by JE Gurley
Renda rushed in swinging the Guan dao in a wide arc. Mace saw the glint of the sun off metal and ducked. The long blade sliced cleanly through the zombie’s neck and into his shoulder, cleaving both its head and right arm from its body. Renda swung through the arc, bringing the Guan dao around to rest on the ground behind her, just as she had learned by watching the training video. A spray of foul blood splashed Mace’s face and clothes as the decapitated zombie toppled over onto the asphalt. Jeb stared speechlessly at Renda, wanting to applaud. He knew she had been practicing with the weapon for months and had insisted on bringing the cumbersome weapon with her. Both men had encouraged her, but Jeb had secretly believed it a waste of valuable space. To his mind, the much smaller dao and the two machetes made better weapons for close infighting. Now, he was pleased to be so wrong.
Mace swiped at the blood covering his face but left dark red streaks his fingers missed. He stared at the corpse at his feet and smiled at Renda.
“Nicely done.” At the comment, Jeb remembered their naked savior and turned to face the stranger. The man had dark hair, a week’s growth of beard and clearly was uncircumcised. He calmly slung his rifle over his shoulder and keeping his hands in the air, walked slowly toward them, stopping about five yards from the trio. “I’m glad you didn’t shoot first,” he said, looking at Jeb.
Mace raised two fingers and held them half an inch apart. “Almost.”
The stranger jerked his thumb back toward the canal. “I saw you come up and hid. I figured you didn’t see the zombies. I almost didn’t get involved.”
“I’m glad you did,” Renda said smiling. “It was close.”
He smiled. “My name’s Vince Holcomb. You can call me Vinny.”
Neither she nor the stranger appeared embarrassed by his nudity, but Jeb was a little uncomfortable. “Maybe you had better put something on,” he suggested.
Vince smiled, lowered the stock of his weapon until it covered his groin. “Yeah, I guess.” He looked at Mace covered in zombie blood and grimaced at the smell. “You can wash up in the canal. It’s dangerous to ride along the highway,” he said. “I saw a truck of Hunters a couple of days ago picking up people, munies, they called them.”
“Hunters? A man in gray?’ Mace asked.
Vince nodded. “Yeah. Friend of yours?”
“Not a friend of ours,” Mace replied, spitting on the ground to emphasize his distaste. “We ran into him a few days ago ourselves outside Casa Grande. We hid in a burned out store, while his men raped one of the women.” He glanced at the Renda. “If there hadn’t been so many of them, so well armed, we would’ve killed them.” He did not mention that he and Jeb had physically restrained Renda to keep her from shooting the men. Jeb wasn’t sure she had completely forgiven them for that.
Vince nodded. “Yeah. I had thoughts along those lines myself. Where are you from?”
“Tucson. You?”
Vince shrugged. “I’ve been drifting for a while. Headed to California.”
“Us too. What are you looking for?”
“A secret military base. I am, or was, a Technical Sergeant in the Air Force.”
A surge of anger poured through Jeb at the mention of military. He raised his rifle and pointed it at Vince. Mace grabbed his shoulder and said to Vince, “Maybe you had better explain yourself before my friend here shoots you.”
Vince eyed Jeb with a cold deliberateness that annoyed him, but he lowered his rifle. After all, the man had saved their lives. “Go ahead.”
“Do you mind if I get dressed first? I haven’t been clean in a week.”
The four walked back to the canal. While Vince dressed, Mace went to the edge of the water and splashed his face; then removed his bloody shirt and rinsed it as well.
“Sorry about the hot water problem,” Vince joked. “The plumbing is off.”
Jeb dismissed his attempt at humor. “Okay, Vince. Tell us your story.”
He eyed Jeb as he laced up his boots. “Suspicious aren’t you? Well, after what I’ve seen, I don’t blame you. I’ve been in the Air Force nineteen years and a Technical Sergeant for about three months. I was stationed near you in Tucson at a secret first strike base called Red Rock.”
