Harvest of Ruin (Book 2): Dead of Winter Read online

  “Get inside, Soph!” Tim called, swinging the rifle from his shoulder.

  He shouldered the butt of the M4 and fired a rushed shot, missing the undead entirely. He took a breath and re-sighted the thing’s head and squeezed the trigger, dropping it face-first onto the stone patio as Jen and Sophie buzzed past into the house. Tim fired three more shots, killing the other two as they realigned their course and roared in towards him. With all the undead in sight taken out, he too ducked back into the house, closing the doors and bolting them behind him.

  A cacophony of roars continued outside. None of them had seen this many of the fast ones in one place. The sound of another gun shot came back to him from further ahead in the gloom of the house. Panic set in and his heart raced as Tim saw the shadowy forms of people ahead of him in the hallway leading to the front of the house. For the life of him, he couldn’t be sure who it was in the deep gloom of the unlit house.

  *

  “I think we need to continue trying,” Chris said at length.

  “Why? The noise we make in trying to rip it down is just going to bring more of those things to us.”

  “We need a way out is why,” she said flatly. “It’s pretty damn obvious at this point that we won’t be using those two doors.”

  She finished her statement, indicating the doors currently being battered by the undead on the other side. Nick thought about it for a minute before nodding agreement. He agreed mainly because he had no desire to argue; truthfully, he didn’t care either way. He wasn’t a leader, nor a follower; he usually chose to go his own path. On this particular occasion, he was more than happy to let Chris make all the decisions. He would do his own thing when it actually meant something to him.

  “Let’s see if we can further barricade the doors further with shelves and stuff first,” he said, moving towards the near barren pots-and-pans shelves.

  The two worked for a bit, eventually deciding that a barricade wasn’t in the realm of possibility. Anything they placed, no matter how heavy, slid easily on the slick grease crusted brick-red tiles. Instead, they decided to make nasty obstacles out of the heavy wire shelving. When they were finished, it looked terrible, and they both privately doubted that it was worth the effort they had put into it, but maybe it would help.

  “Think we should call it a day? Let them settle down a bit over night?”

  “Yeah, maybe even take a day or two off, see if they will disperse again before we continue.”

  They settled in for the night, Chris made another vegetarian Mexican feast.

  “Eventually, we will have to eat the meat, you know,” he stated in between mouthfuls of bean and cheese enchiladas.

  “Nope,” she replied flatly.

  “What do you mean ‘nope’?” he asked, a bit annoyed.

  “If no one comes for us, we have more than enough food to make it through the winter at the very least. If we aren’t rescued by then, I plan on taking whatever I can carry and getting the fuck out of here.”

  Nick had no response. He had been so focused on waiting for rescue that he hadn’t even entertained the notion that rescue might not come. Now he was forced to consider that they were going to be forced to spend the entire winter here. If no one is coming to rescue us, what does that mean? He tried to change mental gears and concentrate on how they were going to get the exhaust hood off, but now that the idea was tossing around in his head, he couldn’t shake it. What about his family? Were they all dead? Christine’s family? Thoughts of the implications of spending the next four months trapped in the high school kitchen nagged at him for hours after he lay his head on the apron-pillow that evening. It wasn’t until the wee hours of the morning that the sounds of undead hands slapping and pounding on the heavy wooden doors started to peter off. It took a good couple hours after that before the two managed to fall asleep, their thoughts lingering on the dead outside the doors and why help hadn’t arrived yet and whether or not it was coming at all.

  Chris spent the bulk of the next day baking. It comforted her to do, made her think of the many hours she spent as a little girl baking with her nanna. By the end of the day, the kitchen smelled of brown sugar, fresh baked bread, and chocolate. Every flat surface had a tray of cooling cookies, breads, cakes or pies. It was unbearably warm in the kitchen, and Nick, having no interest in baking continuously monitored the dead outside the doors. Unlike the crowd on their arrival to the kitchen, these undead didn’t disperse. He had a nagging thought that there was no one else for them to go after, no more distractions to lure them away. This thought made him extremely uncomfortable. He decided to keep his thoughts to himself rather than upset Chris with it.

