Storm Horizon Read online

  Ranch life didn’t permit Will to suffer from claustrophobia. It called upon his entering all manner of tight places- feed bins, the hatch to the scale pits, the cramped workspace in the middle of the auger system, crawl spaces galore. But he didn't like doing it. And he was unexcited about going into the bootlegger's little hideaway. But not entering would be giving into his fears, something he refused to do. So he bent low and stepped inside.

  Where he found himself pleasantly surprised. Instead of a cramped cubbyhole, he stood in a spacious anteroom with vaulted ceilings and its own fireplace.

  And guns. There were guns and weapons in racks on the wall and crates on the floor, and boxes of ammo in every available space in between.

  The anteroom was nice, but it was unlit and difficult to work in by the yellow cones of their flashlights. So the first order of business was to get everything out of the compartment and into the boardroom where they could see the weapons and decide on what they wanted.

  When they finished, they had set aside an impressive array of firearms for transport back to the quarry. They chose six dozen M4s and thousands of rounds of ammunition for the rifle. Terrence, who dug through the boxes and crates as joyfully as a kid on Christmas morning, set aside two dozen of the M4’s big brothers, the M240 and M249 SAW. They selected ten Mk19 grenade launchers and two hundred fragmentation grenades and five enormous rifles that Will only recognized because they were the same weapon as the one on top of Terrence's Humvee- M250 Brownings. Next to the Brownings sat ten boxes of fifty caliber cartridges. After some discussion, they pulled out a case of M67 grenades and made an on-the-spot edict that only Terrence be allowed to handle them. They set aside three dozen Beretta nine millimeter handguns.

  To round out the bounty, Terrence picked out five tubes like the Somali warlords used to take down helicopters in Black Hawk Down. "Those are M136 AT4s," he said, grinning ear to ear. "RPGs. They are recoilless, and they'll take out a tank a football field away." He pointed to several black trunks nearby. "Those are the projectiles. They have the regular kind, plus ones that you can set to detonate a few seconds after impact." He chortled. "This is going to be so bad-ass."

  "Especially if we go up against a herd of creepers driving tanks," Will said in a dry tone. He whistled to get the attention of the whole group. "Good work- we have what we came here for. Get the ropes out. Somebody get on the horn to Justin. And let’s everybody take it down a notch. This thing ain’t near over with yet."

  Forty-Seven

  * * *

  Justin sat on a short, hard, bench chained to the wall in the cargo compartment of the plumbing van. He leaned forward with his forearms on his thighs, tapping his foot and awaiting his cue.

  He was easy to overlook because he wasn't one of the guys always out front putting down the dead. Not that they scared him- he may not possess Will and Danny's brute strength, or Jiri's graceful moves, or Terrence's weapons ability, but he could handle himself just fine when it came to fighting creepers. But his real skills lie elsewhere.

  Justin managed an auto parts store in Sabetha, Kansas before the outbreak. And he managed it well, too. He called his customers by name and possessed the rare ability to anticipate their needs. His employees liked him, his sales and inventory numbers improved each month over the year before, and he treated the guys at corporate with respect without kissing their ass.

  He had it mapped out- district manager by the time he was thirty and regional manager by forty. Somewhere in there he’d have to fit in a finance degree, but after that? Maybe when he hit fifty he’d be a big shot at corporate himself.

  And then the outbreak occurred. He bounced around the outskirts of Sabetha for four months. He ate where and when he could find something and kept himself hidden from both the living and the dead. In a stroke of fortune, he ran into the Crandall's and their group (there were eight others with Will back then).

  As the crew grew in size, day-to-day matters like food, water, and the group’s location grew more complicated, and that's where he saw an opportunity for himself. Will might tease him from time to time about his maps and his ledgers, but he knew the big man appreciated his work. After all, not everybody could run around fighting creepers and bad guys all the time. Somebody needed to make sure the trains ran on time, to assume the responsibility for getting them from point A to point B, to keep track of the guns and ammunition, and to keep an eye on the food supply. Those tasks and a dozen others were his, and he did them well.

