Zombie Rush
By: Joseph Hansen
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Chapter One:
Reynolds
A new day… a new beginning. It wasn’t the beginning that she had dreamed of, but it was the fresh start she desperately needed. She had always heard things were different south of the Mason-Dixon; they were right, in a way, and yet wrong in so many others. Instead of stone-ground tobacco-chewing yokels as she was told, she found the city to be filled with regular people. People like you would find everywhere else. Activity night and day filled the streets with healthy people of all walks of life—except today.
Today the streets were eerily empty. The Starbucks baristas were glum and looked warily out the window as if they feared something bad would suddenly pop out from around a corner.
She leaned over and turned on the radio in her truck.
After hearing nothing but static on all stations but one, Lisa turned it back off as she pulled into the precinct with a smile. A new job, new place; of course there were hints of drama, but she would nip those in the bud soon enough. This time around, nobody would define or identify her by false labels.
She entered what they deemed to be an investigation room. The focus of which centered on a sand table and chalkboards—the former she suspected being purchased just for her arrival. She took the map board off the wall and laid it on her desk then stared at the magnets scattered to the north and west of Rockwell. Red for where blood was spilled, yellow for where it was projected to be spilled, and blues located on every small town within fifty miles, which was surprisingly few compared to the East Coast. Nothing but a big, fucking guessing game, she cursed.
No rhyme, reason, or pattern; just horrific scenes of devastatingly brutal murders. It was only a matter of time before it hit home, and that was what she feared most. Hot Springs was the perfect location to fit the perp’s M.O.—provided it was a he. All the evidence pointed toward it being a man, middle aged, and white, but there could always be that twist. The degradation of society as a whole always allowed for extraordinary circumstances that left most criminals running free and unchecked. This was one that she was going to catch; it had become a personal challenge.
Hot Springs didn’t have the budget for detectives, so they fed off of the larger cities for those services. Lisa was trained for this and would have excelled as an investigator in Shelton, Connecticut, where she had been employed. A harassment suit had landed her here in Hot Springs, Arkansas, while her harasser still worked his beat and was up for promotion. Punishing the victim seemed to be a common practice in the bigger departments, but other than the cut in pay when she was transferred, she didn’t really care.
It wasn’t that she had lost her home, either. Shelton was no more her home than Charlotte, or Buffalo, or any of the other bullshit places she had lived throughout her short life. Home was a word that meant very little to the up-and-coming peace officer.
The entire city seemed to have exploded overnight; everybody on her shift had been called in early with no signs of getting off at the end of the day. They all busied themselves as the duty officer prepared for a briefing of the day’s agenda. It was rare that they had to come all the way into Hot Springs; usually they received their assignments over the radio in their squads, but today they were instructed differently.
Her pager buzzed so she re-hung the map and moved toward the duty room, where the others were already seated.
Lisa saw the famous duo that always seemed to be snickering in the corner as they searched through the crowd, but today their eyes were on her. This was her first official day as their boss, and she knew they weren’t happy about it. She caught the tail end of the word spic and stopped in place before turning and facing the two women. Nobles and Traynor were rumored to be good cops, but Lisa hadn’t seen it yet. She only saw two petty and spiteful bitches who were going to walk the line until she called them on it.
Spic, wetback, beaner… none of these labels fit Lisa. Born in Ohio and pushed around the country by struggling parents, she was nothing but American. She didn’t speak Spanish, like the food, or identify with their plight; hell, she wasn’t even Catholic.
“Fuck ’em. They’ll learn soon enough not to fuck with me. Better done in private,” Lisa thought, knowing that a public scene she was set up to lose would not behoove her so early in the game.
****
“It has been a rough night, people. The city has gone crazy since your last shift,” the duty officer said. He stood behind the podium looking down at Lisa and the other five officers. Ernie, their trainee, would have made it six but he was studying for his final test. “Zombies is the word on the street…” the duty officer paused and waited for the customary chuckle when somebody mentioned the absurd. But nobody laughed; they had heard the rumors already. “I have to admit that some of what we heard suggests that there is a massive cannibalistic event occurring as we speak.”
“Excuse me, sir,” Lisa spoke up, “what do you mean, exactly? Is this some sort of satanic ritual or some type of planned event?”
“No, Lieutenant, there doesn’t appear to be any organization or cult control behind this and it seems to be as random as it started. Attacks have been reported over four municipalities—all within twenty minutes of each other. I would tell you more, but I don’t have more. We haven’t had any reports from the graveyard shift for over an hour,” the captain said, holding his hands helplessly out to the sides to show that he had no more information to give.
“It has been verified that reanimation of the slain is a factor and that head shots are what is needed to put them down. I can’t stress this enough, people; if they are dead… stay away from them and let the coroners deal with it. If they are dead and start to move… put a bullet in their head. If someone is bitten—and this will be the hardest part—put a bullet in their head. There is no cure and they will reanimate and infect more.”
