Dead in the Valley Read online

  With all immediate threats dealt with, Bull motioned to a house with a red metal roof. Wade fell in behind the soldiers as they hustled between two houses, eyes scanning for any more threats. The three men were just about clear of the houses when a window beside them screeched, slamming to a halt in its frame.

  "Freeze, assholes, or I will blow your heads clean off," came a voice from inside the house on the right.

  "I would advise against that, mister, seeing how there are about 1,000 rotters right behind that little spindly fence you have up across your back yard. Sound draws them like flies to honey," Bull said as he moved to the side of the window.

  "We are not here to cause you any harm. We just need to scout out the infected over there. We need to get one of the fuel trucks at the Holtzman plant," Wade said quietly.

  "You are more likely to draw them things to us if you go pokin’ around over there," the voice said.

  "Look, mister, eventually those things are going to be here, like it or not. You are going to run out of supplies, or some noise is going to alert them to the fact there are living people nearby. You should take yourselves out of town," Bull shot back.

  "We have lots of survivors gathered together in a safe place. We’ll be able to keep power going once the power grid fails. You can come with us if you want. You'd be safer by far than in the middle of town with hordes of zombies wandering around," Wade said.

  "How do I know you won’t take what little we have and leave us dead in the street?" the voice asked.

  "Look, pal, if you want to stay … fine. I ain't going to beg you to come. If we wanted you dead, you would already be there. I have done tours in some of the worst shitholes around the globe. I don't think Harry Homeowner is going to be the one to take me out. Now, if you want to stay, close your window and keep quiet while I do some re-con or gather your shit together and be ready to move out when we are. Choice is yours. Let’s move," Bull said to his two companions.

  As the three men gathered at the back fence, they peeked into the large lot directly behind Plumley's Lumber.

  "See those two dumpsters at the edge of the lot? They are full of lumber scrap. Shouldn't be too hard to get those lit up like Roman candles," Bull said, pointing at the dumpsters.

  "We can bring the GMV to the edge of the side street and light up the dumpsters, then hit the dead with the Ma Deuce. Once we take off, the dumpsters should grab their attention and draw them all to this lot, or at least enough to get this done," Bull continued.

  "What if there are other survivors in those houses?" Wade asked.

  "There are two fences between the lot and the houses. They shouldn't be in any more danger than they already are. Once the dumpsters stop burning, they will lose interest and spread out again. We don't have a lot of choices here, Wade. We need that fuel, and with just the three of us we need to get the numbers down to something manageable."

  "Okay, you’re right. We need that fuel. Let's get back to Jessie and put things in motion," Wade said as he moved back towards the street.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  The Gauntlet

  Fear is the ultimate motivator. Nothing can drive you to be more careful and focused than the fear of dying. For me, the day we went to Holtzman Oil Company to procure much needed gasoline was a day I will never forget. Sure, I was scared at times in my life; popping the question to Kelly, the birth of my first child … both scary because of the uncertainty involved. Would I be a good husband? Would I be a good dad? Those are moments that cause heartfelt self-assessment. The first day of the zombie apocalypse was horrifying. The first infected that attacked me nearly caused me to soil myself. Nothing made me appreciate my mortality more than being hunkered down at the back of the Holtzman property with a chain-link fence the only thing separating me and my friends from a thousand flesh-eating monsters. That was fear, unbridled, unadulterated fear. The kind of fear you can feel seeping out of every pore of your body. The kind of fear that has your heart pounding so vigorously in your chest, you’re afraid the monsters might hear it hammering. There were a thousand things that could go wrong and it would only take one to have this plan end in utter disaster. I just prayed that when this was over, they would not have to write on my epitaph "Well, that didn't work like I planned."

  Wade Marshall

  ◆◆◆

  Wade and Bull lay prone just on the other side of the fence from the fuel yard. They had been lying there for almost twenty minutes. After their re-con, Wade, Bull, and Rico had met back up with Jessie and Lauren and filled them in on their plan.

