The Beginning, Part Three

Migration
My continued info on how we got started.
....
I go home to gather what we deem necessary. You know, my wife, my Dad, armament, ammo, food, clothes, and tools. We take our two vehicles and leave for the base. Dad is confined to a wheelchair because of a stroke he had, and this is the hardest on him. Luckily his mind is still sharp, and his war experience in the coming days will be a great asset. We call the younger brother again, nothing. It’s been more than a week. Odessa is starting to worry now. The older brother is not budging, secure in his knowledge the police and society will not let him down. I say good luck to you, but Odessa is in tears as we leave. We have maybe a four dozen adults and about a dozen kids at the Depot. We start work as soon as possible. The ground just outside the chain link fence is a high school stadium. Plenty of lumber and metal materials to fortify our little base. By this time, what little people are left in the town are also fortifying their homes or just staying indoors per the government propaganda.

*Avoid large groups
*If you have fever, blurry vision, vomiting, Flu-like symptoms, contact your local CDC number (Listed at the bottom of your screen or flyer)
*Call this number if you witness suspicious activity or people with these symptoms.
*Stock up on supplies, stay indoors and wait to be contacted by the National Guard, the State Police, Local Police or Community Action Council.

It went on like this for pages, what to do, how to do it, mostly recycled stuff from the 50’s about nuclear survival. By the time we were settled in and started to add length to our fencing to ensure we had room to garden, exercise and room to just be out in the sun sometimes, the Major showed up. He was the 2nd in command at the Depot before it all went downhill. He came in all bluster and vinegar, mostly pissed about all the ones who fled the post and to the last ones here for letting us stay. We quickly pointed out he had HIS family with him. In a few minutes he quickly settled down and took in the situation. We were told in no certain terms he had not had contact with anyone higher than him for several days. Could the government have fallen so quickly? The Major (Major Kevin Garreth) advises us to check the sat transmitters. None of the men here knew how to work it, so he showed a few of us how to do it. ‘Unusual circumstances dictate unusual situations, I will deal with consequences later.’ We organized along the lines of the military. Everyone has a job and we do it. We are put where our skills are best used. Great. Since not many computers need fixing, I get to be a guard. Well we tested out on the weapons we had, and what we unlocked from the armory cabinets to see who could and could not shoot. This in the long run saves ammunition. Luckily (or unluckily) I was pretty good with the AR-15. My eyesight was not good enough to be a sniper, but I was okay with anything within 300 yards. Especially human sized at that distance. So I got to be a guard and worked my way up in the informal military hierarchy to Sergeant. I was given a 12 person team, 12 of us dumb enough to do what we were told. I had a few ideas, some were implemented, and some were not. Was I pissed? Sure at first but then I was not looking at the big picture.

Between them, Dad and the Major, we were getting the Depot very defensible. We took runs over to the Lowes store and Wal-Mart. Both had been closed ‘due to illness ‘or just no one showing up. The town itself was a ghost town, only us and maybe one other car, usually leaving. No foot traffic, a lot of abandoned vehicles, (why is that? You would think, only in the movies do people give up their car, this is America after all.) and a few houses with their front doors left open. Coyotes were EVERYWHERE. Damn vermin were bad enough before all this started sliding into Hell, but now much worse. If the Zombies want to eat them, have at ‘em, I say. We are still working at ‘collecting and securing’ (Let’s be honest here, we were armed looters. We never hurt anyone and actually helped a few people load up on stuff before we took ours and even after we invited them to come help us.)during this time, most news feeds were down, the sat-uplink at the Depot unresponsive, and the shortwave full of horror. But still, no Zombies, no mass riots, no nothing, just a lot of empty places. We met a fewer and fewer people and tried to get them to pack in with us. We either got the feigned smile (We-know-you’re-crazy, but-we-will-be-friendly-and-not-make-any-sudden-moves smile.) or the ones getting out of dodge for the hills. Harlan and places like that should be filling up with refugees by now. None decided to come with us. So we continued to pack it in and build. That was Sunday the 7th.

