Zombie Fallout (21 page)

Brendon peeked his head around the last privacy fence that marked the delineation between safety and demise. The other three waited expectantly a few feet behind. Paul lived at the end of a cul-de-sac, no more than a hundred yards long. What Brendon saw almost made him turn tail and run. It looked as if the world’s most successful block party was raging. There had to have been at least three hundred lost souls wandering around; most looked as if they had a purpose. Some, however, looked lost and were somehow relieved to be among their own. Brendon, of course wouldn’t swear to that, it was just a feeling he had perceived. He pulled his head back before any of those errant demons had a chance to spot him.

“Uh, I’m not so sure about this, guys,” Brendon said in hushed tones. “There have to be at least a couple hundred zombies. Most of them are clustered around one house. So we might be able to sneak by but I wouldn’t want to bet our lives on it.” Which of course they would be.

As if on cue the three boys looked to Tommy to see if he had any insight into their situation, but he merely smiled back. Their contemplation was interrupted by the sporadic firing of a small caliber pistol coming from the cul-de-sac. Travis ran up to the fence to hazard a look; Justin and Brendon followed. What they saw both lifted their spirits and simultaneously weighed heavy on their hearts. At the apex of the house was the distinctive outline of Paul’s wife Erin. It appeared that she had knocked out the attic vent and was taking some ill-aimed shots at some of her besiegers. The boys were happy she was alive but saddened at the thought of the impossibility of a rescue attempt.

“So obviously a frontal assault is out of the question.” Brendon stated the obvious.

Travis spoke up. “Let’s go through the backyards on this side of the street, and see if we can spot a way in from that vantage point.”

“It’s not really the way we want to go,” Justin said nervously.

“You know what I mean,” Travis answered.

“That’s going to put us about ten feet away from the nearest zombie,” Brendon said. “Will they be able to smell us from that distance?”

“My dad asked the same thing when we went to get Justin. I think they can. But if they are focused on something it takes a lot to get their attention away from the first thing,” Travis said optimistically.

The boys moved away from the zombie infestation to traverse behind the houses. Once they got to the house directly across from Paul’s, they quickly climbed over the six-foot privacy fence. Brendon had thought that they might have to leave Tommy behind because of the fence, but he was surprisingly agile and seemed to have the least amount of problem getting over.

“Must be all the sugar,” Brendon mumbled mirthfully to himself.

The boys moved to the front yard, still under concealment of the fence. The smell was unbearable. Even Tommy, who seemed immune to it, stopped eating.

“What’s Paul’s backyard like?” Brendon asked Travis.

“It’s heavily sloped down and away from the house, but it won’t do us any good,” Travis answered.

Brendon cautiously looked over the fence. From his vantage point he could tell that the fence that led to Paul’s backyard had been destroyed, most likely from the press of dead flesh against it. The fence hadn’t stood a chance. “Yeah, it’s as likely as not to have as many deaders in the back as in the front.”

Over the preternatural quiet that enshrouded the neighborhood it was easy to hear Erin shout to Paul that she had seen someone over at the Henderson’s house. Paul crowded Erin out of the small opening to take a look. Brendon had quickly jumped down before any zombies could see him, but apparently zombies suffered the same affliction that troubled dogs, they couldn’t follow a pointed finger. And that was exactly what Erin was doing.

“Is your dad here?” Paul asked as hope surged in him. If anyone could get his wife and him out of this jam it would be Mike. The guy had a penchant for getting out of tight jams, the Marine Corps had only added to that legacy. When Travis shook his head no, Paul was dismayed. “How many of you are there?”

Travis held up four fingers. Paul couldn’t imagine that Mike would send his boys alone to get him. He prayed that Mike hadn’t died trying to save him.

“Where’s your dad?” Paul asked. Travis shrugged his shoulders. There was only so much the boy could answer with body movements, but the fact that he didn’t look too upset told Paul volumes.

“Any ideas?” Paul asked. Travis again shook his head no.

“I’ve got an idea,” Brendon said from below. Travis held up one finger and mouthed ‘Wait One’. Paul was left to ponder what this meant as Travis ducked back down off the fence.

“You three wait here. When the coast is clear get Paul and Erin and get back to the car,” Brendon said as he began to move back towards where they had come from.

“Any chance you could be more specific?” Travis asked to Brendon’s back, but he was already out of earshot of Travis’ whisper.

A few moments later Travis got his answer. Brendon thought valor was highly overrated as he hesitantly walked out into the middle of the junction between Wheelspoke Avenue and Lacey Street. ‘Couldn’t it have been something a little more noble, like OK Corral Place and Okinawa Way?’ he muttered to himself. At first, not one zombie took notice of the interloper. Brendon had aspirations that maybe he was somehow invisible to them. However, when he cleared his throat as if he wanted to reap attention in a loud auction house, he was rewarded beyond his wildest dreams. A zombie no more than twenty yards away turned to look at this newest nutrient food bag. The lone zombie started its hunt. Brendon felt like a fox about to be released. Although his body was moments away from bolting, his mind was holding steady. Pulling one whole zombie away from the fray was not the distraction Brendon was looking for. He aimed his gun in on the unaccompanied zombie and neatly removed the mass of its head from the rest of its offending body with a loud explosion. Most of the zombies were so tightly packed in around Paul’s house that turning around was an industrious undertaking. It was only after a fair portion of the zombie crowd had peeled off to pursue this new quarry that the rest were able to swing into a position where they could see what the fuss was all about. In the rudimentary works that passed as thoughts in the zombies, the dinner bell had been sounded. ‘Meat for me’ would have been the vocalization of their thoughts if that were a possibility.

