Ragnarok Rising: The Awakening (Book One of The Ragnarok Rising Saga) (17 page)

“Watch my back,” I said as I moved towards the Sheriff.

“Gotchya, Sar-major.”

Cautiously, I picked my way towards the Sheriff.
Along the way, I recovered four empty Glocks and tossed them into the open passenger door of the Humvee. I also found three empty shotguns and one AR. Those went into the Humvee, as well. As I passed the fallen officers, I checked them all. I didn’t know any of them personally, but knew their faces in passing. The black shirts were all from D-Shift, I think. Their name tags read Simonson, Walters, Bradley and Tate. The patrol gray uniform belonged to a Sergeant that I didn’t know.

All of them had nasty bite-marks on their bodies and a single large c
aliber bullet wound to the forehead. Spec-4 stayed as close to me as she could, without running over too many bodies. I took the time to strip all four of the officers of their duty belts, any extra ammo and radios. There wasn’t much ammo left on any of them. They hadn’t gone down without a fight. That was good.

As I checked the Sergeant, I noticed his name plate said
Jennings. I’d heard his name before, but didn’t know him personally. His eyes were partially open and he had almost a relieved look on his face. Blood was congealing around the bullet hole in his forehead. I pulled off his badge and stuck it in my cargo pocket with the others.

Then I continued on to the Sheriff.
He was covered in blood and had a nasty bite wound to his left shoulder. He didn’t appear to be breathing. I could see other bites on his arms and one on his left thigh. He hadn’t been shot, though. That meant that he could still turn at any time. I kept the M-16 pointed at him as I approached and nudged his boot with my toe. I was fully expecting him to wake up and try to attack me. I almost shot him when he opened his eyes and looked at me.

“Grant?” he whispered, barely loud enough for me to hear. “Is that you?”

“Oh, shit,” I whispered. “He’s alive!”

I lowered the rifle and went to him.
His wounds were bad. Frantically, I dug out my first aid kit and started to open it.

“Don’t waste it,” he managed to gasp out. “It’s too late.”

“Let me help you, sir,” I said.

“You can,” he hissed through pain-clenched teeth.
“Just listen.”

I did as he asked.

“I did…all I could. I tried to…(cough)…save them. We got trapped…up here. We held out… (cough)…as long as we could. Just too many… (cough)…of them. They just…kept coming.”

He gasped and coughed, again.
Dark red blood spurted out onto his chin and chest. Spec-4 ran over with a bottle of water and handed it to me. I opened it and gave him a sip.

“Grant,” he said. “I don’t have
…much time left. I’m turning; I can feel it…inside. I need you…to do something…for me.”

“Yes, sir,” I said. “Name it.”

“Take my badge…and gun,” he whispered. “You’ve got to…keep it going. Don’t let it fall. Someone has to…take up the badge.”

“But…” I stammered.

“Take it, Grant!” he hissed. “I carried it for a while. It was…heavier...than I ever expected.”

I waited, expecting each sentence to be his last.

“Keep it going. Pass it on… (cough)…when you can’t…carry it… (cough)…anymore.”

“I will, sir,” I said, my voice quivering.

“It’s more…than a badge….it’s a symbol. Keep it……”

He gave a soft wheeze and shuddered, and then his chin fell to his chest.
Sheriff Rick Hawkins was gone. It was one hell of an end for the 41
st
Sheriff of Nathanael County. This was only the second time in history that a sheriff of Nathanael County had died in the line of duty. It was always a peaceful place. At least it was, until Ragnarok came.

Gently, I took the badge from his shirt and took his pistol from his hand.
I took the shoulder holster that held his county-issued Glock. Around his waist was his pride and joy. It was a gunfighter rig holding a beautiful 1873 Army Colt. It had wooden grips and gleamed like it was new. I’d heard the story on how he’d come by that particular gun.

It had belonged to his father and he claimed that it once belonged to another Sheriff, long ago.
A Sheriff named Virgil Earp, brother of legendary lawman Wyatt Earp. I don’t know if it was true or not, but it was a hell of a story. Although it was a museum piece, the gun worked just fine. Sheriff Hawkins had even qualified with it at the range.

