The Living and the Dead Read online

  He flopped backward onto his ass while dropping his rifle and bringing both of his hands to his face. Blood quickly seeped between his fingers as he rocked back and forth in pain. I thought I saw a couple teeth slip out from between his fingers and then to the ground, tumbling away like a dice roll.

  “If you don’t want more of the same, I’d recommend you drop your gun,” I said to short-round.

  I could tell he wasn’t happy about it, he complied, dropping his rifle at his feet.

  “Kick it away or I’ll shoot your balls off,” I said.

  He was less than cheerful about this, but he knew it wasn’t an idle demand.

  His leg kicked out, and the rifle slid across the asphalt about ten feet.

  “Good,” I said. “Now, if you want to live, I need to know where Marlow took the girl and I need to know it now.”

  Tall and gawky said, “Mmrumph in admim bildneg.” He was hard to understand with a busted up mouth.

  “Translating toothlessness is going to take forever,” I said. “Short-round, you tell me.” I emphasized my command by lifting my aim to his face. I don’t think he liked my nickname for him, but I was way past caring.

  “Like he said,” Short-round replied, “she’s in the administration building. In the principal’s office.”

  If the situation hadn’t been so bleak, I could have made a dozen quips off that. Instead, I asked, “Is she alive?”

  This question caused them to pause and sent a cold shiver down my spine. The chill was quickly replaced by a searing and growing anger. The little demon in my head told me to shoot the man’s face off, but the more practical angel told me that men without faces didn’t answer questions.

  “Is she alive?” I said and fired a single shot over Short-round’s head. Taking the shot was a risk, but I figured it would be lost in the din of the battle in the parking lot. No one took notice. At least for those few seconds.

  “Marlow likes to get a little rough with his woman and since you sassed him. I think he gave her some extra attention with his fists before he...he...he…” He didn’t want to say the rest and I certainly didn’t want to hear it.

  “How badly is she hurt?” I asked.

  Both men shrugged. That only caused the little demon in my head to scream, “Shoot them! Shoot them both!”

  It took everything I had not to pull the trigger and I’m sure I was close to the threshold of pounds of pressure on the trigger. As it turned out, I didn’t need to shoot them.

  Although, I didn’t know it, my shot did not go totally unnoticed. The helicopter might have picked up on the sound, but I would bet it was the muzzle flash. The next thing I knew, there was a zipper-like pattern of churning asphalt coming at me like a wave accompanied by the roaring of the machine gun in the helicopter.

  Short-round and Tall and Gawky got just enough time to turn around before the wave caught up to them. As I dove to my right, I saw Short-round literally explode into a ballistic spray of blood, bone, and gross body parts. Tall and Gawky lost the right side of his body as the flow of bullets tore past my feet and up the side of the building, ripping out chunks of bricks and mortar.

  My tuck, dive and roll routine got me free of the bullets, but I lost a great deal of skin off my knees, hip, and elbows. I had had worse.

  What I did have was information and confirmed course direction. The by-product of their information also gave me a burning fury. Had my rational mind not suppressed my desire to wreck havoc, I might have strode directly across the parking lot - damn the torpedoes. Thankfully, it did win out because running across would have most likely gotten me killed.

  The best course of action was to resume my long route around the outer edge of the parking lot and then make a sprint for the administration building. I hugged the building, jogging slowly along, all the while keeping an eye out for Marlow and his men and the helicopter. I quickly made it to a spot where I had a long and deadly run across the heart of the parking lot that I was now calling “Dead Man’s Land.” It was complete with burning vehicles, dead men, and newly formed craters made by the helicopter’s cannon. It was about as inviting as the Old Testament’s version of hell. I wouldn’t be surprised if I saw some little red men dancing with pitchforks and pointed tails in among the carnage at any minute.

  By then, the helicopter’s slow spin had increased in speed. It wasn’t spinning like a top, but its revolutions were faster and a jerky up and down quality had been added to the motion. Surprisingly, none of this seemed to decrease the gunner’s ability to rain down a deadly spray of bullets. I was amazed that they didn’t run out of ammunition.

