Winter's Salvation (19 page)

             
Naomi jumped into the truck, pressed the clutch and turned the ignition making the garage roar from the trucks engine, but one sound stood out amongst it all.  Sam could make out the distinct sound of scratching paws at the garage’s house door over the undead’s groaning, and pounding.

             
Sam felt a strong urge to get out of the truck and rescue the dogs.  She held onto the truck’s door handle and cracked it open as soon as her mother put the truck in reverse.  Light from the interior lights immediately shined on their faces and Sam opened the passenger door.   

Naomi showed a state of confusion from the light as they looked at each other.  “Close the door!” She screamed and the truck jumped into gear, as it backed into the roll up door.  The door bent outward and the Chevy stalled.  It quickly roared back to life and lurched forward.  The lights stayed on in the truck and Naomi turned back to Sam as she was about to climb out of the vehicle.
“Close the fucking door!”  She screamed.  Three shots were fired in the house and then the scratching stopped. 

The truck moved forward crushing two plastic trash cans, as Naomi tried to get as much room as she could, so she could get as much speed as possible to ram the garage door.  Sam stepped out of the truck, “Get your ass back in here!”

“I’m getting the dogs!” Sam hollered back in defiance.  Then she looked at her mother and screamed as she noticed one of the undead walking past the trucks bed and reach into the driver’s side window of the Chevy. 

Naomi turned just in time as the ghoul reached for her face.  All she could make out from the undead was the filthy hand that reached for her.  A grey palm that was covered in its other victim’s blood and caked with dirt as if it were crawling in the mud, grasped for her face.  Behind that hand was a gapping maw filled with broken teeth that needed to be filled with the flesh of its victim.   She felt herself being pulled to the window toward the open mouth that exuded with the stench of death and decay.  The ghoul had her grey hood in his hand and was pulling her toward it.  She braced herself against the door and the steering wheel, but the power of the zombie pulled her closer.  Naomi tucked her head and pulled her arms through the sleeves, as the ghoul began to pull the hoodie off of her.  Her arms were out of the sleeves, but she had to wrestle to get them out of the hoodie.  The hungry and frenzied zombie grabbed hold of a portion of her braids through the sweat shirt and pulled the hoodie into its mouth. 

The teeth bit into her long black braids, through the grey sweat shirt and she could feel the creature shaking its head back and forth like a pit bull playing tug a war with a piece of rope.  Two ghouls were making their way under the bent garage door and started crawling toward Samantha.  Sam covered her face in fear not knowing what to do as she watched the ghoul rip at her mother.  Her feet were made of lead and her legs jello.  She wanted to do something.  She wanted to pull her mother out, but her feet would not move and she could not pull her hands from her face.  Her mind raced with hundreds of scenes that she could not comprehend.  Thousands of thoughts jammed into clouds that fogged her mind as she watched her mother get pulled into the ghoul’s mouth.  Then the sound of groaning blew the clouds from her mind and she turned in the direction of one zombie beginning to stand and another one crawling inches from grabbing her leg.  She forced her heavy feet and week legs to jump into the truck.  Sam slammed the door and then began to scream.  It was a blood curdling cry that made all other sound impossible to hear.  It was just then that one of the undead smashed its shedding skin up against her window.

A loud pop and then a deafening ring sounded in Naomi’s and Sam’s ears.  Naomi fell back against Sam as she was released from the grasp of the undead.  She pulled the rest of the hoodie off over her head and looked up to see Mr. Cook with his riffle in his hand. 

He had walked to the side of the ghoul that shook wildly and placed the barrel against the side of its head and eliminated the mad beast.  “Get out of here, I’ll open the garage.”  He mouthed out the words, but Naomi only heard two things, the low tone in her ears from the gun shot and the ear piercing sound of Sam screaming. 

Cook began to pull down on the chain to open the roll up door, but the truck had knocked it out of the track, making it very difficult to do so.  It was moving opening, but very slowly.  With each forced pull on the chain the old man would have to reach higher for another pull.  Every effort moved it slightly popping the door back into the track.  

More undead began to crawl under the door as it reached a little more than quarter of the way open and the zombies soon began to crouch under it.  Mr. Cook backed away from their prying and clawing hands trying to work the chain.  He could not move away from them any further and work the chain, so he let go.  He backed away from the door and drew his rifle.  “You have to go!  You have to get out of here,” he screamed as he lined his sights on the closest ghoul, crawling on it’s hands and knees.  It did not take the time to stand up and reached with excitement as it got closer. 

Naomi heard him scream something as the tone in her ears started to fade, but Sam’s screaming muffled any
coherency from his voice.  She watched him move closer to the truck through the rear view mirror and then she was able to make out one of the white dogs running through the kitchen toward the garage house door.  Behind the white dog was a horde of undead that had filled the house shoulder to shoulder, as they made their way toward the fleeing animal. 

One, two, three shots rang out one after the other as the crawling zombie dropped.  He was at the drivers side window now and turned to Naomi.  “Get out of here!  Go!”  She was able to make out what he screamed, but only because she was able to read his eyes and him mouthing out the word go.  Sam was still screaming with her legs pulled up to her chest and her hands cupping her ears. 

She pulled the shifter into reverse and that made Mr. Cook believe she had finally snapped out of the daze and was actually going to leave.  He lined his rifle on another undead and fired dropping the next one that was behind the crawling zombie.  He was walking backward toward the garages house door when he noticed a white blur shoot out from around his legs.  He turned to the door to see a wall of undead making its way toward the garage. 

