Zombie Rush 2 (13 page)

“I don’t want to get hooked up with some hat wearing redneck truckers waving some kind of banner, all right? They just don’t get us.”

“Hey now, I may wear a hat from time to time, and I do drive a tractor trailer, but I’m not a redneck. I know you’re gay. Hell, even Charlie can tell you are lesbians.”

“Lesbians?” Charlie’s eyes got big, causing Dean and the two ladies to smile.

“Come on, Charlie; she introduced June as her wife,” Jonah chided and Dean smiled.

“Okay, maybe Charlie didn’t know, but my point is that no one will care. We have all manner of people with us just trying to find somewhere safe, that’s all,” Dean said as he looked over the rail at the fire escape nine or ten feet down. “The other thing is that we need your van.”

“You’re not going to steal our van,” June said as she raised her gun again.

“Not if you come with us.”

“Wait, wait now …” Mabel said and June put the gun down. “It’s my van, and I’m not staying here any longer, so let’s just cooperate with him.”

“Oh, so all of a sudden he’s in charge?”

“I think he knows a little more about things down there since he’s been running and hiding while we stayed up here. So just shut up and let’s get on with things.” Mabel was obviously the smarter of the two. “Now grab the shells and food while I get the other gear.”

“Shells? What gauge shotgun do you have there?” Charlie asked.

Dean didn’t hear the answer … he was flabbergasted. They were as much a couple as any husband and wife could be; he never imagined that it would be so similar. Dean never thought of himself as opinionated or judgmental, but sometimes it just crept up on him.

Dean hang-dropped down onto the railing of the fire escape, trying to stay away from the window, which acted as a skylight inside the building. Charlie stayed on top with June as they handed the other two down to him. Charlie came next, followed by June, who leaned in and whispered, “There is no way to let this down quietly, so once we do, it’s going to be balls to the wall.”

“Okay, you got the key ready?” Dean asked, and June turned her head back to the roof with an
oh fuck
expression. “Oh fuck, don’t tell me …”

“Just kidding. I got the keys right here,” June said, making Dean wonder if she understood the gravity of their situation.

“Don’t you fuck with me, little missy.”

“Relax, there always has to be time for a joke, or I’m not playing,” she replied seriously, and Dean just shook his head.

Mabel dropped the ladder and things suddenly became a mad scramble. Charlie hit the ground first and instantly posted toward the front of the building as if he were a battle-hardened soldier. June came behind and Mabel and Jonah followed while, through the window, Dean kept an eye on the zombies filling up the shop, the closed door to the roof unnoticed. He followed Jonah down and pushed everybody toward the detached shed that housed their vehicle. The noise had attracted several away from the front door of the consignment shop, but Dean was ready. He had no fear of these slower ones. Shaaka seemed to lend him an energy or speed all its own.

With his guns, he would have been dead already, refusing to budge while he still had rounds. With Shaaka, he had to pick and choose more carefully; in right circumstances, he was almost indestructible to zombies. The custom-shaped hardwood buckler would push three or four back at a time as his spear plunged with the bladed end or smashed with the butt. His large old muscles could create a constant motion that the slow ones didn’t have a chance against, unless there were too many of them.

This time was no different as he covered their trek to the van. He directed the van back to the south, leaving most of the zombies still inside the consignment store.

Chapter Ten

Stage Left

They were starting to see signs of the compound already stretching out beyond its walls in the form of scavenging groups, people clearing buildings, and of course, the heavy equipment used to combat the infected. Brett had said this would happen as they kept most of the undead focused on one side of the compound or several blocks away to allow access to and from.

Lisa and Skit both heard the bleating sounds of hundreds of zombies just beyond the pile of cars and debris that was piled in place the day before. The blockades were all over the city and designed to thin out the herd before it hit the walls of the makeshift compound. Some streets were blocked completely, forcing the zombies to wait until extermination teams could be put together to clear them out. In other streets, the zombies were allowed to filter through vacated buildings and out the other sides, spreading their numbers thinner for easier kills.

Lisa was still having problems digesting how they had to think of the past humanity. They needed to be eliminated completely or there would be no survival, no future. But it was still going to take a toll on her and everybody else. It was frightening to think about what the rest of the living would be like; would they long for more trivial times buried within their memories, or would they embrace this new brutal world? She couldn’t even venture a guess and couldn’t tell which would be better, but she knew which group would survive.

Lisa felt as if the Z’s in Hot Springs were already on the defensive, and the Springers were dominating because of a common goal. She looked up, stopped, and smiled at a man who was working a front-end loader, piling more debris into another alley mouth. He waved back, happy to have someone watch his skills on the giant cat. Lisa looked toward the other man running a New Holland skid loader and working in tandem with the bigger machinery. He worked the levers back and forth, diligently clearing the streets of smaller garbage.

