Deadrise (13 page)

Jenkins walked up to Matt, his weapon slung over his shoulder, a lit cigarette in his hands.

"We just got the word people. As soon as the reinforcements arrive, we load up and head back to base. So pull yourselves together." He went to stand near the passenger door, and converse with the Comtech. The rest of the soldiers went about what ever they had been doing.

"So much for their fallen comrade." Matt muttered. The top gunners body had been carted away; a bullet put through his brain, and loaded aboard one of the trucks.

"You've got to understand," Ron began. "Most of these soldiers have been in the shit, fighting the deadfucks since it all started. They've seen more friends die than they can count, most torn apart by deadfucks. Their hard."

Matt didn't look at him. He found it hard to understand how someone could become so cold inside, that the loss of a close friend, one that they had been joking with fifteen minutes earlier, didn't even affect them. Matt also wondered if he too would become that cold inside? That dead. Without another word Matt piled into the back of the Humvee. He was exhausted. All he wanted was to return to the hospital, find Zack and Susan, get to the Barracks at Fort Douglas, and get some sleep…

Chapter 9

Friday, June 22, 2001

University Of Utah Hospital

Salt Lake City, UT

9:09 AM

After Surgery, Zack had been taken into the hospital cafeteria, which had now been filled with dozens of folding cots, most of which held wounded. Some of the people here had relatives or loved ones beside their beds, cramping the space even more. The Head Nurse pointed to an empty cot across the room, and the orderlies began weaving the stretcher through the maze of wounded. Susan followed behind. It smelled of antiseptic. When they reached Zack’s cot, they slid their arms under him and quickly yet gently lowered him onto the cot.

"A nurse will be along to see to his needs." the orderly said. Then they left, folding the stretcher in two and carrying it away. Susan knelt beside him. She laid her hand on his face. His skin was burning hot with fever.

"Don't you die," she said softly, fighting back tears as her fathers face suddenly sprang to mind. "Do you understand? Don't you die." she lowered her face, wiping away tears.

"I won't." She looked up, to see Zack’s eyes half open and glassy from the painkillers. She smiled wide, leaning foreword and kissing him on the cheek.

"How do you feel?" she asked.

"Like shit." he muttered. "I need water."

"They told me the nurse would be here soon." He closed his eyes, appearing to slip back into unconsciousness. But his eyes opened again, and he looked at Susan.

"I'm sorry about your father." he said meekly.

"I know." she said. "There was nothing you could have done." she said. He tried to speak again but she spoke first.

"Stay quiet. Matt is taking care of things with the bus. He'll be here in the morning."

A nurse stepped up alongside the cot, a pillow and blanket in one hand, a portable IV kit in the other. She slipped the pillow under Zack’s head while Susan covered him with the blanket.

"I need water." he said, his throat a raw, parched desert.

"After I put the iv in.," the nurse said. She swabbed the back of his hand and inserted the tube, taping it down when she was done. She then applied the saline solution drip to his IV. "I'll be right back with some water." the nurse left.

"Looks like we’re in a pretty bad situation." Zack rasped.

"We’re much better off than we were in the city." Susan said. "There are no zombies here, and you got the bullet taken out."

"How bad is it?"

"The doctor said you would be ok." Zack began to chuckle to himself. "But you need rest. What's so funny?"

"That was a
DOCTOR
who was operating on me? It felt like a meat butcher." He continued to laugh, a bubbly, giddy laugh brought on by the painkillers. They had doped him good.

The nurse returned with a small Styrofoam cup of water. With a groan of pain, and a small fit of coughing, he rolled onto his side.

"Careful!" snapped the nurse. "You'll do yourself no good if you reopen your wound. Start the internal bleeding all over."

"I'm fine. I need water."

"Here you go." the nurse gave him the water with a scowl on her face. He tipped it to his lips and gulped it in two swallows. Nothing had ever tasted so good. "Careful. You’re dehydrated. You'll gag if you drink too fast. Now lay back and rest. Get some sleep." Zack looked up at her. "Go on now." she said sternly. Zack complied without a word, laying back and letting out a deep breath.

