Dead Team Alpha: A Post Apocalyptic Thriller (24 page)

Ten down, twenty down, thirty down, too many to count. Stanford realizes that the ones they saw following the Z herd were just the wranglers, the zombie herders pushing on with their mission. The actual number in Denver is unknown to him, and while he is a man of chaos, he is not a man that likes unknowns.

One by one, the carbines click empty and become nothing but heavy hunks of metal and wood.

Or, in the right hands, deadly clubs.

Diaz, Cole, Lang, and Anna Lee all flip their M-4s end over end and grab onto the hot barrels with their gloves. They can feel the heat from the searing metal, but ignore any discomfort as they batter up and start swinging. Monkeys converge on them, with half taking carbine butts to the head, while the others leap at the Mates, bringing them down in a pile of insanity.

Val’s M-4 clicks empty and she drops it to the ground, pulling her blade from her belt. She runs and jumps into the pile, stabbing everything not in a uniform. The blade pierces backs, necks, the bases of skulls; killing whatever it comes in contact with. She pulls on the corpses, trying to get them off her fallen Mates.

Hands and feet punch and kick their way through the Monkeys until Diaz is able to get out, rolling away so he can get to the large knife strapped to his leg. He pulls it, gives Val a wink, and gets to work. Screams of pain, cries of surprise, calls for help, and yelling of rage, all merges into a cacophony of violence.

Monkeys die and Monkeys fly when Diaz begins lifting them and throwing them to the side. Even though some are even bigger than the Mate, and fueled by crazy brains, they can’t match the man all hopped up on adrenaline. He lifts and tosses, lifts and tosses, getting to the bottom quickly. A hand reaches for him and he takes it, hauling Cole to his feet.

“Duck!” Cole shouts and Diaz does as a machete whizzes just over his head.

Cole slams his fist into the attacker
’s nose, then grabs Diaz and pushes him out of the way, going in closer for another hit and another. The Monkey staggers back, his arms reeling as he takes the punches to his cheeks, jaw, chest, and to his gut. As he doubles over, Cole grabs the man’s wrist and snaps it, catching the machete before it can hit the ground. He whips it up and buries the blade deep in the man’s groin, hitting the guy’s pelvis with bone jarring finality.

Cole plants an elbow into the man’s head and sends him slamming to the pavement. He spins about and sees that the rest of the Mates have gotten free of the furious Monkeys and the still corpses. There are
a couple more gunshots, but then there is silence.

“Sound off,” Stanford pants, his empty M-4 dangling in his hand. “DTB?”

“Lang!”

“Horton!”

“Schuemaker!”

“Which one?”

“Both!”

“Leister!”

There’s silence.

“Shep?” Stanford asks, looking around. “Shep?”

“Yeah,” Shep says, walking up to the group. “Here.”

In his arms is a girl, maybe ten or eleven, her belly split open and blood streaming from her clothes. Shep sets her down by the other fallen crazies.

“They aren’t all the same,” he says. “These are just meat. They aren’t trained like the others.” He rolls the girl over and lifts the back of her shirt. No markings. “Just a cult following the real Code Monkeys. Meant to slow us down, but probably not expected to kill us.”

“Shit,” Val says, looking north. “Then the real threat is almost to the Stronghold.”

***

The cramps finally
stop as he gets to the first checkpoint at the outer perimeter of the Stronghold. Still a ways from the massive wall that truly secures the settlement, Carlyle is happy to know his journey is almost at an end, at least.

Scotty Kurowski, pissed off he has perimeter duty five days in a row, watches the man stumble towards him, his skin red and cracked, lips split, eyes wild with fatigue. Foam coats the edges of the man’s mouth, and Scotty’s first thought is
that he’s watching one strange looking Z come at him. Then he sees who it is and hurries forward, catching Carlyle as he collapses, keeping him from cracking his head open on the pavement.

“Fucking A, Carlyle,” Scotty says. “What the fuck happened to you?”

Near delirious with dehydration and his muscles, starved of oxygen, going into painful spasms that make the earlier cramps feel like tickles, Carlyle struggles to speak.