  But now his role involved more than telling the driver when to turn left, or counting the canned goods and reporting the number to Jiri. It made him nervous, but he relished it, too.

  A two-way radio next to him on the bench crackled in the silence, causing him to jump as if he'd been goosed. He looked around to see who noticed before he remembered he was alone. Feeling sheepish, he picked up the radio and pushed the send button.

  "Yeah, this is Justin. Is somebody trying to talk to me?"

  It was silent for three beats, then the radio crackled again and emitted an atonal, high-pitched squeal. He winced and pressed the send button a number of times.

  Will's voice came through, clear as a bell. "Stop doing that."

  Justin looked around, befuddled. "Stop doing what?"

  "Pressing the button. It clicks on this end each time you do that. If there were creepers around they’d be all over me."

  Justin felt his cheeks grow red. "I'm sorry, man. I didn't know."

  "No harm, no foul, buddy. That’s why I told you." Will paused, but Justin remained silent.

  "Are you still there?"

  "I'm here."

  "Okay, put your maps away because we’re ready for you. Remember- drive south a block and a half, turn right, turn right again at the next street, and back north a block and a half again. I took a look back there. You'll have to drive over the curb and through a plot of grass to get under the window, but you can do it. We'll have the window open so you can see what you’re shooting for. Try to get right underneath it."

  Justin nodded his head with impatience during the speech- they'd gone over the plan a dozen times. He had his part memorized frontward and backward. "Consider it done, Will. I won't let you down."

  He let his thumb off the talk button and stood. His knees popped; it sounded like far away gunfire in the echoey confines of the van.

  Danny and Clark Tullin had used a welder's torch, a plasma cutter, and a pair of tin snips to cut a crawl through between the cargo box and the cabin. Justin ducked his head, squeezed through the opening, and pulled himself up into the driver seat.

  "Uh-oh," he said, seeing a problem right off. His view out the windshield was fine. But a lumpy film of snot, blood, and saliva covered both side windows from multiple flesh-hungry creepers pressing their faces against the glass.

  "Nothing to do but live with it, Justin," he mumbled. He turned the key and the engine roared to life. He maneuvered around the truck and headed down the street. It was thick with the dead- the scene reminded Justin of a weekday afternoon at a busy shopping mall.

  "Maneuver around them where you can, but don't let them keep you from making forward progress," Danny had told him. They leaned against the van two nights before the trip and discussed Justin's responsibilities on the big day. They had attached a contraption that looked like an old train engine's cow-catcher to the front of the plumber’s van. It was a blunt wedge in the shape of a V that ran the length of the front bumper. "This will keep them from getting thrown under and gumming up the works," Danny explained. "It'll also help if you have to mow down a pack of them when it's time for you to take off."

  It took him less than two minutes to drive the short distance to the other side of the bank; the cow-catcher knocked away five creepers before he stopped. When he was close, he stopped and pushed the button that rolled down the electric window on the passenger’s side. Craning his neck, he searched the face of the building until he located the open window, judged the distance, and goosed the accele
rator. He jumped the curb and pulled up alongside the bank. A grinding, metal-on-brick noise told him he’d misjudged the distance and rubbed the wall and he winced.

  He took a last look around - the dead shuffled in his direction, but were far off at the moment – and pulled himself through the hole back into the cargo box.

  Two tools were attached to the driver’s side interior wall; a step ladder and a long pole. The van roof sported four C-clamps in a rectangle five feet long by three feet wide. One by one he positioned the ladder under each clamp and unscrewed the bolt that held it tight. After all four clamps clattered to the floor, he threw them in a corner and picked up the pole.