“I know Red Rock,” Jeb replied. “It’s nothing more than a deserted gas station and a water tank beside the railroad tracks.”
“Yeah, well, Red Rock was the code name for our base. It was eighty feet beneath the Pima Air Museum.”
“Bullshit,” Jeb snapped.
Vince glared at him. “Do you want my story or what?”
“Let him talk, Jeb,” Renda urged.
Vince smiled at her. “Thank you. Red Rock had four F-22 Raptors and two mobile cruise missile platforms. The major went bananas and tried to launch a nuclear strike on Yuma. When I pointed out that he was stark raving mad, he tried to kill me, so I shot him, leaving me in charge of a dozen very frightened people. When all communications ceased, we were alone. Someone broke the seals, some of my friends turned into zombies and tried to eat me,” he shrugged, “and now I’m here.” He stared at Jeb. “Anything else?”
“It sounds too unbelievable to be a lie,” Jeb said.
Vince shrugged. “It gets worse. I decided to resign from the military and become a wandering chronicler of events. I guess this little episode deserves a line or two.”
“What about this Gray Man?” Mace asked, as he wrung the moisture out of his shirt and spread it out to dry.
“I was hoping you knew more than I did. I came across them two days ago. It seems some major is handing out a cure for the plague in exchange for immune people.” He looked around at the others. “Like us.”
“For what?” Renda asked.
“The cure,” Jeb answered. “That’s why they took my wife.”
Vince winced. “Sorry, man.” He paused a moment. “Where did they take her?”
Jeb pointed west. “California.”
Vince nodded. “I see. Riding those bikes down the Interstate is not a good idea. We all want to get to California, but I prefer not hitching a ride with the Gray Man.” He shuddered to emphasize his concern. Walking is slower but safer.”
“How were you headed?” Mace asked.
“First, I’d travel west along old 85 to Camp Viejo, and then I was going to cut north between the Gila River and the Wellton Mohawk Canal. There should be some water in the river this time of year after the rains. I haven’t seen zombies swim. Have you?”
Mace smiled. “Not yet.”
Jeb wasn’t convinced. “I’ve been through there before. You’ve got irrigation canals, lakes, the Colorado River, the Gila River and the All American Canal. That’s a lot of water to cross.”
“We can use the railroad bridges,” Vince said.
“So can the zombies,” Jeb reminded him.
Vince shrugged. “Yeah, well it’s not going to be easy, but I wouldn’t suggest loitering in Yuma.”
“Why?”
“Before I left the base, I saw a satellite image of Yuma. It looked like tens of thousands of zombies out of Mexico following the Colorado River north. Most will be well north of us by now, but I imagine quite a few remained for a tour of the city.”
“My God!” Renda gasped.
The news stunned Jeb. “It’s impossible,” he cried. Was his trip over before it had barely begun? “We have to go around.”
“How?” Mace asked. “North into the zombies or south into country so desolate we would never make it.”
Jeb realized Mace was right, but it didn’t lessen the impact of the news. “I… I don’t know,” he stuttered.
Renda came up with a solution that surprised them all. “Why don’t we get as close as we can on foot, and then make a wild dash in an automobile?”
The three stared at her.
“Well?” she asked “Why not?”
Mace chuckled. “I don’t know. It just might work if the roads are clear of wrecks.”
“And if the Gray Man isn’t around and if
the zombies don’t fill the roads like some kind of walking dead roadblock,” Jeb added. He threw his hands up in a show of hopelessness. “I want to get there, but . . .”
“No, no, she’s right.” Vince was standing and smiling broadly, intrigued by Renda’s idea. He began to pace, using his hands to gesture wildly. “We don’t have to drive through Yuma. We can pick the right spot; make it fast and furious. It could work. It’s a damn sight better than walking through.”
“There has to be a better way,” Jeb protested.
All three stared at him expectantly, waiting. He wracked his brain for some other option, but came up empty handed. Mace, Renda and Vince were obviously convinced Renda’s plan would work. Finally, succumbing to peer-pressure, Jeb agreed.
