Lisa flew around the front of the vehicle as Nobles looked at her with regret. Lisa turned, managing to lock her rifle into the teeth of one of the runners who led the pack. Nobles rose out of the seat, stepped out of the SUV, and swung her handheld Mossberg cannon up to blow its head off; Lisa felt the wind from the pellets as well as the blood spray across her visor. She smeared a hand across her visor to clear her line of vision. With her rifle out of play in her left hand, she drew her Glock and shot the knees out of one that had latched onto Nobles’s wrist. The shotgun fell to the ground as the still intact jaw bit down through the tendons before Lisa could get a headshot.
Nobles fell to her knees, pulled her back-up Sig with her left hand, and began shooting at the other runners. Lisa slipped into the passenger seat and slammed the door. Krupp—having witnessed the event from the driver’s seat—threw the SUV into gear and lit up the tires, but not before Lisa rolled down the window and put a .40 between Nobles’s pleading eyes just before she was overwhelmed.
Lisa’s face showed empathy, and her heart ached even though she didn’t know Nobles that well—and what she did know she didn’t really like. But this was here, this was now, and Nobles was as good as dead when she pulled the trigger; Nobles knew it too.
“Once you’re bitten, it’s done,” Lisa said to Krupp, who ignored her. She was mired in a sea of regret; her nightmares had finally come to fruition. She shifted in order to pull an object out from under her, only to find Nobles’s .357. Lisa envisioned it must have been tossed away or fell out of her holster when she tried to get in the off-road.
Lisa keyed her mic with her chin. “Unit 242 we have a man down at the intersection of Central Avenue and Pine Hill road… Do you copy? … Dispatch?” Great, the radios are down. She switched the setting to a multilevel band and broadcast again. “This is 242 reporting an outbreak on Central and Pine Hill.”
“No response?” Krupp asked.
“Nope, all comms are down.”
“Not all comms,” he said as he pulled his cell phone out and pressed a couple of buttons. “Benson, where are you at?” he asked gruffly. “Hang tough, we’ll be right there.” He hung up the phone. “They didn’t make it much further than we did. They’re pinned down by some kind of street gang they caught looting.”
“Street gangs I can handle, but why they would worry about looters right now is just plain ridiculous.”
“Hey, they're just trying to react to the situation like any good cop would do. We need to get our team back together,” Krupp said.
Lisa smiled; this was the first intelligent thing she heard come out of his mouth.
****
The other truck was a mess and so was the building the officers had taken refuge in just a couple blocks from the marina. Lisa was glad they chose a brick building; judging by the number of pocks in the bricks, a wooden house would have collapsed in on them. The gang was hiding behind their own cars for cover and so involved in putting rounds down field at the cops that the zombies stumbled right up on them from behind. Surrounded by retirement communities that bordered the marina, most of the zombies were seniors and brought their health and mobilities with them into the afterlife. Some still walked while others crawled, all in a relentless desire to feed. Even when the first gang member screamed, the others didn’t pick up the fact that it was they who had become victims.
Lisa had Krupp slow the truck to a crawl as they watched the slaughter begin. The bangers started firing on the dead, but there were too many. The bangers shouted insults and raged as they tried to intimidate, not fully realizing what their attackers really were. Lisa and Krupp quietly waited for the chance to get to their team members. This didn’t even resemble police work and had instantly morphed into a strategy of survival. There was nothing they could do about the gang or the mass of undead that attacked them. All they could worry about was saving their fellow officers.
The zombies were unwavering, relentless as their teeth sought out more of the tender flesh of the shooters. Several broke and ran, making it around the corner of a tenement building. But it was only a matter of time for them; gaping wounds could be seen on some of the runners even from this distance. The zombies seemed to forget the gangbangers, and when they moved toward the brick building, Lisa shouted, “Go, go, go!”
