Run (Book 2): The Crossing (10 page)

14

It was early afternoon, ten miles south of I-80 in central Nebraska when an A10 Thunderbolt screamed over the heads of the mission team. Joe the puppy had started whining, and Anna had needed to pee, so now Rick and Androwski had their backs to her while she took care of business behind a small trading post in the middle of what seemed like a million miles of corn fields. Joe was running around happily near them. Androwski had forbidden anyone to go into the restrooms, as there was a bloody hand print on the men’s room door.

Rick was staring up at the noise, but the SEAL had dived on to the ground and covered his head. He looked up into Anna’s eyes. She was squatting with her pants around her ankles. “Like the view?”

Androwski looked in all directions. “Fuckin’ Warthog!”

Anna stood and pulled her pants up. “I didn’t think I was that ugly.”

“What? No! No, no, no, the plane! The plane is called a Warthog.”

She stuck her bottom lip out in mock despair. “I never did go to prom…”

Androwski stood and brushed himself off. “Dammit, he must have seen us. Stark! Anything on comms?”

“Negative sir, no chatter.”

“Keep monitoring, and let me know if anybody else is out there.”

“Copy.”

Two helicopters, a blue and white Channel 8 traffic copter and a military Blackhawk followed shortly after the jet. The traffic chopper slowed and looked down at them for the briefest of moments, but then continued after the other aircraft to the south.

Dallas, Seyfert, and Chris came out of the trading post, arms laden with appropriated foodstuffs, and staring into the sky. Dallas had a full Native American headdress on, the faux white feathers blowing in the warm Nebraska wind. Seyfert was chewing on a Slim Jim. “Place is a gold mine, Chief, tons of packaged goodies. Maybe—”

A huge explosion shut Seyfert up mid-sentence. The blast was far off to the south, but that was the direction they had intended to head. A massive mushroom cloud of fire erupted a hundred or so feet into the air, and the team felt the wind and heat from the blast a few moments later. Even from the two or three mile distance away that they were, they could tell that the cornfields were ablaze.

Androwski and Seyfert looked at each other wide-eyed. “Jesus, they dropped a Hades.”

“Is that a nuke?” Chris demanded in a panicked voice.

“No, but almost,” Seyfert answered while still looking at the conflagration. “It’s a bad-ass MOAB full of napalm-like stuff that they can ignite by remote control. Everything within half a mile of that detonation just reached about a thousand degrees. It will burn for days. Weeks if all the corn goes.”

Dallas took the headdress off. “Well, I’m pretty damn happy that we wasn’t a mile further south.”

“Agreed. I wonder if they knew we were here and dropped anyway.”

“We’re alive, so I don’t give a shit about any of that,” Androwski said. “What worries me is why they would drop ordnance like that here. The only thing I can think of is that there were a shitload of Limas over there, and we’re only a couple of miles away. Button up, we’re out. And Dallas, that ridiculous thing is not coming in my LAV.”

Chris came down the LAV ramp empty-handed. “One more trip into the store?”

Androwski nodded, “Yeah, I’ll come with.”

When they had loaded their booty of canned goods and bottled liquids, they pushed on. The lieutenant decided that they would go north. Directly east was out of the question as Androwski didn’t want to meet up with this other group of survivors near Lincoln. He thought they might get conscripted into whatever rag-tag military operation was in this part of the country, and his commanding officer had given him specific orders to do no such thing.

Four hours north, and they shifted east again, on Route 20. This route would keep them a hundred twenty miles north of the Lincoln area, and hopefully out of sight of prying eyes.

No contact had been attempted from the group with the air support, but the message from the Triumvirate was broadcast on all frequencies every half hour. The signal was significantly stronger than it had been in Wyoming.

After two hours of flatlands and small farming towns heading north, it was back into the corn again. Both sides of the road had three meter stalks as far as the eye could see, which was about twenty feet into the yellow vegetation. An hour east, and they came upon a crossroads in the waning daylight. Half a mile north of them was a farmhouse.