“Okay, but I get to pick the car.”
Mace smiled and slapped the palm of his hand on his thigh. “Well, we might as well get moving.”
As they marched west, Jeb glanced back at the discarded bicycles, now wishing he hadn’t been so disparaging about the bike’s lack of comfort. He glanced at Renda suffering with the unwieldy dadao slung over her shoulder, but he wasn’t about to suggest she discard the heavy weapon after having seen it in action. Instead, he took it from her and laid it across his shoulder. She stared at him a moment, as if to offer up a protest, then she smiled and trotted up to walk beside Mace. He eyed Vince Holcomb, eagerly chatting with Mace about something, and he wondered just how far they could trust their new companion. Holcomb had been military, and according to his own statement, a murderer, perhaps a deserter. On the other hand, he had saved their lives and, as a technical sergeant, could prove useful back at Biosphere2, if they returned.
As expected, their shots had drawn zombies, but most were on the opposite side of the canal and they merely followed them, growling their hunger. None attempted to cross the water. Jeb hoped that meant they could not swim. The four soon left the zombies behind. As the morning progressed, the temperature rose steadily, becoming hot and muggy with no breeze stirring the air. Just outside of town, they came across the blackened remains of a jack-knifed 18-wheeler amid the molten, twisted ruin of smashed transformers and power line towers of an electrical substation. The truck had been hauling cattle and the smell of ozone and burnt flesh still hung over the area. Past former vegetable fields now overgrown with weeds, they crossed beneath the interstate at a wash, deciding on the more level ground of the desert to the uneven terrain of the foothills to the north.
By the time, they had chosen a spot to camp for the night, a low ridge overlooking the highway, Jeb’s aching back and leg muscles made him long for the agonizing discomfort of the bicycle. There was no time to collapse. While Mace built a small campfire in a depression, he gathered wood for the fire. Engrossed in his hunt for pieces of wood suitable for the fire, Jeb failed to hear Vince approach.
“You don’t trust me, do you?”
Startled, Jeb twirled and fumbled for his pistol. He relaxed when he saw it was their new companion and not a zombie. “Damn.” He stared at Vince a moment before answering. “We don’t know you and you were in the army.”
Vince shrugged. “Air Force, but that doesn’t really matter, does it? I could feel your eyes on me the entire afternoon.”
“I’ve had a taste of the military and it left a foul taste in my mouth. They took my wife and maybe killed my son. I saw what they did at the FEMA camp in Marana.”
“I can’t blame you. I’m a bit disappointed in their actions myself. I’ve been in the Air Force almost eighteen years. It was my whole life.” He handed Jeb a blue, spiral bound notepad, dog-eared and crinkled from much folding. “Here. Maybe this will tell you a little about how I feel.” He turned to walk away.
“Why did you decide to come with us?”
“When I warned you about the zombies, I realized how good it felt to actually do something besides observe. I’ve been on my own for nearly three months. That whole time, I’ve been thinking that, all that’s happened, all I’ve been through was for a reason. I just couldn’t figure out what it was. Now, I think it might be to help you three. You have a purpose. You’re not just running or killing. You’re trying to find your wife. That seems noble. I think that maybe you three are good people. Good people are worth saving.”
As he walked away into the deepening darkness, Jeb smiled. He shoved the journal in his pocket to read later, gathered up his armload of wood and returned to camp.
* * * *
Over the next few days, as they traveled north between the canals and the Gila River, they saw occasional groups of zombies in the distance, but encountered only a few they were forced to kill. During rest breaks and at night by the campfire, Jeb read Vince’s journal and developed a grudging respect for the former Air Force sergeant. His meticulous notes on zombies spoke of many hours of close observation. His poetic, but poignant chronicle and his personal comments, revealed a man saddened by events that had swept him up in the fall of man. All of them had lost something. All of them searched for something. Jeb considered himself lucky that his search was for his wife. His goal, at least, was attainable.
