The Pandemic Sequence (Book 1): The Tilian Virus (12 page)

Easing through the now unlocked door, the three slid silently into the unfamiliar home. The entryway opened into a small living room on the left, dining room on the right, and a large staircase leading to the second level. Moving room to room, they made a cautious search of the first floor, and then headed up the stairs. The home showed no apparent signs of an attack, but also no sign of Derrick’s parents. Making their way back down, Mike followed Derrick’s verbal floor plan and located the door in the kitchen that led to the basement.

Since his adolescence, the history teacher suffered from a crippling fear of basements. His youthful imagination had always created fanciful monsters that for some reason chose to live in basements and waited anxiously to attack little boys that wandered into their lairs. With the rationality that came with age, Mike had always told himself that such things were impossible. Given the events of the past two days, he began to think his childhood fears deserved a bit more credence than his adult mind had previously given them.

Descending the wooden steps, Mike felt about for the string overhead to turn on the light. Thankfully, Erik thought to improvise a flashlight with the blue glow of his cell phone. The faint light provided enough illumination for him to locate the string and with a gentle tug, an exposed bulb sprang to life above them. Reaching the bottom step, Mike found and flipped on the switch that controlled the rest of the lights in the basement. The room was small; a well-worn work bench stood at the center, and one wall was filled with shelves of tools. The other walls, however, were lined with the unmistakable rectangles of giant steel gun safes. Mike counted fifteen as his eyes scanned the room.

“Damn,” Erik exclaimed, the utterance matching Mike’s own amazement.

“Sean, go get Derrick so he can open these things up.”

As they waited for Derrick, Mike opened a tall metal cabinet that stretched to the eight foot ceiling. Stacked neatly on shelves were boxes upon boxes of various types of ammunition.

“It’ll take an hour just to get these out of here,” Erik said as he stepped behind Mike and saw the contents of the cabinet. Mike realized the teen was right; loading all of the weapons and ammunition into the vehicles would be a daunting and time-consuming task.

When Derrick entered the basement, he quickly began entering the combinations to open each safe. Mike was amazed that he could remember that many different combinations. Derrick explained that his father had used only three different codes for the fifteen safes.

Seeing how many weapons each case held, Mike sent word up for the other students to take shifts guarding the front of house, while others took brief showers in the two bathrooms in the home. Derrick, joined now by Jenni, began to show them how each weapon worked and the steps for loading and unloading. Mike’s head spun with terms like clip, magazine, double barrel, spring action, bolt, hammer, and a slew of others that he struggled to remember.

Seeing the bewilderment etched across his teacher’s face, Derrick presented Mike with a case holding twin black firearms.

“Mr. Allard, why don’t you take these? They’re Glock 17Cs with extended magazines. Each mag has thirty-three rounds, so you won’t have to worry about loading and unloading as often.”

“Yeah, that sounds like a much better idea for me,” Mike laughed as he took the weapons into his hands. Expecting a greater weight, he was surprised as he lifted the guns, estimating the weight to be between two and three pounds. While he practiced removing and replacing the longer magazines, Derrick provided him with two hip holsters that snapped easily over his belt.

Days earlier, Mike would have declined the opportunity to possess firearms. Having grown up in the North, he had never been exposed to the pleasure and sport his new Southern friends had experienced while being raised in hunting families. He liked to consider himself a gun-control advocate, but now with the weapons holstered at his hips, he felt a greater sense of protection and confidence than he had expected.

As the automobiles were being loaded with the basement arsenal, he thought a third vehicle would serve their interests better. Heading in to the garage, he discovered that the Chancers had left a smaller red SUV behind. Derrick informed him that the mini-truck ran well and tossed him the keys from the kitchen counter. The extra car allowed the students to have more space, and provided additional room for the weaponry.

Two hours after their arrival, the students were freshly showered and a large majority of the weapons, as well as some various canned foods, had been loaded into their transports. Derrick asked for an extra minute in order to leave a note for his parents telling them he was safe and headed north to the army base.

