The Last Town (Book 4): Fighting the Dead (9 page)

“Grady turned into a zombie,” Victor blurted out.

“Damn, Vic, does liquor always work that quickly on you?” Norton asked, speaking for the first time since arriving.

Corbett looked past Victor at Estelle Garcia’s neat little house. In the flashing lights, he saw Mike Hailey and another officer standing by the open door that led into the house. Suzy Kuruk was there as well, panning the beam of her flashlight around the carport floor.

“Is he in the house?” he asked.

Victor nodded. “Yes.”

“Can you go back inside with me?”

“Yes.”

Santoro held up his hands. “Whoa, whoa, no one’s going inside,” he said. “It’s a murder scene under active investigation. We have to collect forensic evidence—”

“Oh, Wilbur. Shut the hell up,” Corbett said before he started walking up the short driveway.

###

The scene inside the little house was gruesome, but Corbett had seen much, much worse during his time in Vietnam. He was nevertheless saddened to see Chief Grady’s cooling corpse spread out across the kitchen floor, his face and skull severely disfigured from both a convict’s shotgun blast and a shot from one of his own officer’s pistol. There was not a great deal of blood, which to Corbett meant that the man had already been dead when the fatal shot had been delivered.

“Oh, wow.” Gary Norton’s voice was strangled, and when Corbett turned to him, he saw the producer’s tanned, handsome face was wrinkled in disgust and horror. “I mean ... Jesus.”

“You’ve never seen anyone killed before, Gary?” Corbett asked.

“Not like this. Not someone I actually knew.”

Corbett nodded. He noticed Danielle was hanging back in the carport, standing next to Suzy Kuruk. Danielle looked at the dead man sprawled across the bright linoleum tile floor, and there was a great sadness in her eyes. Corbett didn’t like that. He looked at the smaller woman beside her. Suzy Kuruk looked much the same way Danielle did, but she’d had the presence of mind to secure Grady’s pistol. She held it in her left hand, already ensconced in a plastic bag that Corbett surmised was for preserving evidence.

Inside the kitchen, an older cop Corbett didn’t know was photographing the body. Mike Hailey stood in the doorway that separated the kitchen from the living room, his eyes blank and emotionless. To Corbett, it looked like the boy was in shock. And he had every right to be—not only had he seen two zombies up close in just a few days, one of them had been his boss, and he’d had to put him down.

“Okay, we’re coming in,” Corbett said, looking at the older cop with the digital camera.

“Oh, gosh, you probably shouldn’t do that,” he said. His voice was high and reedy, and his big nose was covered with a spider web of veins that told Corbett the guy was a veteran boozer. He didn’t recognize him, though he appeared to be around Victor’s age.

“Who are you?” Corbett asked.

“John Lasher,” the man said. “Officer John Lasher.”

“Officer Lasher, I’m Barry Corbett. Are you from Single Tree, perhaps?”

“Oh no, no. Not at all. I’m from Ridgecrest. I came up here a couple of years ago to get away from all that action down south.”

“There’s action in Ridgecrest?” Norton asked absently, still staring at Grady’s body.

“Dani, take Norton outside, would you?” Corbett said.

Norton looked up and shook his head, visibly steeling himself. “No. No, I’m good.”

“Mister Corbett, I’ve heard of you,” Lasher said. He reached down and hitched up his pants, which were sagging low due to his rather large belly. “Are you really a billionaire?”

“Yeah. Anyway, you done with your pictures?”

“Well ...” Lasher turned and looked back at Hailey, who finally looked away from the body of his dead boss.

“You guys can come in,” Hailey said. “Just be careful not to disturb any of ... any of the evidence.”

“In other words, don’t step in any gore,” Victor clarified. “Like Officer Lasher, there.” He pointed at a bloody scuff mark that bore a boot tread, and Lasher looked down in shock.

“Oh, my,” he said, mortified to see what he had done.

Corbett pushed into the kitchen, stepping around Grady’s corpse. He paused for a moment to inspect it, then pushed on into the living room. Victor followed, then Danielle, who took great care not to step on anything that might be important. Norton brought up the rear. Suzy Kuruk remained in the carport.

Estelle had been carted off already along with the prisoner Victor had managed to arrest. Inside, two more bodies lay in a tangled heap. On top was a Latino man with thick, tattoo-covered arms. He had been shot several times in the torso, and once in the head. Beneath him was a smaller white man, whose face had been savaged. It was obvious the Latino had turned into a stench and attacked him. The smaller man had been shot as well, and Corbett noticed all the shell casings in the room were from a .45. The cops all carried nine-millimeters, even Suzy out in the carport. Only Victor was a .45 man, like Corbett himself.

