The Horror Squad: An Apocalyptic Tale (2 page)

She let out a small amount of relief in a short sigh, then smiled a semi crooked smile. He smiled back at her and kissed her forehead then zipped up his luggage bag and walked it out to his truck.

CHAPTER TWO

I AWOKE
with
the light barely seeping into the room. Daybreak had finally hit without any problems throughout the night. I looked over to see my wife, Kris, staring back at me. We had been married for four years before this nightmare had started. Even with the chaos all around us, I could always look into her eyes and calm my storm. I smiled at her and tucked her hair over her ear. Before getting up, I placed a kiss on her lips and told her I loved her.

“It’s daybreak, it’s time to push on.” I announced.

“Stretch out your grumpies.” Kris called out.

I got a head start with pulling down the barricade from the front door. I cracked it a bit to let in some fresh air and to spy out to ensure that we weren’t going to be walking into an ambush of zombies.

“What’s it look like?” Steven asked with the sleepy still in his eyes.

“Looks clear.” I replied.

“Grab my Gamo and let’s do a little hunting while everyone gets awake.” I continued.

Steven grabbed my Gamo pellet gun that was hooked onto my bag and met me back at the front door.

“Start getting ready, Steven and I will be back shortly.” I announced.

We walked outside and stepped over the tripwires. We walked a ways into the woods without making much noise to scare the wildlife or attract anything else that may take what we needed.
I cocked the barrel down and placed a pellet in the chamber as I looked up, I could see some squirrels running across the treetops. One by one, I put them in my crosshairs and squeezed the trigger. Steven was collecting them as they fell. After only a short hour of walking through the woods we had fourteen squirrels and three rabbits. We brought them back to the house and let Kris and Tina skin them out. They skinned them and placed them in some Ziplocs they had found in a kitchen cabinet and used the water from their camelbacks to fill the bags to not spoil the meat.

Kris was the fastest at it; she’d run the knife right under their tails, slit down the back legs, grab them by their heads and pull until the skin met the next set of legs, then make another slit cutting the heads off.

Tina would try to cut down the spine and pull from the sides. It led to having to use the knife to separate the meat from the skin, which had it to where Kris could skin almost three to Tina’s one.

It was now about nine o’clock; they loaded up the meat into the backpacks and got all of their gear back on while Steven collected his trip wires and bells.

“Okay, I want the same lineup that we came here in.” I announced.

We all got in line and walked out the door of the house. *CRUNCH* the leaves sounded around us. I could see one of those bastards with a crooked leg, one eye eaten out and in a BDU Army uniform coming from around a tree on a hill.

I put my pointer finger over my lips to let the group know to stay quiet and then slowly started walking towards it with my knife pulled out ready to bludgeon the knife through its skull. All I could think, as I made my approach, was to not look at the name tag. I didn’t want to know if I knew them or if I had served with them. I was there and ready to make my maneuver when I was taken by surprise. There was a whole Army herd of these things coming at me from over the hill and I don’t mean a huge group, I mean literally rotters in uniform.

This badass lunged at me, knocking me off my feet and knocking the knife from my hand. I rammed my pointer and middle fingers into his ate out eye and started jamming them into his brain.

“You mother fucker!” I called out.

Steven ran over, grabbing my knife and stabbed it in the back of the head and pulled me out from under it by my other hand. I stood up and stomped its head and wiped my hand on my pant leg.

We were all about to make a run for it, but I could see something worth fighting for, Humvees. I quickly went back to my M-4 and started emptying rounds into their heads. My group that was already set to run, turned around and got in line with me and started firing as well. We were outnumbered thirty to six, but we had the knowledge that the only problem we could run into was if we let the rotters get too close. They all fell one by one. We stayed in line as we pushed through to the Humvees giving each that had a twitch left in them an extra round to the brain. We opened each door killing any Rotter that had been left inside.

I opened the leading vehicles door with my knife already going forward.

“WAIT!” A soldier called out.

I stopped myself from taking out another tragic victim of this plague as I heard the voice.

“What’s your name soldier?” I questioned.

“Corporal Denson.” He answered.

