“Why not just do it and have the radio station coordinate everyone when the time is right?” Thorn stated.
“I don’t know; why don’t we do that, mastermind?” Lisa said sarcastically as she glared at the handyman. “We haven’t talked to the station yet and don’t know their capabilities; they might be off the air by midnight. We just don’t know.”
“Hey, this is your show. I mean, it sounds good to me as long as the phones still work, but I think the chances of that lasting are slim,” Brett replied.
“Yeah, we’ll figure it out and try to get word to you. If we don’t, then listen for gun fire early tomorrow morning, alright?”
“No, you’re not thinking about this right; I can tell already,” Brett said, putting Lisa off just a bit. His hand was on his head as he thought about it for a second. Brett was a commercial contractor, same as his dad had been. He felt that he was missing something on how to fight these things, but he couldn’t quite put his finger on it.
“You can’t just start shooting without bringing more down on you. Let me talk to my dad and see if this is enough of a puzzle for him. We’ll let you know what we come up with,” he finished as the three of them headed up the stairs. Before Brett and his companions disappeared into the lobby with their new guns, he said, “We’ll leave a message at the radio station when we know more.”
“Kind of arrogant, don’t you think?” Lisa said.
“Oh, and you’re humble? We gonna need more like him, trust me. Too bad you had to kill Jonah; he would have been good at this shit,” Skit responded.
“Jonah? He would have been nothing but a thug, trust me,” Lisa said.
She loaded up some bags with weapons. “Okay, that’s all we can haul so let’s hide the rest in the lockers so we can come get them when we need them,” she said just as her phone rang.
****
Benson stood on the deck of the pontoon watching as the mayhem progressed throughout the city. He looked at his kids and wondered how he could keep them safe no matter where they went. For having witnessed his grandparents turn and his sister killed, Benson found it odd that Justin smiled like he was on top of the world, and he couldn’t help but ask.
“Why are you so happy, Justin? Didn’t you just lose your entire family?” Benson asked.
Justin shrugged before answering. “I’ll miss my sister. I never met my dad and my mom was way too busy to spend much time with us, so I really didn’t feel much when she got cancer and died. She was too busy, too busy, and then she was oh, I’m sick, come love me, my babies! Then she was gone. My grandparents were okay; at least they were rich, but I only met them just over a month ago because they had disowned my mom, but… I’ll miss my sister, she was a good shit,” Justin said with a lack of emotion that bothered Benson. The kid felt nothing because there was nothing there for him to feel. He had no feelings to be hurt because he had been unattached since the day he was born.
A sudden and overwhelming sadness came over the police officer and he wondered what they were really doing running away. It would be safer, but was it right? He studied Justin’s face as he watched a group of people in the distance getting chased down by a small horde of Zs, and there wasn’t a smidgen of emotion. It didn’t thrill him or excite him in any way; it was just more people dying and as long as it wasn’t him, he was okay with it. Benson could run and hide and save his children, but he knew someday the threat would come from somewhere else. He suddenly felt as though he was looking at the threat that would someday come.
“Pull up to that dock over there, Justin; we need to help those people.”
“Help those people? But we only have like ten bullets between us.”
“They are called rounds, Justin, and I have a few magazines that Lisa left us. It doesn’t matter though, they need our help, and we are going to help them.”
“Okay, okay… but they’re not coming to the island with us.”
“That’s fine, Justin.”
Justin slid the pontoon quietly toward the docks, close to the spot where he had seen his grandpa killed by Lisa, and nothing showed on his face. The kid didn’t even look at the body still lying there.
The group had backed up next to some type of storage shed; four women stood behind two men with bats beating off the pursuing mob. Benson could see that it was only a matter of time before the zombies on their backside got them. He drew his sidearm and lined up a shot, even though they were still fifty yards away from shore. He doubted that he would deliver a killing blow, but he may get the people’s attention. He had three magazines and decided that spending the first was a necessary evil, so he fired three shots in quick succession. One zombie fell and stopped moving, but the horrified people didn’t notice.