  Jessie was not too happy when Wade told him that he would need to drive the GMV and play decoy. Jessie wanted to be at Wade's side as they put their daring plan into action. Wade loved him for that, but they had to stick to the plan he and Bull had devised. Jessie, with Lauren riding shotgun, would take Baker Street over to North Kent from Cameron Street which was only one block. They would open up on the infected with the Ma Deuce and get the horde moving towards them, then go back the way they had come to pick up Rico who would light the dumpsters of scrap on fire in the southwest corner of Plumley's fenced-in lot. He would have to run about a block to Baker Street to meet up with them, but if all went according to plan, he would be just about to Jessie by the time the Ma Deuce was unleashed on the infected. Once the dead began moving, hopefully the burning dumpsters would draw them in and Jessie, Rico, and Lauren would be in route to rendezvous with Wade and Bull.

  As Wade and his group had sat in front of Harry Homeowner’s house planning the operation out, Harry's wife had helped him come to a decision. He came out and apologized for pointing the gun at them and asked if he and his family could come back to the farm. Turns out Harry, who was really George Avery, didn't have to think too hard when his wife Amber said she was taking the children and going regardless if he stayed or not. They also had their neighbors Steve and Jenny Mongold hiding with them.

  “Okay, you have about thirty minutes to load all the food and essentials you can into your vehicles. Once you’re loaded, drive out Route 11 a couple of miles. Find a quiet spot to wait for us. Stay in your cars and keep as quiet as possible. As soon as we have what we came for we will meet up with you. If for some reason we haven’t showed up in an hour use this map to get to the farm and tell them Wade sent you,” Wade said, handing him the hastily drawn map.

  Wade and Bull had left on foot then, working their way back to the fuel depot, moving slow and steady and utilizing all the cover they could find. Now they waited for the fireworks to start and hopefully draw the bulk of the infected away from their prize.

  Wade glanced down at his watch for the tenth time at least in as many minutes. He listened to the shuffle and incoherent moaning of the infected. There was a steady droning buzzing sound he couldn't quite place until he raised a bit. A black cloud hovered over the horde of infected. There was a solid cloud of flies where the dead shuffled aimlessly between the two factories and the fuel depot. The gathering of decaying bodies must have drawn every fly in the city with the unseasonably warm day. They were easily fifty yards from the nearest of the infected but the massive swarm's constant droning buzz filled their ears. Jessie should be putting the plan in motion any minute now.

  Wade checked his watch again just as the Ma Deuce opened fire. Even though he knew it was coming, he still practically jumped up from his prone position. Bull laid a hand on his shoulder and gave him a calming pat. Wade took a deep, cleansing breath and settled back to wait for the dead to be drawn away. Jessie had been right on time. Phase one had gone as planned. Wade silently prayed that the rest of the operation went as planned. The mass of dead in the street began ambling towards the gunfire. In true herd mentality, once the group closest to Jessie moved that way, the rest fell in behind them and started a slow, determined shuffle towards the sounds.

  As the street in front of the depot began to thin, so too did the infected inside the fence of the fuel yard. Bull rose up and motioned Wade to follow. They cut the links i
n the fence as quietly as possible and soon had a section large enough to slip through. Bull paused to place zip ties to secure the hole they had cut in the fence. After entering, the two men dashed the twenty yards to the nearest fuel truck and climbed under so they could better survey the rest of the fuel yard’s interior. Almost all of the infected had made their way to the street. There were still a few extremely slow-moving rotters in the vicinity, but they were headed in the right direction. From this vantage point, thick plumes of smoke were visible rising behind Plumley's Lumber Company. Bull, not wanting to wait any longer, nodded to Wade and crawled out from under the truck and sprinted towards the front gates.