Chris looked longingly at the large house. “I could sure use some sleep in a bed, a real bed.”

“We all could,” agreed Androwski. “Stark, let’s recon that homestead.”

The LAV turned northward and they circled the farmhouse and huge barn before parking in the dirt driveway. The recon went smoothly. Chris, Seyfert, and Rick checked out the house, while Dallas, Anna, and Androwski looked into the barn. The house was locked up tight, with boarded windows on the lower floor. Repeated knocks on the door yielded nothing from the inside. The barn wasn’t an animal barn, but housed a huge green combine harvester and big dump truck. Various other farming equipment adorned the walls and hung from hooks all over the place. Two fifty-five gallon drums of diesel fuel were found as well. The loft was empty except for a desk with a small computer and a dead man. He had taken his life with a shotgun, and there wasn’t much left to see. There was a photograph with a pretty woman in a floral print dress and two little blonde girls clutched in his decaying hand. Androwski said not to touch anything, and they left the man in peace.

Seyfert reported the locked house to Androwski. “Three doors, front, back, and bulkhead to the basement. Bulkhead is the strongest, it’s made out of steel. Back door is the weakest, flimsy wooden thing, but it’s braced from the inside. Front door is solid oak, also braced. That window,” he pointed to an open window on the second floor, “looks to be our best way in without destroying the barricades.”

“Okay then, you and I are on point. Chris, Anna, back in the LAV. Rick, Dallas, cover our six while we get in. We’ll recon and let you know if it’s safe. Stark, button up. If a hundred Limas come out of the corn, I want you to lead them away then get back here to pick us up.”

“Copy.”

Ten minutes later, a different window opened up on the second floor and a roll-out fire ladder tumbled down, and the lieutenant stuck his head out. “It’s clear. The barricades are so well built that I think we should come and go through the upper floor. Bring the sniper rifles.”

The civilians climbed the ladder and entered the house with Seyfert’s help, passing their weaponry in first. They looked around at a child’s bedroom, immaculate, with a Littlest Pets bed spread, and picture books on shelves on the wall. AMY’S ROOM was on the front of the open door, neatly printed in block letters on yellow construction paper. Pictures of SpongeBob torn from magazines, and some other cartoon characters nobody knew adorned the door as well.

Androwski was sitting on the bed, rubbing his face in his hands, “Rick, you and the civvies will stay in the house with Seyfert. Stark and I will bunk in the LAV. Try to keep the noise down, and no lights on without the windows covered.”

“Ain’t you gonna sleep in a bed for once?” Dallas demanded.

“Somebody has to stay in the LAV, and I don’t want anybody alone while we sleep.”

“Fair enough. I’ll bunk with Stark when we get to the next Motel 6.”

“Thanks, Dallas. There’s a full cupboard downstairs, and the gas is still working in the stove, so a hot meal is in order. I want a guard at all times just in case, two hours each ought to do it. We’ll leave by zero nine hundred, after a good breakfast. Oh, and the basement door is locked, and we couldn’t find a key, so we pushed a table and the fridge up against it. Nothing will get in without making a shit-ton of noise, and the back bulkhead is secure. Feel free to explore, but nobody goes anywhere alone except the armed guard, not even to the bathroom. Take whoever is on guard with you if you gotta pee. Now let’s get cooking, I want to get some food to Stark, and get him a shower if the water’s working. Poor bastard hasn’t been out of that LAV except to piss in two weeks.”

“I heard that!” came a tinny voice from the radio.

“Dibs on the shower,” Anna said with a yawn.

Shouldering his shotgun, the big southerner volunteered his services. “I’ll cook us up some vittles then.”

Rick looked at him in mock surprise. “Hillbillies can cook?”

“Yeah, ribs n’ brisket are my specialties, but yer probly gettin’ soup tonight Hoss.”

“Everybody should get some quality rack,” Androwski said. “Remember the lights and noise. There isn’t a town for fifteen miles, but who knows what’s around.”

