Rise (5 page)

The rifle was hers, she said, not Ken's, and she said she's a competition sharpshooter, and told us she has about 500 rounds left in her pack as well as a gun cleaning kit and personal stuff. She saw us drive by on the main road, and figured that we might be her last chance, since she was out of water and food and she wanted her son to have a chance. So she started shooting to get our attention. It worked. By the time she was done Michael had finished his meal and was asleep. We drove in silence for a while, until I found a minivan on the mountain road that looked abandoned. I stopped and explained we were going to try to siphon whatever gas was in the tank to top up our fuel. Jess got out with us, and held her rifle ready as we scanned the surroundings. Trees, rocks, and pavement, with a side of abandoned van. No undead in sight, so I moved over to the van and popped the gas cap. We got about 20 liters out of the van, enough that the Explorer needle showed somewhat less under full.

We drove until we reached a sign that said "Sicamous 2.5 km", and stopped at the roadside turnout there. We had a spectacular view of the mountains there, and I could see a train tunnel in the mountain opposite.

The next morning we all had a pleasant breakfast. Darren seemed a little amused when Michael went and sat on his lap and took some of his food. We all chatted and shared our experiences, but the telling didn't get us down like I expected. It seemed to be a bit of a relief to get it all out.

Jessica is an interesting woman. She's practical, level headed, and way better with a gun than any of us are. She's offered to show us all how to shoot properly, and we are going to take her up on it.

We have decided we need another vehicle. The Explorer has a serious oil leak now, and I worry about the gas it uses. So we are going to try to find some vehicles with a lower gas mileage, preferably two so we can carry anyone else we might meet as well.

So we rolled into Sicamous. The town was a nightmare. From where we sat in the Explorer we could see nearly a hundred of the undead, several burned vehicles and buildings, trash all over the streets, and what appeared to be at least a dozen corpses, the really dead kind, scattered about the area. And that's just what we could see
from right there
. The scattered zombies were walking or stumbling towards us, and the smell preceded them. There was no way in hell I was going in there, so I backed away and turned around. We drove back until we found a logging road we had passed, and pulled in there.

We had a look at a map of the various towns in the area that we took from the gift shop in the pass. There was only one road over the Shuswap Lake, the Trans-Canada. But there were several ways to get to the bridge, so we decided that we'd take one of those. By this time the undead were sure to be thick on the road into town, so we decided to be stealthy. To a point. We returned with grim determination to get through to the bridge, and right before the long downhill slope into the main town, I took a left turn along a residential road. The population of undead was much lower here, and we were able to drive around them quite easily. Not a shot was fired, though Sarah, Darren, and Jess were all ready to if needed. We made it several blocks, turning towards the lake often, following the map. The town we passed through was desolate, completely overrun, and in ruins. None of us spoke as we drove. We were focused only on getting through. We found the last turn before the bridge, and turned onto it, but it seemed our luck was dipping a little low now. The end of the street was completely blocked by an overturned semi trailer and a huge tank of fuel or milk or something, and there was clearly no way through. There were three undead near enough to reach the truck, a male wearing a Grateful Dead t-shirt and missing his entire left arm, and two females, one in a sundress with lots of little holes torn in it like she'd climbed through barbwire, and another who was older, white haired, and nearly intact. All three of them managed to get to the truck before I reversed, and the look of frustration and confusion on their faces as we moved away from them was almost comical. I backed over another one that had gotten behind us, and we turned onto the street again. There were more of them closing on us now, probably about ten or so. I accelerated away, turning between a few of them and then around a burned out car.

Ahead I could see the water of the lake, and the end of the road. I hastily pulled a U-turn and sped back the way we had come, but instead of turning back down the blocked street I took the alleyway. This led us straight to the end of the street, and we could see the embankment for the bridge ahead of us. Three more walking dead blocked our way and lurched forward. I gunned the motor, and we hit them. One bounced away and went under my tires; another actually went over the hood, windshield, and roof, leaving greasy red smears on the glass. The third bounced back and hit a fence, then fell forward and I think hit his head rather solidly on the side of the Explorer. We turned and got up the embankment, and turned again to go over the bridge. The bridge itself was abandoned, no corpses were walking there, but there were more than fifteen cars and trucks scattered about. We passed one that had a zombie strapped into the seatbelt in the passenger side. It looked at us and waved its arms as we drove by. After that, we passed through the rest of the town without a hitch.

