Howell brought up the shotgun just as the zombie leapt on him, driving him to the floor. He kept its snapping jaws from his face. Jen pulled her axe and swung, cleaving its head just above an ear.
She pushed it to the side and gave Howell a hand up. "I owe you one," he said.
A squad of armed soldiers burst into the chow hall and took down several zombies.
"Get out of here," Howell said.
"Call Cartwright," Jen said. "Tell her Butler plans to attack Washington."
Howell waved her off. "Go."
Jen dashed to the idling truck a few yards outside the door. Zeke held the door open and she dove in. Zeke landed on her a second later. The vehicle took off, the force of it closing the door.
Jen pushed on Zeke. "Want to give me some space?"
Zeke took a seat and helped Jen up.
The truck sped toward the flight line. "Where are we going?" Jen asked.
Mark glanced at her. "Our plane. We're getting the hell out of here."
The sun peeked over the horizon, bathing the base in light and shadows. Mark drove the truck to the flight line and steered it toward the northeast end, where they'd left the plane.
As they got closer, a dozen blue and red flashing lights showed up behind them. "Shit," Mark said. "We've got half the base chasing us."
Jen pointed ahead. "Then there's the other half." Another eight sets of lights approached them from ahead.
"Where the hell do we go?" Mark asked.
"Ram the front gate," Zeke said.
Mark turned the wheel and the truck careened across the runway. "We'll never make it that far."
"What about the opening in the unfinished wall?" Jen said.
"But aren't there fences there to keep zombies out?" Mark asked.
"You got a better idea?"
Sirens blared from behind them. Jen looked back. Two pickup trucks and a Humvee raced after them. The Humvee had a gunner. "They've got a machine gun on that Humvee."
Mark glanced in the mirror. "M-60. It could be a lot worse. Could be a .50 cal."
"Right," Jen said. "So I die from a big bullet up my ass instead of a huge bullet up my ass. Sounds like a deal."
They hit the grass on the other side of the runway and bounced toward the wall opening. The construction crews still had lights on the wall and their equipment in action. Jen checked their pursuers. Not falling back, but not getting closer.
Mark jerked the steering wheel to weave between a front-end loader and a dump truck. He pulled it back to avoid a group of workers, then straightened it out. "They won't shoot with all these construction workers around."
He pointed through the windshield. "Look at the fence. See the opening for the first fence on the far left? We go in there, hang a right, and the second fence's opening is about seventy-five percent of the way across. It's like a maze."
"I'll trust you," Jen said. "But I say we just ram through it."
The truck rattled over the uneven ground. "Here we go." Mark hit the brakes and slowed to a crawl, then made a hard right turn. The engine roared as he accelerated, then slowed and made a left before speeding up again.
The M60 on the Humvee opened up.
"Hold on," Mark said. "One more to go."
Bullets sang as they passed over the truck. Mark slammed on the brakes for the last opening and took the turn, ripping the passenger's side-view mirror off on the gate. The back window shattered and he floored the accelerator, breaking out into clear, flat land.
Jen and Zeke bumped fists. "We made it," Zeke said.
"Don't celebrate yet," Jen said. "We escaped Butler only to end up in a zombie war zone."
23
The truck bounced over the uneven ground. Mark could barely keep the wheel straight. He steered for a road several yards away, where the truck jumped the curb and the ride smoothed out. "Damn," Jen said. "My ass is going to hurt for the next week."
Mark steered around an abandoned vehicle. "So what the hell did you find out? What's Butler up to that's so dangerous?"
"I'm not sure you'll believe me."
Zeke settled back into the seat. "I'd believe you if you told me Butler was going to raise Godzilla from the sea."
Snickering, Jen said, "Thanks. But it's not that far off."
Zeke straightened.
"Just tell us," Mark said. "After all we've been through and the crazy shit we've seen, I'm not sure more crazy shit wouldn't make sense."
"Morgan has been experimenting on zombies." Jen cleared her throat. "Butler wants to build himself an undead army that he commands to march on Washington, D.C., and take over the government."
