Rot Series (Book 3): Rot III Read online

“It is,” Ana told him as she put a hatchet in each fist, “It was my friend Lumpy’s. He sharpened it countless times himself.”

  “Do you want me not to use it?” Bo asked, “I’m sure I can find something else.”

  “No, Lumpy would be cool with it.”

  Bo felt the edge, said, “He did a good job.This thing is razor sharp.”

  “You should have seen it before it dulled cutting up the infected.”

  Bo nodded and turned his attention to the house. He saw Gavin getting out of the Suburban and said, “Stay in the car kid.”

  Gavin did not seem to like the idea, but he went back inside.

  “You do the same,” Vance said to Donna, “Stay behind the wheel and keep it running. If we need to get out fast I don’t want anyone fumbling with the keys,” he looked to Bar, “Stay here and cover Donna. Kate why don’t you do the same.”

  “Who made you boss?” Katelin, who was holding twin hatchets like Ana, said.

  “Listen to your dad kid,” Bar said as he plucked a baseball bat with nails jutting out of the top, “He knows what he’s doing.”

  “I can handle myself.”

  “I know, that is why I want you out here with me. I’m down to one arm you know.”

  “Fine.”

  “Me and the surfer will go around back,” Clay said.

  “You can call me Bo.”

  “Do you surf Bo?” Clay asked.

  “Everytime I get the chance.”

  “Then you can be the surfer. You good with going around back?”

  “Yeah.”

  Vance nodded and looked at Ana, “I guess it is you and me going in the front.”

  As Clay and Bo went around the back Ana and Vance stepped to the front door.

  “What if someone is home and they aren’t infected?” Ana asked.

  “I suppose we should ring the doorbell,” Vance said.

  Ana rung the bell. They waited. When they heard nothing Vance got ready to kick in the door.

  “Hold on,” Ana said, “I heard something.”

  Vance paused and listened, “I don’t hear anything.”

  “Let me try the bell one more time,” Ana said as she pressed the button.

  Vance was getting ready to tell her it was a waste of time when a female voice from inside said, “I’m coming.”

  While they waited Vance said, “Good catch.”

  “Thanks.”

  After a minute the same voice said, “I’m going to ask you nicely not to rob me. You can come in and I will help anyway I can. There is no need to rob me.”

  “We don’t want to rob you,” Vance said, “We just need somewhere for some of us to hole up for awhile.”

  “How long?”

  “A couple of hours at most and then we will leave you and your house the way we found it,” Vance told her.

  A middle aged woman opened the door, “I’m Caroline.”

  “Eric, but people usually call me Vance.”

  “I’m Ana.”

  Caroline shook both their hands and said, “I’ve been watching you guys. I’ve seen the uniform you are wearing on television. Two of you are TMRT right?”

  “We were. Can we come in? I will tell you the whole story, but I would prefer to tell it inside.”

  She stepped aside, “I can see why you would feel that way, though I think we are relatively safe. Most of the neighborhood actually got evacuated. I’m one of the few left behind. I’m afraid I may be only one who hasn’t got the rot. I could be wrong I have been too scared to go out and check on my neighbors.”

  “Probably smart to stay inside,” Ana told her, “It can be dangerous out there.”

  “I believe it,” Caroline replied, “There were infected roaming around earlier but they all gathered and left. It was like something was calling them.”

  “Something probably was,” Ana said as the four left by the Urban Assault Wagon made their way inside. Vance went to the other side of the house and let Bo and Clay in. Saving Caroline’s sliding glass door from being the first victim of Clay’s Sick Slaying Stick.

  Once inside they made introductions. Caroline seemed glad to have the company.

  “Do you mind if we check out the rest of the house?” Vance asked, “We had a bad experience the last place we stayed.”

  “A bad experience?” Caroline asked.

  “The last place we stayed had some infected locked in a room,” Donna told her.

  “Oh, I don’t have any infected. Just Grampy Gary.”

