Assuming Room Temperature (Keep Your Crowbar Handy Book 3) (19 page)

“We? I did all the heavy lifting.” Beatrix mumbled, picking a few burrs out of her hair. “I got nine of them. You put down how many? Three? Four, maybe?”

Jake ignored her. “Twenty or so are still vertical, but if we do end up having to head out on foot just keep moving and you’ll be able to outdistance them easily.”

“I’m not so sure.” Barker looked uncomfortable with the possibility of having to ride ‘shanks mare’ to avoid ghouls in close quarters.

“Just stick close and we’ll all be back in Langley by dinnertime.” Jake pointed back into the sunlit room. “Do you need a hand?”

Barker shook his head and hurried towards the door. “I don’t have much, so it will only take me a minute to gather my things. If you both want to head down to the third floor I’ll be there in four minutes flat.”

“You’ve got three, doctor.” Jake told him. “We’re on the clock here and you don’t want to miss the bus, because the natives are restless. They’re cannibals too, so you might want to, you know, hurry.”

* * *

When Kat and Elle sped around the north-western corner of Craig General, O’Connor and Beatrix—along with the very doped up and slightly freaked out Dr. Barker—were waiting on top of the drop-off canopy.

T
here were six more corpses—truly dead ones—littering the pavement, and as Cho sped towards the remaining crowd, O’Connor sent another .223 caliber round through the top of a zombie’s skull.

The thing had been attempting to claw its way up the sheer brick column to get a mouthful of living flesh when he’d picked it out of those left below. The author chose to terminate that particular ghoul, because it reminded him of a professor he’d had in college. One honorable Professor Matthew Herbert Wick.

The guy had been a real piece of work. Not only had the miserable shit taken childlike glee in failing students who didn’t agree with his skewed political views, he’d been one of those overgrown infants who constantly tried to relive what he considered to be his glory days. The good professor had made a habit of trading passing marks to his female students in exchange for sexual favors too but, when he’d attempted to set up such an unwanted arrangement with a female co-ed Jake had been friends with, O’Connor took steps.

He’d confronted Wick alongside his friend, with his phone’s digital recorder app running in his pocket. Ol’ Wick had been quite incensed when she not only told him to go spank-off with a cheese grater, but also said in no uncertain terms the only way she’d ever trade sex for higher grades would be if Steven-fucking-Hawking was teaching the course. He’d threatened to flunk them both, citing the fact that he’d been teaching journalism for nearly fifteen years and had an exemplary record, so no-one would believe a word they said about his extracurricular grading process. Wick had then ordered Jake from the room so he could “further discuss his friend’s most recent class assignment, in a more intimate setting.” Jake had flipped him off, gathered his female friend up, and marched her to the president of the university’s office while using his phone to send the entire recorded conversation straight onto YouTube. Needless to say, ‘Slick Wick’ didn’t remain in his position after that and, oddly enough, the grades of male students enrolled in Journalism 202 showed a marked improvement.

O’Connor was positive Professor Matthew Herbert Wick had been chomped by the creatures long ago, and dismissed the corpse as it toppled backwards.

Though still near-rabid to get up to Jake, Barker, and Beatrix as their Humvee approached, some of the creatures turned and shuffled towards the noise created by its roaring engine. Kat dropped the vehicle’s speed to thirty mph and simply began rolling over them, using the thick crash plate that protected its nose and its heavy combat-grade tires to mush them into fleshy Jackson Pollocks. Dealing with the things in that manner was far easier than capping them in the brain holder, or even snuffing out their insatiable hunger with one melee weapon or another.

And evidently, it was a lot of fun. Jake saw the enormous smile on Cho’s face when she slammed through the pack a second time.

“Good grief, that woman behind the wheel is a lunatic.” Barker carried a battered, medium-sized EMT bag, stuffed with what little he’d been able to quickly salvage from the hospital pharmacy and his meager belongings. A few pairs of scrubs, his wallet (which Jake thought was a waste of space), his MD licensure confirming he was certified to practice medicine, and several folders chock full of hand-written notebook pages.

