The Hunt Chronicles (Volume 3): Crusade

by Demers, J. D.

  “What about the road? Any traps?” DJ joined in just as Julia inserted the needle into my arm. I winced more in surprise than pain.

  “A lot of debris,” Fish answered sourly. “More than usual and if traps are there, they’re hidden better than they were Holopaw.”

  “I have an idea what’s going on,” Campbell stated. He rose and squeezed between Fish and DJ as he walked toward the back of the bus. “I’d like to put a bird in the air, Major. See if I’m right.”

  “Sure that’s wise?” DJ asked. “What if it gives us away.”

  “If I’m right, DJ, it won’t matter,” Campbell said, taking one of the drones off a shelf.

  “Okay, Captain, go ahead,” Dobson said. “Tell us what you’re thinking?”

  Campbell stood on a crate, unlocked the top hatch, and then opened it.

  “Well, sir, I think we’re dealing with a scab hive, similar to the one we saw in Holopaw. Maybe even the same one,” the Intelligence Officer said as he strained to set the drone on the top of the bus.

  “A ‘hive’?” DJ asked.

  None of us had used that term before. We would call outside scab camps “nests” and “dens” for the places scabs called home that were indoors.

  Campbell pulled out a laptop and rested it on his lap as he sat on the crate. He turned the device on, grabbed a joystick controller that appeared very similar to that of my old PlayStation, and plugged it into the computer.

  “Yes, a hive,” Campbell confirmed.

  “What’s the difference between a hive and a nest?” Dobson asked.

  “Think about it,” Campbell said just as Doctor Tripp removed the needle and put a Band-Aid on my arm. “We’ve been referring to scab dwellings as nests and dens because they were small. What if there were thirty, fifty, or even a hundred scabs? They all couldn’t settle in the same building. I think this whole town is full of scabs.”

  “That doesn’t explain the few thousand Zulus that are riled up,” Fish pointed out.

  “The Zulus could have come recently,” Campbell said as he waited patiently for the program on the laptop to load. “How far is St. Cloud and Kissimmee? Ten, twenty miles? There could be hundreds of thousands of Zulus in the greater Orlando area, if not millions. It’s not farfetched that eventually some would migrate to other areas.”

  “Yeah, but the largest group of scabs we’ve seen is eight,” Dobson reminded the Captain.

  Campbell nodded. “Yes, sir. But think of the size of Holopaw. Small town with a population of two or three hundred? How many turned into Zulus during the Awakening? How many turned into scabs? Small towns likely have a better chance of survival than big towns or cities. Easier to clean up an area. Well, what if a few people were turned to scabs while the rest of the people cleared out the Zulus? Then the scabs infect the majority of the living, increasing their number.”

  “We’ve seen that happen,” Campbell continued. “Chad’s group of scabs changed two of the three people in the hunting party to scabs and left Gardner for…” the Captain stopped himself short of saying “food” as a grimace appeared on his face. I, too, felt a small but sharp pain in my stomach at the mention of my old friends.

  “The Captain has a good point,” Doctor Tripp said as she secured the blood samples. “We need to remember how quickly the scabs are evolving.”

  “I hate it when you talk about them evolving,” Fish grumbled.

  “Like it or not, Fish, it is the truth,” the scientist said evenly. “You yourself keep repeating that they are getting smarter.”

  Fish sighed. “Doesn’t mean I like to think about it, Doc.”

  “Consider the timeline,” Doctor Tripp continued. “In the beginning, they were solitary hunters. They used basic tools as weapons, from broom sticks to shovels. Within a week or two, they started to gather in groups, depending on each other and even showing some emotion, according to your story from the previous compound you occupied. And look at the weapon Enrique carries and the different objects they have turned into projectiles. That takes ingenuity.”

  Doctor Tripp took a sample of blood and mixed it with another liquid, continuing to work as she spoke. She wore two sets of latex gloves for protection, not wanting to take the chance of getting infected.

