Ground Zero: A Zombie Apocalypse Read online

  Hos nodded patiently. “I know, Jimmy,” he said. “But we’re not going to prepare bonfires. We’re going to prepare old-fashioned torches. And they’re only a precaution. I don’t plan on lighting anything unless the power goes out.”

  The young guy nodded. The store manager stepped forward, tugging his tie loose and unfastening the top button of his shirt. “What do you want us to do?”

  “Break apart a bookshelf, or find something we can wrap cloth around,” Hos explained. “There are plenty of old cleaning rags in the store room. We just need something to wrap around them if the time comes.”

  John Grainger nodded. He grabbed the young man’s elbow and steered him away towards one of the dark corridors Cutter had noticed earlier. Cutter watched the two men go. When he turned back, Hos was staring at him, like he was measuring his worth. The big man’s eyes were narrowed and cunning. Cutter met and held his gaze defiantly.

  Hos bristled. “You got something to say?”

  “Yeah,” Cutter nodded slowly, then stared the big man in the eyes. “I saw the way you shot,” he said. “You’re pretty handy with a gun.”

  The expression on Hos’s face became a harsh mirthless smile. “It’s a good gun,” he said. “I call it Visa – because I never leave home without it.”

  Cutter grunted. “But you’re also a murderer,” he accused. “You killed that man I was helping in cold blood.”

  Hos said nothing for a long moment, and when he spoke his tone was dispassionate and remote, his voice lowered and masked by the rising sounds of bustling activity around them. “Yeah, I killed him,” he admitted. “And maybe that does make me a murderer. But I also saved your fuckin’ life – and what I did is no worse than what you did.”

  Cutter glared. “Meaning?”

  “Meaning you were trying to commit suicide by trying to save the man,” Hos stabbed his finger at Cutter. “So don’t judge me.”

  The two men stared at each other for long moments, the tension between them rising.

  “Why else would you do it?” Hos challenged Cutter. “You knew when you reached the middle of the road that you weren’t going to make it dragging that guy with you. So why did you keep trying? Have you got some kind of a death wish?”

  Cutter stared at Hos, his eyes black and cold. “I had my reasons.”

  Hos grunted. “Well your reasons left me with no choice but to put the guy down to save your ass. I wouldn’t have had to shoot, if you hadn’t been trying to kill yourself saving him.”

  There was another long moment of tension, and then Hos suddenly spread his arms wide in exasperation. “Take a look at where we are! Think about what is happening. The old rules no longer apply,” Hos said. “Civilization went out the window when those undead mothers started infecting and killing people. I did what I had to do, and I’d do it again. I’m a survivalist,” Hos explained. “I’ve been prepping for this for years, because I knew it would come. I knew one day the world was going to go to hell – and now it has. Now only the strong and the prepared will survive. Now the weak and infirm will be the first to die. I didn’t cause the situation, but I ain’t going to be a victim, so don’t give me your bleeding heart shit. I ain’t got time. None of us have.”

  Cutter said nothing for a long moment. He could hear women talking urgently on their phones, and the sound of running water coming from the lunch room. “You think you’re prepared for this?”

  “As well as can be,” Hos said confidently. “I’ve got guns, ammunition and enough survival gear in my bug-out bag to make it out of the city and get clear to safety.”

  “Enough gear for you. Right?”

  Hos nodded. “For me.”

  Cutter raised an eyebrow. “Then what happens to the rest of us?”

  “I don’t give a shit,” Hos flared. “You should have thought of that before doomsday. Right now you’re safe. But once we leave this place, you, and the rest of these people are on your own,” he said bluntly.

  “You’re just going to leave us? Abandon everyone in this room?”

  “Damned right I am,” Hos said, and his voice became an angry growl. “I came into town to fetch my mother from the nursing home because I thought there was still time. But when I got there she was crawling across the floor, vomiting blood and moaning like a mad fuckin’ dog,” he snarled. “So I put a bullet in her head. Then I came in to work to get my bug out bag, and got caught here. I should have been away by now.”

