Two Alive, стр. 50
Baker went back to the door and bent down, “Rico, close the door and don’t open it again until you hear from me.”
Rico responded in the affirmative and lowered the shutter to the floor with Bryant’s help. When the captain turned around, he saw the boys kneeling and Miles was muttering a prayer.
“Thank you for the sky. And the air. And the sun. And thank you for us still being alive today lord God.” Miles spoke with his eyes closed. “Please watch over us… and the army guys. Watch over us and the army guys and protect us and don’t let the hive get us. Give us one more day,” the small boy whispered.
“Give us one more day,” Antonio breathed and stood to his feet.
The men watching were overcome with a religious vibe and Torrez crossed himself as he pulled a rosary from under his shirt and kissed it. Bates eyed the boys strangely but looked up to the sky hoping someone was up there watching them.
Captain Baker had long since given up on God. If God was still up there, he sure as hell wasn’t listening to any prayers. You could tell by looking around the parking lot at the lumbering infected freaks, still circling aimlessly; mutilated shells of their former selves.
There were still bodies littered everywhere, either decomposing or no more than lumps of rotten flesh that the infected hadn’t fully finished eating. Vacant cars around the parking lot were broken into or left abandoned while other vehicles like ambulances were ransacked for medical supplies. Tables, stretchers and gurneys were overturned where the quarantine check was once set up. The tents that still stood were torn and scorched and blackened from a long since burned out fire. Baker remembered the events that led to everyone fleeing into the store for refuge. It wasn’t God who kept them safe from the infected, it was the captain with his assault rifle, and Major Carver with his quick thinking.
“Rock, paper, scissors!” The two boys said in unison, and again the soldiers stared at them, confused. Miles and Antonio played the game again, reciting the words as they shook their fist. After two more times, Antonio threw his hands in the air in victory.
“I win! I get the gun and you get the knife Miles!” Antonio’s cocky smile wasn’t smoothing over the situation.
“Nuh uh! You cheated! You cheated! You a cheater!” Miles whined and shoved at his bigger brother, but Antonio barely reacted to it.
“Let’s hurry this up!” Baker called out. “Here’s what we’re gonna do. We’ll go out into the woods and all set off our airhorns and--”
“Nope, we can’t do it like that.” Antonio cut off the captain.
“What?” Baker’s eyebrow went up and he peered at the teen out the corner of his eye.
“We gotta get close first. They gotta all hear it.” Miles pulled an air horn from the deep pockets of his shorts. “We gotta get close so they all hear it.”
“If we too far away or not all them strikers hear the horns, some might stay and keep banging on the doors,” Antonio added.
“We gotta go and do it so they all hear it,” Miles repeated.
“Have you guys done somethin’ like this before?” Lincoln, the brawny, six-foot-four black guy with the buzz cut asked.
“We did it, yeah. We did it once before wi--” Miles stopped when Antonio gave him a stern look. He almost said how they did it once with the old man.
“And it worked?” Lincoln asked.
“Yeah it worked,” Antonio answered. “But it wasn’t this many strikers and there wasn’t a siren with them.”
“We just gotta get close enough with a horn and get them to chase us into the woods. It’ll work.” Miles added.
The Colombian, Torrez, shook his head. “Tienes que estar bromeando. You gotta be kidding me.”
The radio on Baker’s hip came alive and a soft voice came through it. “Captain Baker, are you guys ready yet? Those things are still going… madhouse. Over.” It was Julia in the monitor room.
The next voice was gruff and unapologetic. “Baker, move your ass and get to work! Clear those things out, over.” That was Carver.
“We gotta move. C’mon.” Baker took off to the side of the building, heading towards the dock.
Miles and Antonio followed, then Castle, Lincoln, Bates and Torrez in that order. Anderson took a deep breath and went after them with a cold sweat running down his back. A lurker lunged out at them and Lincoln took the butt of his gun and bludgeoned the creature. Then another came stumbling towards the group. Miles moved in when Torrez lifted his gun to fire. A quick knife to the temple put the infected person down and Miles turned to Torrez with a cold look in his eyes, shaking his head. The boy mouthed the words, “No guns.” and wiped his knife on the shirt of the dead infected. Torrez’s hard swallow and nervous nod meant he understood.
When they all reached the side of the wall, Baker knelt and peaked around the corner to assess the situation. The visual on the monitors inside didn’t do this madhouse justice. The screams coming from the siren were in surround sound, which made it feel like the creature was standing right in front of the group rather than at least a hundred yards away. Even that felt too close to this mayhem of fighting, screeching, clawing, and banging hordes.
This was the largest, the most violent, and the most horrifying mass of infected Baker had ever seen. Madhouse wasn’t even the