Six Feet From Hell: Unity: 6FFH Book #5 (14 page)

CHAPTER
14

April 18, 2022 – 1415 Hours

Balboa quickly learned that horses were not meant for high-speed pursuit. It was clear after the initial kick to the flanks that Beefcake was not meant to be a thoroughbred racing horse, too. He was by no means a small man, but the horse was protesting the combination of speed and weight that he was now forced to tote along. Bounding along, the horse didn’t fail him, though. He kept his body low, and his head raised a bit to see if smoke would start to roll out of the center of town. After thirty seconds of looking, he began to wonder what caused the gigantic boom if not an explosion. As Beefcake thundered forward, desperately trying to keep up with Larry and Kody riding Flex, Balboa began to run through what exactly was going on inside the walls of Tazewell. He didn’t have to wait long.

“
…near the jail. Wait five…
” The radio on his tactical vest crackled, cutting out before he could adequately obtain any useful information. Gripping the reins with his left hand, he grabbed the radio with his right.

“Repeat!
We can’t copy!”

Silence.

He hastily stuffed the radio back onto his vest. “Larry! Get on the horn to Joe! I think he wants us to head towards the jail and wait!” He yelled at Larry, hoping the sound of his voice could be heard over the clopping of the horses.

Larry
did hear Balboa’s hollering. The radios they used didn’t have the best range on them, and didn’t fare well for battery life, either. Even now as they were nearing the edge of town, he could not hear anything on it.

“Joe!
Curtis! Anybody copy?” Larry’s heart began to race as fast as the steed he rode as they came up to the wall. They approached the jail from the outside the wall, unable to avoid the massive building for the route they had traveled. Main Street ended at the jail and its sally port, the only effective way of getting inside. The door to outside the wall was locked, but Larry was one of the few people that had the key to get in. They stopped a few dozen yards away from the wall and dismounted.

A
pair of shots rang out in rapid succession.

Larry
fumbled for his keys as he swiftly approached the jail door. He grabbed the radio off his belt and tossed it to Kody. Kody caught it, a puzzled look across his face.

“Get
hold of somebody while I get this thing open. Joe, Curtis, and Rick all have radios.”

Kody
nodded and keyed up the radio. “Uh, anyone copy?”

“
Larry? Is that you?
” Joe’s voice came across the tinny speaker.

“Yeah,
I mean, I’m
with
Larry. This is Kody, dude. I’m at the jail with Larry. We are trying to get inside as we speak. We heard you say to get near the jail,” Kody said, unsure how to proceed. “Um, over.”

“
No! Do not go near the jail! We haven’t had a breach, someone from inside the town started this, and I think it started either at or near the jail. We are rounding up some people to head that way, but we need to make sure the jail is clear first. Do you think the jail is secure
?”

Larry
finally managed to get the door to the jail open, swinging the heavy door open and motioning for the radio. Kody tossed it to him. Larry caught and keyed it up in one swift motion. “Balboa, Kody, and I are fixin’ to get inside and find out. We will clear it out; get the people safe and get them here, pronto. Did you get the boys and Paige?”

“
Yes we did, they are safe and sound. We are with Rick and Curtis at the motel rounding up some more people. I don’t have a location on Jamie or Cornbread, though. I thought I had Cornbread on the radio, but haven’t seen ‘em. Have you guys seen or heard anything from them?
”

Larry
swallowed hard. Cornbread was at the stable with the horses when they left, close to the jail. He wasn’t sure where Jamie was at, further unsettling him. “No. I haven’t seen or heard anything from either one of them. We don’t have enough daylight to go looking for ‘em right now, either. Just get your ass over here to the jail, and we will go from there. Copy?”

“
Shit. I copy, Larry. We will be leaving the motel in just a few more minutes. Clear the jail; we will be along to assist shortly
.” The stress and worry that Joe felt was evident in his voice, even across the radio’s small speaker. Larry tossed the radio back to Kody.

“What
the hell was that big explosion, Joe? We heard it on the way back to town. Is everyone alright from that? Any injuries?” Kody asked.

There
was a long pause. Joe wasn’t proud of the fact that he had plowed down the wall. “
Yeah, about that. We had to crash the wall down to get into town. We didn’t know what was going on, but it sounded like some serious shit going down
.”

Larry’s
eyes quickly widened. “He did
what
?”

“Joe
said that they had to crash the…” Kody started to say.

“Rhetorical
question, Kody!” Larry fumed. “Shit! Why the hell would they do that?”

“As
bad as it sounded, I’m sure they wanted to get in and help. They did what they had to do under the circumstances.” Kody shrugged. As bad as it sounded from their end of town, it was reasonable to assume that Joe heard the same, albeit much closer.

Survival
instinct was a pain in the ass sometimes. You did what you had to do to make sure that as many lives were saved as humanly possible, but at an expense sometimes.

Larry
motioned for Balboa and Kody to follow. He was incredibly pissed, but he had a job to do as well. As much as he didn’t want to, he needed to clear the jail, post haste. He clipped the radio back onto his belt and drew his sidearm, a timeworn SIG/Sauer 9mm. He pulled the slide back, ensuring there was a round in the chamber. The golden glint of brass let him know it was ready. He turned to Balboa and Kody.

“Balboa,
I know you have a sidearm. Kody, what do you have?”

Kody
grinned. He reached behind his back, into his waistband, and pulled out a Colt 1911 .45. He looked at the gunmetal gray pistol longingly. “I
always
have this one on me. My 1911 Rail Gun never leaves my side.”

“Good
enough. How many mags do you have for it?”

