Dead Ahead (14 page)

Caleb suddenly noticed Brandon and Frank stood beside him.

“What do you think happened?” Brandon asked.

“Looks like this place was cleansed.” answered frank.

“The question is, when?” Caleb said, “I don’t think we should stick around to find out! Let’s find what we need and get the fuck out of here.”

“Amen to that.” Frank said before he darted off out in front, his army boots making their trade mark racket on the pavement as he exited the green, Caleb followed a little more stealthily, closely ghosted by the boy. They were no longer taking a leisurely stroll through the town, each of them were taking turns to check over their shoulders. The quietness of the town had taken on a sinister air and Caleb couldn’t shake the feeling that he was being watched.

They caught up with Frank at a large wooden shed by the lakes edge; he was staring out at the boats in the water again.

“I don’t see any boats in shore, plenty of trailers over there though.”

Frank was right, all the boats were out in the lake, and there was nothing by the slipway. “I think you may be right,” Caleb looked to Frank, “How are you at swimming?”

“That can’t be right....” the boy whispered.

“What’s that son?”

“How did they get to the boats? The people who own the boats, they didn’t swim!”

“He’s right, you know?” Caleb said, “Let’s try some of these sheds.”

The large wooden shed provided a veritable treasure trove of sailing paraphernalia, fishing rods, anchors, ropes, a deflated dingy, various oars and a single man kayak. They decided to take some rope and three aluminium oars as they were good and light. A small discussion was had over the kayak, but it was agreed that it would leave the person in the kayak to open to being seen by the infected and therefore create a large gathering on the river banks. What they were in need of was a craft to fit all three of them comfortably laid down, covered by some plastic sheeting.

Their search continued to the next few large sheds. In one they found an old rusted tractor; in the next they found a large rigid hulled inflatable boat which unfortunately was far too big for their needs.

The last shed in the row looked as if a bomb had hit it; the walls looked like they were ready to fall in on them as they opened the small side door. Dust floated through the beams of light shining through the dirty windows as they entered.

“Doesn’t look like there are any boats in here....” Frank said turning around.

“Hang on a minute....” Said Caleb as he pushed himself between an old engine and a stack of bowed timber. He picked his way carefully through the shed, being sure not to knock anything over in case it sent it all tumbling down on top of him. He made it to what looked like a large white drum which was rounded on the top and bottom. He brushed the dust off of it to reveal the words he hoped to see
:
Inflatable Life Craf
t
.

“It’s pretty heavy; I don’t know how we will get it over all this crap!”

“What is it?” Brandon asked.

“It’s a life raft, the sort they have on passenger ferries, but smaller.”

“Nice,” said Frank, “it’s closer to the front doors. I will see if I can get them open.”

A moment passed before Caleb heard the double doors rattling in their frames as Frank tried to open them, “They’re locked.” Caleb heard faintly from the other side, “Oh, hang on.” Frank continued. Another moment passed before a great booming came from the doors, sending even more dust falling from the rafters and scaring the shit out of Caleb.

“What the fuck?”

“It’s not locked anymore.” Frank said as he opened one of the doors and tried to wave away the dust motes that drifted out of the shed to greet him. “What you been doing in here?” Frank coughed.

Caleb looked at him, plain faced, “Just give me a hand with this would you?” he said.

They both clumsily grabbed the white barrel; it was a very awkward shape, probably not meant to be carried about. They took it out of the shed and sat it on the ground. Frank reached for the pull chord on the side of it.

“Whoa there cowboy...! Don’t pull that...! We don’t want it inflating till we get to the river!”

“But how do we know if it works or not? It says here that it went out of date three years ago!”

“I’m sure it works fine. These things last for years, even if they do have an expiration date. It’s not like we are going to be adrift out in the ocean on it for weeks. We only need it for a day at most.”

“Hmm.... I suppose....” Frank’s hand still lingered a little too suspiciously close to the pull chord for Caleb’s liking.

“Now all we need is a truck.” Brandon said, breaking the slight tension.

Frank did his signature ‘look to the heavens’ and said, “Right you are.” then disappeared round the side of the shed.

Caleb looked to the boy with an expression as if to say ‘crazy bastard’ but found the boy looking back at him with the same expression. They shared a rare smile with each other before following Frank.

A hail of bullets hammered into the side of the shed as Caleb and the boy rounded the corner. Frank had been jumped by a single infected that was latched onto his back sending him spinning in circles firing his rifle. Caleb pushed the boy back behind the shed and dropped his Naginata to the ground. He leapt at Frank, pushing the rifle away from him, swept a leg behind him and dropped them to the ground. Caleb grabbed Frank by the hair with one hand and pulled his head out of the way of the Infected’s snapping teeth, with the other hand he pulled out his machete and hacked into its head.

The Infected flopped lifelessly to the ground, releasing Frank from its grip. Caleb released Frank’s hair from his grip in turn and Frank rolled away from the corpse.

“Bloody hell...!” Frank said, “I knew I kept you around for a reason.” Frank smiled at Caleb who was just realising that life may have been easier if he had killed them both. Caleb shook off the thought. That wasn’t who he was; he was a protector, not a killer.

“You really need to work on your hand to hand combat, Frank. Those guns will only get you so far.” Before Frank could respond Caleb took the conversation on a new tack. “We had better find transport quick. If there are any more of them in the area they will be headed this way.”

Brandon was already by Caleb’s side, holding the Naginata, when he turned away from Frank. Caleb took the Naginata from the boy, he didn’t even realise he had given it to him; he should really show him how to use that thing. The boy’s wild swinging with it in the field was useful for clearing crops, but not great for killing infected.

In his other hand, Brandon had a large green petrol can.

