Siege (62 page)

the Reverend’s voice boomed with smoothness and gentleness that Travis’

did not have. It was like balm on the fevered minds of the inhabitants in the fort.

Kevin looked down at the map held under heavy plastic on the table before him and took a deep breath. Nerit stood next to him, her face calm as she gazed out toward the oncoming horde.

“Difficult words to embrace on a day such as this, but we must do just that. For this is the day the Lord has made for us to fight for our lives and the lives of those we love. This is our home, our fort, our safe haven. It has been called many things: the Fort, Eden, Sparta and a slew of other names. But it remains simply one thing to all of us: home. Our home. And, now, we face our greatest challenge as a family.”

Kevin looked over at Nerit and she smiled slightly at him. He moved several red markers along the map as another explosion by Rune’s grenades boomed in the distance.

“We have lost many friends, many family members, during this long plague of the dead. We have seen many atrocities at the hands of these creatures. Our beloved have fallen to their ranks and in some cases, joined their ranks.”

Margie leaned against her new grandmother listening to the Reverend’s voice as she played idly with the dry tangled hair of her doll. Her brother and sister weren’t paying attention, but she understood the Reverend’s words. She thought of her old Mommy and Daddy and of the nice lady with the black hair who had saved them. Kissing her doll, she pulled it close to her and hugged it like her grandmother was hugging her.

“But we must resolve ourselves to be strong. To stand firm. To not waver in the face of evil. It may wear the face of humanity, but it is corruption. We must remember this. They were once alive. They were us. But now, they are the undead. The enemy of life. Be strong and know that the battle you fight today is just and good in the sight of God.”

Linda pulled back on the lever of the catapult she was manning and it groaned as it prepared to fire its heavy junkyard load. Her expression was full of rage and determination as she watched the zombies stumbling after Rune’s motorcycle in the distance just beyond the high wall made of the town’s ruins.

“Today we fight for our lives. We fight for the lives of our family and friends. We fight for our future. We fight for life itself. And it is a good and right thing.”

* * * * *

Rune grinned as he brought the motorcycle to an abrupt halt. The zombies were stumbling along after him, moaning loudly, their stench overwhelming as they drew close. He was satisfied that he had drawn so many after his bike. In fact, it looked like most of the horde coming up the hill had altered direction to skim along the outer wall in the pursuit of him. The big bike rumbled between his legs as he drew another grenade and whistled loudly at the zombies.

Aggravated by the nearness of him, the zombies thrust out their decayed hands and let out moans of desperate hunger.

“Yep, damn good day to die,” he said with a grin, and lobbed another grenade into the horde.

He gunned the bike and rode off in front of the mob. The grenade went off with a resounding explosion and peppered him with body parts. Grinning, he lured the zombies on.

* * * * *

“Damn gremlins,” Calhoun muttered as he fumbled with the wires. Jason glanced back over his shoulder to see most of the zombies were stumbling past the opening a couple of hundred yards behind them. The dead didn’t seem to notice them with all the noise Rune was making with the grenades.

“The gremlins probably took off when they saw Jack,” Jason said, trying to calm Calhoun. He needed the old man’s mind working on a solution, not freaking out over invisible opponents.

Jack barely glanced at Jason when he heard his name. He was poised to attack, his body rigid, his eyes narrowed at the undead. The boy had told him not to do anything and he was obeying for now. But if those smelly things came toward them, he was going to rip them to pieces.

“Yeah, gremlins hate dogs,” Calhoun conceded. “Good old Jack here probably got them running for the hills.”

“Yep,” Jason assured the old guy and wondered if Calhoun even noticed the zombies. Nervously, he looked back toward the undead filing past the fire line. They were still unnoticed. Trying to concentrate, his trembling fingers moved methodically through the innards of the contraption he and Calhoun had built together.

“Jason,” Calhoun whispered.

“Yeah?”

“The clones are here,” the old man’s voice trembled.

“I know,” Jason answered and flipped through the wires and studied their connections.

Jack let out a low whimper.

“Well, uh. I think they noticed us.”

