These Dead Lands: Immolation (14 page)

“Man, for such
a little girl, she sure has big tits,” Tharinger whispered, peering through the PVS-14 light-intensifying scope on his assault rifle.

“They’re fake,” Reader said. He sat on the floor behind Tharinger, his back to the wall, M4 lying across his legs.

“How do you know that?” Tharinger asked.

“Dude, they’re totally fake. Never seen an Oriental girl with a rack that big before, unless it was in a porno movie. Trust me, she’s got bags in her.”

“Huh.” Tharinger continued to scan the black terrain beyond. “Wonder if she was a porn star back before the world ended? That’d be awesome, having a living, breathing fuck muscle with us as the world ended.”

“Man, the shit you think about, Jay. I don’t remember you being so horned up all the time back home.”

Mike Reader and Jay Tharinger had known each other almost all their lives. They had both grown up in Colorado Springs, Colorado, gone to the same schools before they had enlisted in the Army to do great things and assassinate exotic people in the name of Uncle Sam. That they’d wound up in the same unit was something of a major coincidence, but they’d been happy to meet up again.

“I’ll bet she can go all night long,” Tharinger said.

“Maybe, but it ain’t gonna be with us.”

“Fuck, Mike. A guy can dream, can’t he?”

“Dude, you see the same woman I did? She’s a fucking nightmare, a total basket case. You see how she’s always bitching about that kid hanging onto her? She’s got a cold heart, man.”

“She just needs to meet the right guy,” Tharinger said. “Lucky for her, I’m available.”

Reader snorted. “You look in a mirror lately? You’re like five-six and weigh a buck-twenty with an overbite that would embarrass Bugs Bunny. She could lay you out by dropping one of those silicone bombs on you then shit in your mouth.”

“She can drop one of those bombs on me, anytime.”

“Hey,” Guerra’s whispered from the next room. “Shut the fuck up. Movement to the east.”

Reader gathered his feet under him and stood up, keeping his rifle at low ready. “Anything out there on your side?” he asked Tharinger.

“Negative.”

Reader walked out of the room and across the hall. He stepped into the bedroom Guerra was positioned in, sitting in a chair facing the window. Guerra held his rifle to his shoulder, peering into the night through the scope. Stilley was lying on the floor on his fart sack, breathing through his mouth. All the troops had taken showers, and even though the water had been more than a little cold, Reader was overjoyed to finally be clean, and for the first time weeks, he was ready to get his sleep on. He felt the exhaustion tugging at him, weighing him down, but he didn’t dare nod off while he was part of the overwatch team. Downstairs, Ballantine, Hartman, and the captain were keeping the main floor secure.

“How many you got?” he asked Guerra.

“About eight, so far,” Guerra said. “Walking down the road. Not paying any attention to the house, which suits me just fine, man.”

Reader lowered his PVS-15 night vision goggles over his eyes to take a look. Sure enough, on the road leading past the farmhouse, he could see figures staggering through the night. The reekers kept to the road, not for any tactical reason but because it was easier than floundering about in the dark fields. Reader spotted a few more in the distance, stumbling through the fields like old drunks wobbling home after a night at their favorite watering hole.

“Got more out in the field,” Reader reported.

“Yeah, I see ’em.” Guerra fell silent for a moment. “Whoa. It’s a fucking
herd
out there. Check this shit out.”

Reader focused on the road again. Where only a few reekers had been tottering along the last time he’d looked, a huge knot of them were shambling down the street. He stopped counting after he hit a hundred. “Fuck me,” he said softly.

“No, thanks. You’re not my type.”

Reader shook his head. “That’s… that’s a lot of them.”

“Yeah. They come this way, we are seriously fucked.” Guerra spoke into his radio. “Captain, it’s Guerra. We have reekers on the road, well over one hundred strong, moving past us. Over.”

“Roger, Guerra. Break. Reader, come down. Over.”

