The Zombie Virus (Book 2): The Children of the Damned (20 page)

“Defensive fire positions!” He slammed the
hatch shut and rushed to the fence.

Already, the remaining crazies were coming to
life and converging on the new disturbance. The ones at the fence
were gnashing their teeth, biting at the links while several were
rapidly pulling themselves up the fence as nimbly as cockroaches
climbing a wall.

Simultaneously, the Stryker came to life and
surged forward as staccato blasts from an M4 tore into the
creatures climbing the fence, knocking them off onto the ground,
dead or writhing in their own expanding pools of blood.

When Heinlich approached the gate he promptly
slid his M9 Beretta from his thigh holster and engaged a group of
three crazies that were shaking the fence and slamming their bodies
into it trying to get at him. Three well-placed head shots
scrambled their brains and dropped them like lifeless, rock-filled
sacks. He grabbed the chain and soon had it unwrapped and the gate
sliding open while the crack of bullets flew by on either side of
him, seeking out targets of opportunity. The Stryker rumbled
through the open gate and he slid the heavy gate back into place as
soon as the vehicle cleared. He climbed up on the Stryker to drop
through an open hatch, while the big M2 opened up in loud bursts,
decimating the crazies who continued to converge on the big
truck.

“Get us to the Kroger lot, the fastest way
possible!” he yelled over the comms to Hernandez. The Stryker
pitched forward and picked up speed, veered right, and sped up the
small two-lane drive, leaving a scattering of crazies lamely
chasing after the accelerating vehicle. The guns grew quiet as they
sped away.

“Dogwood One, this is Gypsy Hill Mobile,
over,” Corporal Hernandez called into the radio mic.

“Gypsy Hill Mobile, we copy, over.” Relief
flooded through the Stryker’s men and women when they heard the
First Sergeant’s voice again.

“Dogwood One, this is Gypsy Hill Mobile.
Prepare for evac, ETA two Mikes.”

Hernandez steered the Stryker to the right
onto a dirt farm track that led to a tilled field that bordered
Statler Boulevard. The big vehicle didn’t slow when it hit the
dried soil of the field and plowed its own path straight across it
toward the four-lane road.

“Gypsy Hill Mobile, this is Dogwood One. Be
aware that we still have many hostiles at this location.”

“Roger Dogwood One, we are advised,”
Hernandez responded.

“Did you hear that, Sergeant?” she asked over
the headset.

“I copied,” he replied. “Okay everyone, let’s
get ready to rattle and roll. Watch your line of fire to the
Hemmitt.”

The Stryker burst out of the field onto the
pavement in a shower of dirt and dust, pulling a sharp right toward
the shopping center less than a quarter klick ahead.

“I have a visual on Dogwood One,” Hernandez’s
steady voice announced over their headsets, “but we have a
problem.”

The screen in front of the Corporal showed
the parking lot still swarming with a large horde of the crazies,
clambering over the eight-wheeled truck in a mad attempt to get at
its occupants.

Sergeant Heinlich stared at the scene from
where he was standing in the hatch as the Stryker slowed its
approach. He licked his chapped lips and muttered ‘shit’ to himself
when he saw what he estimated to be four or five hundred hostiles
still engaging the HEMTT.

“We didn’t draw them all away.” Nantz hissed
from the hatch next to his. He had an M249 with a tea bag of one
hundred rounds hanging beneath it aimed toward the shifting crowd
of crazies.

“They know there are people inside the
truck,” the Sergeant replied flatly.

The sound of the approaching Stryker drew the
attention of the crowd of crazies and groups started to break away
and rush through the parking lot toward them. Reese engaged with
the .50-cal, careful not to sweep too close to the truck that held
the First Sergeant and McCully. Nantz joined Reese with his squad
automatic rifle and the rest of the squad sent three-round bursts
from their M4s into the approaching bodies. They cut huge swaths of
destruction though the mob, yet the remaining creatures sprinted
onward in a mad frenzy.

