A Time to Kill Zombies

by Jill James

  “Damn,” Jack muttered, striking his fist into his palm. “We need to get to Juan’s relatives. Walnut Creek might as well be the far side of the Moon for how hard it is to get there anymore.”

  Mary started crying. “Don’t leave me alone. Please.”

  Jack gathered the woman in his arms and smiled down at her. Lila felt her heart race in her chest. Yet again she was reminded of why she had loved this man, and wondered for the millionth time why she’d let her father bully her into giving him up. Death threat or not, she should have believed in them. In him.

  “Of course, we wouldn’t leave you alone. You’re coming with us,” Jack murmured softly. “If you have somewhere to go along the way we will take you, or you can just stay with us. Eventually we’ll be heading to Ryde, down the river.”

  “Can we bury Kelly first?” Her voice quivered.

  “Of course.”

  He got the foldable shovels out of the SUV. He and Lila dug a shallow grave for the little girl. Her eyes watered and her vision wavered as Mary cleaned her granddaughter the best she could with the limited water available. The woman wrapped the little girl in her Disney sleeping bag and Lila lost it. A few years ago, Selena had one just like it with princesses on the bright-colored fabric. Hot tears rolled down her face as Jack lifted the feather-light bundle and gently placed her in the ground. Her breath caught and hitched in her throat. That would not be Selena. They would find their little girl and she would be safe. She had to be. Lila wouldn’t survive any other outcome.

  * * *

  As if he could read her mind, Jack turned to Lila after placing the finally dead girl into the grave. He wanted to reach across the clearing and gather her in his arms and guarantee they would find Selena, but he couldn’t for so many reasons, the least of that he was a realist and knew their journey might not have a happy ending. The most important reason: she wasn’t his to hold. His hands clenched into fists at his side as his wants and desires warred with his honor. A deep breath and his hands relaxed at his sides. Honor and integrity was all he had left in the chaos of their new world. Too easy to squander, impossible to get back.

  He brought his mind back to the present as Mary’s whispered words petered off and died as she huddled on the ground at the foot of the grave. The woman stood up, rubbed the tears from her face, and stiffened her spine.

  “I’m done,” she said, looking off into the distance.

  Jack dug into the hard dirt and shoveled it back into the hole. Once it was level, he folded the shovel and set it aside. He turned to the women. “Find some good-sized rocks to cover this up. We’ll protect it the best we can.”

  Lila found a pile of busted up concrete and they had the grave rocked up in no time. He looked up to find the sun on its downward trajectory. He couldn’t ask Mary to stay here with the grave and the dead tormentors. They would have to get down the road as far as they could manage before total darkness.

  He grabbed the shovels and watched as Lila helped the woman gather her few belongings. Mary strode to the far side of the clearing and returned with two backpacks. Lila helped as the woman pulled some things out of the smaller one and added them to hers. The small pack she placed on the grave, Kelly in bright pink letters shining on the front flap.

  “I’m ready to go,” she announced.

  “If we keep going and don’t hit any roadblocks, I think we can make it to the BART station on the freeway,” he told them as they started walking out of the brush and back along the side of the broken asphalt road to the SUV.

  Just before the sun would set over the nearby hills, they arrived at the transportation station. They got out of the vehicle and Jack squatted down in the weeds beside the freeway. The building appeared deserted but he had learned in the zombie apocalypse that appearances can be deceiving.

  He stayed down in the tall brush, motioning to the two women to join him. “I’m going to scout ahead. Give me ten, fifteen minutes and I’ll whistle if it’s safe for you to join me. If you don’t hear from me continue on to Walnut Creek, your duty is to find Selena.”

  The familiar stubborn look on her face let Jack know she wasn’t listening to a word he said. He’d seen that look too many times before in the past, but she had to listen now.

  He put his hands on her shoulders and squeezed, forcing her to look at him. “You will leave me behind. There could come a time when you have to make it on your own. You can’t worry about me; you can only worry about finding Selena.”

  The small nod was almost lost in the growing darkness but it was there. He would take what he could get. Standing, he settled his backpack on his shoulders and ran down the embankment. Once on the broken asphalt of the freeway, he turned and looked over his shoulder. The tall weeds hid any view of the women he had left on the hillside.

