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Riposte (The Redivivus Trilogy Book 2)

Page 35

by Kirk Withrow


  From behind him, Kate let out a sharp gasp. Whirling around, John saw Kate and Reams staring at over twenty revs eagerly stumbling toward them.

  Even though most of the CDC’s buildings lay to the right of their position, they turned left in hopes of outpacing the approaching horde. What they saw when the path curved around made their hearts drop. Directly ahead of them was a far more formidable barricade, besieged by an even larger horde numbering in the hundreds. The mass of infected was such that even pressed against the concrete wall, they extended out far enough to block the path to the right. Once again turning left, the path led them to a wide expanse that was once a common area for the campus—its well-manicured planters replaced by a sea of carnage. While there were revs scattered throughout the innumerable dead, they were far fewer in number than either other option they had.

  “Decisions, decisions,” John said, in an attempt to lighten the mood and dispel his own rising trepidation.

  26

  October 25, 2015

  “Ice, can you see what’s got the crowd so stirred up?” Garza asked. The crowd he referred to was the horde of infected perpetually plastered against the concrete barricade surrounding the only remaining CDC buildings that had not been overrun or otherwise destroyed. Staring through a pair of binoculars, Ice shook his head without taking the optics away from his eyes.

  Given that Garza was an active duty member of the U.S. military, he fell in line with the rest of the men under Lt. Weaver’s command when he arrived at the CDC. Despite the fact that General Montes had no authority over Lt. Weaver or any of the other soldiers, they all respected the veteran Brazilian officer and treated him almost like one of their own commanding officers. For her part, Lin had completely immersed herself in the task of advancing Dr. Bank’s research. Anthony and Charon were given a loose leash and allowed to do as they pleased, provided they stayed out of the way, inside the wall, and out of trouble. Everyone at the facility found the boy and his dog to be a welcomed addition, reminding each of them of a small part of the lives they used to have.

  Ice and Garza were on perimeter patrol until nightfall, at which time another group would rotate on. Despite having been fully assimilated into the group of soldiers, Garza had yet to learn Ice’s real name. All he knew about the man was that he was quiet, well respected by the other soldiers, and he loved to blow things up. Not only was demolition his specialty, it was his obsession. It was rumored that he had been on the bomb squad but quit when he discovered that his desire to detonate far surpassed his desire to defuse.

  As was typical, the patrol detail that day consisted primarily of walking, watching, and listening to the incessant moans of the infected crowd. A few hours into the shift, however, Garza noticed a change in both the volume and quality of their sounds. They seemed agitated, and Garza had a brief flashback to when they were surrounded outside the barricade just before Mother’s men opened fire on the monsters a few weeks ago.

  After completing his scan of the area, Ice turned to Garza, and said, “All I saw was the same old rotten shit I see every time I’m on patrol. The crowd may have shifted a little—probably just chasing after a squirrel. You know how they are. Why do you ask? Did you see something?”

  “No, they just sound excited,” Garza said.

  “Excited? Those shitheads don’t get excited. They don’t get anything,” Ice said.

  Knowing that visualization of the area immediately adjacent to the wall was limited from Ice’s position, Garza said, “I’m gonna head up to obs and make sure I don’t see anything from there.”

  As soon as he reached the elevated platform of the nearby observation tower, Garza saw the cause of their agitation. Three survivors, two men and a woman, were weaving through the rotting cesspool that was the former commons between the main buildings of the CDC campus. Although he had not been there at the time, Garza knew it had been the scene of a fierce battle early in the course of the outbreak; the innumerable decaying corpses littering the grounds served as a testament to that fact. Most, if not all of the infected, were shifting their attention toward the fleeing survivors. “Ice! There are survivors inside the fence! We need to help them!” Garza yelled.

  Ice looked up at him, and said coldly, “L.T. gave us strict orders not to risk anyone for any civilians dumb enough to wander in here.”

  “I have eyes on three—a big guy, another of average size, and a woman. The crowd has spotted them and is in pursuit,” Garza stated urgently as though he had not heard Ice’s reply.

  “Well then, there’s not much we can do for them, is there?” Ice stated matter-of-factly.

  Like a matchstick igniting, Garza’s anger flared and he wheeled on the soldier. He thought about his own decision to help General Montes get Dr. San to this facility. He had not done so because he was bound by any order to do so. He did it because it was the right thing to do. Garza knew when he shook Montes’ hand and agreed to help that he had a good chance of dying because of his decision, yet he did it anyway. When he could no longer see the backs of the fleeing survivors beyond the wall of infected chasing after them, Garza made up his mind once again.

  Climbing down, he said, “Screw that, Ice! That’s cowardly bullshit! We’ve got about a dozen people here out of this whole damn city of millions, and I’m not gonna let three more die without trying to do something about it.”

  Garza pushed past the other soldier, moving in the direction of the survivors. Expecting Ice to give him some rhetoric about following orders, Garza was surprised when Ice said, “Okay. What’s the plan?”

  * * *

  On the far side of the common area, a heavy metal ramp extended from the ground up to an elevated walkway that wound back toward the barricade encircling the centrally located buildings. “John, head for that ramp! Maybe there’s a way out up there,” Reams said breathlessly.

