Man Eaters (3 page)

“Oh my god! Thank god! Please. Get me out of here!”

Roper jumped, her breath leaving her body as she gazed at the wild-eyed man sitting in the back seat. He reeked of alcohol and stale body odor.

“You can’t leave me in here. Please. Please let me out.”

Leaping out of the car, Roper racked one into the chamber.

“Let him out,” Dallas said.

Roper shook her head. “Bad idea. We don’t know why he’s in there.”

“I’m with Roper,” Einstein said. “We don’t need the hassle.”

“Then I’ll do it. I can’t just walk away from this.”

“Wait. We gotta get out of here. Stay on the bike.” Five creatures were bearing down on them as Roper opened the rear door and backed away, pointing the shotgun at the prisoner. He had greasy black hair and a worn and dirty jean jacket.

“You’d just shoot me?” he asked incredulously.

“If I had to, yeah. Step away from the bike.”

“How am I gonna get out of here?”

“Not our problem.” Roper raised the rifle, keeping one eye on him and one on the slowly advancing corpses.

“Come on, Roper, get on.”

Just as Roper started to climb on, the man lunged for Dallas. “Give me the fucking bike!”

Fighting to keep the bike up, Dallas watched as the butt of the shotgun crunched into the side of his face. He staggered back, blood pouring from his nose and mouth, and he stood motionless for a moment before falling to his knees.

“Go, go, go!” Roper cried, getting back on the bike.

As Dallas pulled away, she looked in the rearview mirror and saw two man eaters bearing down on the guy. In a few minutes, he would become one of them...or be their dinner. She wasn’t sure which, and she no longer cared.

As she wove around the graveyard of bodies and cars, she realized the snipers had only been able to put down about half of the walking corpses. The other half were walking toward Oakland, creating more like them along the way.

Einstein was right. The only way to protect the rest of the population was to blow the bridges, and Dallas was pretty certain that’s what those helicopters were about to do.

Wrenching down on the throttle, she pushed herself and the bike as fast as she dared, narrowly missing the undead as they plodded along in search of more flesh. Twice, when Dallas thought they would surely collide with the corpses, Roper had fired the shotgun and knocked them out of the way. The blasts caused Dallas to be able to hear nothing but a slight ringing in her ears until she was sure the next sound was a huge explosion.

“Floor it!” Roper yelled, looking behind them.

All three helicopters released missiles that blew the bridge up at the end of Yerba Buena Island, the island connecting the western and eastern spans of the bridge. By leaving the main bridge alone, they could still effectively cut off San Francisco from the East Bay.

As this section of the bridge shook, Dallas gave her everything she had, the bike’s front tire lifting slightly as she did. She had to get them off the last stretch of the bridge or they would go tumbling into the bay, along with thousands of dead, undead, and dying.

Dallas felt as though she was racing against the falling sections quickly collapsing behind her. As she zoomed past immobile, slack-jawed creatures and around half-consumed corpses, she didn’t think they were going to make it.

Leaning low over the gas tank and beneath the windshield, Dallas knew she’d reached eighty-five miles an hour. She knew her bike well enough to know what she felt like at certain speeds and the vibration clearly indicated they were well on their way to ninety.

“Look out!” came Einstein’s voice as they neared the stretch of bridge that would turn into freeway.

Hovering directly above them were two more helicopters with snipers hanging off the sides, putting bullets into living and dead brains alike.

The moment the Harley was free from the collapsing bridge, Dallas zigged and zagged in and out of more stalled cars as bullets pinged all around her. One shattered her Plexiglas windshield, but she just kept pushing her limits until she could get off the freeway and into the more industrial areas of Oakland.

As Dallas flew down the freeway, she noted fewer and fewer cars in the gridlock, but only a dozen or so of the man eaters. Clearly, they had made their way off the bridge, which must have been why the helicopters turned back to the bridge to continue firing on those creatures that had made it off the bridge.

Way up ahead, she could see cop cars on their way, so she took the next exit into the warehouse district until Roper said, “Dallas, slow down. It’s okay. We’re not being followed. The choppers are busy elsewhere.”

