Fade to Grey (Book 1): Fade to Grey (17 page)

We searched the next two sub-loops without any surprises,
found three more dead bodies in a large RV and another, apparently a suicide,
in the shower stall of an old Winnebago. All of the bodies we found except the
suicide were the same putty gray. None attacked us. Site number forty-six was
the furthest point down on Golden Eagle loop, and consequently had the best
view of Ghost Echo Lake. There was a late model yellow Volkswagen Bug outside a
twenty-four foot Gulfstream travel trailer. Parked next to the Bug was a dark
blue Nissan Xterra with rental plates. The Volkswagen had plates from Virginia.
Scott confirmed that we had no record of this site being occupied, so his dad
radioed it in and we started setting up. A few seconds later, Doc’s voice came
over the speaker, advising us to hold a minute. My team looked at me with some
curiosity but all I could do was shrug my shoulders. Doc said he was heading
our way on the golf cart, so we waited. A few minutes later he showed up and
said, “That one is locked. The keys for it are on the same ring as the ones for
my RV. No one should be in there, it’s been locked for, well, at least a few
days I think.” It was starting to get dark, and my mood was already frazzled
with all the searches I’d been through. It probably showed in my reply.

“Doc, is something going on here . . . somethin’ I should
know?”

“No, I just wanted to make sure that you . . .” he looked at
the RV for a moment . . . “had the right keys,” he finished slowly. I could
tell he wanted to say more, but I didn’t have the time to pull it out of him.

I motioned for him to back up out of my team’s way and we set
up. Mike walked up to the door of the Gulfstream and put the keys in the lock,
then cocked his head and slowly let go of the keys, backing away. He pointed to
his ear and then to the trailer. I motioned for everybody to retreat back to
the road. Doc was still standing there, a slightly puzzled look on his face.

“I thought you said no one was in there,” I said.

“There shouldn’t be . . .” His voice trailed off for a few
seconds and then a look of sudden recollection crossed onto his face. “Unless .
. .”

“Unless what?” I said.

He paused for a moment before replying. “A . . . man came
here a few days ago, that’s his Nissan . . . but he should’ve been gone.”

I dimmed my flashlight by twisting the lens cap; one of the
things I love about the Quark AA was its ability to have multiple intensities
selectable, from a level so low you could hardly see it all the way up to the
205 lumen, ultra-bright turbo mode.

“Just one person in there . . . you sure?” I asked.

In the muted light I could see a dark cloud pass over his
face before he answered quietly, “I hope.”

I stared hard at him for another moment, the faint
illumination from my light clearly showing his brow creased with worry. “Doc .
. .” I said, letting my unspoken question hang out there.

“Just do it,” he said softly.

I nodded and we set up around the Gulfstream. Radio chatter
indicated Michelle’s team had located another body, and Uncle Andy’s team
reported that they were finishing up with the last tent in the group camp area.
We had already checked the Bug and Xterra, but I quietly rechecked them just so
my team stayed on the same pattern. Mike moved back up to the door and got ready.
I looked around to verify everybody else was in position, nodded back to Mike,
who started the silent countdown again.

“Three . . . two . . . one . . .” Mike turned the key and started
to pull the latch when the door burst outward, catching Mike on the shoulder
and knocking him down. Mike struggled to regain his footing, but got tangled in
the rope and went down again. Leaping out of the Gulfstream was a snarling,
bearded man; my flashlight clearly showed his blood covered face and feral
yellow eyes. Yellow. Yellow?  With a surprisingly agile movement, he crouched
and shifted to my left, towards Mike, then reversed course and exploded at me. I
fired. So did Brenda. Three of the five shots I managed to get off hit him. Two
in the upper chest, and one that smashed through the orbital bone just inside
of his left eye. A lucky shot that saved my life. Brenda’s shot caught him on
the side of the ribcage. He crashed, skidding to a halt on the leaves in front
of me, his outstretched hands six inches from my boots.

“Good Lord above, what was that?” Dave said in his loud
baritone preacher’s voice.