Jason quickly looked over his shoulder to see one lone zombie staggering toward them. It was so badly decayed he wasn’t sure if it was a woman or a man. Jack let out a low growl and looked to Jason, awaiting orders.

“It’s still far away.” Jason returned his gaze to the contraption. “Don’t shoot it or the rest of them will come at us.”

Calhoun drew his gun anyway. “I don’t like the idea of those things having an all they can eat at the Calhoun buffet.”

Jason moved so he could keep an eye on the lone zombie moving toward them and keep working. It was clear Calhoun’s concentration was shot. The zombie kept coming, its movements jerky and rigid. It was obviously hard for it to move.

Jason dug deeper into the box, his fingers tracing the wires carefully. Jack growled angrily and woofed slightly.

Looking up, the teenager was startled to see the progress the zombie was making. Then, abruptly, it fell backwards and lay still. Calhoun scrambled forward and looked down at the thing.

“Right through the head! DAMN! That old woman is evil!”

Realizing the snipers had taken the zombie down, Jason felt safer and kept working. He could still see the zombies staggering past the entrance in the distance. The two humans and the dog had to be obscured from view from below. They were not drawing any attention. Another explosion in the distance sounded. Jason heard a catapult creaking as it unfurled its arm and tossed a load of microwaves and TVs into the crowd of zombies passing alongside the fort.

“That’s not good,” Calhoun decided, scuttling along the ground on his hands and knees.

“They’re probably trying to keep them from getting Rune,” Jason answered.

“Not that. That!”

Jason looked up once more. But this time his blood ran cold. Three zombies were running up the hill, pushing past the shambling ones and rushing straight toward them.

“Oh, shit!” Jason jumped to his feet and scrambled to get his gun out. Calhoun took a shot and hit one of the runners in the shoulder, spinning it around. But it recovered immediately and kept rushing toward them. Jack launched himself into the first runner and snagged its shoulder in his teeth. It went down under the momentum of the dog’s leap and struggled to get free of the growling canine. As with all other zombies, it was not interested in animals. It only wanted to break away from the dog to get to the humans.

Another runner went down under a sniper shot. Jason managed to get his gun out and aimed it at the next one coming up fast on him. He saw puffs of dirt kick up around the zombie. Whoever was shooting from the fort was not Nerit. They were missing. The zombie screeched as it barreled toward him. Calhoun took another shot and missed. Jason could see the old man stagger back as the runner Jack was battling grabbed the old man’s ankle.

Jason raised his gun and aimed at the zombie, but then it was on him. It took a swipe at his arm, its bloodied face seeming to streak toward him, and Jason ducked away. He felt the creature grip his long bangs and Jason spun around on his heels as he lost his balance. They both fell. The zombie’s howling mouth was inches from his face. Jason barely managed to get his hand under the thing’s chin and push upwards. In the next instant, Jack was on the zombie, his jaws clamping down on the back of its neck and pulling it away from his master. The undead howling remains of the man tried to hold onto Jason, but Jack yanked hard and it slid off Jason.

Calhoun was nearby using the detonation device to bash the other runner’s brains in.

“Calhoun, no!” Jason managed to utter, then heard a terrible sound. A steady beeping. “Jack! Let go of it! Come here!”

Jack whirled around and rushed toward the boy. The nearly decapitated runner pushed itself to its knees but then the sniper finally got the right shot and it fell over.

Calhoun looked at Jason startled, then up at the box. The light that had so determinedly not come on before was blinking red. Calhoun looked toward the fuel tanks then the boy. “This is not good.”

“You triggered it,” Jason shouted back. “We need to run. Now!”

Jason glanced toward the opening and saw zombies were now trudging toward them. They had finally been noticed and around fifty zombies were already past the fire line. He didn’t say another word, but turned and ran. Jack growled at the shambling zombies, then ran after his boy. The stinky old man threw down the metal box and began to run after them. He was bit slower because of his creaky old bones. Jack barked at him to hurry it up, darted back to urge the stinky man on, then ran back after the boy. The teenager and the old man ran as hard as they could as the red light blinked faster and faster. They were halfway to the fort when the fuel tanks exploded. The blast blew them of their feet and hurled them to the ground as a gush of hot air, then flames filled the air. On the fort wall, everyone hit the ground as the blast filled the morning sky. Fiery debris rained down as the roar of the explosion rang in the fort occupants’ ears.

