Day 2 – 21:25; Genesee Park, CO United States:
The subway train comes to a stop.
For most of the trip, I was restless because of all that had happened to us, but eventually, I fell fast asleep. I awake to see that we have arrived in another underground subway, of some sort, and I assume we are in Colorado like we are supposed to be. We climb out of the train and travel up ruined stairs. The reason we choose this path is that above it is an "exit" sign with no power. The guys and I are very cautious, checking every corner for an infected person.
After the events, we've been through, who wouldn't be paranoid?
"Union Station goes through and around Denver, so I wonder if maybe this underground station is somehow connected to it because I mean, I've never seen a subway in Denver," David wonders as we reach the top of the crumbling stairs. Our path is blocked by doors leading to places unknown. Fortunately, there is no sign of any zombies in this subway but no sign of life, either.
"Ty, help me push open these doors, they ain't budgin'!" Dwayne is frustrated while pushing with all his might against the wooden doors. Ty runs up ahead of the group to the different door Dwayne is driving to help push them open.
"Argh, dude they still won't open!" Ty complains.
"Idiots... You guys don't see that safe-lock, right there, on the door?" Cheyenne points out.
"We need something to break open this door," David states the obvious, but everyone is losing hope. While everyone complains and such about not getting out of this place, I am looking around for something to possibly pry open the door or some action of that nature. Eventually, I find the perfect tool and go to retrieve it.
"Crap, man, how are we gonna get this thing open?"
"Stand back, guys!" I warn everyone, as I come walking up to the doors with an emergency ax I had found. I immediately begin swinging as hard as I could at the worn doors. "Cheyenne, grab that fire extinguisher near you, and get ready! I think I hear zombies behind these doors! They're probably being attracted by all the noise I'm making! As soon as I get these doors open, you need to hose those things down with that extinguisher!" Cheyenne rushes for the fire extinguisher, uses a broken piece of concrete to bust the glass of the casing around it, grabs the tank, then runs back to us, holding the nozzle in hand, prepared to attack. By then, I have the doors beaten up, so finally, I wedge the ax between the two doors and pry them the rest of the way open with all my physical force.
"Now!"
Hordes of zombies begin to attempt to flood in, as the group stands back in fear. Cheyenne jumps before them quickly, as I move out of the way. With her head turned away and her eyes closed, she sprays the zombies down with the substance from the fire extinguisher. The zombies are completely dazed and halt their frenzy, and some even lost balance.
"Get them while they're dazed!"
On my command, everyone storms out of the doors, attacking the zombies, one by one. Every last zombie here is killed; the last being killed by Cheyenne, with a great bash from her fire extinguisher, and after, she drops the tank on the ground.
We are out of the exit, and now we are in some kind of shelter. We all check around for more zombies but find none, so we progress outside, checking out the building we were previously inside of. It appears to be some kind of picnic shelter, made of stones. Outside it is dark from the night. After seeing this, we press on through beautiful forests of ponderosa pine, Douglas-fir, and lodgepole pine, a bit, until we reach an opening to nature at the top of a hill, showing us a great view. We stand still for a moment, embracing the magnificent surroundings before us, in awe. According to David, we are in Genesee Park; the largest park in the Denver Mountain Parks system. He realizes this by witnessing two large mountains before us, Genesee Mountain and Bald Mountain. From this great height, we can clearly see the "Mile-High City," Denver, with its bright lights.
"That's definitely Denver, Colorado, down there," Ty stares.
"It's huge, even from here," Kassandra is in awe.
"My question is, how the hell we gon' get down there? It's pitch black out here!" Dwayne exclaims.
"Wait, what's that? I see lights over there, down the hill," Maria points out.
"Looks like a building. We should definitely go check it out," David insists. "If it has working power, it would be a great shelter for us."
"Yeah, traveling out here in the dark too much is going to get us killed," Kipp agrees with David.
"Right! I agree with Kipp," Kelly states, to which I roll my eyes at her, in response.
