The Dead Don't Bleed: Part 2, The Aftermath (9 page)

"Come on!" Calvin shouted as he raced across the wooden deck and took the stairs to the backyard two at a time. Doug had barely ran fifty yards since they had left the second floor bedroom and already he had to take a couple seconds to steady himself at the top of the stairs. Miranda would have none of it though, she came along behind him, grabbed him roughly by the back of his arm and pushed him towards the backyard.

Calvin reached the corner of the house and paused to peek around the side before rushing out into the open ground between the two houses. "Shit", he exclaimed loudly as he jumped back several feet into the backyard, his rifle coming up to firing position as he moved.

Two zombies crossed the threshold at the corner of the house
just seconds after Calvin jumped clear, he had looked around the corner and found himself only inches from the outstretched hands of one in particularly gruesome looking specimen. The man was wearing only the tattered remains of some type of work shirt that partially covered his right shoulder and chest, long jagged wounds stretched from the bottom of what remained of the shirt down his belly and across his midsection where the pants sagged down and exposed most of his crotch. Two of the wounds across his stomach had penetrated deep enough to expose his intestines, at least two feet of which were dangling out from the opening and bouncing almost comically against his midsection. His left arm was missing from a point just below the elbow, several inches of jagged bone jutting out until reaching a sharp point at the tip giving the impression of a thin sword. From head to toe he was covered in drying mud and grime as if he had spent the last several days wallowing in the dirt. When Garrett saw him and his condition he had the impression that the man may have been run over by a lawn mower or some similar type of equipment with hazardous components. He was coming on fast towards Calvin, his face set in a mask of determination, his teeth bared and snarling in anticipation of fresh meat nearby. Concentrating intently on Calvin he did not notice the others running from the back porch towards the corner of the house and he continued running past quickly closing the distance on Calvin. Wheeling backwards as fast as he could while bringing his rifle up to his shoulder, Calvin's first short burst of gunfire was low and wide, stitching a line of flying dirt in the ground just past the two zombies racing towards him. The recoil from the shots along with his unsteady backward motion through him off balance and sent him wheeling to the ground where he slid backwards another three feet on his ass.

Garrett raised his rifle to get off a shot at the one armed zombie, just as he was about to squeeze the trigger
, Doug's head bobbed directly into his line of sight as he skidded to a halt several yards short of the corner of the house. Cursing to himself, he kept the rifle up and ready as he sidestepped to his left looking for a clear line of sight. Before he could get into position, three shots rang out in rapid succession, one round striking the half armed zombie in his shoulder while the other two impacted perfectly in a tight shot group around his ear. The head jerked to the side as its contents exploded from the exit wound on the opposite side and coated the second zombie with a generous slathering of rotting brain and bone fragments. Garrett glanced away from the sight picture down his barrel and saw Miranda standing a few feet away from him in an almost picture perfect shooters stance, the pistol in her hand was already sweeping towards the second zombie. Before she could fire again, Calvin got off a well-aimed burst from his rifle and turned the creatures head into a tangled mess of unrecognizable slush as the body flipped over backwards and slammed to the ground.

"That was fun." Calvin said as he leapt to his feet and turned towards Miranda, "thanks."

Genuine gratitude was evident on his face, another couple seconds and that zombie would have been close enough to pounce on him and they all knew that all it took was a single bite and it was game over. Miranda gave him a broad smile in return but said nothing as she continued to sweep the pistol around, readying herself in case another zombie was coming up close behind those first two.

"More company coming,
we gotta go." Calvin exclaimed. Being closer to the edge of the house he had the best view towards the front of the property. He punctuated his statement with a long steady burst of automatic fire at targets just out of sight from the rest of them.

"Garrett, look out!" Miranda suddenly shouted as she swung her pistol towards him causing him to duck to one side thinking she was about to fire off a round close to him. As he moved he caught a flash of motion only a handful of steps behind him, but before he could fully focus on it Miranda had let loose two rounds. The next thing he saw was another zombie dropping to the ground with a fresh hole through its chest as well as a
bull’s-eye into the bridge of the nose. Garrett realized that the zombies he had spotted crossing the yard of the house on the other side of them had covered the entire distance of both back yards much faster than he had anticipated and were now just feet away from him and coming hard. Miranda had expertly dispatched the closest one to him and given him an extra second to react. Continuing to move to the side to make himself a moving target and to split the attention of the remaining two, he fired from the hip as he slid away from Miranda and Doug. Most of the rounds from that first burst scored what on any normal person would have been effective kill shots across their torsos. In this the case his shots served to only spin the zombies slightly along with the kinetic energy of the heavy 7.62mm shells, but were not enough to stop their approach. One zombie took the bait and followed as Garrett led it in a direction away from the others but the second one continued its relentless approach and was already within ten feet of Miranda and Doug but Garrett couldn't get a clear shot on that one with the other one blocking the way.

"CALVIN!" He called out even as he adjusted him aim for a headshot.

Two rifles blasted at the same time, Garrett ending the zombie in front of him with a pair of rounds through its face while a longer sustained burst from further behind him blasted a string of rounds at knee level. Calvin had chosen to go for the legs instead of taking a risk at missing the head. The gamble paid off as half a dozen heavy slugs pummeled the zombie’s legs, both knees were completely shattered and the legs instantly lost their ability to support the body sending the zombie sprawling face first onto the ground just five feet short of Doug. Even as it hit the ground it started crawling forward at an unbelievable pace in a desperate bid to reach Doug who had already trapped himself beside the large air conditioning unit and the back of the house leaving him trapped and almost within lunging distance of the zombie. Garrett couldn't risk a shot from his location for fear of hitting Doug and Calvin's aim was now blocked by the large air conditioning unit. Miranda realized the predicament and whirled around towards the zombie. Running up behind it she spread her legs wide, placed one to either side of its body and positioned herself directly over its back. Without a moment’s hesitation she fired a single shot dead center into the back of the zombies head and blew its brains out through a ragged hole in its face.