“Roger that,” Reader said. To Guerra, he added, “Shit, the last thing I want to do is go downstairs.”

Guerra snorted. “Try not to slip and fall, okay?”

“Wouldn’t that be a ball-buster? Survive the freaking zombie apocalypse, only to bust my neck tripping down the stairs in the dark.”

“Might be the best way to die, these days. ’Cause goin’ old and gray in your bed probably ain’t in the cards anymore.”

*

Hastings took Reader’s
report calmly. If the reekers were walking past the farmhouse and sticking to the road, then that was probably about as good as things were going to get. After sending Reader back upstairs, he and Ballantine moved stealthily through the main floor and checked the barricades. The farmhouse remained as secure as they could make it, though Hastings didn’t doubt the reekers could gain access if they subjected the dwelling to one of their swarming attacks. The good thing about the animated dead was that they were incredibly stupid and tended to fixate on one access of attack. Because of that, Hastings was fairly certain the soldiers could either get the civilians out of the house and into the vehicles, or just pour on the firepower and blow the shit out of the reekers as they walked toward the house. The noise would attract more and more of them, but the last inventory Hastings had taken had assured him that they could, technically, take down twenty thousand of the fuckers before things got tight. Not that he was necessarily game to do so. Stealth and remaining off the reekers’ radar would be the linchpins to success. Hastings preferred to preserve his munitions for a time when they might be absolutely necessary.

“We’re good to go here, sir,” Ballantine reported.

“Roger that, Sergeant. We’re about as secure as we can be without being in a bunker somewhere.” Hastings looked at Ballantine through his night vision goggles. Both men were operating under severe light discipline, and that necessitated the use of night vision devices to see with. He thought the sergeant first class was holding up pretty well, but there was a drawn-out kind of anxiety around him. Having his family so danger-close while he was supposed to be tending to his duties was probably taking a hidden toll on him.

“Why don’t you knock off,” Hastings said. “I’ve got first watch. I’ll wake you in thirty mikes.”

Hastings motioned to the couch against the far wall, the same one Diana and Kenny had sat on a couple of hours earlier. It was the only piece of furniture they hadn’t used as barricade material. If it came down to it and exiting the house was not an option and the reekers were about to penetrate it, Hastings planned on dragging the lumpy sofa over to the stairs and using it as an obstruction. It would bottle them up and give the soldiers a perfect targeting window in which they could ice the zombies as quickly as their weapons would allow.

“I’m good to go, sir. Why don’t you sack out first?”

Hastings shook his head. “An order’s an order, Sergeant Ballantine. Get some rest.”

Ballantine fidgeted for a moment. “All right, sir. But maybe we should have Reader come down?”

“He’s fine where he is, Sergeant. Go on, man. Sack out for a while.”

Ballantine nodded. “Okay, Captain. Wake me if you need me.”

“Hooah.”

Ballantine unslung his M4 and sat down on the couch. After pushing his NVGs up on their swivel mount—the action put the unit in standby, preserving its battery—he removed his helmet and placed it on top of the couch back. He stretched out on the couch, cradling his rifle to his chest. After a few minutes, his breathing became deep and steady as sleep overpowered him.

Hastings looked past the pile of junk that served as a barrier for one of the living room windows. There was a small opening, a murder hole through which he could fire his weapon if the need arose. Through the green world of his NVGs, the dark world beyond was revealed as if it were no more than an overcast day.

Clumps of zombies tottered along the road, making almost no noise. Hastings imagined if the house were closer to the thoroughfare, he might be able to hear the shambling footfalls of all those lost souls walking through the night to whatever fate might await them. He was happy to hear nothing of any consequence, other than the trilling of nighttime insects and the occasional pop or click as the house settled in the night, shedding the heat it had accumulated during the day. The reekers were oblivious to the building, and since there was no moon, they might not even be able to see the dark structure sitting well back from the road. Overhead, stars burned bright in the verdant sky, providing all the illumination the night vision device needed. But to the unaided eye, the stars didn’t generate enough light to reveal even the most major features of the local landscape. The zombies were moving more or less westerly, which did not bode well for his unit since that was the same direction they would head in the morning. He put a coda on that thought, intending to discuss it with Ballantine when he woke the sleeping lightfighter for his turn on watch. They would need to plan tomorrow’s road movement and determine whether they should skirt around the zombie herd or fight through it.

