"This is kind of awkward," Marcus said as they walked down the street.
"Yeah," Maya replied softly.
It was getting to be mid-afternoon, the sun high in the sky but mercifully hidden behind a thickening gray cloud cover. Marcus thought that it might rain tonight. That would be pleasant, peaceful. It had been a while since he'd enjoyed a rainy day. Of course he might change his tune once he had to fight zombies in the rain, or move a bunch of crap in it. Or both at the same time. He took another quick look around.
A few zombies milled about, stumbling around front yards. They didn't seem to notice the pair as they made their way down the center of the street. What Lily referred to as the Kirkman residence was a house on the right side of the street very close to the church. All they had to do was walk down the soft dirt incline to the left of the church, cross through a yard and come out onto the very road they were now walking down.
The house they were making their way towards had a stonework privacy fence built around it. Someone was standing behind the fence atop something, not a watchtower like theirs, but definitely something. Their torso was exposed and they had a rifle in hand. They were covering Marcus and Maya as they approached.
"That's close enough," the person said.
Marcus studied him. He was scrawny and white, his face covered in several days' worth of stubble. He wore a black t-shirt with KoЯn scrawled across it in severe white lettering. Marcus recognized the shirt, a friend of his had had one like it all through high school. The hands with which he held the rifle weren't entirely steady.
"Okay," Marcus said, stopping with Maya. "We're here because of the call on the radio. I understand we have a deal to clear out a gun shop?"
"Yeah...hold on. Don't move an inch."
He turned around and dropped down off of whatever he was standing on. A moment passed in uncomfortable silence, then he suddenly reappeared. At that same moment, the black iron gate that served as an entryway to the property opened up. Two people emerged. One was a tanned woman with brown hair pulled into a tight, functional ponytail. She wore jogging shorts and a plain white t-shirt and held a long-barreled silver revolver. The other was a man in jeans and a flannel shirt with the sleeves ripped out. He seemed younger than her, with pale blonde hair and a friendly, open face. He carried a pump action shotgun.
"Hi," the woman said. She resembled the man standing behind the privacy wall. Marcus suddenly realized that they were siblings. "My name is Linda Porter. This here is Tucker. The nervous guy with the rifle is my brother Daniel."
"Hello. I'm Marcus."
"I'm Maya."
"Pleased to meet you. I trust you're ready for all the shooting we've got to do? No quiet way to deal with an infestation, so we're likely going to draw in others," Linda said.
"Good to go," Marcus replied, patting his pocket with the two spare magazines.
"Same," Maya replied.
"Excellent. Let's get going, it's just around the corner."
They began walking down the street, now four of them, four young survivors of the zombie apocalypse. Or was it? He still had no idea how widespread it was. Though the fact that the Army was here in force and quarantining them all made him think that it might be a local thing. And that gave him hope. Not exactly a personal hope, because he wasn't so sure about making it out of this place alive, but a broader hope.
Maybe they could stop and contain it here.
As they reached the end of the street and began turning right, Marcus spied movement across the street, behind the windows of a local mini-mart, the Tartan Mart. The movement didn't look listless or stilted, like the zombies, it looked human.
"Hey...are there people over there?" he asked.
"Where?" Maya replied. "Oh, yeah, there's an enclave in there. Two or three, I'm not sure. They're not really open to negotiation, though that's going to have to change eventually," she said.
"Well, you certainly know your facts," Tucker said, cautiously impressed. Marcus thought he heard a note of suspicion.
"I had Lily give me all the information she's gathered so far. I know about you, them, the Wilkersons and a group out on the Miller Farm. There's also some kind of activity going on in Marshall, though we haven't heard anything from Fairfield. I'm in the Army, the ability to memorize facts quickly is kind of in the job description."
"Whoa," Linda said, stopping and turning around. "You're in the Army? Does that mean-"
But Maya was shaking her head. "Been there, done that. The Army told me to fuck off. And I knew one of the guys there, a Sergeant. It didn't mean dick."
Linda sighed, turned back around and kept walking. The gun shop was up ahead. Marcus could see the two-story boxy structure. It, for some reason, made him think of the Wild West. "Well that sucks," Linda muttered miserably.
"Tell me about it," Maya replied.
"Okay, we're almost there, everyone ready?" Tucker asked.
Marcus gave an affirmative response. He had his pistol out.