“I shot them both,” Victor said quietly.

“Had the second one turned?” Corbett asked. He turned and looked at Victor. “The one on the bottom?”

“Of course,” Victor said, but something flickered in his eyes. Corbett understood. The smaller man hadn’t turned yet, but he would. Victor and his beloved Sig P220 had taken care of that, then and there.

“Looks like someone went out the back,” Danielle said, pointing to the open sliding glass door.

“Oh, yes,” Lasher said helpfully. “That’s where we think the other convicts escaped from. We checked the rest of the house very carefully, there’s no one else in here.” He paused, and cleared his throat. “Um, may I start documenting this scene, please?” He held up his camera.

“Sure. Sure,” Corbett said. “Guys, let’s step outside. Hailey, can you come with us?”

“Yeah, all right,” Hailey said. His voice was a flat monotone.

Corbett led the entourage through the sliding glass door. Lennon and two of his men were already out there waiting. They wore tactical helmets now with AN/PVS-14 night vision monocles covering their right eyes. They scanned the desert, and each man held a pistol in his right hand.

“See anything, Walt?” Corbett asked.

“Negative. We’re secure for the time being. I have Tamblyn and McGregor out front. McGregor has the REPR locked and loaded.” Lennon pronounced the acronym for Rapid Engagement Precision Rifle as “reaper”, and the designation was apt. Corbett was frankly very fond of the weapon, which fired 7.62-millimeter man-killers out to ranges of over five hundred yards.

“I hope he’s not flashing that thing around in front of the police,” Corbett said.

“No, sir. He is not. He’s mounted up in the Expedition.” As he spoke, Lennon kept turning his head, panning the monocle across the dark desert.

“Did you want to talk to me about something, sir?” Hailey asked.

“I did. Your boss was long gone when you shot him, Hailey. In fact, you didn’t even shoot
him
—you shot a bag of bones that just happens to look like him. Do you understand what I mean?”

Hailey nodded in the darkness, his face only slightly illuminated by the light spilling out of the sliding glass door behind him. “Yes, sir. I know all that.”

“Well, you’re not acting like you know it, so you might want to take a moment and get yourself squared away,” Corbett said, not unkindly. “The rest of the guys on your force, are they any good? I understand Santoro and ... who’s the other guy, Vic?”

“Whitter,” Victor said immediately. “Does anyone mind if I smoke?”

“So long as you don’t light yourself on fire,” Norton said.

“I’m not that drunk. Yet.” Victor reached inside his jacket and pulled out his cigarette case.

“Anyway, Hailey,” Corbett continued. “Santoro and Whitter, I know they’re reputed to be assholes. My question is, what about the others?”

Hailey shrugged. “They seem okay to me. We’ve only got a force of eight sworn officers, and Lasher’s a part timer, more of a hobby cop. Everyone can do their job, but murders and escaped convicts and stuff, that’s more for the Highway Patrol than us local yokels.”

“Mike, you okay?” Danielle asked suddenly.

“Yes,” Hailey responded dully.

“Hailey, it’s a shit job, but you’ve got to do it now,” Corbett said. “I’ll lean in and give you guys as much support as I can—we already have guys getting ready to come in and help with the search. And believe me, they’re better than the California Highway Patrol any day.”

“Hell yes,” Lennon said. He reached up with his left hand suddenly and pressed it against his left ear.

“Something over the radio?” Corbett asked. All of his men were wired up with communications gear. Lennon held up a finger and walked away a few steps. Corbett grunted and turned to Victor. “Okay, Vic. Give me your notes.”

“Heard about a shooting on 395, rolled up there with Suzy, we found a corrections bus with three dead prison guards in it. Grady arrived about two minutes after we did. We surmised that the prisoners had escaped, they were armed and dangerous, and that the potential for them heading for Single Tree was high. Hailey met us here on Substation Road, and Grady sent him off to Muir to check things there. We came here to Estelle’s, and guess what, bad guys. Boom, boom, zombies, boom boom.” Victor delivered all of that in a languid, emotionless monotone.

“Who shot Grady? The first time,” Corbett asked, looking at Hailey.

“Someone with a shotgun, which we haven’t found,” Hailey said. “So the guy who has it must have escaped.”

“The Latino had a pistol, which we recovered,” Victor said. “As far as we know, there are two men at large, and they have a shotgun and possibly two pistols between them.”

