the destroyed window, and he slithered through the small shards of razor-sharp material, groaning in pain and leaving a trail of blood behind him as he crawled.

  The driver’s side was slightly less crushed, and the driver emerged, pulling himself up on the bottom of the car, and stumbling as he leaned forward to catch his breath. Blood streamed from his head as he tripped once, falling to the grass. He looked up as he rose, seeing the pack of creatures approaching. They were less than fifty feet away, hundreds of mouths opening and closing, hundreds of arms reaching for food.

  The driver panicked, and turned to run. His friend from the passenger side saw him turn, and shouted, the words indecipherable from where I stood. The driver shouted back, flinching once toward his friend, then shaking his head and tearing off down the road.

  On the pavement, the man who had been seated in the hatchback stirred, groaning once.

  The passenger had pulled himself out of the car, but merely flipped onto his back and was now breathing hard. He had likely punctured a lung, and I could see a compound fracture in his left leg. A single pistol was in a holster next to his right hand.

  The pack was less than thirty feet away now, and as I reached the fence, I knew I was too late. But I started to climb the chain link anyway. Behind me, I heard Kate hit the fence and start climbing as well.

  The hatchback rider called out a name, but in the cacophony of moans I could hear nothing but the high pitch of his pain and fear. I looked at him as he called out, his arms and legs were motionless, and a trickle of blood ran from his nostrils.

  He was too far away for me to help.

  The horde was barely ten feet from him. I saw him arch his head, eyes wild as he saw them approaching. He screamed again loudly, a line of curses following the animal-like howl. I saw his eyes shift to the shotgun laying fifteen feet away. Then they met mine.

  I saw the mouth form the words that I would say if I were him.

  “Shoot me.”

  I dropped to the other side of the fence and crouched low, raising the weapon and lining up a shot.

  The pack was five feet from his head, the first creature already stumbling to its knees.

  The blood spat out onto the concrete, and his eyes stared at me as they reached him. The muzzle streamed a small curl of gun smoke as I started forward toward the passenger. But I had known I couldn’t help. Even as I heard Kate drop behind me and curse, I knew we were too late.

  He was facing them and firing fast, scoring several head shots before the slide shot back and he reached to his pocket for another clip. I fired into the crowd, trying to get closer, trying to find an angle to reach him, but there were too many.

  Their noise was loud in my ears, and as I fired, they started toward me.

  The passenger’s gun clicked again, and as they closed over him, I heard the sound of tearing flesh, like the amplified sound of the skin being torn from an orange; then the coughing screams and the hair-raising sound of mortal agony.

  We ran back to the fence, and climbed quickly, zombies no more than ten feet away as we dropped to the other side and ran back to the bus. They were moving toward the fence line as George started forward. They followed along the fence, but were soon lost behind as the trees thickened and blocked their shambling pathway.

  Kate and I sat on the roof, numb and silent, staring forward as we approached the next station. We passed under an overpass that led to Route 50, and as we moved through the vacant station, I absently wondered if those three men had bought us the time and window of opportunity we needed. I wondered if the station would have been packed with zombies if we had come through minutes before.

  We moved along the tracks steadily, and as the day began to wane, we approached and moved parallel to the Anacostia freeway, through heavily wooded surroundings and some industrial and commercial areas. We saw only one pack, and this one from a distance as the tracks raised up to pass over several streets below. They were moving slowly to the West, and there were thousands of them, dark bodies crowding along the street, and filtering through the adjacent woods. Mindless in their wandering, but doubtlessly with some basic purpose motivating them forward.

  We passed three stopped trains at the Minnesota Avenue station, doors opened and no signs of movement aboard. Four other trains were empty, and stood on the other side. It was a curious cluster, as we expected the trains to be spread out over more stations and more distance, but it appeared that they had moved together to this designated point.

  Fortunately, the Northbound trains headed toward New Carrollton had been pulled through the platforms and parked further on, as if being staged, allowing us to move from the Southbound tracks to the Northbound in order to bypass the platform. As we passed through the station, we began to make the long turn into the bridge over the Anacostia River, and Kate and I dropped down into the bus as George slowed us to a stop over the river itself.

  We would go underground permanently after we crossed into the District, and we gathered to discuss our next few hours.

  “We keep on as we’ve been going, and use the spotlights through the tunnels. Isolated zombies, no problem; if we encounter a horde, we back up or go through them, and look for an exit. We’ll stop every two to three stations, shut down and run silent for a while—no light, no sound, nothing. As far as those things are concerned, we’re just another empty train on the tracks. It will prevent us from driving blindly into a pack that hears us clattering along the rails.”

  I was positive that we had the details clear, but wanted to make sure.

  “We stay in the bus until we can’t, then we’re on foot. Any contact is called out immediately, and we can rotate the night vision goggles between the adults—sorry Ky—if we’re forced to hoof it. Remember, our protection in the tunnels is the
bus. If and when we have to ditch it, we need to move quickly. If we have to go topside, we continue to move West.”

  George cleared his voice and spoke up as Ky counted her arrows for what must have been the fiftieth time.

  “Remember, I’ve got some goodies stored up in back that we can use if we’re pressed. Just make sure you take cover.”

  He smiled through his large beard and clamped his teeth down tightly on his pipe, leaning with his hands in his pockets against the side of the bus.

  I nodded. Having seen his little concoctions, I knew they’d be a hit with the crowds, but did worry about finding appropriate cover.

  Kate looked at me, curious.

  “Start tomorrow morning, or go in tonight?” she asked, looking out the front window at the soon to set sun.

  “Tonight. If we have to bug out, these things will have to hunt us topside in the dark, so we might as well take away one of their available senses. They hear and smell pretty well, but they don’t see for shit.”

  She nodded and stood up, as George turned around and went back to the driver’s seat.

  Time to visit our nation’s capital.

  Chapter 37

  As we passed into the tunnel, I took one more short look at the setting sun, before tears welled in my eyes and I had to look away in pain. I hoped in earnest that it wouldn’t be the last time I ever saw it.

  From the peak of the bridge over the river, we could make out nothing more than the D.C. skyline, set against the rapidly dropping sun, but as we moved down from the bridge, we saw another large pack moving parallel to the tracks through the neighborhood to the West. They were separated from us by the fencing around the tracks, and we couldn’t even determine if they had seen or heard us, but it was unsettling to have seen two large groups as we approached the city and began to descend underground.

  The dark of the tunnel was absolute, and we turned on the headlights and flood lights, startling two rats into a small hole near the tracks. The metal rails extended into the dark unknown and we clattered over the ties slowly, all of our eyes plastered to the windshield and the dangers we imagined ahead. The walls of the tunnel were wet with streaks of condensation, looking to my eyes like trails of blood, and we passed several metal maintenance doors as we drove through. The lights lining the walls were dark, and I cringed as I thought of the prospect of being caught in one of these tunnels or one of these trains during the outbreak.