By dusk we were at a rest stop near Salmon Arm. We stopped to check out a Honda Civic that was parked there, and finding nobody around we broke into it and popped the gas tank. It was only half full, so we didn't get that much. The view here is spectacular, and we were planning to stay a day to rest but decided to move on in case the hordes of former Sicamous citizens were still after us. We drove on into the night.

Salmon Arm was as bad as Revelstoke and Sicamous. We went around it rather than through. The only worries are that we are low on gas, and running out of food. We are going to raid the next grocery store we see, if it can be done safely. We haven't been traveling very fast, just cruising along at about 50 kph or so. Every town we approach is a new source of danger. Plus we take plenty of rest stops when we think it's safe, since Michael can't take being strapped into a seat for the 12 hours a day we often drive.

We are near Kamloops, but we are afraid that we'll find it in even worse condition than the other towns. I remember from a previous trip that there is a gas station/grocery about 20 minutes outside the city. We plan to stop there tomorrow and see what we can grab. Tonight, and for the last several nights, we are staying at a rundown campground, mercifully off the main highway, that has lots of firewood, a nearby creek, and seclusion. We found an abandoned Toyota Rav4, with a third of a tank in it, and the keys! We have taken this to be our second car, and Sarah is driving it, with Darren along with her to ride shotgun, so to speak. It is getting darker. I need to recharge the laptop batteries tomorrow, so I had better remember to plug in the solar charger in the morning.

We smelled smoke earlier yesterday. We had been having a lunch of canned fruit, instant coffee we had heated over a small single burner propane stove, and some canned oysters and crackers. All the perishables in the grocery store we raided a few days ago were spoiled, so we left them and took whatever canned or packaged goods we could. Several bags of pasta, some sauces, and a large bag of powdered milk were our chief discoveries, and the instant coffee and tea bags were very welcome too. So we were eating, and all of us smelled wood smoke. We saw that the haze, somewhat more orange than usual today, was worse, and the smoke was definitely thick now. It seems there was a nearby forest fire burning, and it had started to blow this way.

We hadn't gone near Kamloops yet, just into a few houses and a grocery store. We saw a few undead, and avoided them easily, except for one that was locked inside the freezer at the grocery store. That one we had to kill. We managed to load up the vehicles with gas, oil, and a tire repair kit, as well as some food and water.

Now we smelled smoke. We had a look outside the house we had commandeered, and I could see smoke in the trees and a glimmer of fire in the brush down the hill. We grabbed what we could, which was easy, as we left the vehicles stocked and ready, and took off down the hill. By the time we got down to the highway we could see thick smoke and flames marching slowly down the mountainside. We got out of there just in time. The entire mountainside from the tree line down to the house we just left was burning. For once we were more afraid of something in nature than we were of the undead hordes. Smoke and fire could kill us far more easily than we might be able to imagine.

So we were about 6 km from Kamloops, running from the fire, when the Explorer suddenly lost power. The electronics shut off, the power steering went away, and the engine just stopped. As I was trying to steer us to a stop I spotted three of the walking dead a few hundred yards away. They were just noticing us, and starting towards us. Around us it was the highway, low mountains, and a few abandoned cars.

Jess stepped out of the vehicle, brought her rifle around, and leaned across the hood of the Explorer to take aim. Three quick shots later and the three walking dead had joined the really dead. The sound of the shots was very loud, and I could hear it echoing like thunder. Sarah pulled up in the Rav4, and we quickly transferred Michael and as much food and supplies as we could. Jess and I climbed in, and I looked back as we left the Explorer behind. As I was looking at it, I saw movement behind it and out of the brush came an even dozen of the undead. As we drove away they started pursuing, some of them tripping in the ditch, others lurching along at a steady pace. They couldn't catch us, and we left them far behind quickly. Just a few minutes after that we saw the sign for Kamloops, and kept going. We saw many vehicles on the road here, and several corpses lying about, and in a nearby field we saw a few of the walkers, who, like their fellows behind us, started towards the vehicle as we passed.