  “Grampy Gary?” Donna asked.

  “He is over here in the bedroom, I can introduce you. I have to warn you though he is not much for conversation. The bedroom is small with all his stuff. I can only take two or three of you at a time.”

  “I want to check the house,” Clay said.

  “I’ll go with him,” Katelin added.

  Her parents did not seem to approve, Clay was older but still a good looking you guy, but they let her go anyways.

  Ana saw the look on Donna and Vance’s faces and said, “I’ll go to. I can meet Grampy Gary later.”

  Bo joined them with Gavin tagging along. Bo believed Caroline about the house being empty so he did not see any harm in the kid coming with them.

  Vance, Donna, and Bar followed Caroline into the downstairs bedroom. Caroline was right, there was not a lot of room in there. Most of it was taken up by a long black metal tube. A wrinkled gaunt face with clear tubes in his beak like nose poked out of one side.

  “Is that an iron lung?” Bar asked.

  “The proper name is a negative pressure ventilator, but yes this is what was popularly called an iron lung. The man inside is my dad. My sisters kids called him Grampy Gary and it stuck so soon enough everyone was calling him that.”

  “Aren’t those obsolete?” Donna asked, “I thought they quit using them years ago.”

  “They aren’t obsolete to my dad. It’s keeping him alive. You’re right, they quit using these awhile ago, but it works and it is paid for and he unfortunately has been using it to stay alive long before they became obsolete. There are some still using the iron lung and my Grampy Gary is one of them. I’d say there are less than a dozen of them left.”

  “How?” Vance asked.

  “Polio when he was young, his respiratory system was paralyzed. He has been in the iron lung over sixty years.”

  None of the three was sure what to say to that.

  “As you might guess the people doing the evacuation had no way to accommodate him and I couldn’t leave him. There was supposed to be a bus for special needs cases such as his, but I don’t think they are coming now.”

  “No, I would say they’re not,” Vance told her.

  “You’re TMRT,” Caroline said, “You can get us out can’t you?”

  “Not exactly,” Vance said.

  “What does that mean?”

  Vance did not answer.

  “We have a possible way out in Oregon,” Donna told her. “We are going by boat. There is something we need to do first and then we are leaving.”

  “I don’t think Grampy Gary can get on a boat.”

  They all agreed but did not say.

  “You can’t help us can you?” Caroline said.

  “No,” Vance said, “We can’t.”

  “Does that mean you want us to leave?” Donna asked.

  “No. You’ll understand if I don’t want to share my food since it may have to last me awhile.”

  Vance nodded, “Like I said before some of us just need somewhere safe to stay while the others go get something.”

  “Then you are welcome in my home.”

  “Can I ask one more favor?” Vance asked.

  “Of course,” Caroline replied.

  “Do you have a computer I can borrow?”

  “Yes, right this way.”

  They met the others in the front room.

  “House is clear,” Clay said. He looked at Caroline, asked, “Are those Grampy Gary’s clothes I saw upstai
rs?”

  “No, Those are my husbands.”

  “Husband?”

  “Yes.”

  “It looked like there was another guy’s room up there, like a teenager,” Katelin added.

  “That’s Tanner’s room.”

  “Is your husband and your son still around?” Ana asked picturing an infected middle age man and his teenage son locked away somewhere.

  “Tanner is not mine, I would never have a child like that. I have two children of my own, both grown and living back east and they never did the things Tanner does.”

  She paused to see if anyone wanted details of Tanner’s misbehavior. When no one asked she continued.

  “He was Doug’s kid from a previous marriage. My husband was evacuated and Tanner went with him. My husband was very clear he was not going to risk staying and becoming infected on Grampy Gary’s behalf. I think he is a little bitter about Grampy Gary being such a big part of our lives once my sister could no longer take care of him. Tanner for all his many faults offered to stay, I think he really likes Grampy Gary.”

  Everyone breathed a sigh of relief there were no infected stuffed in a closet somewhere.