“What’s your actual name, if you haven’t noticed, you aren’t serving anymore?” I demanded further.

“Donald…Donald Denson, sir.” He reestablished.

“Anyone else alive from your unit?” I questioned more.

“Yes, in the third vehicle. My Staff Sargent Manuel is still alive. We were talking through coms until the power went out.” He answered.

I helped Donald out of the vehicle and walked over to the third vehicle. I knocked with the butt of my rifle. Instead of opening the door, he just dropped the window of the Humvee like it was some social fucking meet and greet on the side of the road.

“Are you fucking kidding me? Get out.” I told him.

“Where’s your military barring?” He questioned.

“It went out when the world went out. Now get out of the God DAMN vehicle.” I stated further.

He opened the door and stepped out with his hands held up in the air.

“This isn’t a hostage situation, put your hands down… Look, we don’t know you and you don’t know us, so all I can tell you is we’re taking all the supplies that we can carry. If you and him want to come with us, that’s fine, but as soon as you give me a reason not to trust you…” I started saying.

“I get it, we’ll be dead.” Howard stated.

“How did you know I was military?” I questioned more.

“No civilian would get their men...and women in line like that. You used a basic military maneuver to assault through.” He stated.

“Well, we’re not military anymore. I’m TJ.” I responded.

“I’m Howard Manuel.” He introduced himself.

“Well, Howard. Let’s get what we can and we’ll take you two back to where we call home.” I suggested.

“How about I save us all the trouble and we just take the deuce and a half?”

“We had already loaded all our weapons, gas, MRE’s and water on it. We had planned to get the fuck out of Dodge until the zombies realized that we were still alive inside the Humvees.” Howard suggested.

“If it’ll start, that sounds like the best plan.” I answered.

“Denson, go fire up that deuce and let’s get out of here.” He commanded.

Without hesitation he ran over and fired it right up. I looked at the five Humvees that were in front of the deuce.

“Kris, grab that Humvee and Tina you grab the Humvee in front of that one. I want Steven with Kris and Gizmo with Tina. Let’s move out.” I did some commanding of my own.

Justin jumped in the back of the deuce and pulled the flaps open so he could have a clear view of anything that was behind us. Howard and myself climbed up in the deuce and pulled off.

We didn’t get far when we could see a black man running on the side of the heavily wooded road with a uniform on as well.

“Let’s stop and check on him.” I stated.

“That’s Sargent Simmons. You don’t want him. He’s the one that put us in that position…As soon as the zombies started coming in, he got scared and started shooting our men in the legs to give him time to run.” He stated in anger.

Donald pushed on the gas harder. The man started waving his hands in the air. Donald turned the steering wheel quickly and ran the man over before maneuvering back onto the road. The man was of decent size, but barely even made a bump. I had thought about saying something, but thought that I would want revenge to if some son of a bitch did that to me.

We drove on through the streets of abandoned cars and through a few small herds, but nothing substantial that could not just be avoided. We all kept our eyes peeled for the anything that we might be able to stop for to take home, but nothing was really good enough to stop for to take the chance of drawing the attention of being eaten.

GIZMO AND TINA JACOBS

GIZMO AND TINA
walked
into
the Brookshire’s grocery store with their two kids, Hudson and Cloie, picking up food for a barbeque they were hosting later that day. They loaded the basket with four racks of ribs, Adkins season, mustard, brown sugar and Tony Chachere’s Creole seasoning. They snatched two aluminum pans from the shelf, grabbed a couple of things for sides and went to the check out.

“$174.84 is your total.” The clerk said.

“God Damn, you’re proud of your shit.” Gizmo almost shouted as he pulled out his debit card and slid it across the card reader.

Tina started collecting the bags and dispensing them out to the kids while giving Gizmo a shitty look for speaking out to the cashier.

Gizmo took the receipt from the cashier and walked out to the Redbox to grab some movies for the kids so they would stay out of the adult’s ass. He started checking out all the selections with Hudson pointing out different movies that interested him. He finally paid out with “
Goosebumps
” and “
Victor Frankenstein
” as his selections.

Tina was already at the truck, tying the plastic
bags and laying them in the back of the truck so they didn’t scatter during their drive. Gizmo put Hudson in his car seat and then helped Tina.

