Zombie Apocalypse Whiteout - 20
EP20 120 Kilometers (5)
Tak tak tak tak!
The sound of the sheriff and Min-gu’s footsteps drew rapidly closer. But just behind them, barely thirty meters back, dozens of zombies were giving chase, moving even faster.
Graaaagh! Kraaagh! Gyaaaagh!
Their roars echoed through the building. Jin-woo flicked his eyes toward the noise for only a split second before turning his focus back to the front and opening fire again.
Bang! Bang-bang! Bang!
He’d like to offer covering fire for the sheriff and Min-gu, but he simply didn’t have the bullets to spare. With so few rounds left, every shot had to count. He needed to thin out the subway horde as much as possible before they reached him.
Bang-bang-bang! Bang! Click!
The final shot rang out, followed by the chilling sound of an empty chamber. Jin-woo’s heart sank. There were still so many of them left.
Snap!
He let the K2 hang on its three-point sling and drew the Glock 19 from the holster strapped to his thigh. Flipping off the safety, he took a Weaver stance and aimed at the forehead of the nearest zombie in a tattered business suit.
Bang!
The lighter report of the Glock rang out, smoke curling from the muzzle as the suited zombie crumpled to the ground.
“Not like last time, you bastards.”
Jin-woo muttered under his breath as he shifted his aim to the second and third targets and squeezed the trigger.
Bang. Bang!
Again, neat holes punctured the zombies’ faces, dropping them where they stood. This wasn’t like that rain-soaked night when he’d panicked and blindly fired a gun he’d never used before. He’d since fired off thousands of rounds with a handgun. His hands were steady. And with the RMR red dot sight mounted on the Glock, his aim was sharper than ever.
Bang! Bang! Bang!
With cold precision, Jin-woo picked off each zombie head, one after another. The 9mm Parabellum rounds didn’t have the stopping power of the K2’s 5.56mm, but they still hit true, and they still dropped the enemy.
Splat! Crunch! Thud! Slam!
Zombies collapsed across the slick subway station floor, foreheads or eyes blown clean through.
‘Eight…’
Jin-woo counted silently with each shot. The Glock 19 held fifteen rounds. That meant he had seven left. More than twice that number of zombies were still coming, but he had no doubt that once he shaved his share down, the sheriff and Min-gu would clean up the rest.
“Hah… Hah… Hey, what the hell? Why are you using that thing?”
The sheriff had finally caught up to him, panting heavily, his eyes widening when he saw Jin-woo had dropped the K2 and was wielding only a pistol.
“Shit, don’t tell me you’re out of ammo?”
He didn’t wait for a reply. Answering his own question, the sheriff swung his backpack around and started rummaging through it.
Bang-bang! Bang! Bang!
Jin-woo didn’t even have time to respond. He kept shifting his aim, dropping one zombie after another. With each one that fell, so did another bullet from his dwindling supply.
When his final round left the chamber, the ominous click of the slide locking back echoed.
“Here!”
The sheriff shoved a loaded Glock into Jin-woo’s hands. It had been tucked in the front pocket of his backpack.
“Give me that one and take this!”
Without missing a beat, he yanked Jin-woo’s spent Glock from his hands, the barrel still hot and smoking.
“Nice work, Sheriff!”
Jin-woo gave a genuine shout of praise as he squeezed the trigger on the fresh weapon.
Bang-bang! Bang! Bang-bang!
Even the gunfire seemed to carry a rhythm of its own now. Jin-woo smiled as a zombie leapt over the turnstile, only to be shot midair and crash backward in a heap. A fully loaded fifteen-round Glock in a moment like this? It felt like the best gift in the world.
“Jesus, what are you doing, giving me a performance review right now?”
The sheriff grunted, pulling out a spare mag from his bag and reloading Jin-woo’s old Glock. It was no big deal, but he couldn’t help feeling a flicker of pride. Maybe all those hours of shooting practice weren’t a waste after all, at least now he could play backup competently. Without it, he wouldn’t have even been able to reload properly.
“Here, reloaded your gun and left it on my bag with a spare mag!”
He set Jin-woo’s pistol and one remaining magazine on top of his pack and grabbed his hammer again. Even now, the swordsman behind him was locked in a vicious melee with the pursuing zombies. The number of incoming enemies had grown so much, it was impossible to count them on two hands.
