Chapter 9

Vanderbergs

"HOLY SHIT, BACK UP BACK UP!"

"I can't the people behind us are in the way."

I slam the truck into reverse and start to hit the gas anyway. The family behind us was at first confused until they see the bodies starting to pile up around our truck. The father starts to immediately back up as are truck is seemingly engulfed by the zombies. They reverse all the way to the last intersection. The fact that so many of the damn things were around the truck kept them from bashing the windows in but their sheer numbers were going to soon crack them. I put the truck in four wheel drive and slammed down on the gas. It started to pick up momentum steadily then it tore out of the crowd. Some of the undead were still holding on as I slammed on the brakes and threw them off the truck. I slammed on the gas again and ran them over and kept going until I hit the intersection. Surprisingly enough the family had not yet driven off. The father was looking at me as I turned around in the intersection and floored it down the road. I looked in the rearview mirror and saw their car following close behind with the pack of zombies following.

"Damn that was too close! Where the hell did they all come from?"

"No Idea but we need to put as much distance between them and us as possible."

"Hang a left here and drive for 7 Blocks then hand another left."

"I see what you are doing if we can get in front of them we can get passed them and back to the store."

"Exactly."

We followed Wades plan and did not run into the mob of zombies again. We came up to the area where the car dealership was located and Christopher asked for us to stop.

"Christopher we need to get these people back to the store now. The trucks are not going anywhere."

"I know this Aaron but part of planning something out is to know what you are going after. There are at least four trucks in there we can grab in addition to yours."

We scouted the car lot from the truck picking out the trucks we would take with us and then sped off to the store. A few zombies followed us back to the store but we easily put them down before pulling into one of the service bays.

"Welcome back guys and welcome to the warehouse new people!"

I kissed Ericka, Liam and Michelle and made sure the family inside got situated in the store. The family's name was the Vandenbergs; George, Katherine, Robert, and Ellen. The man was a doctor before the outbreak (A plus for us, now we had an actual doctor that could tell us what to do with all the medication in the pharmacy). We let them clean themselves up as we explained what happened to us as to rest of our group. Once we got to the part of running into another pack of zombies they all seemed to visibly get anxious.

"Ok we know these things are moving in groups and in a general direction but I can not for the life of me think of why they would be doing this."

"Maybe it's the fire that we had to run from that is driving them this way" Ericka proposed.

"While that does make sense it does not explain the picking up of the ones we shot as they moved on the other day. I really want to find out what is going on. If we don't we may end up paying for it."

"Before we go any farther in to that plan we have other things we need to do first like check on that family we rescued and see if they need anymore help."

The Vanderbergs were sitting in the furniture aisle pulling out mattresses and linens for them to sleep on. I could not fault them for wanting to do this. This is probably the first time in days that they have had almost complete silence and not the non-stop moaning the undead do. I motioned for everyone to stop and turn around so that the family could get some rest. We would speak to them after they were more able to converse. As I was walking away George held up his had motioning for me to stop as he walked over to me.

"I really would like to thank you for what you guys did for us. You risked your lives to help us and for that I am eternally grateful."

"It really is no problem. You needed help and we were in a position to help you so it is really ok. Now you guys need to get some sleep. You are safe here."

With that we shook hands and George went back to his family and lay down. We on the other hand knew that with mobs of undead wandering through our area we would need to reinforce our position so we all sat down and started going over plans.

"We are going to need to plan on staying here for the long haul. This building is pretty secure but we need to build some type of barrier between the store and the surrounding area."

"That is all well and good but where are we supposed to get the materials from and how are we going to be able to move it, Aaron."

"Well, David, while we were out getting the Vanderbergs I saw some construction yards with heavy equipment. Plus the internet is still up so let's see about what we can find in the way of building materials and such. We should also look for State, County and City road depots. They have those concrete dividers that we can use also."

"What happened to your plan of heading towards Pensacola Naval Air Station?"

"With the streets full of those things out there it would be foolish of us to try to make a run for it. Besides we have plenty of supplies here."

After few more minutes of discussion a rough plan was starting to take shape about what we could and could not use to build a barrier for us and the immediate surrounding area.

I jumped on the internet to find out where materials could be located. After using Google I was able to locate more than ten businesses that would have the materials we needed. I printed the addresses for all the places out and went over to Wade who was finding all the heavy equipment companies in the area. This was going to be a slow process but if we could pull it off we would be far safer.