  Just as I braced myself for my run, I saw a massive figure step back into the doorway of the building I was heading for. There was little doubt in my mind that it was Marlow. His gargantuan form was hard to mistake.

  A rip of bullets slashed the ground next to the building barely missing him as he drew back into an overhang over the entryway. For once, I cursed the gunner’s lack of accuracy.

  I wanted to start my approach, but my feet were hesitating. That rational mind told me that this was a fool’s errand. Kara was probably dead. It was suicide to even attempt the journey across hell and then to have to face-off with Marlow, but this time my rational mind lost the battle. I think it would always lose when it came to Kara.

  I took one last look to my left and then to my right, making sure none of Marlow’s men were nestled in among the wreckage, ready to blow my head off. It was Go-Time!

  “Colonel, I can’t keep us in the air any longer,” Soto said. “If I don’t get this bird down right now, we’re going down and I can’t guarantee that we all won’t be killed in the crash.” He knew Kilgore didn’t like hearing bad news, and he half expected to be shot. A part of him didn’t care. It was a miracle that the helicopter was still in the air at all and he felt that the eventual crash would probably kill him, anyway. The chopper’s control stick bucked in his hand and seismic shudders rippled throughout the aircraft continually.

  “Dammit, Soto,” Kilgore yelled over the din. “I have seen no sign of Carter or his friends and there are still people alive down there.”

  As if to accentuate this point, one of their gunners let loose with a flurry of bullets churning up anything moving or not moving on the ground below. Soto wanted to watch the effect of the barrage, but all his attention was focused on keeping the helicopter aloft.

  “I’m losing back rotor control,” Soto replied forcefully. “Once it goes, we go down whether we like it or not.”

  Bullets pinged off the bottom of the helicopter and Kilgore leaned out the side and fired down with his pistol at something Soto couldn’t see. Soto knew this was lunacy, but it was becoming par for the course for Kilgore.

  “Shit!” Kilgore yelled. “Set her down over there.” Kilgore pointed to a small open field next to the school. It looked no larger than a postage stamp to Soto.

  “Sir, I prefer a little more space,” Soto said.

  “Negative, we can’t get too far away,” Kilgore said.

  “Okay, sir,” Soto said with a small amount of sarcasm. The back of the helicopter flipped back and forth like a fish’s back fin. This caused Soto’s view to jump from the tiny patch of grass to the side of a two-story house. The way the helicopter was acting, he figured that it was 50/50 on which place they would land. He hoped and prayed it was the grass, but he couldn’t be sure.

  Soto navigated them toward the grass and yelled, “Brace for impact!” His view out the windowed revolved from the side of the house to the patch of grass.

  He noticed that Kilgore didn’t heed his warning at all and wondered if the old man just had an all-out death wish.

  The house predominated his view in those final seconds before he set the helicopter down. At the last possible moment, he used all the strength his arms could muster and jerked the controls to the right and the chopper responded. Grass filled his field of vision.

  That was all well and good until the back end of
the helicopter over compensated and flipped out like an angry snake, smashing into the side of the house. The tail rotor cut into the side of the house, sending chunks of wood like arrows and spears flying past the left side of the helicopter. Part of the tail rotor followed by shortly, clattering like a kettle drum down the side of the chopper. The aircraft slammed down on the ground hard, causing Soto to bite his tongue. His mouth filled with the sweet coppery flavor of his blood.

  Soto flipped off the engines and the flow of fuel, hoping to prevent a fire just as the helicopter started to tilt forward and to the right. He knew there was nothing to do but go along for the ride. He also knew that they were lucky to be alive.

  The world tilted in slow motion and Soto saw the main rotor, in its final revolutions, chunk into the ground and the helicopter shook violently from the impact. Parts of the rotor snapped off and went flying, pounding into the side of the house, sounding like a jackhammer. The slow tilt and touchdown of the helicopter seemed like it took an eternity. The side of the helicopter finally touched down with a jarring thud and Soto heard one of the gunners yell something, but he couldn’t make it out.

