Chapter 6

 

After tangling with the spooled-out firehose, the Fireman Zombie didn’t pop back up behind the Chief’s rig. Nor did it come scrabbling on hands and knees around the rear of the high-centered SUV. Instead, while Riker’s attention was being hijacked by One Shoe’s noisy arrival, Fireman Zombie had crawled over the low median and wormed its way underneath the Tahoe.

At the same instant One Shoe put its head down and set out across the highway, making it clear to Riker they were about to come face-to-face with a Bolt, Benny was feeling the cold crush of a hand clamping around his ankle and being drawn off balance. It was at this moment Benny had screamed his expletive and the Bolt was putting a sizeable dent in the Tahoe’s fender.

As all of that was going down, Riker was bringing his Sig to bear on One Shoe. However, whereas the Fireman Zombie had gone low, One Shoe went high, hitting the Tahoe at full speed, upper body ahead of its feet, in the middle of what was to be a very long stride.

Instead of being repulsed by two-and-a-half tons of Detroit steel and glass, One Shoe pitched forward, arms extended, back bowed, and began what would be an inelegant face-first slide across the hood.

Bearing a stark resemblance to former Cincinnati Red Pete Rose, only stiff and unsmiling, the zombie continued its journey, on its stomach, slowing only when its face bashed into the life-saving tool left laid out on the hood.

Lips turned to pulp, lower mandible split in two, One Shoe followed the tool and a multitude of his own broken teeth off the hood. As the zombie face-planted on the road, body folding over like a wet paper bag, Riker threw open his door.

 

Kneeling on the road beside the Tahoe, Steve-O was just getting the top of the medical kit closed when the dry rasp of something dragging against asphalt drew his attention. At about the same moment he was turning to locate the source of the out-of-place noise, he received the tap on the shoulder from Benny and heard his friend exclaim, “What the fuck!”

Starting from the sudden outburst, Steve-O hinged up and turned his head to see what Benny was going on about. But instead of seeing Benny standing over him, he saw his friend spinning around, face turned up to the sky, and the rest of his body speeding toward the road like a felled tree. As that was registering, he spotted the reason for Benny’s rare use of the eff word and sudden loss of balance.

Wrapped around one of Benny’s ankles was a pair of hands. They were obviously a man’s, the knuckles white and craggy, like barnacles on a rock at the beach. There was nothing slender about them. Following the wrists and forearms with his eyes, Steve-O caught a glimpse of a face emerging from the rectangle of gloom beneath the Tahoe. Wild-eyed and open-mouthed, the Sicko coming into the light was focused entirely on Benny. Both gnarled hands released and clamped down again, only higher up on Benny’s leg. The pale fingers were curled claw-like and pressing deep divots into the denim. The force of the opposing struggle was quickly relieving Benny of his jeans, exposing the north forty of his butt for all to see.

Just as the Sicko began drawing Benny’s boot-clad foot toward its gaping maw, Steve-O swung his right arm on a flat plane. Tracking right to left, all his might behind the action, the medical kit came along for the ride.

 

Riker was planting his bionic on the road and craning around when One Shoe rose up off the pavement. With no other choice than to engage the zombie before it could get to his friends, even though it meant his rounds would be hitting dangerously close to them, he bracketed One Shoe with the Sig’s Romeo red-dot sight and pressed the trigger.

One Shoe was lunging forward when the first round punched a neat little hole in its chest an inch or so above the sternum. Save for a slight tremor shaking its torso, there was no discernable effect. No bloom of blood. No wheezing gasp. No crashing to the ground as Raul had done when he’d been on the deadly end of Riker’s Sig Legion.

As the recoil pulled Riker’s aim up, he pressed the trigger a second time.

Round number two punched a quarter-sized entry wound in the V of soft flesh just below One Shoe’s Adam’s apple but did nothing to stop the advance.

Gun hand still tracking a vertical arc, a third press of the trigger sent another round screaming through space on an upward trajectory whose terminus was an inch below One Shoe’s pronounced brow.

Unbeknownst to Riker, just a few yards to his fore, a life and death struggle was ensuing on the ground beside the Tahoe.

 

One of the latches to the lid on the medical box Steve-O had swung at the zombie wasn’t secured. Mid-swing, the box popped open, spilling its contents over Benny’s face and chest. Now but a shell of its former self—both literally and figuratively—the empty box had no heft when it connected with the zombie’s head.

Instead of inflicting any real damage, the empty box came apart, the individual pieces skittering away in opposing directions.

Left holding a plastic handle, Steve-O could only watch as Benny struggled to bring his Glock to bear.

