Fracked (14 page)

Glass shards and chunks of wood rained down all around John and Rebecca as they stayed on the floor and kept their heads covered. The ceiling fan fell onto the bed and pictures tumbled off of the wall.

The gunner lowered his weapon and ran a line of fire along the first floor of the house, destroying the porch, shattering the windows, and reducing the front door to splinters.

After passing a line of fire along both floors of the house one more time, the gunner stopped and turned the weapon towards the pick-up truck and fired.

The pick-up truck erupted into a fireball and was reduced to burning scrap.

The back of the armored vehicle opened and six soldiers wearing black tactical uniforms hopped out with their rifles ready.

“Search the house! They’re in there somewhere!” the soldier manning the gun turret ordered.

The soldiers split into two groups; three entered the front door while three ran towards the backdoor.

The helicopter turned off its searchlight and veered away from the scene.

Rebecca looked at John, terrified.

“Hide!” John said.

“But they’ll find me, John!”

“Just trust me! Go hide! Don’t shoot him!” he insisted, pointing towards the closet. “I want him alive.”

Rebecca nodded and crawled towards the closet. She got inside and tucked her knees against her chest.

“It’s about time I got some damn answers…” John muttered to himself.

Downstairs, the three soldiers who entered the front door were already in position; one soldier stayed outside and covered the porch, one stood in the foyer, and the other started walking towards the stairs.

“I’m going to check the second floor,” the soldier said as he brought the rifle to his shoulder and started climbing the stairs.

“Copy,” the soldier standing in the foyer replied.

The soldier carefully scanned the upstairs hallway and heard something rustle from the direction of the master bedroom. He narrowed his eyes and pushed the door open.

As soon as he stepped inside the bedroom, he noticed that the closet was cracked open…

“Gotcha,” he said with a smug smirk. He walked towards the closet with his weapon ready.

Behind him, John crawled out from underneath the bed and picked up a large piece of glass from the shattered window.

Just as the soldier reached for the closet door, John grabbed him from behind and pushed the shard of glass against the front of the man’s throat.

“If you move or try to call for help, this piece of glass goes in your goddamn windpipe,” John whispered in the man’s ear.

The solider paled and immediately froze.

“Toss your weapon on the bed,” John ordered.

The soldier hesitated, but complied. He tossed the rifle over onto the bed.

“Who are you working for?” John asked.

“The United States National Guard!”

John pushed the shard into the man’s neck just enough to draw a bead of blood.

The soldier hissed in pain and squeezed his eyes shut.

“Next time you lie, you die,” John whispered. “Save your fucking bullshit. Who are you working for?”

The soldier hesitated…

John pushed the glass in a little deeper.

“Who do you think?” the soldier replied in pain as blood started to trickle down his throat.

“What about the people wearing the white hazmat suits?” John asked. “They claim they work for the CDC. Are they telling the truth?”

The solider chuckled.

“Something funny?” John asked as he held the glass against the man’s throat.

“You’re ballsy, but you’re fucking naïve,” the solider said.

The soldier struggled weakly, but John kept the glass pressed against the man’s throat.

“Look, just let me go,” the soldier said. “You’re never getting out of this alive. It doesn’t matter who you work for. After what you did, do you honestly think we’ll let you walk out of here? You’re outnumbered and outgunned.”

“Shut up,” John said as he pressed the glass a little deeper. “Why are you even bothering to follow us? Don’t you have bigger problems?”

“Why do you think? You’re the one who made this personal. You ran one of our vans off of the road and killed one of our men,” the solider said.

Confused, John shook his head and furrowed his brows.

“What the fuck are you talking about?” John asked.

The soldier scoffed.

“Don’t play stupid. The helicopter saw you,” the soldier said with a resentful scowl.

John thought about the traffic accident they came across.

“He was infected you moron,” John said. “We didn’t run anything off of the road. All we did was cross paths. He attacked us!”

“Bullshit. He was a good fucking man and the best squad leader we had, but you and that bitch killed him in cold blood!”

“What’s the holdup? Is everything okay up there?” the soldier standing downstairs in the foyer asked.

Before the soldier could respond, John slid the shard of glass into the man’s throat, broke it in half, and stepped back.

The soldier gurgled on his own blood and collapsed to the floor, gasping for breath and grabbing his throat. Blood spurted out from in-between his fingers as his complexion grew ghostly pale. After a few moments, he collapsed on the floor.

The soldier in the foyer heard the thud as his comrade hit the ground. He cautiously gripped his rifle as he made a slow ascent up the stairs.

“Toliver?” the soldier called as he brought the rifle to his shoulder and scanned the upstairs hallway.

The bathroom door was cracked open.

“This shit isn’t funny. Say something!” the soldier said as sweat beaded across his forehead.

The bathroom door slammed shut.

The soldier aimed at the bathroom door.

Rebecca emerged from the master bedroom and fired a three-round burst into the soldier’s head.

The soldier’s head snapped to the side and his helmet flew off of his head as the wall beside him got spritzed with grey matter and chunks of hair. His limp corpse cartwheeled backwards down the stairs and collapsed into a heap in the middle of the hardwood foyer.

The other three soldiers ran through the house towards the sound of the gunshots, knocking over furniture and knickknacks in their wake.

The fourth soldier stepped inside and stood by the front door, gun ready.

