Winchester: Over (Winchester Undead) (11 page)

Maypearl
, Texas

Jack led the three-vehicle convoy out of the old Royal Rangers campground and away from their compromised cache site. As they approached the town of Maypearl, Bexar saw that the fire had done considerable damage, but had mostly died out. There was no movement in the town at all; it seemed as if death had swept through the town, laying all living things to waste.

In the lead vehicle
, Jack booted the GPS that Malachi had protected from the EMP and selected their destination. The GPS advised the group to turn north back up to I-20, but that would lead them back into the very area they were trying to escape. No, they needed to move south and point west as soon as possible, putting as much distance between them and the undead horde behind them as possible.

On the south side of
Maypearl, Jack stopped the convoy for a quick pow-wow and planning session. Walking over to Bexar, who was standing next to Jessie by the Wagoneer, he said, “Bexar, I don’t think there was anything alive in that town.”

“
Yeah,” Bexar agreed, “I didn’t even hear any dogs barking.”

Jack continued,
“The GPS says to go up to I-20 and head west, but I think we’d be better off hitting I-35, and heading south to get to I-10 somewhere west of Boerne.”

Bexar thought for a moment.
“I agree, except that I-35 was a parking lot of death when we crossed it heading up here. We can hit it for a little ways, but we need to get off before we get anywhere near Waco. Then we can see if we can find a highway heading west. I don’t want to get any closer to San Antonio than Boerne, and even that seems a little close.”

Colorado

Cliff reached I-70 without any issues. The number of abandoned cars was surprisingly small, and he found the drive fairly easy even with the fresh snow, but was still concerned that he hadn’t seen any signs of life since climbing out of the underground facility. He really didn’t want to be the last man standing in this hellish new world.

He
turned onto the Interstate and headed west towards Groom Lake, Nevada, keeping his speed around forty miles per hour in an effort to conserve gas, and also to drive safely around the abandoned vehicles on the roadway.
It would be nice
, he thought,
if all the people that had been in those cars and were now nowhere to be seen had fled to safety
, but he was a realist, and thought those people had probably all been killed and were now wandering the countryside, looking for their next victim.

The drive took Cliff through the heart of Colorado skiing country
, and as he passed through Breckenridge and Vail, the thought of a bunch of rich, undead skiers lurching through the resorts in their expensive sweaters and North Face jackets made Cliff smirk. Even though the thought was funny, the threat was real, so he stopped the van in the middle of the highway, clear of any other vehicles, and filled up the tank with the three gallons of gas he had stored in the water jugs.

Scanning for threats,
he chose another truck to steal gas from about two hundred feet further up the highway. This time he drove his van close to the fuel source and left it running while he slid under the Dodge Ram to repeat the same fuel siphoning process he had done the night before. He wanted a full tank and a backup, since he didn’t want to stop again until he was on the other side of Vail.

Hillsboro, Texas

Hillsboro was a sad town long before the dead rose from the grave to hunt the living. The once well-stocked outlet mall had withered away years ago, with much of the retail space sitting vacant. For Bexar, the best part of Hillsboro was that it was the last stop for a Braum’s hamburger and shake. There weren’t any more Braum’s south of here in Texas. Not that it mattered now; any Braum’s food or ice cream in the store would have gone bad by now.

The convoy
stayed on the Interstate through the town, passing several clusters of undead. Each turned to follow their new prey, stumbling down the road behind their vehicles. Although the group quickly outpaced them, Bexar worried that the undead might not ever stop the chase; that he and his family and friends would never be able to stop and rest, or they would be forced to fight for their lives.
Won’t they get distracted after they can’t see us anymore and wander off somewhere else
? thought Bexar.

His
mind continued to wander as they drove. The convoy was keeping pace between forty and fifty miles per hour, driving around undead and abandoned vehicles, but even those obstacles weren’t enough to keep him from becoming sleepy and distracted. He wished the group had some sort of two-way radios so they could talk to each other, and he really wished the radio in his truck would still play music, not that there was probably anyone left in the radio stations to broadcast it.

When the group reached the outs
kirts of Whitney, they stopped to survey the area. Jack could see movement across the roadway, but from that distance he couldn’t tell if the person was dead or alive.

Glenwood Springs, C
olorado

Cliff made good time, considering his situation, but once he reached Glenwood Springs he had to slow down because there were a lot of abandoned cars in the road. He had expected to find some sort of signs of life as he came into civilization, but there was a complete lack of people. If anyone was still alive, there should be some signs of their survival, cooking fires or something, yet there was nothing.

If they were
all dead, truly dead, he would have seen bodies. There was nothing, not even the undead. Glenwood had burned, and although it didn’t look like any large fires were still burning, much of the typical urban sprawl—shopping centers, restaurants, stores, and apartments—had obvious and significant fire damage.

As
he neared the Highway 82 turnoff, it was apparent that a massive battle had preceded his arrival by a couple of days. He couldn’t tell if the fight had been between factions of the living, or between survivors and the undead, but for all the damage and all the carnage, there was a distinct lack of bodies. Further down the road though, there were at least one hundred bodies strewn about on both sides of the river, obvious battle casualties that also appeared to be covered in bite marks.

Cliff
had downshifted and slowed the van even more to survey the carnage when out of the corner of his eye a movement caught his attention. With a loud curse, he slammed both feet down onto the clutch and the brake pedals while jerking the wheel of the old van to the right. He was able to miss the first two undead, but hit the next three while skidding on the snow, front wheels still turned to the right.

