The Dead Series (Book 3): Dead Weight (35 page)

“Here they come,” his friend said in a low voice.

“Hold your fire until they get to where the trees end and the road opens up into the field,” Steve told him.

“Already on it,” Tick-Tock said as he pulled back the charging lever
to feed the first round into the chamber. “It’ll create a choke point.”

Tick-Tock could see the dead clearly as the last dregs of fog burned off in the sun. Some were clothed
, while others had a variety of tattered clothing hanging from their bodies. Only a few were completely nude, which led him to believe that a majority of this group had been hiding in vehicles. A handful of the faster ones leading the main body of the dead reached the kill zone, but he held his fire. Steve would deal with these individuals; his concern was the mass of Z’s behind them.

Not worried about making noise anymore since it was obvious that the dead knew they were here, Steve used his M4 to fire single rounds into the heads of the lead Z
’s. This energized the ones behind them and they came forward in a rush. From his left, he could hear Tick-Tock saying to himself, “Wait for it. Wait for it.” And then he yelled, “NOW.”

Tick-Tock squeezed off a short burst with the .50
caliber heavy machine gun. Seeing his bullets punching into the chests and stomachs of the dead, he adjusted his fire and let loose. His rounds smashed into the heads of the closely packed Z’s, some of them blowing through two and three of them before losing velocity. Black puss, brains and skull fragments flew into the air as the dead at the front of the pack were mowed down.

After three sustained bursts
from the heavy machine gun, it was empty. Tick-Tock grabbed his rifle and fired a few shots at the Z’s he’d missed and then yelled, “GO.”

He and Steve turned as one and ran for
where they could see Heather standing in the opening of the gate, firing her CAR-15 at the advancing horde. Once safely inside, they turned and covered her while she secured the locks. Once this was done, all three of them started firing at the Z’s who had already made it halfway across the field.

The dead poured down the road and spread out a few feet to either side
of it. They were focused on the food in front of them and came toward the gate in a straight line. Despite the fire being poured into them from Heather, Tick-Tock and Steve, there were so many of them it was like trying to empty the ocean with an eyedropper. For every one that fell, three more took its place as they stumbled over the bodies of their own.

As the dead neared the gate, its three defenders backed away out of reflex. They continued firing
in order to stem the flood of Z’s and lessen the impact on the fence, but it seemed futile. The dead hit the gate with an audible bang and it bowed in slightly before springing back. Prepared to flee if needed, the trio stopped and stood their ground when they saw that their first line of defense was holding. After firing the last rounds in their magazines almost point blank into the grotesque, whining, blue-grey faces that assaulted them, they reloaded and slowly backed away from the dead arms reaching through the uprights to grasp at them.

After a few step
s, Steve turned and started running for the lead truck. He passed Brain crouched over a car battery at the right side of the lane and said, “Wait for my signal.”

Steve jumped
up on the hood of the Ford and then looked in awe at the number of Z’s still flowing down the road and onto the field. They were already bunched up twenty deep at the gate, so the newcomers flowed out to cluster against the fence on both sides of it. He could see the stakes in the ground where they had planted the landmines, but there weren’t enough of the dead around to justify setting them off yet.

Looking to where Brain was poised over the battery with a wire in each hand, he called out, “Not yet.”

“Let me know when,” he yelled back.

Steve l
ooked at the other vehicles, pleased to see that everyone was where they were supposed to be. Only a few more minutes and they would leave.

***

Sean could feel himself losing his sanity at the sight of all the dead pushing against the fence. All the dirty faces with their teeth bared, and their equally filthy hands reaching toward him, made his skin literally crawl at the thought of them ripping into his flesh. His mind screamed at him to flee, but his body was frozen in place. Screams of horror came from behind him and he felt his head turning in slow motion to look. It was his people. They were yelling something at him but he couldn’t understand what they were saying. It was as if the English language had escaped him.

With a snap, he came to his senses. He could now understand that his people were screaming at him to get them out of here. Looking past them, he
saw that the doors of the mansion stood wide open. His first thought was to get out of the minivan and run for them, but what safety did a house hold against the number of dead coming at them?

Turning to look forward again, he could see more dead lining the fence. He focused on their twisted faces and
saw fresh blood on some of them. With the truck blocking his view of what was directly in front of him, his mind latched on to the idea that the dead had caught Steve and his buddy out in the field and had eaten them. He saw someone climbing onto the hood of the truck in front of him, but in his crazed state, he thought it was one of the dead attacking Denise. For a second he focused on his reflection in the rearview mirror and could see his mouth opening and closing as he tried to say something.

Then his mind snapped again.

They’re gone, his brain screamed at him. Steve was gone and now it was everyone for themselves. He even said the word, “Gone,” but it was lost in the screams from the back of the minivan. This caused his panic to grow and energized him into action. He had to act to save himself.

As he slid behind the
steering wheel, he caught Mary’s attention as she leaned down to yell at everyone to shut up. Seeing his hand reaching for the ignition, she pulled her pistol and pointed it at him while screaming in a high-pitched voice for him to stop.

Sean’s stomach dropped and he felt a surge of adrenalin go through him when he saw the handgun pointed at his head. Rage flooded his mind and body at the thought of these Neanderthals and their guns. They had no idea what they were doing
, and it was their fault that he was this situation in the first place. They had treated him and his people like nothing more than swamp donkeys, and now they would get them all killed.

Reaching out with a speed born of fear and madness, he grabbed the barrel of the .40 and twisted it out of Mary’s hand.

“We’ve got to go,” he screamed, “They’re all dead.” Then he stuffed the pistol under his leg and turned the ignition of the minivan. The engine cranked once and caught.