“What about Hot Springs PM shift?” Benson asked.
“We haven’t heard from any of them, Art. No response or sightings, not even so much as a mic click. Hold your questions now and let’s get through this.
“People have gone ballistic, and traffic jams are blocking most of the routes out of the city, so getting to your neighborhoods is going to be difficult.” The lights in the duty room flickered, causing a stir as each of them wondered how far the devastation had stretched.
“This is my vacation, Chief,” Krupp said as he stood to leave. “I should be with my family, but instead you call me in to this fiasco?”
“Sit down, Ed. You took an oath to protect and serve; that is your priority right now.”
“The world is fucked, Chief. We all knew it was gonna happen, and well… the time is nigh,” Krupp said dramatically, causing the room to buzz. Most knew what Krupp was about and took his opinion with a grain of salt.
“Sit your prepper ass down, Ed. We don’t need theatrics or panic right now. Your duty is here and Geraldine knew that when you married her.”
Krupp took the admonishing tone in stride as he sat down; his body language stated to Lisa that he wasn’t quite done yet.
“As a result, we have extended day shift an extra eight hours, so if you see
them, help them re-establish contact with base. Use the off-roads,” he said, referring to the SUVs. “No one is sure where this all started. We believe this has extended down from what happened up north yesterday, but those reports are as confusing as they are inaccurate. The dead are walking. It’s our job to get out and protect people. We’ll let someone else figure out the hows and whys.”
The duty officer shuffled through some papers on his podium, wanting to say more about what was going on but really having nothing more to give them. He finally settled upon one page in particular. “We will be having some power outages, as reactors and refineries have gone on lockdown until this is over. And they aren’t letting anyone in or out until this is resolved.
“Lisa, I want you to team up with Nobles and Krupp until Ernie gets back,” he said, nodding his head at her. “Ferry service has been established for you in twenty at the public access off Sandal Court on Peter’s Point. Don’t be late. Stop by the armory and equip for code red on your way out, and watch your backs, people.
“The National Guard has been doing a tactical search of as many new arrivals as they can. Amazing little fact: over three hundred people arrived by train yesterday,” he said and stared out at the blank faces as they tried to process why they would need this tidbit of information. “It’s just that I didn’t think anybody traveled by train anymore and if that many came by train, think of the cars and buses bringing people to the lake; not to mention airports. There are a lot of people here right now, so keep your eyes open. That is all.”
Lisa left the room behind Krupp, marveling at the size of the man. Not a handsome man at all, with a nose that had seen too much ring time and scars etched upon his shaved head. He also carried himself with an arrogance that she had found annoying from day one. He did have a nice ass though, so she would tolerate him.
After stopping at the armory, they picked up their gear. Lisa’s arms felt as if they were stretching out of their sockets by the time she got the two ammo boxes she carried to the truck. Krupp unloaded three Mossberg pistol grips onto the truck’s bed. He then unloaded his other shoulder of tear gas canisters and the launcher, two M4s, and three magazine belts. Nobles set her two boxes down next to Lisa’s, giving her an emotionless smile. Given the cold response she had received from both when she introduced herself, she had rarely spoken to either Krupp or Nobles in the few weeks that Lisa had been there. They were both very focused individuals with their eye on the prize—unfortunately, it was the same prize. The extra eight hundred a month as detective created a huge draw in Hot Springs PD, which is why Lisa applied for the job. Her training and experience got her the job, but the veterans in the department had their own ideas about her promotion. Her looks figured prominently in their discussions. She didn’t care; there would always be somebody talking smack.
She thought about taking the driver’s seat and really putting Krupp and Nobles in their place. She had the rank, but she just didn’t know the town well enough yet. She did step right in front of Nobles to ride shotgun, flashing a smile in thank you for opening the door for her. Nobles slammed the door shut, almost catching Lisa’s leg before she moved to the back door.
Lisa didn’t even flinch; this was an old game and she was an expert.
They turned the radio to the Rockwell band; it buzzed with traffic from repeated callbacks for ambulance response, fire department dispatches to multiple fires, and requests for police backup that seemed to be going unanswered. They stared at each other with their mouths agape. Typically in the town, a four or five call night was literally burning up the band.
They continued to listen to the calls as they rode the ferry across the lake, frustrated that they were still inactive. They had seen nothing through Hot Springs proper; in fact, the town was strangely empty.
The ferry docked, but there was no way of choosing where they should go or which calls took priority. The hospital had the most activity, but Lisa figured day shift was probably working that, so they had the ferry driver drop them at the Amity Road landing.
They listened to the 911 dispatchers as they tried to get reception from police and emergency personnel in the field. They didn’t respond to any calls, as everything seemed to be on the Rockwell side of the lake, where police dispatch was queerly silent. Not one officer who had been on night crew responded, although most were supposed to be there in Rockwell.
