The horrified motorcycle cops began to fire their duty revolvers at the zombies. The cops were able to stop several creatures in their tracks. However, the revolvers soon emptied. When the officers began to reach for their speed loaders with extra rounds of ammo, the wave of dead washed upon them.
Several zombies now had the motor jocks in their grasp. The misfits began to gnarl on the cops, biting chunks of flesh from their necks and faces and heads. Two zombies, one carrying an umbrella, then wobbled past the preoccupied motor cops. IT began to climb into the car, attacking Governor Connally and his wife.
J
ake climbed back onto the rear step bumper of the car and tried to enter the passenger compartment. But he could not do so. It was as if Jake was frozen. Not out of fear, he was simply unable to move. All he could do was watch as the creatures tore the Connally pair apart.
Another pair of flesh munchers finished their motor jockey meals and began to climb into the rear portion of the limo. The redheaded rear male passenger now turned his head around completely 360 degrees and again looked toward Jake. However, to Jake's surprise, this was not President Kennedy after all. It was sixteen-year-old Jimmy Griggs, from Exeter, Rhode Island.
Jimmy had a large section of flesh missing from the right side of his neck. He begged of Sgt Hathaway, “Jakey, please don’t let me drown again!”
Jake tried with all his might to move his arms and legs, yet they still did not work. He could not even flinch to save his best friend from being devoured by the cannibalistic mutants. L oud chewing and slurping sounds enveloped around Jimmy’s screams of “NOOOO!!! Jake, help me!!”
Soon those screams faded away and were replaced by the sound of footsteps, rustling leaves, and moans.
It was zero dead thirty, and the intoxicated convict Hathaway woke up with wood and pitch black all around him. He was thankful to realize he had only been imagining the whole Dealey Plaza scene, and he wondered what had awakened him from his deep moonshine slumber.
But soon the normal woodland sounds of crickets, mosquitoes, croaking toads and hoot owls were drowned out by guttural moans and growls, as well as rustling and scraping from below. Jake’s heart was pounding, and his pulse was racing. Whatever was making these sounds was just below him on the tree trunk, about ten feet below the platform he was lying on.
Still lying on his stomach on the plywood platform and still quite drunk, Jake was not entirely sure that he wasn’t imagining these sounds. Not willing to chance the fact that there might be a real threat approaching, he moved stealthily. Jake positioning himself in a manner so that he could peep through a crack between two plywood sheets that made up the floor he was on.
Peering through the crack, it appeared as if there were multiple dark figures below surrounding the base of the tree. One lone THING was also trying to maneuver its way up the wooden block steps, toward the tree stand.
Jake was familiar with this part of the country, being a Northeast native and all. He had heard the stories of black bears being in these parts and assumed that was what was visiting him in the early morning hours. Jake was thankful he had arrived prepared, bringing his weapons with him and not just leaving them behind in the vehicle. Jake had his Remington 12-gauge shotgun with five shells and his appropriately sharpened sickle.
Jake sat with his long shotgun barrels aimed toward the opening i n the structure’s wall. His finger remained on the trigger and he was ready for the first sign of an early morning unwanted wakeup call. He planned on staying put and as still as possible. But upon the first sign of that bear sticking his face into the deer stand opening, Jake was going to blow it to Kingdom Come with a shotgun blast straight in the face.
Surely after destroying the one bear, and with the loudness of a shotgun blast, the rest of the pack would flee quickly and head for the hills. Then Jake would be able to sleep off the rest of this peach haze and start out fresh around sunrise to continue his trek north.
The moans and groans became louder and louder as the top bear neared its destination. Jake lowered the weapon’s barrel and steadied his aim as a dark head came into sight and the dark form curiously investigated the tree stand.
Jake’s anticipation of a curious bruin climber turned to horror as the smell of death and decay poured from the open mouth of the creature that was now in his front door.
IT WAS ONE OF THOSE DEAD PEOPLE!!
ITs head was just four feet from Jake’s face. IT was undoubtedly smelling his human delicacy, with nostrils flaring and closing, flaring and closing. IT seemed hungry, mouth wide open, yellow rotted teeth exposed and chomping at the early morning air.
Although horrified by this sight, Jake found himself not taking immediate action. Rather, he began staring in wonder at the nightmare before him. IT was by no means a beautiful creature. But this was like looking into the eyes of something that could not be explained. This was a manifestation of death itself, much more terrifying than merely spotting a Bigfoot, Chupacabra, or the Loch Ness Monster.
Here before him was the evidence he needed to prove to the world that somehow people were turning into monsters. Jake was not the type to normally take “selfies” with his phone camera, but if he had a camera on him now, he would probably entertain the thought. The next best thing would be to somehow preserve the body after slaying it, just long enough for the whole world to see.
The open mouth of the creature was now just one foot away from Jake. Jake thrust the shotgun barrel into the throat and pulled the trigger. BLAMMMMM!!! The shotgun pellets exploded from the weapon, blasting the entire head off the creature with a spray of blood and vessels and decaying flesh pouring down onto the ground below.
The beast’s body descended backwards, out of the tree stand and down below into a crowd of similar forms. That was when Jake finally realized the true extent and seriousness of the situation. He could sense the actual density of the shit he was now wading in.