With that, we travel quietly and carefully downhill. It does not take but a few minutes to reach the building we saw from the top of the hill, and we do not face much interference either. The building appears to be for the usage of park rangers and officials. We do not bother to check the outside, for now, because it is too dark. Instead, we cautiously enter the small building through the unlocked, front door. The second we step in, many of us notice the corpses of park officials lying around, all over the place. The rest notice by the stench of the corpses first, not by sight.
"Yo, Lou, help me move these bodies outta here. There's only two. We can use our shirts to cover our hands. We'll just wash 'em in those sinks over there after we're done," Dwayne asks for help from Lou. They both begin to take off their shirts. Maria is checking out Lou through the entire process. Lou notices her staring, so after taking it off, he gives her a wink and a grin and flexes his muscles. She nearly melts for him. In return, Maria bites her lip, smiles, and then winks back.
With his shirt off, I can see a tattoo of a heart on his right shoulder that I never noticed before. Over the heart is a banner with the name of a friend of ours that was killed in an accident on it. That friend was killed during a drive-by shooting that was meant for Dwayne, so Dwayne has blamed himself for the death ever since.
Dwayne and Lou continue to the dead bodies lying about, cover up their hands with their shirts, and grab up the bodies. After lifting up the bodies a bit, from their places, Lou and Dwayne begin dragging them outside. Once finished, they find dish detergent by the sinks and use it and the water running from the sinks to wash their clothes. After cleaning his shirt, Dwayne conveniently finds a spray bottle of air freshener, under the sinks. He gives it to me, and I begin spraying around the room. Kelly is complaining that I am spraying too much, but I ignore her and continue. I spray most of it near her, just because she is getting on my nerves. When I am done, the building is rid of the smell of death. Then hours begin to pass, and we spend the rest of the night relaxing, waiting for the sun to rise.
It is sunrise, in the early morning, and Lou and Dwayne's shirts are both still damp, but they decide to wear them anyway. Before leaving, we all rinse off our faces, hair, arms, and legs in the sinks. Refreshed, we are now ready to try to make a trip, down the mountain and out of this park, for the city of Denver. Just as we have begun to move on, Ty notices small vehicles belonging to the officials of the park. Two were Side by Sides, or Utility Task Vehicles, which were small, 6-person, four-wheel drive, off-road vehicles, while the other two were small All-Terrain Vehicles, run by a motor, seating two people each and having four wheels with large tires.
"Check it out! They have some ATVs and UTVs here!" Ty points the vehicles out while hopping on to one of the Utility Task Vehicles. "We can use these babies to get us down to Denver!"
"Good point, Ty! These will get us down there quick and safe!" I also jump onto an All-Terrain Vehicle.
I'm very fond of All-Terrain Vehicles like these, so I'm more than ready to drive one down to the city.
We eventually all agree to use the vehicles as transport out of the park. We also already settle the seating arrangements. Kassandra rides with me on one All-Terrain Vehicle, Maria rides with Lou on the other All-Terrain Vehicle, and everyone else rides with Ty on one of the Utility Task Vehicles.
As we ride, I wonder what conversations the others could be having, while Kassandra and I are chatting.
"Hey, Ben."
"Hmm?"
"David told us about this place, before."
"Yeah?"
"Well, he said that this park has even got animals that were brought over from the big-time, Yellowstone National Park."
"Oh, really?"
"Yeah... So, you know what's weird?"
"What?"
"I haven't seen a single animal in this place, yet... Have you?"
"No... I haven't... I didn't even think about that..."
"Ben... I'm scared..."
"I know, Kassandra... Me too... But I'll keep us safe. Don't worry."
We are drawing near the city and the end of the park, when suddenly a large tree goes soaring by, barely missing Ty and the others in their vehicle. Ty nearly has a wreck, but he manages to stay in control. I want to look back to see what had caused that strange danger to happen, but I am much too scared to take my attention off of what is coming in front of me. Kassandra and the others, however, are checking, themselves, and obviously not pleased by what they see. Kassandra wraps her arms even tighter around me and holds herself very close to me. I can feel that she is trembling uncontrollably. With a shaky voice, she tries to tell me, "Ben... It-... It's the Brute..."
"Wh-what? It-... It's still alive?"
"What did you just say?" at the same time, someone has just told Ty what is behind us, as well.