Michelle and Liam were always on the internet or listening to a CB radio that Christopher had in his car. We had heard intermittent talk on the different channels but they were mainly people that were driving through only a few sounded like they were actual people that had been able to find a place to hold up and survive. We would speak to some of the truck drivers but any information we got from them was pretty dire. We actually heard the dying screams of one man that had stopped to pickup a family only to have the mother die and turn on him. She ended up slaughtering the entire family also. We began to also plan another weapon supply run to the gun shop on 8th street in Ocala and also by the Ford Dealership to grab a few trucks we had seen. As much as we did not like it Liam and Michelle were going to have to travel with us to ensure we had enough guns in each vehicle. We planned to make the run in three days but in the mean time we continued to plan how much of the area we would barricade and call our own.

On the second day of planning the Vanderbergs began to relax a little more. They ate and cleaned themselves, and grabbed a new set of clothes. They told us how they were originally at the Ocala Regional Medical Center because they had been trapped there when the city was placed under martial law. They were on the 10th floor when all hell broke loose in the emergency room.

"We had planned on going out of town for the weekend. My wife had come by the hospital with the kids so we could go to Ocala State Park for a camping and hiking. We did that as often as possible because I was on call at the medical center so often. I was just about to leave when we got a bus full of injured people from a local high school football team. I thought there had been an accident or something but the wounds these people had were bites. Some people were missing whole limbs as if they had been gnawed off. One woman was crying and shouting "It bit them off!" When I looked at her hand it was a bloody stump. All these people were immediately wheeled into our emergency room and any other open rooms."

"Where was your family during all of this"?

"I told them to go to my office on the tenth floor. I still planned on leaving when we had this situation under control. I had not spent an entire weekend alone with my family in months so I was going to do my best to salvage this trip. Though what I did not know was that we were not going to get a break in influx of patients that night. This all started at around 5:30 pm. I did not see my family again until 12:15 am. I walked into my office and found them all asleep. I woke my wife up and let her know that we had been placed under quarantine in the hospital and that the National Guard and CDC were here. That o course did not sit well with her but I told her about the people that were dying from their bite wounds even the non-fatal ones. Others that had more life threatening bites were slowly succumbing to an infection despite the use of antibiotics. The morgue was filling up fast and we had to start placing people into empty rooms. Though the fact that the National Guard and CDC was there had me thinking this was no ordinary disease that was being reported on in the news. I told my wife to stay there while I went back to the emergency room to check on some patients. I stepped out of the room and headed for the elevators. As I rounded the corner the elevator opened and out fell a car full of people. They completely engulfed a nurse and doctor that had been waiting and started ripping them to pieces. I luckily was not seen at the time and ran back around the corner to my office. I ran in and woke up my kids and told them all to put their shoes and jackets on. My wife asked me what was wrong but then we heard gun shots from the streets below us. Taking that as our cue we went to the door. I peeked out of it to see if they had made it as far as my office and luckily they had not. I grabbed my wife and kids and started leading them to the stairwell. We came to the T-section were the stairs were located and looked down each corridor before heading to the door. As the door closed we heard the shrieks and snarls of the people that had killed the doctor and nurse. We ran down the stairs as fast as possible, we had no way of knowing if they could open doors at the time so we were running down the stairs as fast as possible. We got to the third floor before we saw some of those things running from the first floor stairs."

"All those poor babies George", Katherine begins sobbing.

"What is she talking about George, what about the babies" I asked?

"Our medical center is the primary neonatal hospital in this area."

"O no." Gloria said behind watery eyes.

We all knew then what caused Katherine's tears. The zombies had made it to the third floor and attacked every person from newborn to adult.

"We knew that the zombies were on the floor, we could hear them but they were so busy...eating… that we were able to get by them to the freight elevator. I pushed then button and waited for it to come down. These elevators were for hospital personnel only. We waited as it came down to our floor and made that god awful dinging sound. That alerted all the infected people on the floor to where we were. Luck was still with us at the moment as we got in the elevator and rode it to the basement parking deck and got out of there. We have been at home ever since trying to survive. The only reason we were found was because I fell down the stairs and knock over plant. But there again you guys saved us so I am thankful for the help."

After hearing their story we ate and finished planning the first of many supply runs we would make to ensure that we could survive the epidemic. Though what we did not know was that we would be leaving this place we had found sanctuary in the not too distant future.