The houses were empty and looked as if a battle had raged through the neighborhood as people stumbled around on the streets, slowly noticing the police SUVs. On a typical day, they would have investigated, but without witnesses, it was a lost cause. Instead, they moved on into the city, ignoring the harmless souls who stumbled toward them. They couldn’t focus on individual people when they had so much more to contend with. Krupp waved as the other off-road pulled away to pursue their own agenda. Lisa was tempted to call them back so they could stick together as a team but decided not to; there was a lot of ground to cover and she had no reason other than her own fear.
The first strip mall, a block away, seemed to be under attack. All the windows were smashed and people ran in and out, stealing everything in sight. Krupp slammed on the brakes and reached for the dash-mounted shotgun when Lisa grabbed his hand firmly.
“What are you gonna do, cowboy? Martial law hasn’t been declared so you can’t shoot them. There are too many to arrest and we can’t get them to the station. Just calm down; we got more to deal with than looters. Besides, the weekend warriors are supposed to take care of that shit.”
“We have to do something!” Nobles said from the back, her door already open.
“Close your door, Nobles,” Lisa said and the tension hung in the air as the overzealous officer struggled with the instruction. “That’s an order,” Lisa finished. Nobles slammed the door shut.
“Drive on,” Lisa said. “We only stop for murder and the walking dead at this point. That mess over there? It’s out of our hands.”
Krupp threw the truck into gear—leaving no doubt how he felt about it—and drove past the mass looting. They heard the running of hundreds of feet for only a second before they were swarmed by a stampede of terrified humanity trying to get away from… something. Some paused to pound on the glass of the SUV before running on. A man slammed face first into the passenger window and was quickly swarmed by two others whose teeth flashed before blood sprayed from the man’s neck. A large chunk of flesh hung loosely from a strand of muscle as blood spurt in time with his diminishing pulse.
“Is it time yet, Detective Reynolds?” Nobles asked sarcastically from the back seat.
Lisa waited for a couple seconds until the majority of the living and dead passed them by before replying.
“No time like the present.” Lisa opened her door, pushing the just bitten but already dead man onto the street. The signs didn’t show but she knew it. He started getting up as the three passed out their riot gear, but she just couldn’t make herself shoot someone while they were still normal.
The man held his arm as he watched the cops, knowing there was nothing they could do for him. Should I ask? He wondered but couldn’t summon the courage. The big man looked at him, and when their eyes met, he quickly shifted to his rifle. When he looked back toward the large cop, he saw him regarding his rifle with his head cocked in a thoughtful manner. He looked back up and gave a quick nod before chambering a round into his M4. The man closed his eyes.
Lisa watched as she slid her helmet on. It was the right thing to do; she knew it, but it was still cold-blooded as hell. How were they so sure he was infected and would turn into one of them? They weren’t sure; nobody could be sure… so they made a choice. As regrettable as that choice was, it was one they had to live with.
They came upon a small pocket of survivors in front of a farm supply store who were fending off a group of dead with lawn chairs and garden tools they had taken from inside.
No orders were given; everybody just played their roles. Krupp drifted right, lining up his shot, Nobles dri
fted left to cover the wings, and Lisa walked straight in, aiming at the front targets. More were starting to appear, creating the urgency that Lisa needed to take her first shot. Her indecision didn’t affect her aim as she double tapped the closest through the temple and cheek with practically identical results on the next one behind. Both experienced police officers and trained shooters, Krupp and Nobles had similar results. They kept their aim on the survivors who were scrambling to get into the store and barricade the doors.
“She’s bit!” a strange voice shouted out and a woman was pushed away from the group clustered at the building. Her hands were clasped in front of her, and she was visibly limping because of a long strip of meat that hung from her thigh. Lisa was about to start placating the girl when a shotgun blast exploded her head. She looked over at Nobles, whose Mossberg still smoked from the round and shook her head with wide eyes.
“What? She was bit,” was all she said as she squared up against the horde that was approaching them from the surrounding neighborhood. The survivors had made it inside the farm supply store, leaving only the three of them as a potential meal. Krupp and Lisa started firing while Nobles exchanged the magazine in her shotgun before turning to face more who staggered across the parking lot.
A streak of color in the distance caught Lisa’s eye; several people who were ignored by the zombies started running toward them at an incredible speed. Somehow she knew that this wasn’t help coming to their rescue.
“Everybody back in the off-road!” she shouted.
Her partners only had to be told once; they didn’t waste time firing into the crowd; there were just too many. They turned and ran toward the vehicle as Lisa watched the approaching runners from over her shoulder. She reached for the passenger door handle and felt herself pushed out of the way as Nobles made her way to the front seat. It could have been spite that motivated her but more than probably it was habit. She had been sitting in that seat for years and in the heat of the moment, she had forgotten their seating arrangement today.
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