He heard a slight sound behind him, and he turned as the cellar door creaked open. He rose to his feet, holding his M4 in the low ready. Diana emerged from the stairway, her eyes wide and unseeing as she turned her head in the near total darkness and tried to get her bearings. She made her way into the living room by feeling along the wall.

Hastings relaxed a little and stepped toward her. “What’s wrong?” he whispered.

She started when she heard his voice, and he crossed the distance between them quickly, his boots whispering across the old, mangy carpet that still smelled of stale cigarette smoke and dog.

“Don’t get jumpy,” he said. “Reekers don’t talk; they just attack and bite.”

“Sorry,” she whispered. “I couldn’t take it down there any longer.”

Hastings reached past her and gently eased the door shut. “How’s Kenny?”

“Sleeping. He’s fine. He sleeps really well through the night. One of his better talents.”

“Okay. Why are you up here? You should be sleeping, too.” Hastings grabbed her arm to steer her toward the kitchen.

She resisted. “Where are you taking me?”

“Back into the kitchen. Sergeant Ballantine is asleep on the couch.”

“Oh. Okay.”

She relented and allowed him to lead her into the other room. Hastings stayed in the doorway, where he could keep an eye on the living room.

“You need something?” he asked.

“Like what? A hug?”

Hastings shook his head. “I’m the wrong guy for that. Just asking if you needed anything.”

“Yeah, I’d like for the power to come on so I can watch
True Blood
on TV.”

“Out of luck again. Thanks for stepping up and helping with Kenny.”

Diana sighed and sank to the floor to sit with her back to the wall. “I’m not exactly the motherly type. Before those fuckers killed his parents, he wouldn’t even look at me, which was fine. To tell you the truth, as soon as I found another group, I was going to ditch them.”

That didn’t surprise Hastings a bit. “Why?”

“They were living on a wing and a prayer. The only reason I was with them was because they had food, and I figured more eyes was better than only two. They weren’t really very well armed, only a shotgun and a pistol, but it was more than what I had.”

“You have a pistol, too,” Hastings said. “Or was that theirs?”

“I lifted it off a dead guy in Boston, some old man who’d been mauled by zombies. All that was left was half a skeleton and a gun belt. I blew through the ammo trying to get out of the city and never found any more.” She paused. “You guys don’t happen to have any three-eighty, do you?”

“No. Not our caliber. We have five-five-six, nine mil, and fifty cal. Three-eighty’s kind of a wimpy round. You’ll do a lot better with that Sig we gave you. Where is that, by the way?”

“Downstairs. I handed it to Kay before I left. She’s still awake.”

“Her boys all right?”

“Yeah. They’re fine.”

“Sit tight.” Hastings returned to the living room and looked through the gun slit in the front window. The reekers were still moving past. He returned to the kitchen and watched Diana for a moment through his goggles.

“What?” she asked, apparently sensing his observation.

“You ditch Kenny’s family back at the roadblock?”

She didn’t hesitate. “Hell, yes. Without any ammunition, what was a girl on a Suzuki going to do? Best thing I could do was get the hell out of there. Just plain luck that I found you guys. Had no idea you were down the road.”

“So you just left them,” Hastings said. “With a defenseless autistic kid?”

She looked up at him, even though she couldn’t possibly see him. “What did you want me to do, General? Die with them?”

He ignored the question. “Where were you headed? Before getting jumped by Frank and his crew?”

“The husband had a sister outside of Philly. He wanted to try to meet up with her down there. After that, they were talking about going to Georgia.”