Joseph Talluto - Taking It Back

I shook my head. “Remind me never to do that again. If Sarah had been watching I’d be in serious trouble.”

Charlie just smiled, then turned as low moans carried to us. Thirty or so yards away there was about twenty slow movers headed our way and we needed to get to work. “I’ll take the right, you take the left,” Charlie said as he lifted his rifle.

“Deal.” I raised my rifle and started with a small boy on the far left. He was wearing a striped shirt and ripped up jeans. His vacant stare reminded me of students I had once upon a time when we did state testing. I dropped him with a quick shot, then moved on to the next. In short order we had killed the oncoming zombies, the last one literally dropping at our feet.

Our efforts had attracted the attention of several more ghouls and we decided we needed to get to a more defensible position. I could see more zombies coming up from the countryside, attracted to the sound of shooting, which I figured was akin to a dinner bell for roaming Z’s.

“Let’s get gone before we find ourselves out of ammo, trying to figure out how to spend the rest of our short lives in a cargo container.” I said, moving to the east towards the railroad tracks. Charlie agreed, telling me spending the rest of his life in a cargo container with me was only attractive if I was a supermodel. I didn’t bother to reply.

We ran to the tracks that paralleled the fence, since that part of the fence was not being as aggressively attacked as the north side. We ran about halfway down the length of the fence, stopping once to shoot two zombies that were coming in off the south end and getting to the ladder that had been placed there for us. I ushered Charlie up and I climbed after him, pulling the ladder up behind me. Zombies generally didn’t seem to have the mental clarity to figure out what to do with a ladder and certainly lacked the dexterity to manage climbing one, but I have heard of exceptions. No point in trying to figure out if one was out there right now.

We got to the top and moved quickly towards the source of the firing as their seemed to be quite a bit and for some reason that made me nervous. As we turned the corner I could see two people firing directly down into the masses of zombies milling about. Every time they fired a body fell. All good. But the bodies were starting to pile up and they were not aware that the zombie’s grasping hands were getting higher and higher.

“Step back!” I yelled. “They can reach you! Step back!” I ran faster, trying not to lose my balance on the uneven surface of the containers.

I was too late. Even as I got within twenty yards, a shooter was dragged screaming down into the teeming mass. Clawed hands ripped away chunks of flesh and chipped teeth tore at clothing and skin. It looked like someone had dropped a piece of hamburger into a pool of piranhas. Blood sprayed as arterial walls were ruptured by ghoul s’ teeth. In a matter of seconds, the screaming stopped as whoever it was died. A pack of zombies stayed hunched over the body, tearing at the meat, stuffing it into their mouths. Blood smeared over hands and arms, dripping down chins and staining dirty clothing.

The other person on the container screamed, “Noooo!” and before I could get to him, he jumped off the container into the pack of hunched over zombies, shooting randomly and kicking zombies away from the body. I ducked as a bullet screamed past my ear, nearly causing me to stumble. He didn’t seem to notice the zombie on his back, biting him in the neck. The man kicked away another zombie, then threw the one on his back off, knocking down a row of zombies. Other ghouls surged forward, and just before they swarmed the man, I could see the face of the shredded body on the ground.

It was Casey. What she was doing out here instead of staying at the town hall where she was supposed to be I had no idea. I turned my attention to the man fighting on the ground. He swung his rifle like a club, but he had no chance. The zombies came in from all sides and bore him to his knees. He fought up one last time and it was then I could see who it was. Martin Oso. My heart sank as his eyes locked with mine, then he disappeared beneath the wave of undead. I brought my rifle up and was not disappointed when the mass of ghouls surged upward again and I could see that Martin had regained his feet. His face was covered in bites and he was bleeding freely from numerous wounds on his arms and neck. The Z’s snarled collectively then rushed him again, their hunger evident in the intensity with which they glared at him.

Martin looked at me again, then nodded as I lined up his head in my sights. A split second before the dead started tearing at him again, my rifle cracked once, the bullet putting a neat hole in Martin’s head. He dropped to the ground, followed by the dead which tore at his fresh corpse. I lowered my rifle and just shook my head.

Charlie dropped his head and shook it gently, his anger at the useless deaths evident in his slightly shaking hands.

The ghouls noticed us after they finished with the bodies of our comrades and set up another chorus of death as they moaned and surged forward. There were a lot of them in this area, but I could see pockets of more of them down the line. I took the scope off my rifle and standing back from the grasping hands that reached over the edge of the container, I proceeded to cut down the zombies that reached for me. I worked my way from the back, shooting methodically. I don’t remember Charlie firing next to me, I just went on autopilot. Aim, fire, shift, aim, fire, shift, aim, fire, shift, aim fire. I started at the back of the mob and slowly worked my way forward. I saw Charlie doing the same and he was as disciplined as I was. Inside, I was furious. Martin knew better than to shoot the way he was and not only did he get himself killed, he got another team member killed as well. If he wasn’t dead, I would have kicked his ass.

I emptied my magazine, replaced it with another one and then went to work again. At the end of my second clip, I had corpses laid out like a macabre carpet. On Charlie’s side, the same carpet was laid off to the right. In front of us, were still the grasping hands and I put a loaded clip into the rifle, noting absently the heat coming off the barrel. I stepped carefully forward and peered over at the dead. When they saw me, they again moaned and reached for me, but I had nothing for them except release from their prison.

I fired quickly, killing six of them in short order and Charlie finished off the rest. I looked over at him and nodded, words being useless at this point. We gathered our empty magazines and began walking down the fence line, heading towards the masses of zombies in the distance. Out on the open land I could see distant shapes slowly moving towards our position, but paid them no mind. We’d kill them when they got here, no sooner.

As we reached the main point of the zombies’ attack, I could see Sheriff Harlan walking up and down his line of shooters, encouraging them, and telling them to aim for the back of the horde, just like we had discussed the night before. It was hard to ignore the grasping hands that reached up, but they couldn’t risk the zombies climbing up. As it was, they might have done it anyway, just from crushing each other in the press to get the succulent pink flesh just out of reach. The container we were standing on rocked gently from the onslaught, but it stayed in place, being bolted to the container next to it. On the initial tour of the defenses Harlan had said most of the containers had been secured, but not all. The ones by the lake were not, the logic being that the zombies appeared to avoid immersion in water, therefore if they made it through, they wouldn’t go far.

I walked along the fence, followed by Charlie, and we saw other groups of men shooting down the ghouls and adding to the grey, lifeless mass out on the plain. A lot of ammo was wasted, but the men seemed to have enough. If we ran out, we’d have to do the job the old fashioned way, but that could be done. The focus now was to eliminate the threat of being overwhelmed.