Sometimes We Ran (Book 2): Community (12 page)

I smiled at her. “Yes. Cannon Fields has children. And they need a doctor.”

Doctor Connelly smiled. It was a big bright smile full of hope and relief. “That’s good. It’ll be nice to treat children again.”

“You believe what the doctor was saying?” Ben asked, as he tightened the bolt on the positive battery terminal of our possible new ride. “You know, about those parasites attacking the brain. Do you think she’s right?” We were working as quietly as we could. I could sense that the zombies were out in the wreckage, watching us. “How can a little thing like that cause the end of the world?”

I handed Ben a smaller wrench. The one he was using was too large for the job at hand. “The doctor seems pretty sharp. She’s had time to study it. I think I can believe her. I guess there were more things in the world that could kill us than we thought.”

Ben finished tightening the stubborn bolt, and wiped his face. “Damn. Hard to believe.” He wiped the grime of his hands and stared at his palms. “Makes me want to wash my hands about a million times.”

“I know what you mean. My skin has been itchy ever since she told us about the little bastards.” I reached into the large black SUV and turned the key. After a little grinding from the starter, its big V8 engine roared to life. I was happy to see that it had half a tank of gas.

Ben closed the hood and glanced at Ryan, who was standing in the street with rifle ready. He was watching the rows and piles of junk cars and trucks that surrounded us. He had an angry look in his eye.

“Ryan still upset?” I asked.

Ben finished putting his tools away. “Yeah. Kind of. I don’t think he blames you for Jenny as much as he blames himself.”

“Really wish he get out of the road. He’s pretty exposed out there.”

Ben smiled and slapped me on the back. “He’ll be okay. He just wants to be alone. You know the young people…always emotional.”

I nodded my head in agreement. Claire could often be moody, angry, sad, and then happy again in the space of a few minutes. I secretly nicknamed her “Hurricane Claire.”

Ben continued “We’ll get home, and he’ll feel better. Ryan just has to work it out. My Momma always said time is sometimes the best medicine.”

As we walked back to the clinic, a shot rang out. The sound echoed off the buildings.

Ben and I dove for cover behind a little brick wall. A second shot, from another location, sounded off from the junk pile across the street.

“Who’s shooting at us now?” Ben said. “More cannibals?”

“Don’t know.” I looked for Ryan. He had taken cover behind our new ride. He was in a defensive position at the back of the vehicle, preparing to fire back. Our truck wasn’t good cover, and I really didn’t want any bad guys shooting out the windows or tires. I caught some movement across the street. Two men in city camo uniforms were running around in cover behind some cars. Wallace’s men. They were here for me.

“Looks like two in uniform,” I said. “Over there in front of us.”

“That’s all I need to know.” Ben took his rifle off his shoulder and brought it to bear. He took two shots. The bullets ricocheted off the car the men were hiding behind. They had to duck.

Ryan started to fire. He stood up, and left cover to fire a few shots at our attackers. With the automatic rifle fire, the two uniformed men had to mount a mini-retreat from cover. Ryan decided to press the advantage, and he left the truck to rain some more lead on their heads.

Ryan was too out in the open. He was a target.

“Ryan!” I yelled. “Over here!” I waved my arms for him to come to the wall. I wanted to retreat into the clinic.

Ryan shot me a glance, and started back toward the wall. He took a few steps, then started to run. He was a few feet away from our truck, when a third shooter popped up and shot him in the back. There was a spray of blood, and Ryan went down hard to the asphalt. He didn’t cry out or yell. He tried to crawl to me, but he was in too much pain. Someone was going to have to go get him.

“Dammit! They got Ryan,” Ben yelled. He turned his rifle and started firing at the third shooter.

“Cover me!” I shouted to Ben. Without thinking, I jumped out from behind the wall and tried to get to Ryan. The bullets began to fly as I approached. I ignored them and focused on getting Ryan back to the wall. I reached him, and grabbed his outstretched hand. I scooped up Ryan and his rifle and started to beat cheeks back to Ben. Bullets hit the ground and bounced around me as I ran, stooped over, in a zigzag pattern to try and thwart the third shooter’s aim. Like a laser, I focused on getting Ryan to the clinic. Ben fired over my head in an attempt to give me some cover. I felt a sharp pull on my jacket that nearly knocked me over. At first, I thought I had been shot, but it had gone through my sleeve, missing my arm. It made a ragged hole in the material.

