Chapter four: Gas, guns and Guttermouth
No one talked much in the car. It was a comfortable silence, except for the Guttermouth CD Ryan and Brandon seemed to have put on repeat. Mark and Alec didn't say anything, actually it was pretty good. Everyone knew what the others were thinking about. What had happened? Why? Where are my family? Mark didn't think about that, or at least he tried to. The less he knew about what happened to them the better. He knew they were dead and that was it. No dark feelings of revenge, no need to know who did it. He was alive and he planned to continue that way. Alec on the other hand also knew what probably had happened to his close ones but wondered if it really was true. Maybe they weren't dead, maybe they were alive and waiting for him to come back home. But he forced those thoughts out of his head, Mark was right when he said: 'I guess they're as dead as everyone else.'. He seemed to have taken this whole mess pretty good after all, and he had actually saved Alec's life when he grabbed the guns and dragged him out of the restaurant. And it was good to be with some other people, other survivors. These people looked as if they were honest and friendly, but who knew? Seeing his dead friends charge at him had made him a little suspicious. He could remember what had happened inside that restaurant, how he and Mark had killed Stan and Kyle. But no, he told himself, they weren't his friends. They were zombies, the enemy. If he got his hands on the person responsible for this he was going to throw him to the fucking zombies. But for the moment he simply wanted to survive.
They drove in their two car caravan for the rest of the day. About sunset Steve stopped the car and went outside. Carl followed and last of all came the girl, Jessica. For the first time both Mark and Alec saw more than her face. She was as both boys would have said, a hottie. Nice face, nice ass, nice everything. And she wasn't hot like girl next door hot, more like playmate hot. Terry opened his door and walked out to ask what was going on. The rest followed. When everyone stood in a group on the highway and faced each other Steve started talking.
"We're running low on gas, or out of it more likely. How about you?" He asked Terry.
"We are a little low to, in a while we'll be needing a refuelling." Terry answered.
"I think there's a gas station about ten miles from here." Alec told the group.
"Hope you're right, cause that's where we are going." Steve said.
"Are we going to trust those boys?" Carl asked. "For all we know they might slit our throats when we're asleep!"
"I don't think so. These guys are just as good as anyone of us. In the short time we've known 'em they have told us more about the infected ones than we did know before. They've only been helping and you're telling me that you don't trust them?" Steve asked, his tone went from normal to almost angry as he talked. "Do you think you're special just because you lost your fiancée? Everyone here has lost at least as much as you, probably more."
"Ok, for now. Just don't come begging me for help when someone betrays us. Fucking nursery school!" Carl said and returned to his place riding shotgun.
"Excuse him. He's lost a fiancée and everything. Are you sure there's a gas station there?" Steve continued.
"Not entirely sure, but I think so." Alec answered.
"We might have to fight when we're there. Have you fought these crazies?" Steve asked Mark and Alec.
"We have killed four of them. You've got to shoot them in the head, like in the movies." Mark said, remembering all those B-horror movies.
"That's more than anyone here has. Hell, we didn't even know we had to shoot them in the head." Terry said.
"Dad shot one when we escaped. He hit him in the shoulder." Jessica added in on the conversation. Man! Even her voice is hot! Mark thought as he heard it.
"That's all action we've seen since we left home. What about you guys?" Steve asked and looked at the three young men.
"Terry shot one, emptied a whole clip into it until it lay twitching on the ground and Brandon slammed one on the head. That's about it." Ryan said and the two others simply nodded.
"That's good. Do you have any ammo for that gun?" Steve asked.
"Two clips counting the one inside." Terry said. "How about shells for that shotgun?"
"A box of 20 guage shells in the car that is almost full and a full box of .367 for Carl's revolver. What are you boys packing?"
"This shotgun, three automatics and a revolver but only three extra shells for the shotgun and two spare clips for the two glocks and none for the rest." Mark answered and saw the surprised looks on their faces.
"That's quite an arsenal." Said Steve. "You mind sharing?"
"Not at all." Alec said and went back to the car to get the bag with the guns. When he came back he grabbed 'his' glock and the spare clips and tossed the second one back in without a clip in it. Ryan took the .45 and tried to familiarise himself with it. Brandon took the .38 but kept his axe. Now everyone except for Jessica had a gun, but Steve didn't want his child to do anything else than sitting in the car while they did what they had to.
"Anyone here did any military service except for me and Carl?" Steve asked.
Brandon and Ryan shook their heads.
"Does growing up on the streets od Seattle count?" Terry asked and everyone knew what he meant. He could handle himself as good as any GI. Steve didn't answer that.
"Then we're off. If anyone thinks this is too dangerous, say so." Steve said instead. "You guys can drive first so that Alec can lead the way."