The three automobiles slowly made their way along the gravel driveway and turned back onto the narrow back road. Driving the red SUV, Mike led the caravan at a steady pace, hoping to reach the parkway without any difficulties. Though his eyes were scanning the surroundings as he drove, his thoughts wrestled with how and when he would tell the young Chancer boy about the shredded bodies of his parents that Mike had discovered in the garage.

* * *

The cars wove their way through the many obstacles in the streets. The abandoned vehicles told the tale of the panic and frenzy that had most assuredly ensued when the infected had begun to attack. Mike tried to ignore the sounds of crunching bone and flesh when the many bodies that littered the path could not be avoided.

Soon, the convoy rolled steadily down his own street. The houses of neighbors stood vacant, the neighborhood resembling a ghost town more than the once thriving residential community it had been just days earlier. Through the rearview mirror, Mike could see the horde of infected in the distance that followed after the three cars. On his left, he saw the familiar mailbox he checked daily upon returning home after a day’s work. The small, gray home sat twenty feet off the road, its short driveway allowing space for two cars. As the front door became visible beyond the large tree in his front lawn, Mike was startled to see four tattered forms throwing themselves against the entrance. Over their howling, Mike could hear a familiar sound. Acting on instinct, he slammed on the brakes and leapt out of car. Guns at the ready, Mike began firing and the four infected fell just as he reached the wooden steps leading to the front door. With a fierce kick of his left leg, the door crashed open and a gray flash of fur exuberantly jumped in circles around him.

“Hey, girl,” he soothed as he crouched down to return the greeting of Gazelle, the small terrier he had adopted two years ago when he first moved to Tennessee. Scooping her up in one arm, Mike quickly grabbed a small bag of food from the kitchen cabinet and headed back out, pausing for a second to remove the short leash that hung on a hook by the door. Racing back to the car, he could see that the infected that followed them had grown in number and were now only a hundred yards down the road. Sliding back into the driver’s seat, Mike passed the dog to Michelle, who sat to his right. As the vehicles resumed motion, Gazelle, with tail wagging and tongue licking, still brimmed over with excitement. Mike knew that it had been a foolish risk, one that endangered the students in his care, but in the moment he had been helpless to his instinct to save the beloved pet from the rapacious appetites of the infected.

Though clearly stunned by his hasty departure from the car, the students now played gleeful with the attention-loving canine. Mike found himself smiling as he listened to the cooing of the passengers with which he travelled. The paradox was not lost on him as he observed the students, each armed with guns, as they giggled like children, passing Gazelle back and forth between them.

Perhaps it was the adrenaline, or maybe the enjoyment of seeing the students’ excitement, but the entrance to the parkway appeared before them faster than Mike had expected. Glancing into the mirror, he saw the other two vehicles following closely, and all three made the gentle left-hand turn towards the on-ramp.

While not as bad as he had feared, the parkway was a jumbled web of cars and trucks as far as the eye could see. Most sat idly with doors thrown wide as the occupants had attempted to escape on foot. Frighteningly common now, Mike barely noticed the numerous bodies that lay strewn about. Instead his eyes were drawn to the hundreds of figures that milled aimlessly, some standing upright, while others crouched, greedily feeding off a human carcass.

With his foot on the brake pedal, Mike revved the car’s engine in an attempt to inform the other two drivers of what was expected of them. Receiving a thumbs-up from Derrick in the minivan behind him, he released the brake and the small SUV lurched into motion. Blurred forms bounced wildly as the car crashed into them. Knuckles turned white as he gripped the steering wheel tightly, aiming for the open spaces between the abandoned automobiles. Maneuvering onto the emergency lane which held far fewer mechanical obstacles, Mike glanced down at the speedometer as the red needle glided past first sixty, then seventy miles per hour. In the mirrors, he could see the two other vehicles still following closely behind.

In the distance ahead, he saw what appeared to be an over-turned tractor trailer, its hulking mass sitting sideways across the three lanes of the parkway. The emergency lane was entirely blocked with cars that had attempted to go around the disabled truck.

