There was a clear path on the road, and Jeff knew the National Guard must have created it so traffic would continue to flow despite every citizen’s impulse to turn the thoroughfare into a giant parking lot. It was tricky navigating past the dead cars and military vehicles, and he was forced to pull into the grass on the side of the road to get around several clusters of more overturned and smashed Humvees.
Blood-soaked signs with hastily scrawled messages were tacked to several telephone poles. They all read the same: “Civilian vehicles must go north or south! Please do not abandon your vehicle on Route 28: it will be removed from the roadway. Personal items are subject to inspection and confiscation. NO civilians are allowed to carry firearms or explosives beyond this point. Violators will be shot!”
It appeared as if several makeshift checkpoints had been set up and then smashed and trampled. Jeff and Megan looked out at the wasteland around them, fighting back nausea at seeing the remains of countless dead soldiers and civilians. They were impossible to miss, because they were everywhere. Thick clouds of circling flies blackened the air above the corpses.
Not only was there a wide array of severed body parts spread across the pavement and grass, there was a slew of weapons as well. Jeff saw rifles, sidearms, grenade launchers, and even a few flamethrowers. Scorch marks on the roadway and vehicles hinted at the massive battle that must have taken place in the area. Night vision goggles, shattered and useless, were also strewn about.
Thousands of spent cartridges surrounded several heavy machine gun emplacements. They had been spit out at a tremendously high rate of speed and bounced off concrete barriers that had been set up in a feeble attempt to block the advance of what must have been a horde of the infected. They could hear the sound of countless hollow metal shells being crushed beneath the van’s tires as they rolled on. All the weapons, the belt-fed machine guns and the fifty-caliber M-2s, along with the grenade launchers, M16s and M4s, had fallen to the ground. Tripods and other mounting devices were smashed and broken. Jeff wondered how many useable weapons were still lying around, and he felt the itch of desire to stop and snatch something up once again. The temptation passed as he saw a group of rotters congregating nearby. They were stumbling around clusters of military equipment, and he spied several shadows moving on both sides of the road, back near the buildings and behind them.
Without warning, several ghouls popped up in front of them, jack-in-the-box fashion. It was almost as if they had magically appeared in front of the van, banging, moaning, and trying to climb on the hood as Jeff hit the brakes. Megan burst out with a high-pitched squeal, and Jeff shouted “Jesus Christ!” as the monsters slavered and slouched toward them.
Megan shoved herself backwards in her seat, her hands pressed against the dash. “Go around. Go around. GO AROUND!” she repeated as she pulled her legs up underneath her chin.
“SHUT UP AND LET ME THINK!” Jeff screamed.
Megan chirped one last time and then fell silent, turning her full concentration toward scrunching into the tightest ball possible. Jeff gripped the steering wheel, looking frantically out at the front of the van. For the moment, the five or so stiffened figures pounding on the hood were their only immediate threat. More were coming from all directions, but were farther back.
Two of the five wore flak vests with the digital patterned camouflage that had become the standard with the military over the past few years. Another was in a MOPP, or chem suit, that had been ripped open, exposing a shattered ribcage. The mask had also been torn off and dangled freely from its neck. The monster’s exposed face was free of flesh and gave Jeff a skeletal grin. The other two appeared to be civilians. None was in great shape, their clothing shredded and their flesh cracked and burnt from endless days exposed to the summer sun. But even in their present condition, Jeff knew they could make some serious dents in the van if he allowed them to keep whaling on it.
There was no room to turn around. Not much possibility of driving past them either. More were coming and closing rapidly. He flipped the van in reverse and hit the gas.
Megan popped her head up from behind her knees, and her eyes went wide as she felt the van moving backwards.
“Wha-what are you doing?” The panic in her voice rose as she repeated the question. “NO NO NO! We can’t go back!” She reached for the wheel, and Jeff swatted her hand away with a stinging slap. She pulled back and held her hand close to her chest as she gave him a horrified look, pain and terror battling for supremacy on her face.
“I’m just giving us some room to maneuver,” he said, fighting to keep the wheel straight. The loud thump startled them both, and the bounce, like they had hit a large speed bump, sent the minivan careening out of control. Jeff’s head slammed into the headrest as they came to a stop against one of the Humvees that lined the street. He quickly recovered and looked out the back window of the Odyssey.
The rear window was splattered with a trail of something dark and viscous. It dripped from the point of impact, where a piece of something still quivered like a blob of coagulated chocolate pudding. After a couple seconds, it left a snail trail as it slid to the ground. Jeff thought he had seen a tooth in it. He flipped the car into drive and heard moaning coming from below the vehicle.
“I guess you didn’t finish it off.” The sudden jolt of hitting the Humvee had allowed Megan to regain some of her senses. Her arms were crossed as she chided Jeff.
He smiled and began to accelerate. “Got it covered.” The next thump had a more sickly sound to it when they ran over the body again. Megan shivered involuntarily as a wet, greasy popping noise completed the effect. The revulsion was short-lived, and she focused on the group in front of them. They were closing on the minivan.
“Brace yourself.”
Megan gripped the edge of the dashboard with both hands as Jeff floored it, heading straight toward the wall of flesh in front of them. The impact was surprisingly quiet. The rotters were spread out, and Jeff managed to avoid one, nick two, and only plow head-on into the final three. One was so ripe and bloated that it exploded like a balloon, spreading its insides over the front of the vehicle.
Megan watched the ghastly pseudo-human disintegrate, eyes bugged out. The head must have been mush to begin with, because it did not sound or look like any bones shattered on impact. It was a pinata with eyes, but instead of candy, it was filled with a brackish jelly that ran in thick ropes down the window. Megan tried to bend over, to get some blood to her head. She felt dizzy and nauseated. Her seatbelt locked, forcing her to stay upright. Acid splashed up from her stomach and caught in her throat, bits of the chips she had eaten that morning revisiting her mouth.
Jeff nailed another stiff dead-on, and its head thumped hard against the hood before it was sucked under the vehicle. The last one, the one closest to him, was the tallest of the trio, and the point of impact was at its midsection instead of its chest. Its legs connected with the bumper and were crushed on impact, though it seemed unconcerned as its right arm landed next to the side view mirror. It latched onto it and pulled itself onto the windshield directly in front of Jeff. Its other arm clawed at the window.
It glared woefully at the driver. One of its eyelids was gone, along with a good chunk of the bushy brow above it. The lower lip was in tatters, now just a ribbon of flesh that had gone green with some sort of bacterial growth. The ghoul pressed the ragged flap of skin onto the window’s surface and formed a ring on the glass. Jeff watched, hypnotized, as its shattered, yellow teeth drew little lines on the windshield when the lips opened and closed. A blackened tongue darted between them, depositing soupy globs of saliva on the glass.