“One
in it, and one extra. Not a whole hell of a lot, but I suppose it’ll have to do. Self-preservation has a way of keeping one’s…”

“Don’t
get all philosophical on me right now, Kody. We ain’t got the time for that shit,” Larry interrupted.

Kody
shrugged. “Fair enough.”

Larry
turned and peered into the dark doorway. The lack of light made it difficult to see anything past the entry. No movement, and no sound greeted him; he took that as a good sign. The less that was in his way right now, the better. There were already several more locked doors between him and the other side of the wall, not to mention they needed to lock and secure each door behind him. It was a tedious task that he did not envy, but it had to be done. There were more questions than answers now, but the fact of the matter was the jail needed to be secured. The fact that they had an idea of what was going on was an unusual luxury, and one that would not be wasted. Joe had told him that thought the breach had come from
inside
the town, and that it may have originated at the jail. If he was right, then there was a likely possibility there were undead in and around the jail, inside the town, and other random areas. Too much to do, and less time to do it in.

Larry
brought up his SIG, aimed eye-level, and took a deep breath.

“Here
goes nothing.”

* * *

Three hundred and sixty degrees of protection guarded the LMTV and the Dodge Ram. Joe and the rest of his crew kept their rifles at low ready, constantly scanning the area for more hostiles. There was an unsettling sound of moans and the occasional choked gurgling coming from all around them. The growls were close by, but did not get any louder, as if the dead were taunting them, waiting for them to step out of line, ready to snatch up the unsuspecting. The moans however, were steadily getting louder, building up like a storm of macabre sound. It was eerie and very unnerving; it felt ominous, hanging over the group like a fog.

Joe
slowly walked away from the back of the LMTV. There was something amiss, something he couldn’t put his finger on, but he could
feel.
As he stepped away from the back of the truck, he looked towards the end of the road. The street they were on ended at the wall, and then made a left turn back towards the chow hall. The gaping hole in the wall was less than a hundred yards away from there. Joe made a mental note to park the LMTV in front of the hole and try to keep it secure as possible. Even though the threat had most likely came from inside the walls, the problem would be dealt with and the town would hopefully regain some normalcy with little interruption to everyday life. He hated losing even one person, but he was afraid there would be more casualties before it was all said and done. They would go to the jail – after Larry and the others had cleared it – and hole up for a little while, at least for the night. It would all blow over soon enough, with any luck.

A
single zombie shuffled forward at the end of the street, about a hundred yards away.

Joe
raised his rifle. He didn’t want to take the shot, even though it would be an easy takedown, but he did want to keep an eye on the singular zombie. It moved slowly, much slower than the few that they’d seen so far in town. It hadn’t been recently turned. It was from outside the wall.

Shit.

Joe stood for a moment, anchored to one spot, and watched, as one zombie became two, two became three, and then a deluge of undead began to turn the corner. Even though they moved slowly, it seemed as if they all poured in at once. Fixated on the end of the road, he didn’t hear Rick and Captain White yell for him. He was stuck, unable to move. It took him a few moments to pull the ACOG from his eye. A thousand ideas ran through his head, and it was not the time for most of them. All he needed to do right now was get his people to safety.

“
Hey! Shit-for-brains! We’re ready to move out!” Captain White yelled from the front of the Ram, nearly ready to get in the vehicle. White held out his arms in a
what the fuck
manner, waiting for Joe to rejoin the conversation. He rapped his knuckles on the bed of the truck, another vain attempt to get Joe’s attention. It didn’t work the second time, either. Rick looked down from the bed of the truck and shrugged. White returned the gesture, unsure why Joe wasn’t moving.

Joe
couldn’t help it; he was stricken with a combination of fear and anger. How dare the zombies traipse into their town? How dare they intrude on their protected life?

A
hand on the backside of his head snapped him out of the daydream. Joe spun around, meeting Captain White’s gaze. White had a wry grin, until he noticed what Joe was seeing, now less than seventy-five yards down the road. The swarm of undead turned from a trickle to a steady stream, with several dozen zombies within a hundred yards of them. His grin turned dour.

“Damn.”
It was all he could manage. “Fuckers probably heard us crash the gate. All the goddamned noise in town must’ve drawn ‘em here. There’s no way in hell that’s the horde from the tunnel.”

Joe
started backpedaling. “Yeah. That’s what I thought too.” He grabbed White as he backed up. “Get in the truck, Captain. We need to get the fuck out of here.”

White
paused. “We can take these. We have more than enough ammo in the LMTV to get the job done. Between the M4’s and the .50 cal, we have plenty.” He raised his M4 to take a shot.

Joe
swatted the rifle back down. “No. We get these people to safety first. We can’t go off half-cocked with no plan and no backup. We get to the jail, make sure it’s safe, unload these people, and wait until morning. We only have a few hours of daylight left, less than that considering its overcast. So, let’s roll to the jail.”

Again,
White didn’t agree with Joe’s assessment of the situation, but he didn’t protest. He lowered the rifle all the way down, and then slung it over his shoulder.

“Alright,
you’re the boss. I think we need to take ‘em out while they are all grouped together. If we wait until morning, the whole goddamned town is gonna crawl with zombies.”

“That
can’t be helped. Get in the truck, White. We gotta roll.”

White
cursed under his breath, but made his way to the passenger’s side of the Dodge nonetheless. Boyd was standing at the driver’s side. Joe gave him thumbs up, and then climbed into the passenger’s side of the LMTV. He took one last look back before ducking into the truck. The mass of zombies wasn’t getting any larger, but they still made a formidable sized force. White was right; tomorrow, the town would be crawling with zombies. He couldn’t worry about that right now; he had to get his people to safety first. The undead could wait until morning.