Lennon stepped back to the group. “Mister Corbett. The mayor is here, and he’s looking for you.”

###

With nothing else to do aside from watch television and watch Meredith slowly retreat into herself like a frightened sheep attempting to hide from a hungry wolf, Jock Sinclair headed to a pub—
Or “bar”, as they call them in this country,
he reminded himself—down the street from the roach coach motel he was staying in. The bar was called simply Bob’s Place, and it was virtually as low-brow as the name promised. Clearly, “Bob” was into Formica-topped tables, metal chairs, and weary tile. A substandard wooden bar dominated the far wall, and its lacquered veneer was worn in so many places that it resembled a patchwork quilt.

He bellied up to the bar and ordered himself a beer—a cold one, as they had only chilled draft available. As he sipped it, he looked around at the rest of the patrons. It was not exactly a full house, but it wasn’t empty, either. He spotted several travelers like himself easily enough, for they stood out amidst the jean-and-flannel shirt crowd of locals. Some were white, some Asian, and a handful were black, but most of the patrons seemed to be of Mexican extraction. Sinclair didn’t particularly like Mexicans, and occasionally referred to them as wetbacks, so long as he wasn’t on camera or wearing a hot microphone. He knew that he had to be careful in America, for they took their appellations very seriously. He couldn’t get away with calling a Jew a kike here, whereas in Europe it was practically expected. In many ways, America was so liberal it was almost silly, but they countered that by true stupidity from the right, such as continuing to allow citizens to own firearms. The asymmetry of it was almost astounding, when he thought about it. It was like the country was half pearl, half dung.

“Excuse me, are you Jock Sinclair?” asked a Mexican man with thick glasses and a big, bushy mustache.

“I am,” Sinclair said, even though he wasn’t exactly in the mood for talking. But he still received a little ego recharge at being recognized, especially in such a basic establishment as Bob’s Place.

“I watch you on the television, you’re quite good,” the man said.

“I thank you for that. And you are?”

“Hector Aguilar,” the man said, holding out his right hand. Sinclair shook it and favored the man with a smile.

“Please to meet you, Mister Aguilar,” he said with as much
bonhomie
as he could muster.

“The same here. So how did you manage to find yourself here in Single Tree?”

“Car troubles, of course,” Sinclair said. “My wife has a foreign import, and we can’t find anyone in town who can attend to it. Unless you happen to know someone who knows their way around a Maserati?”

“Unfortunately not,” Aguilar said. “Hey, aren’t you friendly with Barry Corbett?”

“I don’t know if ‘friendly’ is the term I would use,” Sinclair said before remembering that Corbett was a local. “Why, are you?”

Aguilar snorted and shook his head. “Quite the opposite.”

“Oh? Why is that?” Sinclair asked as innocently as he could. He looked around the bar while waiting for an answer.

“He’s going to destroy this town financially,” Aguilar said in a bitter tone. “Did you happen to notice all the construction that’s going on around town? He has dreams of turning Single Tree into some kind of fortress in response to the emergency that’s going on, as opposed to allowing the authorities to handle it. He even intends to barricade the town from the highway, and bar people from passing through. Can you imagine the arrogance? Separating a state highway, the only road through this area that actually goes anywhere?”

Sinclair was surprised by that. “Seriously? That’s what’s going on here?” Aguilar nodded, and Sinclair could see the man was actually angry. “Well, what do your politicians think of that?”

“I’m on the town council, but the mayor is leaning Corbett’s way. He’s just doing it for votes, and probably because Corbett is paying him off under the table. I’m the only one who’s against the insanity. Even the police chief is open to it.” Aguilar shook his head and took a pull off his mixed drink. “I can’t understand it. It’s going to destroy the town. The state will penalize us, the tourism will dry up, no shipments will be able to come in—we’ll all be broke by this time next year, and Corbett will probably just manage to skip away without even a slap on the wrist.”

“He is that kind of man, able to buy his way in and out of everything without regard for law or who might get hurt,” Sinclair said, allowing himself the opportunity to fan the flames of discord. “I interviewed him at length. He’s a climate change denier, and worse, his organization actually
contributes
to it. He might actually be responsible for what’s happening now, with the sickness that’s going on.”

Aguilar raised his brows. “Why, yes, that could be climate related, couldn’t it? Some sort of stress disorder, making people go crazy?”

