Generation Dead (Book 3): Beyond The Gates (3 page)

Chapter 6

They came out of the car wash at a decent clip.  The dark old zombie was moving pretty good on legs that must have been mostly intact.  His hair was gone, and his clothes were nearly completely rotted away.  All he had on were tattered jeans that had gaping holes in them from thigh to ankle, and a shirt that was torn away on one side, revealing dark grey skin underneath.  His face was nasty, though, with nearly all of the skin from his cheeks and chin ripped off. It was as if the top half of his head was fine, then it went completely skeletal.  I had seen some rough zombies in my time, but this guy was running to the front of the line.

The other zombie was a woman, and she was in much better shape. Her color was mostly white, but bloodstains covered her legs and hands.  If I had to guess, she lay down somewhere, and the old guy got her legs first, biting her hands when she tried to fight him off.  Her black clothing was torn around her legs, revealing deep bites and tears.  Not a nice way to go.  Her face was clear, though, and it was easy to see she had been pretty when she was alive.  Now she was dead and coming after me, which made her ugly as hell in my book.  Her speed was better than the old guy, so she was going to have to be put down first.  As she advanced, I saw what made me want to let the two of them out.  Pinned to the shoulder of her shirt was a small piece of paper.

I hadn’t seen that sort of thing before, and I didn’t have time to figure it out right now.  I backed up and put a fuel pump between myself and her.  She was making good progress, but she was single focused as zombies tended to be.  She kept her eyes on me and walked straight into the gap between the two pumps.  It was just large enough to let her in, but not large enough to let her through.  She bumped into the garbage can wedged in there, and with that distraction I slammed my ‘hawk into her head. She crumpled over the can and lay there, her arms dangling down.

I didn’t give her any thought as I turned to face the other zombie.  He was a bit trickier, since he had been cooking for a while.  When zombies age, they tend to evolve a bit, and even develop some problem solving skills.  We’d all seen their crude ambushes and ability to manipulate doorknobs and such, so I figured Smiley here was no ordinary ghoul. That didn’t change the fact that I was going to kill him permanently, it just encouraged a little more caution.

Smiley weaved around the pumps and walked towards me.  He kept his eyes on me, alternating looking at my face and my weapon.  That was new. I half wondered if he would duck if I swung at him, but I really didn’t care.  I waited until he got close, and I raised my weapon.  He looked up at it and missed the foot I planted in his chest, shoving him backwards and onto the ground.  His head smacked against the little concrete island that held the pumps, and that stunned him just long enough to let me bury the spike end of my tomahawk in his forehead.  His eyes rolled up and looked at it as he slumped back and died.

Wiping my blade off, I went back to the other island and retrieved the piece of paper pinned to the woman’s shirt.  I couldn’t figure an explanation for it being there, just that it was curious.  Opening it up, I could see it wasn’t paper at all, but a kind of thin cloth.  On it was written:

45-28-10

117-12-7

The numbers were neat and precise, like someone had taken great care to make sure they were legible and distinct. I had no idea what they meant or what they were for.  But somebody had thought them important enough to make sure they stood a chance of being found.

“What do you have there?”

I turned at the voice of my brother.  He was lounging by the road, and I was used to his sitting back and letting me deal with situations.  I knew he would have stepped in had he felt it necessary, but with just two zombies there wasn’t too much of a danger.  I would have done the same in his place.

“Just a small piece of paper with some numbers on it,’ I said, holding it up so he could see.

Jake perked up. “Really?  Let me see.”  I handed them over, and he looked at them quickly.  “Huh.  These are the same numbers that were on the piece of paper the girls found on the dead guy.”

It was my turn to perk up. “I’ll be damned.  Wonder what they mean?”  I said.

“Not sure.  But you know what dad says, ‘
Once a coincidence
…’”

I finished the sentence. “‘
Twice a pattern
.’ Yeah, something is weird, but we can’t figure it out unless we know what the numbers mean.”

“Let’s get back to the van,” Jake said.

“I’m glad you’re here,” I replied.

Jake looked at me funny.  I had never expressed any sort of sentiment like that before. “Why?” he asked cautiously.

