Aftershock: A Collection of Survivors Tales (14 page)

I made it out. That’s all you really need to know, but if you’re really curious, just know that Dr. Knowitall fucked up. Bigtime. I guess he was tired of waiting for me to die so he busted into my room one day wielding a large kitchen knife. What a joke. If I weren’t a military-trained killer, he might have been able to do some damage. I saw his opening attack coming a mile away. He threw open the door and came at me screaming and flailing his arms. I sidestepped his clumsy thrust and chopped at the back of his neck with my forearm as he stumbled past me. As soon as he hit the ground I was on him. I dropped a knee into his back, grabbed two handfuls of hair and beat his forehead into the floor until I heard his skull crack. I could hear his breath gurgling through what was left of his face so I walked over to where his knife had landed, picked it up and pressed it against the back of his skull right where it met his scrawny neck.

“This is how you do it,” I said as a pressed the tip of the blade through the skin. Then, with one clean thrust, I buried it up to the hilt. I didn’t really expect anybody else to come through the door, but I waited just the same. After a few minutes, when I didn’t even hear an alarm sound, I made my way cautiously out into the hall.

The place was a mess. Overturned carts, garbage everywhere, busted windows. What the fuck happened here?!

I needed to find some clothes and some food. I searched the floor they were holding me on and only found more mess. I was tempted to try an elevator, but I didn’t like the idea of escaping one cell only to be trapped in another. I found the stairwell and decided to make my way up. I would start at the top and work my way down. Maybe I could find somebody in one of the rooms who knew more than I did. I really hoped I wouldn’t run into a guard, but given the state of the place I didn’t think it was likely. It was entirely possible that Dr. Knowitall, I never did get his name, and I were the only ones in the place. On the top floor I found some offices. There were a couple of vending machines that I raided. Nothing says happy Armageddon like a Big Texas Cinnamon Roll. At least this floor was cleaner than downstairs. I didn’t find any clothes though, and there was no way in hell I was going outside in the paper pajamas I had been living in.

I searched from room to room, floor to floor gathering anything I thought might be useful. Some packaged food, a few bottles of water. I found a nice framing hammer in a supply closet and thought it would do for a weapon until I could get my hands on something with a little recoil. About four floors down, this put me just above where I was being kept, I found a small barracks. I scored two pairs of almost brand new BDU trousers, three shirts, and one hell of a sturdy pair of boots. The insignia were all wrong, but it felt good to get a uniform back on. I had even managed to promote myself to a sergeant first class according to the chevrons and rockers on my sleeve. I crammed the extra clothes into a duffle along with my food and water. The wall lockers looked pretty much the same as the one I had back in Georgia. I left the top drawers alone. Those were the only personal space a soldier was allowed, I had to respect that. I found plenty of clean socks and t-shirts. I left the underwear untouched. Looks like I was going to have to go commando. I grabbed a couple of canteens and a pistol belt to clip them to. There weren’t any real weapons here either. I found a few acetate batons, but they’re pretty worthless.

It was about this time that I stopped to wonder about the electricity. If my assumptions about the past month (had it been a month, I hadn’t really been keeping track) were true, then shouldn’t the power have given out a long time ago. I know they had to have a pretty big generator in this place, but who the hell had been feeding it? I could tell it was still running because I found working lights in about a third of the rooms I checked. I was broken from my musings by a scraping sound coming from a room down the hall. It was accompanied by a weird, gurgling moan. Not good. I set down my duffle and hefted the hammer in my right hand. I moved slowly toward the door, reached out for the handle, and cracked it open an inch. I was immediately thrown backward as the weight of the thing crashed into the opening door.

It looked like one of the previous residents of the barracks upstairs, at least 6’6” and somewhere in the neighborhood of 350 pounds, even with a sizeable chunk of his midsection torn away. He stumbled toward me as I scrambled backward. At least he wasn’t moving too fast. I made it to my feet and swung the hammer in a wide, sidearm sweep. It made solid contact with the thing’s jaw, tearing it off. The shock went straight up my arm, numbing my hand and I dropped the damn hammer.

