DUSK 2
Ty Cooper stared through the passenger side window of the station wagon, as his dream had promised he had been picked to lead one of the teams sent out to search for the heathens. In the dream, their city had been deserted as though they knew what was coming. Only the lepers roamed inside of their walls, which would serve as a new home to some men of faith. For his find, Ty would be rewarded.
“Those were some good times,” said Jud Macintyre from the back seat as they passed the settlement they’d hit days before the messiah was killed.
Jud had been one of the troops holding down a soldier as Ty severed his arms and legs with a machete. The soldier, who looked to be in his early twenties, had first begged for his life, but screamed and pleaded in a demonic tongue as the tendons in his left arm were hacked away. He was still conscious when they pushed him into a shed to bleed his way into Hell.
Beside Jud sat Oscar Coeyman, who silently aimed his rifle out of the window, taking aim at random undead pedestrians through the scope. Whenever he locked onto one, he gently rubbed the trigger, as though blasting the head off of a leper would give him a sexual release. However, Ty had ordered him to conserve ammunition, so the silent grunt held his load.
Almost ten minutes after passing the decimated settlement, Ty thrust his finger forward and said, “get on the freeway here.”
Without a word Hayden Rowley, a man who had been born bald and never grew out of it, eased the station wagon onto the highway.
*
Jasper Newman and Wade Diotrephes watched the road, sharing a single pair of binoculars, as Sal McCree pissed in the bushes. Maybe a week before, they had been sent out to find new resources and possible signs of life. The city surrounding their walls still suffered from a rat infestation, which devastated supplies that weren’t shielded by aluminum armor, but the vermin were becoming harder to catch with each year. The canned food, fuel, and other supplies had been gathered and stockpiled inside of their walls years ago to minimize outgoing missions. Supplies were running low, and the people were starting to worry. Some of the higher ups had proposed advertising the cure the science team was developing over the radio, but had voted it down because the unfinished inoculation would kill more people than it would save. Besides, they had no reason anyone was around to hear it.
A day or two after being sent out to explore, a radio broadcast woke the team in the middle of the night. The radio operator said that the base had been breached, then revealed the gravity of the situation by mentioning the serum. At the end of an uninterrupted moving violation, the team saw patrols and search teams rolling through the base. Portions of the walls had been reduced to smoldering rubble and the sniper towers had been demolished. If there were any survivors, they were in the custody of whoever attacked, and out of Jasper’s reach.
With nothing left to do, the team ran, not stopping until they reached farm land and woods. As luck would have it, their car smashed into a deer, killing their driver, Sonny Shimane instantly. The animal had probably broken every bone in the tail end of its body, but still attempted to stand and run away. Wade blasted the deer’s head with his shotgun, while Sal shot Sonny in the face before his body could reactivate.
The car had proven to be undrivable after the wreck and they did not know if someone had heard the commotion or if patrols would be sent out this far to search for survivors, so the three moved the car and deer into the woods and out of sight. Carrying everything they could, they walked for miles, only stopping to rest in a barn.
They’d rested inside for a few hours, and had left to go hunting, leaving the shotgun and shells, since the Remington would not have been as useful for hunting as the rifles. Not long after, they’d heard gunshots in the distance and not long after that, fire ate through the forest in the distance. The commotion had attracted a thinly spread crowd of ghouls, who seemed to be spawning from the trees. Without bothering to waste time engaging the undead, the trio dashed through the trees, knocking down every dead creature that stood in their path. Luckily, they had found a river. Unluckily, they had been swept downstream, soaking some of their supplies and destroying their radios leaving them to trek back home on foot and low on ammunition.
Days later, they had nearly reached their city and still had no plan for when they got there.
“Sal, you better zip up and hit the deck!” Wade said, shoving the binoculars at Jasper and pointing towards the city, where a station wagon with metal caging over the windows and plated armor over the frame sped along.
“I don’t think they’re looking for us, but we’d better stay low anyway,” Wade said.
Although he doubted the drivers could spot the watchers, Jasper reflexively crouched to a lower position and watched through the twin telescopic lenses until the automobile was out of sight.
“I wonder what that was about,” Jasper said.
“I recon we start walking in that direction and find out,” Sal said. “I’m sick of hiding. There’s no point in just sitting by and hoping for another day if everyone else is dead.”
At fifty-three years old, Sal was the oldest of the group. Gray stubble sprouted from his face, stained from where it had collected bits of food in the last few days. Although he’d never been a member of an branch of the US Armed Forces, Sal had been involved with a militia group before the dead had began to rise. He was confrontational and violent, but loyal, like everyone in the compound was his family.
