Surviving Day By Day (Book 1): So it Begins (24 page)

That triggered something inside of Beth that caused her to think about when she had to put her family down. All of this death and destruction that had been started by the government that she worked for, that
promised
they would prote
ct the citizens of the nation.
Well that was the biggest amount of bull shit
and
she had been brainwashed into thinking
it
for years.

There was no terror in Beth now
,
it had been
replaced
with pure
anger
and that anger now was coursing
through her veins. There was no more government official inside of her. Beth’s family was gone, Colt’s
wife
Jessica was gone and right now all she knew was that she was not about to let herself or Colt die. Without hesitation Beth began rapidly firing her Beretta at any moving target that was coming at them
.

Colt followed Beth and kept firing, each one in his mind was the monsters that created this, not humans, never humans. He fired shots not knowing where he was hitting t
hem but running and firing was his plan and he was sticking to it
.

The
monsters seemed to be
circling them, Colt wondered if they still had some kind of brain function. He fired at the three in front of them and Beth lead the way threw them, “Well if any of those mother fuckers are coming they need to get their ass here!!”

Leaning on a large tree he leveled the gun shooting two more than a click, “Beth I have to reload, cover me!”

Colt reached in his pocket pulling out a few bullets, he released the clip and started filling it with the bullets he had, reaching back in his pocket for more when he had the first ready to slide in. He hit the ground with a monster on top of him; he only worried about the mouth. Everything was so fast, they were so strong.

Colt tried to swing the axe but it was useless. Suddenly gunshot rang out and the man went limp on Colt and he was covered by thick bloody chunks. He shoved the man off scrambling to find his gun and the clip, as he quickly wiped the blood and brains off his face. He found the gun then the clip and slammed it home not worrying about if he was fully loaded or no
t. He looked to Beth, “Thanks.”

“No problem.” Just then from out of nowhere coming from up from her left side one of the infected reached out and grabbed her arm and pulled on her. Both of them went to the ground as their legs tangled up.
Like Colt,
Beth paid no attention to any other part of the subject, just the mouth. The muscle tissue where the cheek bones were located was hanging in chunks off of the chin and the teeth were fully exposed. There chomping action of the teeth was very ferocious.

Tilting her head to the side Beth instantly pulled her arm away and shifted her weight
flipping the subject under her,
then while sitting on top of his legs Beth hit him with the butt end of the gun dead center in the face which knocked him flat on his back. With her gun in her hand Beth fired off a round that went through the bottom of the subjects chin and exited through the crown of his skull. This was the first time that Beth had been that up close and personal with one and
was shocked
seeing the brain matter burst out onto the nearest tree bark
.

Colt just watched as Beth shot the man, the woman had balls.
T
urning and firing again at some of the others, he thought they had to of dropped at least ten of them but there were still at least that many left. He could only hope the ones they heard the night before would come but he wasn’t so sure he believed it.

Ceara lifted one of the fish and looked at Alden wrinkling her nose, “I ain’t got no idea how to clean fish.”

Charlie laughed, “I’ll clean
,
if you cook.”

Ceara s
miled dropping the fish, “DEAL”

She went to the fire to get the pan ready as Charlie start
ed gutting the first fish.
Alden watched as the kids worked together as a team. Charlie was doing a good job of cleaning the fish and filleting the larger
ones;
Tabitha had the canned milk and corn meal and was breading the fish then handing the
m
to Ceara who was frying it all up in the skillet.

Alden kept one eye on the tree line knowing the wind was blowing to the southwest so he paid the most attention to that. The bad thing about frying fish has always been the smell. He grinned
,
thinking of the old adage about fi
sh and guests after three days.

Getting up he got the good plates out and the real silverware he had kept. Ceara gave him a quizzical look. Smiling, “The odor of the fish will attract both deadheads and animals so we must take care tonight. Dishes will be done and I will throw the bones and guts and leftovers down into the stream so it takes it away from our camp.”

The group was soon sitting down and eating Alden watched as they devoured the fish. No one was talking
,
which did not surprise him. He knew that
between last night and this morning,
it
was probably the first real home cooked meal
s
any
of them had had in a long time.

Soon they were done and he smiled as they all sat back. The small talk of how good it was started the conversations off. Alden got up and brought the coffee pot to the table and poured each one a cup. As he put the pot back down he watched as Tonto suddenly got up and walked slowly to the woods looking southeast Maximus had followed T
onto but he was growling lowly.