  The two men quickly and quietly dispatched the remaining dead from behind and closed the front gates. They ran to the small Quonset hut that served as the office for the fuel depot. Taking position to the right, Bull waited until Wade was ready on the left then nodded and turned the doorknob. Bull smiled when the handle turned freely. He slowly pushed the door open and reacted instantly when a rotter's face appeared in the doorway. Grabbing the reanimated corpse by the side of the head, Bull, with another freakish display of strength, slammed the thing’s head into the door frame with such force its head collapsed in on itself like an egg falling to the floor. Bull paused momentarily to wipe the disgusting residue from his hands on the dead man’s clothes, then moved into the dim interior of the building. After finding it empty, they hurried back outside to locate a full fuel truck.

  "Okay, kerosene will be marked with a placard 1223," Bull said.

  Luck was with them as the first two trucks with 1223 on the placard showed they were fully loaded. Wade then noticed a truck with the placard 1202. He remembered a former home where he had used fuel oil for heat. The trucks that had delivered his fuel oil had 1202 on the placards.

  "That truck is fuel oil. It might work even better than kerosene for disposing of the bodies in the pit," Wade said, pointing.

  "Bonus," Bull replied.

  Just then, the GMV pulled up beside the fence. Wade motioned Jessie over. After finding the keys for the three vehicles, Wade, Jessie, and Bull each took a truck. Bull opened the gate and waited for Wade and Jessie to drive through. Wade stopped the truck and ran back to secure the gate once Bull was clear of the fuel yard. They would likely need to resupply at some point, so no sense having to fight the dead again. The three-vehicle convoy then set out for the predetermined meeting place on Route 11.

  Wade had just started to make the turn off Brooke Road onto Route 11 when bullets pinged the windshield and front end of the tanker. Driving down Route 11 from town was a pickup with two men armed with rifles leaning across the roof of the cab. Wade slapped the shifter to neutral and yanked the button for the air brakes, bringing the truck to a lurching halt. He grabbed his AR-15 from the passenger seat and took aim at the driver's side windshield of the oncoming pickup. The truck in-turn locked its brakes up and came to a screeching stop in the center of Route 11.

  Several more rounds pinged the driver’s door beside Wade and shattered the side window as he hunched over the console for cover. Popping up, Wade sent a couple more shots towards the hostiles, once again laying out across the console to hide from the return gunfire. Then like music to his ears, the ear-splitting rat-a-tat-tat of the Ma Deuce echoed through the air. He rose up as the GMV came flying into view, Lauren driving with Rico standing behind the big 50 cal. He sent several bursts at the pickup that was quickly starting to look like a piece of Swiss cheese. In moments, the big gun ripped gaping holes through the metal of the vehicle.

  A few more rounds from the Deuce and everything went still except for the throaty purr of the GMV's engine. Wade slowly rose and scanned the truck. Nothing was moving. Bull and Jessie, who had also realized there was a problem, had stopped and ran up to join Wade. Together they moved cautiously towards the pickup, weapons at the ready.

  Wade flanked the truck from the passenger side. When he got the all-clear signal from Bull, he ran over the rest of the way. He looked in and saw the driver was still alive, but it was only a temporary thing. The big 50 caliber had torn through and cab of the pickup and the driver had several large wounds across his chest and abdomen. Jessie with Lauren in tow approached to the bloody scene. The driver glared at Lauren.

  "Bitch, you’re gonna be sorry when Donte–"

  Lauren pulled a Glock from the pocket of Rico’s jacket and shot three successive rounds into the driver’s face before Bull covered her hands with his massive paw and slowly pushed the gun down, easing it out of her hand as she broke into tears. Bull pulled her in close and she buried her face in his massive chest. He looked decidedly uncomfortable as Lauren released the pent-up frustration and pain in a series of racking sobs.

  "Let’s go home," Wade said, letting out a long sigh.