“We’ll never catch up on foot,” Wade said. “Let’s go back home and see if there’s anything we can use.”
“I don’t think they sacked us just so they could leave stuff behind,” Jasper said.
“For all we know, the base is still crawling with hostiles,” Sal added.
“That’s exactly why I think we should go back.”
“What?” Jasper said.
“I gecha, kid,” Sal said. “We go back and whack a lone patrol. Steal their ride and supplies.”
“And if another group comes up that onramp, we’ll have supplies all the sooner.”
“We’re not walking down the onramp,” Jasper said. “What if it’s not just one of them?”
“Well what’s your plan?”
“I don’t like the idea at all.”
“Nobody is forcing you to come with us,” Sal said.
“Fuck, okay,” Jasper said, realizing a fight was useless. “Scaling down the overpass would leave us in the open. I say we walk down the off ramp.”
“What’s to keep them from coming up the off ramp? It’s not like they run the risk of crashing into someone,” Wade said.
“Whatever you’re going to do, let’s start doing it,” Sal said.
“Alright. We go down the off ramp,” Jasper said, “but keep low. If we hear someone living, try not to get spotted. If you’re in the open, try to stagger like a zombie. Maybe they won’t notice.”
“Stagger like a zombie? And you thought we were crazy?”
“Just do it. With all the creeps in that city, they won’t bother with three more unless they don’t buy the act. I’m more worried about the undead. Nobody’s gone through that city on foot in twenty-two years.”
“It’s about time you start showin’ some guts, kid.”
“Kid? For Christ’s sake, I’m twenty-eight years old.”
With his rifle grasped in both hands, Wade started walking without his friends. Jasper and Sal locked eyes for a moment, and followed.
*
Leonard Reed watched the troops scour the old scouting base. He’d never lived there, but a handful of generals had. They’d sealed off five buildings just as they would have done for a regular settlement. The place had been deserted as soon as the rest of the forces had moved into their current home. They’d stashed a sizable backup ordinance in the abandoned complex, which would have been helpful in Reed’s quest, had the buildings not all been burned to the ground, leaving skeletal beams stretching towards the sky.
Balling his fists, and striking the frame of his jeep, an animal shriek escaped Reed’s gut. He breathed deeply, then walked towards one of the scouts.
“What is the situation?” he asked.
“The buildings were ashes when we got here.”
The little Judas must have torched the old base along with the two armories. He’d have to fight his battle with limited explosives. Though he’d wished he’d had more leftovers from the battle, Reed considered the change in circumstances a test. His fists unclenched, and he said “we’ve wasted enough time here. Gather the rest of the troops and head back home.”
*
From the off ramp, Jasper could see ghouls stumbling about the streets. Some of them were still moving towards the highway, but others were moving towards random buildings, standing under signs, and one even fondled a light post.
“Any plans on getting past them?” Jasper asked.
“They’re afraid of fire,” Wade offered.
“Either of you bring a lighter?” Sal said.
“I thought I had matches.”
“That’s what I thought. Just stay low, like Jasp said to do if we saw people. If you want to stumble around like one of them, go ahead. Just do it away from us. If we use our firearms, we’ll have a crowd to deal with so use anything else. Try to avoid them when possible.”
Sal hung his rifle on his shoulder, and took out his crowbar. Wade clutched the tire iron from their wrecked car, and Jasper had a hammer.
“One more thing,” Sal said. “When you’re down there, shut your mouths and open your eyes and ears.”
Jasper and Wade nodded.
Sal took point, with Jasper in the rear. When they reached the bottom of the ramp, two ghouls turned their heads towards their newly found prey. Both ghouls had all of their limbs. The ghoul on the right’s throat had been slashed, possibly by the knife whose handle protruded from it’s chest. The other was missing its lower jaw, tongue, and right eye. The jawless zombie hissed. The stabbing victim remained silent. Sal charged to the right. Wade took the one on the left.
Before Jasper could figure out who to help, one zombie was on the ground with the top portion of its head shattered, and the other had a tire iron sticking out of its left temple. After the bodies stopped twitching, Wade extracted his tire iron. Sal stood over his zombie’s immobile corpse for a second before stooping down and tugging at the knife, which came out with a dry ripping sound.
“Not in bad shape,” Sal said. “Don’t worry Jasp. There’ll be plenty for you, especially if we don’t get a move on it now.”
Jasper looked in the distance, and saw that they’d attracted a mob of zombies, maybe a quarter of a mile away.
“Fuck. How many are there?”
“More than we have bullets,” Sal said.
“Maybe Jasper was right.”
“Too late to walk back up that ramp, now.”