Dallas was gripping the handlebars so tightly that slowing down took longer than normal. When she finally came to a stop and turned to look at her passengers, she realized Einstein had wet himself. He was incredibly pale and needed their help to dismount.

Roper had Einstein on one arm, the shotgun butt on her hip, and for the most part, she didn’t appear the least bit phased. “Easy, kid. It’s okay. We’re okay.”

“I’m...I’ve never...” He blushed, his cheeks coloring his shame.

“Don’t sweat it,” Dallas said. “I’ve seen grown men barf on their own shoes before. We’re all scared, Einstein. It’s nothing to be ashamed of.”

Dallas walked around the bike inspecting it from every angle. She found two other bullet holes: one in the sissy bar, another in her saddlebag. “You guys didn’t get hit?”

“Hell no,” Roper said. “You were awesome. Mario Andretti has nothing on you, man. That was brilliant riding.”

Dallas knelt down to check the engine. There was something about the silence of the warehouse district that made her skin crawl.

“Did you guys see the man eaters off to the side of the road?” Einstein asked.

Roper nodded. Dallas was still examining the engine.

“Unless those cops and snipers can kill every one of those undead, our problems have just begun.”

“I saw at least three dozen once we got off the bridge,” Roper said, wiping off the blade of her enormous buck knife on a piece of newspaper that had fluttered by.

“Uh...you always carry a huge knife around?” Dallas asked over the gas tank.

She nodded and lifted the leg of her jeans up to reveal a sheath attached to her boots. “Never leave home without it.”

Dallas could only grin. “Well, it sure came in handy.”

Roper peeked around to the other side of the motorcycle at Dallas before tracing her fingertips over the personalized license plate. “Your name really Dallas?”

Dallas nodded, wiping her hands on her chaps. She’d found no more holes. “It is. My parents thought it was cute to name me for where I was conceived.”

Roper turned to Einstein. “And your name is?”

He smiled. “Einstein will do.”

Dallas tried her cell phone, but received a message that the circuits were all busy. “What are the chances that those things will spread in the East Bay?”

Einstein looked up in thought. “I saw a ton of them moving parallel to the freeway. I don’t think the snipers saw them all or could get them all. This got out of hand right from the getgo.”

“Well, at least a good number of them sank to the bottom of the bay.”

Einstein shook his head. “That’s just it. That won’t kill any of them.”

Roper and Dallas cut him a look. “What?”

“Look, everyone knows the only way to kill the undead is to shut down the control center...the brain. Now I’m not saying these things are zombies, but they sure as hell are man eaters. We all saw that.”

Roper shook her head. “Whoa. Wait. You’re saying they’ll what? Just up and walk out of the bay?”

“They don’t need oxygen. They’re dead. So water doesn’t really change anything for them.”

“So they’re going to just walk out and start attacking more people?”

Einstein dug the toe of his sneakers into the gravel before answering. “The mass of the horde grows exponentially with each populated area they pass through.”

“Oakland.”

“And Berkeley.”

“And Alameda.”

“Shit.” Roper paused a second to listen. “Do you hear that?”

The other two listened. “What? I don’t hear anything.”

She nodded. “Exactly. Where are the cars? Where are the sounds of life? We need to get out of here.”

“Wait. No cell phone use, but the news is reporting it.” Einstein held out his cell phone and started watching the local news. “This will probably be the last real newscast we get. In all of the zombie and virus movies I’ve seen, the government has to shut them down for fear of panic.”

All three crowded around the tiny device.

“Oh god...”

The disheveled newscaster was being force-fed paper after paper and she couldn’t keep up. Before she could read the first one, the emergency warning sounded and the red ticker tape crept across the bottom of the screen warning everyone to stay inside their homes.

“Terrorist attack?” Dallas asked as she read the tape’s explanation.

“Shh.”

The ticker tape warned everyone of a poisonous gas released on the bridge and that everyone—everyone—needed to stay indoors until further notice. If you were home, stay home, and only allow military medical personnel into your home. If you were not home, return home as soon as possible. It appeared that Marshall Law was going to be announced and go into effect at dusk.