The pop of a rifle sounded off close to their location and sparks sprayed off of the steel roof of the skidsteer cab. Lisa cocked her head, not quite sure what to make of it, her eyes still on the driver. Was it a ricochet or a misfire?

The answer came in the form of another rifle shot, as the inside of the skidsteer’s cab turned red and brain matter streaked the large windows. She waved to get the other guy’s attention, but it was too late; another rifle shot and his cab interior also changed to crimson.

Lisa scanned for the shooter but noticed the rooftops were clear. Then she looked for Skit, her rifle ready. Skit was a half block away; he had kept walking, not realizing that she had stopped. He was turned and looking at her, wondering what was going on. He looked around when he saw she had her rifle ready.

“Sniper!” she yelled.

He crouched down, continuing to scan the area with his .45 out. A large explosion, followed in quick succession by another, and then a third, forced them both to their bellies. The source of the explosions destroyed three separate blockades, and zombies began filling the streets between her and Skit.

“Get to the compound!”

Skit gave a quick nod and started running with both dogs in tow. Tonka looked behind him as he went, wanting to go to Lisa but not seeing a way through the thick wall of zombies now flooding the streets.

Lisa brought her rifle up and took out a couple around Skit and the dogs before they disappeared behind the mass of bodies. She bolted for the door of a market. Locked. She had to crawl over an abutment to make it to the next building—some sort of counseling center—but it too was locked. She continued to sprint, keeping only just ahead of the mass.

She turned and stepped backward to take down a couple of runners that were getting up to speed before she dashed down an alley and into another street. This one had trash piled in front of every door, blocking people from going in or out. She took another right, crossing behind the street to where the zombies had originally been trapped prior to the blasts.

A few stragglers were still there but headed away from her. She let her rifle hang and drew the Glock from her holster so she could move through doorways quicker. She was coming up on the large brownstone where she thought the shots may have come from. She wanted to slow and check it out, but the Z’s had already rounded the corner of the building behind her. She could hear the screams of building clearers when they noticed the escaped Z’s. Shots started ringing out, but were blocks away and Lisa was on her own. She wanted to go to them and help, but she would be on the wrong side of the horde, in the line of fire, and she had her own mess to get out of first.

The door on the end was locked, the barber shop inside clean, as if it had never been touched by the apocalypse. The sandwich shop around the corner was also locked, as was the V.I.P. Nail Salon. She stopped and looked up at the condos above and saw zero activity. It was strange; crews had found people hiding out in almost every building. This building looked untouched and could have living people still inside, but it appeared abandoned.

After emptying her mag into the approaching wall of dead, she crossed the entrance to an underground garage with a closed overhead gate. She moved on, reloading as she went.

After the garage was the second half of the building, its lower level dedicated to a clinic of some sort. She practically fell through the open door, pausing only to empty her mag so she could slam it shut and hold it with her slight frame. She threw the deadbolt-style lock and breathed a sigh of relief as the bolt slid home. She dropped the horizontal blinds in front of the glass to cut off their view of her in hopes that they would calm down. The safety glass would keep all but the most determined living humans out, and zombies were no exception.

Lisa took a couple of steps backward, noticing the chemical smell in the room. Her eyes scanned as she holstered her sidearm and dropped her magazine in the rifle while checking all of the potential trouble spots in the front of the business. Her hand was in her pouch, getting a full magazine, when a strong arm came over her face, smothering her mouth and nose with a cloth.

Her initial reaction to gasp was the worst thing she could have done. Her sharp intake of air filled her lungs with chloroform, sending her world to black and denying her the opportunity to fight back.

***

The only thought in her mind was
Oh fuck
when she awoke. Her hands were bound above her head and she was stripped naked down to her waist, leaving her upper body completely exposed.
Is he some kind of rapist now?

She didn’t have to see him to know who it was. Lisa had been fucking with the doctor, toying, and trying to bring him out into the open, and she thought she was prepared. She didn’t think he would be able to set things up this quickly. Then again, why couldn’t he?

With a simple disguise he could go anywhere with people, waving and smiling all the while. He had been one step ahead of her the whole time, even before he knew she was after him, which was … 
Could he have been in the compound when I went to talk to Ally? Hell, he would be familiar with the entire security system cameras and all … fuck! For all she knew, that connection could extend anywhere.

She tried to scan the room and saw a bank of portraits on the wall, and there he was, the same picture Skit had, smiling back at her and she said it again, “Fuck.”

His was the center of three persons, one an older woman with a stethoscope and the other an older man in a lab coat.

“Welcome back to the world of the living,” a good-natured voice said as he approached the bedside. “I see that you have noticed the co-founders’ portraits. This was mainly my brainchild; the others donated time and money for tax reasons.”

