A few minutes later he was loading up his car. He kept looking around him, the groaning becoming louder, it had been a soft white noise earlier, but now, it was intensifying. Then his heart slammed into his chest when he saw one of the creatures lurching from the side of the building. Even from the distance and fading light, Ethan could see the shredded muscles hanging in tatters down the man’s arm. His clothing was black with dried blood. His shirt was hanging open and there were blackened gash marks across the man’s chest. The wind shifted and Ethan let out a hasty breath. The guy was rotting, literally rotting before his eyes. Putrid fumes engulfed Ethan as the man drew closer. The man’s eyes were white, all color gone. Ethan didn’t turn when a woman screamed. The thing before him jerked in that direction and the woman screamed again. He wanted to tell her to shut up, these things apparently followed noise and movement.
He sighed heavily and pulled his weapon and took aim. He drew a bead on the creature and shot it in the head. It fell to the ground in a boneless motion, the strings cut. The man was out of his misery and Ethan wondered if the man had even been conscious of his condition? Unfortunately, that shot drew more of the zombie-like creatures and he cursed in disgust. Going to the trunk of his car, he pulled out a modified suppressor and attached it to his weapon. As the creatures came within range, he shot each one and watched as they dropped. The soft ppfftt sound of his weapon’s report didn’t draw attention. Six dead easily and he looked around him. He ejected the magazine and shoved in a fresh mag.
He noticed a body laying by a dumpster and walked over to it. He could smell the fresh blood and looked down into the face of a woman, her eyes wide open and a scream frozen on her mouth as it gaped open. She had been pretty, but her face was distorted with the terror she experienced just before death. Her throat had been ripped open, the blood pooled and drying around her head. He squatted down and put his hands over her dead eyes and shut them. He felt her jerk and he jumped back.
“What the fuck!?” he snarled and he backpedaled. Were these really zombies? The woman sat up and the blood leaked down her neck and patted onto the ground. Her eyes looked up at him uncomprehending and she let out a noise, somewhere between a cry and a groan, sounding like a wounded animal.
“Lady, you’re not right,” he said and shot her between the eyes. Her body twitched a moment, fell and then she was still. He realized that no blood oozed from the small hole in her head. Yeah, she was dead and she was a friggen zombie. He cursed softly under his breath and turned away, going back to his car. There were fewer people on the streets now and he got back inside his car and leaned back to the back seat. He picked up a black cargo bag and pulled it to the front seat. Inside was ammo for his Walther PPQ 9mm but also for his other weapons. He replaced the used magazine with a full one. His eyes bounced from his weapon to out the window and around him. He needed to get to the storage garage and quick.
He checked the GPS and let out a sigh of relief, it was only three blocks away. He was again unsure as to why he had to track down Wilder first, surely Agent Zed was nowhere near Agent Echo, why would she? O’Donnell, had ordered him so here he was. Did they know something he didn’t? He again speculated that perhaps Wilder and Demir were having an affair. It wasn’t out of the realm of possibilities. There were very few female agents and operatives in their line of work. He had to admit that Demir was a beautiful woman, but she was so odd and quirky and a smartass with a lethal tongue. He’d felt the bite of loneliness himself, but relationships were rare and it was the nature of their profession.
Ethan constantly scanned around him; he pulled out and moved around abandoned cars. He felt the trickle of sweat slide down his face and wiped at it, surprised. This shit was unnerving. He was used to bizarre situations, but this was some kind of alternate universe crap. Zombies. He just couldn’t wrap his head around it. When he’d watched the shows about zombies on TV, he had laughed his ass off at the insane possibility of it. Yet, here he was, driving down the street and watching as distorted beings moved between the shadows. He snorted with a combination of dark humor and the unsettled feelings that were growing in the pit of his stomach. He turned down several streets and saw the storage facility ahead.
He pulled in behind a truck and turned off the engine. He cracked his windows and caught the funk of death and rolled them back up again. He watched the gate to the storage garage; he was parked roughly thirty feet away and had a good view. He looked around and saw no one and so opened his door and stepped out, ignoring the stench around him. Looking up and down the street, he ran over to the gate. He pulled out his phone and tapped onto the app that the agency had given him. It was the locator beacon on Wilder’s car. He had the input number and climbed the fence quickly. He was glad there was no barbed wire. It was quiet around him and he no longer heard the moans of earlier. Hopefully that meant there were no zombies in the area.