"The fucking Brute is behind us, Ty! Floor it!" Cheyenne screams at Ty.
"Aw, come on! Seriously? Fuck me!" Ty pushes the accelerator pedal of the vehicle to the floor to go as fast as it will go.
The very same Brute we thought we had killed, before coming to Colorado, is still very much alive, flashing, from spot to spot, behind us, chasing us down, trying to kill us. He has somehow survived, and he has somehow followed us all the way to another state. We realize now that we have completely underestimated this thing. He is gaining on us extremely quickly. It is hard, but Ty and I are avoiding everything the Brute tries to toss at us. All the while, David and Dwayne are firing their guns at the Brute, trying to, at the least, slow the zombie down. Nothing we can do is stopping the Brute.
"The gate!" Kelly points out in exclamation. The exit gate to the park is closing in fast, but the Brute is closing in much quicker. As we come even closer, we see that the gate is not even open. There is no way for us to stop and open it because the Brute will surely kill us, but there is nowhere else to go either.
"I'm gonna ram it!" Ty exclaims his plan. No one with him likes his idea, but it is the only possibility, other than being torn limb from limb by the Brute, for sure. I agree to his plan, and in a brief, few seconds I pull behind Ty. We pull ahead of the Brute by a good bit of distance. Ty's Utility Task Vehicle makes a hard impact into the gate, and the gate doors swing open with large force. I drive out through the open gate directly behind him on my All-Terrain Vehicle. We all come to a stop, and I begin my own plan of action swiftly. I make Kassandra get off of my vehicle because I will have to use it for my method because I know that Ty's transport is not fueled by gasoline, and mine is. Knowing Ty has it, I ask him to give me a box of matches—not that I want it to smoke; I am not into drugs and never want to be—he does as I ask and quickly hands me a box of matches. I take a few out of the box, light them, then ignite the box a bit, as well. I unscrew the cap that covers the gas tank of the vehicle. With a dash, I take off, back toward the open gate and oncoming Brute. I am within but a few feet of the Brute, and it starts to reach its sickening arms out toward me. As I become merely inches away from the Brute, I jump off of the vehicle backward and throw the box of matches on fire, plus a few lit matches into the gas tank, as I jump away. In a brief moment, the vehicle can be seen alone flying at the Brute and hitting it, but not doing any damage to it, but soon, the carrier explodes into flaming pieces, taking the Brute with it. I have just touched ground, side-first and am rolling across the earth for a bit. Pieces of the hot metal and such from the vehicle touches my skin in different places, such as my arms and legs, scarring me. My friends quickly come to my aid. As they help lift me to my feet, I peer at the dark smoke and crimson flames and the nothingness that was left of the Brute.
Finally...
Just outside the gates of the park, we find a small pickup truck that belongs to the park's staff. Instead of riding in the Utility Task Vehicle, everyone rides in this truck. I am driving, because I have no weapons to fight off zombies with. The girls are made to fill every seat and ride inside the truck, as well. The guys are riding in the tail of the vehicle. Dwayne and David are on watch for zombies.
As we are riding, I glance at Kelly in the backseat through the rearview mirror. She notices and quickly looks away with a mean look. David and Dwayne can be heard firing away as we come into the city.
It is still morning, but it is a bit dark because the sky has become covered by clouds. Judging by the weather, it seems as though it is going to rain soon. Another unfortunate factor soon reveals itself, as well; we are out of gas in the truck. We end up having to stop at the closest location, near us. We cannot tell exactly what it is because it appears that we are at the very back of the building. Whatever it is, it is gigantic.
"Why'd we stop?" Dwayne asks David.
"I have no idea, ask the driver," David replies. Dwayne does as David suggests and hops off the back of the truck and knocks on the driver door window, trying to get my attention. I open up the door, and he comes closer.
"Yo, why'd we stop?"
"Out of gas," I answer him while tapping on the glass over the fuel gauge on the dashboard, behind the steering wheel.
"Great..."
"Let's just go in this place and look for some gas or something," David suggests. With that, we all exit the vehicle and leave it behind to investigate the unknown place we are at. The strange place is surrounded by rather large gates, but for us, they are easy to climb over, helping each other out. Once inside, we go traveling around the unknown place. Not long after starting our exploration, we discover a sign with a map of the entire area. The sign reveals to us just where we are. It turns out we are at the Denver Zoo.
