After Siege (As the World Dies 4)

g if there was anything left of a soul trapped in the rotting corpses. One woman was wearing her nurse scrubs. Another was in a school uniform. A smaller zombie, clearly a child, was wearing its school backpack. Shaking her head, Emma tried to keep herself from falling into the trap of feeling compassion for the creatures. She glanced at the nurse, and the zombie woman's head jerked as one of Kurt's bullets blew out her brains.

“You okay?” Monica called out.

“I'm fine. Just getting the lay of the land.”

The rocking of the bus forced her to make some adjustments to her stance. She found the rhythm and it helped her aim. Kurt killed the zombies rammed up against the windows, but it was increasingly obvious why he needed Emma's help. The ones pushing up from behind pinned the dead zombies to the side of the bus forming a shield. That meant she should concentrate on the outer edge.

Emma took a mental note of the bullets she'd already fired from the weapon earlier, calculating how many shots she could fire before reloading.

She slid her finger over the trigger.

She pulled.

The pistol fired with a sharp pop.

One bullet, one zombie gone.

“Like shooting fish in a barrel,” Monica said.

It was a phrase Emma's grandfather had often used and her heart ached with the loss of him. He used to be her partner when she went on her killing runs, and now he was gone. Just like her son, Stan, and most of the world.

Emma aimed at the next zombie and dispatched it.

Behind her, Nerit fired her sniper rifle at regular intervals, only pausing to reload.

Emma counted each of her shots, handed off the magazine to Monica, and slapped a freshly loaded one into the pistol.

“Can someone kill this muthafucker trying to break the window?” Arnold yelled from within the bus.

Monica slid across the top of the roof on her tummy, hooked her foot onto a handhold to keep herself secure, and aimed with her Glock at the target. The pistol fired and the sound of something heavy falling down the hillside followed.

“Thank you!”

Over a year's practice made Emma fast and efficient. She killed the zombies one after the other in fast succession, only pausing long enough to reclaim her reloaded magazines. The bodies piled up, throwing off the balance of their undead brethren. A few tumbled to the ground, knocking more down. They clawed at each other, struggling to get up. Emma killed them too. The stink of offal and old blood wafted over her, a stench she would never get used to for as long as the apocalypse lasted. The bus stopped rocking when the last of the zombies fell. A quick look around revealed Kurt had killed all the zombies close to the bus. Nothing moved in the heap of bodies below her.

“All clear on this side,” Emma announced.

The road above their location was littered with corpses that Nerit had sniped. The older woman surveyed her handiwork for a moment then said to Emma, “We have some coming down the hill after us, but we have a little time until they're here. I took out the fastest ones.”

The back door clanked open and Juan jumped out. “We got a plan! I just need to get something wedged under this tire so it can get some traction. I need help!”

Emma glanced down long enough to see Juan kicking dead zombies out of his way while searching the terrain for an object sturdy enough to lodge under the back tire.

“On my way!” Monica pushed the ammunition bag toward Emma. “Keep us covered,” she said, and disappeared through the hatch.

“We need to buy Juan time.” Nerit pointed at the zombies shambling around the curve in the road. “I'll pick off the ones coming down the hill. You keep an eye out on the lower road.”

“Gotcha,” Emma said.

While Nerit stood near the front of the bus, sniper weapon ready, observing the slow, steady march of the undead from Lookout Point, Emma remained near the rear. The walking corpses pursuing them were far enough away to not be a threat. As long as the bus was in view, the zombies would continue to shuffle toward it. The creatures were annoyingly persistent in seeking out the living.

There weren't any zombies on the road below their position. Or so it seemed to her naked eye. With so many trees and high brush, it was hard to declare the area clear. Gunshots didn't always draw out the dead since sound reverberated in the hills, making it difficult for the zombies to locate the source.

Scrutinizing the area, Emma mentally made plans if things went sideways. If on her own in the same situation, she'd already be on the move. She learned early in the zombie apocalypse to ditch vehicles if they broke down. Being trapped in a hot, stranded car was not a fate she'd wish on anyone. The Texas sun would cook a human in no time. She knew that horror from experience. A month after the end of the world, she'd found a station wagon with an entire family dead inside. A flat tire and bloody handprints smeared on the outside of the vehicle had told a terrible story. Trapped, the family had faced a terrible end. She'd seen many things that haunted her, but she'd learned a lesson from staring at the small bodies wrapped in the arms of their parents.

Keep moving.

Don't get trapped.