  Then there was silence for several seconds.

  Dust and smoke filtered in the air and Soto began to worry about fire. His senses, somewhat stunned, made him fumble with the latch on his seatbelt. He knew getting out was his sole priority, but his brain was scrambled. Staying inside could mean burning to death and that was not on his agenda that day, but his fingers didn’t want to cooperate. He closed his eyes and shook his head like a dog shaking off water, hoping to get his faculties to return.

  As he opened his eyes, he saw a strong pair of hands reach and unsnap the latch. A millisecond after that, he toppled down onto the side of the helicopter and a soft patch of grass below him. As he blinked away this second impact, feeling woozy, he saw Colonel Kilgore climbing up and out of the helicopter. Kilgore disappeared from view. A moment later, Kilgore’s head popped back into opening, looking down into the helicopters damaged insides.

  Kilgore shouted, “Sound off and give me a sit-rep!”

  Beltran replied with, “Here, and I’m basically okay.”

  Miller grunted out his reply.

  “Does that mean you’re okay, soldier?” Kilgore shouted.

  Miller responded, “My shoulder hurts like a son of a bitch, but I’m good enough.”

  “What about you, Soto?”

  Soto’s knees ached from colliding with the control panel and his head pounded from the impact. He guessed he had a mild concussion, but he knew if he could walk and talk, Kilgore would consider him good to go. “Good enough,” he replied.

  “Well then, come on, you assholes,” Kilgore shouted. “Get up and get out. Prepare for a ground assault.”

  All Soto thought was, “What the hell?”

  The helicopter was gone, and that was a good thing. I then only had to contend with Marlow and his men, plus a small herd of the undead. Nothing new there. Life was always tossing little challenges my way.

  I took my first step forward and, what to my tired eyes appeared? Certainly not Santa Claus and Eight tiny reindeer. No, it was a stinking zombie. It must have gotten too close to one of the burning vehicles because a large portion of its body was blackened and charred. I could see that its hand no longer had any fingers but instead looked like a dark mitten with little stubs poking out.

  Did any of this damage stop the creature from wanting what it wanted -- which happened to be me? No. Some things never change.

  There was no time to waste, so I reacted with my patented Blow the Damn Thing’s Head Off move. I should get that move trademarked, too. Maybe have a bronze statue sculpted of me while in action..

  I continued forward, stepping over the body of the charred zombie. Marlow was no longer in my direct line of sight. I did see two men running across the parking lot to where the helicopter had gone down and felt that that was a small blessing. It meant less of them that I would have to shoot?

  Moving forward in a slight crouch, I was forced to skirt around another burning vehicle. Smoke burned my eyes and filled my nose. When I rubbed my sleeve across my nose, I came back with big globs of sticky black mucus, but that was the least of my worries.

  After I pulled up behind a bullet-ridden old junker of a car, I found myself only twenty feet from the doorway of the building where Kara was. Or, at least, where I hoped she was. Who knew if those two guys weren’t lying their asses off.

  I did one more check of my surroundings when I caught motion out of the corner of my eye. One of Marlow’s men came into view, moving in a fast walk towards the doorway of the building. He got to the doorway, paused, wiped a hand across his forehead, and looked around as if wondering if he should enter the building at all. Maybe he was looking for Marlow? Or me? It only took him a second to spot me, even with all the smoke and carnage.

  He started to pull up his rifle, but I already had the drop on him and fired off three quick shots. My first one missed, but the next two hit home. One hit his midsection and the second one caught him in the chin, knocking him into the doorway where he rolled onto his side, still and lifeless.

  Any chance of hiding was over. This was no place for stealth, so I took the most direct path I could and sprinted toward the doorway, feeling very exposed in those few short feet. At any moment, I expected a bullet to strike my back, but none did. Slowing as I got closer, I leapt over the dead man’s body and ended up almost falling on my ass as my feet slid on the dirt and grit on the ground. Somehow, I managed to stay upright. It wasn’t my most graceful moment, but there were no judges there that day.