Although it was an old style holster, it had been upgraded with
loops that held replacement cartridges for the Colt that could be swapped out. Only seven rounds remained with in it. Reverently, I reloaded the old beauty and stuck it back in its holster.

Just then, the Sheriff opened his eyes.
As he started to get to his feet, I drew the old revolver and brought it up. I hesitated for a few moments, letting him stand completely up. Before he could lunge forward to attack, I cocked the hammer back and steadied my aim.

“I won’t let it fall, sir,” I whispered, and shot him between the eyes.

I considered grabbing the old .45 brass casings, but I didn’t have any way to reload them. Then I slowly turned and headed for the Humvee. I turned and glanced back at Sheriff Hawkins one last time before I got in.

“I won’t let it fall,” I promised.

The sun was down completely as we secured the doors. The street lights were beginning to flicker on all around us. I gave silent thanks that the power grid hadn’t failed, yet. It would only be a matter of time until it did, though. Little by little, we were losing this war. With every new zombie that turned, humanity lost more ground. If we didn’t find a way to stem the tide, we were all as good as dead.

“Where to?” asked Spec-4.

“Back to the jail,” I said, and clipped the badge to my Interceptor vest. “We’ve got work to do.”

“Nae man can tether time or tide.”

- Robert Burns

We made it back to the jail without incident.
Sure, there were zombies around but we had more difficulty finding streets that were clear to navigate. We finally made it by driving down the road behind the student arena and then taking the same streets we’d used on the way in. Then it was easy to cut back to the jail. With the gathering darkness, we avoided the worst of the dead by running with the lights out.

There weren’t many zombies near the old courthouse, like before.
I didn’t ponder that too long, since we were almost at the gate. I called Master Control and we rolled back inside to the relative safety of the vehicle sally port. Inside the gate was another vehicle that hadn’t been there when we’d left. This one was a Republic Police Department Charger, one of the smaller municipalities from just west of Springfield.

Lt. Murdock was waiting for us when we came in through Release, with Cal Sanders standing beside him.
The L.T. looked pale and tired, so I made a mental note to have Medical check on him. Sanders grabbed me in a near rib-crunching bear hug. I thought my eyes were going to bug out onto my cheeks before he sat me down. Sanders was far stronger than I think even he knew.

“Wylie, you old bastard,” he said, grinning.
“I thought I was done for until you rolled in. Who’s this?”

I introduced him to Spec-4, and even managed to call her by name.
She smiled and waved, but I could tell that she wasn’t sure what to make of this muscle-bound man. She smiled and nodded, but kept her distance. Although Cal was one of the nicest guys you could meet, his sheer size made him more than a little intimidating.

“I came back with a passenger, but not the one we set out to get,” I said, and motioned for Spec-4 to bring up the little girl.

She pulled away from Spec-4 and ran to me, grabbing my legs and peeking out from behind.

“It’s ok,” I said, picking her up.
“No one here’s going to hurt you. We’re the good guys.”

She looked at
Cal and hid her face in my chest, holding on tightly. I gently patted her on the back and tried to be as soothing as possible.

“I think you’re scaring her,
Cal,” I said. “I can’t say that I blame her. My ribs are killing me.”

With that the big man leaned over and held out his hands.

“You don’t have to be scared of me,” he said, softly. “I’ll protect you.”

I was surprised when she leaned into
Cal’s big outstretched arms. He lifted her up onto his shoulder like she didn’t weigh an ounce. Despite his appearance, his way with children was astounding. He whispered to her soothingly and stroked her hair, letting her relax in his powerful arms. I think it was the first time she’d felt safe since all of this started. I knew she was going to be well taken care of.

“Why don’t I take her and let M
edical check her out,” said Cal.

She held fast to
Cal’s neck and kept her face buried in his shoulder, clinging to him for dear life. I noticed that she still had the little red stuffed doll under her arm, as well. Funny how it turned out that I really did need a toy from the truck of that police cruiser.

