Ragnarok Rising: The Crossing (The Ragnarok Rising Saga) (23 page)

I could see the shoreline was coming up quickly. We didn't have much longer before we reached our landing spot. My pulse began to quicken and I began to get nervous. This was not going to be easy.

"Here," said the King, handing me my splitting maul. "You're going to need this. When we get into shallow water, jump out. The sun will be up any minute."

I hefted the weight of my
maul and sighed. I had no idea how many of the dead would be waiting for me, but I knew it would be a lot. I silently prayed that Spec-4 and Elliott would be all right if I failed. I had barely finished whispering the words when the motor cut out and stopped. It was time to go.

"This is your stop," said the King.

I opened my eyes and looked around. I was still only dressed in boots and pants. The air was chilly and there was a light fog on the water. I didn't see any movement in the immediate area, so I slipped over the edge of the boat and sank in frigid water up to my chest. It was all I could do to keep from gasping at the sudden cold shock.

"Victory or
Valhalla," I said softly to the King, glaring daggers at him.

He looked at me with
surprise on his face, but didn't reply. I could see that he knew that phrase. Maybe he'd heard it before. Maybe he had the same dream that I did. I knew that I intended to find out. However, standing ass-deep in freezing water and surrounded by zombies wasn’t the best time to talk. After I won the challenge, I would find out what he knew. One way or the other.

I started wading towards shore and heard the engine hum back to life behind me. I glanced back to see the boat slip away into the thin mist. With a grimace on my face, I waded to shore and tried to keep the sound of splashing water to a minimum. I thought maybe there might be a chance that if I hurried, I could sneak across the dam in the darkness.
Yeah, right. My luck is never that good.

I climbed
the hill taking me up to the road that ran across the dam. The grass was almost chest high, so I had to be careful I didn't walk up on a zombie that was on the ground. It was steep, so it took me almost ten minutes to climb to the top. Just as I reached the road, the sun emerged over the horizon and the golden light began to light up the sky. So much for luck.

Steam rose from my chest and arms in the chill air. I had forgotten the cold with the exertion from climbing the hill. There were abandoned vehicles dotting the span of the dam, but I could also see close to fifty zombies shuffling around. So far, they hadn't seen me. I knew that wouldn't last
, though. There weren't enough cars for me to hide the entire way across.

Crouching low, I crossed the road and kept mostly behind an overturned SUV. I knelt by the bumper and peered around the corner. So far, nothing had noticed my presence.
I leaned out and glanced down the other side of the dam. I could see the little office at the bottom that housed the entrance to the dam. It was a long way down. With the spillways open, the river below was roaring with powerful white caps. There was no way I was going to make it across that. My only choice was to go across the dam.

Glancing over the dam again, I noted the positions of the other vehicles. Most were civilian vehicles that had been abandoned or crashed together. Almost half-way across was an overturned
fire truck and a police cruiser sitting next to it. It was one of the huge ladder trucks, almost as long as a diesel with a trailer. I couldn’t help but wonder how they had managed to flip it over on its side. I also wondered if there was something inside the cruiser that might prove useful. I had little hope of making it across the dam with only a splitting maul for a weapon.

The next vehicle was an abandoned hatchback, about ten yards away. There was a body slumped against the front bumper. I couldn't tell if it was a zombie or not, but I really couldn't afford to assume it wasn't a threat. That was my next position. From there, I'd decide where I would go next.

Crouching low, I took off as fast as I could manage, heading right for the little hatchback. I kept my eye on the body and hoped that nothing noticed my movement. When I reached the front of the car, I hid behind the bumper and stayed down. The body was in the uniform of an Osage Beach Police Officer. He had a pistol in his hand with the slide locked back.

His head was slumped forward on his chest and I could see the ragged bullet wound to his head. I could also see the bite marks on his arms. The poor bastard must have used his last bullet on himself after he'd been bitten. I prodded him with the head of the splitting maul but he didn't stir. He was stiff and unresponsive. A quick check of his equipment belt yielded no ammo for the pistol. I pried it out of his hand and slipped it into my cargo pocket, anyway. No sense leaving it here to rot.
Out of habit, I took his badge, too.

I started to peek around the side of the car when I heard the sound of shuffling feet. I closed my eyes and cursed silently. I could tell it was approaching on the passenger side of the car, so I shot a quick glance around the driver's side.
I didn't see anything nearby, so I slipped around the fender and put my back against the side of the car. Silently, I held my breath and waited for it to pass by.

The shuffling feet continued and then stopped when it reached the front of the car. I was hoping it was just a
Shambler
and would go on about its way. I froze and forced myself to breathe very slowly, silently willing it to move on. My blood turned to ice-water in my veins when it began to make an all too familiar sniffing sound. It was a fucking
Tracker
!

I stood and swung the maul all in one smooth motion. Before it could react, I drove the hammer side into its skull with bone crunching force. The force of the blow threw it backwards and sent it over the railing, to plummet into the frothy river below.
I turned as quickly as I could to look for more targets when the zombie near the back bumper began to scream.

"
Shrieker!
" my brain screamed in warning.

The piercing shriek shattered the silence of the dawn and alerted every zombie on the dam. I knew I only had a few minutes before they began to converge on me from both sides. I had a more pressing concern
, at the moment. I had to shut this
Shrieker
up before it alerted every zombie at the lake. I had more than I could deal with already, without it bringing others in for miles around.