“You can help me carry the gas cans,” I said.

Chapter 7

Back at the van the girls were waiting outside, taking in the sun and enjoying the air.  The two of them had their heads turned to the sky, and the gentle breeze blew back their long blonde hair in slow, easy caresses.  If I had a camera I would have taken a picture, but these two had the models I had seen in old books beat by a mile.

I lashed the cans to the top of the van and rummaged around until I found our kerosene sprayer.  I gave my tomahawk the once over and set it alight, getting a curious look from my wife.

“Who’d you kill?” she asked.

“Couple that were taking a bath in the car wash,” I said.

“Really?  How’d it go?” Kayla asked.

“Not so well.  They needed more soap.” I burned off the residual virus and put away the sprayer. “But I found something interesting.”

Jake took the cue and handed over the bit of cloth.  Kayla and Julia put their heads together and Kayla promptly yelled.

“Oh my god!  It’s the same as from the dead guy! What do you think it means?  Did you get it off a woman?  Was she dressed the same way?  Maybe it’s a combination.  Let me see again.”  Kayla looked at the numbers while the rest of us tried to recover from the question tornado.

Jake smiled and shook his head, getting into the van and starting it up.  I went inside and was followed by the girls.  I looked over Jake’s shoulder and told him to go to the gas station, since I had left our hose and siphon there.  We could fill the tank on the van before we continued our journey. 

As I filled the van, Julia looked over the maps I had found and plotted our next leg of the trip.  When I had secured the siphon and the hose, we headed west on 20 towards Casper, Wyoming.

While the miles rolled past and the sun climbed over its zenith, Julia and I looked over the maps and figured out where the heck we were going.  Jake and I wanted to see the mountains, and the president of the New United States had asked for an update on the country outside of the capital back in Illinois. We’d mapped out a good portion of the middle states, took stock of the condition of the people living where they were, and whether or not there were any credible threats to the country.  So far we hadn’t seen much of anything that was a threat, outside of a measles problem in Missouri, but that was winding itself down. There were the odd zombies that wandered off the city reservations we had kept them in, but nothing in any sort of numbers. By and large, people were getting themselves back on track to living normal lives before the zombies had come.  They would always be a threat, to be sure, and just a little extra caution was needed when travelling or going near areas known to be infested, but apart from that, a person could take comfort in being able to move about with relative safety.

By the time we reached I-26 the sun was well past evening, and the mountains helped hide the dwindling rays.  Jake was starting to keep his eyes on the lookout for some place to spend the night that wasn’t the van, and Julia helped out a little.

“Turn south at 319!” she called from behind a map.

“Any good reason?” Jake called back.

“Water and shelter,” Julia replied.

“Good enough.” 

I took a moment from buffing a rust spot out of my sword to see what she was looking at.  A thin line ran close to the highway which took us towards a small lake.  A river ran nearby, which we would cross more than once.

I felt the van turn as Jake took the heading, and after a few minutes it turned again.  I could hear the crunch of the gravel road beneath the tires, and I wondered where he was taking us.  A quick look out the front window told the tale.

Ahead of us was a small white house with a green roof.  It was surrounded by tall trees and a great deal of scrub brush.  Behind it was a another structure, a second home, by the looks of things.  I didn’t see any cars or any signs of life, so I was cautiously optimistic.

“Did the map show this was here?” I asked Julia as I put on my vest and checked the load in my handgun.  I slung the scabbard of my sword over my shoulder into its customary place on my back, and secured my knife and tomahawk.

Julia smiled.  “When was the last time a map showed where a house was?”

Good point.  I stepped out of the van and looked around.  The house was surrounded by tall weeds, and the shrubs that had once been tamed by trimming had asserted their independence. Looking at the gravel driveway, I couldn’t see any tracks which would indicate someone was using this place, so first thoughts were it was abandoned.

Jake and Kayla were next out of the van, and they split off to go check out the house.  I was more inclined to get a feel for where it was I was spending the night so as to not have any ugly surprises.  Once, when we were in Nebraska, we spent the night in a farmhouse that had an entire family of zombies hanging out in the basement.  We would never had known if Jake hadn’t tripped on a board and looked through the floor to find someone looking back up at him.