“More likely some virus that was dug up and exposed to the open air,” Sinclair said. “You know that in the permafrost, there are all sorts of nasty little buggers that have been suspended in the ice. I wouldn’t be surprised if Corbett or one of his cronies managed to unearth something particularly nasty.” He swigged some of his wretched, cold beer. “And of course, people like him would rush to cover it up—no warnings, no confessions, not a single thought for anything other than their fat bank accounts.” The fact the Sinclair’s bank was on the fat side itself had nothing to do with the conversation, so of course he didn’t bring it up.

“You should report on this,” Aguilar said, his eyes shining the bar’s pale light. “It could be a great story, how one of America’s richest men totally destroys a helpless small town.”

“Well. We’ll have to see about that,” Sinclair said, looking down at his beer. “My wife and I will hopefully be catching a ride to Reno tomorrow, so I’ll be leaving.” He almost said “I hope to be leaving”, but managed to catch himself before letting the words slip out. No sense in offending the one soul in this Godforsaken little town that actually knew who he was.

Aguilar seemed disappointed. “Oh. That’s a shame. But if things don’t work out and you get caught here, let me know. I run the pharmacy up the street.” He pointed toward the wall behind the bar, indicating someplace Sinclair couldn’t see. “Unlike Corbett, I’m a small business owner who works hard every day.”

“Good man. Good man,” Sinclair said. “So tell me more, what is it that Corbett plans on doing, exactly?”

Aguilar grinned. “You’ll love this.” And he began to talk.

And Sinclair listened with rapt attention.

###

Max Booker’s first words to Corbett were, “What are you doing here?”

Corbett could see that his presence at the crime scene was pissing off Booker something fierce. Just the same, the mayor’s tone and general attitude got Corbett’s back up immediately. “I came as soon as I heard, Max. I figured you would have, as well. But it seems I beat you. Why is that, exactly?”

Booker glared at him in the strobing emergency lights. “What the hell do you mean by that?” he snapped.

Corbett stepped up and got right into Booker’s face. The mayor was a good twenty-plus years younger, and still looked to be in good enough shape to kick his ass, but Corbett was done playing around. All the talking, the convincing, the facts, the figures, the planning—he was sick of it. It was time to start making things happen, and Booker couldn’t get comfortable with it.

“Let me spell it out for you, Max. We start shutting down the town. Tonight, my men begin deploying razor wire all over the perimeter. We
will
fortify this town and make it as impregnable as we can. Your chief of police is dead. There are three corrections officers lying out in the desert, killed by escaped convicts, at least two of whom are loose in your town. Your emergency backup police chief, Wilbur Santoro, is about as bright as a bag of bricks and about as competent at the job of leading a police department as an old pair of underwear is at holding back a squirt of piss. I want you to give his job to Victor Kuruk, who by the way, apparently killed one convict, captured another, and shot two zombies. One of which happened to be Chief Grady.”

Booker’s eyes widened at that. “My God ... how did—”

“I told you, we’re all infected,” Corbett said. “The government is covering that up, but it’s the only answer for the spread. Yes, zombie bites are fatal, and the spit or whatever they carry is loaded with the virus that reanimates the dead. But those of us who die, be it from natural or unnatural causes, also reanimate. Old Wally was the test case, and Grady was the control. Both rose, and the only way to stop them was by shooting them in the head.”

“How did Grady die?” Booker asked.

“Looks like one of the convicts popped him with a shotgun. That man is still at large. I see that Estelle is gone, hopefully one of the locals have her? We’ll need her to provide a description.”

“Yes, she’s at the police station now,” Booker said. “Listen, about Victor, I can’t—”

“God damn it, Max, you can do anything you want. Victor has the gumption and skill set, and he has more people to bring into the mix. At the same time, you can appoint Santoro as the new chief, but you’d damn well better make sure he doesn’t get in my way.” Booker started to speak, but Corbett kept on going. “In about twenty minutes or so, more of my people will be here. These are ass-kickers and name-takers. They’ll be bring some dogs. We’re going to start hunting down the sad sack piece of shit who shot Grady. I want you to tell your cops to stop touching their junk here, because what happened, happened. We know who did what, so we need everyone in a uniform out policing the town, because we have to find these fuckers before they hurt more people.”

“So what are you telling me to do, Barry?” Booker was calming down now, no longer worried how it looked that he was late to the party. He was starting to think ahead. Like any politician, he was looking for the upside, and he could see that going toe to toe with Corbett wasn’t in his best interest.

“I’m telling you to give Victor temporary control of the Single Tree PD. He can direct them better than you or me. You’ve got to explain to Santoro that Victor’s not just some former Hollywood actor, that he’s a trained law enforcement officer, and he has the skills and personnel to make this run much more smoothly. And then I expect you to shut down Aguilar and anyone else who wants to get into a pissing contest about what’s going to happen as far as the town goes.”