Alden walked back to the table as the kids were laughing and joking about Charlie holding a fish head and singing some old fish-head song from a music video from the eighties. He picked up his coffee and gave Tabitha a grin as he took a drink. His eyes were still watching the dogs. Tonto’s ears perked up and the hair rose down his back but still made no sound. Maximus on the other hand was growing louder. Alden reached down to his side and released the s
trap that held his large knife.

C
eara saw Maximus and Tonto,
and then
looked to Alden. The man was watching the trees where the dogs were. Maximus barked, “Maximus SHHH”

Ceara went to her dog, “What is it boy? Are they coming again?” She looked to Alden, “What’s going on?”

Alden gave a slight head shake and put a finger to his lips to tell her to be quiet. Ceara went back to the table looking at both Tabitha and Charlie, “Do you think it’s more dead heads? He ain’t yelling at us so I don’t think that’s it.”

Neither Charlie nor Tabitha said a word, Tabitha was watching the trees and Charlie was watching Alden. Ceara didn’t know what to do but the gun shot that rang out made her jump.
Charlie’s head turned quick towards the woods. “Holy shit
Boss. What the fuck was that?”

Alden never looked at him he simply said, “a forty five would be my guess.”

Charlie looked to the girls who were now up and looking the same direction. “What, wha- what’ll we do.”

He looked at them and never saw Alden
,
who had turned and bolted to the van. The next thing Charlie knew Alden had some sort of short barreled machine gun and had thrown on some sort of combat web vest.

The speed he used to get dressed made Charlie speak, “There ain’t no way that man’s as old as he looks.”

Charlie then ran to the van and grabbed the shot gun he had used earlier, along with a box of shells. He opened it and began to try and cram them into his pockets. Looking up to Alden, “I think I need to get me some of those baggy army pant
s I can’t carry shit in these.”

Alden grinned,
“
We’ll see wh
at we can do about that later.”

Tabitha stacked the plates up quickly on the picnic table and then made her way over towards where Ceara was. “Ceara we will get all of this cleaned up later…while the guys are getting locked and loaded how about you and I use hand to hand combat.”

Giving Ceara a pat on the back
trying
let her know that she was enthused about what was about to transpire
but
she just couldn’t show it any better than that. Tabitha’s attention then became diverted after Alden opened the van and she saw something resembling a crow bar or something of that nature.

Nodding
her head Tabitha made her way over to the van and grabbed the crow bar and a tire iron that she saw wedged underneath the driver’s seat. Turning around she looked carefully at both weapons then threw the crow bar at Ceara. “Here….catch! The one thing that I have learned about these choices is that we don’t have to reload AND they
don’t make a hell of a racket!”

Ceara caught the crowbar and just looked at Tabitha, what the hell was she nuts? The girl was actually smiling. Ceara didn’t trust the enthusiasm Tabitha had, “Yeah umm but this means I have to let them get close, not so sure I’m okay with that.”

She walked over to the van and laid the bar down looking at Alden, barely speaking above a whisper, “Do you think I wou
ld survive fighting with this?”

“Sweetheart I’m surprised you’ve made this far,
b
ut no you being up close and personal with a deadhead if not a wise idea.”

Alden reached in and took out a short barrel combat shot gun with a 20 round drum. He attached the drum to the rifle. Looking to Ceara, “You pull this little lever
back, which
will chamber your first round now you simply need to pull the trigger each time to fire it. You have 20 rounds…. Don’t waste them.”

He turned to the group,
“
Okay here’s how we play this
,
Tonto will take point
,
I’ll be behind him.
” He pointed
at Ceara, “Cupcake two
you’re
behind me and Charlie you and leather britches there bring up the rear.”

He turned snapped his fingers and Tonto took off towards the sound of the shots with Maximus right behind barking and growling and Al
den moving quickly behind them.

Tabitha rolled her eyes at the “leather britches” comment and smiled, “No guts…no glory and well as for your little comment there Grandpa
,
I make these
‘britches’
look good!”

Looking over at Charlie; Tabitha
saw
that he was loaded for bear. “Charlie
,
you keep an eye out
,
if you can’t pick off the closest ones
,
go for the ones farther out
,
I’ll get the ones that are within arm’s reach. I will just way lay the mother fuckers
,
so you don’t run out of ammo cause
with
Red up there I am kinda worried
. S
he grabbed that gun a little too eager for my liking and she may not be stingy with her bullets. I’ve taken a few out up close and personal if you catch my drift and their melons pop like pimples if they’ve been dead a while.”

