by Wood, Gareth
Unfortunately, our gunfire had drastically shortened the amount of time we had to salvage things. More walking corpses would no doubt be arriving at any time, drawn by the multiple gunshots. I jumped into the cab and put the key in the starter, and turned. Nothing happened. Sanji told me to get out, and he climbed in. He did something other than just turn the key, and the engine rumbled. He did it again, and it rumbled twice more, then gave a titanic cough of black smoke, and caught! I told Darren to wave down the others, and I headed back in to grab the things I had seen earlier. That was my stupid mistake. I just got to the door when four more of these stinking atrocities came around the corner of the building. Darren shouted a warning at me, and I had to dive away from the first one as its torn fingers flailed at me. The other three were right there, so I rolled away and heard a gunshot. Must have been Darren; it sounded like a Glock. The one nearest me went down, and I got to my feet as fast as I could and ran for the side door of the truck. The Caravan was pulling up, and Darren ran for that as Jay leaned out the window with the other shotgun. He aimed behind me, and I dodged to the left as he fired. I have no idea if he hit anything, I just ran. I jumped up on the side of the truck and hit the panel with my palm. Sanji started the truck rolling, but slowly at first, and the three zombies were reaching for my legs as we rolled past. I grabbed the mirror frame and pulled my legs up, and rode by just over the rotten hands. One went under the back wheels, and I opened the door and climbed in as we pulled onto the road. I looked back and could see the other vehicles moving, and at least another two dozen undead coming out of the trees. Where were they all coming from? It didn’t matter. We left them behind us as we drove away. This was getting familiar. As a bonus, Sanji showed me the display for the tanker’s fuel load. It was full! We had a tanker with 18,000 liters of fuel in it. In my wildest dreams I had not expected this. Things were looking up.
August 12, Miette Hot Springs
Ah, to be clean again. I haven’t felt this good in weeks! We saw the turn-off for the Miette Hot Springs on the way down out of the Rockies, and decided to take the road up and see if it was still intact. To make a long story short, we arrived at the parking lot in our little convoy and found it utterly empty. The springs themselves fed into a pool located outside, and near to changing rooms and tourist shops meant to gouge as much money out of visiting travelers as possible. The group of us searched the complex, but that didn’t take long. It’s a small area, and there was nobody there at all. The main gates were locked, but that wasn’t much of a problem to people determined to get in. We got in by climbing over the fence and locating a key in the front office.
An hour later we had locked the vehicles, and all of us but Darren and Sarah were relaxing in the hot water of the main pool, shedding weeks’ worth of grime and sweat. After being together so long, none of us were really concerned that nobody had a bathing suit. Looks like modesty is going out the window for now, and we were just so relieved to swim and bathe. Sarah had lost the draw, and Darren had volunteered to stay out with her and keep watch. The pool was covered with a huge net when we arrived, and we rolled it back when we got in, but we’ve replaced it every time we leave, so as little debris gets in it as possible. Drainage appears to be a natural thing here, with no machinery to foul up.
We stayed the night in the tourist cottages just up the hill from the springs, and then the next night, and now we are getting ready to leave in the morning. We’re clean, we washed all our clothing in the side pools, and we’ve managed to find some more food here. Water hasn’t been a problem so far, due to the streams and creeks we’ve passed. Sarah still insists on purifying it, and I agree.
We are going to have to think seriously about raiding a grocery store in a town we pass through, if the risk is worth it, to restock on groceries. With this many people, we only have another week’s worth of food now. That might seem like a lot, but it really isn’t. We’ll be closing on Hinton soon, and the IGA or Safeway or whatever is there will be seeing a visit from us if there’s a chance of doing it safely.
Now I am going to go relax for what time we have left here in this beautiful place. Dinner needs to be made, and then I promised to play with the kids for a while. After that Sarah is going to teach us more about CPR.
August 15
This is Sarah. My brother Brian is hurt, and asked me to write this entry for him. I don’t know why though, since nobody will likely ever read it. He’s always saying that we’ll find help, other people, if we look far and hard enough. I think he’s wrong, but I don’t make a point of arguing with him about it.
Anyways, he wants me to write what happened when we reached Hinton. We drove the truck and cars down the hill there, and stopped a little bit back from the town itself. Jessica got her gun and looked through the scope at the town from a hill, and told us that it looked pretty good, but she could see a few of the animated casualties around. She sounded so serious talking about it. Like it was some big commando raid thing or something. I guess that’s why he likes her, she talks so tough all the time.
We (and by that I mean my brother and Jessica) decided that it was safe enough to try to get in and raid a grocery store we could see from the hilltop. I volunteered to stay with the kids again. The closer I get to those animated casualties the more I thought about disease and contamination and infection vectors. This seemed to be okay with Jessica, I think she likes having another grown-up woman to take care of her kid while she’s off with my brother playing soldier.