Jake chuckled and watched Kat speed by again, now bouncing in her seat with excitement. He could hear her singing “Ballroom Blitz” by Krokus as the Hummer hammered another zombie from its path, sending the creature airborne to smash messily into one of the canopy supports face-first.

“Maybe,” he admitted with a small grin, “but she’s
our
lunatic. And life with her around is never dull, I can tell you that.”

* * *

Beatrix thought about his statement as the three of them cautiously dropped one-by-one to the ambulance roof. It was no secret, at least among the female members of their group, Cho was carrying a torch for Jake so large it could be seen from orbit. Uncle George was just clueless to the fact (even after witnessing the blue-haired woman’s reaction to Jake almost dying at the hands of the Purifiers) and, while Leo may or may not have noticed, the younger man was too focused on their very own version of ‘GI Jane’—Sargent Elle Pierce—to have commented on their almost-relationship one way or another. That left Bee, Gwen, Rae, and Penny to marvel over Jake and Kat’s foolishness.

Kat was too afraid of Jake possibly rejecting her to broach the subject with him, which was nuts. She was
super-
awesome, and much of the time Bee just wanted to yell “For fuck’s sake, will you just drag him off somewhere and snog his brains out already?” at her.

Jake was seemingly clueless about the scope of Cho’s affection. In no small way because he’d closed himself off emotionally after Laurel’s death, and likely didn’t believe he could go through such pain again. That would make it tough for him to open up to her, unless maybe something pushed him to do so?

A light-bulb flickered on in Bee’s head and she grinned broadly.

It was so
simple.

* * *

“What are you smiling about?” O’Connor helped the good doctor to his feet on the roof. Baker was noticeably shaken after hopping down off the canopy.

“Just glad our girls there are on time.” Bee shouldered her rifle and put a round through one of the remaining ghoul’s head. “I’m pretty over this town.”

Cho was repeatedly driving forward and back again over a trio of ghouls that refused to stay down. Their legs had been pulped under the Humvee’s tires, and she parked the mean-army-green machine squarely on one’s torso, holding it to the ground like a roach under a boot as its appendages continued to flail about lethargically.

“You
totally
missed it!” Kat exclaimed. “We’re gonna kill off a crap-load of those things!”

Jake’s head snapped around as his feet hit the surface of the parking lot and turned to help Barker climb down the rear door of the ambulance. “You were supposed to
lure
them, not think up inventive ways to get us into a fight.”

“We didn’t even need to fire one round.” Elle told him. “You wait. Kat’s right, it’s going to be
awesome.”

“What did you do?” Bee jumped lightly off the red, rescue vehicle after dangling from its upper edge.

Kat was bouncing up and down in excitement. “We let them creep after us for about six blocks, right? We kept leading them in circles like we planned. Elle was sniping a few with that rifle of hers as we went along, and it was all going just great-”

“Until...?” Jake closed his eyes. This was going to be bad. He just knew it.

“I had just dropped one with a shot through the left eye, when this great idea just hit me right out of the blue.” The blonde sergeant smiled and leaned out over the Hummer’s turret, causing her breasts to squish higher against the steel frame. “We had the horde following along a couple blocks behind when we passed a gas station, and I thought, “Hey. I wonder if I could get to the fuel.”

O’Connor felt his sphincter pucker. “And?”

“This is great.” Kat’s expression was beatific. “She wrapped an incendiary grenade with a few strips of electrical tape and dropped it into one of the underground tanks.”

Jake stiffened. “How far away is this gas station?”

Kat thought about it. “Just a block north, right Elle? Not far. You did say to keep in the general area, just in case there were—”

“Get in!” Jake shoved Cho back through the driver’s door and scrambled inside after her, causing an amusing tangle of arms and legs until she managed to scooch herself into the Navi-guesser position.

Bee and the doctor didn’t even manage to get their doors closed before Jake slammed the Hummer into gear and put the pedal to the floor. The Troll surged forward as O’Connor cut across Craig General’s lawns, ignoring startled cries from the others as the vehicle caught air off a small hill and bounced hard onto the street.

“I haven’t taken much joy in life recently,” Barker yelled, clutching at the door to stay seated, “but I’d rather not go out in an automobile wreck! And definitely not with zombies around. They’ll still consume our bodies if we die of natural causes, you know!”

