The
Zombie
Chronicles

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Finished works:
   Billions
    ---
   Outbreak
    ---
   Undead
     Advantage
    ---
   Found
    ---
   About a Woman
    ---
   Short Stories

Works in Progress:
   TZC2: Discovery

Works on hold:
   Zombie Nation
    ---
   Zombieboy

Outbreak

Chapter 44

Max was ready to try the light rail tracks. Anything to get home to his wife and kids. Juan and Hank were going to take the doctor and nurse up to the warehouse store with them and form some sort of a commune and medical center, they were almost insistent that Max go with them, but eventually they understood that Max had to go find out about his family. As for the warrior kids, they too, had their own way to go and nothing any of the adults could say would deter them. From Max’s point of view they kids wanted to do the same thing he did; check on their families, save them if they could. Stewart let Michael keep the revolver he had taken off the man from the apartment, Tom handed his pistol over to another one of the kids as well. With two guns and their hand to hand weapons the kids at least stood a chance, plus they had experience going for them, they knew what to expect. Max and his group would be leaving first, today in fact to try and make it to Max’s house by the evening, the rest, well it was obvious to everyone that the wounded boy, Jacob, was going to die. Nothing the doctor did for him worked. The rest of the group was simply waiting on death to collect yet another soul before they moved on.

Once Stewart had the car loaded and ready to go (with another spare taken from a compatible car, just in case) the two groups looked at each other and said their goodbyes.

“Hank, Juan, we will try to make our way to your warehouse once we get my wife, we know where you are holed up at.” Hank, nodded.

Juan, answered with his characteristic ‘Si’, his face full of worry he added, “Vaya con dios.” And made a sort of cross in the air over Max.

Turning to Michael and Whitney, Max said, “You guys stay safe, there is not much I can say to you, just, just stay safe and keep the kids safe. I know you will so this is useless advice.” Max shrugged, “Pointless huh? I wish we could all stay together, we can’t though everything needs to be done right now, so we can salvage what we can.” Looking at everyone they were leaving behind Max wondered if he would see any of them again. He had a strong urge to give up going after his family and just join with the group, guilt at that thought forced him to smile and get in the car. As he waved goodbye to the others he thought of something he had heard not too long ago, ‘Duty compels’, all the people involved seemed to have a duty of some sort to attend to and they were all doing it until it was proven to each of them that their obligations no longer existed.

Tom, Stewart and even Steve were going to go with Max, they vowed to see this through to the end, and to the end they would see it.

“You know,”, Max began as Stewart drove to the closest light rail station, “I feel like I am making a bad decision here, maybe we should stay?”

Steve laughed, “Not hardly. You know how pissed off Sarah would be if you did not come to get her? I have had to listen to you vent about her spats of anger the last 3 years, something like this, well Max, it could destroy a marriage.” Tom and Stewart, simply added their “no’s” to staying, agreeing that they had to see it through, with Stewart adding, “We can always come back, if this works out it won’t be that hard to get back here. Besides I think we might need Hank’s help to get those plows at some point anyway. I am more worried about Michael and Whitney.”

Max turned his face to the window and said softly, “Yeah, me too.”

The light rail was a good idea, the group made more progress in an hour than they had all day. Mid-morning however they came across a problem. The light rail had numerous bridges over streams, roads and bike paths, the car could still drive over these bridges with no problems, but over the Platte river there was a problem. The bridge was fine, however a light rail car sat upon it, and there were people in the car. It looked like they were human, they had one door forced open and were using it to go in and out as Max watched. They carefully edged along the tracks, 30 feet above the river below and approached the police car. One man approached while 3 others looked around for zombies and covered him, all the men had rifles. As the man got near the car he called out, “What do you think you are doing?”

Stewart, who had rolled her window down, called back, “We are trying to get through to the station in Arvada.”

“Power’s off, the cars don’t move anymore, we pushed this one up here after disabling the brakes. The zombies have a hard time getting to us, we can see the better ones and pick them off, the slower ones tend to fall into the river.”

“Yeah, good thinking, the heat has to be killing you though. We’ll go around, take a side street back over to get rail line.”, said Stewart.

“There is another cross-over in about two blocks, if you can get to the rail beyond us anyway. That bridge is pretty clear.”, here the main pointed at a nearby traffic bridge, “Can you get the car off the tracks?”

“Ah, yeah probably.”, turning to Tom and Steve, Stewart said, “Could you guys get out and pile gravel up alongside the tracks so we can hop the car over them easier? Max you stay in the car with your gun drawn, in case these guys are not so friendly as they look.”

The man with the rifle stayed about 20 feet away and watched as Steve, Tom and eventually Stewart shifted the heavy rail road rocks up along the tracks, making an impromptu crossing, eventually satisfied Stewart was able drive the squad car off the rail lines, over a curb and onto the street. Once Steve and Tom were back in the car, they merely waved to the men with the rifles and headed towards the bridge. A few blocks up they were able to get back onto the tracks where they crossed a road, resuming their bumpy trip.

The day progressed in a similar fashion, by sundown they had made it almost to the station they wanted to get off at, expending only 3 shots at a more persistent zombie they could not seem to get rid of. That is when the right front tire blew. It took them well past sundown to get the tire changed, with the car on the tracks they could not get the jack under it, they had to pile up gravel as best they could to pop the car off the tracks, then Stewart drove it to a nearby road where they managed the tire change easy enough.