  By the next morning, noticeably fewer feet of undead feet could be seen outside of the doors. There weren’t less of them, but with a full day of quiet behind, they thinned out a bit around the doors, although they could still be seen shambling about the cafeteria. After a brief, hushed discussion, they decided to err on the safe side and wait another day before working on the vent again. Nick spent a few hours quietly disassembling a baker’s rack to free up the rods for later use, one as a pry bar and the rest as potential weapons.

  After two full days of waiting, the morning arrived that they decided they would finish the job of getting the range hood off. They rocked the huge stainless steel thing back and forth, gradually loosening the hold the bolts had on the metal, until Nick was able to slide the baker’s rack bar in the gap. After about ten minutes of struggling and repositioning the bar, the entire hood swung down, hanging by a single bolt, before that too gave out and the whole thing came crashing heavily to the floor next to the stoves. Its final resting place pinned the cafeteria door shut, the jagged steel from their demolition work managed to find purchase on the greasy floor. Both of them stood atop the stoves, looking upward and seeing snippets of the gray sky through the roof vent. For the first time in a week, they breathed deeply of cold fresh air.

  On Christine’s first attempt to climb up the hole to the outside, she came back down after reaching for one handhold. She grimaced at her hand as she pulled it clear of the air duct, covered in thick yellow and brown grease. Nick waited impatiently, rolling his eyes, as she spent the next two hours wriggling up into the duct work, cleaning the years of accumulated grease off with cans of industrial degreaser and rags.

  Once she was satisfied with the results of her cleaning, she was able to scramble up the four-foot shaft to the roof cap. After three trips back up the shaft and a great deal of effort, she was finally able to shove the cap noisily free of the sheet metal screws that held it in place, using her shoulder. She came out of the vent and breathed the freezing damp air as if it was the first breath of her life. Her next breath ended in a nasty coughing fit after hours of abuse at the hands of the industrial degreaser in an enclosed space.

  After what seemed like an eternity of silence in the kitchen below, Nick started to panic. He was worried that she would just leave him there.

  “Chris?” came echoing up from the kitchen below.

  “Yeah, Nick. I’m up!” she screamed back down, feeling exultant.

  *

  As soon as he had taken the second shot, Tar ducked back behind a tree. The two men with automatic weapons started firing and a hail of bullets split through the air, some zipping past nearby, while other bullets thudded into boles, skipping off rocks and boughs well away from where he hid. He counted to three and spun around the opposite side of the bole, aiming quickly and firing. His shot struck a bearded man sporting a filthy red trucker hat in the throat. The shot spun him to the ground where he lay clutching at his neck, noisily gasping blood. The initial surprise of his attack was over and the last three men that hadn’t scattered to the night were a flurry of movement, either scrambling for cover or rushing to reload and bring their weapons up to fire. He could see that one of the men held a scoped rifle and marked him as his first target. The others carried military-style assault rifles, and he doubted their ability as marksmen. The man
with the rifle dove behind a log that had been dragged next to the fire as a seat. Tar’s next shot tore a chunk of bark off it.

  Catching the flash of a muzzle out of the corner of his eye, Tar threw himself to the ground. A hail of lead skittered around him, thudding into trees, thrashing through shrubbery, a few rounds striking into the dirt around him. As the burst of gunfire came to an end, he scrambled around the trunk of a great, old conifer and held his 9mm at the ready. From the camp ahead came the newly familiar sounds: the clatter of rushing hands, sliding clips out or in, and fumbling with loose bullets. Almost in unison came the sounds of bolts sliding into place and the familiar click of his pistol’s hammer cocking at the ready. Flashlights popped on and their bright beams scanning the forest indicated that his timetable just got cut to nothing.