Justin stood behind Benson and lined up his shot on the zombies in front of the group. When he fired his big .45, the kickback very nearly hit him in the face. Benson whipped around when he heard the shot and saw one of the women drop to the ground as several of them looked out at the boat. Benson spun and grabbed the revolver from the boy and then signaled the group to go to the boat tied up on the end of the dock.
“Hey, give me my gun back!”
“You just drive, Justin. They’re being attacked by zombies so you shooting them doesn’t help.”
“I wasn’t aiming at them.”
“I know that, son, I know that. Just drive the boat.”
One man stood at the end of the dock, swinging for his life as the others crawled into the moored V hull. The scene reminded Benson of what he must have resembled as he defended the dock so his children could get on the pontoon back on the island. This time, however, there was no police dog to come to the man’s rescue. He aimed over the man’s shoulder as he told Krissy to catch the rope another man tossed to them then told Justin to tie it off. The group turned and screamed for their friend who continued to fight the mob, but he was quickly becoming overwhelmed, and the boat began pulling away from the dock.
He took one final swing before he turned and ran, but it was too late, they were just too close and fell on his legs, chewing and biting. The man looked up at Benson pleadingly. He saw the request etched upon the man’s face, so with the last round in his magazine, he honored that request.
Benson was a father who wanted nothing more than to keep his children safe. Just as importantly, he was a cop—a cop who could never stand by and watch people as they struggled to survive. They continued to help those few they saw and could get to in time, though many perished in a most horrific way. Old… young… healthy and strong… they all fell victim to the zombies’ lust for flesh, and for the first time in his life, Benson knew what it was to hate. He hated them and everything about them regardless of the fact that they used to be human.
***
They pulled up to the small flotilla of boats filled with those few they managed to rescue. None had keys or a way to operate the watercraft, and Benson didn’t know how to hot-wire them but it didn’t matter. Hanging out on the water was not sustainable for this group; they were already haggard and run dry. He noticed Justin staring at one of the women who returned his gaze boldly. She was in the first boat that they had rescued and one of her legs was wrapped with a bloodstained shirt being used as a bandage.
“Hi,” she said and paused. “I’m Julie.”
Justin meekly waved his hand. “I didn’t try to shoot you.”
“I know that.”
“I was trying to hit the zombies.”
“I know that too. I won’t be able to run as fast now though. I guess I’ll have to find someone to help me out.”
“I’ll do it, I mean, well, I… feel kinda… I should be the one who takes care of you.”
The woman, who was in her late twenties and showed no signs of a ring on that special finger was very pretty with short-cropped dark hair and a radiant smile. She wore a smile that never quite seemed to leave her eyes, and Benson smiled at the affect it was having on the young prepubescent boy.
“I don’
t know, I mean you got this boat and all of these others to take care of,” she replied.
“I can take care of them too. My mom told me before she died that I was very capable for someone my age. I can do it… you’ll see. Would you like some food?”
“I am hungry but I won’t eat until everybody eats, so no thank you,” the woman said with some kind of uncanny ability to see into the mind of the young man.
“Well… I don’t have enough to last more than a couple days with everybody eating, but if that’s what you want me to do…”
“Yes, I do. What’s your name, young man?” Julie said with a twinkle.
“Jus… Justin,” he stammered.
“Thank you, Justin, you’re a life saver,” Julie said. Several people in the other boats who were paying attention to how well she played the young man smiled inwardly.
“Why don’t you come down here and sit with me while we eat, Justin?”
“Okay, I would like that,” he said. He crawled into the large Bayliner and sat down next to Julie, who shared her peaches with him.
Benson pulled out his phone and called Lisa. He spoke to her quietly for a long time before he turned back to the group.
“Well, we’re all in quite a predicament sitting out here with only one running boat. Justin, why don’t you come up here and steer us over toward the east bank.” Justin complied, happy to show Julie how important he was. When he walked by, Benson leaned down and whispered into his ear, “Don’t mention your house on the island just yet, okay?”