“Zs,” he croaks, barely audible above the wind that never stops whipping off the Plains and up the mountain. “Zs…herd…huge.”

Scotty looks at the trolley jocks a few yards down from him. He had wondered why the uphill line wasn’t moving while the downhill line continued to send reclaims and other passengers down the Turnpike.

“Hey!” Scotty yells. “Fo
gherty!”

One of the uphill line jocks turns and gives him a bored look.

“What, Kurowski?” Fogherty asks. “What the fuck, man? Who you hugging?”

“It’s Carlyle, dildo!” Scotty yells. “Hustle you ass up to the wall and let them know we’ve got a herd coming!”

“A what?”

“A fucking herd!” Scotty shouts.

“A herd?” Fogherty asks, moving from his station and walking towards Scotty. “We’d know if a herd was coming. Someone would have sent a trolley up, man. Do you see a trolley coming up the hill?”

“No,” Scotty says. “And you don’t find that weird? The salvage from the reclaims should have been sent back by now. But no salvage. And no Teams, either.”

“Teams are down for the week,” Fogherty says as he stands over Scotty and Carlyle. “I’m just glad for a break, man. Weather’s nice. No Zs bugging us. Life is good, bro.”

“Monkeys,” Carlyle whispers.

“Huh?” Scotty asks, unsure of what the man has said. “Did you say monkeys?”

“Blind,” Carlyle whispers. “Blind monkeys.”

Fogherty holds his hands up and walks back to his station. “Fucker lost his mind,” he says. “Runners are a crazy fucking bunch, man. Who volunteers to fucking sprint up and down the mountain? Or sprint run from pyre to pyre in the fucking wasteland? Old bastard didn’t drink enough water and fried his brain. He’s yours to deal with.”

“Asshole,” Scotty says, squatting and getting Carlyle situated in his arms before standing up. “I’m taking him inside. I’ll send someone else down to watch the checkpoint.”

“Dude,” Fogherty says. “It’s your ass. You leave your post, you’ll be on shitter detail for a month, and I heard that Collin Baptiste works the shitters now. Fuck that crazy asshole. Or, if you’re lucky, you’ll just get thrown in the jail with no one to keep you company other than Sheriff Marsh.”

“Just keep your eyes open, will ya?” Scotty says. “If there is a herd, you better be ready to sound the alarm.”

“Tell ya what,” Fogherty says. “I’ll hitch a ride down to the next switching station, how’s that? I see this mystical monkey herd the old guy is yammering about and I’ll come let everyone know.”

“Fuck you, Fogherty,” Scotty says as he walks away, Carlyle
heavy in his arms.

Fogherty watches Scotty walk off and shrugs. The other uphill line jock looks over at him then at the downhill line.

“You going down there?” he asks.

“What? Are you nuts?” Fogherty replies, closing his eyes and lifting his face to the sun. “Why ruin a perfectly good day by riding down with a bunch of sweaty reclaims? I’m not wasting time on a hallu
cination some old Runner has because he forgot his water bottle and salt tablets. Fuck. That. Shit.”

***

Scotty quickly attracts attention. Any man would when walking up from the perimeter carrying a body. The majority of houses around him are empty, but a few aren’t and the occupants start coming out to see what’s going on.

“Who is that?”

“What’s up, Scotty?”

“Is he dead?”

“Is that Carlyle?”

“He’s dead, isn’t he? Poor guy.”

“If anyone wants to help instead of jabber at me, that would be great,” Scotty says. His arms are already beginning to ache and he’s only a third of the way to the wall and main gate.

“Here ya go, brother,” an older man says as he pushes a
wheelbarrow from around the side of a house. “This’ll help.”

Scotty carefu
lly places Carlyle into the wheelbarrow and grabs the handles.

“You want me to take him?” the man asks.

“No, I got it,” Scotty says. He looks over his shoulder at the checkpoint down the road. He’s certainly worried about getting put on shitter duty, but he can’t risk the old Runner being right. What if there is a herd coming? “Listen, you all should come with me. Get your neighbors, anyone still home, and have them get to the wall and inside the gate.”