  Tar knew he either needed to end this fast, or he needed to vamoose back to Donner. Instinctively, he knew that if he prolonged this encounter at all, that they would outmaneuver and flank him. Shit. He mumbled under his breath as moved away quickly, in a crouch, keeping the bole of the tree in between him and the others. He figured his job was done, having put a bullet in Grayson, and he moved quickly back towards the darker cover of the forest. He figured he could easily pick them off if they were stupid enough to follow. Another burst of gunfire from behind sent him leaping to put the bole of another tree behind him, as one of the machine gunners caught sight of him. He could see the plateau of the road just a few yards ahead and as soon as the gunfire petered off, he bolted toward it. They had cut the drainage ditches deep to account for the heavy snowfalls and it took longer than he liked for the arthritic man to scramble atop the tarmac four feet up. Once he was back on his feet, it took just a few long strides and before he was sliding down into the safety of the opposite ditch. He quickly rolled over and took aim as the first of his pursuit burst out of the brush. The man hesitated, panning the beam of his light to and fro, not seeing his intended quarry. Tar took careful aim and fired. The pistol echoed loudly in both directions, down the forested corridor that the roadway cut. The man fell in a heap and Tar shifted his position by crouch-walking twenty feet to the right. The campfires that lay scattered about the large camp backlit his remaining pursuers as they came out for him.

  He could see that the rifleman had taken a covering position as the machine gunner came forwards, moving from tree to tree. He assumed the maneuver, complete with the cover of a sniper in position indicated some level of experience. To Tar, that meant that both men were competent with their weapons. As quietly as possible, he crept further along the ditch, trying to limit the rifleman’s field of vision. As the machine gunner approached the road, he was left with no choice but to fire. He cursed, knowing that if the man reached the ditch, he would be in a veritable bunker, and Tar would be pinned down. He had no interest in pitting his little pea-shooter against a full automatic weapon, especially not when the automatic had a rifleman in the wings. As the man closed the last few feet to the ditch, Tar aimed and took his shot, hitting the man in the center of the chest. The quick whistle of air indicated that he had, at the very least, punctured a lung. He looked up from the gasping, dying man in time to see the muzzle flash from the rifle.

  Tar’s next realization was that he was facing the wrong way and had a mouth full of pine needles and loamy soil. He spun back around to get a bead on the rifleman, confused at what had happened when the pain on the left side of his chest set in, crippling him in agony.

  *

  “Laura!” Tim hissed into the gloom.

  “Here, Tim,” her voice hissed back from the gloomy, unlit kitchen.

  “Bjorn? Will?” he called, a bit louder, his eyes fixed on the form in the hallway.

  “In the kitchen, man,” Bjorn responded from the left of Laura.

  Tim raised his gun, aimed at the form, and crept a hesitant step towards it. The violent crash of wood splintering and glass breaking from directly behind him sent a high-pitched whining noise from his lips, the likes of which he had never heard before. Sophie screamed and ripped her hand from Jen’s grip, running off into the deeper gloom of the house.

  Tim spun and raised his rifle simultaneously. Two of the things were ripping through the decorative doors. He fired a hasty shot, hitting one in the shoulder and spinning it momentarily away. A hand grasped around his bicep, pulling him through the threshold into the kitchen. His skin crawled with fear. Another noise of terror and panic issued forth from his mouth, involuntarily, as he spun about to face Bjorn.

  “Something in the hall!” he barked as he stumbled over the body of a freshly killed undead that was likely a result of the gunshot he had heard a few moments earlier.

  He scanned the intense faces gathered in the kitchen and moved around the kitchen island to join them.

  “Follow me,” Bjorn said, collecting Sophie from where she cowered by the side door.

  Bjorn’s senses were heightened and the hairs on his neck stood erect as he ducked through the threshold into the formal dining room of the 18th-century farmhouse. Turning back to the group, filing in behind, he caught sight of movement off to the right.

  “Watch out!” Bjorn barked.

  No sooner than the warning had been called than the window of the side door blasted inward behind him. Tim barely had time to grab Laura by her hands as the upper half of one of the dead leaned in and grasped at her. Laura shrieked as the dead took two handfuls of her long black hair and yanked her towards its hungry maw. Bjorn leaned in, trying to take aim with the barrel of his rifle across Tim’s left shoulder.