On their fifth day out from Gila Bend, the day began overcast with the threat of rain. The wind began to pick up out of the northeast, gusting at over fifty miles per hour, making walking difficult. Stinging sand pelted their exposed flesh and burned their eyes. Familiar with Arizona weather, Jeb hoped they didn’t walk into a haboob, a dust storm so strong it reduced visibility to zero. A massive dust devil raised by the winds raced down the narrow defile between canal and river. It towered hundreds of feet into the sky and was dark with suspended dust. Devils were common in Arizona desert country and usually did little damage. However, this one looked more like a tornado. With no chance of escaping, they lay prone on the ground while the dust devil swept over them with enough force to yank Jeb’s pack from his shoulder. He grabbed it before the wind took it and held on with one hand until the devil passed. Then he got up, dusted off and looked at the others, equally coated in a fine layer of fine dust. When the first drops of rain began to fall, creating muddy patches on his shirt, Jeb knew it was time to seek shelter.
“We’ll get nowhere in this,” he yelled to be heard over the wind. “The washes will become rivers soon.”
Mace nodded. “We passed a farm about a mile back. Let’s try it.”
Backtracking proved difficult. Now, the wind propelled them. Lifting one foot for the next step left them off balance and at the mercy of the wind. Each muddy slope became a slide. After several bruising falls, Renda began using the dadao as a walking staff.
“There it is,” Mace yelled and pointed to a structure half hidden by the heavy downpour.
Jeb wiped the water from his eyes and peered at the house and barn. A tractor sat in front of the barn. An old, army surplus jeep, the top down, was parked by the house. There were no lights showing, and no smoke rose from the chimney, but that didn’t mean the house was empty.
“I hope no one’s home,” he said.
“We’ll have to risk it.”
As they got closer, they were disappointed to see the rear of the house had suffered fire damage and the roof had partially collapsed.
“Not much shelter there,” Vince said, wiping rain from his face. “Let’s try the barn.”
The door of the barn was ajar, swinging in the wind. All four made sure their weapons were handy. At the entrance, Mace stopped and yelled, “Anybody in there?” Then they waited thirty seconds for a reply. When none came, he arched an eyebrow at the others questioningly and stepped inside. “Clear,” he called out a minute later. “You’ve got to see this,” he added excitedly.
The barn, rather than filled with hay or dead livestock as Jeb expected, was a garage. An old blue Ford pickup, its engine dangling from a hoist, sat on blocks at one side of the large open area. Parked beside it was a mud-splattered Polaris ATV, one tire removed and lying flat on a workbench. A complete workshop took up another entire wall. All of this, Jeb noticed out of
the corner of his eye, as the rest of his attention focused on the object in the center of the barn. He whistled softly.
“I think we’ve found our vehicle.”
A tan Humvee, complete with a machine gun mounted on top, took up most of the space in the barn.
“Man, oh, man,” Vince said, chuckling as he danced around the Humvee. “This guy was some collector. An HMMWV, 8-cylinder diesel engine, four-speed automatic, and that’s an M60 machine gun up there in the gun turret, and I’m willing to bet it’s not just for show.”
“Take a look at this.”
Jeb stepped around the side of the Humvee and saw Mace standing over the grisly remains of the Humvee’s former owner. The man’s partially dismembered body lay atop a steel door set in the dirt floor of the barn. Animals or zombies had eaten away most of the softer flesh. Flies buzzed around the body and the stench was overpowering. Several bales of hay that had once hidden the door lay scattered around him. A steel chain with a padlock threaded through two handles secured the door. A key attached to a retractable keychain on his belt protruded from the padlock.
“Poor sucker,” Mace commented. “He almost made it.”
Jeb eyed the steel door, suspiciously out of place in the old barn. “I wonder what’s down there,” Jeb asked.
“I doubt it’s a storm cellar,” Mace said.
He and Mace looked at each other and smiled at the same time. Jeb held his breath at the stench and helped Mace move the body parts deeper into the barn, covering them with straw to hide them. As Mace unlocked the padlock, the other three stood around expectantly.