Alaskan Undead Apocalypse (Book 3): Mitigation Book 3) (33 page)

Her car gained speed and put their pursuers firmly in the distance but it didn’t seem to be deterring them from the pursuit. Glancing in the rearview mirror often, she saw Allen visibly shiver, the prickly goose bumps rising on his neck. She completely agreed with his sentiment, whether it was spoken or not.

They drove hard back toward Soldotna, noticing for the first time there appeared to be people wandering aimlessly in the open spaces off the side of the road. They all knew, despite the distance between their car and those souls on foot, that there was something different about the other people. Sometimes they were wearing torn or otherwise tattered clothing. On one occasion, they saw a woman dressed in a nursing uniform who appeared to have seeping, lethal wounds on her neck and face. Part of her cheek had been peeled back, exposing teeth and gums to little black gnats and flies who hungrily swarmed the open and inviting wound.

As they neared Soldotna, on their left hand side was Skyview High School. From the highway, they weren’t able to see the school itself, but they knew that it was there just the same. Jess pulled into the parking lot, surprised to see a series of school buses parked end to end to form a kind of a barrier. The great yellow and black wall cordoned off the front entrance of the school and part of the parking lot in front of the building.

Jess stopped her car and waited expectantly. Sure enough, one of the buses slowly began to reverse itself, making room for her to drive her car into the enclosure. She, Simeon, and Allen were relieved, but Jess still felt sick over the distance separating her from her daughter.

The first pair of zombies found the school on the second day after Jess and her companions arrived. Simeon was alongside the other men swinging his bat like a club. There was no denying its rudimentary effectiveness. It wasn’t as loud as one of their guns and it still got the job done.

As it was, Jess, Simeon, and Allen were among the few people at the school to have firearms with ammunition at their disposal. The three of them were immediate celebrities as a result. At least two of them accompanied every excursion outside the wall. They were rarely called upon to use their guns for fear that the sound would attract more of the ghouls, but the reassurance of having the guns along eased many worried minds.

On more than one occasion, however, especially the further they were from the first day, their guns were the difference between everyone returning to the school and none of them returning. Jess was a capable shot with her pistol and put it to good use. Both Simeon and Allen toted powerful hunting rifles. Though the rifles were slower to shoot than the pistols that several people carried, the large caliber bullets which hurtled from their barrels were quite capable of dispatching more than one of the devils at a time so long as the angle was right. Simeon learned this fact very early during a trip to the gas station.

They had a couple of very efficient generators to run a limited number of appliances and some lights, but the generators required gasoline. A recent survivor who had found his way to the school told everyone about a tanker which was parked partially in and partially out of the road at the Chevron station near the juncture of the Sterling and Kenai Spur Highways. He told all of them that it looked like the driver had just left it there.

The gas station was only a little further than they had been already. They could take Jess’ car and as many gas cans as they could carry. If they were lucky, the truck would still have its keys in it. A woman named Francine, a pretty, young Native girl, had experience driving heavy equipment, so she agreed to come along. Simeon and Jess were in the front seat, while Francine and another older man named Royce rode in the back. They had four large jerry cans, each capable of holding five gallons of gasoline, loaded into the trunk. There was room for more, but at their disposal they only had the four empty cans. There were two other cans which still had gasoline in them at the school. The hope was that they would lay their hands on more gas cans at the gas station or on the truck.

Jess sped them across the bridge and into Soldotna. Every time she found herself back in the city, she felt more and more like an interloper. This wasn’t her home anymore. This wasn’t the town that she had always called home. It was still, painfully familiar however.

Having been out on more than one occasion, all the grim reminders of their current circumstances were also becoming horribly familiar. The empty buildings, the abandoned cars, and the bodies...always the bodies. She wondered about each and every nameless, faceless corpse. She likely knew more than a few of them. Like Dante’s torments in his Inferno, the sorrow she felt each time she saw the decomposing piles of bones was as if it were the first time. The bitter burning acid scorched her stomach and her heart simultaneously, taking her breath away. She couldn’t deny the distraction that it threatened to be every time she drove them near any of the bodies she had spotted.

Of course, the bodies that were still moving around gave her equal pause and they lacked predictability. The threat of their unpredictability had her and all of her fellow pillagers on edge from the moment they drove away.

Luckily, on that day, they didn’t see any of the walking dead lurking about. They could see the stalled tanker truck as they passed the Carrs grocery store and they all became anxious. The furthest any of them had ventured into town was to go to the Spenard Builder Supply store which sat just across the river. Had any of them gone the slightest bit more, they would have seen the tanker clearly. It didn’t matter. They were on their way now.

Francine hopped from Jess’ car and into the cab of the big rig while barely touching feet to ground. Royce got out, opened the trunk and took one of the cans with him. In his other hand was his bat. Simeon too was up and out. He still carried the bat he had used during his first close encounter with the undead at Skyview but over his shoulder was slung his rifle.

Simeon circled Jess’ car, looking at their surroundings from different angles. When Francine tried to start the big truck, the diesel engine choked loudly, causing everyone to jump. She leaned out of the cab and said with an embarrassed laugh, “Sorry, I should have warned everyone. My bad.”

The loud, mechanical bark echoed through the quiet morning air. Simeon knew they were there on borrowed time as soon as she did that. Royce hurried over to a valve on the tanker trailer but was puzzled how to proceed. The wrong move and he would be doused with fuel and become a walking fire bomb. Maybe Francine would know. He walked back over toward the cab but was stunned to see one of the walking corpses pull itself from the wheel hub of the truck. It had obviously been run over by the truck’s driver and assumed dead. Stuck and immobile, the zombie must have been dislodged by the sudden lurch caused by the engine. It slithered out of its lodgment, pulling itself along by its hands, its legs largely missing from about mid-thigh down.