“Good idea,” I said. “
Cal, let Medical know that she hasn’t said a word since we found her. She might be in shock, too.”

Cal
headed off towards where Katie Pendleton was sitting by the Booking counter. She was one of the on-duty nurses when the shit hit the fan. Now she was trapped here, like the rest of us. Katie took one look at the little girl and I could see her heart melt. I could tell that she was in good hands. Katie was one of the guys. She had a quick wit and wry sense of humor that fit right in with our bunch of oddballs. But then again, if there’s a profession out there with as odd of a sense of humor as law enforcement, it would have to be the medical field.

Turning back to the L.T., I said, “I found the Sheriff.”

“I rather assumed that by the badge on your vest,” he said. “Is there a story there?”

“Yeah, I suppose there is,” I said.
“It was one hell of a sight, sir.”

I told him about the battle that had taken place on top of the parking garage and my conversation with the Sheriff.
I left nothing out, not even when I shot the zombie-sheriff. The Lieutenant just listened to me as I talked. It felt good to tell it all to him. I felt less crazy for wearing the badge once the story was told. Until then, I had been wondering whether or not I should keep the badge or to find someone who deserved it more than I did.

“Well,” he said, at last. “It looks like there’s a new sheriff in town.”

“But, sir,” I said. “I’m just a C.O. I’m not even a road cop.”

“I’m not sure that really matters now, Wylie,” he replied. “No one’s out there trying to arrest the zombies.
We’re just trying to survive, at this point.”

“But isn’t the Sheriff supposed to be an elected position?”

“True,” he said, “but I sincerely doubt that we’re going to be seeing an election any time soon, if ever again. Wylie, what you see here may very well be all that’s left of this county. We need a leader, right now. We need a Sheriff to unite this group of people. Someone we can all look to for direction.”

“I’m not sure that I’m the right man for the job, sir.
I’m not a leader.”

“Son, you’ve been taking charge and leading people since this all started.
You’ve done just fine.”

“Maybe you should take it, sir,” I said.

“No thank you,” he replied, shaking his head gently and holding up his good hand. “Besides, I’m in no shape to lead anyone just now. I’ve broken my gun arm. What we need is someone who can lead from the front, not just sit back at the jail and give orders. Anyone can do that.”

“How do you think the gray shirts will take it?”

“Better than you might think. Everyone’s been talking about all the things you’ve been doing. I’m pretty certain that the Fair Grove officers would follow you anywhere.”

“Alright, sir,” I said, reluctantly.
“I’ll give it a try.”

“You’ll do fine, Wylie,” he said, smiling and patting me on the shoulder.
“Now go get yourself something to eat and get some rest. Tomorrow’s going to be another busy day.”

“Thanks, L.T.”

With that, I headed off towards the main sliders. I wasn’t ready to go to bed just yet, though. There was too much that I wanted to check on first. My first stop was in Reception. I stopped at the reception desk and opened the key locker. I checked the key log and took out a set of the emergency keys and tucked them in my pack. They would open almost any door in the jail and would be invaluable if the power went out. Without those, we would be trapped inside the jail when the main grid went offline. I made a mental note to get other sets into the right hands before the time came. Add that to the list of a million things we needed to do to fully secure this place.

Then I moved on into the lobby.
I wanted to inspect the barrier on the main glass doors. Frankly, I was impressed. Southard and three of the Fair Grove Officers were still working on it when I arrived. It looked like that had taken full advantage of the time that they had. You could barely recognize the place.

“Looking
good, boys,” I said, nodding appreciatively.

It did, too.
They had sealed off the entire glass front, including the revolving door. They’d emptied all of the admin offices and made a wall out of desks and filing cabinets. It looked pretty solid, too. It might not stop an entire horde of the dead, but it would stop pretty much anything else that tried to force their way inside, living or otherwise.

“If you like that, go upstairs and look out the window,” said Southard
, jerking his head towards the stairs.

“Ok.”

