The Dead Don't Bleed: Part 2, The Aftermath (19 page)

Miranda was busy taking aim
at another two zombies who had rushed past the impaled girl and were just rounding the edge of the deck heading towards Doug and Emily. Garrett couldn't get into a good position to get a shot on those two in time so had to trust that Miranda had that under control while he dealt with the problem that Cameron had managed to get himself into. Moving a little further down the deck he found a spot where he could just see the girls head through the cross planks of the porch railing and where Cameron was not in the line of fire. As the girl growled and pulled against Cameron's arm her face filled the entire opening between the two wooden rails and Garrett took his shot. The round nailed her in the left cheek and blew a fist sized portion of the back of her head out into the backyard behind her. As she dropped away from Cameron she slid cleanly off the blade of his knife and he was able to jerk both of his arms back inside the railings. Cameron immediately dropped to the wooden floor of the deck where he cradled his left arm and writhed back and forth in agony.

For the moment Cameron was safe and he would just have to deal with the damage to his arm on his own while Garrett got the rest of the group safely into the house and
into the garage. He jumped the stairs, passing by Doug and Emily and raced to the edge of the porch with his rifle raised and ready. In addition to the teen girl he had just put down he counted five additional zombie corpses littering the lawn along the side of the deck. Another six zombies were just coming into view around the side of the house beyond the deck but still far enough away as to not pose an immediate threat. Garrett turned around and checked the situation over in Doug's backyard. Calvin was nowhere in sight and the trailing edge of zombies that he had been leading off was just disappearing into the woods in the farthest reaches of the backyard. The zombies that had not taken off after him were pushing their way through the hedges with the first two just about to break free. While he was worried about Calvin, he knew there was nothing any of them could do for him at that moment. He had been successful in relieving some pressure from their backs and stopping to go looking for him would only serve to make his sacrifice a waste of time.

"You've been busy." Garrett commented as he stepped beside Miranda while continuing to scan their surroundings.

"Yeah, well the neighbors started getting a little pushy. How are things inside?" she asked.

"Kitchen is clear, more company further into the house. We need to move but keep as quiet as possible all the way into the garage."

Miranda turned back to collect Doug and his wife while Garrett returned to the deck and helped Cameron to his feet. There wasn't time to examine his arm and assess the damage right there so Garrett directed the tearful boy towards the open door at the back of his house.

"Hang in there Cameron, were almost there. I know it hurts but you need to dig deep and push a little longer. I still need you to get your dad's car keys." Garrett gently prodded.

Cameron looked at him through teary eyes and nodded his understanding. With Garrett leading the way, he followed along as they eased back into the house. Garrett stopped short of the kitchen and took up a position at the edge of the hallway to the foyer. The shadows he had seen earlier were now nowhere in sight, but he could now see that the front door was standing wide open. It was possible they had heard the shots out back and simply ran out the front door in search of the source. It was equally possible they had simply moved into another room just off the foyer and were circling around to enter the living room from the other hallway on the opposite side of the kitchen. Garrett waved over his shoulder to indicate that it was still clear and remained in place while everyone else scooted silently into the kitchen behind him. After a few seconds he heard the snap of fingers and a jingle of keys from behind him. Turning back towards the kitchen he watched as Doug and Emily disappeared through the garage door and then laid his eyes on Cameron standing in front of the refrigerator with a set of car keys held out proudly in front of him. Garrett gave him a thumbs up and then pointed to the garage door as he backed away from the hallway to join everyone else inside the garage.