Knowing that there were way too many people here to do that, Justin nodded; although he thought it would be nice if he could convince Julie to go.
“First off, I need to know if any of you have military training,” Benson continued. A few of them raised their hands, albeit reluctantly. They knew that request usually led to something they didn’t want to get into. “I don’t have to describe the obvious, but I have to start somewhere so let’s just say it. The city is overrun. Not only that, but from what I have heard, all cities have been overrun. Is there anybody here who can confirm that?”
“Yeah,” one of the men who had raised his hand as being ex-military said. He looked to be in his early forties but still very capable. He had a steel look to his eyes that said he had seen a lot and when he spoke it was with a deep, guarded layer of fact. “I talked to my brother up in Chicago and it was almost completely overrun by sunrise. They said it started up in Minnesota somewhere.”
“I heard that they had something going on up there, but whether or not it’s connected to this, I couldn’t say,” Benson replied. “Well, there’s really nowhere to go… we can’t stay out here on the lake, and the water is filled with zombies. Also the islands are overrun. There was an effort to protect the bridge, but to my knowledge it has failed and since the 70 Bridge has collapsed, that leaves no western exit. That’s just some of the bad news and there really isn’t any good news. However, there is a cause for hope. There’s another officer in the city who’s in the process of setting up a stronghold, a place that’s secure so we can start to clear out the dead from our city… but we need help. There’s a lot of work to do, but if you have another option then I will assist you if I can.
“I need to get up to New York,” he heard one voice say above the many others that spoke, and he held his hands up to stifle the crowd in the surrounding boats.
“Look, I’m just a cop here in Hot Springs. I can’t arrange safe passage for you or even transportation. At this point, I can get you to shore and wish you luck in finding a vehicle that will assist you. There are a lot of them abandoned out there and you may have some luck, but my concerns are here and the people that choose to stay here. Sorry, that’s all I have today; tomorrow may be different but I doubt it. We have a city to clear a lot of dead out of.”
“What about weapons?”
“Again, good luck. Any that you find while in my company will be used in the re-taking of the city, but after we part, what you do is up to you.” He could tell from the upset faces that a lot of people had no intention of sticking around to help. “That being said, we’re heading over to the east bank. If you can get one of these boats going, then you can get several miles upriver—which would probably be your best bet. Downstream is a dam that will drop you into less populated areas, but not totally safe. I don’t think anywhere is totally safe anymore.”
“So what’s your plan?” asked another who had held up his hand as ex-military. He was much younger and looked as if he could have been deployed recently.
“We’re going to hold up tonight and plan a takeover of some very defensible areas that will sustain us until the plan becomes more calculated.”
“That doesn’t sound like much.”
“It is all I got; sorry but I never planned on being overrun with walking dead. Justin, turn on the radio to 1430 AM,” Benson said as he watched a couple of men messing under the console of the larger of the attached boats.
“Hey, is that someone swimming over there?” Julie asked.
Benson looked to see a man swimming strongly and unaware of their presence. There was no way he could keep up that pace so he directed Justin to steer over toward the man. As they got closer, he recognized him and just hoped that he’d had a change of attitude or at least wasn’t drunk.
“Tommy! Hey, Tommy,” Benson shouted, getting the man’s attention. Tommy started treading water as he looked to see who called his name.
“Hi, Officer Benson, can you give a guy a lift?”
“Of course, Tommy; crawl up the swim ladder on back.”
Chapter Ten:
1430 AM
“This is still the same Tasha LeCrem who hasn’t been relieved from the night shift and it doesn’t look as if I will be anytime soon, but I do have something for you, folks. If you can take some time to listen, there might be a plan brewing. I have with me here a newbie to the Hot Spring, Rockwell Police Department. Lieutenant Lisa Reynolds is here to hopefully give you something to look forward to. She has just received a phone call and will be with us momentarily.