I told the Major I need to go talk to Odessa’s older brother and said I would use my truck to go see them. He told me to use one of the Humvees in case they would finally come back with me. The Major is strict by the book, but he knows the score on a lot of things. We were lucky, when we ‘appropriated’ the Depot, it came equipped with 9 Humvees (should have been 12, 3 were gone when we got here.) 6 large cargo trucks (6X6’s or the modern equivalent to a Deuce and half.) and 2 APV’s (Armored Personnel Vehicles. Kind of like small tanks with only one machine gun mounted on top). These would come in handy in the days ahead. We also had a Sherman Tank out at one of our parks, but we didn’t have enough parts to get it going again, and if we did we had no ammo for the main gun. So my Buddy John decides to come with me. John has his wife in the Depot and his son and daughter in law, who happens to be pregnant. He came along to get away from the constant carpentry work, since they found out how good he is at it. So off we trundle the empty streets to see if my stubborn brother-in-law wants to come with us finally.

The streets are really empty and a cold wind seems to seep into the Humvee. I mention to John, I have seen horror movies like this. We both laugh. Then a man stumbles into my path from out of nowhere. I slam on the breaks but the big truck just keeps sliding and then a sickening thud as the front bumper meets body. We both jump out of the truck as soon as it is stopped and run to the front to take a look. I can see a hand and arm sticking from under the truck. Oh God. I just hit someone, they may be dying. Think, what do I do? John looks around and says look, we are half a block from the hospital. We can see an ambulance sitting at the emergency entrance with its lights on. I ask John should I back up or what? He says wait and gets down to look at the poor guy I hit.
‘He’s still moving, I just think he rolled under the truck, he’s coming out from underneath.’
John grabs the guy’s hands and pulls. (I know, I know, not what you do in an accident, but what am I, a paramedic?) A rancid odor hits my nostrils as John, now sitting on the ground and bracing his feet on the truck, pulls the guy out. Maybe I should jog down and get the paramedics was the thought I had when John screams ‘Jesus’ and scrambles back from the truck on his butt, kicking with his feet.

This can’t be good, I should not look. The ‘person’ is wiggling out from under the Humvee, at least the top half is. The first Zombie I meet and I hit with my car. Sigh. John is now on his feet and moving back around to his door. I stand there perplexed looking at this half-man creature scrabbling across the blacktop, when the smell hits me again. It ‘sees’ me (or smells me, who knows.) and twists toward my feet. I am still staring like a rat watching a snake, looking at white glazed eyes looking up at me and a mouth snapping like a machine as it gets closer by the second, when John reappears and shoots it in the back with his pistol. The old gun’s (An old cowboy style .45 caliber) blast breaks the spell. Shit what am I doing? John pumps another round into it, but it is not stopping. I blink, it’s almost within clawing distance, and I move back, just 2 steps, but it triples my distance. Another blast hits where its heart should be.
‘John, shoot it in the head!’ I yell, nearly deaf from the shots so close to me. That’s the kind of stuff they don’t show you in the movies or on TV. Firing a gun, any gun, unless it has a suppressor is NOISY. You can lose your hearing quick. John adjusts his aim (I see it coming and start to turn, but of course am not fast enough) and ‘POW’ the head explodes. On us. All over us. Luckily in retrospect, neither one of us got any fluids in our eyes or mouths. It twitches a few seconds then stops. I look toward the hospital and see people coming this way. I tell John people are on their way here to see what happened, and we will probably have to deal with the police. I guess I was still in shock thinking that way. John grabbed my shoulder and told me to look closer. Squinting I noticed they were not running but kind of walking toward us.
‘Shit man, they are more of those things. Let’s get the Hell outta here.’ He is already around the truck and inside by the time I can register that they are a bunch of zombies shuffling towards us. I shake my head, look again and jump into the Humvee. Starting it up, I pull away and grimace as the rear of the truck goes up and over something. We have two choices at this point. Turn around in the street or drive through them. I ask John what he thinks.
‘Hell man, run over the dead sonsabitches.’
So I do. I floor the large truck and with the diesel engine whining we plow our way through the crowd. John tells me later he watched as we went by and they were pouring out of the hospital emergency doors. A lot had hospital uniforms on.