  The group collected the Averys and Mongolds in the specified meeting place and made it back to the farm without further incident. They now had two full tankers of kerosene and a full one of fuel oil to boot. It had been a hard-won prize, for sure. Wade was completely exhausted both physically and mentally. For the last six hours, his adrenaline levels had been off the chart, and for a former desk jockey, the physical demand through the day had taken its toll. They had done it, though, and were all coming home in one piece.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  Taken

  Most people like to believe they live their lives as good people, having morals or a code of ethics they live by every day. The question is at what point do you take action against those who don't live their lives with any kind of morally acceptable code. Before the infected took over, this would have been law enforcement’s responsibility. While I never have agreed with people breaking the law, I would not have taken any action against them unless they were threatening those I loved. Now things had changed. Lauren, a young woman with a long life still in front of her, had been raped, tortured, and held captive by a group of despicable excuses for human beings. Her family and other people were being held against their will by these animals. Did I have authority to act? Was this my responsibility? In a world without order, I think it falls to those who have survived to determine what will be acceptable behavior. This most assuredly is not. I knew this conflict could escalate and possibly put those I cared about in danger. Would me taking a stand against these pitiful excuses for men ultimately put our still developing safe haven in jeopardy? Quite possibly that would happen, but I could not stand idly by with the knowledge that this kind of madness was happening in the town I had called home for so many years. I would find a way to put a stop to it, no matter what that might mean for our future. I could not allow this to continue. These animals needed to be put down. In this new existence, people – monsters – like this could not be allowed to live.

  Wade Marshall

  ◆◆◆

  The farm continued to be a beehive of activity. Tommy Jackson, who was a master builder, had taken the lead on securing the buildings on the farm. He had also begun planning additional structures that would be needed in the future. There was still a steady trickle of survivors coming in for sanctuary. Over 200 souls now lived at the farm. Amazingly, internet, cell service, and electricity were still available. This would not hold forever, so now was the time to get as much as possible done. Becoming self-sufficient was imperative before the frigid winter weather overtook the valley.

  The plan for disposing of the corpses worked better than expected. The pit had been filled with a six-inch layer of mulch then soaked in heating oil. The branches from the trees the group had used for different security purposes were then piled in the pit and the whole thing set ablaze. Since the pit was 300 yards from the farm proper, the smoke was not too much of an issue and luckily the wind usually came from the east, so it blew the smoke away from the buildings. There were about a hundred corpses in the pit and it looked to be working well. Wade felt better knowing health risks from the decaying infected would not be much of a problem.

  Wade turned from the pit and star
ted towards the house. He had called together what he considered his council to discuss how to proceed in dealing with the Lords and Masters. He wanted to check in on Lauren first, though. They had set her up in a room with several other women in the underground bunker. The bunker was pretty much maxed out. They had been forced to put cots and sleeping bags in the cafeteria area, which then had to be removed when mealtime came along. It was far from perfect and incredibly cramped, but at least it was safe.

  Jarred came up as Wade entered the barn.

  "Hi, Dad. I have an idea, but I need some things," Jarred began without preamble.

  "What's up?"

  "We have downloaded tons of documents on just about everything you can think of from farming to open heart surgery. Everything is saved in files on the computer, but we should have this library backed up somewhere. If we grabbed some external hard drives, the information can be stored in multiple places. With a decent desktop computer and some laptops, I can set up a server. Then I can run some cable to provide access to it from machines all over the farm. Bunk houses, the bunker, the main house and the infirmary once its built. The sky's the limit with enough cable and connections," Jarred finished in a rush.

  "Smart thinking, son. I’ll make sure we pick up everything you'll need to get it up and running. We will be doing a lot of supply runs as soon as we take care of another pressing issue," Wade said.

  "Those guys who hurt Lauren, right? How can people do that to someone as sweet as Lauren? They shouldn't be allowed to breathe," Jarred said with a growl.

  Wade turned his head to hide his smile. He recognized the signs of a young man smitten with a pretty girl. Not that he would not have said that about any woman treated the way Lauren had been, but Wade suspected his oldest was quite taken with Lauren. Why wouldn't he be? After all, she was about his age, and very pretty, even after what she had been through.