We passed a strip mall on the left, many houses, and a gas station or two, but nothing we saw made us want to stop. The Trans-Canada here was fairly clear, and we only had to divert around a few vehicles here and there. As we drove up the hill to the area where the Coquihalla split from the Trans-Canada more wrecked or abandoned vehicles dotted the roadway. I spotted a few undead in some of them, still strapped in by seatbelts, or trapped by closed windows. I wondered how long they would last that way. Some of them looked pretty ripe by now too.

The city itself looked bad. There were enormous sections that had burned, and there was still smoke rising in a few places. It would only get worse when the forest fire we had run from arrived.

We drove through without seeing any survivors, just a few more of those things. They would pursue us for a while, then stop or wander off when we were too far away. We pulled off the road into a huge gas/diner/store complex at the west edge of Kamloops right before the toll highway began. There were at least 20 vehicles parked in the lot, so we thought we'd have a good chance at getting a vehicle there. In the parking lot there were also several bodies, or body parts, lying near the front doors of the store. None moved or moaned as we approached. The stench was overpowering for a few moments when we opened the doors. Darren and I pulled our shirts up over our noses, and cautiously approached the storefront, covered by Sarah and Jess with the rifles. I had the Glock, and Darren had my baseball bat. The doors didn't open at our approach, the power having been off for weeks by now. We pried them open after taking a look inside, and forced our way in. Inside was chaos…it looked like several survivors had holed up here for a while, and then abandoned the place. We could see barricades that were neatly set aside and also several corpses with massive head wounds in front of the nearest barricade. I called out, just in case there was anyone else here, but there was no answer. The place had also been picked clean of food and water, but there were several month-old magazines, newspapers (headline from
Vancouver
Sun
:
The Dead Walk
), and many books left here, as well as cheap novelty toys, and some clothes, the souvenir sweaters common in Banff or Jasper or here. I took several of those for Jess, and Michael when I spotted a kids size.

Next we moved outside to examine the cars. Darren and I walked the lines of cars looking for a decent vehicle that wasn't trashed or rusted out. Darren called to me, and I went over to a blue Honda Odyssey that had keys left in the door with what looked like a note. Darren looked at it, and then handed it to me. It read:
“Gas tank full. Water and food for 3 in back. We left this in case more survivors showed up. On our way to Prince George. Good luck. Rodney Grant + 3, June17/04."

I was amazed. We used the keys to open the back, and sure enough there was canned food and a few cases of bottled water, three blankets, and a Gerry can. I went up to the driver’s side and climbed in, and grinned when the engine turned over. Full tank of gas too. Thanks to Mr. Grant we now had more than enough room for all of us and our supplies. I was about to move the van to the front door by where the ladies were waiting when I heard a shot. I looked up and saw a zombie fall over not 15 meters from Darren, who was standing just outside my door. Jess waved for us to hurry. Darren climbed in the passenger seat, and as we drove out of there I spotted another five of the undead approaching. Jess shot the lead one of that group as well, and then we drove both vehicles away from there. The van was larger and more comfortable than I was used to. It had seating for at least seven, and ample room for storage. It felt different than the Explorer, but it was a nice ride. We drove until we got back on the Trans-Canada leading west, then took the turn off for Prince George. Trees and scrub lined the low hills here, and sandy patches of ground were visible as well. I remembered there was a desert here, between the mountain ranges. Ninety minutes later we stopped at a small motel (the kind with single bungalows instead of a large building), and after checking it all out completely (Darren and Sarah and I checking rooms, Jess covering us from a distance) we decided it was safe enough for a few nights and stopped there.