Unlocking the doors, Krupp floored it and screeched up to the building ahead of the Zs. Benson and Traynor didn’t waste a second as they bolted out the front door and into the back. The horde continued to envelope the truck, closing in from the exposed three sides, pounding on the windows, and bogging down the vehicle. The mass of bodies was so great they could hear the wheels spin as the zombies pressed against the hood.
“Fishtail, do a loop de loop or something,” Traynor shouted from the back seat. “No fucking way am I going to die here, you dumb son of a bitch!”
“Quit fucking screaming; this ain’t the goddamn movies!” Lisa heard Krupp shout back. She watched as he threw the truck into neutral, causing it to sway freely with the press of the crowd. She nervously watched the blinking light on the low lock button he had just pressed and waited for it to become solid as the crowd continued to push the truck backwards up and over countless infected that Krupp had previously driven over. The light on the button turned solid and Krupp waited. He felt the ass end fall and finally roll off the fallen bodies and touch solid pavement before he threw it into reverse and pulled away from the crush of the oncoming horde. He drove for over half a block in reverse before he stopped, threw it into drive, and switched the low lock to high on the four-by-four. The tires squealed as they broke through the final wave of zombies, leaving all of them grateful for the heavy-duty rig as opposed to the squads that they typically drove.
“What the fuck is happening?” Traynor shouted as she watched more of them advancing from the houses and hotels, forcing them out toward the peninsula and bridge over the lake. That same bridge was so jammed with cars, they had to use a ferry to cross and it had left as soon as they were dropped off. They were driving into a bottleneck with the sides of the buildings swiftly crushing their progress.
Lisa could see some type of heavy equipment operating on the bridge but that wouldn’t help them on this side. It was nothing more than a glut of cars that they would be pushed up against and slaughtered.
“Hard left!” Lisa shouted as she saw a break where the horde at least thinned out slightly. She knew what crashing through that many bodies would do to the truck, but they were running out of options. The off-road launched through the bodies and came down hard on an unseen yellow parking lot curb, blowing out both tires and sending steam billowing from the hood.
“There… between the buildings.” She pointed and Krupp aimed for the alley, which was way too tight for anything bigger than a golf cart. Her hand on the dash stopped Lisa from a concussion as the truck stopped abruptly, wedged between the two buildings. A plank above them between the two buildings cast a shadow across the hood. Krupp shot several holes in the window with his .40 before he and Lisa kicked the windshield the rest of the way out just as the horde reached the back of the truck, where most of their weapons were.
With a pistol-grip Mossberg between them, their pistols empty and holstered, Benson and Traynor were pinned down and held their fire. Lisa and Krupp had a chance to access their gear earlier so were a little better off with a pistol grip, an M4, and ammo, both of the sidearms barely touched. Not having access to what was in the bed was going to hurt. A hard fiberglass top over the bed kept the officers from their gear while at the same time gave the zombies a platform as they advanced toward the shattered but still in place rear window. Benson and Traynor crawled over the backseat before assisting each other through the front window behind Lisa and Krupp.
Lisa broke out of the alley on the end of the block and cut hard left, already feeling the day’s exertions and knowing it was going to get worse. Nobles’s resignation was etched in Lisa's mind; she knew that she should be in a panic and thinking only of
their current situation, but there was no denying her actions. She killed a fellow officer; right or wrong, she’d pulled the trigger and there was no changing it.
Her thoughts were interrupted by two younger infected that were running toward her, their faces distorted with rage.
She forced herself to wait as their images became larger with a sprinter’s grace. Lisa pulled the shotgun to her shoulder. She aimed before sending a slug into the head of one, then two in quick succession into the other as Krupp made toward the open door of the small three-story building they were wedged against.
Once inside the building, they made their way to the front and stopped at the entrance. As Benson tried to grab the door, Traynor jerked him inside just as the first zombies started coming out of the alley and slowing once they lost sight of their prey. The four officers moved swiftly up the stairs, Lisa reloading as she climbed.