Garrett closed and locked the garage door behind them and immediately rushed over to the pile of supplies they had left stacked near the outside door the night before. Emily had made it as far as the back of the Range Rover where she collapsed with her back against the bumper and struggled to regain her breath. Doug plopped down on the ground next to her and to everyone's surprise began consoling her and encouraging her to take small easy breaths to bring her blood pressure down. Miranda turned towards Cameron and checked both of his arms informing everyone that neither of them appeared to be broken but the left arm had a nasty looking bruise from wrist to elbow and would probably not be of much use to Cameron for at least day or two until the swelling subsided. Cameron was still doubling over from the pain in his arm and fighting to control his tears. Reaching into her pocket
, Miranda produced the vials of pills she had recovered from under the sink in his parent’s bathroom the evening before. Reading the labels on both she chose the one that contained Percocet and shook a single pill into the palm of her hand which she offered to Cameron.

"This will help with the pain, but it may make you a little drowsy." She said with a gentle motherly tone.

Cameron accepted the small pill and swallowed it dry while offering Miranda and timid thank you.

Garrett busied himself loading their supplies into the back of the Range Rover while considering their options for helping Calvin.

"He had a good lead on them when he hit the woods." Miranda said from just behind him as if reading his thoughts.

Garrett stopped loading supplies for a moment and just looked at the young woman before him, "I know. He's tough and resourceful, he'll be fine." He didn't know if he really believed that himself, but it just seemed like the right thing to say.

"Are you thinking about going after him?" she asked.

Garrett looked from Miranda to the other three
people in the garage with them. Cameron was sitting on a bench near a small wood working station in the corner of the garage still nursing his injured arm and doing his best to hide his tears. Doug was starting to recover his normal color and spending his time softly whispering encouragement to his wife as she slowly recovered from their ordeal outside. Emily was coated in sweat and her face was still a deep crimson color but it looked like she would eventually recover. As he watched these people trying to pull themselves back together he understood that each of their lives where in his hands. He owed a lot to Calvin, all of them probably owed him their lives more than once in the last couple of days. Even with that realization and the loyalty he felt to his good friend and fellow vet, he knew that any foolhardy attempt to find him out there with all of those zombies running loose would likely end with one or more of them dead. He understood that he had a greater responsibility to get everyone in the garage to safety. Calvin would just have to fend for himself for the time being.

"No, he's on his own for now. Help me get this thing loaded and
let’s get the hell out of here." He tersely replied as he resumed stuffing supplies into the back of the Range Rover. Garrett stopped working after loading his next armful of dry goods and turned to Miranda, "Thank you."

She looked into his eyes and understood that he was not just thanking her for helping him load the truck, he was thanking her for much more than that and it was something that required no reply on her part. She smiled at him, reached a hand out to gently brush his cheek and then turned back to the finish loading the truck.

Garrett had just picked up the last case of bottled water to stack in the cargo section of the Range Rover when the banging began on the outside of the door leading into the kitchen. It sounded like two or three zombies had tracked them to the garage and were eager to break through and have them for breakfast. Looking towards the kitchen door he saw that a crack had already started forming down the middle of the flimsy wooden door. It would not hold up for long under such intense pounding on the other side. The sound of those zombies trying desperately to break through to them was all the encouragement everyone else needed to get to their feet and load themselves into the Range Rover.

Without power the garage door opener was not working so Garrett reached up to the
automatic opener just above his head and pulled the release cord that would allow the door to be opened manually. He had given some thought to this next part of their departure and discussed it with Miranda. To open the garage door enough for the Range Rover to pass through it he would have to stand at the entrance, reach down to a handle near the floor and pull the door up until it was fully tucked back into the ceiling. They had no idea what would be waiting for them out in the driveway and while opening the door Garrett's entire body would be exposed and vulnerable for the several seconds it would take him to completely raise the door. Miranda was going to stretch out prone on the garage floor several feet behind him where she could see out into the driveway as the door rose, she would be able to see if there were any signs of trouble nearby as soon as the door was opened the first several inches. Their plan was that as long as there were no zombies directly outside she would signal Garrett to continue opening the door and the two of them would then bolt back to the Range Rover standing with its doors open and ready for them. If there was a threat directly in view, Garrett would abort his attempt to open the door and they would take their chances with ramming through the door with the Range Rover. Garrett didn't like that idea if they could avoid it, while he was sure the heavy truck could break through the outer doors he didn't want to risk damage to the engine compartment. All it would take would be a sliver of torn metal to puncture the radiator or a piece of twisted debris passing underneath them to rip a hole in a fuel or brake line for their trip to be cut dangerously short. Crouching down and grabbing the handle of the door Garrett looked back over his shoulder and saw Miranda stretched out on the concrete floor behind him and off to one side, her pistol was raised and ready as she concentrated down the sights ready to swing her aim left or right if any targets suddenly presented themselves. Confident they were as ready as possible and with the wooden kitchen door straining against the relentless pounding just behind him, Garrett pulled up on the door slowly and opened it six inches when a warning cry from Miranda caused him to stop short.