Sal tucked the knife in his belt and began walking into the city. As long as they kept moving and didn’t get cornered, they’d be alright. The zombies moved as slow as molasses, but it was important to remember the danger. Back in 1919, twenty-one people in a Boston town were killed when a molasses tanker burst, sending out a wave of sugary death. Jasper clutched his hammer, ready to swing at anything that wasn’t breathing, and followed.
“Should we try to lose them?” Wade asked.
“Not yet. I want to get some travel time in.”
“We don’t know which buildings are infested with them,” Jasper said.
“Assume it’s all of them.”
“Should we try to lead them onto the highway and double back?”
“No. We’ll just have more of them to deal with later. We can get past them.”
Zombies stumbled out of several of the buildings, roused by the commotion outside. Most of them were far away, but they could come out of everywhere. When they reached a concentration of strip malls and apartment complexes, Sal ducked into an alley. The others followed.
The remains of a vagrant stumbled towards the group, but Sal put it down permanently with three swings of his crowbar. Once the creature hit the ground, the trio stepped over its corpse.
“If they follow us back here, we’ll have no place to go?” Wade said.
“We’ll worry about it when it happens,” Sal said. “Now shut your trap and listen.”
The moaning and shuffling of feet grew closer as a parade of flesh eaters walked in their direction. It wouldn’t be long before bodies filled the allies behind them. Jasper wondered if Sal knew where he was going, but didn’t want to ask for fear of eating crowbar.
Eating. Jasper hadn’t done that since the morning, and it was now late in the afternoon, so he was glad that the restaurant and diner signs were not visible from his position. They had a few hours until twilight, which gave the trio light to aid them while scurrying away from the mob, like rabbits running from a pack of crippled greyhounds. He’d wondered if they should have waited until nightfall, when there were fewer zombies outside.
There was maybe a ten minute drive from the on ramp to the fortress, which meant that they had a long walk. Maybe two hours of fleeing the undead at low speeds. If they tried to run, they’d wear themselves out within the first mile or two. Their only hope was to confuse the undead with the obstacle course of buildings.
Isolated zombies began to form a sparse crowd in the path of the three rabbits. Without taking the time to send the undead back to their graves, the living simply knocked over the dead and kept moving. Every once in a while, a short sprint was necessary, but they kept the retreat at a walking pace.
“Quick, in here!” Sal said undead bodies flooded the pathway in front of them.
Sal tried to open a back door, but it was locked. He kicked it once, but it didn’t give. The second time, it failed to give and the undead were moving closer. With ten feet between the undead and a gap between buildings, which led to the street, Jasper said “Fuck this” and dashed towards the street. Wade and Sal followed, only a hairline away form the undead grasp.
The undead in the alleyways began to fill the corridors between buildings while the corpses across the street turned their attention. A few zombies were at the entrances of the buildings, but were evaded with ease.
“You know,” Wade said, “if we knew then what we know now, the world would be a hell of a lot different today.”
“When was that ever not true?” asked Sal before adding: “Now shut up and move.”
The undead began to pack at both ends of the streets, limping, stumbling, and dragging themselves towards their prey.
“This way!” Jasper said, pointing across the street where there were now fewer zombies blocking the alleyways.
This time, they ran to the temporary cover of the in-between building passageway.
“Why don’t we take the sewers?” asked Wade.
“If you know your way around them, I’ll be glad to go with you,” Sal said.
This time, the undead flooded the alleyway within ten minutes. Sal kicked the nearest door, but it didn’t budge. Wade pushed him out of the way and cranked the door handle, yanking the door open. Sal rushed in after the others, then helped them pull the door shut, lock it, and push a desk in front of the doorway.
The inside of the room was pitch black, and without a lighter, there was no improving the situation. Dust flooded the air, forcing sneezes out of Jasper. Wade cursed at a cobweb. Jasper hit several thick ones too, which was good news. It meant that there were no flesh eaters wandering inside of the room. The building was probably even clear.
Dead fists pounded on the other side of the door.
“I don’t know how long that will hold. We shouldn’t stay in here long,” Sal said.
After fumbling through the dark, they found a door, and opened it with weapons ready. Luckily, there were barred windows in the other side. The room they had left must have been a storage room of some kind, where the room they were in was the main area. There was a stage in the middle of the room, featuring a pole which stretched from floor to ceiling. On the far right side, they saw a bar counter, with broken taps, and unopened bottles of liquor.
“Move some furniture in front of that door, but be quiet,” Sal ordered.
Instead of helping them, Sal hopped over the bar counter and ducked below.