Julia came with me as I walked down the path that used to be the driveway.  The only thing that made it different was the grass was slightly shorter than the rest. Walking slowly so as to not make much noise, I reached the side of the house and looked in. 

“Anything?” Julia asked.  She was holding her spear and looking for all purposes like a Viking princess.

I shook my head and proceeded to the front door.  It was unlocked, and a quick shove of my foot opened it all the way.  I stepped back as stale air traded places with fresh air and waited for the exchange to finish.

I stepped into the house and immediately knew this had been a place where zombies had been.  The furniture was turned over, the interior doors were clawed and scratched, and there was a pile of dressers and mattresses blocking the stairway leading to the upstairs.  I gave Julia a look and pulled my blade.  Just because the zombies were not in front of us didn’t mean they were gone for good.  I didn’t want to use my gun because I didn’t know where Jake and Kayla were, and if they came looking for us I’d rather not greet them with a bullet.

I moved around the first floor, checking for trouble, and while doing so, I read the signs of the struggle of the people who lived here.  One of the downstairs windows was open to the porch, giving entry to the ghouls who circled outside.  The family threw furniture at them to slow them down while they grabbed what they could and headed upstairs. 

I didn’t see any skeletons, nor did I see any blood anywhere.  The debris at the stairs told me the zombies didn’t get up that way, so what happened here?  Something had to draw them out, leaving the family alone.

Julia pulled a dresser off the stairs and the heavy bureau crashed to the floor with a deep thud that shook the house. Two mattresses tumbled off easily, telling me that this barricade would have been a cakewalk for the zombies. This wasn’t a barricade.  It was just a delay.

I followed Julia up the stairs, distracting myself briefly with a long look at her lovely posterior. At the top we looked into each room and came to the same conclusion.

“Looks like they skipped,” Julia said, pointing to a rope tied to a door, leading out a window.

“I’d say that would explain why the zombies didn’t go up here,” I said.  “They just bought themselves enough time to get out.”

As we turned back down the stairs, I heard Julia say something quietly.

“Hope they made it.”

She had seen the kids’ rooms just like I had.  I hoped they made it as well.

Chapter 8

Back at the main house, we got back together with Jake and Kayla. They had searched this house top to bottom and had come up with a much different conclusion.

“This house had been abandoned years before the Upheaval,” Jake said.

I hadn’t expected that.  “Why?”

“The dust hasn’t been disturbed at all except for us,” Kayla said.  “And we found these.”  She held out several magazines, and all of them were dated years before the zombies walked.

Julia shrugged.  “Well, I guess we’ll camp here for the night.  Kayla and I will clean up a little while you to strong men get our gear.”  She reached up and gave me a lingering kiss, not allowing me to come up for air until she pulled away, looking at me with her deep blue eyes. “Okay?” she asked sweetly.

I was only good for a nod.

Jake grunted as he headed for the door.  “I never get asked like that…”

Kayla smiled.  “No, you get asked other ways, my love.”

Outside Jake and I pulled out the gear we would need for the night.  I dragged  out a camp stove and a supply of water while Jake pulled up the food and rummaged a bit.

It was when we came back to the van that we heard it.  Out of the west came a deep booming sound, rolling over the hills and rushing past our ears.  It was the sound of a heavy rifle, and we waited to hear if there were any more shots.  There weren’t.

Jake spoke first. “Thoughts?”

I shook my head.  “Just thinking about our friend in the hills.”

Jake nodded. “Wonder what the hell is going on?”

In answer there came a sound in the wind.  It was a low wailing, like someone was mourning the loss of a close friend.  It rose to high pitch, then nothing.  A second later, two short screams, then nothing.

Jake and I shared a look.  We reached into the van at the same time and brought out our heavy rifles.  I checked the load on my M1A, and Jake checked the magazine on his AR-10.  We used these for times when we might have a live fight on our hands.  We had found the hard-hitting .308 spoke volumes for getting peace out of our adversaries. In this case, we just wanted the firepower.