“Brother! Go left! I’ll take half of them! Raaaghh!”
Without waiting for confirmation, the sheriff charged into the fray, swinging his hammer in a wide arc beside Min-gu. He didn’t need to check if his call had been heard. The moment the words “Go left” left his mouth, he saw Min-gu shift his center of gravity in that exact direction.
It was the kind of silent coordination only people of a certain level could read, body language for veterans.
“Forget that, get out a cigarette instead! Didn’t you say you had some in your pack?”
Min-gu shouted as he swung his kukri to slice off a zombie’s arm, then used the momentum to decapitate it with his machete.
Crack!
“Was too worried you’d die while I was doing that, okay?!” the sheriff yelled back even louder, as he crushed the ribs of three approaching zombies in one swing.
“Yaaahhh!”
A Western zombie lunged for the back of his neck, but the sheriff caught its face midair and yanked it sideways.
Crack!
Its neck twisted halfway with a sickening crunch, and the sheriff shoved the zombie into a nearby wall.
Thud!
Slamming the side of its head against the curved wall, he followed up with a brutal double-kick to its chest.
Krrgh!
Knocked off balance, the zombie let out a warped gurgle as it flew backward and crashed to the floor. Those precious seconds bought, the sheriff gripped his hammer with both hands again and turned to face two more: a zombie in shorts and another shirtless one sprinting his way.
“Yaaahhh!”
With a roar that could shatter eardrums, he brought the hammer down hard. Though the blow glanced off the short-wearing zombie’s skull, it smashed its collarbone and shoulder in one devastating hit.
Thud!
The zombie dropped to its knees, limbs folding unnaturally under the shock. As it tried to push itself up, the sheriff was already two strides ahead, kicking the shirtless one square in the chest.
Smack!
The force of the steel-toe boot bent the zombie’s spine like a bow. The sheriff followed through, pivoting on the grounded foot to swing his hammer diagonally.
Crunch!
The creature’s skull caved in and it collapsed, bouncing off the far wall.
“God, how many more of these things are there?! This is getting ridiculous!”
Grimacing, the sheriff crushed the jaw of the shorts zombie with an upward strike. No matter how many he smashed or split open, more just kept coming. Even Min-gu, slicing through them beside him, was starting to sound winded.
“Clear out! We’ve got a path!”
Jin-woo’s voice rang out behind them. The sheriff threw aside the zombie clawing at his collar and turned to follow the call. Min-gu hacked open the face of the lead pursuer and spun on his heel to retreat as well.
Bang, bang! Bang! Bang! Bang, bang!
Jin-woo unleashed a burst of 9mm rounds toward the space the two had just cleared.
Grugh! Thump! Thump! Smack!
The charging zombies collapsed one after another, heads snapping back from the impact. With all of their immediate pursuers within 30 meters neutralized, Jin-woo broke into a run alongside the sheriff, heading toward the subway station.
Huff, huff, huff!
Sam-suk galloped beside them, tongue lolling with excitement. Ahead, Min-gu was already vaulting over the ticket gate.
Thup!
Without slowing down, the sheriff reached down and grabbed his backpack off the ground. With how bad things had gotten, the emergency supplies inside were now more important than ever.
Groaargh!
Just as they reached the gate, another zombie leapt up from the stairs connected to Ttukseom Park, mouth gaping wide.
Bang!
Jin-woo didn’t hesitate for even a second. He aimed and pulled the trigger. The shot was slightly off from center, but still tore through the creature’s eye and blew out its brain.
“Which way?!”
Min-gu pointed to the split staircase leading down to the subway platforms, shouting the question. The subway layout still confused and overwhelmed him.
“Just pick one, man! Doesn’t matter, they’re all the same!”
The sheriff motioned toward the right-hand stairs as he passed through the gate. Jin-woo had no objections, there could be a horde waiting on one side, but they didn’t have time to debate.
Tatata-tat!
The three of them, and the dog, raced up the steps, with Min-gu in the lead. He was the lightest on his feet, not carrying a backpack, and also the one best positioned to warn the others if something dangerous was waiting at the top.
“Keep going! All the way to the end!”
Jin-woo shouted after briefly stopping midway. If they could just reach the far end of the platform, they’d have the option to jump down onto the tracks and make a run for it if necessary.