“You know, I think I spent a week’s pay in here once,” Sal said, popping up from behind the counter with a key ring.
The pounding in the back side of the building grew more intense.
“Rest in peace Merv,” Sal said and moved towards the door.
Sick of his hammer, Jasper moved to the counter while Sal fumbled with the keys and a padlock, securing a chain to the door handle. Behind the counter lay the fossilized remains of who had probably been the bar tender. In his left hand he held a long dry bottle of whiskey, and in his right was a .45 Smith and Wesson. The wall behind the skeleton’s head was still stained by a powdery, brown splatter.
Past Merv’s long dead corpse, Jasper found what he was looking for: a Louisville Slugger, still in good condition and able to give his strikes some range and leverage. After tucking the hammer in his belt, Jasper leaned over and retrieved the wooden baseball bat.
“Are you coming?” Sal said before yanking the door open.
Without answering the question, Jasper leapt over the bar counter with his baseball bat in hand and rushed through the door after his companions. They were already in the fray, slugging zombies who stepped within reaching distance. Though there weren’t many yet, nobody took the extra time to kill if the first blow did not do the job.
Jasper had never been out in the street like this before, and hoped he never had to do it again. He preferred driving close to a crowd of zombies and blasting a few in the head from a safe distance before moving to a new position to shoot more of them. The practice had been deemed futile because the dead outnumbered the living by hundreds or maybe even thousands of them to every live human. They hadn’t burned the city because of valuable supplies, and because they feared it would scare the rat population into their homes. Instead of keeping them on the streets where they could feed on the corpses of those who had once been undead.
“Fuck!” shouted both Wade and Sal.
Maybe two-hundred zombies were tightly packed, directly in the trio’s path. The undead poured out of the alleyways faster than they had before, leaving the living almost entirely surrounded.
“Do we use the guns now?” Wade asked.
“Hell no. It won’t make much of a difference. Look for an opening and go for it,” Sal said.
Sal picked up the neck of a broken bottle and tossed it at the nearest zombie. It missed, but did not deter his assault. He picked up a loose stone, and hit the zombie in the head. The creature stumbled backwards, but did not die. Wade joined in, throwing bricks, bottles, rusty tin cans, and anything else that was on the ground, slowing some of the zombies but not damaging any of them.
Jasper turned his attention to an apartment building about ten yards from their position, offering eight stories of refuge. Although the undead poured out of every hole between buildings, there was a clear path to the front doorway, which had fallen off of the hinges years ago.
“There!” he shouted and ran.
The others followed. A zombie stepped out through the inside of the doorway, giving Jasper a chance to practice his swing. A dust clout flew from the zombie’s head, and the creature spun before hitting the ground.
Inside, there was nothing that could be used to block the open doorway, so his only chance was to run, and the basement would more than likely leave them trapped so he retreated upstairs.
“What in the hell are we doing?” asked Sal.
“Hopefully finding a way out,” Jasper said. “Just keep moving up and make sure it’s clear in front of us.”
Evading the zombies wouldn’t work. Not only did the undead know they were up there, but if the living got out of the building now, the living dead were still outside. They’d no longer be trying to pile into the building if they saw their prey on the street.
“Make as much noise as possible, and move slow.”
“What?”
“Sal, trust me. I have a plan.”
“Does this plan include sapping our energy before we become a buffet?”
“I hope not.”
Without any more questions, Sal shouted a stream of obscenities at the undead below, keeping their attention more focused on the prey. Jasper and Wade followed, saying every word that would lead to a wiping by the belt of his father, even at the age of twenty-eight.
The undead continued to follow the living up the stairwell, their moans traveling much faster than their bodies. The stench of decay saturated the hallway. Before, it had stuck in the air like humidity, becoming a nuisance through the first few years, but unnoticed after a while. Being hit full force by the spoiled odor made Jasper want to collapse and vomit.
Flies buzzed in ever direction. Some were deer flies, sucking the blood of live hosts. Others were refuse eaters, and landed on everything. All of them had followed the undead inside through the front door. With most of the windows closed and intact, the inside of the building was stuffy, humid, and stale. The air had been baking all day, and trapped for years.
As the stairs creaked and flung dust into the air, Jasper hoped they would hold. He needed the zombie to keep following them, and even more importantly, he needed to avoid a drop, which would land him in the rotting arms of the undead.
The body of a woman, wearing a red night gown stepped onto the stairs above them. Jasper swung his bat, knocking her down and into a tumble with the first swing. Sal and Wade stepped aside and let her roll for the undead below to trample.