 

Ears just beginning to buzz as a result of the three booming reports, another barrage of gunshots rang to Riker’s fore. They had been fired rapidly, out of sight to him, somewhere behind the Shelby. From first to last maybe a second had elapsed. Spray and pray was what he’d heard it called in the Sandbox.

Clearly no kind of time had been taken to aim.

To Riker’s ears, it had been an engagement birthed by pure panic.

As he stepped away from the Shelby, fully expecting to see one or both of his friends mortally wounded, instead he saw Benny pushing his way out from underneath the zombie dressed in firefighting gear. In his hand was the Glock, its barrel still smoking. Splattered across the side of Chief Hickok’s rig were the contents of the zombie’s cranium.

The rest was confusing to say the least: Steve-O was no longer kneeling and fiddling with the medical kit. He was now on his butt, legs crossed Indian style. On his face was a shocked expression. A miasma of brain and congealed blood painted his jacket and pants. Clutched in his hand was a thin plastic item Riker couldn’t immediately identify.

Further muddying the waters, the medical kit was broken in two, the box’s entire contents scattered about the ground all around the two men.

A wind gust sent some of the bandages tumbling and skittering away from the surreal scene.

Riker said, “Benny, please tell me it didn’t get you.”

Now on his hands and knees and pushing up off the road, Benny shook his head. “I’m good, but it was damn close.”

Exhaling sharply, Riker posed the same question to Steve-O.

Steve-O said nothing. He remained statue still. As far as Riker knew, this was the first time the man had seen the inside of a person’s skull. He was damn sure it was the first time he had taken a face full of it. It was pretty clear shock was setting in.

After confirming the Bolt was truly dead—an absurd worry to address, seeing as how he had witnessed the bullet fired from his Legion collapse the monster’s face—Riker stepped over the leaking corpse and offered Benny a hand up.

Grimacing, Riker looked all around. Only when he had confirmed they were all alone did he make his way over to Steve-O. Placing a hand on his friend’s shoulder, he said, “Are you OK, buddy? Did the Sicko bite you?”

Steve-O blinked but said nothing. He was staring off into space, seemingly focused on something down the road, somewhere well beyond the helicopter.

Riker followed the man’s gaze. Saw only the burned-vehicles which quickly gave way to a long run of gray asphalt leading to the distant horizon. The oil-stained stretch of road was framed on two sides by the dirt embankments and skeletal power poles. Crushing down on it all and moving in fast from the south was a bank of steel-gray clouds.

Riker had seen the expression worn by Steve-O on the faces of fellow soldiers: men and women who had seen things their minds couldn’t quite process. Awful things. Incomprehensible things. The aftermath of evil acts perpetrated by extremists who believed they were acting on orders from their God.

It had been a regular occurrence in the Sandbox. Recently, in places like Middletown, Manhattan, and, most recently, the Miami Panhandle, Riker had seen the same expression on the faces of fellow Americans just waking up to the harsh realities foisted on them thanks to the Romero virus.

The look frozen on Steve-O’s face was called a thousand-yard stare. In all the pictures that had been taken of Riker at the hospital in the days after he had lost his leg and suffered the burns that scarred him for life, he had been the one wearing the faraway look.

Benny brushed by Riker, crouched down next to Steve-O, and looked the man in the face. “That was some quick thinking, big guy. Probably saved my life.” He paused and took a deep breath. Exhaling, he went on, “Check that. You did save my life. Now let’s get you up off the road.” Looking a question at Riker, Benny took a hold of one of Steve-O’s arms.

Doing the same, Riker said, “The gunfire is going to draw more of them to us.”

“On one,” Benny said, beginning the count at three.

Working together, as the count hit one, they hauled Steve-O to his feet.

Riker removed Steve-O’s Stetson. Tiny dots of blood stood out on the stark white brim. A quick swipe across Riker’s sleeve took care of that. The man’s glasses were another story. They had picked up a thin film of something that was going to need a thorough cleaning to remove.

The Stetson went back on Steve-O’s head. The glasses Riker removed and passed over to Benny to clean.

Unzipping Steve-O’s soiled Carhartt jacket, Riker said, “Let’s get you out of this.” He removed a few odds and ends from the pockets and tossed them onto the Shelby’s tonneau. Peeling the jacket off, he turned it inside out, then used the clean liner to brush the detritus—flecked bone, brain goop, and drops of blood—from the man’s stiff denim pants.

After discarding the jacket, Riker gripped Steve-O’s elbow and gently steered the man alongside the Shelby. Steve-O remained silent and offered zero resistance as Riker helped him into the pickup and got him belted in.