So my brother, Darren, Jay, and Sanji took a van and left us there on top of the hill, where we could see for a few kilometers in every direction. Jess went with them, leaving the kids and me with Martin, Amanda, and her no good boyfriend Adam. He doesn’t appreciate her at all. Amanda tries to be strong, but underneath it all she’s sad, misses her mom I think.
Anyways, we were up there for a while, and nothing came near us. That night we heard some shooting in the town, and I went to look through the binoculars, but it was too dark to see anything. What were they thinking crawling around down there in that disease trap in the dark anyways? We waited until morning and they didn’t come back, so Christie and I took the truck and drove closer to the town to another spot we’d decided on earlier. From there we watched the town for an hour. We saw plenty of the animated casualties, but not much else moving. Come lunchtime we returned to the others to wait. If they weren’t out of there by nightfall we were to assume they weren’t coming back and leave without them.
In typical male bravado fashion they showed up at the last minute. My brother had fallen down a set of stairs while some of the casualties were chasing him, and broke his left arm above the wrist. They all had to hole up in a business while trying to find a way out. They snuck out yesterday morning at dawn and made it back to the van, which they had stocked with enough groceries to last a while. They came back to us, and I set his wrist correctly (the field dressing Sanji put on was not well done, I think he needs a refresher in bone setting) so it wouldn’t heal crookedly. We drove back to a house we had spotted earlier, and stayed there for the night. Oh God I miss showers. And clean sheets. Sleeping in the vans is driving me nuts.
That’s all I have to write. He’ll write some more when he’s feeling better. Sarah out, 20:18hrs
August 17, Hinton AB
I cannot believe my sister sometimes. She was supposed to write the events I related to her, not go off on some vaguely disappointed tone about how we’re all gung-ho and paramilitary. Whatever. When I read that I knew I’d have to do it myself, so here it is.
Right now we are in a house west and a bit south of Hinton, just off the highway. It’s secluded and abandoned, has two floors above ground, and a lot of bedrooms. There’s still some sharing going on, of course, but we are all sleeping comfortably. My wrist is broken, so I am typing this very slowly with my right hand. It hurts. The painkillers are good, but it’s still a broken bone. Sarah says it’ll heal straight, and the improvised splint is quite effective.
As we drove down the hill we checked our guns. Full loads and extra ammo were the order of the day. We each had a rifle, and Sanji and I had the two Glocks. We’d each taken the precaution of wearing long sleeved shirts, jeans, bandanas for our noses, decent running shoes, and hats. All dark colours, all tight clothes. The less for them to grab onto the better, and the covering was to help keep gore off us if we had to kill anything. Given the choice I would have had military gear. Yeah, Sarah, I guess we are playing soldier. Happy?
Hinton was a nice little town. I’d been here a few times while staying at the cabin by Jasper. Right now it looked like a set from The Stand. The highway drove right past the Safeway, and we were able to get pretty close before we were stopped by a series of crashed and abandoned vehicles. We pulled up about fifteen feet from a three car pileup, and Jess and Sanji and I got out to see if we could get around it, or push the wrecks off the road. The cars had no inhabitants, though from the stench we could tell there was something dead nearby. No undead were in sight right that second, though I imagined it wouldn’t be long. We walked to the pileup and checked each vehicle. We could probably move the front car enough to get the Caravan through, if we pushed it forwards and turned its wheels to the left. Jess got in the driver’s seat while Sanji and I pushed, and after a few false starts as the wheels tried and failed to turn, we got it moving. We were sweating heavily by the time we rolled it onto the far curb, leaving plenty of room to get the van by.
Jess went on sentry duty then with her rifle. She climbed on top of the Caravan, to a roof rack made out of plywood and bungee cords that we had mounted there. She could see farther this way. Jay drove the van into the Safeway parking lot, and we saw our first undead come lumbering out of the store. It was alone, a male in company uniform, and he was ripe. His stench preceded him, and bits actually fell off as he walked towards us. It was a revolting sight, but it made me think that he might just decompose by himself if given enough time. I wonder how long it would take? He looked like a stock boy. His apron was still on, but was covered in gore and bits of his own or someone else’s flesh. We had decided to deal with lone undead as quietly as possible. This meant no shooting. So three of us circled him while Jess and Jay kept watch. I had the baseball bat ready, and I stayed back a little so he’d focus on someone else. He chose Sanji, who stood with the shotgun leveled, and took steps towards him as I came up from behind. He was leaving foul squishy footprints as he walked, and the smell as I got closer was indescribable. Sanji lowered the shotgun as I got behind the undead stock boy, and I swung the bat as hard as I could. The right side of his head caved in, and he fell. The smell actually got worse, and I gagged. He rolled over and attempted to rise, but I swung again, this time coming straight down on top of his skull. His head bounced off the pavement as I struck, and I heard a crack. Still he didn’t die, but he was a lot slower trying to get up. The third blow landed as he was rising to his knees, and this one was solid enough that his skull opened like a blooming flower of gore. He didn’t get up from that, but I nearly vomited from the stench. I looked around, but it had taken only a few seconds, and was quieter than I had thought. Nothing else was approaching.