“Where did you get that?”

“It was in the shed. I thought it might come in handy.”

“Is it full?”

“Yeah. But I don’t know what’s in it.”

Caleb opened the can and gave it a good sniff, diesel, the can wasn’t as dusty as the other things in the shed so he figured that it couldn’t have been in there too long.

“Nice one, Brand...! Now all we need is a motor. Leave the can with the life raft and the paddles, and let’s take a look.”

It didn’t take long for them to stumble across the petrol station. Outside at the pumps sat a black Mitsubishi warrior four by four; it looked like a standard four by four jacked up on steroids; parts of the chrome bumpers glinted in the bright sunshine despite the blood splatters that had collected on them and over the black paintwork, twin spots on the front and a quad of spots sat on the top. As they rounded the truck at a distance; they could see that the driver’s door was open, they got further round to see that the petrol pump nozzle was still in the side of the truck.

“If the petrol cap is open then the keys must be round here somewhere,” Caleb whispered, as if the trucks owner would hear him, “Hopefully they filled her up for us.”

Caleb led as they snuck their way round the back of the truck; there was a set of hedge cutters laying nearby which were covered in what looked to be blood and lumps of meat, there was a large dark patch on the ground next to the truck.

He gave the petrol pump trigger a hopeful squeeze but to no avail; they had all stopped working when the electricity went out. Caleb hung up the handle and looked around for the keys; they all looked for the keys, but found nothing but a tattooed, gold sovereign ring clad, disembodied arm under the back of the truck.

“Damn it! This would have been perfect,” Caleb said, “I guess we keep looking, we are bound to find something else that will do.” He tried to sound convincing for the boy, but he wasn’t so sure himself.

Caleb was so intent on finding the keys to the truck he hadn’t noticed the mass of Husks slowly dragging their feet towards them; luckily there didn’t seem to be any infected amongst them.

“Uh, guys? I think we had better get out of here!” Caleb said.

Frank turned to see what Caleb was talking about, and then turned to look at him with a smile on his face.

“Frank....”

He cocked the rifle.

“....Don’t do it....”

He raised it to his shoulder.

“....there’s too many....”

Caleb’s last words were lost in the relentless gunfire as Frank marched towards the shambling Husks. Caleb hefted his Naginata. It was too late now; more husks had circled around the petrol station from the other side, cutting off their escape.

“Stay close!” he said to the boy.

____________________________

Brandon’s dad burst into his dance with the blade, Brandon tried to dance along.
HHHHHhhHh
His dad always told him to stay close. But how close could you really keep to someone who was weaving their body around a constantly spinning blade? Brandon tried to keep up. The truth was; he was terrified, he could still feel the husk latched onto his neck from the day before; still feel the withered old fingers digging into his flesh. He could feel himself backing away from the chaos unfolding in front of him.

Brandon kept backing away till his back hit the petrol pumps; his knuckles turning white on the handle of the axe. He could feel himself shaking. Adrenaline willed him forward, fear held him back.

Fear won.

Brandon closed his eyes and felt tears roll down his face. His eyes, however, couldn’t stay closed for long. He heard a great tramping noise getting louder and louder in his ears and was forced to open his eyes.

The tramping noise turned out to be a great bulk of a man lumbering towards him. He was huge, at least six foot, his open red checked shirt exposed the gaping wound where the zombies had feasted on what was once his profound beer belly; his left arm was missing, it must have been the one they had found under the truck, the right arm was held down by his side and in his hand he held something, Brandon couldn’t quite make it out.

He lumbered closer. The terror in Brandon rose as he pushed his back harder against the petrol pump; he edged to the side and quickly fell between the two pumps. The big man fell with him, wedging himself between the pumps just inches away from Brandon’s face. Brandon could feel it’s stank breath on his cheeks and scrambled away as the saliva dripped from its mouth towards his chest. The zombie reached towards Brandon with its only arm and he saw what was in its hand.

The keys! The fat zombie had its finger stuck through a key ring with a petrol cap hanging off the end of the key, it had to be the one, it
had
to be!

Brandon swiped at the hand with his axe but it shot back to the zombie’s side. He tried again as it reached to him but the same thing happened. The fat zombie was slowly sliding down between the pumps closer to the ground. Brandon ran round the pump and jumped on its back, pinning it to the floor, he swung the axe hard down onto its arm and severed the hand.

He grabbed the hand and it grabbed him back, Brandon threw it to the ground in fright; but instead of landing where he threw it, it zipped back to its owner’s hip. It seemed to have stopped twitching so he grabbed it again and ran for the truck, He didn’t get far though, suddenly it pulled back towards its owner, sending Brandon into a near back flip, and the hand went scuttling back across the ground to the big zombie, who was writhing in between the pumps, and landed neatly on his hip again. Brandon scrabbled back to the hand on the fat bastard’s hip to inspect it more closely. Upon inspection he found that the key fob had a retractable chord which was strapped to his belt. Brandon drew out the chord and smashed his axe head into the concrete, severing it in two. He grabbed the keys, hand and all, and rushed for the truck.

He slammed the door behind him and fumbled with the keys trying to get the key out of the petrol cap, the hand; still stuck through the key ring making it more awkward than it should have been. With a ‘click’ the key turned and came out. Desperate, Brandon put the key in the ignition and turned.

It started!

Bounced forward and cut out!

Shit!
Brandon grabbed the gear stick and shifted it till it wobbled freely.
That should do!
He turned the key again. It started and ticked over this time. He tried to press the accelerator but it was too far away, ‘
Of course it was; the guy was six foot!’
He fumbled for the seat adjustor and shot himself hard against the steering wheel and back again till he got it right.