"Move! More coming from out front!" Calvin shouted to the rest of the group as he slammed home a fresh magazine into his rifle and resumed laying down a lane of suppressing fire into the front yard.

Garrett darted past Miranda and grabbed Doug by the arm pulling him out of the small corner he had backed himself into besides the house. Garrett shoved Doug out in front of him and towards the yard between Cameron's home and his own. "Lead the way Doug, don't stop for anything." He glanced over towards Miranda who nodded her understanding that he wanted her to continue looking after the man and make sure that he kept moving forward.

As Garrett rounded the house he saw exactly what Calvin was dealing with in the front lawn, the number of zombies had swollen to somewhere in the twenties as they
raced towards them from points all over the neighborhood. The gunfire now attracting them like moths to a flame. Garrett ran a few feet past Calvin and then took up a position alongside him and added his own controlled and measured fire into the mix. Together they were knocking down zombies like bowling pins one after the other, but more and more kept appearing from different directions in front of the house and with each one or two they knocked down the ones behind managed to get even closer before they could adjust their aim onto them. Miranda and Doug passed behind them taking the lead towards Doug's house. First Calvin and then Garrett dropped out of the two man rank they had formed and continued following Doug's lead turning every few seconds to blast away at any zombies that managed to get too close. After his rifle clicked on an empty chamber for the second time since they had left the back door of the house, Garrett started to worry that they were burning through their available ammo at an alarming rate. Between the two of them he guessed they had another three full magazines, Miranda would have the few rounds remaining in her pistol and one additional full reload. There was more ammo back at the Ranger's station but they still needed to get all of them safely there and even then what they had stored there might be all that they would be able to get their hands on. Calvin clearly had not come to the same conclusion as his rate of fire continued as if they had a never ending supply of rounds. Every time he pulled the trigger it was for at least a count of two, sending out anywhere from four to five rounds at a time while the weapon was set to full automatic. Garrett switched the selector on his own rifle to semi, which would only fire one round with each pull of the trigger.

"Conserve ammo Calvin! Three mags left." He shouted in between their combined shots.

Garrett punctuated the point with two well-aimed shots one closely after the other resulting in dual headshots and two less zombies out of the countless millions still hungrily roaming the world. Calvin caught on to his message and followed his lead in switching to a slower rate of fire. While this method forced them to take more care in their aim and resulted in a higher ratio of kill per shot, it also slowed down the time it took between hits and was allowing the zombies to start getting even closer.

"GARRETT!!" Miranda shouted from somewhere behind him and off to his right.

Turning to dash forward another few feet before swinging back to face the zombies coming up behind them he saw what Miranda was yelling about. At least fifteen more zombies were racing up Doug's driveway and across the front of his lawn and threatening to cut them off from his house. He saw that Miranda and Doug had just finished forcing their way through the row of hedges between the two houses and that Miranda was pushing Doug by the back forcing him to try and run faster. He caught sight of Doug's face and saw his mouth opening and closing rapidly as he struggled to catch his breath while his face was turning dark red from a level of exertion that his body was totally unaccustomed to. He was going to either fall flat on his face or stop to puke at any moment. If either of those things happened right now, they would have to leave him behind or try and stand their ground while getting him going again, either option was sure to result in at least one if not more of them not making it to the safety of Doug's basement.

"You got this?" He yelled to Calvin as he drilled one last zombie between its eyes.

Calvin glanced back over his shoulder and saw the scene behind him reaching the same conclusion that Garrett had.

"Go, go", he urged as he turned back to the closer of the zombies still coming along behind them and let loose with a trio of rounds resulting in two more undead sent forever to their endless slumber.

Needing no further encouragement, Garrett turned back towards Miranda and Doug. With an exaggerated leap, he cleared the row of hedges and quickly caught up with them. Without any preamble he grabbed the struggling man under his arm and pushed him along freeing Miranda to concentrate on any zombies that managed to get between them and the kitchen entrance at the back of Doug's home.

"Come on Doug, you
can’t give up. Just a few more feet and we are home free." Garrett encouraged as he felt the man sag against him trying to force him to carry more of his weight.

The sound of Miranda's pistol capping off a
pair of rounds just behind them forced him to take the extra weight from Doug and pull him along as best he could. He considered looking back to see what she was dealing with but it would only slow him down and get him out of rhythm. Miranda had more than proved that she was capable of handling herself in this situation and he just had to trust that if she started running into trouble she would cry out.

By the time Garrett reached the threshold to Doug's kitchen he was also starting to get out of breath as the extra burden of carrying almost all of Doug's weight started to take its toll on top of the exertion of the life or death situation they found themselves in. He let Doug lean against the doorway while he turned back towards the yard. Miranda was only twenty or so feet away from him having continually worked her way backwards as she methodically dropped several zombies along the middle of the driveway. She had just fired off her last round in the pistol's magazine and Garrett watched as she smoothly and efficiently went through the steps he had showed her to drop a spent clip and slap in a fresh one. Miranda released the slide to chamber the first round and was instantly back into a perfect shooters stance scanning in front of her for the most threatening target. He was amazed at just how cool this young woman was, it was a trait that even seasoned soldiers sometimes lacked when faced with heated combat. He had taught many young soldiers under better conditions the basics of firearms use, and it often took repeated lessons and many hours of practice for a good deal of them to grasp those basics and even then he had seen many of them just go blank when it really mattered. To see this young girl, who had never handled a gun before in her life, pick it up with such precision, it showed him once and for all that she was definitely one of a kind.