  A thin film of moisture on the ramp in combination with their muddy, gore-caked boots made their footing precarious, forcing them to ascend on all fours. Upon reaching the top of the ramp, they turned right, hoping to find a way around the north side of the wall. As they ran, John racked his brain for a way out of the nightmare they had stumbled into.

  Fortunately, the ramp proved to be an even bigger encumbrance for the infected. They simply lacked the coordination and agility to deal with the slick surface. Like a row of dominoes, when the first one fell, many others followed suit. Eventually, a few of the infected successfully reached the top of the ramp by climbing over their fallen brethren, forced upward by others eager to follow their lead. Those that remained on the ground tracked the survivors as they ran back toward the barricade. The revs pressed against the stone wall supporting the elevated sidewalk, continuously clawing to get to the trio that was hopelessly out of reach.

  The walkway came to a dead end at the former northwest corner of the barricade. Having sustained extensive damage during the fighting in the early days of the outbreak, the northern wall of the barricade had been breached and deemed unsalvageable. As such, a new one was erected roughly thirty feet inside the original. Although the number of infected on the opposite side of the section of wall directly ahead of them was far less than on the ground of the commons below, the fact that there were any was unknown to the three survivors as they approached.

  Winded, Garza reached the northwest corner just as the horde of infected began to pile up outside the barricade. He climbed onto the wall and stared down into the seething mass, hundreds of vacant eyes staring back at him. His hopes fell when he did not see the survivors, and he assumed the worst. Fearing he was too late, Garza began to descend from the tower when a woman’s voice called out:

  “Hey, is anybody there? Over here! Help us!”

  Leaping back onto the platform, Garza scanned the area, not realizing where the voice came from until the woman called out a second time. Originally, he had planned to lower a rope for the three survivors, but he had not anticipated them heading up the ramp. If he were to drop the rope from his cu
rrent position, it would land uselessly in the midst of the horde amassed in the common area. With the new wall set inside the original, he simply could not get close enough to drop the rope straight down to the three survivors huddled on the elevated walkway. As he tried to think of a new plan, Garza’s face went pale when he saw that nearly twenty infected had made it up the ramp and were closing in on the cornered survivors.

  “Think, Garza, think,” he said quietly. At once an idea came to him, and he called to Ice who had just reached the base of the wall. “Ice, fire up the distraction.”

  “Garz, helping these folks out against orders is one thing, but Mother will be supremely pissed if we make all that noise—especially when he finds out why we’re doing it. Besides, we don’t even know who these guys are. What if they’re like, serial killers, or some shit? You never know,” Ice said.

  Garza fixed him with an intense stare that said you do it or I will. Realizing that Garza’s mind was set, and that they were likely already screwed either way, Ice replied, “Okay…but don’t think I won’t tell him you made me do it.”

  Garza gave him an appreciative look and nodded before turning back to the survivors. With the band of infected getting closer, they pressed back against the wall, and Garza could no longer see them. “I’m going to lower a rope. Get ready to move south along the wall when you see the crowd start to move away. We’re going to distract them. Stay out of sight until then. Watch out for the group of infected heading down the path in your direction,” Garza called over the wall. Hearing no reply, he hoped they heard and understood him.

  Below, Reams said, “Did he say move south? Doesn’t he see the twenty-foot drop into a pile of revs standing in a cesspool of rotting corpses? I, for one, don’t feel much like crowd-surfing in that mosh pit.”

  “I got nothing else,” John said with despair in his voice. “Let’s hope he knows what he’s doing, but just in case, be ready to fight through those revs heading toward us.”

  Reams and Kate nodded reluctantly.

  All of a sudden, a surreal and eerie sound rent the air, drowning out that of the infected mass. Echoing between the buildings, the haunting sound of an old banjo was soon joined by a lonesome voice that called to mind a ghostly breeze whistling through a hangman’s noose. Much like the sound of the revs earlier, the disorienting music reverberated such that it was difficult to determine its point of origin, causing something akin to confusion amongst many of the infected. Some simply stopped moving while others changed directions all together. When a rapid, multicolored barrage of extremely bright light began pulsing near the southwest corner of the barricade, the closest of the infected took notice immediately and shambled in its direction.

  O, Death

  O, Death

  Won’t you spare me over till another year

  What is this that I can see

  With icy hands takin’ hold of me

  I am death and none can tell

  I open the door to heaven and hell

  Garza was transfixed by the sight of over one hundred infected being drawn away by the light and sound show Ice was putting on. He was left seeing spots when he accidentally looked at the light generator for a split second. Many of the infected atop the walkway also found the powerful stimuli overwhelming, causing them to walk blindly over the edge in an attempt to reach the source. Unfortunately, the lead revs already had their infected brains set on the three survivors, and no amount of distraction was going to interfere with their reptilian instincts.

  I’m death come to take your soul

  Leave the body and leave it cold

  To drop the flesh off of the frame

  The earth and worms both have a claim

  O, Death

  O, Death

  With a look of bewilderment in his eyes, John said, “I’ll be damned. I never dreamed I would be saved by Dock Boggs.”