Finished cleaning Steve-O’s glasses, Benny handed them to Riker, who placed them atop Steve-O’s lap with the rest of his stuff, then closed the door.

After a thorough visual recon of their surroundings, Riker faced Benny.

“What happened that caused you to burn through half a magazine?”

“You weren’t watching?” said Benny sarcastically.

Hanging his head, Riker said, “I missed it.”

Planting his hands on his hips, Benny said, “I thought you had my back.”

“I did up until those things showed their faces. They both appeared at the same time, Benny. Mine was a Bolt. Damn thing got to running straight away. Hit the Chief’s rig before I knew what was happening. I drew my gun, got out of my seat, and barely had one foot on the road when lo-and-behold, there it was, back up and about to pounce on you two.” He paused long enough to brush a hairy chunk of skull off the front of Benny’s jacket—a conciliatory gesture meant to mend the rift he sensed opening between he and his longtime friend. Continuing, he said, “I’m real sorry I fired my weapon in your direction.” He shook his head. “It couldn’t be helped.”

Benny shrugged out of his coat. Removing the spare magazines for the Glock from a pocket, he tossed the soiled coat on the ground. Eyes roaming the road, he said, “Before we stop again, we’re going to have to figure out some kind of protocol. Got to make sure this doesn’t happen again.”

“I’m still learning the rules,” Riker conceded. “I’m sorry, man. It won’t.”

Benny said nothing. His gaze was locked on the ambulance where a steady knocking had just started. It was coming from inside the rear compartment’s gloomy environs.

“Look,” Riker said, “let’s hash this out in the safety of the truck.”

Benny nodded but remained tightlipped. Eyes never leaving the ambulance, he drew his Glock, dumped the partial magazine, then inserted a fully loaded replacement.

Striding toward the partially open driver-side door, Riker said, “I’m worried about our friend. I think it’s going to take the two of us to bring him back to the land of the living.”

Finally Benny spoke. “Agreed,” he said. “I think what he just saw messed him up pretty good.” As he slipped around back of the still-idling pickup, he got a dig of his own in, saying, “We’re still burning gas.”

 

Once they were inside the pickup, Riker said, “Buckle up and grab onto something. We’re about to see what this hundred-thousand-dollar Shelby Baja is capable of.” He turned the traction selector to Crawl and steered across the far shoulder. When the front wheels came into contact with the steep embankment there was no slipping. Just a steady forward pull.

In the backseat, Steve-O was still in a near catatonic state.

Once all four off-road tires were digging into the loose soil, Riker inched the steering wheel to the left, slowly, hand-over-hand, until the scenery out the windshield switched from blue sky to a sea of brown.

With the long train of burnt vehicles gliding by on the left, and the horizon over the hood tilted at an extreme angle, Riker let the idling motor pull the Shelby forward. Once they reached the clear patch of two-lane adjacent to the Life Flight helicopter, Riker inched the steering wheel to the left.

The dirt visible outside Riker’s window was quickly replaced by the six-foot-wide asphalt shoulder. Once all four wheels were off the embankment, he hauled the wheel hard left and brought the pickup to a full stop.

Plucking a pack of Reese’s Peanut Butter cups from the center console, Riker dropped it in Benny’s lap. Hooking a thumb over his shoulder, he said, “See if that’ll coax Steve-O out of his shell.”

Thrusting the Reese’s into the airspace between seats, Benny said, “Want it, Steve-O? It’s your favorite.”

Strangely, there was no reaction from the backseat. No hand broke the imaginary demarcation line in order to snatch the candy bar from Benny’s hand. No elbows banged down on the seatbacks, a common occurrence whenever Steve-O reclaimed his usual perch between the headrests. And highly out of character, the self-sufficient Steve-O did not insist he be engaged directly instead of being talked around while in their presence.

“All right,” Benny said. “You had your chance.” He ripped open the orange wrapper and removed the pair of peanut butter cups. Handing one to Riker, he discarded the wrappers and wolfed his down in one bite.

While Benny had been conducting his little experiment, Riker had been staring at the short run of two-lane between the front of the pileup and where the helicopter had landed.

On the blacktop were the remains of more than one person. A mangled arm had come to rest against the base of one of the Jersey barriers, fingers curled tight, like a bug in repose. A leg missing the foot was nearby. A limbless torso was wedged underneath the car at the head of the pileup. It was totally naked and partially burned, the skin blistered and weeping a viscous yellow and red liquid.

Whether the person had been a living breathing specimen when he or she suffered the horrific fate was a mystery to Riker. They were dead for good now. No disputing that.