“Well, do we hole up or go on?”, asked Stewart, looking around the industrial center they had driven into she spotted a large warehouse and pointed it out, “We could bust that open and drive the car inside, it looks pretty secure.”

“Breaking and entering officer? That is a crime!” Replied a sweaty and dirty Steve, his banter lacked the usual bounce though, he was tired from the work today. “I am game if you are, maybe they have a shower for industrial accidents, right now I feel like an industrial accident.”

“And smell like one too!”, replied Tom, who had been sharing the back seat with Steve all day.

“Hey stinky you are no rose right now either!” Steve shot back.

“How about this we go rest for a few hours, let things kind of get settled, then head out in the early morning to go the last leg?”, said Max

“It is really your call Max, we are so close, but we are beat too. I know you didn’t do a lot of the heavy work today, getting shot gives you free pass on any bending or lifting, however I am sure the rough ride did not do you any good either.”, said Stewart.

“You are right, I have been laying off the pain pills too, I figure I can take ‘first watch’ and let you guys get a little shut eye. If I can find a nice recliner to sit in to keep watch, so much the better.”

They climbed back into the car and drove to the building Stewart had pointed out, it was a large warehouse and was not locked, when they slide the doors open they saw inside was almost filled with round gravel, there was more than enough room for the car though and it was empty, no zombies in sight. Stewart backed the car in and the four of them shut the door and walked over to the office, Stewart and Steve leading. The office was deserted, there was a break room and there was a shower, though it was an emergency shower and only had cold water. Everyone took turns in the stall and changed into clean clothing. Stewart re-bound Max’s wounds with fresh bandages, applying an antibiotic ointment as well. Steve raided the medical kit and came up with more aspirin, bandages and various other things to replenish the kit Stewart had in the car. They also broke into the cold vending machine, which was still running and ate their fill of ham and cheese sandwiches and hot pockets.

“So do we bed down here or with the car?”, asked Steve.

The other three looked at each other and responded in unison, “With the car.”

“Yeah I figured, I am taking a couple chairs though, and this emergency blanket to sleep on.”

Tom poked around and came up with several jackets and coats left by the workers to make his bed out of. Stewart said she would content herself with the back seat of the car and Max grabbed a shovel he found in the front office.

When they got back to the car Steve put one of the chairs up against the smaller, man-sized door as a wedge and left the other one facing towards the large sliding door, he put the back of the chair up against the front bumper. Max took the shovel and carefully made a reclining slope in the rocks, he lined it with a couple jackets from Tom and used the shovel to sit himself down with, he had a bag with six mountain dews and four snickers bars in it. Tom borrowed the shovel and leveled off a place to lay down on top of more coats. Steve saw this and did the same thing, he had to cajole Stewart to go back with him for more clothing, once he had his spot laid out he pronounced it ‘very good’ and set about falling to sleep. Stewart sat in the chair for awhile talking quietly to Max (who had made his reclining spot in the rocks close to the front of the car too), she was eventually yawning and Max told her to go to bed, getting her to give him her police flashlight and the shovel first. Tom and Steve were already asleep and Stewart was soon snoring softly, leaving Max to think deep thoughts and try and keep himself awake with caffeine and candy.

Thinking of Sarah he pulled out his cell phone again, he had three missed calls from her the day and night before, however when he had tried to call her back he got no answer. This put Max at his lowest since the ordeal began and party played into his reasoning when he thought about just staying with Hank and Juan. Sarah could be dead. Or worse zombified. So could his kids. This was something Max had to consider and come to terms with. What would he do if he pulled up to his house and saw his wife eating his neighbor? Kill her. No doubt about it, so long as she kept her mouth shut, if she had progressed to the stage where she could speak to him, well, Max thought he might be a dead man, how could he kill his wife who looked and acted like his wife? Max tried to call Sarah again. Nothing. Probably she was asleep or the cell phone batter had run out. Hopefully she was okay.

Around 1 am, according to the clock on his phone, Max was tired to the point of falling asleep, he checked the doors to make sure they were well barricaded, then woke Stewart.

“Hey, should I get someone up to keep watch? The doors are all locked and I bet we could hear someone trying to get in.”, he asked a groggy Stewart.

“Ah, yeah, no. If nothing has happened so far we are probably safe enough, no lights, no noise. Just hit it Max, you got an alarm to get us up around 6?”, she replied yawning.

“Sure, sure, I will set it on my phone, no problem. G’night.”

Max went back to where he had been sitting, turned off the flashlight he had used to make his rounds, waited for 20 minutes or so after setting the alarm on his cell phone for six am and then tried to get to sleep. His dreams were vivid and filled with the horrors of his wife eating his oldest child, then turning and offering him a leg. He woke with that image in his mind and fumbled for his phone to check the time. Five fifty-five. He felt like he had gotten no sleep at all. In misery he got up and woke the others. Together they opened the smaller door to the storage shed, checked for zombies and then moved into the office to make some coffee and raid the vending machines. They had enough food for several days in the car, but had all agreed to use it only if they could find no other food where ever they bedded down at.

After their brief, cold breakfast they got the car and moved on towards Max’s house. The going was easy, in fact Max was growing more perturbed as they proceeded, they could have made the trip last night! Stewart had opted not to follow the light rail, as the streets had looked pretty clear, this decision was wise on her part, the streets were passable. They spotted several zombies near the road and Max and his friends had the impression more were hidden among the strip malls and convenience stores they passed, they always had the feeling that undead eyes were upon them. Soon enough the group was turning onto the street that led to Max’s house.

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