Seeing that Sean had lost it
and was ready to drive off, Mary knew she didn’t have time to un-sling her rifle. She could see her pistol sticking out from under his leg, so she lunged at it with her left hand while reaching out with her right to rake her nails into his eyes and down his face.

Sean saw her coming
at him and grabbed the pistol first. Unfamiliar with firearms, he nonetheless knew enough to point it and pull the trigger.

The
bullet caught Mary almost point blank in the upper stomach, doubling her over and knocking the wind from her with a whooshing noise. A fine spray of blood flew out from behind her as the bullet exited her back. She stood there, half in and half out of the passenger side door, until Sean reached out with the pistol and put it against her head. He wanted to pull the trigger again, but instead, shoved his hand forward. Using the barrel he pushed her out of the minivan.

He looked
around in panic and saw that his actions hadn’t gone unnoticed. Sheila began heading toward him at a run from behind. To his front, he saw that the dead thing on the hood of the truck had spun around at the noise of the pistol firing. It was Steve. With a start, Sean realized that the man hadn’t been eaten, and in an instant he knew that it didn’t matter. After what he’d just done, they would kill him no matter what.

Sean dropped
the handgun and shifted the minivan into drive. He spun the steering wheel to his right and stomped down on the gas pedal. The vehicle lurched forward just as Sheila grabbed onto the open passenger door. He reached down to grab the pistol again but saw that she wasn’t a threat. It was all the woman could do to hang on as her feet dragged along the ground.

Turning his attention
to the front, he could see the gate and the dead pushed up against it. Brain jumped out of his way as he swerved back onto the gravel drive and felt the minivan bounce as it ran over the car battery. Bullets hit the side of the vehicle as he swerved, trying to make himself a more difficult target. Sean was rocking back and forth in his seat, trying to urge the minivan to go faster. It was moving at forty-five miles an hour when it hit the gate.

With a bang, the chains and locks parted
and the wrought iron twisted outward, pushing the first line of Z’s out of the way. Sean gave a whoop of joy that caught in his throat when he ran into the rest of the dead beyond them. The minivan slowed and then stopped within twenty feet of the gate as it hit dead flesh that was pushed beneath it and caught in the wheels and undercarriage. Sheila was first slammed between the passenger door and its frame by the impact with the dead, and an instant later she was pulled away by dozens of reanimated corpses.

With her hands free
, now that she wasn’t holding on for her life, Sean saw that she had pulled her pistol and was shooting into the wall of reanimated flesh that fell on her with gnashing teeth. He lost sight of her when a large group of the dead circled around her. The gunshots stopped and were suddenly replaced by screams of pain and terror as she was torn apart.

The side sliding door had been left open in case they had to run, so the dead flooded into the passenger compartment. They bit and tore at their helpless victims, dragging some of them out
of the van where they were ripped to pieces, while the rest were killed and eaten where they sat, still restrained by their seatbelts.

Sean’s last sight was
of dirty hands reaching in through the passenger side door to dig into his face and body before dragging him to their dead mouths.

***

Steve jumped at the sound of the gunshot. He turned to locate where it came from and saw Mary fall away from the side of the minivan and land sprawled out on her back in the grass. He could clearly see the blood that covered her midsection gleaming in the sun. Before he could react, the minivan jumped forward and sped past him as it headed for the gate. He raised his rifle but couldn’t get a clear shot at the driver. Seeing Sheila clinging to the passenger side door as her toes dug furrows in the dirt and grass, he aimed low, raking the side of the vehicle with high velocity rounds as he emptied his magazine.

The minivan
started swerving to avoid his bullets, and he could see Sheila being thrown around like a rag doll. He knew that there was no stopping the vehicle, so he yelled for everyone to run for the house just as Sean hit the gate with a resounding bang. Steve called out to Brain to blow the dynamite and could see that the tech was trying to right the smashed battery. Knowing it was no use, he yelled again for everyone to retreat to the mansion as he called out for Brain to run.

Steve l
ifted his rifle to cover the tech, and then squeezed the trigger at the first of the dead flooding into the compound.

***

Brain ignored the sting of acid on the cuts he’d received from jumping and sliding on the gravel of the road in an attempt to get out of Sean’s way. He lifted the battery as his eyes searched for the wires leading to the dynamite. The minivan had scattered everything when it almost ran him over, so the leads were now twisted and driven into the gravel of the road.

Grabbing the first red and a black wire in sight, he pushed them against the positive and negative anodes on the battery
as he scrunched his head down in expectation of the impending explosion.

Nothing.

Hoping the smashed battery still held enough of a charge; he grabbed another black wire and pushed it against the negative post.

Nothing.

He could see a few the dead coming toward him, falling from bullets that exploded their heads in sprays of bone and black puss, but it barely stemmed their flood. Brain knew he had only seconds before he had to turn and run, so he brushed his hands back and forth over the surface of the road. Something poked his forefinger and he dug out a blue-coated wire. In a panic, he tried to recall how all the bundles of dynamite were wired but couldn’t remember. Trying the negative first, he had to switch the red, black and blue wires three times before he hit the right combination.

The concussion of the blast threw him back from where he was crouched and sent a shockwave out from its epicenter
that flattened everything within a hundred foot radius. Dead flesh and body parts flew up into the air and outward in a spray of black puss and dirt. The explosion was so powerful; it even knocked down the dead that were already through the gate.

His ears ringing, Brain righted himself and
began searching for another wire. Finding a red one, he was getting ready to try it when he looked up and saw a dead thing, dressed in meter reader’s uniform, lunging at him with a gaping mouth. His focus fixed in on its rotting, brown teeth only feet from his face, and his mind flashed back to when a zombie had attacked him on the Dead Calm. As he tried to get his foot up to push it away, he knew it was no use. The Z was too close.