There had been at least twice as many zombies in the garage and surrounding area tha
n Calvin had originally thought. Once they had started entering the house he found himself stuck with confronting them in the laundry room where they had to bunch up for a moment, if he turned to run they would be on him and everyone else well before they could reach the hedge row between the two houses. His plan had been to knock enough of them down in the constricted passageway of the laundry room to create a makeshift barrier of bodies that would hopefully slow the masses enough to allow them a few extra seconds to get some distance from Doug's house. He had learned long ago that any team was only as strong as their weakest players and in this situation with Doug and his bitch overweight wife now part of their group, their weakest players were going to slow them to a crawl.

Firing the AK inside the kitchen increased the decibel level of each shot
, making it sound like a cannon in his ears. After shooting off only four or five rounds he was deaf in both ears and relying only on his vision to track zombies as they appeared in front of him. He had been concentrating so intently on the laundry room and garage that he never saw the young boy rushing towards him from the hallway leading off to another part of the house. His first realization that he was in trouble was when he felt a searing pain in the back of his right shoulder as the kid bit into his shirt, ripped through the fabric and tore a chunk of meat from his shoulder. Calvin wheeled around on his heel and used the butt of his rifle to knock the kid hard across the side of his head. The blow sent the young zombie skidding backwards across the floor where he slammed his back into the wall under a pantry. For a moment Calvin locked eyes with the kid, he couldn't have been more than nine or ten years old, shirtless and filthy the little shit reminded him of children he had seen in third world countries around the world. The sole expression on his face was just as familiar, hunger, although in this case the child wasn't begging for a small morsel of bread or spoonful of soup. A strip of bloodied meat hung from the corner of his mouth as he greedily chewed and smacked his lips on the tasty treat. Calvin felt a sudden rise of nausea at the realization that it was part of his own shoulder that this kid was devouring before his eyes. Struggling back to his feet, the boy started towards him again but Calvin had already turned the barrel of his rifle in that direction and without regard for his dwindling stock of ammo drilled four rounds into the boy’s face and head.

Reaching to the back of his shoulder Calvin felt the wound with his hand, it was deep and wide and he could feel warm blood running freely down his back already soaking most of his shirt. He knew that the blood loss was the least of his worries, whatever that kid had injected into his blood stream was going to do more damage than anything else. He thought he could already feel an inky blackness coursing through his veins and knew that from that moment on the remainder of his life could be measured in minutes or hours at best. Calvin wasn't quite ready to simply lay day and die though, while he still had the ability to do so he was determined to at least make sure everyone else got away clean.