  Caroline continued, “Anything he left is yours to take. Even if he comes back someday I figure he left it so it’s mine to do whatever I want with. If it wasn’t so early I’d offer the beer he left in the fridge.”

  “Early? I was thinking it was getting kind of late,” Bar said.

  “Is that a good idea with your arm and the pain meds?” Donna asked.

  “Good idea? No. Excellent idea? Yes.”

  “You’ll find them in the refrigerator in the garage,” Caroline said.

  “Honestly, I would not mind a beer myself,” Clay said.

  “We should be going to get the transponder,” Vance told them, “I think we need to get that done, including securing the boat, before sundown.”

  “Sure, but we need to make a plan,” Clay said, “And while we are sitting down figuring out how we are going to do this a cold one sounds absolutely fucking delightful right about now.”

  “Good point,” Vance said, “Grab me one too. I should take some time to get online and see if Barrington has anymore information anyway.

  “Can I have one?” Katelin asked.

  Vance and Donna both said “No,” together.

  Clay found the door into the garage and turned on the light. He smiled when he saw what was inside.

  “Good thing you are an alcoholic,” he said to Bar.

  “I agree but what made you come around?”

  “If you had not said yes to a beer I probably wouldn’t have either and we would have never saw these. Looks like Tanner and the husband liked their toys.”

  Bar looked and saw half the garage was dedicated to dirt bikes and jet skis. At the end of of the garage was a trailer that looked the right size to carry bikes and jet skis. On the other side of the garage was a pick up with a trailer hitch.

  “Nice, but so what?” Bar said.

  “I’m forming a plan for getting to the transponder quickly and getting out just as quick.”

  “Using a jet ski?”

  “I was thinking the dirt bikes.”

  Bar opened the fridge, “Okay. You think Caroline will go for you using her nice bikes to dodge the infected?”

  “This may be sexist, but this stuff looks like the beer to me.”

  “The beer?”

  “Just like the beer this is stuff belonging to her husband and his son. The stuff she said she won’t mind us taking.”

  Chapter 5

  Glen ‘the Glenster’ Larsen’s Garage - Oceanside CA

  “Listen my loyal listeners, the possibility of some kind of nuke for a nuke deal is certainly real. Don’t be surprised if we ‘retaliate’ and conveniently take out some of the enemies of whoever is behind the spread of the rot on our shores. At this point, even with our excellent sources, who risk their very lives so I can pass this information on the loyal listeners of the Cam Carson show, cannot say for sure who is behind this plot. It could be Satanists, Martians, martian satanists, communists, Chinese, Democrats, or Super Saving Mart, but we do know the plot is real.”

  Tanner thought listening to the radio would bring a welcome distraction to his situation but could not stand Cam Carson and sadly he the only thing on.

  Tanner wished he could have gotten his dad or even stepmom to take him out driving more often. He had his learner’s permit for over six months but had yet to go test for his driver’s license. Both his dad, stepmom, and the driving instructor said he wasn’t quite ready. He would never say it outloud but Tanner agreed with them. No one starts out a good driver but he was shittier than most, despite plenty of experience driving dirt bikes, quads, and jet skis. Which was part of the problem, he was used to using vehicles as recreation, the idea of just driving to get from point A to point B without doing something extreme did not register in his sixteen year old brain.

  He was going to have to do some driving now if he was going to keep from becoming an anonymous member of the horde of the Oceanside infected. On the plus side for him the situation was extreme so this drive was not going to just be about going from point A to point B while obeying the local traffic laws.

  He resisted the temptation to hit the gas as the first of the infected came under the slowly rising garage door. Tanner could not be sure the Toyota could bust through the door. It was not like he could get a lot of speed backing up the two feet until his hit it. He knew if he got hung up in the garage door he had no chance.

  The door was about halfway up when a vampire rotter with tusks jutting out it’s neck bounded inside the garage and began pounding on the driver’s side window. Two slower moving amblers ducked under the door and began pounding on the back.

