Dead Life (Book 4) (10 page)

              “I'll hurry her up. Go downstairs and make sure we have all our gear together. We'll be right down. Don't go out there by yourself though.”

              “You don't have to worry about that,” he said as he left the room.

              Lily was out of the shower and getting dressed when I went to get her. I sat down on the bed and put my shoes on while I told her about the situation outside. We grabbed our bags and hurried down the stairs. John was standing at the door giving both of us a dirty look. He opened the door and we headed out. Running down the road was a man being chased by a small group of zombies. I say small but only in comparison to the horde that had gone through here last night. There had to be over a hundred. Only seven of them were runners and they were right on his tail. The rest were zombies stumbling along and weren't an immediate threat.

              “That would be Edgar,” Lily said.

              “How do you know that?” John asked.

              “There's family pictures all over the house,” she answered.

              “Go back in and get his pack,” John said. “We'll take care of his friends.”

              Lily ran back into the house to get his gear while John and I ran out to meet Edgar. As we got closer John yelled for him to head for the car. He looked surprised but listened and veered away from the house. He was running toward the Kia when the runners reached us. John wielded his one iron and I attacked with my newly acquired hatchet. I hadn't had time to sharpen it but it was still an effective weapon. I dropped the first one by hitting it in the temple. I pulled the hatchet free and struck the next zombie on top of the head. It went down like a sack of bricks, the hatchet stuck firmly in it's head, pulling me with it on it's way to the ground. I had the presence of mind to release my grip on the handle so I wouldn't be pulled down on top of it but the next zombie was on me before I had a chance to react. It hit me on a dead run and we both went to the ground. Fortunately zombies don't seem to have much in the way of motor skills, even runners, and I was able to roll away from it before it was able to get a hold of me.

              John had already dropped two of them and was in the process of taking care of a third. The golf club was a good weapon but it seemed to take three or four good shots to crack the skull open enough to where there was sufficient damage done to the creature's brain. While John was putting the finishing touches on his third kill he was also being stalked by the last of the sprinters. It seemed to be aware of the damage John was able to inflict on the other three with the golf club and appeared to be standing back waiting for an opening. The zombie that I had rolled away from was struggling to get to it's feet so I rushed over and kicked it in the head with my steel toed army issue boots. This dropped it to the ground and I followed up with a few stomps to the head. When it's head finally split open I picked up a huge rock and moved towards the zombie stalking John. He was well aware of the one watching for an opening and gave the one he was dealing with a huge blow to the head, turning to face the stalker. There was only one problem; the head of his club had broken off. I stood behind the stalker and raised the rock over my head intent on crushing it's skull. John jabbed the broken end of the golf club through the zombie's eye socket, into it's brain, as I brought the rock down on top of it's skull.

              “I guess we killed him twice,” I said.

              “Let's get the fuck out of here,” John said, looking at the approaching mob.

Chapter 8

              I watched Al and Gina drive away, headed for the rally point. When they got to the top of the hill Al stopped and got out. I had my binoculars on them and I saw him with the radio. I figured he must have been calling Rick and Cindy telling them to get back. After a few seconds I could see Al and Gina were in a heated discussion. I watched as Gina climbed into the truck and after a moment she got back out. She had a piece of paper in her hand and held it up so I could see it. “Get ready” was all it said. They both got into the truck and started back towards the motel.

              There were already a few hundred zombies on the parking lot with more on the way. I didn't know what Al had in mind but I knew I would have to be prepared for anything. From what I saw through the binoculars I could tell something was wrong. I assumed there was a problem with Rick and Cindy and if that was the case Al would be wanting to get me out of here as quickly as possible.

              As the truck came on to the street in front of the motel I could see that Gina was driving and Al was up to something beside her in the cab. I had a feeling I knew what was about to happen so I stepped back into the doorway of the room directly behind me. Instead of pulling into the entrance to the motel Gina drove past. Al started lobbing grenades over the cab of the truck into the parking lot. I ducked down as the first explosion went off. I lost count of how many grenades went off in the few seconds it took them to drive past the motel but there were a lot, at least ten. Once World War Z stopped for a few seconds I went back out onto the walkway. I saw the truck head up a side street and could see between the buildings across from me that they were getting ready to make another run by the motel.

              Zombies lay everywhere below me. Most were still alive, or whatever it is zombies are, but were in pretty bad shape; arms and legs missing and massive bodily injuries abounded. God bless them though. They still did their best to get to their feet and resume looking up at me. Zombies are pretty single minded and unfortunately I was on most of their minds.