  “No!” Tim shouted, afraid the shot would hit his wife or the screaming, wriggling toddler in her arms.

  To be sure Bjorn didn’t take the shot, Tim spun, sending the barrel of the weapon back towards the kitchen, from which the sounds of their pursuit were growing louder by the second. He yanked mightily on Laura, the panicked screams became tinged with pain as the tug-of-war played out. The fast undead raged and thrashed, pulling itself inward as Tim gained the upper hand. Jen flashed in to the side of the dead and thrust the barrel of her rifle into the thing’s gnashing mouth. She pulled the trigger and the struggle ended with the deafening report of the hunting rifle in closed quarters. Tim worked the undead hands free of her hair while she continued her panicked screams and shouts. He yanked her forward, away from the shattered window, and pulled her and Luna in front of Bjorn and Will.

  Tim moved around the outside of the ornate table that dominated the room, clutching Laura’s hand tightly, feeling the soft squish of plush carpet beneath his feet. The thrashing and crashing behind them stopped, replaced by heavy footfalls, running through the house towards them. Tim stopped, turning around and bringing his rifle to bear, but the bulky form of Bjorn carrying Will across his shoulders was blocking any shot he might want to take. A flurry of movement from the door at the opposite end of the dining room ripped his attention to it. Without thought, Tim spun and shot. He hit whatever it was, dropping it skittering to the ground. Its momentum carried it underneath the table. An eruption of thrashing ensued from underneath and the table bucked violently.

  Tim shoved Laura roughly ahead of him into the front corner of the room, well out of reach of the thing under the table. With his family safely behind him, he backed into a crouch and tried to make sense of the shape and movement under the table. After a moment of forcing his eyes to peer into the dark under the table, he came to the understanding that it was not one of the undead, but rather the family dog he had shot. The poor thrashing thing writhed and flopped around. His heart ached, thinking about Captain, his own dog that they never had a chance to return for after the world disintegrated. He couldn’t help the tears that came as he fired three shots into it, stopping its agonized thrashing for good.

  One of the fast undead came bursting into the room from the kitchen, roaring as it barreled towards Jen. She fired instinctively at the furious thing, putting a handful of bullets in it until it lay immobile on the plush area rug. The sounds of roari
ng and gunfire intermingled in the dining room for a few moments. Bjorn flipped the switch and the chandelier over the table cast a hazy yellow light through the gunsmoke that hung in the air.

  “Come on!” Tim growled, moving around the table and through the front threshold that led into the foyer.

  The shape that Tim thought was a person came into view and from the foyer he could see that it was an antique coat tree, piled high with coats and a stack of hats. He almost laughed at himself, and would have but for the sounds of glass and wood breaking and shattering from down the hall, where the French doors they had come in through lay. The undead were piling through the doors into the house at this point. A flight of stairs behind the coat tree led upwards into darkness of the second story. Straight ahead across the hall lay what looked to be a formal sitting room. Tim cast a quick glance behind him to ensure that the rest of the group was following before stepping out into the foyer. A violent slam exploded to the left of him and the front door shook it on its frame. A shrill yell escaped from both Jen and Bjorn’s mouths, as something slammed into it from the outside. Tim hesitantly leaned forward and made sure the bolt was thrown.

  “Up,” he hissed at Laura. “Let Bjorn go first.”

  A blast of movement down the hall caught his eye, as a few of the things rushed through the ruined French doors. They all moved into the kitchen, thankfully, giving them the briefest of respites. He urged Bjorn and Will up the stairs with Laura, Luna, and Sophie following after. He remained in the foyer, watching inside the dining room, waiting on the first of the undead to come into sight. The first rotting thing erupted into the room, whipping the chair on the end out of the way and diving underneath the table. Tim was flabbergasted as the next two followed suit. It was only when the trio started devouring the fresh remains of the dog did he understand and slipped quietly to the stairs as more of the things poured in through the French doors down the hall.