  Looking even more confused, Reams replied, “What? Who the hell is that? You know that guy?”

  “The music—never mind. The light and sound is drawing the revs away,” John said in a hopeful tone.

  “And the guy on top of the wall has a rope in hand,” Kate added.

  Looking over the edge, Reams said, “We’re not really going to jump down there, are we?”

  “Do you have a better idea?” John asked, as he pointed to the ten or so revs still approaching.

  “Shit,” Reams said, realizing there was nothing else to say on the matter.

  “I’ll jump down first. You lower Kate as far as you can, then drop her to me,” John said to Reams.

  “Oh, you guys are so sweet,” Kate said, her words drenched in sarcasm.

  “Who’s going to catch me?” Reams asked.

  The way he said it, John was unsure if he was joking. “I got you big guy,” John replied with a shit-eating grin that ensured Reams he was on his own.

  Once again, Reams said the only thing that fit. “Shit!”

  * * *

  Reams landed with a hard thud, and his feet seemed to sink a foot into the boggy field of death before his body pitched forward. He rolled to dissipate the momentum, and the muddy gore sloshed onto his neck before sliding down his back. The odor combined with the tickle of the rancid fluid running across his skin caused a shiver to rack his entire body. It felt as though one of the infected was lightly stroking his skin, and he had to fight the urge to run screaming as he clawed at his back. Leaping to his feet, Reams said, “Shit!”

  “You keep saying that. I’m sure they’ve got a bathroom inside,” John said.

  “Smart-ass white boy,” Reams muttered under his breath.

  “There’s the Reams I know and love. I knew you were in there, buddy,” John added.

  Just then, a thick rope thudded against the barricade. Kate gave it a tug and found it was secure. With the rope in hand, she smiled at them. They were surprised by the renewed look of hope that neither had seen nor felt in a long time. It was contagious, and they felt their own spirits lift.

  To John, her expression was proof they had finally made it. In her simple smile, he saw hope for the future they were fighting for, and in that instant, he thought it possible to find closure and keep hope alive at the same time. He realized that he, like Kate, had made hope dependent on the presence of a single thing, rather than viewing it like a state of mind. That was the flaw in his line of thinking. Hope was far bigger than any one thing, no matter how significant that thing was to a person. He wondered if Kate had that same realization, or if perhaps she had known all along.

  A nervous excitement passed through John and Reams as Kate disappeared over the top of the wall. “You’re next old buddy,” John said, slapping Reams on the shoulder.

  “No way I’m leaving you down here. Anyway, I’d probably just have to come and get you like last time,” Reams replied.

  Despite the rib, John heard the sincerity in his voice. “I insist. Besides, what could possibly happen, right?” John said, knowing Reams’ loosely held belief that their real-life apocalyptic nightmare was bound by the same dogma prescribed by Hollywood.

  “Now why would you say some stupid shit like that? You know every time someone says…” Reams began, but was cut off mid-sentence.

  “Dude, seriously. Climb. Dock Boggs isn’t going to hold their attention forever,” John stated with an air of finality.

  Less than a minute later, John was on top of the wall and dropping down next to Reams and Kate inside the barricade.

  A Hispanic soldier stood on an elevated platform and pulled the rope up as soon as they were all inside. A moment later, he and another soldier approached them. Although they were both armed, neither had their weapons trained on them. When the soldiers grew close, Kate spoke. “Thank you so much. I’m not sure what we would have done if you two hadn’t been there to help us.”

  Garza opened his mouth to reply, but the loud bang of a door being thrown open behind them stopped him short. “What in the Holy Hell is going on out here!? Which one of you two dips
hits turned on the distraction without authorization?” Lt. Weaver bellowed. Several other soldiers followed closely on his heels.

  “Great, L.T. himself. Told you it was a bad idea,” Ice muttered under his breath.

  Lt. Weaver continued his tirade as he stormed toward Ice and Garza. He had not yet noticed the three newcomers who stood just outside his line of sight, almost wishing they could head back over the wall to face the infected horde rather than find out what this fuming bull had in store for them. “Had to be you, Garza, because Ice would have just blown the damn thing up! I can’t leave a one of you ass clowns alone for five seconds without you—”

  “JOHN!” cried a voice from behind the screaming officer. From a distance, the female voice was just loud enough to be heard over the irate lieutenant, though no one standing near the barricade could make out what she said.

  John caught sight of the movement and looked in its direction. Recognizing her immediately, he stepped forward, no longer concerned about the soldiers, the officer, or even the infected. Racing toward him with her white lab coat fluttering in the air like an angel’s wings was his longtime friend, Dr. Lin San. Without a thought, John ran to meet her.

  Having risked their lives to ensure her safety, John’s sudden movement toward Lin garnered the attention of both Garza and General Montes. While neither was particularly close to Lin, they both rushed to intercept the advancing man all the same. Everyone else stood stock still, confused by the events unfolding around them. As John was closer and had a small head start, he reached Lin first, and they collided in a strong embrace.

 

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