15

Androwski woke with a start as Stark shook him gently. He woke confused, which was unlike him. Normally he would spring up like a cat and be instantly awake, as his SEAL training kicked in, but two weeks on the road had taken their toll.

After the civvies had eaten, he had brought out some soup and boiled corn on the cob for him and Stark. They had eaten and then stretched out on the benches in the LAV for a night’s rest. Now Stark had his hand on his superior’s mouth and was
shhhh-
ing him. Androwski nodded and sat up rubbing his right eye with his palm. Stark pointed at the thermals on one of the monitors.

Dozens of undead were streaming out of the corn.

“Fuck me.” The chief looked at his watch and calculated who would be on guard at the current time, four forty one AM. “Dallas, don’t answer me, just listen. There are Limas on station. They’re pouring out of the fields. We can’t tell how many, but it looks like a hundred or more. Wake everybody up, but don’t make a sound. I don’t want you to look out the windows either. Click your radio twice if you copy.”

The radio squelched twice.

“Wake Seyfert first, then everybody else. Don’t let them speak. If we keep quiet, the Limas might pass us by.”

In the house, Dallas stood from his armchair at the top of the stairs on the second floor. His size thirteens didn’t make a sound as he trod lightly to the first bedroom. The door was wide open, and Chris and Anna were asleep in a queen size bed. He moved past them and went to the second room, where Seyfert was sleeping in a kid’s bed. The SEAL was fully dressed, with his boots on. As Dallas made his way into the dark room, he heard the all too familiar sound of the hammer clicking back on a pistol. “Speak or I shoot you in the face,” came an unmistakable New Jersey accent.

“It’s me, Dallas, an’ keep your voice down. Ya boss just tole me there’s pus bags outside, tons of em. He said ta keep quiet, an’ they might move on, but he wants ever-body up in case they don’t.”

Seyfert sat up quickly, his voice an almost imperceptible whisper, “I’ll wake Chris and Anna, you go get Rick.”

Dallas nodded and moved out of the room. Soon all five survivors were huddled in the master bedroom, speaking in hushed voices and armed to the teeth.

“So we just sit here and hope?” demanded Anna.

Seyfert turned his palms up. “What do you wanna do? Make a break for it? What if there’s a thousand of them out there, we can’t see through drapes!”

Rick put his hand on Anna’s shoulder. “Relax, both of you.” He looked at Seyfert. “We sit tight and hold out. First thing is we stop talking unless absolutely necessary, and remember, whispers carry farther than low voices.” Rick pointed toward Dallas’s radio and motioned for it with his fingers. Dallas handed it over.

“Androwski, you copy? How many?”

“At least a hundred. I can’t figure out where they came from. I can see them on the thermals. One came close, and he looked burned. Maybe there was a…hold on…” Stark pointed toward one of the dead people on the monitor. While the others around it kept moving past the house and the LAV and down the road, this one had stopped and was looking at the house, his mouth impossibly wide open. He walked to the house and put his hand on it. His other hand followed suit, and it looked as if he were pushing. He looked left, right, and up, then he reared his right hand back and slapped the siding. He did it again and again, then started using two hands. Other undead had stopped to see what the ruckus was all about.

“Androwski, what the hell is that?”

“You have an admirer, now keep quiet.”

The dead man continued to smack the house, and an obese woman in a flowered mu mu decided to join him. They stood next to each other playing patty-cake with the clapboards. A young woman also came to the party and soon there were six, with more coming. In the LAV, Stark pointed to the starboard side monitor, and Androwski saw that some of the dead that had walked past them were starting to return.

“This got fucked up fast. Rick, put Seyfert on.”

“Sir?”

“Looks like these sons of bitches either know you’re in there, or they just got lucky. The whole troupe is coming back, and there’s still more coming out of the fields.”

Seyfert’s steadfast voice came back. “Orders?”

“Shit. Sit tight, we’ll try to draw them away like we did at the airport. Barricade the stairway, and if they get in retreat to the roof.