I kept my gun trained on him as Mike untangled himself from
the rope. The yellow eyed  . . . monster? . . . thing? . . . zombie? I still
don’t know what to call them, was face down in the leaves. I could see the back
of his skull was missing, blown outward along with the pink mist of vaporized
brain cells that always accompany a headshot.

Dave repeated his question.

“I don’t know,” I said, “but I hope there’s no more of em’.”

Scott moved up for a closer look and said, “Did you see how
fast that thing moved?  It was like a freakin’ ninja. Damn . . .”

A stern look from his dad changed his vocabulary. “I mean
dang . . . and you were like freakin’ Clint Eastwood, all ‘boom-boom-boom’ . .
. holy s . . . um . . . I mean crap,” he finished.

I shook my head and snapped out of my self-induced stun. “Is
everybody OK? . . . nobody’s hit or hurt?” I asked.

More gunshots split the air—they were close—Michelle’s team. I
spun around and looked; their group was near the top of Blue Heron loop,
probably at one of their last sites. I could barely make out Michelle at this
distance, she was lit up by several different flashlights, standing in a
classic weaver stance, gun pointed towards the ground in front of her. She
looked OK, unhurt.

I forced myself to focus on our own situation and ask again
if everyone was OK. They were. I put a fresh magazine in my CZ, raised it up
along with my light, and said, “People, we’re not done here.” I indicated
toward the inside of the Gulfstream. We took up entry positions and I slowly
poked my head through the doorway, flooding the interior with brilliant white
light. Two short steps later I was standing inside, looking at the remains of a
large black man. He was dressed in what I would call the “I just bought these
from L.L. Bean” look. Everything he had on looked like it just came off the
rack, no wear or tear, no rips or stains . . . unless you counted the four quarts
of blood, torn flesh and entrails that decorated most of what was left of his
body. The rest of the RV was empty. I came back out and told Dave to call in
our status . . . “Total of two bodies, both deceased.”

Doc rushed up to me, “What other body?  What does it look
like?  Please . . . tell me!”

As I began to describe the body I watched his expression go
from a sense of fear to relief, and then through confusion, finally settling
back on worry. I started again to ask him what was wrong, but Mike said, “Here
comes your uncle’s team.”

I turned toward the road and saw that Uncle Andy’s team was
walking up toward us, their flashlights pointed right at us until a gruff voice
said, “Get yer’ damn lights out of their eyes, whatcha trying to do, blind
them?” I turned back just in time to see Doc hop on the golf cart and leave.

Both of our teams waited, watching as Michelle’s team
approached as well. When she arrived, I scanned both her and Uncle Andy with my
light, they looked OK. Physically anyhow, Michelle looked a little green around
the gills. It was now fully dark, the overcast sky deadening our vision even
further. Uncle Andy asked if I wanted him and his team to start at the top end
of the loop and work their way back towards us, just to make things go faster. I
thought about it for a minute, then told him to watch my team a few times first
to see how we do it with an RV. He thought that was a good idea. I asked if any
of my team needed a break or wanted to switch out, nobody did. Two people on
Michelle’s team and one on Uncle Andy’s asked if they could go back to the
soccer field. Having too many people crowd around a potential firefight zone
was inherently risky enough, so we thinned the herd and sent them back. The
rest of Michelle’s team was divided between mine and Uncle Andy’s teams. I gave
Michelle the choice of where she wanted to go. She hesitated for a moment and
then walked towards my uncle. My gut was telling me she didn’t want to appear
weak in front of me. If she only knew how much effort I was putting in just to
keep my own knees from shaking.

The next few sites all checked out normal, so we sent my
uncle’s team to start at the top of the loop and work his way back towards us. The
first RV they hit had two of the “red eyes” in it. I heard my shotgun
BOOM
several times, then silence. We waited a few minutes for the report.

It came through saying, “Two infected put down, four more
previously deceased found inside. Security team OK.” It was followed by the
site number and a brief description of the RV.

My team worked our way up the loop, finding several more
deceased bodies along the way. At site number sixty-one, we found a Travelite
motor home with two dead bodies in it, one male, one female. We also found two
live bodies, and I think I’ll have nightmares for the rest of my life because I
almost blew them away. They were kids. Two little curly-haired blond girls . .
. twins—about nine years old. They were hiding under blankets on the pull-out
bench, and when they heard my footsteps squeak on the floor, they flung the
cover off and bolted toward the back screaming. My heart was going about a mile
a minute and it took a bit for me to calm down enough to gather my senses. I
stepped back out and told my team what I saw, and was about to go back in when
Mike said, “How do you know they weren’t infected?”