“Why would I give a fuck?”

“You have such a delicious potty mouth. I think I am falling, Rey. You could be the one, you know.”

“Yeah? Why don’t you take me camping and we’ll sing Kumbay-fucking-ya together and roast marshmallows over an open fire. You know, maybe just shutting the fuck up and doing what you’re going to do is the best choice right now.”

“What, and miss out on all of this? Never. You’re just being judgmental. You and I both know that every girl wants to marry a doctor.”

“Not every girl, dipshit.”

“Well then, you are one of a few select individuals, Rey.”

“Don’t call me that, dickhead.”

“Okay, Lisa, I can give you that. You may call me Craig in honor of the racist bastard that we gunned down together. That was quite a show, wasn’t it? Our first and only collaboration.”

“It wasn’t a show, asshole. It was real life.”

“More like real death, wouldn’t you say? I have to be honest. By the way you started out, I thought you would be a lot harder to get control of than you were.”

“Yeah, me too.” Lisa’s tone was regretful. She would be damned if she showed this guy a lick of fear, but the truth was that she was more terrified than she ever thought possible. It was a struggle to retain her bladder, and her entire being wanted to shudder, but the doctor fed off of that. Fear and terror were what he craved. She could feel his eyes penetrating her, looking for a sign, so she became stone cold and defiant.

“So, now that I have your undivided attention, I want to inform you that I will be describing every procedure we do here, no matter how minute. Full disclosure is the best policy, I think, and I feel that you have a right to know.” His eyes lingered a little too long on her naked upper body.

“Take a picture; it’ll last longer,” she said, peeved at his wandering eyes.

“Have no fear, Lisa; everything is being filmed in great detail. I have to say though, I have seen a lot of breasts, but yours … yours are pretty spectacular.”

“Just fucking kill me, all right?”

“Ah, but the world has changed. I no longer have to worry about a practice or my livelihood. Just like when I got into my forties and realized I didn’t have to rape every victim. It was a good thing, and opened the doors to men. Now I realize that I don’t have to kill every subject, and it might even have its own rewards; allowing them to walk in fear knowing that one day, I will return. Ally will be my first test of that and you my second. So kill you? That's just not an option. You're too much of a delightful challenge for that.” He paused and walked around to the side of the table so he could look right down at her, his eyes locking on hers.

“You see, the true question is, in what capacity will I leave you? I will do my best, but pain management without drugs can be a very touchy thing.” He held up a long, wiry needle and spun it so its limp form caused the light to dance in her vision.

“I studied for a time in the Far East and picked up some hobbies that I have become quite proficient at; not to mention fond of. Now keep in mind, I am not certified or professionally trained, so there may be some mistakes. I am going to ask you to remain perfectly still because some of the pain insertion points can also cause your bowels to release if we’re not careful.” Web gently turned her on to her side and twisted the needle into her skin.

Her hip and leg lost feeling and her tongue started to sweat. Her stomach juices started to churn and she felt …

“Do you feel nauseated?” She nodded like a good patient. “Gooood. I don’t smell anything, so that means your bowels held. I think we got it,” the doctor said as they fell into a natural rhythm of doctor-patient relationship that made Lisa want to puke, but she was helpless and completely unable to stop it.

“You should feel numb in your lower back and down your hip and leg.”

She nodded and bit her lip as she tried to control the tears that wanted to flow.

“Good. We’re doing great, Lisa. Now I am going to continue the pain blocks up your spine and into your neck.” He got out several more needles. A different portion of her body vanished from her sense with every insertion as he continued with his delighted rhetoric.

Lisa had never felt so helpless, and she was torn between hating him more and more every second and just wanting to die. If she could have held her breath until life passed from her body, she would have; she had never imagined that a horror like this could ever occur. Her eyes locked on her guns and ammo stacked with her shirt and TAC vest on a table in the corner just a few feet away, and prayed they would magically come to her so she could kill the bastard.

Web gave each needle a kink so he could roll her onto her back and smiled as he looked in to her face.

“Done; now that wasn’t so bad, was it? Well, at least not as bad as it is going to be taking them out, and you can trust me on that. Okay, on to the next step. I’m getting anxious because I am starving, but all good things in time.

“You seem to have lost your voice, Lisa. Is there anything you want to say?”

Lisa shook her head and squeezed her eyes tightly together when she noticed him looking at her breasts again. He reached up and squeezed her right one hard, but she couldn’t feel it.

“You know, in some of the groups which I belong to, people prefer to start here,” he said, indicating the gland that was pushing out between his fingers. “But I tell you, from a culinary standpoint, there really isn’t much there. Most will go for a forearm or calf to start, but that is just too much meat for one person, and it doesn’t store well. Besides … I am a rib man.”