Tabitha was nervous but she wasn’t about to show cause she really did care
about the others of the group.
Charlie looked at her with suspicion. He really wasn’t as enthused about this as Tabitha was. “Look
,
if we find what I think we’re gonna find out there you just watch
whose
head you’re way laying with that thing.”

The two took off behind Ceara and Alden.
The path was covered with fallen branches and weeds, Ceara watched where Alden went and glanced back from time to time to make sure Charlie and Tabitha were still in sight. Turning back to watch Alden again she walked right through a spider web with the resident spider in the web.

Ceara dropped the gun screaming jumping waving her hands trying to get the spider off. “GET IT DAMN IT!!”

Maximus came running and barking sure that something was attacking his
new
owner. Alden spun around and watched for a
m
oment
as Ceara was doing some sort of tribal war dance.

Reaching he grabbed her shirt and pulled her to him placing his hand over her mouth. “You will shut the fuck up or I will hog tie you to that fucking tree
with that silly spider web.”

Maximus growled at Alden and he returned the growl, “I don’t need any of your shit either.”

Maximus stopped, cocked his head and
looked at Alden. “We need to go and go now I won’t have Tonto running headlong into whatever is up there without me behind him. Remember the
rule; that
dog means more to me than any of you people. Now suck it up and let’s move.”

He let go of Ceara and bent down picking up her weapon and shoving into her chest. Looking her in the eyes one last time, “You stay focused this is not only your ass on the line but my dogs too!!”

He turned and bolted to catch up with Tonto almost at a full run as h
e heard more shots being fired.

Seeing Alden scold Ceara after her little tribal spider dance caused Tabitha to giggle a little
,
but then she remembered too; that she didn’t like spiders either. When Alden continued on Tabitha jogged up to Ceara and whispered in her ear, “Don’t let it get to ya, he just is this way when he hasn’t had his first cup of coffee and it may be that time of the month for him is all.”

Tabitha hoped
that would help Ceara not feel
so
embarrassed.
Charlie snickered as Ceara hit the web, “Girls”, he said shaking his head.

Tabitha hung back with Charlie once more bringing up the rear. Paying particular attention to where she walked Tabitha didn’t want to walk into a pot hole or trip over a log because that would just draw more unwanted attention. Just then she heard the gun fire getting louder and she almost immediately brought her head straight up and looked in the direction that the noise was coming from. Taking a few steps back and looking toward the right Tabitha could make out shadows and commotion from up ahead
, “Hey Alden!! 1 o’clock, looks like we got company!”

Ceara looked to where Tabitha said and she could see several deadheads about hundred feet ahead, she was pretty sure that Alden had already seen them. Maximus and Tonto were both right with Alden and she was about ten feet behind them. Tabitha and Charlie were another ten from her. Alden waved her up and Ceara got up to him, he pointed out a tree, but then she saw what he was pointing at, there were two people there shooting. All Ceara thought was, “Great now we have to worry about being bit or shot.”
Charlie
picked up the pace to
catch
up with Alden. The man may be old, crusty and hard but Charlie was sure that if any of them had any hope of getting through this, it all laid on that old man’s shoulders.

Catching up with the rest he dropped down to one knee and peered with through the brush. He saw a girl shoot one of the deadheads right through his jaw. “Damn that chick’s got balls.”

His eyes scanned the area around the two people, “Boss there’s a lot of them I count twenty but
its
hard
cause the fuckers keep moving.”

Alden was crouched and
had
Tonto by the neck with Maximus at his side. Watching the whole thing unfold he cussed under his breath, “Fuck Fuck Fuck! They got them boxed in! The only thing is the deadheads don’t know it.”

Standing up he looked around to where he saw the least amount of
deadheads, and t
hen looked to the group. “Alright listen up. This is what we have, we can sneak out of here and leave them or we can try and save their asses what you want to do?”

The three young people all looked at each other; then
at Alden and in unison spoke, “
LIKE WE HAVE A CHOICE?”

Alden grinned “That’s what I thought… okay follow me
. We’re going to flank the dead
heads over this way and get them to turn to us. As they do
,
those folks over there will be able to escape. Ceara, your job is to go get them to come towards you. Fire three shots in the air. With that thing
,
I’m sure you’ll get their attention. Charlie
,
you and Tabitha follow me and the dogs. Tabitha your last
,
as soon as you can
,
I want you to turn and help Ceara. Charlie you stay with me and when I say peel
,
you cut and run back to the girls and get those people back to camp.”