More of the swarm of crazies dropped away
from the HEMTT, drawn to the sound of the gunfire, and soon the
front end of the massive truck was clear of the creatures. Heinlich
saw a puff of smoke appear from the truck’s exhaust as the engines
started up.

“That’s it, First Sergeant, get your ass out
of there!” he snarled to himself while engaging the rapidly closing
crazies with his own rifle from the stopped Stryker. “Back it up,
Corporal!” he ordered Hernandez over the comms.

The Stryker lurched backwards, hesitated, and
then moved again in fits and jerks. Abruptly, the engine sound
ceased with a cough and the Stryker stalled in the center of the
road.

“Hold them back with suppressive fire!” the
Sergeant yelled at the men and woman who poked through the ports
around him and ducked into the Stryker’s interior.

He could hear the engine turning over to no
avail. This could be evolving into quite the clusterfuck.

“What’s happening, Corporal?” he calmly asked
into his mic.

“She’s not starting!” Hernandez screamed at
him, and Heinlich could hear the panic rising in her normally calm
voice.

“Fuck! Fucking-fuck!” he cursed.

“You need to get everyone in here and button
her up!” she yelled at him through his earpiece.

He thought about them being trapped in this
metal shell for days or weeks while the swarms of crazies
continuously pounded the armored hull trying to get in.

“No! We’re getting out!” He then addressed
the rest of the team over the comms, “Everybody out! Head to the
warehouse at our 9 o’clock!”

“I need to put the call in to Base first!”
Hernandez immediately responded back.

“No time,” the Sergeant ordered. He pushed
through the hatch and scrambled out onto the deck, scurrying across
to the driver’s hatch and threw it open. He reached in and hastily
snatched the Corporal by her arm as she was trying to raise Gypsy
Hill Base over the comms unit; she barely had time to grab her
rifle as he pulled her up and out of the Stryker. Behind him he
heard boots hitting the ground and the sounds of rifle fire moving
away. Reese was standing on the deck over him and Hernandez,
supplying covering fire while he got the protesting woman onto the
deck. Reese paused and looked at the Sergeant questioningly.

“We move, we survive,” Heinlich stated
bluntly and followed Hernandez over the side. Reese gave a
sarcastic ‘hooah’ and jumped off of the Stryker after them, firing
his rifle as his legs moved him in the opposite tack along the side
of the vehicle in the direction that the rest of the squad had
taken. A skinny young female crazy in tattered and rotten clothing,
a plethora of tattoos sleeving each arm, leaped onto the front of
the Stryker and used it to launch herself at him in one fluid
motion. Reese swung his rifle at her, knocking her sideways with
the barrel even as more and more of the creatures bounded toward
him with amazing speed.

The loud repetitive blasts of the SAW filled
his ears along with the ‘
tap
-
tap
-
taps’
of
three-round bursts from the M4s and the advancing front of the
rabid horde were cut down only steps from him. He looked over at
Nantz and the rest of the squad, who had formed a defensive line
next to him and nodded his thanks.

“Let’s get the fuck out of here!”

They sprinted toward the dark opening of the
warehouse which looked so far away, the noise of the pursuing swarm
sounding like a cattle stampede closing in behind them.

Chapter Eight

Steven surveyed the road through his binoculars,
trying to detect any movement along the north or southbound lanes
of the highway. Only a handful of abandoned vehicles sat like
colorful, dead beetles on this stretch of road. After a few
minutes, he put the binoculars down.

“It looks clear. Dontela, have Katy bring
Jane up.”

Dontela slid back down the embankment into
the gorge that led down to a deep valley crisscrossed with fallow
fields.

“I’ll help her,” Kera whispered and
disappeared after her.

They had stayed four days in the camp,
nursing the injured woman and also allowing both Katy and Dontela
to regain their strength after their rape and abuse by their now
dead captors. Although it had pained Steven to postpone his hunt
for his son for such a long period, unless they wanted to carry the
woman, or leave her, Jane wasn’t able to travel. The first few days
she couldn’t even walk from one end of the camp to the other, let
alone begin a mile-eating hike.

