Dying Days 5 (5 page)

Mitchell put the rifle on his shoulder and used the crosshairs to find a target. A large naked male zombie with an open gut and engorged penis was the easiest mark. He pulled the trigger and hit the zombie in the crotch, his privates exploding.

Everyone laughed except Jeff, who took the rifle away from Mitchell. Jeff looked at everyone in turn until they stopped laughing. “What a waste of ammo. You’re an asshole. I thought you said you never shot a gun before?”

“Lucky shot,” Mitchell said and looked away from Jeff, who looked pissed.

“You aim for the fucking head.” Jeff aimed the rifle and fired, blowing the zombie’s head open. He handed the weapon back to Mitchell. “Load it and clean up the bridge. We have work to do. By the time I ride to the top, it better be clear.”

Mitchell nodded and loaded the rifle as Jeff and the other men started climbing down the ladder.

There were three more zombies on the bridge. A wall had been built out of cars and debris at the peak of the bridge but it looked like someone had pushed through a spot. Now the zombies were walking right over to this side.

Mitchell fired, the shot blasting through the face of a zombie. He’d fired guns before but he wasn’t going to tell these assholes where and why. It was none of their business. He’d help them and hope he didn’t have to do this shit work anymore.

He took his time with the next two shots, hitting the mark easily. From this distance, and with no wind factor, he could sit and shoot for hours. Mitchell watched as another zombie got into the breach and he dropped it with a shot; the zombie crumpled in the hole. That would keep them at bay for a few minutes, until Jeff and his crew could get there.

The motorcycles shot into view below, riding up the bridge.

Mitchell aimed the rifle and kept a bead on Jeff as he rode. All it would take was a tap on the trigger and the asshole would be dead. One shot.

Jeff had ridiculed Mitchell right away. “You’ll ride that Harley.”

“I can’t. I’ve never ridden a bike before,” Mitchell had said.

Jeff looked disgusted. “Then you’ll ride bitch with one of us. But not me. I don’t want your pussy ass behind me. You might try to fuck me.”

Mitchell heard the rest of the group laugh but they were doing it to stay out of Jeff’s way. The guy was rotten to the core. And now he was lined up…

A zombie pushed through the gap, falling through but righting itself. It stopped and looked at the motorcycles heading its way. Mitchell could see it smile.

A fucking smart one
, he thought. Mitchell took the shot and watched the head explode. Were there more behind it?

Yes. Two more went down. Mitchell checked his ammo. He didn’t want to run out.

Jeff and his team made the breach and fired a few shots of their own while they started filling it in with the debris on the bridge.

Mitchell had clear shots at a few zombies on the other side of the bridge but decided against it. There was really no point except target practice. He toyed with the idea of a stray bullet in the back of Jeff’s head but decided against it. He was too far away from Staples to go back, and he had no food or supplies. If he shot Jeff, he’d have to shoot all of them and run out of ammo.

He figured he’d get his chance at some point, and then the guy was going to die.

Mitchell was shocked at himself to be thinking such a crazy thought. He was going to seek revenge and shoot someone because they were an asshole? Revenge fantasies were always a big thing in his head, like everyone else, but he never thought he’d actually be planning for one.

He covered them as they finished closing up the gap and then met them in the parking lot.

Jeff rode right up to Mitchell but didn’t turn off his Harley. “Where’d you learn to shoot like that?”

“My dad taught me.”

“There might be some uses for you yet. Get on,” Jeff said.

*   *   *   *   *

Vee watched the children as they helped the adults in the garden digging up the soil to plant vegetables. In the last two days, they’d successfully pulled down another building and begun chipping away at the foundation for more room.

But there was so much more work to do just inside the compound. Dilapidated bars and stores were on the verge of collapsing into the street, and there was so much debris an army of zombies could hide out and they’d never be noticed.

“Are you Vee?”

She turned to see a big man and a small woman approach. “Yes. Can I help you?”

“Hi. I’m Juan and this is Lola. We’ve been assigned to the western end of the block, I guess. We were told by Claude to come and see you. He said you had a ton of work for us to do to earn our way and be protected.”

Vee smiled. She was about to answer when she saw five more people coming up the street. “Are they with you?”

Juan nodded. “Yes, ma’am. You have seven new recruits. What do we need to do?”

The Full Moon Saloon was the staging ground for all of the tools and supplies, for building, they’d collected. Jeff and his crew had found two hardware stores in the last month and taken every last nail and screw they could find. Vee led the newcomers over, once introductions were made.

“At the end of the block, just past the cemetery, is a gas station. It needs to come down. Everything of value needs to be brought to the other end of the street. You’ll see a couple of smaller storage areas. If you can save wood and metal, please do. We can’t waste anything. Don’t just take a hammer to it,” Vee said. “The electricity is live, so be careful. Shut off the breakers first. Stay away from the gas pumps. We’re only interested in taking the building itself down right now.”

“That’s a lot of work,” one of the new men said.

Juan turned his head. “No, a lot of work is fighting zombies and not eating. This is earning your way. Understand?”

The man nodded.

Vee liked Juan. He was big and a definite leader. She could use him to make sure everyone stayed in line and did the work. “You’re going to be the foreman on this job. Think you can handle it, big guy?”

“Yes, ma’am. We’ll have the building down in no time. How do we move everything down the street?” Juan asked.