Mark raised an eyebrow. "Based on the way you've acted since you found that out, I'm guessing you think that's possible."
"I saw it with my own eyes. They tapped our last conversation with Cartwright and heard our observations about the leaders. The plan is to control the leaders, which allows them to control the drones."
Zeke sat up. "I saw a movie like that. They put collars on them and made them do stuff."
"They have a helmet," Jen said. "It's like a bike helmet. They put it on the leader and they hit a remote control button that hurts the zombie. I've never seen one cringe before."
"A zombie in pain?" Mark asked. "How?"
"Morgan said the helmet emits localized EMP waves or something like that," Jen said. "But the bottom line is he can get the leader to do what he wants, and he says the leader can control ten thousand drones."
Mark whistled. "We need to find a way to call Cartwright."
Jen frowned. A dozen zombies stumbled around at the intersection ahead. Beyond it lay a subdivision. "We're the only ones who can prevent Butler's plans. It'll be too late for anyone else to act."
Mark swerved around two zombies. Another ran at the truck and bounced off the bumper. "I still think we should try to get word to Cartwright."
"Why not do both?" Zeke said. "Contact her, then go kick Butler's ass. I'm up for that."
"What do you say?" Mark asked.
Jen shrugged. "OK. We try one place to see if we can call out. But it's got to be somewhere we can hide for now. Tonight, we go after Butler, no matter if we've contacted Cartwright or not."
"OK," Mark said. "We want to find a place that's likely to have a generator and some other form of communication, like a radio."
Zeke held up a walkie-talkie. "Here's a radio."
"Need a stronger one than that to reach Atlanta," Jen said.
They'd arrived at Route 902, and Mark stopped at the intersection. "Which direction?"
A sign ahead told them to go left for Spokane and right for Medical Lake. Mark jabbed a finger at the sign. "There's a good place. A hospital. Bet we find a generator and radio there."
Jen squinted. A smaller sign below the other one said Eastern Hospital and had an arrow that pointed right. "Good idea. A hospital should be defensible and have some food."
Mark turned onto Route 902 and followed the signs. As they passed Lefevre Street, Jen pointed past him. "Look."
A thousand or more zombies milled around in front of a school two blocks down. A sign for the high school stood on the corner. "I've had enough of high schools," Jen said.
Mark laughed. "That was pretty intense."
"What?" Zeke asked.
"In Anchorage," Jen said. "When you were babysitting Trip and his gang. We had to lose a mega horde by driving through a high school."
"Damn," Zeke said. "I missed some fun stuff."
They came to the intersection of North Howard Street. A sign for Eastern Hospital pointed them to the left. Mark followed the road down to a lake.
Jen pointed across the lake. "I'll bet that's the hospital."
A long multistoried brown building, partially hidden by trees, stood atop a small hill.
Mark rubbed the stubble on his chin. "Looks a bit institutional. Even for a hospital."
He turned onto the road and followed it around the lake and up a gradual slope through the trees. It
led to a series of buildings, the largest being the brown one they'd spotted across the lake. "Eastern State Hospital" was engraved over the main doorway. Most of the buildings were brick, and it looked like one of those places you'd see the ghost chaser shows on TV investigate.
Zeke smiled. "Pretty creepy place."
"I don't think this is your typical hospital." Mark pointed to a fenced-in area. "That looks like some kind of recreation area."
"Are they trying to keep people out, or in?" Jen asked.
Mark pulled into a parking lot. "If nothing else, it's huge and Butler would have a hard time finding us here."
He parked between a green-and-tan jeep and a shiny black minivan. "No zombies so far."
He turned off the truck and hopped out. "But there's a lot of room inside that building to hold them. Don't get complacent."
Jen climbed out of the truck and checked her weapons' loads. She switched out magazines on her pistol and shoved it back in the holster.
"Can I get some help?" Zeke pulled two stuffed backpacks from the back seat.
"What are those?" Jen asked.