"I think what would make the most sense is to get into the parking lot, cover all the angles, and then try to get them to come out to us," Maya said. "It'd be stupid to walk into a confined space with a bunch of zombies."
"That's...a great idea," Linda said. "I like it."
"Thanks," Maya replied.
They made their way into the dusty gravel parking lot, passed a rusted-out old red pickup that looked like it might never again run. Marcus took a quick survey of the area. There were a few zombies milling around within eyesight. There was a house behind them, across the street, with a few dead-heads wandering about with their glowing eyes, looking a little like lawn ornaments. To the left, also across the street, was a fast food joint, a Swine & Bovine. That made Marcus suddenly hungry. He remembered how damned good their burgers were. Forcing himself to focus, he turned his attention to the gun shop itself.
It had a big, plate-glass window in the front, and that gave them a great view of the interior. The walls were lined with shelves and racks for weapons, and there was a long, glass display case that bisected the room and held the cash register. There were over a dozen dark, shifting shapes inside. Probably more than that, Marcus couldn't see them all.
"Time to let them know we're here...ready?" he asked, raising his pistol.
Everyone gave an affirmative response. Marcus sighted the nearest zombie, a middle-aged man in a hunting vest missing half the skin on his face, standing nearest to the plate glass. He squeezed the trigger. The shot was good. It made a foot-wide hole in the glass and smashed into the zombie's ugly face, spraying its brains and blood all over the others.
The reaction was immediate and volatile.
The remainder of the glass shattered as a living wave of undead smashed through it. The front door burst open, admitting six more of the ugly freaks. Marcus immediately opened fire, hammering away at the seething horde that was coming directly for him. He put down one, two, three...behind him and beside him, he could hear the immense report of the revolver and the powerful blast of the shotgun. Beneath it all, he could hear Maya's own weapon, working quickly, quicker than he was. He was glad she had his back, she was an excellent shot.
Marcus kept firing. Here was a woman in a white dress, torn and bloodied. He put a hole in her forehead. Here was a teenager in a hoodie and sweat pants. His right eye explode and he collapsed to the ground, beneath dead gray skies. Marcus emptied his first magazine, putting down just over a dozen zombies, and hastily reloaded.
As he slammed a fresh magazine in, something new stumbled out through the door. At first, he thought it was just a regular, armless zombie, but he quickly saw that it was anything but regular. Its skin was a very dull gray and it wore nothing but shredded cargo pants. It had no arms and its head was perfectly bald and smooth. It seemed almost bulbous. It was also missing its jaw and portions of its neck seemed to be exposed muscle.
Marcus began aiming when, suddenly, the thing leaned back, as though preparing to sneeze, and let out an earsplitting shriek. Marcus screamed, but couldn't hear himself do so, dropping his gun in an automatic reaction and clapping his hands over his ears. It didn't seem to help. He stumbled, dazed, a horrid pain ripping through his skull. It felt like his eardrums were going to burst. Then, mercifully, it was over.
"What the hell was that!?" Maya cried, her voice sounding distant.
Noise, Marcus realized suddenly as he dropped to his knees to retrieve his gun. Noise drew in the zombies. And this thing looked like it was designed to do that. By the time he had his gun and was standing back up, he saw that the thing was gearing up for another shriek. He aimed and fired three times in rapid succession. All three shots hit it in its bulbous head and the cranium literally exploded in a spray of blood and gore.
"We've got incoming!" Tucker cried behind them.
Marcus growled in frustration, head still hurting. There were still more of them coming out of the store. He took aim and kept up the fire, trying to stop the zombie tide on his end. He expended another magazine, making most of his shots, and as the gun clicked dry, put down the last zombie. He turned around and cried out in surprise. A small horde had gathered on Linda's side, coming from the left, and suddenly there was no time to reload.
"Help!" Linda cried, her own gun running dry.
"I'm on it!" Marcus said, dropping his gun and pulling out his crowbar.
He barely managed to bring it up over his head and then down sharply as the first zombie reached them. A sharp crack cut through the air and blood sprayed his face. Ignoring the awful taste and sensation, he kicked the corpse back into the others, sending them stumbling and giving them a precious few seconds of breathing room. Linda was holding a black baseball bat. She took a few steps back and swung hard.