Putting aside the pain in his shoulder and knowledge that he was now on borrowed time, Calvin turned his attention back to the laundry room and popped off the final few rounds in the magazine dropping four more zombies in the process. Seeing the difficulty that the next few zombies were having climbing over the pile of stacked bodies, Calvin was satisfied that he had created enough of a roadblock to slow them down for a few moments. Turning back towards the kitchen door he slapped a fresh magazine into his rifle and poked his head out the back door to check on everyone else's progress. Garrett had run ahead of the others and was charging towards the hedgerow to face several zombies coming at them from the other side. Calvin thought it was a good move, clearing the path ahead of everyone and putting him in a position to cover the others while they crossed the open ground he had just ran over. Even though he had lured most of the zombies from the driveway on that side of the house, there would undoubtedly be more that hadn't fallen for his distraction and Garrett was now in a good position to deal with them when they started after Miranda and her charges. Behind him he could hear the pounding of feet on tiled flooring telling him that his makeshift roadblock in the laundry room had already been breached and zombies were now starting to flow freely into the house. He turned back towards the laundry room and let loose with a couple more rounds while waiting for Miranda and the others to start their way across the yard towards Garrett. His original plan was to catch up with all of them at the hedgerows and move with them across to Cameron's house. That had gone out the window the moment that zombie kid had found his skin with his teeth. He now decided that a better idea would be to continue leading as many of the zombies coming into the house after him away from everyone else as possible. From the way Garrett was looking off further down the driveway he could tell that he was seeing more undead heading towards him from that direction, the more he could draw off from inside the house the better chance they would have.

Once Miranda and the others were well on their way across the open ground towards Garrett, Calvin made his move out into the backyard. He was trying to stay close enough to the first few zombies coming after him to keep their attention
focused only on him while not getting so close that they may actually have a chance to get their hands on him. Stopping every few feet he would turn and fire off a round or two, dwindling their numbers down. He knew that all he had left for ammo was the remains of the magazine in his rifle and one additional full reload. It was not nearly enough to do much damage to all the zombies that were popping up around the houses, but it should be enough to keep them interested in him and give him a means to deal with the most threatening ones. He could hear Miranda calling out encouragement to Doug and his wife and he thought of what a good solider the girl would have made. When they first met her all he could see was her feminine side and his thoughts had focused on her as a sex object, he had never thought for a second that the small little woman would actually become a hardened fighter who would be a valuable contributor in the face of the apocalypse.

Calvin picked a point at the edge of the yard where he could slip into a thicket of trees and then start using them for cover as he led this group of zombies away from Garrett and the others. As he ran through the back yard he started feeling the first throbs of a headache and
was also becoming aware that his body temperature was starting to rise. He knew enough about how his own body chemistry worked under stressful and physical conditions and what he was starting to feel could not be as a result of the fight he was involved in. The toxins that kid had pumped into his body were speeding through his blood system and were already hard at work doing their job. He knew what the end result would be once those toxins completed their work, but he was not going to let it get that far. When he felt that he was getting to a point where death was imminent he would take care of it himself, turning into one of those things was not an option for him, the last bullet in his rifle would have his own name on it.

Reaching the edge of the woods he saw that he had a comfortable lead on the closest zombies still racing after him. He thought there were close to twenty five of them eager to get the next bite out of his ass, but he also could now see that Garrett was dealing with another group of roughly the same number if not a little larger coming up the driveway towards him. Once they crossed the hedges they would have a chance to put some distance between them, but they would not be able to stop and smell the roses, if Emily or Doug fell out at any time they would have to leave them behind.

Leaning up against a tree trunk Calvin steadied his increasingly shaky aim and fired off a round that just missed his target. As the virus tore through his system he was going to have to keep letting them get closer to him to ensure an accurate shot. His second round blew a gash in the zombies shoulder and sent its arm flopping uselessly down against its side. Not a kill or disabling shot, but Calvin found a little humor in seeing the zombie struggle to raise his arm again. Only a thin tendril of muscle and meat kept it attached to the shoulder and the zombie twisted its body to the opposite side trying to raise the arm only resulting in it flailing out to the side like a poorly affixed prosthetic. He turned back into the woods and picked another tree further along that would offer a clear line of sight as the first of the zombies started entering the tree line behind him. He would continue leapfrogging forward in this fashion and firing a round or two at his pursuers until he reached a point far enough from Cameron's house that he was confident the zombies chasing him would have lost sight of the others. At that point he would break contact and work his way back towards Cameron's house, hopefully leaving the remaining zombies coming after him to wonder around the woods aimlessly searching for him.

