Life Goes On | Book 4 | If Not Us [Surviving The Evacuation] Tayell, Frank (classic books to read .TXT) 📖

that was the waterfront. It wasn’t far, but they weren’t moving fast enough.

“Thato, Lesadi, where can we shelter?”

“Not here,” Lesadi said. “Thato made too many traps.”

“You didn’t say it was too many before,” Thato said.

“We need shelter,” Tess said. “High up. Now. I’ll run to the boat, get the sailors, radio the ship, and arrange a proper extraction.”

“Commissioner!” Toppley called. “The extraction is coming to us!”

She heard it. An engine. Loud. Growing louder. She couldn’t turn. “Keep going, Leo,” she said.

“No, we can stop,” Toppley said.

“You sure?” Tess asked.

“One thousand percent,” Toppley said.

“Zach, take the stretcher,” Tess said.

He grabbed it instantly, clearly wanting to do something more useful than trailing along at the side.

Tess turned around and saw a road-dragon driving towards them. A high-wheeled dumper truck she vaguely recognised from Inhambane. But between it and them were the undead. Far more than she’d realised. Well over forty. Until the truck ploughed into the ghouls. Arm and leg, head and body, bone and blood, guts and skin flew as the zombies exploded with the impact. Others were dragged beneath the monstrous tyres as the truck barrelled on.

“Keep going!” Tess yelled to Leo and Zach, while the approaching truck followed a different instruction. It braked, sudden and loud, both doors opening. Out of the passenger side, Clyde leaped, rifle raised, firing at the partially crushed zombies even before his feet hit tarmac. Out of the driver’s side jumped a figure with a blue scarf draped over her head.

“Laila?” Tess asked.

“Good day again,” the nurse said, stopping next to the stretcher. “How was she hurt?”

“Shot in the side,” Tess said.

“Put her down please, Zach,” Laila said. “Can you hear me?”

“Her name’s Pippa,” Zach said.

“Pippa, can you hear me?” the nurse asked.

The sailor groaned. “Yeah.”

“Your ship is nearby, yes?” Laila asked.

“In the harbour, and we’ve a boat at the quay,” Tess said. “It’s about a three minute run.”

“We should hurry,” Laila said. “We need to get her to surgery.”

Oakes had followed Laila out the driver’s side of the truck, and had added his rifle fire to Clyde’s, killing the crawling undead as he and Clyde had backed up, away from the truck, and towards the stretcher.

“Clyde, Nicko, grab the stretcher,” Tess said. “Go with Laila. Take the kids. Get to the boat. Send the sailors back here. We’ll hold this position.”

“I can carry her,” Oakes said. “Laila, would that be okay?”

“Haste is most welcome,” Laila said.

“I’ll leave you my rifle,” Oakes said, dropping his weapon before scooping up the injured sailor.

“Clyde, cover them. Go!” Tess said.

Sullivan in his arms, Oakes ran at a dead sprint, around the engine, Laila five paces behind.

“Go!” Clyde said, pushing Zach, and then the children after the soldier, leaving Leo, Toppley, and Tess alone, except for a long tail of crawling undead whose legs had been crushed by the dumper-tank’s charging advance.

“The truck,” Tess said, picking up Oakes’s rifle. “We’ll hold that position. Go.”

“We’re not retreating?” Leo asked, as they jogged to the cab, dripping with blood and skin from impact with so many of the undead. Oh-so-many, but not nearly enough.

“We can’t flee,” Tess said. “We need that food.”

On the roof of the cab, she looked behind the lip of the truck bed, filled with blankets, bedding, and even a few chairs. Beyond, she saw the undead.

“Teegan, give me the sniper rifle,” she said. She peered through the scope before lowering the weapon and detaching the suppressor. “About a hundred walking. Can’t say how many crawling. We’ll draw them here. Best we get inside the back of the truck where we’re less liable to fall off when they start thumping the tyres.”

“You want to lure them here?” Leo asked.

“We have to,” Tess said. “The African Union’s stuck inland somewhere. Must have been surrounded by zoms until this vehicle broke out. Now the undead are strung between the airport and waterfront. Oh, what a mess. How much ammo do we have?”

“Not enough,” Toppley said, as she opened the double-barrelled rifle and loaded two hand-length cartridges. “But this is a secure position. A sight more comfortable than the truck in the mine, eh, Commissioner? There are seats here.”

“Looks like they were turning into a bus during their—” Leo began, but the rest of his words were drowned by the explosion from the elephant gun. Toppley staggered back with the recoil, while her target’s head completely disappeared.

“I best sit down for this,” Toppley said.

“Hold your fire, Leo,” Tess said. “We’ve found our way of luring ’em here.”

“This gun can certainly do that,” Toppley said. “I think it could sink that warship.”

“Did you sell many of those?” Tess asked, as she watched the column of broken ghouls crawl and lurch nearer.

“None,” Toppley said. “I’ve seen a few in my travels. They were prized by the type of warlord obsessed with the size of his gun. Watch your ears.” Toppley pulled the trigger, and nearly fell from her seat as the shot reverberated between the metal walls. “I plead age,” she said, holding the rifle out to Leo. “The stock has been sprung to reduce recoil, but my bones aren’t as young as I’d like them to be.”

“The kids said the three thieves had friends,” Tess said.

“Thieves aren’t exactly our primary concern,” Leo said, taking a cartridge from Toppley. Below, the undead drew nearer.

“Hopefully not,” Tess said. “I was thinking about how the locals were fighting over food. Meaning there’s no other obvious or larger cache in this corner of the city, and we’ve got to feed the entire African Union convoy. Oh, we really did walk into a mess.”

Leo raised the rifle. “But Sullivan is alive. The African Union is here. And zombies can’t shoot back.”

After four thunder-quake shots from the