"We're at a zoo, huh? If there isn't gas here, there's got to be vehicles," David states.
"According to the map, all we have to do is go straight through the zoo, and we'll be at the front of the zoo where there's a parking lot. Let's just go there," Cheyenne discovers a route by reading the map.
"Yeah, let's do that, 'cause that'd be a lot easier than looking for gas for our truck. It'd be easier to just get a new vehicle," Dwayne agrees.
"Or a couple new vehicles!" Ty adds to Dwayne's statement, wanting to drive his own car again.
We decide to travel straight through the middle of the zoo and find new vehicles to drive, in the parking lot at the front gates of the zoo. A usual amount of infected people are walking about, but they are not very problematic for us. I pray that the hordes would stay this calm and short-numbered so that we will survive long enough to find more weapons. Just as predicted, the rain begins to lightly pour from the sky. The weather causes us to speed up in walking pace, a bit because we do not want to get soaked, or we will get sick. Kassandra keeps turning around, as though she is paranoid of something. She gets close to me and begins whispering to me.
"Ben, do you feel like something is watching us?"
"Not really, why?"
"I keep hearing something, and I feel like someone's watching all of us... It's scaring me..."
"Bruh, we gotta problem...," Dwayne stops us all. Standing in our way is the seemingly, zombified body of an animal; an orange tiger. It looses a terrifying growl, as it creeps up closer to us. We look around and realize that we are surrounded by felines of the same group. Suddenly, in the midst of the terror, I hear the same sound Kassandra heard all this time. This time, we can clearly tell where it is coming from, so we both look at its source, in unison. A flash of lightning reveals the silhouette of an enormous, infected lion, on top of a cage. As it roars in sync with the thunder, Kassandra begins shaking and clenching my shirt as tightly as she is close to me. I glare at the lion and hold her for protection. The lion immediately jumps down from the top of the cage and runs for us. It is going for Kassandra. I do not have much reaction time, but I attempt to get her out of the way; however, the lion is much too fast. A loud crunching sound can be heard over the rain as well as many screams of horror.
"No, Ben!" screams Kelly.
I could not get Kassandra away because of the lack of time, so all I could do to protect her was block her from the lion. The lion took a huge bite to my arm. The laceration hurt but not nearly as bad as it should have.
"Ben, you okay, dude?!" Ty is in a panic, as he bashes a tiger a few times with his piece of PVC pipe, finally bashing its head in and killing it, then running to my rescue.
"I'm fine! Protect Kassandra!" I yell at Ty, as I elbow the infected lion in the face, causing it to release my arm from its crushing jaws. As Ty grabs Kassandra and protects her, the lion lunges at me with its bite again. I take its jaws and hold them open and in place. As I try to push it off, eventually, I gain the strength to toss it to the ground. I hold down its face with my foot. By then, the others have already defeated the infected tigers, but this lion just will not stay down, and the others are out of ammo. It knocks my foot with a mighty swipe of its paw, then gets to its feet and growls in rage at me. We have no other choices left to make. "Run for it!"
Everyone begins running away as fast as possible. We get a head start, before the lion, but it is relentless in its chase. The front gates to the zoo are closing in on us fast. Behind those gates, we can easily see new vehicles to take, sitting in the parking lot, just as we had hoped. With a quick pace, we make it to the parking lot and pick random cars. Ty uses his PVC pipe to bust the driver window out so that he can unlock the one he has chosen. I ask him to pass the pipe to me, which he does, and I break into a car, as well. We make a quick decision on who is riding with who and get into the vehicles. Ty successfully hot-wires the car he has chosen and starts it, while I am in the process of doing the same. The lion attacks the driver's side of the car with a loud roar, startling me, causing me to mess up, and scaring the others, causing them all to scream. They begin to rush me, and finally, I start the engine of the vehicle. I slam my foot on the accelerator, immediately, and with that, Ty and I leave the scene, with the group split up and riding in two separate vehicles, deeper into the city.