Another zombie went down with a sharp crunch that made Marcus wince. He brought his own crowbar around in a tight arc, breaking the skull of a third zombie. He heard more gunfire behind him, more shrieking, but there was no time for that now. He made a quick jabbing motion with the pointy end of the crowbar, breaking in through the forehead of the next undead horror. Slipping it back out, he suddenly found himself in the arms of a large male zombie. It grasped him with a cold, iron grip and began lowering its jaws towards his neck.
He cried out for help, and suddenly the top of the zombie's head was blown away. Still holding onto him as it fell, the thing brought Marcus down with it. He struggled to get out of the thing's fingers and finally managed to stand back up. As he surged to his feet, ready to continue the fight, he suddenly found himself in a sea of silence.
"Holy shit," he breathed.
"Yep, we did it," Linda replied with a nervous laugh.
"Thank god," Tucker muttered.
"Come on, let's get in there and see if it was worth it," Maya said.
It was worth it, all right.
The gun shop seemed to be almost totally untouched. The glass display case and a few of the racks were empty, so it was obvious that someone had gotten in at some point, but there were tons of guns and a ridiculous amounts of ammo stashed in the back office and the upstairs storage rooms. There were shelves, racks, lockers, cases, crates and containers of all sorts. Nine millimeters, shotgun shells, five point five sixes, twenty-twos, three fifty sevens, forty-fours...a veritable garden of bullets. It would have taken two trips if another one of the other team's members, an older, soft-spoken man named Brady with a benevolent temperament, hadn't come down with an extra backpack and two empty rucksacks.
They spent the better part of an hour combing over the gun store, making sure they grabbed every pistol, every last shotgun shell, everything of any use. Then they made their way quickly back up the street to the Kirkman residence and spent another two hours there sorting through the ammo and dividing it up properly.
While they were there, they also got to know everyone who lived at the residential enclave.
Linda was in her early thirties and had part-timed as a cashier at the Swine & Bovine. She seemed even-tempered, nice and was prone to bouts of honest laughter. Her brother, Daniel, younger by five years, was a gas station attendant and called himself a gamer. He lamented the loss of Xbox Live and the internet in general, and Marcus found himself in general agreement. Linda confided that that was the real reason he was so grumpy.
Tucker explained, with a lit cigarette that always seemed on the verge of falling from his mouth but somehow never did, that he had been a chef in his former life. Technically, he still was, but it was hard to cook without gas or electricity. He was a short-order cook at the Fork in the Road Diner and had part-timed as a fry cook at the Swine & Bovine with Linda. He had a laid back demeanor and, despite the fact that he seemed a few years younger than Daniel, Marcus got the impression that there was something physical going on between Tucker and Linda.
The man who had come to see them, Brady Ivanov, seemed to be the one in charge of the enclave, though he'd apparently never admit to this. He was a slightly overweight, balding man in his mid forties who had originally come from Ukraine. He still had a slight hint of accent. He was immensely polite and told them that he had been a dentist, one of the very few in Trumbull Valley.
The final member of the Enclave was a pale, miserable woman with limp black hair and baggy, bloodshot eyes. Her name was Danica and she had once been a paramedic in New York for three years. The experience had aged her terribly. Although she was only twenty seven, she looked easily ten years older. She'd moved to Trumbull Valley after becoming a burned-out alcoholic. She'd taken to making house calls and working at a clinic in Marshall, but while she'd left the job and most of the stress behind in New York, she'd kept the alcoholism. The zombie apocalypse had erased any of the healing she'd undergone after moving to the quiet countryside.
Marcus felt very bad for her.
Once they were finished, both he and Maya had two full backpacks, two duffel bags and two rucksacks full nearly to bursting with guns and ammo.
"Thanks," Marcus said as they stepped out.
"Yes, definitely, this was great. Thank you," Maya said.
"Hey, I'm glad we worked together and got to know each other," Linda replied, standing at the gate. "Except for some crazy asshole trying to break in one night and a few tentative failed passes at the people in the Tartan, we haven't had any real positive contact with anyone else since this whole thing started up. If you want to trade or do another run like that or just talk, feel free to get us on the radio," she said, sounding genuinely happy.
"We most certainly will, I'm sure there's a lot we'll be doing in the near future," Maya replied. "See you later."
As they began walking away, Marcus groaned quietly. "This stuff weighs a million pounds," he muttered.
"Yeah. I'm praying we don't run into any zombies on the way back," Maya replied.