  “Away? Away where?” Cutter was confused. “Where is there to go?”

  “I’ve got a place. About forty miles out of town.”

  “A place?”

  “A compound. On some land. That’s where I’m going. That’s where I’ll wait this thing out,” Hos explained.

  Cutter frowned. “What makes your place any safer than any other?”

  “Because I’ve prepared,” Hos said. “I’ve got enough weapons and ammunition to last six months, a motorbike, and months of food and bottled water. And I’ve got a small generator. It’s the kind of place that doesn’t get noticed. And it’s isolated from other properties.”

  “But there’s no hope for the rest of these people?”

  “Probably not.”

  “Then why did you save them?” Cutter was suddenly angry. He felt his resentment rise, and he clenched his fists. “Why did you save me? Why are you doing what you’re doing right now?”

  “Because it serves my interests,” Hos snapped. “I’m trapped here. Until I make a break for it, there’s safety and support in numbers. Simple. But once I’m on the move, every one of you becomes a liability. You’re dead weight around my neck. Every one of you. It ain’t gonna happen.”

  Cutter looked away for a moment, and when he turned back his eyes were dark and repulsed. “I called you a murderer,” he said levelly. “And I meant it. This is just murder in another form. Either way, we’re all dead.”

  “Not me.”

  Cutter glared. “Then at least tell these people right now what they’re up against,” he urged. “Tell them what their chances are and what you’re planning. Tell them they’re on their own when they leave this place because they think you’re going to lead them! They’re counting on you already. I’ve seen it in their faces. They think you’re going to lead them to safety – not abandon them when they’ve ceased being any use to you. You owe them that. You owe them the chance to make their own decisions, and their own preparations, dammit.”

  “To hell with them,” Hos snapped coldly. “I told you only the strong are going to survive. I’ve got my own agenda. I’m not planning on being slowed down by any passengers.”

  Cutter seized the man’s shoulder. “They’re women, for God’s sake! They’re your workmates and friends,” he snapped. “They need your help.”

  “Fuck ‘em,” Hos said coldly. His eyes were flinty hard and merciless. He shook Cutter’s hand from his shoulder. “I’m the dispatch guy. I work down here sending books round the country. That’s all. I’m not anyone’s friend.”

  “You’re not a dispatch guy anymore. Not as far as these people are concerned. You’re their only hope, man. You’re their one chance at survival.”

  “That’s not my choice. Not my decision.”

  “It is, dammit,” Cutter’s anger flared white-hot. “It became your decision when you said you were taking over. It became your decision when you told that poor woman none of them could leave to reach their families, and when you organized everyone into tasks.”

  The big man’s face turned to stone. Cutter could sense his fury. Hos’s lips became thin bloodless lines across his dark face, and his fists bunched into shapes like massive hammers.

  “Fine,” Hos snapped suddenly. “I’ll fix that right now.”

  He stormed back into the kitchen area and dropped the semi-automatic rifle on the table with a clatter so loud that the women in the room jumped with fright and fell suddenly silent. Hos put his hands on his hips, looming over them like an avalanche of angry muscle, and w
hen he spoke his voice was pitched low and rumbling.

  “I’m not leading you out of here,” he declared. “When we break out, I’m travelling on my own. I want you to know that right now. So if you’re looking to me to save you, you are looking at the wrong man. You need to save yourselves. Make your own plans, make your own choices. Once we leave this bunker, you’ll never see me again.”

  For long seconds the room was shocked and silent. “So if you’re looking for a savior, I’m not it. Maybe Mr. Grainger will take you with him. Or maybe this guy,” Hos pointed at Cutter. “But I won’t.”

  Cutter took a sudden step back as desperate eyes turned to him in hope and expectation. He shook his head. “I’m not fit to lead. And I don’t want the responsibility,” he said darkly. “I’m a commercial artist, not a survivalist. I’ve never fired a gun in my life.”