  “Now we see evidence of them gathering in larger groups, creating ‘hives’, as the Captain put it. They designed road traps. They understand how vehicles work, at least to the extent of stopping them. They have evolved in five months what it took man thousands of years to do.”

  “Are you saying you think they will surpass us?” Dobson asked as he stepped behind Campbell.

  A buzzing sound came from overhead as the drone turned on and lifted off.

  “I hope not,” Doctor Tripp replied as she dabbed some of the liquid onto a small glass slide and slid it under the microscope. “I’m not an anthropologist, but I think their hyper-aggression may put limits on how far they can evolve.”

  “Should we be worried about them using guns and driving cars?” DJ asked.

  “Again, it’s not my field of study,” she reminded him. “I would say no, though. At least, not in the near future. Intelligence and intelligent instinct are two different things. The damage caused to the brain during the metamorphosis of a scab most likely affects their reason. For instance, they don’t see us as fellow homo sapiens. They see us as food or a way to reproduce. I think they are mentally broken down to the basic instincts for survival. Their ability to reason probably has its limits.”

  “Enough hypotheticals,” Fish grunted. “Let’s see what the UAV tells us.”

  Doctor Tripp smirked, but stayed silent. She turned and went to work on her samples.

  No one asked me to leave yet so I kept my silence. There was no sense in giving them a reason to kick me out of the cramped bus.

  Leaning slightly to the side, I could see the footage from the drone, or UAV as Fish referred to it. Unmanned Aerial Vehicle was the proper term the Military had used for years, but was soon replaced by the term “drone” after 9-11 and they became a regularly used surveillance and weapon platform. Campbell currently had it in color, but switched the display to black and white.

  “Why not leave it in color?” DJ asked, leaning over next to Dobson. Fish maneuvered in front of me, causing me to lean further to the side to see the small screen on the laptop.

  “Something I learned when I took an imagery analysis course. Color can distort reality in two dimensions,” Campbell explained as he maneuvered the drone over the woods that surrounded the town of Harmony. “While in grey scale, we can adjust lighting, see shadows more clearly, and in the case of video, recognize movement easier. Basically, the same reason why we use one color for night vision.”

  That made sense to me, and the rest of the group seemed to understand as well. Another one of our drones had the same camera as the one that was flying, while the third was outfitted with night vision. The video resolution wasn’t as good, but seeing in the dark always had its advantages.

  Everyone stayed silent as the drone flew higher. The elevation meter on the lower half of the screen read two hundred and fifty feet. Back on the screen, Harmony came into view. I noticed Dobson pull out a map, correlating to the roads from the laptop screen.

  Campbell had chosen to stay on the north side of the road, opposite of the large church Fish had described.

  “There’s a cart path running along those powerlines,” Dobson noted. “It’s parallel to the road we’re on now. Maybe we can use that to skirt the town and scab traps.”

  The power lines were just to the north of us. Fish found a flaw in his idea.

  “Major, there’s a huge ditch off to the side. Big Red and this bus won’t make it,” Fish pointed out. “Not to mention that flat area between us and the power lines may be marsh land.”

  Dobson frowned, not entirely convinced.

  The UAV rose above the golf course. Just ahead were hundreds of upper middle class homes and to the left were one story condom
iniums. The neighborhood seemed pleasant, except for the five thousand zombies that were roaming the streets. Peppered throughout the neighborhood were large gaggles of the dead surrounding various houses. I instantly took note that each of the houses that were under siege were two stories. In some cases, the zombies were layered twenty deep, pressing in on the buildings.

  On one of the homes, we saw a figure prowling along the roof. It had a single spear in its hand.

  “Move in close on that house,” Dobson ordered.

  Campbell played with the controller and the drone dipped down and the camera began to zoom in.

  It was a scab. Campbell was right.

  A few of the other houses in the neighborhood had scabs on the roofs. Some had just one, while others had two or three of the monsters.

  “Zoom in on that intersection,” Fish said, pointing to the corner of the screen.

  Campbell obliged. On the ground were four zombies. They were motionless and there were dark pools around their bodies.