“You all right?” Krupp asked when they reached the top floor hallway.
“Yeah, I'm fine. It’s more like paintball than killing. Where the hell are you taking us?” Lisa asked, worried about getting trapped up on the top floor.
“I want to wait them out a bit; kinda let ’em forget about us, you know? Then we can make it back down to the tru—”
“Forget the truck; the truck is gone,” Lisa cut him off. “You got us trapped with only one way out, Krupp.”
“No, there’s a plank laid out across the two buildings. I saw it from below and these balconies can be navigated all the way down. So let’s just lay low for a sec, alright?”
“Yeah, okay, take ten while we have the opportunity,” Lisa said, knowing she could use the break. She slipped up to the edge of the window and looked down on the street as a few wandered aimlessly in search of food.
“The alley is clearing out,” Benson said as he looked down upon the truck that was lodged between the two buildings. “The lot out front looks pretty crowded still; I don’t see that clearing out for a while.”
“All the apartments seem to be empty with the doors left swingin’,” said Traynor, a little too loudly for Lisa’s taste.
“Keep your voice down, Officer Traynor.”
“Oh, you gonna start throwing protocol at me? I think your authority has fizzled a bit, don’t you?”
“Do you really think this is time for a coup?” Benson jumped in before a catfight ensued.
“Yeah, better back off, Traynor,” Krupp said and then locked eyes on Reynolds. “Or she might take you out like she did Nobles.”
After a long, silent pause from the group, and with her features etched in pain, Traynor said, “You killed Irene?”
They had been friends long before becoming police officers. She advanced, instinctively reaching for her empty revolver.
Lisa straightened for the challenge.
“This isn’t the time for this,” Benson said as he stepped between them. “We have to stick together or we all die.”
“Do we?” Krupp said. “I don’t think being effective as police officers is still an option. There’s too much happening for just the three of us, and I’m beginning to think that’s all we got. I, for one, am heading home. Hell, I am supposed to be on vacation anyway. My family knows what to do in a situation, and we have places to stow away.”
“You a prepper?” Benson asked. “The rest of us aren’t.”
“No, not for an apocalypse, but for attacks and gang activity, I’ve always had a plan in place for my family’s safety. Point is, they need me, and they’re more important right now than hanging out with Lieutenant Blood here.”
“You do whatever you fucking want then, Krupp, but I’m not the only one with blood on their hands today,” Lisa said as she headed into one of the apartments toward the front of the building. “You know that Nobles was infected. She asked me to do it.”
“I didn’t hear her say anything,” he said.
Lisa spun, her face frustrated from trying to stifle her rage. She stormed over to him with the Mossberg in her left hand, a full magazine on her hip, and her right working the strap on her baton when Benson once again stepped in her path.
“Yeah, well, you’re a murderer.”
“You’re a deserter, you stupid fuck,” Lisa replied, unable to stifle her anger toward the man who had made her life miserable from day one. She set the shotgun down on a chest in case she became too tempted to use it. She had seen the complaints, the ones he’d pushed upstairs, and the ones from his now dead counterpart. Everyone seemed to have a complaint about her, including Traynor. She walked back toward the window mumbling angrily.
“You guys do whatever you fucking want,” she said with a caustic wave of her hand.
“So what’s the plan?” Traynor asked, her tone telling that there was more behind her question than a simple need for information. She didn’t know who to look to; the lieutenant who should be in charge, Krupp her friend and neighbor, or the peacemaker who always seemed to know what to do.
“What do you mean ‘plan’? We have to get back to base,” Lisa said, leaving no question as to her role in all of this.
“I ain’t going back to base,” Krupp said. “The world has gone to shit. I have my family stocked up and waiting for me, so I am done.”
Lisa wondered how dedicated he ever truly was. Was he one of those cops who looked at the job as a testosterone rush more than a responsibility? No, she told herself, he was a good cop regardless of what was going on now. He had an exemplary record and didn’t as a rule profile the populace. He was right; his obligation was to his family. Lisa didn’t have family here—or anywhere, really—so of course she would want to go back to the base. “What about you, Traynor?”