“Ask for Denny at the western gate. He has the keys to the pickup trucks. Take two and load them up. He also has cans of gas stored. We drained the tanks as much as possible. Figured if we got raided they’d look there for the gas. That’s why we’re going to keep them up for now, I guess. All I do is follow orders.”

“From a zombie,” Lola said.

Vee nodded. “Yes. From a zombie. One who has protected us from the rest of his kind. A zombie who has let many people leave whenever they wanted to. He’s provided us with shelter and electricity and food.”

“We’re here to be fattened up until he eats us, or does something even worse,” Lola said.

“Hey, we are her guest,” Juan said to Lola.

Vee held up her hand. “No. She’s right to question it. I did when I got here. It is more than understandable. I look at it this way: the evil you know is always better than the one you don’t. He might be fattening us all up before he eats us. He might be enjoying a game he’s playing. But at least we’re together and we’re not going to die of starvation. And what’s the chance of us surviving outside these walls anyway? Not that good. At least here I have a warm bed. Electricity. Real food. You know what I was doing the night before I found this place? Licking stale dog food out of a can and trying to sleep in a tree. This might not be the ideal fantasy spot for you and your boyfriend, but it is what we have to work with. The Lich Lord doesn’t bother us. He does his own thing and I go to him with questions and concerns. He answers them. So far so good.”

Juan grinned and pointed a thumb at Lola. “She isn’t my girlfriend.”

Chapter Seven

John woke at first light and tried to stand up. His leg felt like it was on fire but it wasn’t stiff. He prayed it wasn’t infected. He managed to rise and lean on the good leg, rubbing his thigh as he moved slowly across the camp.

A few people watched him walk. Heath was one of them.

“Can you tell me where Lincoln is?” John asked. He wanted to get on the road before it got too hot. “I thought the camp would’ve been broken down by now.”

“You thought wrong,” Heath said with a grin. He was carrying an AK-47 and casually swinging it around and taking the slightest pause when it was pointed at John before pulling it away. “Lincoln went out on a patrol first. We don’t want to drive up Route 1 and right into an army of zombies or a trap.”

John saw the motorcycles lined up. “Which way did he go?”

Heath shook his head. “I don’t think so. You’re staying right where I can see you until he returns. Don’t give me an excuse to shoot your other leg.”

“Don’t give me an excuse to end your life. I’m not sure you understand what’s going on out there, but you don’t scare me. Even with a bad injury, I have no doubt I can take you. By the look in your eyes, you know it, too. This will make you very dangerous or very stupid or both at some point. So let’s get this out in the open right now. I don’t like you and, for some reason, you don’t like me. Maybe you think I’ll take your spot next to your boyfriend. Maybe you know I see you for what you really are: a wannabe with a gun. A guy who’s former life as an unemployed loser living in his mom’s basement means you have no practical training for anything, and the only way you’ve survived so far is by hiding around a guy like Lincoln. You act tough and you try to play the game but everyone can see you’re a scared man with no social skills. You think you can prey on the weak. Well, fucker, I’m not the weak. I’m the guy who will break you in half if you puff up your skinny chest one more time. Do you understand?”

Heath turned away like the coward he was and John walked slowly to the motorcycle line. Now that he’d settled that, at least for a few hours, he wasn’t so sure he’d be able to ride with his leg hurting so badly.

“You won’t get far with that wound,” Jessica said as she approached.

“Is that a threat?’ John asked. He was getting tired of confrontation with everyone in this camp.

Jessica laughed and put up her hands. “Just an observation. How far do you think you’ll get? You can’t ride for long. You’ll get tired. And who knows if you can even balance. You’re in pain. It would be stupid to go off by yourself. That’s all I’m saying.”

“Now I’m supposed to thank you and find a nice, comfortable spot to lie down and rest until we finally move?” John asked.

Jessica nodded. “Pretty much. It would show Lincoln you can be trusted and it would calm Heath down. He’s an asshole. He gets bored. And you’re not as strong as you think you are. He’s been itching to fight someone.” She looked past John to where Heath was watching them. “He’s smacked around a few of the women in camp. Might have killed one. We don’t know. She was supposedly taken by a zombie but I saw him with her not an hour before. He’s not good people.”

“Then it will give me great pleasure when I finally kill him, right?” John said. He turned and waved at Heath, who gave him the finger. “No matter what’s out there to face, as far as zombies, the asshole in front of you is always worse.”

“True. But sometimes that asshole is easy to spot. And watch and bide your time. It used to be, we would see a zombie slowly moving toward us. You could take your time and take your aim and shoot it in the head. Done. A shitload of them? You walked fast and escaped. You stayed out of enclosed areas and major cities. You kept your head on a swivel. You watched your neighbor breathing next to you because he wanted the last candy bar in your pocket. But now…” Jessica looked away.

“Now we have intelligent zombies. Maybe even smarter than when they were humans. Definitely more aggressive. And some of them are working together, while others have reached a certain pinnacle and think they are the New God.
Now
it’s a scary world we live in,” John said. “Who knew we’d need to watch out for a superior breed of killing machine?”

“You make it seem so hopeless,” Jessica said.

“Maybe it is. But I’m going to find Darlene and our baby. If I’m going to die, I’ll do it as a family and not in some field with a bunch of strangers who’ve already divvied up my few meager possessions.”

*   *   *   *   *

Darlene watched the young girl as she came into the room, carrying a lamp and a flashlight.