Jake also pulled out a small case and a slender tube. I smiled when I saw that.  Jake had gotten interested in archery while he was recovering, and he seemed to have a knack for it.  He hit everything he aimed at and found that he liked the recurve bows the best.  I had to admit, he was good with the thing, and the ability to kill at a distance silently was a huge advantage sometimes.  I didn’t know what Jake’s ultimate limit was, but I had seen him hit a baseball at seventy-five yards five times out of six.  The tube held his unstrung bow, and the case held his arrows. 

We walked back to the house, and when we were within five feet of the door we heard a different sound.  This one we had heard before, and anyone who had ever heard it and lived never forgot the sound.

It was the low moan of a zombie, rising to the hunt.

“Well, hell,” Jake said, getting his gear into the house. 

“Yep. Let’s get this one done.  Sounds like he’s close,” I said, dropping off the gear and my rifle.

“Who’s close?” Kayla asked.  She had a smudge of dirt on her chin, and her hair was pulled back into a ponytail.

“Zombie out there.  Sounds like he’s close.  Aaron and I will go get him,” Jake said, getting his weapons in place.  He left the rifle and bow but brought out his new melee weapon.  He had borrowed our dad’s old mini pickaxe, and the semi-retired zombie killer had found a new home.  Jake appreciated its heft, and had commented on more than one occasion that the thing just felt right when he killed a zombie with it.

Julia came into the room and saw we were preparing for war.  “Something I need to worry about?” she asked.

I shook my head.  “Keep your spear close, lights down low, wait for us. There might be others, and we may need someone to cover our retreat.”

With that we stepped outside into the growing darkness.  The sky was still light, but the shadows of the mountains were long and reached us well before sunset.  As such, it made seeing difficult because the eyes had to adjust between the dark ground and the light sky.  That worked in our favor, too, since zombies had the same problem. I pulled out a baseball cap to minimize the effect, and Jake did the same.  Pulled low over our eyes, it kept the light parts out, and we could keep our eyes adjusted to the darkness.

“Plan?” Jake said.

I thought for a minute.  “Let’s get to the road and see if we can’t get the thing to come to us. I don’t really like hunting in the dark.”

“Yeah, it kind of sucks,” Jake replied.

“Kind of?”

“Okay, seriously sucks rocks.  Satisfied?”

“Better.”

We walked out to the end of the driveway and looked up and down the road.  I couldn’t see anything, but that didn’t mean nothing was out there.  It was getting really dark, and the first stars were beginning to show through the curtain of night.  On the sides of the road, stretching away to the north and south, tall grasses swayed easily in the evening breeze.  We could smell the river from where we were, and if we listened carefully, there would be the occasional splash of a fish doing hunting of its own.

That wasn’t what I was listening for. I sorted out the night sounds and focused on the ones that shouldn’t be there.  The sliding of the grass, the slow tread through the weeds, the sniffing as the zombie tested the breeze, looking for prey.  I figured it was about fifteen yards to the west of us, and I decided to force the issue.  Placing my rifle on the ground, I drew my sword. The long blade shined pale in the starlight, reflecting the arm of the galaxy that was slowly becoming more visible as the night deepened.  I tapped the blade on the road and pinged a sound into the dark.

A groan answered my call, and there was a rustling in the grass to the west.  I tapped again and the groan repeated.  I was tempted to do it again when the zombie appeared.  It was right next to us, and I was facing the wrong way for a swing.  I twisted, but Jake got there first.  He stepped forward, swinging the pickaxe.  The hands of the zombie were nearly around Jake’s neck when the pick connected with its head.  There was a crack, and the ghoul dropped instantly.

“Nice work,” I said.

“Thanks,” Jake replied. “Let’s get a look at this guy.”

I flicked on my flashlight and took a look at our zombie.  It was a man about twenty-five years old, and he was wearing clothing similar to that found on the man on the hill. He had been shot in the back, but the bullet had gone through at an angle, tearing out a good chunk of the right side of his chest.  That would have killed him later, but not right away if he was strong enough. On his neck and arms were bite marks and a couple of spots where flesh was torn away.

Jake looked over the wounds.  “Aaron, this is bad,” he said.

“Why?” I really didn’t want to know, but here we were.

“These are little bite marks.”