  Working the way Danny had shown him, he wedged the butt end of the pole against the cabin wall, down where the wall met the floor. Then he lifted the other end and placed it on the shoulder. He took a step toward the cabin, raising the pole as he moved. Three more steps wedged it tight at an angle from the roof and the floor. He threw his weight against it, trying to raise it even higher. Nothing happened for several seconds. This won’t work, he thought. Then he imagined the abuse Danny would subject him to and the disappointment he’d see on Will’s face if he didn’t come through. He emitted a huge sigh, dried his sweaty hands on the front of his shirt, and grasped the long pole. He pushed with all his might and was rewarded when he raised a rectangular piece of the roof up and out of the way. They had cut that section out and clamped it back in place the same night they made the pass-through to the cab.

  Once he got the cut-away section out of position, moving it the rest of the way was easy. It fell behind the van with a clatter, leaving a gaping, rectangle-shaped hole in the roof.

  He looked up, thrilled to see he had placed the van right on the spot, parking it squarely under the open fourth-floor window. Will and Danny leaned out and looked down at him. He waved his hands over his head, forming a big X to let tell them he was ready for part two.

  Forty-Eight

  * * *

  Justin looked forward to the next part. He monitored the window from the cargo box, his neck cranked back like a person transfixed by someone contemplating suicide from atop a tall building. Outside, dead hands slapped against the van and nails scratched at the glass; at first only a few, but in a short time the sounds drowned out everything else. The creepers had arrived.

  After a shorter wait than he expected, Terrence stepped onto the window ledge. A long rope snaked around his waist and both thighs. The ex-bounty hunter turned, paused, and stepped off the ledge.

  He half-rappelled/ half-rope climbed down four stories until he landed with a clump on the roof of the van. Standing on the edge, with his back against the bank wall, he gave the climbing rope a double-tug; they followed it with their eyes as it wormed its way up the side of the building and disappeared into the window. He flashed Justin with a big grin. "Are you ready to grab us some firepower, brother?"

  "You bet. Tell them to let them rip."

  Terrence turned and signaled Will, waiting above. Then he looked back down at Justin. "They'll be coming any time now."

  He nodded and eyed Terrence with a wrinkled brow. "When they cut that roof segment away, they left more room up front and in the back. It’s a pretty narrow where you're standing."

  Terrence smiled again and patted the bank wall behind him. "But if I'm there, or there," he pointed to each end of the van, "the dead guys might reach up and grab me. If I stay here, this wall's got my back." He laughed like there was nothing out of the ordinary about standing on an eighteen-inch-wide strip of van roof.

  Both men laughed, and then they waited. After a couple of minutes, a pair of arms set a long nylon bag on the window ledge. Somebody upstairs pushed it over the side. A nylon rope clipped to its handle controlled the bag’s descent. When it dropped low enough, Terrence grabbed it and guided it through the hole in the top of the van. It landed on the floor with a thud; Justin unclipped the rope and tossed the heavy hook up to Terrence. He muscled the weapons into the corner of the cargo box and Terrence gave the rope a tug to let the people upstairs know it was time to pull it back up.

  Working slowly and carefully, they lowered each weapon and ammunition box set aside for the quarry the same way.

  Some near-misses occurred. One of the duffel bags tore during its descent, sending two cases of ten caliber ammo plummeting down. They missed Terrence by a few inches, slammed against the roof rail, and bounced through the hole, landing with a clang and enough force to dent the floor. Twice, Terrence slipped twice but regained his footing before he fell both times.

  After a time, the thumps and scratches from outside were a steady drumbeat. "Hey, Terrence," Justin said in between bags, "how thick are they out there?"

  Terrence shook his head. "Don't even think about that right now. Concentrate on storing these weapons and not getting hurt."

  A short while later, Justin looked up after shoving one of the heavy bags out of the way just in time to see the Doc lean out and give the all-clear sign. Terrence rubbed his hands together to dry the sweat, bent at the knees and grasped the lip of the severed roof with both hands. He swung his feet out and dropped gracefully to the floor. A feat I couldn't duplicate in a thousand years, Justin thought.