“Hold on!” he shouted.

The back end of the vehicle fish-tailed wildly when the smooth pavement changed to soft, wet grass as Mike veered the car off the road. More bodies slammed into the front grill as he struggled to maintain control of the car’s direction.

“Mr. Allard, look!” Michelle screamed as she pointed towards the fast approaching tractor to the left.

Removing his eyes from the road briefly, Mike could see the outlines of four forms standing atop the over-turned trailer. What appeared to be a man and woman with two small children at their sides, waved manically at the three car caravan he was leading down the parkway.

“Dammit,” Mike muttered, plans racing through his mind.

With a concerted effort, Mike, Pete, and Sara had managed to transport the supplies from Sub-Level 5 to the back of the building ahead of schedule. Sitting on unopened boxes of canned goods, the three conversed casually—the topic, of course, being the possible salvation offered in Cuba.

“Wanna bet that Castro is still alive and kicking?” Pete joked. For decades, the Communist dictator seemed impervious to all attempts at removing him from power. The idea of a surviving government system, communist or otherwise, was something Mike had not yet pondered. The American government had crumbled quickly after the outbreak. He recalled the final broadcast of the then-Vice President, urging patience and composure. It was the last vestige of executive law and order the country had known. The days that followed witnessed a steady decline into chaos, distrust, and isolationism. A once civil country by most standards had turned into a wildly barbaric, unforgiving wasteland.

As Mike kept an attentive ear tuned to the sounds of returning companions, his mind mulled through the possibility of an actual government, fully functioning, and supported by citizens that lived and worked as they had before the virus. The concept seemed so foreign to him now, having spent so much time surviving in that wasteland.

Though the refugee camp could only be described as rag-tag at best, the survivors had established basic ground rules aimed towards ordered cohabitation. Mike was understandably proud of the community he had helped create, but faced with the possibility of a truly prospering civilization, he began to realize how truly lacking the camp was. The brief time in the complex below, with its electricity and hot water, reminded him of the necessities the camp still lacked. The small, portable generators that provided minimal power were abandoned during the Tilian attack on the second camp. Since then, the refugees had survived as Neanderthals with only the advanced technology of fire.

The three continued to humorously debate the seemingly indestructible force that was Fidel, when the distant rumble of car engines sounded through the metal doors of the loading dock.

“Showtime,” Mike said as he hopped from his seated position, drawing one of his weapons with his right hand. His left rested on the handle of the door, waiting to heft it open when the sounds seemed close enough, while Pete prepared to open the second door. Three short blasts of a car horn signaled the arrival of the others and with simultaneous effort, the two men lifted the heavy doors. As instructed, the four who had retrieved the vehicles stood poised behind open truck doors, taking aim at the throng of Tils that were pouring into the alley.

Shots echoed off the concrete walls, as Mike, Pete, and Sara quickly began loading the opened hatchbacks of two Suburbans. He had worried that some of the supplies would need to be strapped to the roof of the vehicles they returned with, a time delay he did not wish to be forced to concede. But Paul and the others had chosen well, and the massive SUVs easily accepted the numerous boxes.

“Grenade!” shouted Lisa, giving the others warning to expect the rocking boom that would follow. Her strong, battled trained arm hurled consecutive grenades into the Til mass. Explosion followed explosion as dozens of infected were torn apart by the blasts.

Minutes dragged on, and Mike could feel his strength depleting as he lifted the heavy boxes into the trucks. The deafening roar of gunfire and explosions filled the small alley, and reverberated through the cavernous interior of the loading dock. He could see Pete and Sara faltering under the strain of their exertion. By sheer force of will, his body continued lifting and stacking, each movement bringing him closer to collapse. His muscles screamed in protest as he shifted the last remaining supply boxes into the now-filled truck. Fighting his body, he rushed over to the second bay and aided Pete and Sara with the final boxes. Their task complete, the three vaulted from the loading dock and quickly piled into the idling Suburban.