              Gina stopped the truck before pulling on to the street in front of the motel and I saw Al throw a rope over the cab of the truck. Gina reached out of her window and snagged the end pulling it through. I can't say I was too excited at the prospect of what was about to happen. Don't get me wrong I'm still in pretty good shape for a man in his forties and it really wasn't that far of a drop down to the truck from where I was. But I'm no stuntman, just a clerk in a grocery store. I could envision any number of things going wrong; up to and including bouncing off the truck into the jaws of the hundreds of hungry zombies just waiting for their next meal.

              Gina started the truck moving again. More zombies were coming into the area by now and the street leading to the motel was already full of dead bodies from our earlier shoot out. My point being Gina had to keep moving at a pretty steady pace or risk becoming stuck. The street was already slick with gore from their first pass and things weren't getting any better. The sides of the U-Haul were coated in the blackish blood of the already crushed zombies and with the increased speed Gina had to maintain to keep the truck moving the cab and windshield were becoming blood soaked also.

              Zombies exploded off the wooden “cow catcher” bumper that Al and I had put on the truck what seemed like a lifetime ago as the truck turned into the lot. I could see it wasn't a smooth ride for the two of them as they continuously bounced side to side as bodies were crushed non-stop beneath the wheels. I was worrying that they would get mired in the goo and the bodies when they stopped so I could jump on to the top of the truck when it dawned on me, they weren't stopping. I hurriedly started moving all the crap I carried around with me to the back of my body so as not to land on anything that would cause me bodily harm. The first thing I did was sling my rifle across my back. I would be jumping leading with the left side of my body. I carried my sword on the left so I did the best that I could to slide it around as far back on my belt as I could get it. My pistol wouldn't be a problem, I hoped, because it was on my right hip.

              I patted myself down to make sure everything was secure and looked up. Al had his window down and was hollering for me to jump. I saw he had a grenade in his hand and he looked like he was going to throw it at me. Then I remembered Gina's dad and Chong. I hadn't been able to get the fire started and it looked like Al was going to get the job done for me. The room they were in was two doors in front of me and I watched in horror as he threw the grenade through the open door. There was no turning back. I either jumped now or died in the explosion or the resulting fire.

              I climbed on to the railing as fast as I could and leaped for the truck as the cab went past me. I made a grab for the open vent on top of the truck and was able to get one arm around as I landed. The vent broke off and I started sliding for the edge. I felt the truck tilt the opposite way that I was sliding, I assumed it ran over a zombie, and scrambled back to the vent. I thrust one arm down into the now gaping hole and held on for dear life. Just then I heard an explosion and glanced back at the motel. Fire belched from the open doorway fifteen feet from where I had just been standing. I stuck my face down into the vent and yelled to Gina and Al that I had made it. I felt the truck accelerate and we pulled off of the lot. Gina drove past the front of the motel, back through the all the crushed bodies she had just finished driving over seconds before, and we headed in the direction Rick and Cindy had taken.

              There were zombies everywhere in the street. Gina kept going. There was no way she'd be able to stop anytime soon, allowing me a chance to get from the roof to the cab. I was getting ready to stick my face back into the vent, to ask them what their plan was when Al's head came through.

              “Why didn't you jump to the cab?”

              “Why didn't you slow down?”

              “Crawl your ass up there. I'll help you through the window.”

              “Take my gear before you go.”

              I handed what I could of my gear through the vent. The damn rucksack wouldn't fit so I shoved as much of it as I could down the hole, making sure it was wedged in pretty good, and started belly crawling to the front of the truck. When I got to the drop off to the cab I took a look around. There was still a shit load of zombies making their way back to the motel so I gave up on any ideas of trying to get Gina to stop. She was only going about five or ten miles an hour, just fast enough to keep us from being surrounded, but from where I was it seemed like we were going seventy miles an hour.

              By now Al was hanging out of the window waiting for me to jump down onto the cab.  He was looking back into the window saying something to Gina so I gave it a second, waiting for him to finish. I wanted his full attention when I jumped. The cab was covered in black goo from all the zombies they had run through trying to get me out of the motel and I was afraid I would slip when I jumped down. If I did slip I wanted Al ready to catch me because I planned on falling his way.

              “What the fuck are you waiting for?” Al shouted at me.

              I took this as my cue to go. I jumped from the box to the cab. Now understand, when I say I jumped that's not exactly how it went. I was sitting on the edge of the box with my feet dangling over the front. They were only about two feet from the cab and I really just sort of scooted my ass off of the box. My feet hit the top of the cab and flew out from under me. I landed on my ass and looked over at Al. He was trying to grab me with one hand while holding onto the mirror with the other. I grabbed for him as I slid down the front of the truck. He was too far away and I did the first thing I thought of which was roll onto my stomach. Of course I rolled away from Al instead of towards him. Covered  now in black zombie goo I slid down the front of the windshield blocking Gina's view of the road. She moved her head to one side, trying to see around me, and hit the brakes causing me to slide off of the windshield and onto the hood of the truck. I heard Al yell for her to “keep moving”. She started forward almost immediately, which probably stopped me from sliding all of the way off of the truck,  causing me to slide forward smashing my face into the windshield and all of that zombie blood.

