Zombie apocalypse fiction – Ruth’s story #50 stopping for the day in an old warehouse off 522 after SHTF & TEOTWAWKI

After a dramatic pregnant pause, Sam explains, “We’ve got a report from the scouts that have found a warehouse large enough for all of our vehicles inside. This large warehouse might be a good place to spend the day.”

“What about people behind billboard?” Nikola asks.

“Says here that the scouts could not get close enough from the ground, so they are going on to the roof of a building nearby to see if they can see inside.”

After some murmuring, Sam issues the move order. “Alright everyone saddle up, back to your vehicles. Let’s roll in five. Nick you keep the two AK-type weapons, I’ll send a runner back with the magazines and loose ammo.”

Our little group breaks up; those of us who were smoking either toss the cigarette butts in the bushes or drop them at our feet and stomp on them with the toe of our boot.

Shack and I walk back to my little idling Smart car and I get in the driver’s seat again. Shack a moment later plops into the passenger seat a MRE package in his hands. Since we removed the convenience light that illuminates the inside of the car when the doors are open, Shack uses a small red pen light clamped in his teeth.

Shack opens the flat MRE package with his folding pocket knife and lays the opened package on his lap while he puts his knife away. He then bites open a pair of long slender MRE packages ripping off one corner with his teeth. Reaching into the flat MRE package in his lap Shack pulls out a small, about six-inch round flour tortilla and squirts MRE squeeze cheese and peanut butter in the tortilla. Shack then wraps the cheese and peanut butter smeared tortilla into a compact tube and begins to eat it.

“Yuck, Shack that is disgusting.”

“Waant shome” Shack asks me with his mouth full of chewy, sticky cheesy tortilla.

“No thanks.”

Shack shrugs and keeps munching making another cheese and peanut butter tortilla wrap after eating the first. I sigh at my companion’s poor dietary choice and pull one of the chocolate and peanut butter Power Bars out of my Scottevest jacket.

Reaching into the cooler behind the passenger seat that sits on the floor, I grab two warm cans of beer. Looking at them in the pale moonlight, I offer one to Shack.

“Bud or Coors Shack?”

Shack nods at me and takes the warm can of Bud. I shrug back at him and take the warm can of Coors Light, cracking it open with a sudsy hiss and taking a long deep drink consuming about half the can. Shack also pops his beer open and we sit in silence hearing all the vehicles idling around us.

I am suddenly startled as a police man heavily slams into my driver’s side window. I have a moment panic that he will discover that I am sitting in an idling car drinking beer and give me a ticket or arrest me.

After the momentary panic, I realize it is a policeman zombie and he is flopping around the side of my car probably attracted by the noise. He does not seem to be able to see and is responding to the noise.

I pull my NVGs down which makes me realize how much my neck aches from holding the weight of my helmet and the NVGs. Shack I see follows my lead and activates his NVGs as well.

“Think po po zombie is worth a bullet Shack? I ask.

“Nah, he is just flopping around as long as everyone is inside the vehicles, he is not a threat and not worth wasting a bullet. You did not happen to notice if he still had his pistol or cuffs did you?”

“No I did not,” I reply.

Shack puts his beer in the cup holder in front of the gear shift lever next to my beer and tosses his empty MRE packages out his window.

“Watch my back for me Ruth. I am going to see if po po zombie still has his cuffs and weapon.”

“Alright Shack but be careful and watch for crawlers.”

I watch Shack get out and check his M4 then pull his antipersonnel hatchet off his belt. Hefting his hatchet he carefully walks up behind po po zombie and with a short horizontal swing buries the blade in its neck at the base of the skull with a wet meaty thunk.

The zombie immediately collapses and Shack pulls his hatchet out and this time with a vertical sky to ground swing buries the spike in the side of the zombie’s head with another wet crunching thunk noise.

Dragging po po zombie by the hatchet buried in the left side of its head, Shack walks to the shoulder of the road and quickly searches the dead zombie. I see him lift some plastic zip tie cuffs and pair of steel cuffs and something else from the body.

Shack pulls his hatchet from the corpse and wipes it in the grass on the shoulder trying to get the nasty ichor off of it. He trots back to our car and jumps back in the passenger seat.

“Well?,” I ask.

“Got two pair of older flexi cuffs, and a pair of nice Smith and Wesson chrome handcuffs with keys. No weapon, but I found two full Glock 22 magazines full of .40 S&W.”

Shack places the items recovered from the zombie on the floor board and we sit in silence for a moment drinking beer. We toss the empty cans out the window just as the convoy starts to move north again.

The radio suddenly crackles to life with Sam’s voice startling me. “Alright folks we are following the scouts to our rest spot for the day. Once we get the non-combatant settled and the troops fed we will consider our next course of action.”

We drive for about a half hour in silence and then take a side street off of 522. We drive through a commercial district until we come to a large white warehouse. Pulling in through the chain link fence I see that the gate is manned by the former rear guard Humvee with the M240 machine gun on top.

We drive right inside the huge building parking our vehicles in the order of the convoy. Shutting down the little Smart car in what seems like forever. I realize we have only been driving for nine hours although it feels much longer.

As the huge warehouse double doors close, I see the sun is just starting to rise. It is still cool this morning and I can see my breath. It is still unseasonably cold for even this far north.