In two rapid steps, I covered the distance between us and drove the blade of my maul into its forehead. The cry ceased instantly and it stood there for a moment before collapsing to the ground in a heap. I yanked the blade free with a sickening slurp and ran for the next vehicle. I didn't have time to fight every zombie on the
dam, so I used the handle to knock a pair of
Shamblers
out of my way and kept running.

More and more zombies were appearing and heading towards me, but I kept running until I reached the parked police cruiser. I glanced into the window and saw that it had already been picked clean. There w
asn't so much as a ticket pad lying in view. I didn't have time for a thorough search, so I did the next best thing. I smashed out the window and reached inside to pop open the glove box.

Hitting the release button for the trunk, I heard the
thunk
of the lock and moved towards the back of the car. I swung open the trunk to find only a tactical vest and some road flares. I shoved the flares into my cargo pocket and grabbed the vest. I didn't have time to put it on, so I just slung it over my shoulder and turned back to the advancing crowd of the dead.

Three
Sprinters
appeared out of the crowd and came right for me. With no other options, I headed right for them. Using the maul like a short bo-staff, I slammed the handle into the face of the first one. It went over backwards, flipping almost completely over before it hit the ground. I drove the head of the maul into the bridge of second one's nose with a satisfying crunch. Its momentum carried it on past me, but it didn't move when it hit the ground.

The third one slammed directly into me
, and would have had me, had I not managed to get the handle of the maul between us. The force of the impact drove me backwards and onto the ground. I managed to keep my grip on the handle but we were nearly nose to nose as we fought on the ground. Its teeth were blackened and it had no lips. The lifeless eyes were partially glazed over and it reeked of rotten flesh.

It continued to snap it
s teeth together while struggling to bite into my face. I shoved against the handle with every ounce of strength I possessed and forced it back. With a tremendous shove, I knocked it off of me and leapt to my feet. Before it could regain its footing, I swung the maul with everything I had. I connected using the hammer side with enough force to knock the creature up and over backwards, colliding with the first three
Shamblers
that were approaching.

It took them to the ground and didn't move. The
Shamblers
were struggling to free themselves from beneath the dormant
Sprinter
but were having very little success. I glanced down in horror to see that I had cracked the wooden handle of the splitting maul. It wouldn't last much longer before the head fell off. I needed to put some distance, or an obstacle, between the dead and me. I needed time to find another weapon.

I glanced around, almost in a panic
, and realized the only place I could run to was the overturned fire truck. It was lying on the passenger side and there were hoses everywhere near the top of the truck. Sensing my only chance lay in the relative safety of the fire truck, I ran for it as fast as I could go. Around me, nearly a hundred zombies were closing in from both directions.

I reached the truck and bega
n to scramble onto the side. I had to throw my splitting maul onto the top. I couldn't carry it and climb at the same time. Grabbing part of the undercarriage, I climbed as fast as I could go. The dead were less than ten yards behind me and closing fast.

Just as I reached the top, a
Sprinter
grabbed my right leg and held on with a death grip. I had to kick it in the face three times with my left foot before I knocked it off and I could scramble on top of the truck. My heart was thundering in my chest and my ragged breathing was coming in huge gasps. Somewhere along the way, I had managed to cut my left arm and blood was streaming down my bicep and onto my forearm. I could see a quarter sized piece of glass sticking out of the skin.

"Damn it," I hissed as I pulled the shard out and threw it off into the water.

I briefly considered leaping from the truck and into the lake, but I was too close to the spillway gates. With them open, I would be caught and sucked through them. I'd be battered to death in the river at the bottom of the dam and they'd find pieces of my body all down the Osage River.

I scrambled to find my weapon and found that tossing it had finished the job. The head lay less than a foot from the handle, severed with a ragged piece of wood sticking out of it. It was next to useless, now. I tucked the head into one of my cargo pockets. I didn't want to leave it behind. I might still need it before this was over.

All around me, I could hear the sounds of the dead slapping their hands against the sides of the truck. Since I knew that most types of the dead couldn't climb, I had a moment to catch my breath and to figure out my next move. I slipped the tactical vest on and lay back against the cool metal of the truck to catch my breath. As I lay there gasping with my chest heaving, I saw the head of a zombie emerge over the end of the truck. From the way it was sniffing the air, I knew it had to be a
Tracker
.

"Great!" I snapped. "The goddamned
Trackers
can climb, now."

It slipped onto the top and got to its feet. I began to scramble backwards, still on my back. I knew that I didn't have much farther before I would run out of truck. Two more
Trackers
were emerging and climbing onto the top as the first one came towards me. I could see my own death in their dead eyes. As they closed to within a few feet of me, my left hand found the handle of something solid.

I glanced quickly to see what I had found and smiled when I realized that I had found the handle of a Halligan Bar. It was a heavy-duty all-steel wrecking bar used by firefighters to smash their way into burning buildings. One end was a clawed nail puller and tool while the other end had a sharpened spike on one side and a pry-wedge on the other. The entire thing was made out of
solid steel, so breaking it was pretty much out of the question. It could survive almost anything.

With a cold smile on my face, I pulled the Halligan free and got to my feet. Squaring my shoulders and adjusting my stance, I swung the Halligan at an upward angle, catching the first one in the jaw and knocking it flying over the side. It landed in the middle of a group of
Shamblers
and knocked several of them to the ground.

Quickly, I reversed my swing and drove the prying wedge into
the head of the second one. The skull split like it was made of paper and knocked most of the front half of the head off into the water. The rest of it crumpled and tumbled over the side of the truck. I heard it hit, but didn't see where it landed. I was too busy lining up my next target.