  “They killed some of the Zulus,” Fish noted. “Seems they’ve figured out how to do that.”

  “Survival instincts,” I muttered, repeating Doctor Tripp’s words.

  Fish glanced back at me approvingly and then turned back to the laptop.

  “Captain, move south,” Dobson ordered. “Let’s get a look at that church.”

  The drone turned to the left and immediately the church came into view.

  “Look at the road,” DJ said, pointing at the screen. “Those scab traps go for at least a mile.”

  Debris covered the road in both directions, but the amount was three times as dense from what we witnessed in Holopaw.

  “Staying on this road is no longer an option,” Dobson murmured. There was the sound of defeat in his voice. He lifted the map, examining the road network.

  “Check this out,” Fish said.

  I looked back at the laptop. The entire screen was filled with the church facility.

  Both the north side and the west side of the church had large parking lots that could fit a thousand cars. The church must have drawn people from all over, not just Harmony. To the south was a baseball field and to the east was a football field. Apparently, the church was used for a school as well as sermons.

  There were six large buildings and three smaller ones all connected with covered walkways. In the middle of them was a giant courtyard. No doubt the facility could hold thousands of people at once. From the looks of it, FEMA or the CDC didn’t use this as a shelter, but there were still over a hundred abandoned cars in the parking lot. I wondered if survivors were holed up in there before the scabs came.

  There were no survivors now, though. The scene around the church was grizzly. Over three thousand zombies packed around the buildings and more were coming from the west. Doors on the first floors had been broken down and I could only guess how many zombies were inside the structures.

  Scabs, numbering well over thirty were running along the rooftops. Makeshift bridges had been built between the buildings, allowing the scabs the freedom to move among them.

  Campbell zoomed in as the drone flew closer to the church. A scab was running along the covered walkway. Hundreds of zombies were crowding around it, reaching uselessly in the air at their prey as he expertly balanced himself. Suddenly, part of the walkway collapsed under the pressure of the zombies. There was nothing the scab could do as it fell helplessly into the mass of zombies below. We lost sight of him as the zombies hungrily dove in like a school of piranha, fighting for their fill of fresh meat.

  “Jesus,” DJ whispered.

  “It seems your hive theory is correct, Captain,” Dobson said. “The scabs took the whole town, only to be besieged by a horde of Zulus.”

  “Congratulations, Captain, I’ll nominate you for a Pulitzer,” Fish scoffed. “Now, how in the hell do we get through this mess?”

  “Captain, bring the drone in and recharge it,” Dobson ordered. “DJ, tell Preacher and Enrique to refuel the vehicles.”

  Both men acknowledged. The UAV turned and began its short trek back to the vehicle train while DJ radioed Preacher.

  Once the drone landed, the Captain ordered me to go outside, retrieve it, and connect it to its charging station. By the time I did that, DJ, Campbell, Dobson and Fish were gathered around outside Big Red’s cab. Campbell had the laptop and they were comparing the recorded video footage to the map.

  “Right here,” Fish was saying as I approached, “this road cuts north into the golf course. That also happens to be where the scab traps get dense on the main road.” Fish put his finger on the map and traced the road network. “We can head north, cut through the golf course into these neighborhoods and take backroads all the way to here.”

  His finger stopped at an intersection with Route 192.

  “The scab traps appear to stop a few hundred feet before the intersection,” Campbell added. “But we still have a few thousand Zulus between us and the main road.”

  “Big Red can plow through them,” DJ pointed out. “We could have the bus and the F350 follow behind it in its wake.”

  “And the scabs on the rooftops?” Campbell asked.

  “We can always pray that they will be gracious and leave us alone,” DJ chuckled. “I mean, we will take out a few hundred Zulus for them.”

  Dobson flipped the page of the map book.

  “St. Cloud is only thirteen miles ahead on Route 192. I’m guessing that if the Zulus have made it this far east then the road ahead should be clear of scabs,” Dobson said and then pondered a moment. “However, that doesn’t mean another hive wasn’t there previously, which could mean more scab traps on the road.”