On top of everything else, now I needed a new jacket.

As I got closer, I saw that Ben was pointing at the soldiers. They weren’t shooting at us anymore, and were now battling something else. I glanced over my shoulder. Several Red-Eyes, aroused by our gun battle, were now hunting our attackers. I watched as a few Red-Eyes jumped on the guy that shot Ryan and were now tearing him apart. He screamed and fired wildly as they took him down. That was enough for his friends. They were bugging out in a jeep, leaving him behind.

“We got a problem!” Ben said, as he fired at the zombies. A big male, foaming at the mouth, went down to Ben’s shot. I looked back, and the Red-Eyes were pouring out and heading our way. Many were in a full trot. Fresh meat in the area had created a frenzy in the local undead population. Ryan, Ben, and I were next on the menu.

“I know. Help me with Ryan. We’ll go into the clinic.” Ben took hold of Ryan’s limp body, and we started running for the door of the clinic at full speed. The clinic was our best hope. We had suddenly become outnumbered. If we stayed outside and fought, they would eat us alive where we stood.

We ran towards the front door of the clinic, with a moaning hoard of hungry zombies on our heels. I don’t know if it was my imagination or not, but they seemed faster. Ben closed the heavy steel and glass doors of the main lobby just in time. The zombies collided with the doors and windows and began to pound rhythmically on the glass. The moaning and the screaming drowned out all other sounds. We had descended into hell.

Ben and I shifted our grip on the injured Ryan and proceeded through another set of heavy wooden doors. Ben slammed and locked those, as well. Another barricade in the way of the army of undead. Taking no time to pause and think, we started to run down the main hallway to the clinic and Doctor Connelly. She was Ryan’s only hope right now.

“How long do you think the doors will hold them?” Ben asked between labored breaths. The hallway was very humid, and it was sapping our strength.

“I don’t know.” Just as I said that, I heard glass breaking somewhere. “Not long.”

We dragged Ryan and ourselves through the hospital debris and muck in the hallway. My boots and the bottom of my pants were becoming black with all the grime. We flashed past the intersecting hallway that led to the door where we first entered this fresh hell. Ben stopped and rolled gurneys and other discarded equipment to make an improvised barricade in the hallway. “How long do you think it will take for the deadheads to figure out there’s another way inside?” Ben asked as we passed the pile of debris that was trying to resemble a barricade.

“Don’t know. Probably won’t take long.” I was right. I caught some movement in the lobby and dark hallway as we passed. It wouldn’t be long before our undead friends figured things out.

Doctor Connelly was already at the door. “What the hell happened?”

Ben and I dragged the now unconscious Ryan through the doors. “Ryan’s been shot. Shut that door and lock it,” I said. Doctor Connelly quickly shut the double doors, and shot the security locks. Ben threw more clinic debris in the way as a blockade. We were now sealed up in the clinic, with what may have been a hundred or so hungry zombie maniacs outside pounding at the door.

“Put him over here,” Doctor Connelly directed us over to one of the emergency stalls. She ran ahead and got it ready while Ben and I dragged Ryan over to the bed. We set him down as gently as we could. Blood from the wound in his back immediately began to stain the off-white sheets.

Doctor Connelly pulled on some latex gloves and went to work. She gently turned Ryan on his side, removed his backpack, and cut his clothing around the wound. “Damn. It’s in his back.” The bullet had entered close to his spine, just below his pack.

I tried to swallow my mounting panic. “How bad is it?” I asked.

The Doctor didn’t look up as she continued her work. “It’s bad. Looks like it might have lodged near his spine.” She handed me a pressure bandage. “Hold this on the wound. We’ve got to stop the bleeding first.”

Fighting a dizzy spell, I placed the bandage on Ryan’s wound. Doctor Connelly placed her hands on mine, and we both applied pressure. The situation looked grave. Ryan’s blood wouldn’t stop, and it stained my hands red. His blood was now literally on my hands. After a few minutes, Doctor Connelly took a quick look under the bandages.

“What do you think, Doc?”

She finished her assessment and continued applying pressure to the wound. “Hopefully, we can stabilize him by slowing down the bleeding. I won’t be able to do anything here.” She looked around. “I’m out of everything.”

