Mark Clodi (11 page)

“Oh geez Steve, I am sorry man, really sorry. I met your old man once, when your mother died, it was not a good time to judge character or anything and, well he seemed like the kind of guy who might not survive his spouse by too long if you know what I mean. Like Johnny Cash or something. He pulled through that though, I mean your mom died, what three years ago?”

“Yeah about that, he had it rough after she died, then he started doing the same old things again, his hobbies, when he retired we, Emily and I, thought he might fade pretty fast too, but you know, he didn’t. He got all religious and made the best of things. God saw him through, God wanted him to be here, God wills it kind of stuff. We have never been too religious, but we suffered through it, figured it was a coping mechanism and he recovered. Hell, I figured he would out live me. Until this happened. I don’t know Max, I think we gotta get out of here and find someplace safe. Safer.”

“I agree, we get out, swing by your dad’s, pick up my kids and head, where? Where do we go? Head for the hills? I am not so sure about that. I have been thinking a little and unless the military sets up a safe zone we need to find a place to go to. Maybe Iowa? I have a buddy there and if things are not as bad maybe he could take us in?”

“Iowa? Sure, why not, North Platte is on the way, we can swing by and pick up Tom’s family too. What do we do now?”

Max and Steve had made their way out of Kirkpatrick’s office to where they, Tom and Officer Stewart had chosen to bed down for the upcoming night. “I am thinking we need the guns and ammo in Stewart’s car.” Max said.

Stewart looked up at this, but did not say anything. Steve, started to protest and then said, “Okay, yeah, I can see that, you have a plan, don’t you, you wouldn’t have said anything otherwise, lets hear it.”

Max detailed his plan and by the time he was done he knew he had them on board for a covert action later that night.

Chapter 17

Nancy and her posse were a block away from MAC Co when they heard the first gun shots. “Jimbo, be a sweetheart and go see what’s happening” Nancy instructed. Reluctantly Jim shuffled forward and around the corner of the building out of site. A few moments later he reappeared and reported seeing, “The living fighting with dead.”

“That’s it? The living fighting with the dead? Useless son of a…come on V lets take a peek for ourselves.” After watching the scene unfold for awhile Nancy asked “What do think we should do Veronica?”

Veronica, harrumphed and hawed for a moment, making Nancy impatient, then finally spat out, “Wait until night. Watch. Break a window to get in if we have to. Kill them all and eat them, no more brothers or sisters, a big pack is hard to feed.”

“Very GOOD Veronica! Very good indeed! You know what I really want though? I want a guy named Fred, I want to find him and make him dead. Fred - dead. Get it? He is hopefully still pretty stupid right now, but he is still, maybe, our master and he would be a very bad master. Death would not have improved him. Accounting. You know how it is.”

Veronica made a laughing sound, awkward, but Nancy knew what she met by it. Nancy was concerned now, not worried, that might come later, but a Veronica who might resent her as much as Nancy resented Fred? Probably she would resent her even more, as Fred was just a mindless zombie and had yet to exert any influence on Nancy, whereas Nancy was controlling Veronica all the time. 'Yes, a pretty puzzle.' thought Nancy, perhaps cutting Veronica’s share of the food back a bit might be in order. Or would it matter now? Nancy liked the feeling of eating and felt a compulsion to eat whenever she saw a human form, but did the effect wear off? It had only been, twelve hours? That was it? Nancy was not feeling hungry or worn down or in need of another meal, however she would not pass one up if it happened by either. The more she consumed the more powerful she felt, so she wanted more.

“Veronica, honey, momma is getting hungry again, can we get in there now for a quick bite or should we go find easier prey?”

Veronica screwed up her face, her very pretty, younger face, Nancy noted, then answered, “Easier prey.”

“Why Veronica, why not these guys right now?”

“These are here, hiding inside, they won’t leave, we eat others and save these for later, they will still be here. Right?” said Veronica.

“Why my darling girl you are quite, quite right. Jimbo! Lets go find us some grub, if you find one for us you can have a leg to yourself, ‘kay pal?”Nancy could swear she saw Jim’s eyes go from dull and sullen to, a quick gleam of lusty hunger. Oh he would find them something, Nancy was sure of it.