He had fidgeted and paced the camp each day,
checking on the woman constantly to determine if she was well
enough to leave. They had begun calling her Jane Doe, or simply
Jane, given that she hadn’t been able to offer up a name. For that
matter, she had hardly said two words to them since they had ended
her ordeal, lost as she was in the dark horrors that haunted the
recesses of her mind. Their food stocks had become critically low
and they needed to do some scavenging if they were going to keep
from going hungry. There was plenty of game in the forests around
them; however, Steven didn’t want to give the girls an excuse to
stay in the camp any longer than was necessary.

Steven had convinced them that finding
something to eat couldn’t be put off any longer and that was the
catalyst that finally forced them to break camp. They set off
across the valley floor following the railroad tracks that ran to
the southwest. The mountain that they were paralleling separated
them from the western suburbs of Charlottesville that lay in the
adjacent valley which spread northwards across the interstate. They
followed the tracks for most of the day until the line veered off
to the south, forcing them to break from the tracks and blaze a
path through the heavily forested valley until they found a pass
that opened northwest through the mountain. The land plateaued and
became interlaced with overgrown farmland. They crossed several
small country roads before the land started climbing again as they
approached the imposing Blue Ridge Mountains that stretched from
horizon to horizon north and south. They saw no homes on their
march, which meant that they ended that first day on painfully
empty stomachs. They had camped down in the valley last night and
now were overlooking State Route 29, which Steven’s map showed
running northeast to where it intersected I-64.

The previous day Jane had walked in a
trancelike state, continually having to be prodded and dragged
along. If someone let go of her arm she would immediately stop and
sit down, her eyes focused somewhere far away. This had slowed them
down to what felt like a snail’s pace, but at least they were on
the move again. Today promised to be more of the same as she
shuffled along in her own little world. The swelling in her face
had gone down dramatically and the bruising was barely yellowish
shadows of what it used to be. Her chest and abdomen were a jigsaw
of cicatrices and scabs where the marks of her torture were
healing. Unfortunately, her mind was taking much longer to mend
itself. Steven assumed she was suffering from a form of PTSD, and
that her mind would heal itself as time put distance between her
and the event. Hopefully she would learn to deal with that past
trauma and sorrow a little more each day.

He scanned the four-lane road again, paying
attention to the scattering of trucks and cars. Still nothing
moved. Far up ahead on the west side of the highway, he spotted the
glass roofs of a greenhouse complex, though other than that no
houses or buildings were in sight.

He heard the sound of the group clambering
noisily up the embankment behind him.

Kera plopped down next to him breathing
heavily and was soon joined by Dontela and Katy with Jane between
them.

“Anything?” she asked.

He shook his head. “No movement that I can
see.”

“Doesn’t look like a hopping area of commerce
neither,” Dontela muttered sarcastically.

“Don’t worry. We’ll find some food,” Steven
reassured them.

Dontela harrumphed. “We better. I may have to
cook me up some white boy.”

Steven laughed. “I don’t think it will come
to that.”

They made their way up onto the asphalt of
the road, guiding Jane between them, and headed in the direction of
the interstate.

Steven’s watch indicated that it was October
28th. However, he wasn’t even sure what day of the week it was. In
this post-apocalyptic world, calendar days had lost their
significance. The days of the week were made up entities of
civilization to help direct their weekly lives, and with society in
ruins, did it really matter if they knew what day of the week it
was? When what was left of the human race settled down and formed
an agrarian society again someday far in the future, they would at
least need to know the months and the seasons, and maybe the days
if they were to plant and harvest with any success. However, right
now they had been reduced to a hunter-gatherer society.

Fuck
,
you
can’t
even
really
call
us
a
society
, Steven thought,
just
a
scattering
of
hunter
-
gatherer
groups
.

The only time-keeping such groups needed
would be to determine the onset of winter or summer in order to
better prepare for those trying seasons and to ascertain how game
would be responding. As for the days of the weeks, bah! Who needed
them anymore?

So back to October and what it meant to them
and their immediate future. Winter was coming.