  Cutter glared at Hos. The big man glared back. The tension between them crackled in the air like electricity. Finally Hos snatched up the rifle from the table and stooped to pick up the nylon bag. He stormed back out into the gloomy warehouse. Cutter stood for a moment longer, seeing the sudden spark of hope in the eyes of the gathered women fade, then die completely, and the sickened despair in their expressions made him wonder whether he had been right to confront Hos at all.

  Maybe it would have been better to let everyone cling to hope that Hos would save them – even if that hope was false. Maybe he should have kept his mouth shut until he knew more about what was happening in the streets overhead. He stared at the women silently for long seconds, then went after Hos, back out into the warehouse.

  The big man was waiting for him, sitting hunched against a concrete wall. He had the nylon bag open between his feet, and the rifle propped against the wall beside him. Cutter stood, watching until Hos looked up and met his gaze. There was a black pistol in one of the big man’s hands.

  “This is a Glock 19,” Hos said. It was a compact, sleek looking weapon. “It’s loaded with a full magazine. That’s fifteen rounds.” He held the weapon out. Cutter took the handgun reluctantly. “All you’ve got to do is pull the slide back and let it slam forward. Then point it at one of the undead fucker’s heads, and pull the trigger.”

  Cutter felt the weight of the weapon and was surprised at how comfortably and balanced it sat in his hand. He turned it over. “Isn’t there supposed to be some kind of a safety switch on guns?”

  Hos shook his head. “Not on the Glock,” he said. “Just pull the trigger. The safety on these things is in the take-up.”

  Cutter shook his head. “What are you giving it to me for?” he asked. “I told you I’ve never fired a gun in my life.”

  “You’ll need it.”

  Cutter’s tone was icy. “Don’t do me any favors.”

  Hos grunted. “I’m not,” he said bluntly. “I’m making you useful – because right now you’re not. You’re nothing but a useless drain on supplies and resources. That’s the only reason you get the gun,” he said. “You’re pulling sentry duty. Grainer and the kid too. The three of you will alternate between guarding the steel door and the shipping door tonight, so you’ll need a gun – just in case.”

  Cutter nodded. Said nothing.

  Hos zipped the nylon bag closed and got to his feet. "Don't point that thing at anything you don’t intend to kill, and keep your fucking finger off the trigger till you're ready to fire,” he warned Cutter. “And don’t try to shoot any of those undead fuckers unless you’re less than six feet away. You’ve never fired a gun before, so you’re going to miss with a head shot unless they’re breathing down your neck.”

  Cutter nodded. He tucked the weapon inside the waistband of his jeans.

  And then both men heard a sudden shout, coming from the lunchroom. One of the women was screaming, her voice rising hysterical and panic-stricken.

  Cutter and Hos started running.

  * * *

  The women still in the lunchroom were gathered around the television. Hos and Cutter shouldered their way through the group. A lady was laying on her back on the cement floor, legs outstretched, her breathing shallow but regular. One of the other women was kneeling over her with the unconscious woman’s head in her lap.

  “She collapsed,” the woman looked up at Cutter and Hos, then pointed at the television, as though it was the cause of the turmoil. “I think she’s fainted.”

  The two men’s eyes snapped to the screen.

  A station logo was dissolving, replaced by a wide-angled view of a street. The camera had been positioned somewhere overhead – maybe on top of a deserted nearby building. The elevated angle showed a group of about a hundred heavily armed riot police, standing in two thin lines. The men were wearing bulky black uniforms, helmets and full-face gas masks, braced in a human wall behind bullet-proof shields. Behind the ranks of police were several heavy vans, like armored cars, and a couple of parked up buses, their windows barred and blacked out.

  Stretched out before the intimidating show of police resistance was a length of road, littered with burning vehicles and debris. Cutter saw the grainy image of a police car that had been overturned. The windows were shattered and blood-spattered. Nearby was a small compact sedan, standing in the middle of the blacktop as a charred burned out shell. Smoke and billowing clouds of white gas turned the air into a haze.