Zeke plopped them down on the asphalt. "Goodie bags. This is where I got the radio. They've got extra ammo and food and shit." He jerked a thumb to the canopy on the back of the truck. "I looked back there and found a few more."
Mark unzipped one and rifled through the contents. "Nice. We'll have to thank Howell for this."
"We should move with the bare essentials for now," Jen said. "We can lock the truck and this stuff'll be here when we want it."
Zeke and Mark tossed the packs back in and locked the doors. Jen crossed to the nearest building entrance, two tall doors in an imposing entryway. She waited for Mark and Zeke to catch up, then pressed the old-style thumb latch and pulled the door open.
Light spilled into the entry way, across a dirty tile floor. A flight of stairs with an old-fashioned scrolled railing led to a landing and another flight of steps. The hallway extended into the gloom on either side.
A counter that reminded Jen of a hotel reception desk in old Westerns stood off to the side. Jen ducked behind it, shining her light on the paperwork sitting on a shelf. She picked some up. One was a doctor's note on a patient. Next to diagnosis, it said Paranoid Schizophrenia.
Jen straightened and laid the papers on the counter. "I know why this place looks so creepy and unhospital-like."
Zeke slid his katana from the sheath strapped to his back and faced the darkness of the corridor on their left.
"You see something?" Mark asked.
"Not sure," Zeke said. "Maybe."
Jen cleared her throat and Mark turned toward her. "This is a mental hospital," she said.
Zeke put a hand up. "Listen."
Jen strained to hear anything from the hallways. The stairs. She shook her head. "Don't hear anything in here."
Zeke raced to the door. "Not in here. Out there."
Jen and Mark joined him at the door. The unmistakable thup thup of helicopter rotors came closer. Jen pulled the door closed, plunging the lobby into darkness. Each of them turned on a flashlight.
"Think they're looking for us?" she asked.
Mark grunted. "I never heard of them coming this way before. Always to Spokane. And since we escaped heading south, I think it's a good bet they aren't just sightseeing."
The muffled sound of the rotors got louder. Are they going to land here?
Jen cracked the door open. The helicopter hovered above a small building a couple hundred yards away. "Why would they think we're here? Are they checking out the whole town?"
The helicopter rose and flew over them toward the lake and the town. Jen opened both doors and set the doorstop. "At least this will give us a little light in here. Let's check this place out. Medical or mental hospital, they could both have a generator and maybe a radio."
She pulled out her axe. "I'll take lead."
"I've got rear." Zeke took a couple of practice swings with his katana.
Jen led them to the right, the lights from her beam and Mark's tracing across the walls and floor. The first door on their right stood open. Standing back from it, she shined her beam inside. Desks, chairs, and computers. Nothing looked disturbed.
Moving on, they cleared all the first floor rooms on that side of the building, ending up in a small break room with soda and snack machines. Jen plopped down on a chair. "It'd take us a couple of days to clear this whole damn building. We don't have that kind of time."
Mark bit his lip. "Agreed. Although I don't like it, we'll have to take more of a risk."
He shined his light on the snack machine. "Potato chips. I could use a few of those." He swung the beam to the soda machine. "And a cola. Even warm, it'd hit the spot."
Zeke pointed to a high energy drink. "I down those things like water when I'm in an all-nighter RPG binge with my friends."
"RPG?" Mark said. "Is that like your FPS?"
Jen groaned. "Let's get back to business. There's no power, so the machines won't work."
"I'm sure your axe could shatter the glass," Mark said. "Then we can take what we want."
"Are you nuts? That racket would bring every zombie hiding in this wing."
Mark smiled. "Exactly. Flush them out at one time. Like you said, we don't have time to go door to door."
Why didn't I think of that?
"Stand back." Jen stood in front of the snack machine and cocked the axe back. One, two, three. She swung the blade, shattering the glass into big chunks that fell away. She repeated her actions on the soda machine.
Mark ran to the doorway and cocked his head. "We've got company. And a lot of it."