In his mind
, time slowed, and he chastised himself both for being distracted and for reacting incorrectly. He knew a driver can either evade or brake, but can’t do both and expect to retain control of a vehicle. Striking the three walking undead, physics once again proved master and the van lurched hard onto its left side. Cliff’s head bounced off the side of the van and hit the windshield hard.

Central Texas

Children do not trouble themselves with the worries of the adult world. They simply have no concern for what time a parent went to bed; they will still wake up at a ridiculously early hour. Children don’t care if you’re hungover or sick, they will awake with the need for attention, love, and breakfast. Young children especially will have no thoughts about the total collapse of society, or that the dead have risen to hunt the living.

Will and Keeley slept through the
encounter with the handful of undead in Whitney. The convoy managing to drive away from the threat with no problem. They napped as they passed through the small towns of Meridian and Hico. As the group approached the east side of Dublin, Texas, however, their good fortune lapsed, and both children awoke and demanded to be let out.

Sandra flashed the headlights of the
Wagoneer to signal Jack to pull over. Jack was now on station to find a safe place to let the kids out for a good half-hour, someplace they could run and play, someplace safe in a world overrun by the dead.

While in college
, Jack had dabbled in skydiving, making a handful of training jumps at a little drop zone at the airport in Dublin. Ten years ago the airport had been small, with only a handful of hangars and buildings, and it had been wide open and surrounded by a fence. The idea of finding a schoolyard playground scared Jack, but he figured the group could circle the wagons to create a safety buffer out in the field next to the runway.

He
led the convoy into the airport, past the old weathered hangars, and drove across the runway to the open area between the runway and the fence line. Once the kids were out and happy to be playing, Bexar and Jack began to come up with a plan for a side trip.

“
Dublin, as in Dublin Dr. Pepper,” Bexar said, “made with the original cane sugar formula. Come on, everyone sells it here, how hard would it be to sneak into a gas station and take a case of it?”

“
Bexar, do you know how crazy that sounds? What about the kids and our wives?”

“
They’ll be fine, Jack, we’ll just be gone for ten minutes, besides we need some snack food for the kids and we really need a bunch more Gatorade if we’re going to the desert.”

“
Okay, but we better move fast,” Jack said, “and we’re taking the FJ so we don’t have to dick with that trailer on the Scout.”

Bexar told the girls what they were doing and before much protest could be raised, he and Jack climbed into the FJ and took off across the airport as quickly as they could.

Leaving the airport, they turned towards town in search of a convenience store. They passed a nursing home and could see roughly three dozen elderly undead shuffling around the property.

“
That’s so fucked up!” exclaimed Jack. “Those poor bastards were lying in wait for death, and when it finally came it was taken away from them!”

“
Jack, let’s just hope that none of them head this way until we get back to the airport and get out of here.”

The first store they came to looked like it hadn’t been updated since the
mid-sixties, and the fuel pumps were about as old but looked like they’d still been operating when the end came. A couple of oilfield trucks were parked in the parking lot, as well as a sheriff’s patrol car.

Bexar parked the FJ by the fuel pumps and left the motor running as they climbed out and walked to the front of the store.
The windows were dark and they couldn’t see inside the store. Bexar pulled open the door and held it open with his foot while Jack made entry, switching on the light on his AR. Both were overwhelmed by the stench of death, and they hoped that whatever it was, it was really good and dead.

Sensing
movement behind the counter, Bexar moved the muzzle of his rifle left to light up the possible threat with his weapon light. Behind the counter stood Flo the cashier, ready to help any new customers, white apron and name tag still on her body. The milky white orbs of her eyes flashed in the light as she raised her undead arms towards the fresh meal. Bexar thumbed the safety down and pressed the trigger to the rear, and Flo’s head exploded backwards, covering the lottery scratch-off display.

The single shot brought a handful of moans from the dark towards the back of the store.
Sweeping left, Bexar found another zombie just as Jack’s AR barked through the dark store, engaging his own threats. They shot another four undead in the store before being able to call clear.

“
Jesus, Jack,” said Bexar, “maybe we should throw something into the darkness next time to see if there’s a reaction. Flo scared the crap out of me!”

“
Who the fuck is Flo?” asked Jack.

“
The clerk. She was standing behind the counter, name tag and all.”

They searched
through the store, finding the Dublin Dr. Pepper they had come for, as well as three cases of Gatorade, two cases of water, some lighters, and a few candy bars. Ten minutes later, they were back on the road and headed back towards the airport, Jack at the wheel. Bexar hunched over the dashboard in the passenger seat, scratching at a lottery ticket.

Jack looked at him incredulously.
“Seriously, a scratch-off?”

“
Bash all you want,” said Bexar, “but I just won twenty bucks! Let’s go back and get Flo to cash it for me.”

“
Fuck you,” replied Jack, and Bexar started laughing.

Jack looked
back at the road just in time to see one of the nursing home undead bounce under the bumper of the FJ before the truck lurched to the left.

“
Shit, blew the front left tire, but I don’t think we should stop with those other old-guy undead headed this way.”

“
I’m with you, Jack,” said Bexar. “Airport first, and the girls can give cover while we fix it.”

Now d
riving with a flat tire, it took them twenty more minutes to make it to the middle of the airport, where they found the Scout with the trailer abandoned, their wives and children nowhere to be seen.