"And you," she was looking at Susan. "You look nearly as bad as him. When was the last time you slept?"

"I don't know." Susan wracked her brain, and she honestly couldn't remember. "It’s been awhile."

"Why don't you go find someplace to get some sleep yourself?"

"I'm not leaving Zack," she said. "I'll be fine. Thank you anyway." The nurse left without another word.

"She was lying you know?" Zack said.

"What do you mean?"

"What she said. She was lying." his face held a lopsided grin, his eyes shining bright.

"When?" Susan didn't know what he was talking about.

"That part about you looking as bad as me. She was lying. You don't look bad at all." Susan felt her cheeks grow hot and she smiled.

"You're high." she said, patting his face.

"Yes I am." Zack laughed. "But she wasn't lying about me being tired." She lay down on the cot beside him, on his uninjured side, trying to give him as much room as possible.

"I'm not hurting you am I?" she asked.

"No." he said.

"Good. Now shut your mouth and get some sleep." she said. She let out a large yawn, closed her eyes, and was asleep in under a minute…

Chapter 10

Friday June 22, 2001

University Of Utah Hospital

Salt Lake City, UT

11:03 AM

Once the Humvee returned to base the soldiers departed for the debriefing area. Ron and Jenkins finished talking amongst themselves before Jenkins followed them. Ron walked over to where Matt stood waiting.

"You head on back to the bus, bring everybody up to date." he said to Matt.

"What about you?" Matt asked.

"I'm going to go over to the Comstation and make a call to Ft. Douglas. Let them know we’re coming. Then I'm right behind you. We'll go up to the hospital and get your friends and then go to the base."

"Are you sure the is going to be no problem with this?"

"I told you I would take care of it didn't I?" Ron spread his arms to accentuate his question. Matt nodded his head. Ron reached into his jacket pocket and pulled out a small cigarette tin. He popped it open and pulled out long, fat joint, easily the size of a cigarette. "Here's a little something to help you relax." he held it out to Matt who took it with a smile across his face. "Ok then, get going. I'm ten minutes behind you." Ron patted him on the shoulder then turned and headed towards the Comstation.

Matt headed out of the motor pool, towards the refugee camp where the bus was parked. The battle was still spinning through his head, making it unable to concentrate on much of anything else.

Superzombies!

As if things weren't already bad enough. Not only did you have to worry about zombies eating you, now they could shoot and throw grenades. But how had they equipped themselves? They were deadfucks! Rotting bags of shit. Walking piles of pus. They didn't think, they reacted. So his mind spun in circles until he found himself entering the bus. Sharon and David were asleep. He would let them sleep. It had been a rough night for them.

He settled back in the driver's seat, a heavy weariness seeping into his bones. He hadn't slept since they fled the school, over twenty-four hours ago. Matt reached into his pocket and pulled out a lighter, sparking the joint Ron had given him, puffing until it lit then took a long, slow pull and leaned back once again. The effect was almost instantly. The tired ache washed away, replaced by the cool numbness of the marijuana.

After seeing those superzombies he was really beginning to have second thoughts about the trip down into the city tomorrow. What if they ran across some of them while they were out? There had been the whole perimeter defense squad to deal with them. Tomorrow there would be maybe a half dozen of them on the bus. No, he didn’t want to go out tomorrow. He wanted only to gather Zack and get the hell out of there and up to Kelly's cabin on the lake. But they would need supplies from the city if they were to survive for an extended period there. Matt felt trapped between what he wanted to do and what he had to do. He took a final puff from the joint and pinched it out, tucking the second half away for later. Ron came around the front of the bus as Matt was putting it away.

"Feeling better?" Ron was smiling.

"Thanks." Matt said. He twisted the wires under the dash and the engine sprang to life. "Does the hospital know we're coming?"