There are gasps and scared whispers.

“What’s going on?” the man asks. “Zs? Crazies?”

“I don’t know for sure,” Scotty says. “But before he passed out Carlyle said there was a herd coming.”

“You don’t look so sure,” the man says, his hands on his hips. “What ya holding back?”

Those that live outside the wall and main gate are the citizens that would rather not be directly under the thumb of Team command and the Mayor’s office. Not that they think they have a better way of running things, just that they don’t li
ke being watched and prefer to run themselves. That ingrained suspicion instantly grows strong as they all look at Scotty’s puzzled face.

“It’s nothing,” Scotty says. “Just better to be safe.”

“Ain’t telling no one nothing,” the man says. “Spill it, Scotty Kurowski. I knew your mother when she was still wearing diapers, so don’t act like you’re better than me.”

“I’m not,” Scotty says, thinking
the day just keeps getting shittier and shittier. “It’s just…”

They all watch him. He debates, seriously debates saying anything. If he
does, they’ll probably react like Fogherty. But since they already suspect something, and he can’t lie worth a shit, Scotty takes a deep breath and goes for it.

“Monkeys,” Scotty says quietly.

“What was that, brother?” the one man asks.

“Monkeys,” Scotty states louder. “He said there was a huge Z herd coming. Then he said something about monkeys.”

The crowd all looks at him, then slowly start to smile. Snickers and giggles bubble to the surface and soon the crowd is laughing full out.

“Monkeys?” the man asks, his face suddenly very serious. “Did you say Monkeys?”

Scotty hears the difference in the man’s voice when he says the word. An emphasis there matches Carlyle’s urgency.

“Uh, yeah,” Scotty says. “He whispered monkeys.”

The man turns on the crowd, his face red with rage and sweat slicked with fear. “GO!” he roars. The force of his words makes a few stumble back. “Get your family! Tell everyone! This ain’t a laughing matter no more! GO!”

He whirls on Scotty and grabs onto the wheelbarrow.

“I’ll bring the old Runner,” the man says, nodding up the road. “You run your ass off, Scotty Kurowski! You run and warn everyone! But mostly you find Commander Lee! You hear? You tell her that death is coming! DEATH IS COMING!”

Never having felt fear
like the fear he feels at this very minute, Scotty doesn’t know whether to start running or start pissing. But he pulls himself together, turns and sprints up the road, leaving the panicked crowd behind him.

***

“You hear that?” Fogherty’s co-jock asks. “What is that? Crows?”

“Nah,” Fogherty says. “Sounds like a bunch of girls playing.”

“Hey,” one of the downhill jocks says, watching the line stutter and stop. “Something’s wrong with the trolley. One of you guys want to hike down and check it out? You ain’t doing anything else productive.”

“Fuck you, Price,” Fogherty says, flipping the man the bird.

Price just smiles and points downhill.

“Fuck,” Fogherty says. “I’ll fucking go.” He looks at his fellow uphill line jock. “I’ll just keep walking and grab a trolley up. Be ready, okay?”

“Whatever,” the jock says as Fogherty turns and starts hiking.

He goes a quarter mile before the road curves around a hill. It took tricky engineering to get the lines to stay secure and keep from getting tangled on the curves, engineering that Fogherty doesn’t understand. Sure, he can repair lines just like any jock, but the science behind how they work is beyond him. He spends most of his hike cursing the engineers, thinking it’s their fault that the trolley has stopped and the line gone slack.

But as he keeps going, what his pal thought were crows and he thought were girls playing (which is probably the most stupid assumption in the history of the zombie apocalypse), turns out to be people trapped in a trolley surrounded by the first wave of the Z herd.

Fogherty, never having gone down the mountain ever in his life, is stunned by what he sees. He’s
only lived life in or near the security of the Stronghold.  The last herd that made it up the mountain was when he was three and he spent the whole time deep behind the Stronghold wall, huddled in a closet, wrapped in his grandmother’s arms.