              There was so much black shit on the glass in front of Gina that I couldn't see her through the windshield. I felt the truck shudder as we plowed through more of the undead that stood in the road before us. I let myself slide further down the hood and grasped the metal frame just under the windshield. Al yelled to me to try to work over to his side of the truck. I looked over and he was still sitting on the sill of the door holding the mirror motioning for me to come his way. He leaned into the truck, said something to Gina, and the windshield wipers came to life smearing the black goo across the glass. Washer fluid sprayed from between my out stretched arm and eventually I was able to see inside the truck again.

              Working my way across the hood I was able to reach Al. He grabbed hold of my sleeve, pulled me his way and I was finally able to work my way onto the running board. From there it was an easy process to pull myself through the window into the cab of the truck.

              “Could you have fucked that up any worse?” Al asked.

              “It wouldn't have been easy but if I would have tried a little harder, probably.' I said. “What's going on with Cindy and Rick?”

              “They're not answering their radio,” Gina said, glancing in my direction. “You smell like shit.”

              I looked down at my clothes. “That's because I'm covered in it.”

              “Crawl into the back and change. If there isn't any of your clothes back there wear something of mine.”

              “Thanks Al.”

              I pulled the drapes back and crawled over the back of the seat into the back of the truck. Even though we'd rigged lighting for the box it was still pretty dark in back. I was able to find something to wear that had been thrown into a pile of dirty clothes in a corner. I grabbed my gear and got re-outfitted as best I could. My rucksack was still stuck in the vent so I grabbed another and filled it with some already loaded magazines. I stuck my head through the opening into the cab and started to climb back through.

              “Before you come back up here hand me a towel or something. I need to wipe some of this crap  off the seat,” Al said. “Get some of those loaded magazines while you're at it.”

              “Already filled a bag,” I said and handed the towel through to Al.

              After he wiped off the seat I climbed into the cab and looked out the windshield. The road in front of us was clear. The zombies that had been everywhere earlier were now gone.

              “How long has the road been clear?”

              “Just happened,” Gina said. “Why's that Al?”

              Al pointed off to the side of the road. “That's why.”

              The Hummer was off to the side of the road lying on it's side up against a tree surrounded by about fifty zombies.

                            “Gina, pull up closer. Steve, hand out those magazines,” Al said. “That's close enough.”

                            Everyone got out of the truck. I checked to make sure I had a full magazine in my rifle and got myself locked and loaded. Honestly I don't know what that means. I heard it in a movie. The three of us walked up on the accident scene. Chances were good that someone was still alive in there. Otherwise the horde surrounding the Hummer would have most likely lost interest by now. As it was they were fighting for position in the front of the Hummer, trying to get at the windshield which was partially blocked by a small tree. Out of the corner of my eye I saw Al bring his rifle up and knew it was time to open fire.

                                          Gina and I stopped and started shooting. Al kept walking towards the accident, fanning out to the right and firing nonstop as he moved forward. Within a few moments he was on top of the sight and Gina and I had to stop shooting. By this time only the zombies trying to get at the windshield were left. Al walked up behind the group and calmly shot each of them. As Gina and I worked our way over to the Hummer we checked each of the bodies to make sure they were all dead for good. A few needed head shots to finish them off but since Al had shot the majority of the zombies most of them were already dead.

                                          “Rick's in here. Look's like he's been shot,” Al said as we approached the wreck.

                                          “Is Cindy okay?” Gina asked.

                                          “She's not in there,” Al answered.

                                          “What about Rick? How bad is he hurt?” I asked.

                                          “I don't know. Gina watch our perimeter. Steve help me get him out of there.”

                                          Gina backed away and I stepped over a few bodies so I could get closer to the Hummer. Al looked around on the ground, I assumed for a rock or something to break the windshield with. He finally just used the butt of his rifle to break the glass. It took several good hits to get the windshield loose enough to pull out. The air bags had deployed so we did our best to maneuver around them as we pulled Rick from the wreckage. His right ear looked like it had either been shot off or torn off in the accident. I couldn't tell which. Rick didn't have his seat belt on so he had probably been thrown around pretty good when they had crashed. We drug him away from the Hummer and all the dead zombies and laid him out on the ground to check him for injuries. I was checking his arms and legs when I was startled by the sound of gunshots.