  “Are you saying we should stick to backroads, sir?” Fish asked. I would have expected malice in his voice, but there wasn’t any. There was no time for “I told you so’s”.

  Dobson went back to the intersection that would lead us out of the neighborhood in Harmony. He followed the road crossing 192 and into the neighborhoods on the other side of the church. He continued to trace the roads, moving from one connection to the next, heading further west.

  He flipped the page again, finding the road where he left off, and continued to move his finger below St. Cloud and then proceeded west to the next city, Kissimmee.

  Kissimmee was considerably larger and regularly referred to by tourists as part of Orlando. Again, he traced the roads as far south as possible while still heading west and stopped at a dead end.

  “I think we can take these backroads. You were right, Fish,” Dobson conceded, “there is no other option.” The Major pulled out a highlighter and retraced the new route all the way back to Harmony.

  According to the map, this new course would take us into back neighborhoods and around small lakes. We hoped that would mean less chance of scabs and only sporadic groups of zombies.

  “Marching order, sir?” Campbell asked.

  “Big Red in the lead, then the bus, followed by the truck,” Dobson replied. “There may still be a few traps ahead of the road where we’re going to turn north. If that’s the case, Big Red’s shovel may clear the traps well enough to make it to the turnoff.”

  “Hopefully…” DJ murmured as he stroked his beard.

  Dobson ignored the big man and proceeded with the plans. “We’ll put Pittman in the turret on Big Red to snipe any Zulus or scabs that are trying to hitch a ride.”

  “Thanks,” a deep voice said from above. Pittman was on top of Big Red’s cab, eyeing the area through the ACOG scope on his rifle.

  “Maybe I should be up there, Major,” Fish argued. “I’m the best shot here.”

  Dobson shook his head. “Sorry, First Sergeant, but I want you in the truck. If something climbs on the bus, I may need you to do some of that Green Beret Rambo shit to get it off.”

  Fish gave Dobson an irritated glare.

  “You’ve been watching too many movies, sir,” Fish sneered.

  Dobson gave a rare grin in return.

 
“Nevertheless, Fish, I need you bringing up the rear,” the Major said as he closed the map and handed it to DJ. He turned to Campbell. “Captain, I want you to try something new.”

  “And that is, sir?” Campbell asked, raising an eyebrow.

  “I want you to fly one of the UAVs and scout ahead as we drive,” Dobson answered.

  “I can do it,” Campbell shrugged. “I can’t guarantee that we won’t lose it though. It will be rough keeping track of distance and our location to the bird. And it may be easy to fly, but a few good bumps and I could send it into the dirt.”

  “Understood, Captain,” Dobson nodded. “Just do the best you can.”

  “Depending on how long this will take,” Campbell added, “we may need to change it out. The battery is only good for an hour or so.”

  “Roger that, Captain. We’ll smoke that dog when we get to it,” the Major replied with a frown. He turned, facing everyone present. “We will look for a place to camp south of Kissimmee. Like Fish said earlier, driving at night is no longer an option. We have to be able to see the road clearly.”

  “I’ve got movement,” Pittman called out. “Three o’clock. Four Zulus at one hundred plus meters.”

  Just as he finished speaking, we heard a light crack from the F350. Jenna had a suppressor on her rifle, though the large .308 caliber still made significant noise compared to the suppressed AR15s and M4s. The discharge was still silent enough and kept the noise from traveling more than a couple of hundred feet.

  “Three Zulu’s,” Jenna corrected as we all moved around Big Red to see the zombies.

  Three of the dead were walking in the open field between us and the power lines. The grass was tall, coming up to the zombie’s waists.

  “Zulu right,” Pittman called out.

  His M4 rifle coughed, sending the military grade .556 round toward the trio. Grey and black mist spit out as the round entered the zombie’s ear.

  I raised my rifle, but Jenna and Pittman called their targets before I could get a clear shot. The last two zombies fell with only four bullets spent.