The ragged remains of this thing’s face bore down on me as it tried to grab my arm. The stench of it was unbearable. I looked around for another weapon within arm’s reach but couldn’t see anything worth it. I landed a kick in the thing’s chest trying to drive it back. It was like kicking a slab of beef. I flew backward with the recoil and landed on my ass.

“Back to square fucking one,” I thought, crab walking my way backward to get the hell out its reach. With Beefy between me and the only semblance of a weapon I had managed to find and no hope of effective hand to hand combat, I will admit I had my doubts about the survivability of the situation. I got back on my feet and turned to run when I spotted it; the body of a guard half buried by a fallen bookshelf in one of the offices. I recognized the boots and the black fatigue pants. I crashed through the door hoping this guy wasn’t carrying one of those fucking batons, although given the circumstances, I would be happy to go after that thing with anything other than my dick in my hand. I could hear the fucker limping after me. He was close, too close. If there wasn’t something I could use in this room, I would die here. I rammed the bookshelf with my shoulder ignoring the jolt of pain. It flew across the room and revealed my savior. A beautiful little .45 tucked neatly in a holster on the belt of my new, dead best friend. In one smooth move, I un-holstered the weapon, flipped off the safety and brought it around to where I judged the waiting head of Beefy would be. There wasn’t time to cock the weapon; I had to pray that there was a round in the chamber.

As I squeezed the trigger, a received the satisfying crash that only an M1911 can give. I saw the top half of Beefy’s head disintegrate into a fine red, brown mist and his body hit the floor.

I stood for a moment relishing the ringing in my ears because that meant I was still alive to hear my ears ring. I took a couple of deep breaths smelling the cordite in the air and waited until I felt like the world wasn’t going to give way under me. Then I fell on my ass.

This was some fucked up shit. My head was spinning. I slumped there for a few minutes and took a swing from my canteen. I wasn’t going to bother making sense of any of this right now. I didn’t have that kind of time. I need to get the fuck out of this dungeon.

I checked the guard’s body and found two more clips for the pistol and a ring of keys that I thought might come in handy. I also found the back of his head missing and the majority of his brain gone. I moved past Beefy cautiously. I knew from experience that a good head shot kept them down permanently, but I wasn’t taking any chances. I checked the mag in the pistol and found that it held four rounds. That plus the two full ones gave me eighteen rounds total. Decent start, but I needed to find a rifle.

I made it back to my feet and decided to finish up my search as quickly as possible. I started wondering if I should be checking bodies for car keys. There were plenty of those. Bodies I mean, the kind that don’t get up and chase you. I realized it would be pretty fruitless unless I grabbed all the keys I could find then spent God knows how long trying to match them up to a car in the lot. Then there was the question of gas. Too much to worry about right now.

I continued making my way down, floor by floor. In the cafeteria I found some decent canned goods and a shitload of spoiled food. I stuffed a couple cans in my duffle. I didn’t want to grab too many and weigh myself down in case I had to go on foot. And since I still had no idea where I was going on foot, I thought it might be better to travel light. I did refill the canteens and I also snagged a few bottles of water. I had about given up hope of finding a real weapon when I landed on the bottom floor.

As I came out of the stairwell I was greeted by what looked like the aftermath of one hell of a firefight.

Twenty men in black fatigues lay sprawled on the floor. Among all the bite marks and gouges, each one had a neat little hole in the center of his forehead. The front doors were disintegrated. Bullet holes pocked all four walls. Brass littered the floor. If I was five floors up from here, how the hell did I not hear this going on? I knelt down to examine the casings. I found some .556, some 7.62, and a lot of .30-06. That last caliber meant civilian hunting rifles. What I didn’t see were any bodies not wearing a security uniform. No civilians, no military, no zombies. What the fuck happened here? Again, I didn’t have too much time to wonder. I sorted through the scattered rifles and found a handful of serviceable M4s. I scrounged of half a dozen magazines, each with a few rounds in them. I checked belts and found a few boxes of ammunition. I scooped up a Kevlar helmet and was delighted when half a brain didn’t spill out. Into the duffle it went.