I took the stairs up to the landing above the lobby, but just below Visitation, and looked out at the front steps. There were dozens of zombies in the street, but none on the front porch. Sanders had parked the bus right where it needed to be, sealing off the steps. I’m not sure where they scrounged up a FedEx truck, but they had one backed up to the wall, completely sealing off the wheelchair ramp. The front entrance was pretty well secure and that was a good thing. I came back down the stairs, smiling.

“Excellent work, guys,” I said. “That’s really outstanding.”

“Thanks,” said Wells, grinning.

“We even covered the windows in the offices,” said Southard.

“Well, that’s one less thing we have to worry about,” I said.

“700 to Grant,” said the voice over the radio.

“Grant, here. Go ahead.”

“Sir, can you come up to Master Control?”

“I’m on my way.”

I thanked the guys again for the great job they’d done and headed back through the sliders.
Then it was a quick jog up the stairs to Master Control. I could still hear the banging of the zombies in the pods as I climbed the stairs. The noise died down significantly once I entered Master Control. Lieutenant Murdock was waiting when I got inside.

“I think you might want to take a look at this,” he said, gesturing at one of the big monitors.
“I’m not sure what’s going on, but I think it’s about to turn ugly.”

I went over and looked at the big screen.
The layout of all the big pods was almost identical, except for the paint on the railings and stairs and the color of the plastic chairs. I could tell by the blue color in the image that I was looking at Bravo Pod. It was set up that way so that officers on duty in Master Control could tell the difference between the pods with just a glance at the monitors. If there was trouble, they could call a code without having to check to see which pod it was, first. In an emergency, seconds will sometimes mean the difference between life and death.

The monitor was split into two views, one from either end of the pod.
Near the back of the pod stood close to twenty inmates. You could tell that they weren’t zombies, yet. They were still human. They were forming up into a defensive line, using the plastic chairs as makeshift shields and weapons. The rest of the pod had already been turned. There had to be at least eighty zombies. The odds were heavily in the favor of the dead.

“Why don’t they lock themselves in
their cells?” I asked, scratching my chin.

“The group release is still activated on the pod control board,” said Andrews, seated at one of the control stations.
“With that on, they can’t secure the doors.”

“Can’t you over-ride it from here?”

“Unfortunately, no,” replied Andrews.

“Why are they doing this now, and how’d they survive in there for so long?” asked Lt. Murdock
, leaning closer to the monitor for a better view.

“It looks like t
hey used sheets to hold the doors shut and hid in the cells,” answered Andrews. “I guess they did it when the zombies focused their attention on the people in the hallway that they saw through the windows.”

“They must have gotten
tired of hiding,” I said, shrugging my shoulders.

Seconds later, the zombies were on them.
To their credit, the inmates fought hard. They had made weapons from books tied up in sheets, shanks made from broom and mop handles and a few even used their fists. More than a few zombies went down from blows to the head, but the outcome was never really in doubt.

It was over in a few
extremely brutal moments, and the zombies had them all. The devastation was both terrifying and awesome. It was like watching sharks feed. They were cold, relentless, and nearly unstoppable. The feeding frenzy seemed to last forever, leaving the dayroom covered in blood and discarded pieces. One by one, they began to rise and join the undead army that now fully controlled Bravo Pod.

“You realize that we’re going to have to take b
ack both of those pods,” I said, shaking my head. “It’s not going to be easy.”

“True,” said the L.T.
“How are we going to pull that off?”

“How about we put someone up on the roof?” I said
, pointing up. “They take the bolt cutters from Booking and cut into the ventilation fan at the back of the pod. Once they cut through, we drop in a couple of grenades. We have armed teams in positions at the chase-way doors. During the confusion, we open the chase-way doors and go in shooting. If they get too close, we pull back and shut the doors.”

“How about when they enter, they come in from the upper chase-way first.
Then while the zombies’ attention is on them, they pull back and the second team comes in through the rec yard. We can repeat it, if we have to,” said the Lieutenant.

“That sounds good to me,” I said. “Let’s try it.”

“Do you want to wait until morning?” asked the L.T.

“No,” I said
, frowning. “Let’s hit it now. If it works like we think it will, we’ll hit Delta Pod in the morning exactly the same way.”