I heard the engine roar to life. The engine revved. Dave closed the driver’s door and threw the car into gear. Smoke spewed from the front tires as they spun almost uselessly, as the tires screamed in protest against dry pavement.

The car whipped around and came right at us. Dave spun the wheel as he slammed on the brakes. He brought the car to a sideways stop, and Charlene pulled open the back door. She shoved me into the car, head first and climbed in next to me. “Go, Dave, go!” she said, and punched a fist over and over on the passenger seat’s headrest.

“Where to?” Dave said, but wasn’t waiting for me to answer. He released the break and must have stomped hard on the accelerator. For a compact, 4-cylinder car, the thing had some balls. It pulled away with heart just as the zombies reached us, as flesh deprived hands slapped at the windows.

“Stay away from the bus. Go past it, just keep driving,” I said.

“They’ll see us. They’ll be watching. They’ll think we’re abandoning them,” Dave said.

“We’ll come back for them,” Charlene said. “If they’re watching, they’ll know that right now, we have no choice other than to get away.”

She was right. I didn’t want to leave them stranded. I wouldn’t. They had to trust that we would return as soon as we could.

Trust was difficult. “We will be back,” I said.

We passed the bus.

I looked out the back window. The zombies were still approaching. It looked like things might work out.

And then I saw the bus door open, and Kia stepped out. She waved her arms. She was trying to flag us down. Did she not see the approaching horde of creatures behind her?

“Dave, stop the car,” I said.

“What is she doing?” Charlene said.

“She doesn’t see the zombies. She only saw us driving past them,” I said.

Kia turned around, as if she might have heard the zombies desperate cries. Her arms dropped to her sides. She went back onto the bus. The doors closed.

Dave stopped the car.

We all twisted in our seats to stare out the back window as the zombies forgot about me, my flesh, us and the car, and were now just focused on the bus and the people inside of it.

Chapter Twenty-Eight

“We have to go back,” Charlene said.

She was right, of course. Time was limited. It sounded melodramatic, but time was now a luxury I did not have. I wanted Charlene and Dave as far away from this danger as possible. I wanted to see them safely to Mexico, with or without me. “You have more clips, Dave?”

“No.”

“Still have my machete?” I said.

He shook his head. “On the bus.”

“Take mine,” Charlene said. She opened the car door and got out of the vehicle. She pulled the machete out of its sheath.

Dave got out, too, and took the machete.

I had my knives.

“You can’t even walk. Your ankle is twisted,” she said. “You’re staying in the car. Get behind the wheel.”

“Charlene--”

“Stay!” She turned to face the bus. “Dave, let’s go!”

“Shit,” I mumbled. They were gone. Headed into a battle that I couldn’t protect them in. I scrambled up and over and plopped into the driver’s seat. I grabbed my pants and pulled my leg up. I looked at my ankle.

It wasn’t twisted, like Charlene thought. I’d been bitten.

How long did I have? When would I turn? When would the virus consume the inside of my body and kill me? It would hurt, I imagined. Death would be painful. Knowing what came next, while dying, unbearable.

I didn’t want Charlene to see me that way.

Couldn’t let her.

Turning the car around, I aimed the car’s grille at the bus and at my family.

My daughter wasted no time. She engaged the zombies from behind. They’d been pounding on the bus walls when Charlene sliced her blade through necks and severed heads from shoulders.

Her element of surprise worked, but was short lived.

The creatures now knew she was there, and she must have looked more tantalizing standing before them, than the thought of a people inside a locked up and modified school bus.

Dave hacked zombies like he was pushing his way through a jungle trail in the Amazon. Slashing to the left and the right, he cut away limbs, leaving dangerous zombies alive, but considerably more harmless.

The two now fought back to back.

I drove the car at the mob of creatures. I felt like I was in a jousting match. This little car was nothing like the bus, it lacked the cow scoop, and didn’t have the brawn and power and stamina to destroy the things. It was still a car, and when I drove into a mass of monsters, I found my new weapon to be highly effective.

Dropping it into reverse, I hit the gas, backed up and switched it back into drive. A second run knocked out five zombies, but my tires were hung up on the guts and entrails inside a cadaver's belly. I punched the gas pedal, and practically felt those innards spray from the spinning tires before I caught traction and lurched forward. The front of the car hit the side of the bus.

The bus door opened.

Andy, Kia and Melissa came out armed with guns.

Their shooting was awesome. The three of them dropped zombies.

Dave used his foot, planted on the chest of a fallen zombie, to yank his machete out of its skull.

It took too long. “Dave!”

A creature grabbed him from behind, tackling him.

I opened the car door.

Charlene was defending herself against two zombies, and the others were shooting and reloading weapons. Dave needed my help.

I hobbled forward and raised my knife high. I slammed the blade into the back of the zombie’s neck, felt the vibration of the saw skip across the spine. I pulled on its shirt and lifted him off Dave.

Blood spewed from Dave’s throat. He gurgled and spat blood from his mouth. His hand went to the wound. His fingers were quickly lost in a sea of oozing red blood.

“Ah, shit, shit, shit,” I said.

Dave’s eyes were wide open. He looked scared. The fear was evident in his stare.

“You’re going to be okay,” I said. There was little else to say.

“Dad!”

I looked over my shoulder. Another zombie was about to latch onto my back.

A gunshot sounded. I heard a bullet whiz over my head. The new hole in the center of the zombie’s forehead was perfectly placed. It fell backward, dead.

I looked to the right. Kia smiled, and nodded at me. Her gun in her hands.

I heard someone scream.

Andy was down. I saw his legs. They protruded out from under a pile of zombies packed on top of him.

Kia and Charlene worked at getting the monsters off of him.

I saw a zombie climb onto the bus.

I knew Michelle was on there. Injured. Dying. She was defenseless.

Dave’s hands reached for me, demanding my attention.

There was no way to save him. There was nothing I could do. I held his hand.

He squeezed it. His hand went limp. Eyes closed.

I raised my knife, and closed my eyes too, I didn’t want to do this. I opened my eyes and drove the blade into an eye socket. It was the easiest way to hit the brain.

Charlene swung her sword like an axe chopping wood on a stump. The sharp blade cut away heads, arms and chopped into bone with ease.

Kia fumbled with her weapon. She dropped a full clip. She slapped at her pockets as if checking for more ammo.

Someone screamed behind me. I spun around. I placed my forearm on my leg and pushed myself up into a standing position.

Melissa had her back to the bus. Four creatures had her raised up off of her feet. They tore into her stomach with their hands and teeth, and spilled her bowels.

“Charlene! Kia!” We needed to get out of here. I couldn’t see around the bus. If I had to guess, more zombies were coming. They’d be coming from every direction. Our cries of pain and anguish had to be like more of a dinner bell than the sounds of gunfire.