There were several more of these things on the ground, probably between ten and fifteen of them. The lighting was still very dim, making it difficult to tell for sure. But THEY had not been scared away by the blast or in seeing their comrade miscreation blown to bits. If anything, it appeared as if the monstrosities were now even more driven.
They pushed and shoved at each other, trying to get into the pole position. Or to be more precise, the HOLE position. Each creature wanted to be the one to get up the tree first, to climb through the hole, and feast on the cornered human treat.
Jake was feeling like the only lobster in a seafood restaurant’s tank. He was just waiting to be pointed at by a hungry customer, then plucked from the tank with some cold steel tongs. Jake knew his chances of surviving this were slim to none. But not being one to ever quit or count himself out when the odds were in someone else’s favor, Jake sobered quickly and began to strategize.
Out of nowhere, a different noise echoed through the forest. A set of approaching headlights and fog lights appeared from one vehicle, with a spotlight shining onto the inhuman crowd. Jake flattened in the airborne shelter so as not to be seen by whoever was present.
No weapons could be heard. But Jake noticed that one at a time, as if orchestrated and rehearsed, the creatures’ heads jarred just before their bodies collapsed onto the ground. In a matter of about three minutes they were all down for the count.
The escapee lay still as he heard two vehicle doors open and shut. Voices confirmed two different humans were converging on Jake’s treehouse. A flashlight’s stream of white light was pointed into the shelter’s opening as footsteps of one began to climb the wooden foot pegs.
Jake again prepared his Remington to blow another mid-morning caller to smithereens when the squawk of a police radio filled the dead air.
“Central to 725…. status check. Do you copy, 725?”
“Dude turn your radio down! You’re gonna give us away,” one officer muttered to the other. They switched into silent mode as each pointed a weapon at the opening of the stand.
/> Jake knew that he was now in jeopardy of being identified and returned to death row in Texas. Even with that being a possibility, he could not bring himself to murder a cop who was just doing his job. Jake had been in that position many times himself and now wondered how close he could have come to meeting his maker at any given time in his career. Jake placed his shotgun behind him and opted for Plan B.
“I’m up here, officers! Thank god you found me!” Jake vocalized in a somewhat convincing fashion. Jake showed the lawmen his hands to assure them he was not bearing any arms. He then climbed out of his shelter and stood at the base of the tree in what was now a cesspool of creature body parts, guts, ooze, and muck.
The two officers were dressed in all black from head to toe. Everything starting with their ball caps and plastic water-resistant jackets, down to their also-plastic pants and boots, was black. Their army green Hummer with brush guards over the lights was parked, still idling behind them. The truck’s headlights were still aimed at and lighting up the area where Jake now stood.
“Are you guys the Forest Rangers?” Jake asked the uniformed men.
“We’re with the Pennsylvania Wildlife Control. What the fuck are you doing out here? This ain’t a safe place to be camping out. We need to see your identification.” Jake began to feel about his person, acting as if he was trying to find his wallet in his pants and jacket pockets. He was very thankful that his wallet and identifying credit cards were now locked up in the Dallas County property room and not on his person.
Jake replied,“I must have lost my wallet somewhere.” The older of ficer shined his small rechargeable flashlight at Jake’s face, paused for a moment, then remarked, “I know who you are.”
Jake knew his time was just about up. He had one last chance - to try and catch the officers off guard and then run like hell.
Jake turned away from the wildlife cops. He put his hands behind his back and said, “all right, you got me.”
As soon as the closest officer moved toward him, Jake planned to beat feet as quick as he could. From there the only hope he had was to get behind a tree line before being shot in the back.
“You’re that cop from Texas. Jake somethin, right?” asked the elder cop.
“Umm. Yeah.” Jake said. He knew the jig was up.
“You got a bad rap man,” said the elder officer.
Jake didn’t know if the lawman was playing mind games with him or if he was sincere.
“Yeah, I’m Jake Hathaway,” he affirmed with trepidation. He slowly turned to face his captors.
The younger of the two cops introduced himself as Owen and his partner as Harry. “Your family members that you killed – they had turned into zombies beforehand, didn’t they?”
“They turned into something, all right. Is that what these thingsare?”
“Most people are calling them that. We call them ‘draggers’ cause they are so slow and drag their feet all around. That’s how we track them, by the scrape marks their feet leave behind in the pine needles.”
Owen explained that these forests and wooded areas were crawling with them. That every night the two “Wildlife Control Officers” went out in the Hummer to locate more ‘draggers.’ Then they would shoot them in the head with their AR rifles with built-in noise suppressors.
Or sometimes if they were bored, they would make the job a little more sporting. They would take to their tree stands with crossbows in hand to do some old-school “draggerhunting.”
“But the most important thing to know about taking these thingsdown,” added Harry, “is that you have to cause them major trauma to their brains. You hit them anywhere else and you just slow them down. Not because they are in pain, but because when you shoot their legs off then they must crawl. But they still keep coming.”
“How many have you guys killed so far?” Jake questioned, intrigued.