Moving as a group, the three soldiers hurried up the steps with their weapons pointed towards the master bedroom door.

John kicked the bathroom door open and fired at the soldiers.

The soldiers jolted with each shot and their fingers tightened around their triggers. They inadvertently fired wildly at the ceiling and into each other. They tumbled backwards down the stairs and collapsed in a bloody heap next to their fallen partner.

The soldier standing at the front door panicked and pointed his rifle up the stairs towards John.

Rebecca leaned over the banister and fired.

The soldier was flung back and fell through the porch’s tattered mesh screen. He collapsed on the dirt and lay motionless.

The whole house reeked of gunpowder and the coppery stench of warm blood.

“Is that all of them?” Rebecca asked as she looked at John through the smoky air.

“I think so,” John said as he stepped out of the bathroom and sent shells skittering down the steps. He looked at her with tired eyes and nodded. “You handled yourself well.”

Rebecca wiped the sweat off of her forehead with her forearm and let out an exhausted sigh.

“Yeah, well, we’re just lucky they weren’t really from the military otherwise we probably wouldn’t be breathing right now,” she said with a frown.

“True,” John admitted as he walked down the stairs. He saw one of the soldiers in the foyer sluggishly crawling towards one of the rifles on the floor. “These clowns are just a bunch of hired thugs with a vendetta.”

John stopped, pointed his weapon at the soldier’s head, and fired.

Rebecca flinched and looked away.

The soldier jolted and collapsed back on the floor in a pool of blood, motionless.

John turned and looked at her as he slowly lowered his weapon.

“Are you okay?” he asked.

She nodded without any expression.

“Go grab the suitcases. I’ll get the food back together,” John said. “We’ll take their vehicle and get the hell out of here.”

Rebecca disappeared into the master bedroom without saying a single word.

John stepped over the corpses and picked up the overturned garbage bin with the intention to pick up whatever canned goods were still salvageable off of the floor. Most of the cans were riddled with bullet holes.

The soldier manning the armored vehicle’s turret started firing at the front door.

John leapt backwards and tripped over the bodies of the deceased. He landed hard on the hardwood floor and crawled away from the heavy gunfire.

The gunfire tore the plastic bin to pieces and reduced the doorway into nothing more than wooden slivers. Debris started to fall from the ceiling and the small light fixture that hung from the top of the foyer came crashing down at John’s feet.

“Distract him!” Rebecca shouted from the top of the staircase with her rifle.

“Becky, don’t!” John shouted as he cowered at the base of the stairs, dodging pieces of wood and coughing on plumes of dust as the gunner fired into the foyer.

She didn’t listen.

Rebecca ran into the master bedroom, gun ready.

“Goddammit,” John muttered. He picked up one of the rifles and started blindly firing out of the front door into the dark.

The gunner took the bait and kept firing in return, destroying the porch pillars and demolishing the front of the house.

A burst of gunfire resounded from upstairs.

The gunner stopped firing.

John scrambled onto his feet and ran upstairs, nearly tripping as he ran.

“Becky?!” he shouted as he ran inside the master bedroom.

Rebecca was standing by the shattered bay window. She lowered the gun and turned towards him with a frown.

“I’m fine,” she said flatly.

John walked towards her and placed a hand on her shoulder.

Rebecca kept her eyes on the ground as a tear ran down her face.

John gently brushed away the tear with the back of his hand and brought her close.

She closed her eyes and pressed her forehead against his chest.

“It’s going to be alright,” he assured as he kissed the top of her sweaty head. “Let’s just grab the supplies and get out of here.”

His eyes trailed out the window…

Attracted by the commotion, infected men and women emerged out from the shadows and sprinted towards the house, bodies twitching and arms flailing.

“Becky! Get ready! We have to go now!” John exclaimed as he readied his rifle and backed away from the window.

Rebecca stared at the suitcases on the bed.

“What about the supplies?”

“There’s no time!” John interrupted as he pointed his weapon towards the bedroom door. “Just grab your gun and let’s go!”

A man wearing a tattered Triburton uniform kicked open the master bedroom door and stood in the doorway, snarling. His eyes were pitch-black and oily saliva dribbled down his chin. His fingers were covered with blood and his fingernails were torn off.

The man gave a feral cry and sprinted towards them.

John fired a burst of gunfire up along the center of the man’s chest into his head.

The man’s throat ruptured, his jaw dislocated, and his face was reduced to a bloody pulp. He stumbled backwards and collapsed against the wall, leaving a bloody streak as he slid down onto the carpet.

John ran out into the upstairs hallway with Rebecca on his heels.

A woman in a pink nightgown and curling pins in her hair bounded to the top of the staircase.

John shot the woman pointblank in the forehead, splattering the family photographs on the wall with black blood.

The woman flung backwards and tumbled down the stairs, knocking over three others who were following behind her.

John and Rebecca sprinted down the stairs before the infected had a chance to get back on their feet. The couple fired aimlessly into the foyer as more infected ran through the breached front door.

A police officer on the stairs stood up and tried grabbing John, but John pushed the officer over the banister.

The officer landed headfirst against the hardwood floor below. His skull split open like a rotten watermelon and slathered the floor with tarry gore.

At the bottom of the staircase, John fired into the crowd that had gathered around the doorway and blocked their escape.

The infected men and women jolted with each shot and fell into lifeless heaps on the floor.