Chapter 18

The basis of Max’s plan was to be quick and silent. Tom was in no shape to make a mad dash for the car, if anything his shoulder was more puffed up and swollen than before. He needed rest, but he also insisted he could play the role of lookout from the rooftop. The headlights on Stewart’s car had gone out long ago. When full darkness came the street lights automatically came on and the zombies moved away from the now dark police cruiser toward the parking and street lights. Better still a car swerved madly passed the building about eight o’clock and that drew a whole crowd of zombies away from the main building. By nine they were ready to go. Steve would hold the door, Max and Stewart would run out towards the car. Max would run halfway towards the car and stop, then edge forward slowly, his job was to keep his eyes peeled for any movement. Steve’s job was to do the same and keep the door open until everyone made it back. Stewart’s sole job was to get to the car, salvage the shotgun, all her extra ammo and anything else she could gather that might be useful. Tom, would act as God, overseeing everything from the roof and alerting them if any more than single zombies started heading their way. He was to let single zombies pass, unless they were unduly fast or dangerous looking. Max and Steve would have to bail Stewart out of any trouble they might have in the form of single zombies. When they got to the lobby they found Paul, on duty, waiting for Stewart to relieve him, as scheduled. He headed up to sleep leaving the three of them alone in the lobby. Max dug his cell phone out and called Tom’s number on the roof.

“Yeah?” Tom answered.

“It is Max, you see anything since we left you Tom?”

“No, nothing. The pretty lights have them distracted and the fire down the street quite a ways still has a mob around it, right now everything is still clear, you could make a rush all the way to the deep parking lot if you wanted to.”

Max considered revising his plan, nodded to himself and then said “Still clear, do we try for the parking lot too?” to Stewart and Steve.

Stewart said, “Shotgun and more ammo first, if we still have no trouble, we go for Steve’s car and pull it up to the door and head in.” Steve’s car was closest of the ones they had keys for.

“Okay, Tom, gun first as planned, then the car if we can. We are heading out now.”

Max had been going to take Steve’s keys and get the car himself, he did not want to be responsible if something happened to Steve, but Steve insisted that he should drive his own car, as he knew it’s ins and outs. Max agreed, if they got the gun and ammo out of the squad car, he would retreat to the door, Stewart would take up a cover position by the squad car and Steve would go after his car himself.

They set out, Stewart gripping the keys to the trunk in a tight fisted death grip that Max could see even in the low light from the parking lot. They sprinted out to the squad car, Max going further than they had discussed to get a better angle of view on the building. Stewart hopped in the passenger door without attracting attention. She was doing something in the car for what seemed like eternity and then the trunk popped with what seemed like a loud ‘poof’ sound. Still nothing. Stewart also popped the hood of the car. She hopped out the passenger’s side carrying the shotgun and a duffel bag, ran to the back of the car and put some unknown stuff into the bag. 'Hopefully ammo', Max thought. And then she closed the trunk quietly and ran to the front hood. 'Not in the plan', Max thought furiously, 'not in the plan Stewart! Don’t make stuff up on the fly damn it!'

Stewart propped the gun against the front bumper and then opened the hood quietly, opening it the full way, and reached in and did something, then with the flick of her hand, she let the hood close, making quite a thunk and headed back to Max.

Max kept his mouth shut, but gave her a furious glare at the extra time she had spent deviating from the plan, ignoring his glare she whispered, “Bring this back and send Steve up.”

Max hefted the duffel bag, which was surprisingly heavy, and sprinted back to Steve, whispering, “Your turn, good luck.” He moved into the lobby, dropped the bag, and turned to hold the door. Steve was already sprinting past the squad car. Max saw Stewart open the passenger door to the squad car and the dome light went on. “What the fuck?” Max said softly. Stewart had left the cruiser lights on when she came into the building this morning, but had turned off the car. The lights had drained the power out of the battery even before Max had made the attempt to get to his car earlier.

Stewart quickly ducked in and turned off the dome light and Max saw her struggling to move over to the driver’s seat. Steve was just a bobbing head out in the parking lot by now. “Tom, everything still clear?” Max hated himself for asking, Tom knew his job and would only break silence if something happened.