We approached the store on foot. Jay parked the van about 40 feet from the front doors, and stayed with Jess in case a quick getaway was required. Darren on my right, and Sanji on my left, we went to the front doors and looked inside. The lights were all out, so it was dark as a tomb inside. We’d expected this, and turned on our flashlights as we entered. We listened. This more than anything we had learned: listen for them. So we stood and listened for five minutes. When we were certain there was nothing making noise other than us, we proceeded.
The store had been looted, but not thoroughly. It looked like whoever had hit the place had taken a lot of water bottles, some canned foods and snacks, and medicines. There was a lot left over though, more than we could carry. Before taking anything at all we searched the entire store. Quiet as mice, and stealthy as ninjas, we’d have liked to have been. As it was we made enough noise walking into spilled cans or stepping on things scattered on the floor that if anything had been walking in there, it would have heard us and come running.
We went shopping in the dark. A little light made it inside from the windows, but not enough for us to see clearly at the back of the store. Flashlights were essential, so we loaded up a few baskets full of batteries and put them by the front door. Then we grabbed medicines. Advil, Tylenol, Polysporin, and a whole list of things from the pharmacy that Sarah had requested. Some would have gone bad by now, so we’d have to sort them out carefully. After that was loaded safely in the van we went back and grabbed all the canned food that we could. Stews and soups and chili and canned fruit, canned vegetables, beans and milk and anything we could see. We checked expiry dates as we went, and only a few things were even close. We also grabbed powdered milk, juice mixes, cans of iced tea powder and coffee, and Gatorade. I threw a few boxes of cereal in for the kids, and took all the instant oatmeal boxes that were left. We opened the boxes of those and dumped the packages into a larger plastic container for easier transportation. All this we took to the front doors and loaded. We still had a bit of room, so we went back for a third trip. Toiletries, like razors and extra blades, toilet paper, several bottles of shampoo, and brushes and combs. Jess had us get a few cases of tampons and related things, and we all raided the sock & underwear aisle. Shoes! We all grabbed new shoes, and got new pairs for the others as well. This was like Christmas!
So of course it was all spoiled by the undead. We were taking the third load back to the front when shots rang out. We dropped the things we were carrying near the front door as we went to the entrance, and paused in the doorway to look at what was happening. Jay was standing near the back of the van, with the hatch open and looked like he’d been rearranging the load. He was supposed to be in the driver’s seat the whole time, ready to go, but I guess he’d got complacent, and wanted to fit more things in. I couldn’t really blame him, but it was bad timing. Nearly twenty walking dead were approaching from the north, had just come around the west corner of the store, and were close enough that we could hear them groaning. They stank to high heaven in this heat, and the smell was like a physical force pushing us back gagging. Jess had shot two of them so far, but they’d be surrounding the van before she could kill many more. Jay was trying to shut the tailgate and pick up his rifle at the same time, and was doing neither very well. From what I’d seen of his shooting he’d be pretty easily overwhelmed by the time they got there, so I did the only thing I could think of. I raised the carbine and stepped out shooting. I fired into the lead undead, hoping if I killed one or two the others might fall over it. Several of them changed direction towards us, but most kept going towards the van. Sanji and Darren called to Jay and Jess to get out of there and run, and Jay stayed long enough to help Jess off the roof while I fired the carbine. I emptied the clip in three-round bursts, hitting many of the zombies, but only killing four. It was enough to slow them so that we could get away. As a group we ran east across the parking lot, and around another building, a former pizza place (“Free delivery!”). The crowd of undead was following faster than I’d have liked, so we crossed the street towards a church. Inside there could be anything, so we didn’t go in. We stayed outside, getting distance between us and the dead things following, winding down alleys and streets as we fled. We made
it four blocks before we ran into another cluster of undead. Why do they seem to travel in groups? There were four of them, and they just appeared around an overgrown hedge, and got very excited when they saw us. Sanji shot one and its head vanished. I clubbed the next one down, and evaded the grasp of the third, but the fourth grabbed Darren, and was going for the bite when Jess slammed its head with her rifle stock. It let go of Darren and tried to grab her, but I stepped up and shoved the carbine’s barrel under its ear. One pull of the trigger and it fell. We ran. More of them were coming out of the woodwork now. Out of houses, or alleys. Some were alone, but most were in groups, usually three or four at a time. Why?