From the distance at which he was standing, there was no way he could arrive in time to save Francine, who was unaware of the danger and concentrating on getting the truck started. He shouted and finally got Jess’ attention. Royce pointed excitedly. It didn’t take another look.

Jess was already holding her pistol in her hand. She took a few steps to narrow the distance between her target and herself, but was already in the process of raising the revolver and siting down its barrel. She took a couple of final steps, steadied her arm the way her boyfriend Bob had shown her, and squeezed the trigger.

Jess shot the slinking abomination in the back of the head, its congealed gray matter spattering all over Francine’s legs. Francine’s terrified expression froze on her face, her eyes and mouth wide with surprise. Deciding that the truck was beyond starting, she gave up on trying.

Luckily, she did know how to get gas from the tanker’s out spout, but there didn’t appear to be time to do so. The sound of their car had apparently drawn the attention of several of the undead loitering in some of the surrounding parking lots. The truck engine’s bark and the gunshot had piqued their interest and set them on a course toward the four human beings.

Simeon saw the first one as it appeared around the far side of the truck. He dangled the bat at his side expectantly and started toward the thing, however, he stopped dead in his tracks when the second and then the third creature joined the original one. Seeing their quarry, the zombies became agitated and excited. Their unwieldy, slow gait became much more focused and fast, their quickened steps rapidly propelling them forward. Dropping his bat, Simeon pulled his rifle into his hands and quickly chambered a round. He took one quick look and fired. The bullet punched its way through the closest devil’s eye and exited the back of his head. The bullet then continued into the forehead of the woman following closely behind. Both slumped backward without any fanfare, their brains having been scrambled.

The third ghoul continued forward without missing a step. Simeon calmly chambered another round. By that time, Jess had joined him and was raising her own gun. Simeon waved her off and finished the third attacker with a single bullet.

Royce shouted, “There are more over there!” He was pointing toward the Mexican restaurant which was behind them on the south side of the road.

Francine added, “More from back that way too!” And from around the nearby gas station, more of the abominations were emerging. Simeon knew their position was quickly becoming untenable.

“We need to go! Now!” After which Simeon aimed his rifle and brought down another one.

Jess jumped into her car and realized there wasn’t room for her to be able to maneuver their way out. She hadn’t parked in such a manner as to be able to speed away quickly which she presently regretted. The car wouldn’t be getting them out this time. She got back out and looked apologetically at the others. In shutting her door behind her, they all instantly knew they wouldn’t be driving back to their refuge. Francine leapt back into the truck cab and then leaned out to say, “C’mon, this way! We can cut through the cab. They’re thinner on that side.”

Francine was through the cab and on the other side very quickly, with the others following quickly on her heels. Scurrying like the scared prey she was, Jess held her breath involuntarily as she tried to keep pace with the others. She was behind Royce but just ahead of Simeon, who had stalled to protect the rear. Simeon had to use his rifle butt like a club into the forehead of their closest pursuer, sending him head over tail into the next closest, who ran into the next. The resulting knot of tangled bodies bought Simeon and the others enough time to emerge on the other side of the truck and close the door behind them.

Francine was right. There were fewer of the undead on the far side of the truck, but there were still quite a few of them coming. The four of them paused, feeling overwhelmed by the odds that were building against them. The street, parking lots, and open spaces in front of them were starting to fill with the staggering, rotting wretches.

Jess uttered, “Oh God!”

“Later,” Royce said. “We gotta get away right now.” He pointed to a fairly broad seam between two larger bodies of oncoming walking undead, which were threatening to merge into one contiguous mass of rotting aggression.

Francine, confused, asked, “But doesn’t that take us away from where we want to be? Are you sure?”

Simeon was the first to start moving. He said over his shoulder, “We just want to be away from here right now. There’s too many of those things. C’mon!” With that said, Simeon dropped another target with his rifle. Truth be told, he was trying to line the creatures up in such a way as to hit multiple targets with single bullets. Deciding that he needed quicker shooting to deal with the threat of their avenue of escape getting cut, Simeon shouldered the rifle and pulled his automatic pistol from his shoulder holster.

Repeating “Shit!” over and over again in quick bursts like a revving two-stroke motor, Jess was struggling to load her pistol with some of her few remaining shells and run at the same time. She ran square into Royce’s back and nearly knocked the both of them off their feet. She did end up dropping several precious bullets. Out of habit, she stopped to retrieve the fallen deadly necessities, not realizing there were hands a scant few steps away from grabbing her.

Luckily, Simeon had seen her predicament. He was making his way toward her and firing the pistol at the same time. Royce too had pivoted and was swinging his bat feverishly, hitting everything in its path. Francine, terrified and screaming, had continued to run, oblivious to the others’ plight. It wasn’t personal and she hadn’t intended to ditch everyone. She was simply being driven by her fear, which had taken control of all of her judgment. She watched breathlessly as the envelopment of ghouls around her friends threatened to close.

Royce grabbed Jess’ collar and pulled her upright. She had gotten her hands on four of six dropped bullets. The other two brass colored beauties eluded capture and had to be left in the street. Jess jammed the four bullets into the revolver and had it back ready to fire just as Simeon emptied the magazine on his own pistol.

Firing those four bullets in quick succession, Jess, Simeon, and Royce got themselves extracted from the tightening pocket, sprinting toward Francine. She had stopped running near a small car dealership and was currently fighting to catch her breath. Bent at the waist and looking up from that position, Francine saw the horde of ghastly nightmares, their expressions burning with a single collective ravenous rage, chasing her friends. The four of them accelerated away from their hunters, but it was a pace that none of them could maintain. They were all heaving and wheezing, their lungs protesting their overexertion.