Zombie Fallout 8: An Old Beginning (27 page)

“I would imagine high…OH, I get it! That’s actually one of your better plans. There’s only one thing.”

“Yeah, go on, killjoy.”

“The hose is only two hundred feet. What do we do after that?”

“Well, let’s just hope we’ve found the way out by then. We’ll have Porkchop holding the flashlights, so at least we’ll have light. That hose, when turned on full blast, should be able to send those smelly bastards careening down the hallways like a particularly thick loogey down a drain.”

“That’s gross even for you, Mr. T.”

“I know, I kind of wish I hadn’t said it.” I was looking at the hose. It would buy us some time while we looked for an exit. Then it was going to come down to the rounds we had and the axe, which I was going to take.

“I know the way out,” Porkchop said as Tommy helped him get his legs under the straps.

“You do? Are you sure?” I asked. I don’t know why I didn’t just trust him, and it wasn’t because he was twelve. I would have asked the same question to my wife, although she would have punctuated her answer with a punch to the shoulder.

“I said I did.” I could just about hear his eyes rolling in his head as he spoke. “Mr. Springer showed me the way. We couldn’t ever go because it was guarded, and you needed a keycard, but he said if I ever needed to get out…that was the way to go.”

“Why did he think to show you a way out, Porkchop?” I was curious.

“He said stuff like this taking over the world shit always went to hell, and that I needed to be prepared to run from it while the getting was good.”

“Smart man.” Whether someone from the inside wanted to significantly increase his or her pay grade or outside influences wanted to end the reign, this place was a magnet for trouble. “How close is it?”

“About three-quarters of a hot dog.”

I wasn’t sure I’d ever heard that sort of measurement. If we were talking about how fast Henry could get through three quarters of a hot dog, then we were already outside and this was all a wasted exercise. If we were talking about Nicole when she was around six and wouldn’t eat anything that didn’t come out of a Doritos bag, we were pretty much going to waste away inside these walls. Porkchop, I think, was a perfect blend of the two. We were three or so minutes at a regular walk from getting out. Of course, we’d be running if we could; but more than likely, a few dozen zombies stood in our way.

Porkchop was leaning back as far as he could, testing the tensile strength of the straps that held his legs in place.

“That’s not helping my shoulders any, kid,” I told him.

“Yeah, be careful, he’s old.” I appreciated that Tommy was trying to lighten the moment, but not at my expense.
Talk about the M1A1 Abrams Main Battle Tank calling the AH-64D Apache Longbow Attack Helicopter green…or something like that.

I knew my limitations. I hoped Tommy knew them as well when I asked him a question. “You going to be able to handle that hose?”

“I should be fine.” He grabbed the business end and pulled out a good ten feet or so. “It’s not like it’s hooked up to a fire hydrant.”

I walked over to the door and put my hand on the bolt. Tommy had a hand on the large red valve. “Wait, before I open this door, are we sure it’s going to do more than just get them wet? I mean
, I’m not trying to baptize the fuckers here. I want this thing to slam them against the far wall.”

“I don’t know about slamming them against walls, as it’s only a three inch
diameter hose. It will keep them away though.”

“This sounded way better in my head.”

“Mr. T, all of your plans sound better in your head.”

He was being serious. I could only grunt in agreement.

“You ready?” I asked Porkchop.

He had his helmet over his head and was leaning over, his head next to mine. His glove-covered hands were draped over my shoulders and were grabbing anything that felt sturdy. I’d thought he would be able to hold a flashlight so he could be our light source; that was, of course, until he once again rolled his eyes at me and showed me that the helmets,
which we all had on now, had built in lights. Each one of us was now covered in heavy gear, wielding traditional weapons, and now potentially had a secret weapon. We knew the way out in theory, and we were three-quarters of a meat by-product from escape. This is the best I’d felt today about our chances of escape.

Porkchop rapped on the side of my helmet with his fist. “I said I was ready, Mr. Talbot.” I looked up at him. He was smiling.

“Yeah, I was asking more for myself,” I told him.

I turned and nodded to Tommy. He slowly turned the wheel. It squeaked loudly as water began to dribble out the front of the hose. I had stopped pulling back on the bolt. I’d seen kinked garden hoses with more pressure than this fire hose was displaying. He kept cranking the wheel. I kept waiting for the point when he would stagger back from the pressure. There was a decent stream coming out; if we were going up against some fire ants we might stand a chance.

“It must run on a pump!” Tommy had to shout as the water was hitting the metal lockers and making a loud splashing noise.

“This blows. Back to ‘Plan B’ I suppose.”

“You have to flip the switch first.” Porkchop was still smiling.

“The switch? What switch?”

“There’s a pump switch over by where the uniforms are.”

“Were you going to tell us any time soon?” I asked him.

“I forgot. I’m only twelve, I can’t be expected to remember everything.”

“What do you think, Mr. T?” Tommy, Porkchop and I were all nearly head-to-head-to-head, looking at the innocuous black switch that could very well spell the difference between life and death.

“Well, I guess we’ll never know if we don’t try.” I cautiously reached out and moved the button to the ‘up’ position. It was at this point that I noticed the hose was pointed directly at my midsection. Water was dribbling out and landing on my boots. “That nozzle closed?” I asked as I pushed it away.

“Mostly. I don’t think it worked.”

Maybe off in the distance I heard machinery whirring, it was possible that was wishful thinking. Then we both watched as water swelled the hose like a snake eating a body-length sausage.

“How?” I wondered.

“It makes sense that it could be on another redundant generator in a different locale in case of a fire in the main generator room. Does it matter?”

“Not really. Want to do a test run?”