I figured I should scan around outside to see if I could figure out where the hell I was and where I was going to go. I moved out through the space where the doors used to be and out into the entranceway. More bodies outside. Here were the civilians I was looking for. Scattered among the carnage were several bodies in ACU camo. That meant Army. My guys. I moved cautiously out through the bodies and turned back to check for a sign on the outside of the building, just an address, 109 Governor St, in big-assed letters on the side of the building. I moved among the few cars in the lot trying to plan my next move when out of nowhere a face slammed into the driver’s window from inside a sedan.

It looked female-ish. It was bloated and grey-green and as it smashed itself against the glass trying to get at me, the skin of its face started to slough off and smear down the window. I pulled the pistol pressed it against the glass right in the center of the things forehead and pulled the trigger. She flew sideways into the passenger seat minus the top of her head. Brown and black chunks of rotted brain sprayed the interior of the car. I just stood there wondering if this was going to be a regular thing now. Me shooting people in the head I mean.

I was dragged out of my reverie by the moan. I flashed back to Bentonville as I turned and saw five or six of the things making their way toward me through the cars. I immediately fell back toward the building not wanting to be out in the open and possibly get flanked.

The noise, the gunshot, that’s what had to attract them. Fucking idiot. I realized I would need to find another, more silent weapon when I got the chance. I got back inside as they started to catch up. I tossed the duffle and the M-4 off to the side by the stairwell, scooped up one the other rifles and prepared for a little hand-to-hand. Without a bayonet to fix, I was going to have to Mark-McGwire it on these guys and swinging a rifle like a club is the quickest way to ensure that it never fires again. I grabbed the barrel in both hands and waited. As soon as the first of those things was within range, I brought the butt of the rifle down in a lumberjack swing into the top of its head. I say “into” because that’s exactly what happened. The top of the skull caved completely in like stomping on a spongecake. No crunch, just squish. It fell like a stone. I reared back to take a swing at the next one and saw three more come through the doorway. I had a pretty decent bottle neck here, but if there were many more out there, this may become a problem. I couldn’t let them get between me and the stairwell in case I needed to beat feet.

I swung at the second guy and received a more satisfying crack as the rifle butt made contact with the side of his skull. Apparently I didn’t hit him hard enough because he kept coming. I stepped back and tried the overhead shot again. This time he went down. Numbers three and four were slouching in and I saw another three moving toward the building from outside. Shit. I wasn’t panicking yet, but I couldn’t risk more gunfire in case there were a whole lot more out there, I didn’t want to bring them in here. I wasn’t going to be able to stand here swinging for the fences all day. Eventually, my arms were going to give out.

I took down the third, fourth, and a fifth son of a bitch. By then I knew it was about time to make my retreat to the stairwell. Then, from outside, I heard the unmistakable thuppa-thuppa-thuppa of a chopper. It was coming too low and too fast for me to even hope to get outside before it passed, but the things in the yard all turned at the same time toward the noise. I crunched the skulls of the two left inside with me and saw the mob in the grass turn to follow the chopper. They apparently lost all interest in me which I was not going to complain about. I watched as a rain of paper obscured the view from out the door. I would have preferred they dropped napalm, but then I would have been toast too so I guess you have to take what you can get.

The mob lumbered away following the noise and as the last few stragglers left my line of sight I cautiously made my way out of the building and out into the parking lot again. I snatched up one of the papers. At first glance it looked like your average, run of the mill flyer for a pizzeria or a dry cleaner’s, only done by a four-year-old. I took a moment to cautiously watch the herd of them wander off toward the sound of the chopper, now a barely audible thump way off in the distance.