  The peace offer clapped him on the shoulder. “Good work. It looks like we’ll make it, as long as you can drive us out here.”

  Justin gawked at him. "I'm driving?"

  "Oh, yeah. There's no way I'm leaving these weapons unprotected- I’ll sit back here and babysit them until we get them home. Besides, you've done fine so far. Let's go up front and talk it out."

  Justin wiggled through the opening first.He pulled himself up to the driver seat gracelessly and barked his knee against the steering column. Terrence slipped through like an otter entering its den while Justin rubbed his sore knee.

  Creepers piled around the van a dozen thick. The dead in the crush at the front reacted with a frenzy when the men entered the cab. Terrence took it in stride. "Hey, it could be worse. Way worse. Here's what you want to do- drive slow, but not so slow you're crawling. Make it so the ones on the side and in the back can’t keep up with you. Go straight, and let your cow thingy up front do its job. It'll shove them out a way for you. Don't turn to get back on the street until you are clear of the creepers." He slashed the air in front of him with his palm. "You want to keep a straight and true until then."

  Justin eyed at the dead, his lip curled back in a sneer. Blood drooled from mangled mouths, moldy lips pulled back to show broken teeth, and milky -white, cloudy eyes stared at him with desperate hunger. He felt a hand on his leg and jumped.

  Terrence gave him a gentle smile. He patted Justin's leg, tilted his head forward, and looked him square in the eye. "Quit looking at them and drive. We get the easy part- we're done. We're already home." He pointed back at the open window. "Those guys, they've got the hard part. They have to make it through all this and get to their truck. So let's make their effort count for something and make sure we get these weapons back to the club."

  Justin blew out a breath and nodded. Terrence extended his fist to him; they bumped knuckles and Justin started the engine.

  Forty-Nine

  * * *

  The inside crew formed a scrum at the window, with the members leaning against one another to watch the van depart. Will planted himself in the center of the window; his broad shoulders repelled the bodies that leaned against him from the sides and the rear.

  Justin made slow but steady progress. The cow-catcher in front did its job, shoving the dead to the side instead of allowing them to crowd together in front of the van until it could no longer proceed. The creepers grabbed and slapped at the van in slack-jawed hunger as it passed; their moans and snarls filled the air.

  Jiri stood next to him, looking at the same scene. “If we’re lucky, the commotion back there cleared the lobby and street out front and we’ll walk right out of here with no trouble.”

  “How many times have we been lucky in the past
two years?”

  Jiri took the point with a grim expression. “Not many.”

  Will gave the professor an affectionate clap on the shoulder, then made a quick circle to ensure he had everyone’s attention. “All right, it’s time to clear out of here.” He considered giving a short but rousing speech or spending a few minutes talking strategy. But, with the exceptions of the Doc and Jax, they had been together so long and been through so much there wasn’t a need for such a thing. Looking at their calm faces and relaxed postures, you’d never guess they were minutes away from stepping into an environment where the dead might outnumber them by fifty or more to one.

  So he repeated the words he’d said so many times before. “Load up. Keep your head on a swivel out there.” The crew had cleaned their weapons and re-taped their pads re-taped during the weapons drop. So when Will uttered the magic words the team stood in unison, ready to take on the dead and return to the camp.

  Fifty

  * * *

  With the Doc leading the way, they trotted single-file through the executive conference room and down the corridor Will, Danny, and Tara had inspected earlier. Danny was fourth in line, right behind Tara. He stayed close in order to watch out for her and help if she got in a jam. Of course, if she had any inkling of what was on his mind she’d gut him and leave him for dead, so he kept his role as her protector to himself. The M4 strapped to his shoulder bounced against his side as he jogged; entranced by the sway of Tara's hips, he was oblivious to it.

  They turned right at the second corridor. At the end of it, a short set of stairs led to a platform; one the other side of the platform stood the door to the roof. They ran to the door and pulled up short. A shiny padlock, out of place amid the dust and grime, gleamed and twinkled in the dim light.