"They do. Jenkins is going to meet us at the entrance." Ron sounded as if he had anticipated Matt's questions. Matt eased the bus back into the main road, the sea of humanity parting around it. "So how did you come upon this bus?" Ron asked. He was sitting in the stairwell.

"We were holed up in a school. We knew it was safer to stick together than in separate vehicles. Thank god there was a bus there. I'm surprised that you and Jenkins haven't grabbed one while you were out looting."

"There has to be some kind of law and order for it to be called looting." Ron sounded a bit pissed. "Besides, we’ve usually gone out with military salvage teams. They have the cargo space in their trucks. Like I said it wasn't until recently that the Army started providing an incentive for privateers to salvage. Even then, most people don't venture to far down into the city. Hell, the only part of the college that is safe is the hospital. The rest is swarming with deadfucks."

"Well I'm not looking to make a career out of this. One raid down into the city and that’s it. Zack should be able to travel in a couple of days then we're out of here. Maybe you should get you a bus while we're out. Save us both a lot of hassle."

"Me and Jenkins discussed that a bit before you signed on." Ron’s mood suddenly went serious. "But after that last patrol…those superzombies… I got to thinking about the situation here, and how maybe it wouldn't be such a bad idea to get moving to somewhere else. Somewhere safe. Maybe somewhere up in the mountains?" He looked Matt straight in the eye. He was asking to come along.

"I thought you had a good thing going here?"

"I do. But like I said these superzombies make it a whole new ballgame."

"Just you?" Matt asked.

"I want to bring my Brother Rick and his family. Thank god they escaped the city. They're all I have left."

"It’s a big bus." Matt said. "There's plenty of room."

"What about your friends up at the lake? You don't think they would mind?"

"It’s a big lake. There’s more than one cabin up there. They can't all be occupied."

They drove the rest of the way in silence, each stewing with their own thoughts. When they reached the hospital Ron stuck his head out the door and spoke to the guard a moment before passing. Matt was impressed. Despite all of Ron and Jenkins reassurances he had still been skeptical. But so far everything was going smoothly.

When they stopped in front of the hospitals main entrance, he was surprised once again to see Susan standing beside a portable stretcher, which bore Zack, carried by two soldiers.

"How is he?" Matt asked Susan as they boarded

."He's better now," she said. "But I didn't think he was going to survive the surgery. You wouldn't believe the conditions here."

The soldiers secured Zack to the front bench then exited the bus. Matt looked down on his friend. His face was flushed with fever, but that was better than the deathly pale he had been first thing this morning. His eyes were closed, and his breathing came easily.

"He sure looks a hell of a lot better." Matt said.

"What’s going on?" Susan asked, peering out the window across the parking lot. "They wouldn't tell me anything, only that we were being moved to the base." Matt quickly filled her in on what was happening. As he had guessed, she was less than thrilled about him returning back to the city.

"I can't believe you're actually going back down there!" she looked at him as if he were the biggest fool she had ever laid eyes on.

"Susan I am not going to argue about this right now. It was a long night and not a real good morning. I'm tired." She was about to protest, but there was something in his eyes, some...emptiness that stilled her tongue. It had been a long night.

"I'm sorry." she softened.

Matt got the bus rolling. They went down the hill towards the western perimeter road. As they passed the western garrison, two Apache gunships were lifting off, heading North x Northeast. Going out to search for large gatherings of zombies most likely.

Looking in the rearview mirror, he could see that Susan had went back to speak with her mom and brother, who were now just awakening. At the western road he turned south. Just ahead he could see a military transport truck parked at the shoulder of the road. Three soldiers stood about, holding their rifles not quite drawn, and not really relaxed either. Just beyond it was an M1A1 Abrams tank, also pulled to the shoulder of the road, turret-pointing west, where the ground sloped down into more suburbs. Between the road and the 'burb's was a perimeter defense line of trenches, sandbagged heavy weapons emplacements, and several Humvees and regular army jeeps and dozens of armed soldiers spread in a line for hundreds of feet in either direction. Last night they had been unable to see this defensive line in the dark.