Jake ignored him. The unruly-haired man was alternating between watching the road and staring into his rear-view mirror. “Ohshit,ohshit,ohshit,ohshit,ohsh—”

An enormous detonation shook the ground.

The AN-M14 TH3 incendiary grenade finally went off when the electrical tape encircling it dissolved, sending thermite—nearly half as hot as
the surface of the sun
—into the gas stations nearly full underground tank. The gasoline within ignited and blew up, sending accelerant-laced fuel roaring over hundreds of ghouls still close by along with the other four tank valves. These also turned into impromptu weapons of destruction when the burning, four-thousand degree thermite quickly melted through their shells. A second,
larger
blast wave thundered past the hospital, destroying every remaining window in its wake and sending still-flaming zombie bits an impressive distance through the early-afternoon air. Pieces began falling in their path, bouncing off the windshield and pattering noisily against the Troll’s hood

“
Son! Of! A! Bitch!”
The atmospheric pressure from the blast caused the tail of their Hummer to slew sideways, and O’Connor fought to remain in control while the others dove for cover on the floor.

Kat would’ve joined them, but was too busy hanging on to the dash—and Jake’s right shoulder—for dear life. “Holy
crap!
Elle, did you know that would happen?”

“I knew it would go up, but I didn’t realize it would be
that
big!” Elle’s smiling face rose up from where she huddled with Bee and the doc. “I’ll have to remember that trick. I mean, holy
fuck!
Did you see the size of that fireball?”

O’Connor was breathing hard as he pointed the Humvee towards Langley.

“Yeah, nice job with that you two.” He turned his head to give Kat a firm look. “See? This is why you’re not allowed to go play without adult supervision.”

“One less horde we have to worry about, right?” Cho smiled.

Jake shook his head. “And people ask me why I drink.”

* * *

Gardner ducked into the IHOP.

After making good his escape from Newport News–and spending weeks cutting across West Virginia to avoid going anywhere even remotely near Washington DC—he’d finally made it to the far side of Monongahela National Forrest, where he discovered the abandoned town of Elkins. The two-hundred and eighty-six mile (as the crow flies) leg of his trek took him so long, because there had been an absolute shit-load of zombies in the areas south of Richmond. And Lynchburg, for that matter. To avoid the hordes, he’d been forced to alter his plan and struck out on back roads nearly all the way over to Roanoke before cutting north once more.

Once he was (relatively) safe in the wilds, the going became much more difficult. The lack of anything resembling paved streets made walking distances a real effort, never mind all the underbrush in many areas. And unmarked swamps. And mosquitos large enough to carry off small house pets. But it did provide him with plenty of cover, and there were almost no creatures at all, so that was a plus. Gardner was very thankful to reach Monongahela’s western boundary, though.

The town of Elkins had been a welcome sight too. While the young man had become quite adept at scrounging, he felt the need to sit down on something other than a wet, moss-covered rock. Maybe get a night’s sleep in an actual bed, as opposed to the mummy bag lashed below his backpack. He’d even hoped to maybe find survivors there too, but that hadn’t happened. There were a few sheep that had escaped from a nearby farm roaming the streets along with quite a few stray–now feral—cats, but not a single living human.

Though disappointed, Gardner spent little time bemoaning his solitude. He raided homes, purloining quite a bit of food that had either been left behind or discarded as not worth taking when people had fled their little township, adding quite a bit to his stockpile. Lipton onion soup and Ritz crackers never tasted as good as they did that first night. He found several half-full bottles of multivitamins in different houses and combined them into a single container for ease of transport. One-a-days and Fred Flintstone would help him ward off bouts of unwanted scurvy. He even discovered a forgotten cache of .223 ammunition in the office of a fish and game outlet for his AR-15. That—along with the half-dozen bottles of water purification tablets—made the seven zombies he’d had to put down upon entering the stockroom worth the effort.

Since he had the town to himself—and needed a couple of days to recoup—Gardner decided to use the cast iron skilled he’d scavenged to make himself a few pancakes for breakfast, which was why he raided the IHOP.