24
Mark eased the door closed and Jen pushed the fallen soda machine toward it. Zeke and Mark helped and they had it blocking the door in seconds.
Jen found a corner table and laid her weapons out on it. The footsteps seemed like they were everywhere—in the hall, the floor above, and on the other side of the walls behind her. It was like the building was infested with big-ass mice.
Zeke and Mark joined her in the corner. Mark knelt and had his rife to his shoulder. Zeke took a defensive stance and had his katana ready to taste zombie blood.
The stampede continued and gave no signs of stopping. Jen's watch told her it'd been ten minutes. Are they just running around in circles out there?
One of them ran into the door every minute or so. It would rattle and Jen would aim at it, but no effort was made to breach the room. The zombies had no idea they were there.
Thirty minutes passed, and Zeke and Mark sat down, deciding the risk of attack was low. Even at rest, though, they kept their weapons close and were ready to jump into action.
Jen leaned against the wall, the vibrations helping her keep track of the zombies' tempo. It seemed to her it had slowed a bit.
She stood, and Mark and Zeke looked at her, Mark with his trademark one eyebrow raised, and Zeke with his smirk and curious eyes.
Jen crept to the window and peeked through the blinds. A number of the zombies had made it outside, where some continued to run as if they chased something, and others had slowed and wandered.
She went back to the table. "It's slowing," she whispered. "It reminds me of when you disturb a wasp's nest. They'll go batshit for a while, then calm down."
She leaned against the wall. The vibrations had died to where she could make out individual footsteps. She closed her eyes and concentrated. Another one dropped out. And another.
Five minutes later, one set of footsteps was all that remained.
"It's pretty much done," she whispered.
Mark kept his voice low. "That's all well and good, but how many are just standing around in the hallway, ready to sound the alarm?"
Zeke stood. "With no window on the door, there's only one way to tell."
Jen snuck to the window and scanned the road and parking lot. Damn. "All the ones that were out here a while ago are gone."
Mark joined her. "If your analo
gy of the wasp's nest is right, then they're all back in here." He sighed. "This building won't work. Too many."
Jen raised the blinds and pointed across the road to a smaller one-story building. "How about that?"
"Easier to clear and control," Mark said.
Zeke opened the window and hopped onto the grass beneath it. He crouched, his hand on the katana's handle, and scanned the area. "All clear."
Jen crawled through the window and walked with him to the smaller building's door. A plaque next to it read "Auxiliary Supply."
She turned the knob and pulled the door open, rearing the axe over her shoulder.
Mark rushed in and shined his flashlight beam to the left, while Zeke pointed his to the right.
Boxes and office furniture lined the walls. "Guess this is their equivalent to a junk drawer," Jen said. She walked past Zeke and pointed her beam at a closed wooden door painted institutional green.
"Might as well start here." She turned the knob and cracked the door open, shining the light through the slit opening.
"More damn furniture." The beam caught a desk with a cushy faux leather chair behind it. Nothing moved, so she pushed the door wider and played the beam over the room. A couple of desks, computers, and phones gathered dust, while stacks of paper flowed from inboxes and a sorry-looking coffee maker sat on a counter next to a sink. "That's got to be one of the dreariest things I've ever seen," Jen said.
Zeke pushed past her. "I swore I'd never have a nine-to-five desk job. Now you know why."
Mark sat in the plushy chair, leaned back, and rested his feet on the desk. "I don't know. Doesn't feel too bad to me."
Jen and Zeke laughed. Nice to see Mark let his hair down for once.
A bump came from the far wall. All the light beams shined on it. Nothing but a short bookcase.
The bump sounded again. "Guess we have a wasp's nest here, too," Mark said.
"Can't be as many," Zeke said. "This place wouldn't hold them."
Jen had her ear pressed to the wall. "More than one. They're in the next room."
She crept into the hallway and to the next door down. The damn things bumped against the door, rattling it in its frame.
The Zombie Uprising Series: Books One Through Five Page 39