“I’ve got to stop at my mom’s shop real quick and grab some keys from Bud so I can get his chainsaw before we go home.” He told Tina.

CHAPTER THREE

PULLING UP
to our tightly secured fence, you could see bushels of white smoke pouring into the sky from our cooling towers.

“Y’all stay at a nuclear power plant?” Howard questioned.

“Yes sir, makes it easy for survivors to find us, plus if these aren’t maintained we wouldn’t be here anyways.” I answered.

“I guess that’s true, just out of all the years of talk about the zombie apocalypse, I’ve never thought about having to take care of a power plant.” He added.

I jumped out of the truck’s cab and Justin jumped from the back and we opened the chain-link gates. The three vehicles pulled through and Martin Holsinger ran up to greet us.

“I hate it when y’all do the over nights.” He stated in his greet.

“It was either that or come back empty handed.” I responded.

“Yeah, but we don’t ever know if we need to send a search team or if it would be too late.” He commented.

“I understand, but unless there is a plan set, then don’t waste the time or effort not to mention others’ lives for us. If we don’t return, then carry on as if we died.” I stated.

By that time the rest of my crew had made it over to us.

“Martin, this is Howard and Donald. We picked them up along with their vehicles.” I introduced.

“Nice to meet you.” He stated as he shook their hands.

Lisa Williams started walking up from a distant building.

“You guys made it!” She hollered out.

“Yeah, we made it. Do me a favor and take our new friends to get washed up, give them some clothes to change into and show them around.” I told her.

She nodded.

“Follow me.” She told them before they walked off.

“By the way, did you find any fucking beer?” Lisa turned to ask.

“I wish. I’m sure we could all use one.” I responded.

“I could use a fucking thirty pack!” Gizmo exclaimed.

I laughed and got in the deuce to move it to our storage facility. Pulling up to the tin building, I called out to Karen Dziegiel who ran it. She walked out with her clip board and a dangling pen that was tied to the metal clip and taped to the pen.

“Got something new for me?” She asked.

“Yes ma’am. Got a truck load to be inventoried in.” I answered.

“Wow, hopefully we have enough room.” She responded.

“Well, I figured we can load what we can in the storage and put the rest in the bunkhouse.” I suggested.

“I don’t want it to mess up my books.” She added.

“Whatever works for you then.” I stated within my laugh.

“I’ll have my crew unload it and see what I can make work.” She said.

“Sounds good.” I replied before walking away to go get some chow.

I could see Kris pulling up one of the Humvees, so I stopped so she could join me.

She walked up next to me and inner locked fingers with me as our hands came together and we started walking. The chow hall was an old cafeteria from an old high school that was nearby. The fenced in zone was a little over one-thousand acers. A wall of vehicles surrounded the outside and the inside of the fence. There was another layer of vehicles on the outside in a “V” pattern with the point of the vehicles facing to the inside to limit any hoards to have the room to build up any power to bring down the fence.  The road leading up to our gate was lined with Daisy-chain IED’s,  that we had found in an old military base, for one mile on both sides of the road for those humans that may try to challenge their location. Needless to say, we were ready for just about anything.

We sat down at one of the tables and Milissa Stockholm started walking up.

“What will it be today my darlings?” She asked.

“What’s todays special?” I jokingly asked as Kris nudged me.

“Today is my special beef stew.” She responded with a smile.

“I guess we’ll have two bowls of that.” I responded.

“Coming right up.” She said.

She walked back to the kitchen area. Milissa brought the two steaming bowls of beef stew along with a few saltine crackers as a side. She plopped a spoon next to each bowl.

“Bon appetit.” She stated.

“Always service with a smile.” I said while smiling back.

The two new men we picked up were now in civies, aka civilian clothes and cleaned up walking our way.

“May we sit down?” Howard questioned.

“If there’s a will, there’s a way.” I suggested.

They stood there in almost an attention stance as if they were still waiting for orders.

“Yes, sit down.” I added.

The two pulled their chairs back, sat down and shimmied the legs forward.

“Hey Milissa, we’re going to need two more bowls!” I called into the kitchen.