When they reached the rooftop, Jasper told them to close the door behind them. Wade watched the door, while Sal looked around for anything else he could use as a weapon. Jasper rounded the rooftop, looking for the fire escape.
Hands assaulted the door.
“Here!” Jasper shouted. “Down the fire escape.”
Sal grabbed Wade by the collar and yanked him toward the stairs.
“Is that going to hold us?”
“It better,” said Jasper as he leapt onto the metal grated landing.
The others followed him, this time not maintaining a slow speed. Where the bridge between floors looked rusty and weak, they leapt.
When they reached the sixth floor, they heard the door give on the rooftop and undead bodies were surely pouring through. Soon they’d find the fire escape, and many would try to climb down after their prey. Jasper wasn’t sure that the emergency exit could hold that many travelers, so he picked up the pace.
The third story window broke, allowing two zombies to board the fire escape in their path. The first one was missing half of its face, while the second was missing an arm. Jasper swung his bat at the half faced zombie, knocking it off of the landing, where it hit the pavement head first and didn’t get up. Sal brought his crowbar down on the one armed zombie’s head, splitting its skull in one blow.
When they reached the second floor, the top of the landing began to fill with the undead. They piled onto the fire escape, while some missed, plummeting to the ground. The ones who made it filed down the rusty stairs. The frame creaked as the top began to give.
“Shit!” he shouted.
The three survivors doubled their speed, and leapt from the last half of the last ladder, running through a thin gathering of the undead at the side of the building. Son after, the fire escape collapsed, throwing bodies to the street.
“I love it when a plan comes together,” Jasper said.
“Let’s never do that again,” said Wade.
Sal continued walking.
“Come on, they ain’t gonna give us a time out.”
Jasper wondered if they’d even traveled a mile. If they had to rest, he wondered if there would be a place they could find temporary refuge.
*
“Would you look at that?” Ty said with wonder in his voice.
Just like in the dream, he saw farmland and forest, scorched. The fire had spread across the grass and road to burn the other side. He doubted that the incineration stretched for miles, but the damage looked catastrophic from his spot on the road. The fire had been maybe a week old, or maybe fresher. To their left, sat the charred ruins of a farmhouse.
On Ty’s command, the station wagon stopped, and Ty opened his door. He grabbed a pair of binoculars from the floor and viewed the land. Just as in the dream, he saw burned bodies scattered near the farmhouse. They’d been undead in the dream, and chasing after the heathens. He’s recognized the black man and the one who was crucified.
Oscar climbed out of his seat, and watched the other side of the landscape through the scope of his 30-06, while Jud rolled down the window and peered out, using his hand as a visor.
“Someone had a party out here,” said Jud.
The others trusted Ty because of his abilities and ruthlessness. Though they were all loyal to the messiah’s cause, none of them were firm believers, so Ty had not told anyone about his dream.
“Looks fresh. We must be on the right road,” Ty got back in his car and Oscar followed. “Roll out.”
Hayden let the station wagon roll for a moment, then pressed on the gas, easing the vehicle’s speed to fifty miles an hour.
“You know, I could get used to being out here,” Jud said. “There’s not as much stink in the air.”
“Nowadays I wonder how I could get by without it,” Ty answered.
*
In the last three hours, evading the undead had become tedious and boring. The same tricks worked every time. Though they had not tried to get over two hundred of them trapped in a building again, they were able to duck through alleyways, climb fences, and cut through buildings to get out of corners. Jasper yawned, hoping the trip would be over soon. His feet ached, his mouth was as dry as his canteen, and he still hadn’t had anything to eat since the day before.
With the sun going down, rats began to scurry in the back allies, devouring anything dead that didn’t move. Their squeaks were audible over the moans of the dead, and Jasper wondered if they were hungry enough to swarm live humans.
“I imagine those vermin are having quite a feast back at that old apartment building!” Sal said. “That was quite a trick.”
By the time their ruined walls were visible, the numbers of undead had dwindled on the streets. The ones who occupied this area had been exterminated years before, through gathering missions.
“Stay low. We don’t know if anyone’s watching for us,” said Sal.
They stayed close to the buildings, looking behind at the trailing army of bodies.
“Won’t all of those walking corpses give us away?” Wade asked.
“I say we make a run for it,” Jasper said. “We get inside, and hide in one of the buildings until the zombies just go away.”
He’d heard about such tactics working in the past. The zombies at their walls only stayed there because of the constant activity inside. They’d known there was food. However, if the base had gone silent and turned off all of the lights, the undead may have forgotten why they were there and moved on or gone home.
“That’s going to kill too much time. You two skunks want to run through the front door, then let’s do it and figure things out when we get there.”
All three ran to the entrance.