Something fell over in the darkness to his right, and Gartrell turned toward the southbound tunnel. He shouted a curse when he saw literally dozens of stenches pushing their way through the man-sized openings in the wall that separated the northbound tracks from the southbound one. Some of the zeds were only feet away.
Gartrell fired and dropped three of the zombies instantly. He blew the leg off another, and a fourth he blasted back with a shot to its chest. Jaden came alive on his back, writhing and screaming, and Gartrell’s fifth shot missed its target entirely, and the sixth only decimated one of its shoulders. Undeterred by the gruesome damage, the ghoul lurched toward him, flailing about in the darkness with its one good arm. It missed Gartrell by inches, and the first sergeant unslung his AA-12 and swung it at the zombie’s head with all his strength. The blow knocked the stench to the deck, but another one sprang up to take its place as Gartrell cast the AA-12 aside and ripped his MP5 from its tactical truss. Holding it in one hand, he clicked off the safety and ripped off a burst, moving the submachine gun from right to left. It was mostly a waste of ammunition, but the sudden fusillade of nine millimeter rounds knocked the zeds back a few paces, giving him the opening he needed. He grabbed Jolie’s arm in his left hand and yanked her away from the wall. He took off at a run, heading north, as she stumbled along after him. She made little noises in her throat, but Gartrell was certain the zeds behind couldn’t hear them; they must have been deafened by the gunfire, and their own moans filled the subway tunnel with a creepy, ululating cacophony. Jaden continued writhing on Gartrell’s back, whimpering as he bounced up and down in time with the soldier’s gait.
Behind them, he heard the dead as they surged up the tunnel in pursuit. Ahead, two more zeds appeared, crossing over from the southbound tracks. Gartrell fired on the move, three shots resulting in two fatal hits-a terrible ratio, given his current ammunition state. The walls of the tunnel were coated with a grayish material that he presumed was some sort of fireproofing. It seemed to capture what little illumination there was in the tunnel. Gartrell made Jolie grab onto his belt-it took more time than it should have, but he couldn’t speak-then he fished around in his pocket for another infrared chemlight. He found it, activated it, and hurled it down the tunnel before them. Light blossomed through the NVGs, and he saw the remainder of the northbound tunnel was clear…but in the distance, at the very edge of the goggles’ acuity, he thought he saw some sort of obstruction.
Jesus, what the fuck could that be?
And then, more zombies crossed over from the southbound tracks. They stumbled through the darkness, completely blind, but they sensed the activity in the tunnel, and that activity meant there was a chance at finding food.
Jaden struggled again, and Gartrell moved forward, heading for the zombies ahead. He knew the light infantry troops were in that direction, and if he could do anything to close the gap, then that was what he would do.
“Jolie, stay with me,” he whispered over his shoulder. “If you drop behind, they’ll get you.”
“I know.” Her voice was more whimper than whisper. “If anything happens to me, take care of my son.”
“Roger that.”
Gartrell advanced toward the zombies milling about ahead, pulling ahead of the stenches to the rear. Their footfalls were as quiet as possible, but he doubted the zeds could tell the difference between their steps and their own. As he closed on the group, he made sure his last magazine of MP5 ammunition was where it was supposed to be-he would need it in a hurry. It was. He shouldered the weapon and took aim at the zombie closest to him, about thirty feet away. It stared unblinking into the darkness, as stupid as a fire hydrant and about half as good looking.
The quick tie binding Jaden’s left ankle to him failed suddenly, and the boy shifted crazily on his back. He cried out as the pain in his wrists doubtless doubled. Jolie grabbed him, tried to keep him steady, but the young boy screamed and thrashed, his voice hoarse and dry, but still it echoed throughout the tunnel. The zombies ahead of them turned to the south as if of one mind, and they rushed toward them as fast as they were able. Then one of them went down, tripping in the darkness; the rest of the stenches piled up on the first, falling like a line of dominoes.
Gartrell pulled his knife and cut the quick ties that bound Jaden to him. “Jolie, grab Jaden and move to the right-flatten against the wall there! Keep him out of the way, then get the flashlight out of your pack. Don’t turn it on, just let me know when you’ve got it!” he said as Jaden slipped off his back. He held on to the boy’s left wrist, preventing him from collapsing to the ground. If that happened, he didn’t want Jolie fishing around in the darkness trying to find him. “Do you have him?”
He felt Jolie tug Jaden away. “I have him! We’re moving to the wall!” He heard her shrug off the backpack, and it hit the ground next to the wall.
Gartrell shouldered the MP5 and blasted two zeds through the head, dropping them as they rose to their feet. He then turned at the waist and fired at the mass of zombies behind them. He dropped one zed, then another, the nine millimeter projectiles blasting furrows through their skulls. He turned back to the north and fired again, one round per stench, firing with a quick precision that belied the near-panic that nibbled at the edges of his discipline and threatened to overwhelm him. If that happened, then they would all die.
And Gartrell wasn’t ready to die just yet.
Especially when a lady and her autistic son were depending on him.
So the zombies fell to the rails like clockwork. Every shot he fired resulted in a bullet punching through a stench’s skull, turning the remains of its brain into something like watery oatmeal, and blasting a good portion of that goo out the other side as the bullet continued on its merry way. He counted off the shots as he went, even though he didn’t know how many rounds were still in the magazine after he had ripped off on full auto earlier.
One.
Two.
Three.
Four.
Five.
Six.
Seven.
Eight.
Once he had created a buffer zone between himself and the zombies to the north, he turned and engaged those rolling up on them from the rear. They were close, much closer than he had expected them to be, only fifteen feet from where Jolie crouched over Jaden. She hugged her screaming son to her chest with one arm, her lips pressed against the top of his head as she rooted through the backpack with her other hand. Gartrell dropped the leading zed as it lurched toward them, zeroing in on Jaden’s cries.
Nine.
Ten.
Eleven.
Twelve.
Thirteen.
Fourteen.
The MP5 ran dry then, and Gartrell ejected the spent magazine and slammed the new one into the weapon. He yanked back on the cocking lever and cycled a round into the chamber and resumed firing.
One.
Two.
Three.
Four.
Five.
“I have the flashlight!” Jolie said.
“Turn it on and shine it at them, both sides of the tunnel! Make sure those fuckers see it!”
She did as he instructed her to without hesitation. The zombies blinked at the sudden bright light, their dead pupils slowly narrowing to pinpoints. But when they charged forward, emboldened by the light, Jolie cried out in horror.