When the flames began to die down, zombies were burning, debris littered the wide expanse before the fort, and a boy, a dog, and an old man laid unmoving on the ground.

* * * * *

Katie lifted herself up off the floor and looked over the rail at the devastation the fire line had wrought. Zombies were burning, as was the makeshift outer wall. Many of the zombies had been blown into bits and others tossed back down the hill into the mob. Clutching the railing, she tried to see through the acrid smoke.

It took a moment for her to see that at least twenty zombies were still alive inside the fire line. Most of the zombies outside the fire line seemed to be in a panic and struggling to get away from the fire. The enormous crowd was peeling apart with zombies moving off in two different directions.

As the black smoke slithered over the ground below, Katie struggled to see Calhoun and Jason. She saw Jack first as he slowly stirred, then began to bark anxiously as zombies moved determinedly toward two fallen figures.

“Oh, shit!” Katie grabbed her walkie-talkie and pushed down the button.

“Jason and Calhoun are in danger near my point. Someone kill those bastards!”

* * * * *

Katarina heard the call from her perch but she was nowhere near Katie’s assigned position. At least she could take out the zombies that were in her range. As the staggering figures materialized out of the smoke, she took her shots.

* * * * *

“My boy!” Juan exclaimed, turning to rush to Jason’s rescue. One of the men assigned to his team grabbed him. “We got a job to do, man.”

Juan tried to push past him but realized the truth of that statement.

“They’ll save them, man.”

With a breaking heart, Juan turned back to his duties. His shoulders ached from the tension and he felt tears in his eyes. He prayed to God someone would save his boy.

* * * * *

“Let the two lines that are flanking the fort go. I have a feeling they will keep going,” Nerit ordered over her walkie-talkie. “Concentrate on anything that breaches the outer perimeter. Anything that moves into your hot zone, nail them.”

“The outer ridge line is on fire. It’s splitting the horde in half. That worked out better than we hoped.” Kevin rapidly drew on the map, updating the battle.

“But the fire will die down and whatever is out there will come into the kill zone.”

“We’re ready.”

* * * * *

Travis reached the wall just in time to see his wife about to slide onto the makeshift elevator. “Katie!”

“I need to get Jason!” She answered defensively. Her gun was already in her hand. “He’s Jenni’s boy. I have to.”

Nearby, there were soft hisses as the sniper attempted to keep the zombies away from the two humans down on the ground. Jack’s barking and growls sounded as he defended his fallen boy.

“You’re pregnant. You are not going down there,” Travis said firmly, swinging himself onto the elevator. He could see her jaw setting and he pointed a finger in her face. “Jenni wouldn’t want you risking the baby.”

“Dammit,” she said, sighing as she conceded his point.

Travis grabbed her and kissed her firmly, then motioned for them to lower him. Drawing his gun, in one hand, he took a deep breath and almost choked on the acrid smoke. This day was already off to a great freaking start.

* * * * *

Jason came to slowly. Coughing on the thick smoke, he struggled to roll over. As he fell onto his back, a man lurched out of the smoke and fell to his knees. The dead gnarled face instantly moved to bury itself into his soft flesh. Jason raised the gun in his hand to the man’s temple and fired. The zombie fell over.

Blinking his eyes, Jason sat up. Jack hurtled out of the thick black wisps and nearly landed on him as he barked angrily into the smoke. Jason almost called out for Calhoun, then thought better of it. The zombies would find him faster if he called out. Holding onto Jack’s collar, he pulled himself up to his feet and stood, feeling quite wobbly. Slowly, he realized he would look a lot like the zombies in his present battered condition. Jack would be his best defense against being wrongly identified. Leaning over he whispered to the dog, “Find Calhoun” and held on.

Jack looked up at him with his clear brown eyes and Jason could see the concern in their depths. Jack seemed to think this foolhardy, but obediently began to lead him slowly through the hot, acrid air and dark smoke.