“I was actually working on getting a meeting together for tonight, at nine o’clock,” Booker said. “Hector already refused to participate. He tried to get a hold of someone in Inyo to come down and reel you in, but there’s no one available. The CHP has enough problems up in Bishop, so you don’t have to worry about anything.”

Corbett waved that away. “Fuck the meeting, we’ll do it tomorrow. But our plans continue, regardless. By the end of this week, we’ll have the first layer of defenses up, and then we’ll start closing off the town. And after the meeting, once we know who’s up for it, we’ll start weapons training. I don’t want to hear any more shit about how it’s going to mess up our pristine lifestyle, we already have trigger-happy prisoners shooting up the place and flesh-eating zombies popping up. So are we clear on all of this, Max?”

“Yes,” Booker said, and his face looked pale and drawn in the flashing emergency lights. “We’re clear on it, Barry. On all of it.”

LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA

When Reese found Captain III Fontenoy, he wasn’t thrilled with what he saw. Fontenoy was a small-boned woman with a haggard expression. Her dark hair was pulled back in a bun, and there were bags under her eyes that were so large, Reese wondered if someone had punched her out. She moved like a skittish bird, dark, red-rimmed eyes wide open, as if she was in a state of perpetual surprise. When Reese introduced himself to her and informed her he had a contingent from the North Hollywood Station, she looked at him as if he was an alien invader from outer space.

“Hollywood’s gone,” she said. She sat behind a folding table, and several patrolmen loitered around her. Reese didn’t recognize any of them, but everyone looked shell shocked. He wondered if he looked the same.

He nodded at her statement. “Yes, Captain. That’s what I was told. We were on duty at Cedar-Sinai, and we relocated here after ... after ...” Reese struggled with the words, trying to figure out how to frame it.

Morton came to his rescue. “After the hospital couldn’t sustain operations and was closed by the administrative staff,” he said. “We took the LAPD presence up here with us, Captain.”

Fontenoy looked up at Morton. “And who are you?”

“Lieutenant Colonel James Morton, First Battalion, One Sixtieth Infantry Regiment, California Army National Guard. We’re here to support you and conduct security operations for the Hollywood Bowl.”

“Do you know what’s going on at the mayor’s office?” Fontenoy asked him. “The staff should be at the city emergency operations center. Are you in contact with them?”

“I was earlier in the day, ma’am, but they went dark about four hours ago,” Morton said. That surprised Reese. He hadn’t known that, but he wasn’t surprised. The cops hadn’t been able to raise the EOC from the command post RV, either.

“I need to get there,” Fontenoy said.

“Well, ma’am, I’m not sure we’re in a position to assist you in that,” Morton said. “That’s all the way cross-town from here, and my men and I have a lot of work to do on station. You don’t have any transportation?”

“Yes, we have squad cars, but nothing that can survive an attack from ... from those things,” Fontenoy said. “They got into Wilshire Station, somehow. We had to retreat up here carrying what we had on our backs.”

“Well, you’re lucky to have made it, ma’am. Anyway, I’ve kind of co-opted Detective Reese’s team to help out with crowd control down on the street. It makes sense that police would be a better fit for that job, while us grunts secure the perimeter and try to fortify this place a bit more.”

Fontenoy seemed to not care. “Can’t you take me to the EOC in one of your vehicles?”

“Ma’am, I don’t think the EOC is there any longer,” Morton said.

“For what it’s worth, Captain, we brought a CP with us, and we haven’t been able to raise the EOC, either,” Reese said. “If I were you, I’d forget about it. The mayor and his staff are cut off for the time being, and we need to stay focused on the here and now.”

“I need to get there,” Fontenoy insisted. “I have to see it.”

Reese looked at Morton, who shrugged. “We might be able to get an aviation unit to check in on them, do an aerial recce pass. What’s the address?”

“Five hundred East Temple Street,” Fontenoy said. “On the eastern side of the city.”

“All right. Captain Fontenoy, are you in charge here?” Morton asked, finally.

“What? No, I’m from Wilshire Station. The Sheriff’s Department is in charge here. You want to talk to Captain Bauer. He’s over there.” She pointed at an green LASD command post trailer that was hooked up to a semi-truck tractor.

“Great, thanks,” Morton said, and he started walking away. Reese looked down at Fontenoy.

“Orders, Captain?” he asked.

“Do whatever the fuck you want, Detective,” she said, lowering her head and staring at the plastic tabletop before her.