They returned to their cars and drove away, Alec leading the way. And he was right. After about ten miles there where a gas station out in the loneliness of the Californian countryside. There where a couple of houses on the other side of the road. There where no cars at the gas station, but the lights were on. None of the creatures could be seen. But Mark kept suspicious.
The two cars drove up to the gas stations parking lot and stopped. They hadn't made a plan or something, but they knew they had to act fast.
"Stay here while I go in and check with Carl. And tank the cars for gods sake." Steve ordered and went inside the gas station followed by his nephew.
The five young men gathered around the car where Jessica was sitting, wanting to be outside the others showing that she wasn't a child. Mark clutched his shotgun and scanned the houses over the road. Ryan started to fill Steve's car up. From the inside of the gas station the group heard the loud barking of both Steve's barrels and three not so loud shots probably coming from Carl's revolver. No one got time to turn around and see what happened, two shapes came running towards the gas station from the houses. It was a man and a young woman, both in their underwear. Everyone waited until the zombies got closer, it was to far away to shoot them with the pistols and the shotgun. But as they entered the streetlights light so that everyone could see the bite wound on the woman's neck and the missing flesh on the mans stomach they raised their guns. Mark figured that he didn't want to waste a shell and didn't fire, but everyone else did. The young woman, not really attractive, was hit by four bullets, two of them in the head. Red and pink sprayed behind her like a mist and she fell down to never get up. The man, a little overweight and in his later thirties was hit by one bullet, in his thigh. He man fell down and tried to get up, but tried to take the first step on his wounded leg, and fell again. Someone put a bullet in his head the second later.
"Clear!" Terry shouted, remembering the movie Navy Seals.
"Clear!" Mark shouted, that reminded him of the bad B-movie Navy Seals.
"Clear!" Brandon shouted and figured Terry had got a pretty good idea.
"Clear!" Ryan said, not wanting to waste any energy on shouting.
"I'm okay." Alec said, realising that everyone else was okay as well.
The second later Steve and Carl came out from the gas station. Carl was now holding a small pump shotgun and a bag with food in it. Steve also had a bag of food. It looked like the looting had gone perfectly fine.
"Had to take care of two 'infected' inside, but we did fine." Steve said and looked at the two truly dead ones on the pavement. "See you did too."
Then someone spotted a group of creatures coming their way. This time it wasn't two or three, it was seven maybe eight. The group started to howl like animals as soon as they saw the group of survivors. Everyone raised their guns, aiming and waiting for a moment to fire. Steve opened the door to his car, threw the food inside and grabbed Jessica.
"Everyone get inside, now!" Steve shouted.
The group started to move inside but everyone kept their guns trained at the oncoming group. The last person to get inside was Mark and when he walked backwards through the door the swarm entered the streetlight where the two corpses lay dead. He fired a shell at the closest one, a man so old that it looked strange when he ran, the age didn't seem to stop him though. The mans torso exploded and a red flower of blood exploded behind him. The man fell to the ground twitching. Mark took a step backwards and slammed the door shut. Inside the others had formed a half circle around the door and all aimed their guns at it. Mark took his place besides Alec and Jessica who now held Carl's revolver.
"When they get through everyone starts pacing backwards and firing. Don't panic!" Steve shouted.
The creatures outside seemed to be tackling and slamming their fists at the door. Sooner or later it would break, all they could do was to wait. As they waited Mark reached down into his pocket and reloaded the shotgun with one of the shells. Only two spare ones. Make them count, he thought. He was going to make this he told himself. He looked at everyone else who seemed to be staring at the door. Steve's face was sheer determination, he wanted to live and for Jessica to live. Carl looked pissed as usual, but this time he looked even more pissed clutching the small shotgun he had. Brandon looked concentrated on making it through this, his axe was leaned to a shelf if he ran out of ammo. Ryan actually looked calm, but Mark guessed he wasn't. Terry looked a little stressed, scared maybe. Alec was the only one that really looked scared, but he held his gun prepared to kill, to survive. And last of all, Jessica. She didn't look scared, uncertain was more like it, like if she didn't know what to do with the big revolver she gripped. And of course, she looked good. The door broke down earlier than anyone thought. The ghouls came streaming through the door as a river.
Before anyone reacted Steve fired both barrels into the creature. It hit and completely destroyed everything from the neck and up. It didn't fell backwards, it was pushed forward by the storming zombies trying to reach the survivors. Then everyone else started shooting. The second and third zombie was shoot to shreds. Everyone but Steve and Mark fired. But more zombies came. Everyone started to walk backwards, widening the circle. Mark fired his first shot at a man who looked a lot like Keanu Reaves. Dodge this, he thought as the impersonator got his head blown to shreds. He pumped the shotgun and saw the spent shell fly through the air.
It was a slaughter. None of the zombies got close to the humans. They gunned them down as soon as they entered the room. Soon everything went quiet, everyone's adrenaline was flushed out of their system.
"Clear!" Terry shouted.