I thought of Safety One. Jenny and Ryan had put a few medical supplies in the storage area. “Cannon Fields established a few safe zones out here on the road. They have some medical supplies. If we can stabilize Ryan, can we move him?”

“Maybe. Hopefully the trip won’t kill him. We’ll have to get out of here first.” The doctor looked under the bandage again. The blood flow seemed to be slowing. “We’ll have to keep him from moving too much. I don’t want that slug in his back to paralyze him.”

Something banged on the clinic’s wooden double doors, causing us both to jump in fright. Another bang followed the first. It was much louder. The Red-Eyes were at the clinic doors. The only doors preventing us from becoming dinner.

“John! Problem over by the doors,” Ben shouted from across the room.

“Go!” Doctor Connelly said. “I’ll take care of Ryan.”

I grabbed Ryan’s rifle and ran over to Ben. The banging was getting more insistent. A few hands, caked with blood and grime, were pressed up against the small frosted glass panel on the door that was now beginning to crack. As I watched, a small piece of glass fell out of the corner and shattered on the floor. A few bloody fingers probed the hole, followed by a menacing red eye. The owner of that scary eye stared at Ben and me, then it let out an animal growl.

“Oh dear Lord. I think they’re hungry.” Ben and I retreated from the doors. They were moving slightly from being pushed by the crowd outside.

“How long do you think those doors are going to hold?” I said.

“Not long. There’s a hallway full out there.” By the sounds of the moaning and the pounding, Ben was right.

A splintering sound, like wood beginning to give way, echoed through the clinic. Ben and I retreated a little further away. Ben got his rifle ready. “What are we going to do?”

Nothing immediately came to mind. The situation looked a little dire. I tried to think what Claire and used to do in these situations, but my mind was distracted by the banging on the doors. We were trapped in a confined space, with a swarm outside the door trying to get in. One of our party was dead, and another was injured. We now had a little girl to look after. We were low on ammunition, and forty miles from home.

The banging at the door grew louder.

I checked with Doctor Connelly. She was wrapping the last of the sterile bandages around Ryan, trying to bind his wounds. Her latex gloves were slick with blood. Ryan was coming to, and groaning a little.
“How’s he doing?” I asked. The banging got even louder.

The doctor shook her head. “The bleeding has slowed. The bandage will help.” She looked me in the eye. “It’s bad. He’s lost a lot of blood. I can’t get the bullet. I don’t have a clean operating area. He’s asking for you.” Before I could get to Ryan’s bedside, Doctor Connelly grabbed my arm. “He told me he’s lost feeling in his legs. It might be temporary. I just don’t know.” The banging at the door continued to get louder and louder. The whole Red-Eye nation was trying to get at us.

I got to Ryan’s side just as he opened his eyes. He was pale, and very shaky. I touched his shoulder. “How you doing, Ryan?”

He tried to smile, but was in too much pain. The look on his face became a grimace instead. He grasped my arm, and said two words. “Leave me.”

“No way. You’re coming with us. We started this trip together.”

He shook his head, which caused him great pain. “Save everyone else. Leave me. I’m done. Just give me a rifle or something for a fighting chance.” The effort needed to talk caused him to pass back into unconsciousness. The banging on the door continued to get louder.

I walked back over to the doors. Ben and the doctor stood like statues, staring at the wooden door that was keeping us uneaten. They turned to me with scared expressions, waiting for any instruction. It was probably this way with a lot of survivors. They would get trapped, their options would get limited, and then they died. It was finally happening to me. I was finished. My travels were finally over.

“What are going to do?” Ben asked.

I thought for a minute. “Doctor Connelly, is there a back way out of here?”

She nodded, “Yes, but it’s covered in debris. We’d be toast before we cleared it all.”

I looked at he ceiling. “How about upstairs? We can go to the roof.”

The Doctor shook her head. “No good. The upper floors are full of trapped zombies. I hear them at night sometimes.”

No options. We were going to have to fight.

I pulled my handgun and handed it to the doctor. She was going to need a weapon. I checked the magazine in Ryan’s rifle…about half full. I replaced it, and said, “We’re going to fight. Ben, you and I will try and catch them in a crossfire at the door. Doctor Connelly, you get behind us. Anything that gets past, put a bullet in its head. That includes me or Ben if we are bitten and turned. If a hole opens up, we grab Ryan and run.” Ben and I turned towards the door with weapons ready.