“Solid copy, sir, good luck. Did everybody get that?” Nods all around. “As quietly as possible, bring some stuff out here to block the stairs with.”

“Damn son, I dunno if that’ll even slow ‘em down.”

“I’m out of options here, Dallas, what are you thinking?”

“There’s a chainsaw downstairs, fulla gas. Guy musta used it to cut the boards for the windows.”

“You want to go out there with a chainsaw and eviscerate them like Freddy Kruger?”

“I dunno who that is, but no. I was think’n more like we cut them stairs out so they can’t get up.”

“That…that’s a good idea. Of course the second they hear that thing fire up, they’ll know for certain we’re in here.”

“Don’t’ think that matters none. They’s poundin’ now, sounds like a Baptist Revival out there. They’s gonna get in”

A deep diesel growl outside indicated the LAV had come to life, and then the moaning and hissing began. The pounding stopped almost immediately, as focus was directed toward the machine. The living dead did not operate machinery, and even though they had only the basest of brain functions, they knew that when a vehicle started, a meal was close. They didn’t reason this, hypothesize, or calculate it, they just knew.

Androwski’s voice came over the comms. “We’re moving out. Be ready, we’ll come back as soon as we can.”

As the engine noise faded in the distance, the group in the farmhouse took stock of their situation. “Suddenly I’m feelin’ a mite anxious, with no tank around me.”

“I hear that, hillbilly, douse the lights, I want to recon the exterior.” They all turned off their tac-lights, and Chris turned off the electric lantern that they were using. Seyfert made his way to the window in the master bedroom, and pulled the corner of the comforter they had strung up to keep the light in. He released the curtain, backed up and looked at his shoes.

Dallas strode forward and moved the drape slightly himself. He turned and looked at the rest of the group, “Jumpin’ Jesus but there’s a lotta dead folks out there.”

Anna looked anxious as well. “How many?”

“More’n fifty probly. I seen this movie, it don’t go too good for them folks in the farmhouse.”

“I saw it too,” Seyfert said. “
They
didn’t have any of these.” He produced his suppressed MP5SD3. “Stay away from the windows.” He immediately removed the tac-light from his weapon and put it in his mouth. He put the rifle on the bed, where he began to field strip it. He produced a small leather case from his web gear.

“What the hell’re you doin’?”

“Cleaning my baby. You might want to do the same.”

“Cleanin’ it now?”

“Better
before
they get in than after. Getting that chainsaw now might save our lives. I would be quiet about it too.” As if they read his mind, the things outside began to slap on the side of the house again.

“How do they know we’re in here?” Rick whispered.

“Maybe they don’t,” Seyfert said as he pulled a long spring from the slide and slid a round bristle brush into it. “Maybe they just want a bed to sleep in, or to admire the furnishings,” he mused, blowing down the length of the spring. “It doesn’t matter, they want in and they’re extremely unfriendly, so we prepare as much as we can. Dallas, the chainsaw?”

Dallas hurried off, and Chris went with him. Rick watched them go and then turned to Seyfert. “So the plan is we saw out the stairs and wait for the LAV to get back?”

“I am certainly open to intelligent suggestions should you have any.”

“Well I was thinking…”

Seyfert clicked something together, pulled the slide back and sighted on a picture of an apple on the wall. “Yeah?”

“What if they don’t come back?”

“Then we escape, and meet them at the next rendezvous point in Iowa. And if they don’t show in twelve hours, we consider and move on to the next rendezvous point, and so on. We’ll leave coded messages at each point, or receive them should the LAV get there first. I’m hoping they come back, because I like the safety of that tin can.”

Seyfert looked to his right and noticed Dallas and Chris approaching with their newly appropriated Stihl Farm Boss chainsaw. “I’m a fan,” Dallas whispered with a smirk.

“The second you pull on that cord, they’re going to go apeshit out there.”

“They’re already somethin’ apey. Now I’m a big fella. Y’all gonna be able to haul me up when there ain’t no more stairs? I ain’t gon’ get et!”