She peeped around the corner and gave a thumbs up.

“So why did y’all settle here of all places?” Howard caught curiosity.

“Did you see the giant smoke stacks?” I questioned.

“Yes.” He answered.

“Those are cooling towers. This is a nuclear plant. Do you have any idea what will happen if they’re not taken care of?” I stated further.

“I would assume nothing good.” He answered.

“Nothing good is right. They would take out the world as we know it, in time. We can only hope that people were smart enough to make base at the rest of them.” I added.

“So we’re looking at destruction after all?” He questioned.

“We’re all going to die, nothing has changed that. If the others aren’t taken care of, then no we will not die from their blasts, but we will start running out of places to search for food.” I stated.

Milissa plopped two more bowls down and walked back to the kitchen.

“We would like permission to join your team.” He queried.

“Look, I’m sure you’re great at what you do, but I have my team and the more people we take out with us, the bigger the risk of losing someone.” I stated.

“I understand that, but you can’t just ask us to sit around and do nothing.” He stated.

“I tell you what…I’m going to be putting together a plan for going into the city tomorrow. I’ll replace Kris and Tina with you two. However, if you screw up, just know that it’ll be you before the rest of my team.” I boldly stated.

“Understood.” He answered before digging into his bowl.

Kris looked at me in shock.

“Look, we have our kids here as well as Tina has hers. We can’t keep risking both of our lives in hopes that someone else will take care of them in terms that we both died.” I told her.

She wasn’t happy about the situation because she hated being apart and the not knowing, but she understood and nodded her head.

I turned back my attention to the two soldiers, “Be at the front gate at six.”

JUSTIN HUDSON

JUSTIN FIRED
up his dark grey Z-71 truck which echoed from the glass packs he had installed on the muffler. He tilted his shades down from the top of his head and placed them over his eyes. Pulling the truck into drive, he pulled out of this driveway and started driving the few blocks to the Dollar Store.

Justin had grown up in this town and knew a little bit of everyone. It was a small town and one of those everyone knows everyone kind of places.

He parked right by the door and got out. Walking in, he could only see about three other people inside other than the cashier. He walked the aisles and grabbed a couple bags of chips, two twelve packs of sodas, some hotdog buns and some smoked sausage before walking his items to the register.

“Will that be all for you today?” The cashier asked.

“No, I need a can of Copenhagen long cut.” He added.

She grabbed her keys from next to the register and walked over to the glass case and pulled out one can of the snuff and carried it back to the counter.

She rang each item up and gave him his total. He pulled his card from his wallet and swiped it.

“Have a good day.” She stated as he collected his bags.

CHAPTER FOUR

THE ALARM
went off at five in the morning as I lifted my eyes to look around. It was still very dark with no hint of light shining through the window for at least another hour. I left Kris sleeping and sat up on the side of the bed to wipe my face and gather my bearings.

Our room in the school had been the History class before. It still had some of the lessons written on the chalk board. Not to give any ease to the apocalypse, but it appeared that everyone had at least got out of the big test.

I grabbed a small black bag that I kept my morning items in and started down the hall to the bathrooms.

I showered and brushed my teeth. Looking into the mirror, it looked as if my reflection was a mountain man staring back. My beard was about six inches long now and just as thick as a bale of hay. I pinched it in my hand and glided my hand through it a few times and decided I didn’t have time to bother with it; I grabbed my bag and walked back to the room.

Kris was already awake and trying to be quiet to not wake the kids.

“You leaving without saying goodbye?” She asked.

“No, was just letting you sleep while I got ready.” I replied.

I walked over and gave her a kiss before getting myself dressed. Before I left, I kissed Sidnie and Daltin on the head and then kissed my wife again.

“I’ll be gone for a few days this time, but I should come back with some goods.” I told her as I threw my backpack over my shoulders.

She gave a worrisome smile and nodded.

I closed the door softly behind me to not wake the children and started heading toward the front gate. I could see Donald and Howard already waiting with Martin at the gate. I could see Gizmo, Steven, Justin and Tina walking out of the school not too far behind me. I brought my walk to almost baby steps to wait for the rest of my team to join me.