“Until then, I would like to wish all of you out there still managing to survive this new zombie world hope and strength for what comes. Getting right down to business, I have to tell you that we haven’t had any updates since this all started late last night so I am beginning to believe everyone is still swirling from the horrendous events that they awoke to. The military channels are active but scrambled so we can’t get anything from them. Yesterday we heard about strange goings on up in Minnesota resembling cult activity; whether or not that has spread into our neck of the woods, we can’t tell.
“The good news is that all of the nuclear plants went on lockdown yesterday and should be secured as soon as we hit terror level red. The bad news is we don’t know how that will affect the power grid. We, personally, are equipped with our own generators and should be able to keep broadcasting until the zombies find me or I fall asleep. My hopes of another jock showing up for their shift are nil so I will just keep plugging away as best that I can.”
“What is it, Buck? I am about to go on the radio here… What do mean they changed the plan? Can they do that?” Lisa replied, pissed by the intrusion on their plans to take back the city. “Well, if that is what is going to go down, then that is what it is… Alright, keep me informed.”
“Fuck!” Lisa said as she hung up her phone.
Tasha finished and leaned back, giving Lisa the nod when she saw that she was done on the phone. They had talked for a time before, figuring out how the radio could be used. There was also a tech stranded there who was going to send the stream to other stations—FM and AM. Tasha set up Facebook and Twitter links with the intention of using any media links that they could while they had them. Lisa was impressed and thrilled at how willing she was to help; but then, what choice did she really have? The resources here were beyond her imagination. The station was an outdated emergency response station set up to run on a local level indefinitely as long
as the generator ran and nothing happened to the tower. It was an old-school setup, which was what they needed; a lot of the digital stuff would crash practically immediately without updates and backups. There were some benefits to having been designed during the Cold War.
“Uhh, hi, this is Lieutenant Reynolds. As Tasha said, something was going on up north yesterday and now something is going on down here. What that something is, nobody knows and it doesn’t matter. What matters is that we are being slaughtered like cattle and will continue to be slaughtered and eaten unless we do something to stop it.
“Yesterday we lived in a world filled with expensive cars and homes; high taxes, crooked politicians… bankers along with many other things that we found distasteful but you know what? It was a damn sight better than the world we live in just twenty-four hours later. Take a moment and look at the person with you. If you are lucky, you love that person and would do anything for them. The greatest promise you could have made that person yesterday was that you would stay with them and love them until the end of time. Today, the only promise that you can give is that you will put a bullet in their head when they try to eat you.” Lisa paused letting that sink in for a moment and saw the severity of her words etched upon Tasha’s face.
“Sounds harsh, doesn’t it? Well, some of us have already done it. I had to do it to a fellow officer today and I would do it again if it would preserve the life of the living for one more day. The world has changed overnight, through no fault of our own, but we too must change… change and adapt or die because that is where we now live. You can join with a gang and run rampant on the world adding to the mayhem or you can join with us and fight for what’s right. Fight for your friends and neighbors. Protect your children and fight for the right to live and to keep living.
“Whatever is going on doesn’t matter because we have something much more important to focus on. Something so important that nothing else really matters anymore except this one thing—we need to survive. The only thing that counts right now is seeing tomorrow and if we play it right, we might be able to see that and maybe even the day after that. Right now there are crews working on stabilizing a position within the city where we can come together. We need to stick together and fight because once the zombies are done, we’ll have to take on the rest of the world. You may think that I’m exaggerating but look outside your window and you’ll see the truth. Tomorrow is coming with or without you; it will be here as it has always been here. The question is… will there be anyone here to see it? I say yes, there will. I say yes there will be someone here to see it and that someone is me. I am going to be here and I am bringing as many guns and people as I can find with me. I might even have one for you if you want to help me take back this city, our city. If you are with me and those few who have already decided to fight for you then you will not be alone. I can’t promise you life, but I can promise you that I will be there to back you up, watch over your shoulder, and if worse comes to worst, put a bullet in your head when the time is right. Not much of a promise, is it? Well, it’s the best I can offer anyone right now.
Zombie Rush Page 14