Day 4

All there is is traffic. Sea's of traffic. It is mid-day and we have only just arrived on the Salt flats. Many of the vehicles are driving on the flats and there have been several accidents because of those that speed and spin-out. For about two hours I've been trying to get on them myself, inching my way over the overly packed two lane road.

Josh, for the most part, had overcome the shock of seeing these things, these killers, rip someone apart, but I could tell it was still plaguing the back of his mind. He held the shotgun between his legs, leaning the barrel against the window and stared out at the bright blue sky.

I make it onto the salt flats and take off. I aim for the mountains for several minutes before turning west again to follow, from a distance, the line of cars and those others surrounding them. For the first time for hours I feel my spirits lift as we hit eighty miles an hour and we both roll our windows down slightly to feel the breeze.

We make good time, and eventually, upon moving back to the road to have a look, saw that traffic this far west was thinned out. We are about thirty minutes outside of Wendover when we get back on the road and so followed the few cars the rest of the way to the city. Many got off, however we keep going on past Wendover to make better time. And as the traffic had thinned out significantly it is steady going the rest of the was to Reno.

We are low on gas by the time we reach Reno and so decided to stop. I had brought some cash, and have my credit card, hoping that it would still work.

The city was quiet. There was no movement from what we could see as we approached, and upon entering the weekenders city found it not empty--dead. There were obvious signs of rioting, and dead lay in the streets. Josh, in a panic rolled his window down and vomited down the side of the door. I stopped the car and got out, hacking for several minutes.

"What . . ." Josh began, "what happened?" He looks around at the bodies and the broken glass and run down cars.

I can't speak. We both get back into the van and drive slowly, looking around us. Josh has rolled the window down and is sitting awkwardly in his seat, pointing the shotgun out the window. I make my way to a gas station and park the car in a stall. Gas pumps freely. Josh gets out and starts walking around, holding the shotgun, ready to fire.

"Listen," I say, startling him. "We may not find another gas station for a while. You wanna run in and look for some gas cans? We can fill them up."

"Yeah," he says a bit shaky. "Come with me, though. This is just . . ." he stops and walks towards the doors. I let the gas run and walk there with him. Feeling naked without a gun, I lean over the seat and grab the small bat. It's something.

There is little light in the building. Only that which makes it through the large windows in the front of the gas station, past the first isle it grows progressively darker. Josh has the rifle at the ready. Preparing to shoot if it become necessary. My bat is lowered, but my grip is ready to swing at any moment. The shelves for the most part are still stocked and little has happened to them in the way of looting. I walk over to the counter to grab some bags. There, laying behind the counter in a pool of dried blood is a body, the attendant that worked the counter, with another . . . person. There is a pistol in her hand and an obvious hole in the back of the person laying on top of her torso. I step quickly back, running into Josh causing him to turn and look at the dead.

"I think," I start, but pause for several seconds, trying to get over the blood. "I think that is one of the infected people." I point to the body laying on top of the attendant. It is gray and twisted, as if his bones had broken and healed wrong. I give Josh my bat and walk towards the two, looking at the gun.

"Go find some bleach," I say, "I want to clean this gun." He leaves and I look through the shelves behind the counter until I find the case of bullets for the gun. It is a squat "six-shooter", and that is all I know of the weapon. I never owned a gun, and up until several days ago had never planned on purchasing one.

There is a shout--a scream--and I look up to find someone going towards Josh, from the doorway, the scream coming from the man . . . or creature, rather than Josh. It moves fairly quickly, despite its broken and mangled looking body.

"Josh!" I yell, and the man-thing-zombie, stops and turns towards me. It screams that odd high pitched wale and runs at me. I scramble away, trying to get behind the counter and to the gun but trip. I am still scrambling and the thing is on top of me, leaning down and opening its mouth. The teeth are brown and red and broken. It is screaming. I cannot so much as pull my fist up to try and hit it away when a bat connects to the side of its head and the thing is knocked to the side. It does not fall, however. Josh is standing there, the bat in both of his hands, held much like a man ready to hit a base ball. He rears up and swings again, connecting again with the things head. Blood comes out of the side of his head and it stumbles to the ground. Again, he hits it, each time pulling the bat back and swinging with all of his might.

I am standing now and watch as he swings until it is no longer moving.

I look at him and he is breathing hard. All he says is, "I didn't want to shoot it and get blood on you." Blood, being the most likely transmitter of the disease, if he would have shot it, I would almost definitely have been infected.

"Thanks." I am panting as well, I consider that I may be in shock because I cannot move but it soon passes and I look around. Josh has moved and is bringing over the bleach. Without a word he kicks the gun away from the hand holding it and starts pouring bleach over it. It is obvious that he, like myself, has no idea whether this could ruin it or not. While he does that I quickly check outside. The sun is lowering in the sky faster than I would have liked and we need to move. Quickly I look around for gas cans but see none.

"Did you ever see any gas cans?" I shout over to Josh.

He shakes his head for several seconds before answering, "no."

Knowing that we are running out of time, and getting more and more anxious I quickly reach over the counter and grab some bags. Josh is drying the gun while I start putting in food and some minimal supplies that are sitting on the shelves. Finally, I look over at Josh.

"You ready?" He looks at the gun, and then at the . . . thing. It is bloody and dead looking. The sky is now at twilight.

"Yeah." He starts walking towards the van and I follow, both of us looking wildly around. We load the supplies and Josh gets in his seat.

"Damn it," I say getting back out. "We forgot the gun and bat." I run back into the store to retrieve them. The shotgun, leaning against one of the isles was unmoved. I grab it and turn towards the bat which Josh had placed on the counter top. There, standing beside it is the thing, the zombie, its back towards me. Its head is visibly concave and caked with already dried blood from where Josh had struck it repeatedly. I raise the gun, placing the stock firmly against my shoulder and cock it. That gets its attention. It wheels around, fast, and charges. Without thinking I pull the trigger and blow a hole in the zombies head. It topples and I throw up, dry-heaving mostly, having emptied my stomach earlier.

Josh runs in gun held high. "What happened?"

All I can do is point and shake my head, still hunched over, gagging. It takes several seconds before I can speak.

"It, it attacked me."

"What?"

I just shake my head.

We get into the van, Josh driving now, and drive off, not towards the freeway, but just out of town, to sleep, or take turns sleeping, and so tomorrow we can stock up more, and find, hopefully, more weapons.