Gunfire behind him told him that the others were starting to feel the pressure from the zombies
coming up the driveway. He knew that Garrett was much more disciplined when it came to gun play that he ever was. Where he was more of a cowboy that preferred rushing into a situation with guns blazing, Garrett was a patient man who would only take a shot when he was confident of a kill. That calculation and patience were the abilities that would allow Garrett to effectively lead those people to safety, if he couldn't do it then Calvin didn't believe it could be done.

He noticed that not far ahead of him the trees started to thin out with small gardens and foot paths springing up between them as the next street of houses started to come into view. For him to break away from the zombies he had lured into this stretch of woods, he needed the thickest
patch of cover possible. Glancing right and then left he spotted an area where the ground dipped down into a depression and still maintained a decent growth of brush and trees, it looked like his best chance. Firing off two more shots and scoring only a single glancing wound in return, he adjusted his course and rushed head long into the depression. Reaching a spot where he could duck down and use the rise of the ground behind him to conceal his movements, he darted to his left and sped up his pace. After running full speed for just over fifty feet he turned back towards Cameron’s house and climbed back out of the depression. He could still hear the zombies coming after him as they clumsily crashed their way through the woods and it sounded like they were continuing on a straight path into the back yards of the houses behind him instead of picking up his trail again. Satisfied that he had pulled off a successful diversion, he slowed down and began carefully picking his way back between the trees to avoid making any more noise than necessary and possibly tipping off the zombies that they had been tricked into falling a false path.

He broke out into the backyard at the far end of Cameron's house almost exactly where he had anticipated. Calvin was just in time to see the last of their small group disappearing into the back door of the house. The scattered bodies of dead zombies along the edge of the deck gave testament to the fact that Garrett and the others had run up on more resistance than they had hoped for, but seeing none of their own laying amongst the dead, he was hopeful that they were all still alright. From his position in the far reaches of the backyard he had a partial view of the closed garage door and driveway on the far side of the house, something that Garrett would not have been able to view by keeping tight to the back of the house. He could see close
a small cluster of the creatures meandering about near the top of the driveway and within only a few feet of the outside garage door. Calvin knew that to get clear of the garage Garrett was going to have to expose himself for a few moments while he pulled the large bay door open before he could drive out. As soon as that door started coming up Garrett was going to be swarmed with the things and Calvin doubted he would be able to fend off that many in such close quarters. Checking the magazine in his rifle he counted six rounds remaining, with the other full one still in his pocket that gave him thirty six shots, actually thirty five he reminded himself, that last one had a special purpose. Even with his hands shaking and unsteady as a result of the toxins racing through his system and quickly killing him from the inside out, he thought he should still be able to give his friends in the garage the break they needed to make their escape.

As he took his first step from the edge of the woods into Cameron's backyard
, he doubled over in agonizing pain as an incredible wave of vomit rushed from the depths of his stomach and exploded from his mouth spewing out almost a dozen feet in front of him. Again and again the waves of uncontrollable vomit rocketed from his body until he finally collapsed to the ground nearly exhausted from the worst round of puking he could ever recall. His stomach was still tied in knots and it felt like acid was eating through his intestines and stomach lining. The smell of the vomit on the grass just inches in front of his face almost sent him into another round of violent heaving but there was just nothing left in his stomach to come up and instead he gagged and coughed as he turned his head away and buried his nose in a patch of dirt to escape the rancid stink that had escaped his own stricken body. It took him almost two full minutes to recover enough that he felt he could attempt to regain his feet. Once standing he realized that his strength was quickly failing him, his legs were like rubber and the rifle in his hands weighed three times what he remembered, he didn't think he could hold it to his shoulder and fire accurately anymore. For him to clear the path along the driveway he was going to have to get up close and personal, it would be a blood bath on his part, he had not doubt about that but there was no real alternative.