“Yeah.” came the reply, “What’s Stewart doing?”

Max looked out, Steve’s car was moving! The tail lights as he braked to come around the corner to the front of the building attracted unwanted attention. Closer still the squad car's engine turned over, it took a moment of grinding then that car started up too. Stewart pulled it nose first towards the parking lot then backed it up quickly to the right of the front door. Steve just popped his car over the curb and parked it nose first on the left hand side of the door, both cut the engines simultaneously and hopped out as Tom said into Max’s ear, “Three of them coming around the side of the building four, five, uh, lots more attracted from the street.” Stewart and Steve moved into the building quickly and quietly, Max slammed the door shut behind them and all three of them leaned against the door until the magnetic lock clicked on with a soft noise.

They backed away from the door and Max listened while Tom described the ten or twelve zombies that milled about the front of the buildings. When it was apparent that they were safe, Stewart let out laugh, “We did it!”

Max was ready to be angry, the squad car was not part of the deal, but looking things over it was a good call on Stewart’s part and her initiative deserved praise, not condemnation. So instead he said, “Yeah, we, uh...I mean you, did. That was excellent work on the car. How’d you get it to start?”

“Well we have a lot of times where we have to sit at a crime or accident scene with our lights on for a long time, running the battery down was common enough that a few years ago the department bought those batteries with a special reserve in them to kinda of jump start the cars, flip a switch and you are effectively using a whole separate battery. Ours are heavy duty, and the alternator is wired to charge up both batteries when the car is running, we are good to go and have two cars now instead of one, not to mention a shotgun and ammo for my other guns. Is Tom coming down?”

“He is probably on his way. Good job both of you, Steve you were awesome, a world class run if I ever saw one.” said Max, “So now what? We have the cars, do we tell everyone else? Make a break for it? How is the ammo situation now?”

Stewart answered, “Well good, compared to what it was, I have reloads out of my bag for my handguns and the squad car shotgun has both man shot and some rounds that are supposed to be armor piercing. I really wish I was in one of the cars that carried the assault rifles, that would have been nice. Though I suppose with a head shot to kill, single shots are better.”

“Man shot?” Steve asked.

“Yeah, double ought buckshot. I have some riot rounds too, doubt they will do much against a zombie, but man they should knock them on their asses at least. Tear gas, what a joke, won’t need that. It does get smoky though, that might be worth something. I don’t think we need to go wake everyone up to tell them of our good fortune tonight, we will do it in the morning, everyone will more or less know by then anyway. I wonder how boss lady will take it? Bad probably.”

That said they waited until the next shift arrived to relieve them, shortly after that their relief came down, Walter “Walt” Coggins, an older guy whom Max had always liked. They left him at his post with the advice to get help if anything happened and went up to the cubicles they had staked out earlier to sleep.

Chapter 19

Cautiously they crept the remaining distance keeping to the shadows as best they could. Hiding behind an abandoned Ford Explorer Nancy and Veronica watched the survivors gain access to the patrol car and one other, more sporty vehicle, all without attracting undue notice from the surrounding ‘dumb’ zombies.

“Look.” Veronica directed Nancy’s attention towards officer Stewart. “She’s going to be trouble.”

They watched as Stewart calmly lifted the hood of her car and did something, then hopped in and backed it up to the front doors of MAC co. Stewart’s professional manner under pressure was admirable, Nancy was thinking maybe a hole would have to be made to allow the more competent to survive what she had planed, and therefore allow her and her team to come out of it with less casualties as well. Steve was pretty calm too. Nancy recognized him from work, she always thought he was a bit of a flake, that impression was forced to change, it took balls to run out into the night of the parking lot, hop into your car and drive it back to the building. The other guys, Nancy saw one on the roof who she didn’t, or couldn’t recognize and another one hanging by the door, who might be a guy named Max. Nancy didn’t really get a good look at him, so for now he was ‘Max’. What the group did was just as informative as how they did it. They brought the cars back, why do that unless there were more people in the building? So there were more than four, but how many more? Nancy thought back to this morning, not many early birds came in, but she knew there was a night crew, but how many workers were on graveyard?