One looked really spooky. It had been an elderly man in life, with long grey hair and a long straight beard. Both its eyes were gone, but it still seemed to look straight at Breanne. Its mouth would go from slack-jawed yawn to feral rip-your-throat-out snarl whenever it seemed to sense her.
It was unnerving.
Breanne had asked the guys to take out the zombies, for surely these would be easy shots. But they had disagreed.
“We’ve got about thirty bullets left between our two nine-mills,” BB explained.
Breanne nodded, despite not really understanding their lingo. “Well, I see about a dozen of them.” She threw her thumb over her shoulder to indicate the zombies milling around. “So, time for target practice, I guess?”
Bill shook his head. “No, ma’am. We got to save this ammo.” He added, seeing Breanne’s shocked expression, “Trust me, we gonna need these bullets for when John comes to get us.”
“Hmm,” Breanne replied sceptically.
After that, the two men pretty much kept to themselves. They checked their pistols and then checked them again. They didn’t talk. Noise discipline, Bill had called it.
Bullshit.
From the perch they saw something interesting occur. Most of the zombies down in the street had turned around and were moving away. She couldn’t help but wonder where they were all heading. She feared that it was the school.
The behaviour was strange, though. Why leave now that they’ve cornered their prey? Were Breanne and her two companions not to their taste?
Can’t blame you, Breanne reasoned as she glanced at her companions. BB already looks like one of you, and Bill probably tastes like fried peanut butter banana sandwiches.
She looked back towards the retreating horde. They all crowded and shoved at each other in one great mob. It reminded Breanne of protestors, marching towards a destination.
Only a bit more violent. And a bit more dead.
Breanne tried to stay calm and quiet like her two companions. She sat down with them, basically forming a mini circle on the small roof. At one point, BB grabbed his water canister and leaned over to Breanne. Before she knew what was going on, he poured a bit of water on the side of her head and rubbed her ear.
“What the—”
“Shhh!” BB warned. “Sit still, will you?”
He kept pouring water and rubbing at her ear. Breanne struggled with the soldier for a moment but stopped when suddenly she could hear again. BB worked at the side of her head and her ear for a few more moments.
“Is that better? Can you hear me now?”
“Yeah, I can.” She grinned at her sunken-cheeked savior. “I thought my ear was fucked!” Breanne felt her wet ear, but there was no pain.
“Naw, your ear just filled up with blood from that gash in your head,” BB replied.
“Gash?” Breanne’s eyes opened wide with alarm and her fingers reached above her ear.
“Whoa!” BB grabbed Breanne’s hand before it could explore the wound. “I wouldn’t touch it if I was you. It’s stopped bleeding.” He leaned in for a closer look. “Yeah ... Best not touch that.” His words did little to ease Breanne’s consternation.
“What the hell happened, anyway?” she asked the lanky man, who had sat back down across from her.
BB and Bill exchanged a glance.
“What?” Breanne felt herself starting to bristle. “Are we back in high school or something? Just tell me what the fuck happened!”
“OK, OK!” BB lifted his hands in surrender.
“It was a bit of”—he paused halfway through the sentence to try to find the appropriate words—“a clusterfuck.” He settled down to recount the events of earlier that afternoon.
Chapter 54
BB
“The gate should be just around that corner,” BB said as he approached the intersection. So far, they had encountered just one solitary zombie on their way towards their goal.
They all felt their confidence rising.
Maybe there are only a couple of those stinky motherfuckers over at the gate. Blam, blam, thank you ma’am! A smile crept onto BB’s face as he prepared to turn.
That smile turned into a grimace akin to having drunk sour milk. The mass of zombies on the street was staggering. Undead of all shapes and sizes turned as one and started towards the Humvee.
“Holy fuck!” Breanne exclaimed from the passenger seat. “Stop the goddamn car!” she added with vehemence towards BB, who inadvertently had kept moving forward.
BB slammed the brakes, jarring everybody in their seats and causing Bill to lose the magazine he was about to insert into his M4. The soldier groped around by his feet, trying to grab the thing.
Breanne took the handset, but her attention was on BB and the approaching horde. “There’s too many! Fuckin’ back up the tru—”
BB had slammed the vehicle in reverse and hit the gas. Unfortunately, that’s when things started to go wrong. Bill had managed to find and insert the magazine into his weapon at almost exactly the same time that BB hit the curb serving as a median for the road. The vehicle jumped, and Bill’s weapon discharged. The bullet traveled between BB and Breanne and struck the radio.
The deafening noise stunned BB, who floored the gas, crossing the median and the other side of the road and jumping another curb fifteen yards down the road. The vehicle hit a drainage culvert next, slamming down nearly on its side against the far bank.
Breanne’s head slammed into the window and she lost consciousness for several seconds. Blood started pouring from a large gash in her head.
“Holy fuck!” BB exclaimed. The interior cab was starting to fill with smoke from the shorted radio. BB could tell that they wouldn’t be getting away in the Humvee. “Holy fuck!” he repeated when he saw the unconscious woman