  Tanner wished for a smaller vehicle as the garage door was still to low for the tall SUV to fit under. The first crack appeared in the window as the vampire rotter threw its shoulder into the door. Tanner did not figure the window to survive more than two more attacks such as that one, if it even lasted that long.

  The slowly rising garage door still had a foot or so to go when the door leading from the kitchen to the garage fell and the vampire dog was first through. It jumped on the hood and scratched at the window with it’s savage paws. Tanner saw the nails on the dog’s feet had grown and sharpened to the point the dog seemed to have talons scraping savagely against the windshield.

  Tanner saw his dad crouched at the doorway preparing to leap and he let his foot of the brake and stomped on the gas. With more cracks spider webbing up his window he could not wait any longer. If the door was not up far enough he was going anyway.

  His dad landed on the hood as Tanner rolled out of the garage his roof missing the rising door by less than an inch. One ambler held onto the back as he went down the driveway while the other fell under his wheels, leaving an ugly pile if body parts and fluids in the driveway as Tanner rolled over him with both the front and back tires.

  The bump of going over the ambler knocked the dog off the hood. His dad and the vampire rotter who had been pounding on his window, however, held on. When Tanner swung onto the street he lost the ambler hanging onto the back bumper. As he put the SUV into drive he could see the dog running to get back into the chase. Tanner stomped on the gas and left it behind.

  The arm of the rotter holding onto his door pounded on the window and Tanner was showered with shattered glass. Tanner saw a parked car ahead. He opened his door as the thing reached for him and pushed it open just as it grabbed for his shirt. The impact of the bumper of the parked car shut his door and cut the rotter in half as Tanner sped by and loosened it’s grip on his shirt enough he was able to push it away. Despite missing everything from the waste down the vampire rotter somehow held onto the rear view mirror with its other hand and swung the hand that had been on Tanner back to get a grip on the door. Black blood, intestines and green bile streamed out the rotter as Tanner sped down the street. With it’s las
t bit of life the rotter pulled himself through the window and moved to sink its fangs into Tanner.

  Tanner grabbed the monkey wrench and smacked it in the forehead stopping the tusked vampire rotter’s approach. He kept hitting it, turning the rotter’s face into something resembling ground beef until it finally let go and slid off onto road with the rest of its internal organs.

  With the rotter gone Tanner turned his full attention to the road. Even with his dad still hanging onto the front of the SUV he saw the street he was speeding along was coming to an end.

  Tanner gave the brakes a good stomp to slow down and then cranked the wheel hard to the right He felt the SUV come up on two wheels but it dropped back down instead of turning over as he straightened out and hammered his foot on the gas.

  He thought he finally lost his dad, as he could no longer see him on the hood, but somehow his vampire rotter father had held on. He came over the hood and scrambled across towards the windshield. The vampire rotter that was once Doug Rutherford pulled himself around to the driver’s side and stuck his head through the open window to sink his teeth into his son.

  Tanner picked up the garden shears and stabbed his dad in one of his yellow eyes, “Sorry dad,” Tanner said as he twisted the blade and yanked it out taking one of Dad’s eyes with it. As Tanner yanked the shears free the eye flew across the cab of the Highlander, bounced off the passenger side window, leaving a sticky blob of white goo, before landing on the passenger seat.

  The loss of an eye did not deter vampire rotter Doug Rutherford long. He kept coming forward with its jaw opened wide enough Tanner thought his entire head would fit inside the creature’s mouth. Tanner shoved the shears into the gaping mouth and pushed as hard as he could, jamming the blade deep into the back of his infected father’s throat. He moved his hand as the hug mouth snapped shut. His father’s new teeth went through the wood handles with ease. The vampire rotter turned his head and while holding the door with one hand used the other to try to pull the shears stabbing through so the point could be seen out of the back of his neck free. He shoved his entire hand inside his new bigger mouth and pulled on the what remained of the wooden handles, but could not seem to get them free.