The buzzer continued sounding for another ten seconds before returning the stage to the newscaster, who read the warnings:

“The United States is under attack in several major cities from a toxic gas leveled at them from an as-of-yet unknown terrorist cell. This bioweapon causes a violent reaction in those who breathe it in. If you come in contact with the infected, do not attempt to engage or help. The virus is transmitted through bites, much like rabies. Do not try to help or subdue the victims. Do not try to cure them or allow them into your homes.”

The ticker tape came across the bottom of the screen, naming the ten cities that had been infected. Before they could read the ten names, there was the sound of a chopper overhead.

“Come on!” Dallas pushed the Harley up against the building, and they all tried several doors before opening a service door. Once in, they closed the door and looked at each other.

Dallas walked over to them as the chopper sound was replaced by the now familiar sound of bullets hitting things. “Get down!”

All three dove for cover.

“They’re not shooting at us,” Roper said.

“No, but they’re shooting at something, and that’s never a good thing.”

Einstein scooted closer. “They don’t want to take any chances. They’ll kill everyone who is in the general vicinity. They’ll kill everyone who is outside. They have to.”

“Who?”

“The military. It will be their job to contain this...virus.” Einstein sounded dubious.

“Then how do we get out of here?” Roper asked.

“The Harley. I live in Berkeley.”

Roper’s eyebrows rose. “Going to Berkeley is a bad idea.”

Einstein nodded. “The infection, or whatever it is, is already on its way there. This stuff spreads like wildfire. Cities are the restaurants of the undead, to be avoided at all cost.”

Dallas rose and brushed off her chaps. She put her hands out to help Roper up. “Until we know otherwise, I say we consider Einstein an expert on all things zombie and let him take the lead.”

Roper brushed herself off and turned to him. “Agreed. I have to say, I’m just a cowgirl at heart. I don’t know jack about monsters or movies or man eaters. So, what now?”

Einstein rose and audibly gulped. “In the games, as well as in the movies, the biggest mistake people make is trying to go home to their loved ones, who are usually already infected or dead. Berkeley is definitely out and we need to get the hell out of here, so what about you, Roper? Where do you live?”

“In Livermore, on a forty-acre ranch.”

Einstein’s eyes brightened. “Perfect. Guns?”

She cocked her head. “I’m a cowgirl. What do you think?”

He smiled. “I say we head to your place. See what lies the media has spread and the government’s spin on this, and then we can go our own ways or figure out what our options are.”

Dallas cracked the door open and peeked out. “What are our options, Einstein? Really. What can we expect to see?”

He tapped his chin as he considered the answer. “By this time tomorrow, if the snipers didn’t kill every single one, you can safely assume that for every man eater alive tonight, there will be at least twenty more tomorrow.”

“Twenty new ones for each one who made it across the bridge?”

Roper shook her head. “And besides the three dozen or so we passed—”

“They’ll be coming out of the surf as well.”

“So basically, we’re fucked.”

Einstein shrugged. “At this point, it’s all about containment. They’ll have their hands full containing it to the city, but if they don’t stop them before they come through the tunnel or through Oakland...”

“What?” Roper asked anxiously “What will happen?”

Einstein shrugged again. “It will be apocalyptical...it could very well be our death knell.”

****

When they’d exited the warehouse, they slowly rolled by dozens of people shot in the head; none of them had the telltale blood on their mouths or wounds on their bodies that would indicate they had been man eaters. The military had just started shooting people. Uninfected people. It was insane.

A police blockade had been erected across the freeway, but they were too late to block the back roads Dallas was cruising on.

Dallas took the back roads and frontage roads toward Livermore—her gloved hands gripping the bars so hard it hurt. It was only a twenty-five mile stretch, but the back roads were full of tight twists and people scurrying here and there like rats on a sinking ship.

She couldn’t shake the scene they’d just left behind. The snipers had been busy shooting everyone who was out on the road, everyone out in the open...everyone. The whole thing was madness, and yet, she somehow understood why the military had reacted so swiftly. Time was no their friend. If Einstein’s calculations were correct, and this virus got out of control, it would make the Black Death look like a walk in the park.