Tommy seemed to exert some strain as he hefted the now filled tube away from us. He opened the nozzle up, a jet of water as thick as my forearm rushed out. The force of the water was enough to send chairs and the table skittering along the floor. In many cases if they were hit right they would spiral out of the way. Tommy had to actually brace himself as he wielded the water cannon around. It wasn’t as powerful as the ones used for various crowd control measures but this was no gardening hose either. Tommy quickly closed the nozzle.

“I think it works!” He was smiling.

“You good with this?” It seemed superfluous even as I said it, as he was already moving toward the door with his new Super Soaker Supreme. “Your job is to just hold on, Porkchop. You got it?”

I knew he was nodding because each downward tilt slammed his helmet into mine.

“Ready, Mr. T?” Tommy was standing with his legs apart facing the door, one hand on the nozzle.

This had sounded so much better before I had my hand on the lock. The water stream was strong, but was it strong enough? Were we merely going to give the zombies a nice shower before they sat down to eat? We were about to find out. I slid the bolt back, pulling the door open as I moved out of the way. The water works were almost instantaneous. The zombie that had been right at the door looked a little road worn. His gray, sallow skin hung loosely from his cheeks, neck and eyes, giving him a “droopy dog” expression. Tommy nailed him straight in the face. I noticed, before the zombie was pushed back, that the skin from his face was being ripped away like stuck gum on a hot driveway. How many times had I told my kids to not spit their gum out on the driveway when they were younger? Used to spend an hour of every weekend out there with the hose, my thumb over the business end, trying to get the perfect stream consisting of high pressure and a thin line of water to pry the offending sticky substance off the ground. It looked just like that, but instead of black pavement underneath, there was the glistening red and white of muscle and bone.

For a second, the zombie let his face take the brunt of the punishment before he began to get pushed back. As the floor became soaked, he lost traction and was thrust hard against the wall. I’d love to say he was slammed up against the far side of the hallway hard enough to smash his fucking skull…but no such luck. He was down, but certainly not out, as his feet slipped from under him. More zombies were trying to fill the void but were kept at bay and repelled as Tommy moved forward.

“Time to go, Mr. T.” He was grimacing. It could have been from the macabre work he was performing or the exertion the hose was having on him.

I fell in behind, letting him clean the way. Once a zombie fell, it was easy to send him sliding down the hallway, much like a makeshift Slip ‘N Slide from my youth. He was keeping a good ten-foot push to the front of us, the rear was going to be my responsibility. Porkchop groaned as the M-16 went off. I should have thought to get some padding in his ears to help muffle the sound. He shifted his head to my other side to get away from the noise. I was careful to not step on the hose as I walked backwards. There were a few dozen zombies to our back, a lot, but not nearly as many as had been upstairs. I didn’t dare check out our front. As long as Tommy was still moving forward, that was a good thing.

“Two magazines,” I shouted to Tommy as I let one fall to the ground.

I could feel Porkchop twist in his seat, considering the “seat” was me, it wasn’t too hard to tell. “Next right!” he yelled.

Tommy grunted. Our pace was slowing. I hoped it was the accumulated weight of the hose as he pulled it along with the occasional zombie riding atop.

“How’s it going up there?” I asked.

He grunted again. It had to be gruesome. I was stepping in the human residue left over as the hose was stripping zombies clean like a pressure washer. The flaps of skin that had no definition were bad enough, but when you started to see the odd nose or tattered ear float by, well, that was sickening. The gray tiled floor was slick with water and blood. Mr. Springer would have had a hell of a time trying to get th
is cleaned up.

“Another right!” Porkchop yelled.

“One magazine!” I’d thinned the herd to the back, but I knew now that one more magazine wasn’t going to do it. It seems I’d slightly underestimated the strength of our enemy or, more likely, they were getting reinforcements attracted to all the noise as they came down the chute. My ass hit Tommy’s as he stopped.

“What’s up?” I asked him as I
hit the bolt release button and took out the closest zombie, adding what could only be described as a third nostril, albeit bigger than the other two and not quite symmetrical…but yeah, a third nostril.

“Out of hose.”

I hadn’t realized that the thing was about knee high as he’d tried to stretch its length even further by force. “How much further, Porkchop?”

“
Half an order of small french fries.”

“Kid, you can’t go changing the measuring device mid-stream, this is how spaceships are lost. One side of the design team uses metrics, the other Standard Fast Food fare. It’s a mess. In terms of that hot dog you were talking about, how much further? And this isn’t one of those stadium foot longs, is it? Probably should have discussed this earlier.”

I’d fired off two more bullets since I’d asked the question. The zombies had initially rushed us, but when we held them off—Tommy with the hose and me with the gun—they’d sort of retreated to a safer distance. We had a good twenty-foot bubble to our front and rear. They were waiting, they were patient, they had all the time in the world. Not like they were going to die, at least not without a little help.

It’s that predatory shit that really scares me. Mindless, eating, chewing machine is one thing, but to pause and reconsider needlessly injuring yourself in the pursuit of food, well, that’s an entirely different animal. I hated their progression.
Although, right now, their caution was giving us more precious seconds of life. Sure, it was terrifying seconds of life, but it beat the tranquil quietude of eternal nothingness or in mine and Tommy’s case, endless wandering.

I was going to save my bullets for as long as they would let me. Every time they looked like they wanted to take a step nearer, I dropped one. They would snarl in anger but would come no closer.

“What’s going on up there?” I asked.

“They’re staying out of effective range. From where they are, I’m sure it’s just a refreshing splash of water.”

“A quarter of a hot dog!” Porkchop blurted out. “I was retracing my steps as I ate, I remember thinking that maybe I should go back and get another one, because if the trip was any longer, I wouldn’t have any left. I had ketchup and mustard all down my forearm and Mr. Springer said we were just about there as I licked it off.”