Good question. I didn’t . . . and I really only got a brief
glimpse of them jumping up and running away from me. I remember praying as I
went back inside . . . “Please let them be OK.” I didn’t want to have to shoot
two kids. They had locked themselves in the back bedroom and wouldn’t answer
any of my questions. Nothing. Not a word from them. At that point I started to
think that they might be infected, and backed out again to reassess my
situation. Brenda asked what was wrong and I told her. She thought for a second
and then asked if she could try. I nodded and we rearranged ourselves, her
leading the way and me providing cover right behind her.

She walked up to the bedroom door—didn’t even knock—just said
in a quiet voice, “Hey girls, I’m Miss Brenda, the teacher at the school here. Your
mom and dad told me to come and make sure you’re OK. We’re getting ready to
have snack time, are you and your sister hungry?” Child psychology combined
with a woman’s voice.

There was a soft rustling sound from behind the door, then a
child’s voice asked, “What school?”

Brenda spent the next ten minutes or so talking through the
door to the girls. Ashley and Alicia, as it turns out. Eventually she got them
to open the door, and shortly after that we got them safely up to the soccer
field so medical could look at them. Quick thinking Dave had covered their
parents with a blanket. Thank God for answered prayers. The next several sites
were unoccupied. At campsite sixty-seven my flashlight batteries started to
fade away. That’s the one thing that you need to get used to if you run some of
the better LED lights. Most of them operate off a microchip-controlled power
circuit, which basically gives them a full output of light right up to the
point where the batteries are completely drained, then they drop off
significantly in a very short time. Not like the old lights that would
gradually dim as their batteries got weaker. I didn’t have any spares on me,
they were in my truck, so I radioed to see if anybody had any AA alkaline
batteries. Michelle said she did and would bring them to me.

Campsite sixty-eight had an old Chevy pickup with a camper
top on it, and a sixteen foot U-Haul trailer attached to the truck with what
looked like a home-made hitch. Parked in front of the Chevy, closer to the road,
was an equally old Pontiac Fiero. I saw Michelle’s light bobbing toward us as
she walked down the road. Twenty-five feet away from me she passed by the Fiero
and took a tumble, dropping her light and screaming. Several flashlights from
my team aimed towards her as I sprinted that direction, scooped up her rolling Maglite,
and shined it at the car. Michelle was kicking and screaming, her right leg
being pulled underneath the rear of the car as she tried to draw her Glock. I
grabbed her under the shoulders and heaved backwards for all I was worth. She
didn’t budge. I felt more hands wrap around her body and pull—Mike and Dave—she
started to move backwards.

“It’s pulling my boot off! . . . Eric . . . Help me!” she
screamed.

Brenda grabbed a hold of Michelle’s waist, dropping her
shotgun to do so.

We all felt a quick tug as whatever it was under the Fiero
pulled back. Hard. Michelle screamed again. I made a decision.

“On the count of three pull for all your worth,” I hissed
through clenched teeth. “One . . . two . . . THREE!” On three Dave, Mike, and
Brenda surged with everything they had as I let go of Michelle, drew my CZ and
wedged my head, gun, and Michelle’s Maglite underneath the low sports car. I
could see pasty gray hands clenched around Michelle’s half torn GORE-TEX work
boots. Behind the outstretched grasping hands I could only see shadows and
leaves. I emptied the magazine. Nineteen shots thundered in my ears, deafening
me. Half blinded by the muzzle flash, I kept firing until the hands were still.
I felt other hands on my legs and kicked at them until I realized who they were.
I let myself be helped up. Michelle was sitting down, trying to push away
people in order to get to me. She managed to get on one knee and was trying to
tell me something—I couldn’t hear her—my ears were still ringing and echoing. I
was close enough to read her lips though. “Are you OK?” she mouthed. I shook my
head yes. I could see the relief wash over her.