“Hey zombies! Dinnertime!” Brendon yelled in encouragement as he punctuated his point with some well-aimed shots.

A few zombies went down, a couple even stayed down, but it was the typical drop in the bucket. Brendon did not immediately turn and run as more and more zombies took note of his presence and began to come at him. He laid down shots almost on top of each other. If Travis hadn’t known better, he would have thought Brendon had somehow obtained a fully automatic weapon with that rapid rate of fire. Brendon was holding his ground as best he could, only falling back a step or two when he should have been running as if hell itself were chasing him. In a few more seconds his window of escape would close but he was trying to get most, if not all, the zombies to come his way. Travis had knocked out a knothole in the fence and was just about to lay down some suppressive fire to help him, when Brendon finally understood he could not hold his ground anymore.

“That wasn’t much of a plan,” Travis said to Tommy. Tommy nodded in agreement.

Justin looked through the hole and noted that although it wasn’t much of a plan, it had worked to near perfection. Travis and Justin could count on both their hands the remaining zombies. Of those that were left, Erin was doing her best to dispatch most of them. But unless the zombie’s brains had somehow migrated to their feet, she wasn’t doing much good. Most of the zombies that were left would now have a pronounceable limp, but they wouldn’t be able to collect disability insurance any time soon. Travis, Justin and Tommy walked through the front gate, the Mossberg and the Winchester blazing hellfire. If the zombies were capable of any other thoughts besides ‘meat,’ they would have known to leave this place of re-death so they could salvage what remained of their ravaged bodies in order to attack at another time. The last zombie had fallen long before Travis and Justin stopped firing. It took Tommy’s gentle hands on their shoulders and a couple of words to get their attention; they had been deep in the grip of battle fever.

Justin laughed. But the killing fog had not cleared from Travis’ eyes. It took a giant bear hug from his godfather that threatened to cut off his oxygen supply to do the trick. Erin came out next; she was busy reloading her pistol.

“Holy shit boys, it’s great to see you!” As Paul pulled Justin into the growing mass hug, Tommy stood to the side with his hands clasped behind his back, casually kicking his left foot into the ground. He looked like a puppy in a pet store window.

“I don’t know who you are, kid, but get your ass over here,” Paul said with a beaming smile, doing his best to stretch his arms across the three of them. Erin completed the circle on the far side.

“My name’s Tommy,” Tommy said happily with his face buried in Justin’s back.

“Boys, I’d love to stay like this a while longer but I want to get the hell out of here,” Paul said as he disentangled himself from the conglomeration. “So what’s the plan?”

“Our truck is at the end of the street. Brendon should be back in a couple of minutes. As soon as he gets here we’ll head back home.”

Paul and Erin looked longingly back at their home, confident in the fact they would never see it again. “All right, let’s get going,” Paul said as he wrapped his arm around his wife.

A few moments later everyone was huddled around the car. Tommy was the sole occupant. The rest stayed outside in an uneasy silence. It seemed more prudent to be able to leave in a moment’s notice rather than be imprisoned in the SUV. Only Tommy felt otherwise.

“Maybe we should get your car, Uncle Paul,” Justin said. The waiting was plainly beginning to unnerve him.

“Not such a good idea,” Paul answered. “I coasted home on fumes the night before this all happened, I would have gone to your place before we got surrounded if I had thought to fill the damn tank. I just figured I’d have all the time in the world to do it.” Just as Paul was done rebuking himself, a single shot rang out. It sounded distant. Everyone swung in the general direction of the sound.

Another solo shot rang out. This one was definitely closer, but still no sign of Brendon. Justin was about to speak but Paul saved him the trouble. “Yeah it does sound closer.”

Time slowed to match the shuffle of a zombie. The group fervently waited for something, anything to happen. They were rewarded a few moments later with the compensation of a rapid three round burst.

“Shit, that was close,” Travis said as he jumped a bit.

“
You
swear?” was all Paul could think to ask.

Travis grinned like he had been caught with his hand in the cookie jar. “Not in front of Dad.”

“When we get to your place, I’ll make sure I leave that part out,” Paul said.

Brendon came sprinting around from the main street, still about two hundred yards away, but even from this distance they could tell he was drenched in sweat and laboring hard to keep up the pace. Three seconds later they could see the reason. Zombies were within spitting distance of his back. If he turned to shoot he’d never get the shot off. The boys flipped off their safeties, but at this distance there wasn’t much they could do. Brendon was slowly pulling ahead of those closest to him, but zombies began spilling out of the yards along his path, facing him; they were trying to encircle him.