“Well, let’s see. We have been doing this for about eight months now, probably averaging about thirty per day. Before us, the FBI, Secret Service, ICE – all of them were doing this when the draggers first started showing up. But then there were way too many of the draggers and not nearly enough Feds. So, they told us to start weeding them out ourselves, to burn them and to keep the mission top secret.”
Owen was excited to finally be talking about the mission they kept silent about for so long. “We wear this rubber gear so we can hose off the dragger blood and guts at the end of the night.”
Owen took off his black ballcap and showed Jake the patch sewn onto the center of the hat. “Check it out. Me and Harry made these hats up for us and all the other fellas here. See the zombie guy blacked out? We call ourselves the ‘BODS - Black Ops DraggerSquad.”
“Chief told us we couldn’t make the hats, but we went and did it anyway. If the Mass State Troopers Cold Case Unit can have the Grim Reaper on their patch, we sure as hell can do this. Like the chief’s going to come out here and catch us wearing them? I don’t think so….”
Jake sought information of the duo as to why there was so much secrecy about the creatures.
Owen matter-offactly said, “the government guys don’t want mass hysteria out there. People would be freaking out and acting like it’s the end of the world.”
“How do we know it isn’t?” Jake was quick to point out.
“But wouldn’t they be better off informing the public about how to protect themselves and on how to prevent them from turning into these things? You think maybe there’s more going on here than we know about?”
“There always is,” stated the elder and wiser officer, Harry.
“We are just the bluecollar guys. Like the trash guy. THE MAN doesn’t tell us shit.”
“Before you go, why don’t you give us a hand with our dragger-fire?” Owen said.
Owen handed Jake a pitchfork and a pair of rubber gloves. The three men began to stack the creatures into a pile that was four wide and four deep.
Owen poured lighter fluid over the stack. He then pulled a Swisher Sweets cigar from a uniform shirt pocket underneath his exterior rubber raincoat. Owen sparked a Bic lighter to light the medium sized cigar.
Owen puffed at the fresh stogie for a minute, then used his finger to flick some still hot ashes onto the mound. The monster stack was set ablaze. “Grab the marshmallows,” exclaimed Owen, who paused and then recanted. “Only kidding. They would taste nasty!”
Jake wished he had some way to capture this moment. A method of preserving some evidence of these beasts to take back to Texas and plead for a retrial. But he began to realize that, as many of these things as there were, there would be ample opportunities for him to capture some evidence. He expressed his gratitude to the BODS, then took his sickle, shotgun, and maps down from the tree fort.
Jake requested one last favor before heading out. “I need to get going. Can you guys get a message to my partner back in Dallas? His name is Mack McElroy, and he works at the Central Division. Tell him #4856 is eating beans.”
Harry replied, “No problem. Is he going to know what that means?”
“He will figure it out. And, just out of curiosity,” Jake asked the officers. “What would you guys have done if I had run for it earlier on like I had planned?”
“Haa!” Harry laughed. “You’d be on top of that pile right about now with Owen browning marshmallows over your ass.” The two Wildlife Cops continued to laugh out loud.
“And hey, if you were smart you would ditch that West Virginia stolen ride. And get you a disguise. There are pictures of you and that truck all over the APB’s that the Feds sent out.”
Jake moseyed down the trail back to the old Chevy truck as the malodor from the draggerfire filled the dusk Pennsylvania daybreak. He removed the branches from the top of the pickup and fired the vehicle up. He then drove in a northeasterly direction.
Jake was overwhelmed with relief. He felt very thankful that he had not stuck with his plan to make a run for it when he had the chance.
Chapter Twenty-One - The Organ G
rinders
I20, Texarkana - the Texas/ Arkansas border
The majestic magenta hue of Texarkana’s celestial sphere simmered just above the glowing Avalanche dashboard. Mack guided the SUV eastbound along Interstate 20. Roscoe took advantage of the unoccupied back seat as he lay sprawled out, sleeping and snoring soundly. He was benefiting from this much needed rest because he was still recuperating from his lack of nourishment during his confinement.
Duy rode shotgun. He busily and with aggression was working on sharpening the blade of his newly acquired survival hatchet. He was cutting into a gray rectangular knife sharpening stone, turning the axe edge into a razor-sharp tool. When he was finished, this weapon would be able to slice and dice with the precision of a surgical scalpel.
Mack glanced to his right. He noticed that Duy seemed to be highly agitated and fuming. “Dude, you okay?” Mack asked. “You look pissed off.”
“I’ve just been thinking about the way the whole Roscoe rescue went down. It’s all my fault that Dave got hurt.”
“How can you blame yourself for that? You and I were the ones who got his ass out of there,” Mack said.
“I know, but we never should have gotten Dave involved. He’s not in great physical shape. We made him think the mission would besimple, with no risk of harm or danger.”
“You can’t worry about stuff like that, Duy. None of us saw that coming. But the important thing we got from that experience was that none of us gave up. We had each other’s backs, and we will never go into another situation thinking that it will be easy. We all became stronger as a result.”
Duy had taken a brief reprieve from the blade-sharpening as he thought about the words he had just uttered. The conversation now over, the Vietnam native resumed the procedure.
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