  Then the camera moved, panning urgently towards an intersection where a horde of crazed, blood-drenched undead were shambling in a solid wave towards where the police line waited. The camera swept across the grotesque faces and their horrible disfigurements, and then went back to a wide shot.

  Cutter sensed the anxiety of the women around him. It seemed as though everyone in the room was holding their breath.

  A man’s voice, shaky and uncertain, cut in over the sounds of the moaning wave of terror.

  “These shots are live from the outskirts of Baltimore,” the announcer explained. “Where police and the army have drawn up a last-ditch defensive line against the plague of infected…”

  The voice-over cut off abruptly, and the announcer’s image appeared in a corner of the screen. Cutter drew his eyes back to the main picture and saw the crowd swelling as it drew closer to the line of police. Then, as if let off some unholy leash, the front rank of the marauding undead suddenly broke from a shamble and began swarming towards the blockade.

  “Sweet Jesus,” Hos breathed, and despite the drama being played out live before their terrified eyes, every face in the room turned to look at the big survivalist. “They’re running,” he said, and there was a dark, appalled sense of awe in his tone. “They’re not staggering. They’re not lurching. Some of those fuckers are running!”

  Cutter looked back to the television urgently. About fifty of the undead were sprinting towards the police line. They were snarling: possessed by some mindless maddening rage that hurled them at the wall of riot shields in a frenzy. Behind them, the rest of the undead mass was splintering into fragments as those who could move faster began to break from the seething undulating body of the horde.

  The sound rose to a wail, reaching a crescendo at the instant before the first undead slammed into the blockade.

  The police braced themselves – set their legs and their balance to absorb the impact – but the collision was so violent the wall instantly began to buckle inwards. Cutter watched in horror. The police were hammering at bloody, snarling faces with their batons, and for one brief moment it seemed as though the blockade would hold, as the surging tide of ghouls crashed against the shields and was repulsed.

  The zombies drew back like a tide, and then hurled themselves forward again, this time their savage madness reinforced by the weight of those heaving from behind. They fell against the wall of riot police, demented and relentless.

  Then one of the undead broke through the interlocking shields, flailing its arms and snapping its infected jaws like a rabid dog into the uniformed bodies. A whistle sounded, and there was the dull percussive sound of tear gas being fired into t
he swarm. But it was no use. The crack became a breach, and the wall lost its integrity – and with it all chance of survival. One of the cops reeled away, flinging down his riot shield and clutching at his neck. He wrenched off his gas mask and helmet, and his face was a rictus of agonized pain, as he sagged to his knees. That was all it took. Zombies stormed through the narrow fissure, gnashing and tearing at the riot police. The line fractured. From off camera a dozen more black-uniformed troopers raced frantically to fill the gap, but it was too late. The defensive wall of police protection dissolved in a seething maelstrom of blood and horror.

  Most of the police died where they stood. Others tried to flee and were hunted down and savaged. Then a storm of automatic gunfire erupted. The camera jerked out of focus, then centered on an army vehicle. It was a troop carrier with slab-sides, and rolling steel tracks like a tank. It was painted in a drab camouflage of greens and browns, and there was a heavy machine gun mounted on top of the vehicle. A goggled, helmeted soldier was swinging the weapon in a sweeping arc across the street, ripping a hail of murderous gunfire into the zombies.

  The vehicle lurched, then surged forward on its tracks, bulldozing into the horde with a sound like rolling thunder. Machine gun fire ripped a swathe through the mass of wailing ghouls. Cutter saw bodies ripped apart and flung aside like debris. The undead caught in the murderous fire seemed to fold backwards as though cut down by a scythe.

  The vehicle churned up the road, it’s heavy tracks gouging into the asphalt as it shouldered ruined cars aside. The swarm parted and swirled around it like a storm surge dashing against rocks.

  Then the machine gun fire stopped suddenly, and Cutter saw the sudden panic of the man behind the weapon.

  Those undead who had been left destroyed under the tracks of the vehicle and maimed by the savage burst of gunfire began to rise slowly up from the road, their movements slowed, but still driven with the same blind rage.