  I paused for a few seconds, letting my eyes adjust to the darkness within the building. Before heading into the dark maw of the hallway, I took one last look back over my shoulder, seeing the burning vehicles and clouds of smoke billowing around. In the distance, I caught some movement, but couldn’t make much out other than dark figures moving towards the small field where the helicopter had crashed. That lack of clarity ended when I saw a burst of heavy weapons fire, the muzzle flashes as bright as stars against the darkness of the field. This was followed by the angry report of the weapon that was very familiar. It reminded me of the machine guns in the helicopter and something in my stomach clenched up.

  Somehow, they had survived the crash. Kilgore was proving to be one wily bastard.

  There was nothing for me to do, but to turn and walk into the darkness, not knowing what I would find. Whether there were more enemies, or something worse. My only thoughts were of finding Kara. I desperately hoped she was still alive.

  Chapter 36

  Wheels in Motion

  “Maggie! Maggie! Wake up,” Russell shouted as he knelt over her prone body. The convulsions had stopped, but Maggie was either stunned, unconscious, or worse. He hadn’t touched her yet because he realized that something had happened to her control vest. It looked like it had shorted out. The malfunction had provided a shock, intense enough to have stunned her into unconsciousness. At least, that’s what he hoped for because he didn’t want to contemplate the alternative.

  From his perspective, she looked bad. Blackened scorch marks ringed her neck around the collar of the control vest. He saw similar marks around the top of her arms and around her waist.

  He finally worked up the courage to touch her but was afraid he might get shocked, so he used the butt of his rifle to give her side a little poke, rocking her body back and forth, but still nothing happened. Leaning in close to her face, he looked for any signs of her breathing, focusing on her nostrils. He saw nothing. No signs of life.

  A gritty shuffling noise sounded behind him, but he was so focused on Maggie that it didn’t initially register as he continued to look for any signs of life. It was when he heard something soft thud into something metal that he glanced around in time to see their zombie soldiers shambling towards him. One of them was only feet away with its arms out, reaching for him.

  In his panic about Maggie, he had
failed to put two and two together. If the control vest had shocked Maggie, then that meant that it had probably failed. That, of course, meant that they no longer had control over the zombies. The next natural logical jump was that he had gone from zombie master to food.

  He whipped up his rifle and fired. The first bullet went wild, but the second tore into the thing’s chest. As usual, the zombie was undeterred and maintained its course toward Russell. He corrected his aim and his next bullet took off the zombie’s face. Where one was down, two took its place.

  The next two zombies were nearly ten feet away, though, giving Russell enough time to aim. He put his aim right on the next one’s forehead and pulled the trigger to a resounding click. In disbelief, he pulled the rifle down and looked it as if it were the problem, not really considering the fact that he had failed to keep track of his ammunition.

  There was plenty of ammunition in the room. The only thing standing in his way was the four approaching zombies, starting to surround him. He could back up and retreat, but that would leave Maggie as easy pickings.

  Doing the only thing he could, Russell let the rifle slide down his hands until he held the gun by its barrel. He then drew it back, ready to swing the rifle like a club.

  A lone zombie, a tall one with one long arm and one truncated arm, snapped off at the elbow, broke from the crowd and stretched its lone intact arm towards Russell. He held back, timing his swing, and just before the zombie’s gore ridden fingers were about to brush across his face, he jerked the rifle forward, giving the zombie a faceful of rifle butt. There was a loud crack as the zombie’s head whipped back with the momentum of the blow and teeth went flying. The zombie followed the teeth and went down, but the other three closed on Russell faster than he could react. They were so close that he couldn’t build up any momentum in his swing. Instead, he pulled the rifle back and rammed the butt at the zombie’s hands, batting them back, but he could see that it was a losing strategy. The only thing he could do, if he wanted to survive, was to retreat.