real men got out and began to search for the threat.
Mrs. Deneaux, smoothly pulled her bolt action back and then forward, placing another round in the chamber. The driver of the third truck had stopped in enough time to avoid the collision and had just stepped out of the cab when Mrs. Deneaux sheered his arm off above the elbow.
Paul, who now had the binoculars, told her that the driver was not dead.
“I did it on purpose, sweetie,” Mrs. Deneaux said, almost kindly. “I was hoping that maybe the sight of blood and someone screaming and running around like a headless chicken would get the zombies moving. Doesn’t seem to have worked,” she said, pulling the bolt back and pushing it forward again.
Brian once again got that chill up his spine.
Brian started to shoot, not nearly with the precision or icy coolness with which Mrs. D dispatched of the enemy, but it was effective all the same.
“Might be time to get going,” Paul said as he saw troops rallying. “It looks like they know where we are and they’re getting ready to fight back.”
As if on cue, shots began to pepper their location.
“Good enough warning for me,” Brian said as he shifted to get his things together, ready to leave post haste. The round that hit him, smashed through his collarbone and exited his abdomen. He immediately rolled on to his back. “Fuck! I didn’t think it would hurt that bad!” he said as his breathing became rapid.
“What would?” Paul turned, beginning to rise with his rucksack. “Damn,” was all Paul managed to say as he looked down on Brian and a blossom of blood spread from Brian’s shoulder to his stomach.
“Bad?” Mrs. Deneaux asked, as she realized they weren’t leaving quite yet. She dropped her magazine and started to put more rounds in it. “I’ll keep shooting; you need to get pressure on his wound.”
Brian was breathing heavily, straining the air through clenched teeth. “It feels like someone has dragged a branding iron across my chest,” he hissed. “And I can’t move my left arm.”
Paul gingerly opened Brian’s light jacket and pulled his shirt up. The sharp intake of air was all the information that Brian needed.
“It’s bad?” Brian asked.
“Brian, everything’s bad to me. Remember me saying I was a manager at a FedEx? Worst thing I ever had to deal with were cardboard cuts,” Paul told him as he took an extra shirt from his backpack and placed it over Brian’s exit wound. “It looks like your collarbone is pretty busted up and the bullet grazed across your chest. That’s why it’s burning; and then it went in and out of your stomach.”
“Gained twenty-five pounds since I’ve been out of the Army. Most of it is gone now, but if I had stayed in shape, the bullet would have missed,” Brian said, still in pain, but realizing he might not quite be dead.
“That extra weight might have saved your life, at least the sexual part,” Paul told him.
“What are you talking about?” Brian asked as he repositioned himself.
“Look at the direction that bullet was heading,” Paul said as he got some bandages and tape.
Brian looked down to his left, past the busted collarbone, at the scrape that went to the right of his left nipple to where the bullet entered into his stomach and came out right below the navel. “Oh shit! That was close,” Brian said, placing his right hand on his still present male equipment.
“I’d take a scar on my mid section any day of the week,” Paul commented, doing his best to place a field dressing on the wound so they could get out of there.
Mrs. Deneaux was still rhythmically shooting, but their location was under heavy fire. Mrs. Deneaux’s lawn chair had already suffered two grievous wounds. The only thing saving her life was how thin she was.
“Well, that helps,” she said as she lifted her head from the scope.
The shooting had stopped on both sides, but the screaming intensified from the highway below.
“What’s going on?” Brian asked.
“I think Mr. Talbot has held up his end of the agreement,” Mrs. Deneaux said as she gleefully clapped her hands.
Paul got into a crouch to look over the guardrail.
“Oh, I think you could do the Samba and no one would take any notice of you,” Mrs. Deneaux said as she stood to get a better vantage point of the slaughter down below.
Paul was perfectly happy with his vantage point. “The zombies are attacking Eliza’s people,” Paul said, pumping his fist.
“I think now would be a good time to get gone,” Brian said, pulling his water bottle over.
“Let me get a sling on your arm first,” Mrs. Deneaux said, placing her rifle down and accessing Brian for the first time.
Brian was none too pleased with her scrutinous eye. He could tell she was sizing up his mobility, and if he were left wanting, she would not have any problem leaving him behind.
“Not bad,” Brian said as he stood up slowly. Blood rushed out of his head, sending him into a brief, but intense bout of vertigo.
“You alright?” Mrs. Deneaux asked and it almost sounded like she cared.
“Fine,” Brian answered as he steadied himself on the back of her lawn chair. He prayed that its compromised integrity would sustain his weight for just a little while longer. If he plunged to the ground now and passed out, he was certain he’d find himself alone on the bridge when he awoke. Blood slowly pushed its way back up and into his head, and the dizziness passed.
If Mrs. Deneaux hadn’t been so busy assessing Brian, she might not have missed a chance to end the entire conflict. Paul decided to seize the day as he grabbed Mrs. Deneaux’s rifle. He stood completely upright. A slight breeze was blowing left to right as he placed the crosshairs of the Winchester 30-30 on Eliza’s breast.
Brian and Mrs. Deneaux turned as Paul fired.
“I hit her!” Paul screamed.
“Who?” Brian asked, swallowing down some bile that had swirled up from his gut.
“Eliza! I hit Eliza!” Paul shouted, almost dropping the rifle off the railing.
Mrs. Deneaux grabbed it before he could. She started looking through the scope for any signs that the vamp was dead. “I don’t see anything. How far away was she?” she asked.
Paul started counting off trucks. “Nine or ten back,” he said proudly.
“That’s about a three-hundred-yard shot,” Brian said, finally able to move without the threat of falling.
“Did you compensate for bullet drop?” Mrs. Deneaux asked, moving the scope further out to look for Eliza.
“Bullet what?” Paul asked. His previous high beginning to sink.
“At that distance, the bullet could drop about ten inches roughly,” Brian said.
“If you were aiming for her skull, that could still have done her some damage. Might have hit her in the chest.”
Paul’s head sank.” I was aiming for her chest, figured I had a better chance of hitting that.”
“Gut shot the bitch,” Mrs. Deneaux laughed. “Bet that hurt.”
Brian thought her laugh sounded very much like what drowning babies crying would. “We should really get out of here now, I can’t imagine that anything good can happen from pissing Eliza off.”
***
Eliza had been so intent on finding out why her zombies had turned and what she needed to do to rein them back in, she had not been anticipating an outside threat.
“This is Talbot’s doing! I can smell the stench of him all over this!” Eliza spat.
“I think it would be best if we left him his small corner of the world, Eliza,” Tomas said, smiling as he walked with his sister.
“You did this!” she said vehemently, spinning on her heel to confront him. “Without your help, that animal, Durgan, would have killed him and we could be out exploring vast new ways to torment the world. I will not be bested by a mere man.”
“He is no longer merely a man, sister,” Tomas added.
“No, thanks to you.”