“Big is one word for it, hillbilly. Chris, you ever use a chainsaw before?”

“Nope, but I’m ready.”

Dallas instructed Chris on the use of the machine. They all looked at each other, and Chris set the choke. He pulled on the cord rapidly four times, and the engine sputtered. He set the choke again, then tugged once and the thing came to life. It was loud. He ran down the stairs and started cutting through the wooden railing. In thirty seconds, he hit the far wall, and sheetrock dust filled the air. “You gotta get the stringers underneath!” Dallas yelled to him. Chris looked confused. “Dammit!” the big southerner yelled and stomped down the stairs. He bent down and literally ripped up two of the sawn-through stair treads with his bare hands. “That Z lookin’ thing there!” Chris nodded and sawed through the two-by-twelve quickly. He was moving on to the second one when Dallas noticed a zombie round the corner from the kitchen. The thing couldn’t be seen from upstairs, and Chris was still sawing, so he couldn’t hear Dallas’s warning shouts immediately. Feeling the fool for leaving his shotgun upstairs, Dallas tapped Chris on the shoulder and pointed behind him. The stairs started to shudder.

Chris turned around and saw the threat. He released the trigger on the saw and started up the stairs. He dropped the saw when the lower stairs collapsed, but Dallas grabbed him by the shirt and pulled the pin-wheeling kid up. They paused, exchanging relieved glances when the upper part of the stairway collapsed with a crash, sending them both sprawling back into the foyer in a cloud of dust.

The dead woman that approached them was by no means alone, and Chris looked at a dozen dead faces as he lay on his back. He pulled his sidearm and fired as he stood, his ears still ringing from the chainsaw and the crash. A strange calm came over him as he fired again and again. He glanced at Dallas, but the big man wasn’t moving. Chris kicked him as he continued to fire. Seyfert, Rick, and Anna were screaming something at him, but he was in the zone, scoring headshots. He kicked Dallas a few times and the man stirred.

Seyfert was reaching for him, yelling for him to leave Dallas and climb up.

Chris didn’t look at him, but reloaded and continued to fire. The things were closing, and as they came into view, Rick and Anna began shooting into the crowd from above. Dallas came to, but was groggy. There was a lull in dead people coming from the kitchen area, and Chris did something insane. He left Dallas and ran into the kitchen. A single shot echoed through the house, and Chris returned to see Dallas getting up. “Give me your hand!” Seyfert was screaming to Dallas, but Chris had company. “No time!” He grabbed Dallas and the both of them disappeared into the front room. The zombies followed. A few moaning-filled minutes passed, Rick and Anna terrified for their friends, then Chris was on the radio.

“We broke the lock off of the basement door and came down. The door is barred from this side, but it won’t hold for long. I can hear them pounding.”

Seyfert pounded the bed with his fist. “Shit! Shit! Shit!” He sat on the bed and put his head in his hands, trying to think over the incessant hissing and growling. He raised his head and looked at his two compatriots, “Okay, this is what’s going to happen, and I don’t want to hear shit out of anybody about it, especially the words
suicide
, or
in vain
. Anna, you drop the ladder out the back window again when I tell you, and cover it. I don’t think these things can climb, but if they do, get them off of the ladder. Use your knife if they get close to you, and shoot them only as a last resort. Rick, you and I are going to the front windows, we’re going to provide a diversion.”

“What diversion?”

“I’ll take care of it. You’re going to cover me. Use one of the rifles if you need to. Chris, Dallas, do you copy?”

“We’re here.”

“Anna is going to call you when the back yard clears, I’m going to divert the Limas such that this can happen. When she calls you, you open that bulkhead and run for the ladder, it’s only fifteen feet or so from the bulkhead. When you get out of the basement, hang a right and get up that ladder like a pack of hungry zombies were chasing you.”

“Dallas says he’s dizzy.”

“Dallas deals with his dizziness or you both die. Any questions?”

“No, sir.”