Naomi looked into the rear view mirror and saw nothing, except for the upper torsos of undead that had made their way under the roll up door.  She floored the gas as she released the clutch and the truck jolted backward and jutted up and down as the tires ran over whatever undead were behind her.  Shards of class flew all around Naomi and Sam’s heads, as the cab hit the garage door, breaking the back windows and stopping the truck.   

The wheels spun out from under them and smoke from the tires began to fill the garage.  The undead around the truck now focused on the Mr. Cook who was standing in between two walls of undead making their way toward him.  Undead were piling under the garage door and now fighting to get out of the house door and into the garage. 

Naomi pushed the blue truck into drive and moved forward next to Mr. Cook.  He made eye contact with her.  He stood perfectly still as Naomi pushed the truck back into reverse and began to move backward.  The old man looked at Naomi and said as if he were saying a prayer, “God please forgive me.”  He put the barrel under his chin. 

The truck moved backward as Naomi watched Mr. Cook pull the trigger.  Nothing happened as hands came within inches from grabbing him.  He looked panicked.  She saw him pulling the trigger multiple times hoping the gun would fire and relieve him of the death he was about to experience.  Hands covered him and pulled him down to the ground.  He screamed in fear, pain and agony as the undead began to eat him alive. 

The Chevy hit the bottom of the roll up door again, pulling it further from the tracks and then releasing them from the garage.  They flew backward running over the rough ground, as they drove off the drive way and over whatever ghouls happened to be behind them.

She stopped in the middle of the yard and turned the head lights on which revealed hundreds of undead wrapping around the house, with the exception of the path she made full of undead that were crushed, writhing trying to get back to their feet.                

Hundreds of glowing eyes turned to the vehicle and focused on the lights.  The undead that were walking around the house and not trying to get into the garage turned to the truck.  She spun the wheel away from the house and toward the main gate.  The head lights shined on the open front gate and she felt relief
wash over her.  She saw no undead by the gate and as she made it onto the street, she saw that it was clear.   

Chapter 10

Trust

             
“Just over the bridge is Good Hope Landing,” Eric said as he swung his heavy back pack over his shoulders. “I know a guy from there.  We could stop by and hopefully get some rest.”             

             
A cool breeze on the bridge blew over their faces that gave both of them a sense of relief from the hot September sun.  The first few steps on the bridge were easy.  The bumpers of the jam-packed cars were either touching the rear bumpers of the one in front of it or they were so close they could not physically shimmy to the other side unless they walked on top of them.  A quick look through the vacant vehicles and Eric began to imagine all the people trying to move closer to the car in front of them honking and hollering at each other thinking that they could move a little bit faster.  He thought about the people trying to leave, looking through their rearview mirrors, seeing waves of other travelers fleeing from their cars and having a mob of undead running or shuffling quickly and relentlessly after the fleeing travelers.  Some of the vehicles were, so close to each other they would not have been able to open their doors, making climbing out the windows the only option.  They peered into a few cars with interiors covered with random body parts and blood.  No bodies were left in them, but by the looks of the broken windows Eric could picture zombies reaching in with gnashing teeth and grasping claws that grabbed at anything alive. 

             
“We’ll stick to the right side of the bridge.  That way we only need to watch straight ahead and to our left.”  Eric said as he guided Drew to the right side of the bridge.  He thought of everyone leaving their possessions and running straight ahead away from the mob of undead.  How many families were separated during this time and how many families were trampled by the retreating travelers?  The road was relatively clean; meaning there were no bodies and too much bloodshed on this part of the bridge.  They became used to the bridges and main roads filled with mutilated corpses with hardly any muscle left on them.  As they passed one of the vehicles they noticed a blue cooler left in the back seat of a light blue Saturn. 

             
“Score,” Drew said and reached for the cooler.  He struggled a little bit to remove it, but pulled it free from the hot car.  Upon inspection the cooler contained a few sandwiches that were green with mold, a couple bags of chips and a couple oatmeal cookies sitting in a puddle of dirty water.  Drew grabbed hold of one of the oatmeal cookies and tore open the wrapper.  This was the first time Eric has seen him smile since before his mother’s death.  Drew looked up with his cookie in his hand and the smile on his face reached from ear to ear.  Eric smiled at him and opened one of the bags of chips. 

They were coming to the top of the bridge and the wind began to pick up.   It was a beautiful morning and while they enjoyed the cool breeze
, a foul odor of decay hung in the wind.  Eric took note that they were downwind from the rest of the bridge and knew they may encounter some unwanted travelers.  Drew took note of this as well. 

He looked at Eric and held his nose indicating he could smell the dead.  In the panic of the waves of running people, the drivers of the cars pulled to the shoulder of the road to move up in line faster.  That was a good idea, but when hundreds of o
ther stuck and scared drivers did the same thing, they just made the traffic tighter on themselves.  They approached the first car that blocked their path.  It was pulled in front of them on an angle.  Eric climbed over the sedan and stood on its hood.  From here he could see most of the bridge with the exception of two tractor trailers that blocked almost the entire north bound lanes.  From the looks of it they were standing at the cleanest and most organized part of the bridge.  Beyond the sedan lay pools of blood and broken glass from every one of the vehicles and off in the distance a few zombies could be seen wandered back and forth in between the cars.

Eric grabbed hold of Drew’s arm and pulled him on
to the hood of the sedan and knelt down on one knee.  “We’re gonna have to start walking in the middle of the bridge.”  He pointed to a path of cars down the center.  “We can’t keep climbing over the cars.”