Groaaaargh!
Jin-woo glanced over his shoulder. Three zombies had made it to the first landing behind them. He took a deep breath, gripped his pistol with both hands, and fired.
Bang! Bang, bang! Bang!
Two headshots landed cleanly, but the third only blew off half the creature’s face. Jin-woo had to squeeze off another round to finish it.
Yeah… this Glock still wasn’t an assault rifle.
“Over here! It’s clear!”
The sheriff shouted from the platform, his voice brimming with excitement.
Why…?
Even hearing the good news, Jin-woo found it hard to believe. Just a few minutes ago, he and Min-gu had heard the deafening roars of hundreds, maybe thousands, of zombies. So how could they have all disappeared so suddenly? Sure, he’d used up more than 240 rounds mowing them down, but over half of that ammo had been spent on the uninvited guests who’d come charging up from below at 120 kilometers per hour.
Still, for now, he could only feel relieved. Jin-woo spun around and began sprinting up the stairs, two steps at a time. As long as he could make it to the platform and get even 20 seconds of breathing room, he could pull out one of the ten K-2 magazines from his pack and reload.
Tatatatat-!
The sheriff, who’d been waiting for Jin-woo to catch up, took off running again. Nothing in the world looked more beautiful than the sight of that empty platform.
“Haah... haah... Watch... my back... haah...!”
The moment he reached the far end of the platform, their destination, Jin-woo yanked off his backpack without hesitation.
“Nothing’s coming! Haah...! Take your time!”
The sheriff was bent over, gripping his hammer as he wheezed for breath. Just as he said, there wasn’t a single zombie in sight. But Jin-woo’s hands stayed frantic as he tugged at the zippers. For all he knew, a few hundred of them could start pouring up the nearest stairwell at any moment.
Click!
Jin-woo grabbed whatever magazines his hands landed on first and reloaded the K-2.
Clack!
The metallic snap as the magazine locked into place calmed his racing heart and let him finally breathe easy. It felt like he’d finally regained the strength he’d lost somewhere along the way.
“Haah... haah...”
Steadying his breathing, Jin-woo began stuffing spare mags into the empty pouches on his tactical vest, slipping the last three into the cargo pockets on his pants. The fact that he had no more spare ammo left gave him a bitter smile. Almost 250 rounds, gone in that short amount of time… unbelievable.
“Here. Sheriff.”
Jin-woo pulled a spare pistol magazine from the front pocket of his bag, reloaded it, and handed the Glock back to the sheriff. Without that 45-round backup, he didn’t even want to imagine how much worse things could’ve gotten.
“Just keep it,” the sheriff said, waving it off between heavy breaths. “If I start waving that thing around, I’ll probably just shoot myself in the damn foot.”
He’d only brought it along because Yu-bin insisted, but the idea of swapping his hammer for a pistol was unthinkable to him.
“You can rest and have some water now. I’ll keep watch.”
Jin-woo wiped the sweat from his face and stood up. It wasn’t exactly a safe situation yet, but taking a moment to drink some water was absolutely necessary.
“Haah... shit... haah... all this just for one damn shield.”
The sheriff pulled a bottle of water from his pack and chugged two big gulps before handing it to Min-gu, who took a sip and passed it to Jin-woo.
“But doesn’t this feel weird to you?”
The sheriff unzipped his Gore-Tex jacket, letting his sweat-soaked hoodie breathe, then asked with a puzzled look.
“What does?” Jin-woo asked, eyes still forward as he drank.
“The zombies. When we heard them coming up the stairs, I thought, ‘We’re totally screwed.’ But there weren’t that many in the end, right?”
The sheriff tilted his head.
“Huh… you’re right.”
Jin-woo realized he had a point. Sure, they’d killed hundreds with bullets, hammers, and blades to make it this far. But considering they’d supposedly been surrounded by over a thousand zombies, the breakthrough had gone surprisingly well.
Graaaaah! Gwaaaaah!
That unmistakable chorus of groans and howls hadn’t stopped, so there were clearly still tons of zombies nearby. But then… why had they given up so easily? After all this time, they’d finally gotten their hands on warm-blooded humans again.
Jin-woo narrowed his eyes, scanning the area.
“...What the hell is going on?”