"Clear!" Carl shouted.
"Clear!" Steve shouted.
"Clear!" Brandon shouted.
"Clear." Mark said.
"Clear." Alec said.
"Clear." Ryan said.
"Clear." Jessica said.
While the gunsmoke cleared they saw the carnage they had created. Seven bodies lay on the floor, all with their heads damaged more or less. The first thing anyone did was Carl, he started reloading. The second one to do anything was Jessica who vomited over some magazines. When Carl was done reloading he threw the box of 12 gauge shells to Mark. He still looked pissed. Steve went to comfort his daughter. Mark reloaded his shotgun and picked up eight shells from the box and put them in his pocket. Then he threw the box back to Carl. It seemed as if Carl was going to accept the two new boys as members of the group, at least maybe.
"You did good folks. Let's stay here a while." He said.
Everyone sat down to catch breath for a while. Those who could reload did so and the others simply rested. Mark glanced at the corpses at the door. Some of them looked like if they had been awakened at night and killed while some had clothes on and seemed to have been turned a little earlier. Mark didn't know what to think of it yet.
"What are we going to do now?" Brandon asked Steve.
"I think we should fill the tanks and get the hell out of here." Steve said. "Or we stay here for the night. I don't think there's any infected around here anymore. Actually I'm getting a little tired. Maybe we should stay here."
"I think we should." Ryan said and rubbed his eyes, apparently he hadn't slept a lot since the start of this.
"Then we stay here. Let's fill the tanks in case we have to leave in a hurry." Steve said. "I think it's best for me to stay here with my daughter. Can anyone else do it?"
"Sure. I'm on it." Terry said. He went outside followed by Brandon and Ryan. As they went outside they heard a gunshot, probably them taking care of the twitcher outside.
Mark sat down and leaned himself against his shotgun. Alec leaned against the wall. Both boys sat for themselves a bit away from the others. Steve, Carl and Jessica was talking to each other but the two boys only sat silent trying to forget what they had seen earlier.
They sat quiet for a while until the three young men came inside to report that the cars were filled and that they hadn't seen a single infected on the outside. Together they, Mark, Alec and Carl dragged the corpses outside and piled them up. Steve was busy comforting his daughter about what had happened, even thought it didn't seem as she needed to hear that it was us or them more than five times. When Mark came inside after piling the corpses he saw that there was a pool of blood where the creatures had fallen. And it smelled.
Everyone was pretty hungry and ate whatever they could find in the store. Then they decided who would be taking the first watch and since Mark and Alec was the only ones who had slept anything at all since yesterday they got the first watch, followed by Brandon and Ryan and so on. This gave the boys an opportunity to talk to each other without anyone else hearing them.
"How much ammo do you have left?" Mark asked his friend. The night was cool and Mark was a little cold in his Hawaii shirt.
"Don't know." Alec answered and took out the clip and checked it. "Five bullets in this and the two spare clips. How about you?"
"With that box Carl threw me I'm nowhere close to running out. So, what do you think about them?" He said.
"You mean the others? They're okay, Steve's a good guy and a good leader, Brandon and the guys are okay. The only bad thing is that Carl seems a little weird, but I guess we'll get used to it. It's good to see that there's others alive." said. And it was true, it was good to see that there were others.
"What do you think of Jessica then? You didn't mention her." Mark asked.
"Hot, that's about it. But I think Steve is that kind of father who would skin us alive if we looked at her in the wrong way." Alec said. "Maybe not skin, but at least be pissed."
Mark nodded. "Is she hotter than a certain Linda Romero you talked so much about?" He asked his friend with a smile. Alec had had a crush on her for as long as he or anyone else could remember.
"Don't know. Not really. But since she and all the other ones in school are stone cold dead we might as well forget about them." Alec said.
The two boys didn't say anything for a while. Alec broke the silence.
"We should check out those houses tomorrow." He said. "We might find something useful."
"Maybe, do you think there's any zombies there?" Mark asked.
"Nah, they would have showed up by now. By the way, we did good today. No one got hurt and we fought three times." Alec said.
"It wasn't because of me or you. Both Steve and Carl has military training and Terry seems to be something of a gangster or something. That's why everything went so smooth. And in the restaurant we had luck, that's all." Mark said. Actually he thought he had done fine so far, but he didn't want to brag.
"Maybe, but as long as we don't die I don't really care if it's luck or Steve who saves our asses." Alec said.
"You got a point there." Mark said. "We'll talk to Steve about looting the houses tomorrow."
Kinda funny, two days ago my worst crimes were shoplifting and smoking pot, now I'm talking about looting four houses clutching my stolen shotgun that I killed a man with half an hour earlier. But I feel no remorse. Mark thought and smiled as he sat on the car and watched across the road. It's strange what a apocalyptic catastrophe where the dead rise to kill the living can do to a boy.