“I live by Krupp, so I’m going to head out with him. Looks like it’s just you and Benson,” Traynor replied and accidentally allowed her eyes to fall upon Lisa’s Mossberg sitting on a chest of drawers. Lisa didn’t hesitate in getting her sidearm out, stopping Traynor in her tracks before Lisa snatched the gun up.
“Sounds good,” Lisa said. “But you only take what you came with, alright?”
Traynor backed up and Lisa noticed that Benson had the drop on both with his shotgun already in his hands. Even though he and Traynor were partners, Lisa wasn’t sure which side he would choose.
“That sounds fair,” Benson said. “I’ll go with you, Detective, as far as Grand Island. Then I got to see to my own.”
“Alright, Benson, I get it. I’ll take all the help I can get. Let’s check out the balconies and see if that can help us out.”
The balconies each had a solid wall instead of a rail and Lisa wondered how Krupp knew about this place and its options, or did he check it out so well on just one glance? If so, Lisa knew she’d regret not having him to watch her back in spite of his attitude.
Benson entered the room a few paces behind Lisa and stopped, instantly assaulted by the stench that was entering the living room from the kitchen off to the right. Movement to his left caught his attention. He saw an old woman lumbering toward Lisa while she was distracted by the lot outside. Brown and yellow shit stains ran down the back of her nightie where her bowels had released, the front covered in blood from the neckline down.
Benson didn’t hesitate to pull the trigger, filling the room with the blast from his shotgun and blowing a large hole in the old woman’s head with a load of buckshot.
“What the…” Lisa said turning around and saw the old woman fall. The street suddenly silent, she turned and looked back out the slider where every undead eye was focused on the building where they hid. “Oh shit, this is not good.”
“Running?” Benson said. “Some are running, holy fuck… some are running! We gotta fill up the stairway. Help me with this couch.” He grabbed an end of a sofa that sat along the long wall that ran from living room directly into the hall.
Krupp and Traynor joined in trying to shove furniture down the stairs in an attempt to block it. Two overstuffed chairs, a love seat, and kitchen table with chairs filled the access when the
y heard the first of the runners hit the makeshift blockade. Benson and Krupp struggled to get a full refrigerator to the top of the stairs where it could be pushed on top, creating enough weight to hold back what was clawing at the other side for a few moments.
“We need to move out,” Lisa said as she looked at the mass of undead coming into the building on the ground floor. She turned back to Benson and saw him in private conversation with Krupp. From the way they both looked right at her, it was obvious what they spoke about.
“Traynor and me are taking to the roof. We’ll try to get out from the other building,” Krupp said as they headed off toward a roof access.
Lisa nodded before closing the apartment door and locking her and Benson inside. She had reservations and concerns about what could be considered dereliction of duty from the other three in such a situation.
They were officers sworn to do their duty; then again, can any oath demand suicide? Should they keep putting their lives on the line to show that they have… what… honor? This disease or infection was well beyond their scope of training and had expanded beyond anything they could hope to control. The masses of infected had become so great that Lisa doubted even the military could stop what was happening. How was anyone supposed to control that type of situation other than killing the infected?
A sudden thought struck her; maybe it was all over. Maybe everything she had known and was trained to do was just gone. Could that be why she had so willingly put a bullet into Nobles’s brain? She began to wonder if she had known even then that the old rules no longer applied; what was once honor and duty had become nothing but survival. Can that happen in the blink of an eye? Are humans so in tune with their base primal instincts that they can throw a switch and instantly become ruthless survivors?
“Is something bothering you?” Benson asked as he joined her by the window. They watched the Zs crawl over each other trying to get into the building and heard the furniture blocking the stairway being thrust back and forth as they tried to gain access to the top floor.
Zombie Rush Page 2