  A quick glance right and left showed no one on the road, dead or undead. Jack took a deep breath and held it. The only sound in the desolation was the calls of the birds returning to their roosts for the night.

  A few moments at a steady jog and Jack crossed the median through a ripped fence and the other lanes of the freeway. The empty parking lot contained mostly weeds and a few abandoned cars. The tires had flattened long ago and glittering shards of glass pebbled the pavement from smashed windows and parking lot lights.

  The hairs on the back of his neck stood on end. The location was too deserted. No sentries stood on patrol at what was a very defensible spot. Jack stepped through where once turnstiles had stood. The faint sound of voices filtered down from the cement stairs in front of him. A baby’s soft cries were quickly hushed with a mother’s lullaby. The scent of a wood fire wafted down to him.

  Jack strode up the stairs with his hands held out in front of him to show his lack of weapons. He knew it was a gamble but, with the lack of male voices, one he was willing to take. He stepped out onto the platform, his eyes sweeping back and forth quickly to assess the situation. No one to the left. To the right several women sat by a barely smoldering fire, the wisp of smoke lost before reaching the open roof. A young boy who barely reached Jack’s chest rushed forward, his shaking hands gripping an AR15.

  “Jacob, put that down before you hurt yourself,” a voice called from the dark corner. A tall figure stood and shuffled toward Jack. A man with long gray hair, a long gray beard, and gray tinged skin reached out a hand and pushed the gun toward the ground.

  With an angry look on his face, the young boy stomped off to the fireside circle. The man nodded his head and Jack placed his hands down at his side.

  “Mighty dangerous coming to a camp this late in the evening,” he said.

  “Didn’t have much of a choice,” Jack supplied. “Rescued a woman earlier. Had to bury her granddaughter. This was the first place I could think of with defense capabilities. We only need a place for the night. We’re headed to Walnut Creek in the morning.”

  “Well, not too sure about the defense capabilities, but you’re more than welcome to share the spot until morning. I’m Mitchell by the way and you already met Jacob.”

  “I’ll let the others know that it’s safe to come. We have some food to share and I’m willing to trade for some information.”

  “Information we got; food not so much.”

  Jack let the man know he would be right back with his companions only to be greeted by Jacob and his gun at the bottom of the stairs. Trying to be a man as a preteen was hard enough in normal times, let alone in the zombie apocalypse. He looked him straight in the eye and talked to him man-to-man.

  “I have two females with me. That’s it. We’ll be gone by morning,” Jack told him. “We just need a place to rest for the night.”

  “I’ll be watching you,” Jacob piped up in a cracking voice.

  “I’m sure you will. It’s an important job you do for your group.”

  The boy stood taller and almost cracked a smile. Jack stepped out to the weed-filled embankment and whistled long and clear. In seconds he spotted Lila and Mary making their way down thei
r side and across the freeway. He was pleased to note that Lila checked out both sides of the road before they crossed. A leftover habit of a dead civilization, but just as useful to look for roaming gangs of zombies before you put yourself in the open.

  He met them at the edge of the parking lot and introduced them to Jacob. The sullen teen found a smile for Lila, he noticed. As a group, they made their way up the stairs where the elderly man greeted them. Mary began to cry and rushed into the man’s arms.

  “Mitchell,” she sobbed between gasps of air.

  The man’s arms tightened around her and his gray eyes watered before he shut them.

  Lila and Jack stepped back to give the couple some privacy. Jacob shrugged his shoulders like he didn’t understand grown-ups and strode back to the group by the fire.

  Mary and Mitchell stepped apart, although the man kept an arm around her shoulders. The woman smiled through her tears. “You found my brother. My twin brother.”

  Jack blinked. Twin? The man looked as if he had twenty years or more on Mary. Desperation would do that to a person. The group reeked of it. They’d given up on life and were just waiting to die. Seen it before in groups too small to survive.

  He turned to Lila. “I told Mitchell we had some food to share.” He tried to put an emphasis on the word ‘some’ but he didn’t want to be obvious.

  Lila caught his thoughts as if they’d been spoken out loud as she dug into her pack and pulled out four cans of soup. A more than generous offering. Not enough to make it appear they had a bottomless supply, but not stingy enough to appear rude. When she squatted to dig inside again he wondered what she was adding to the pot, until he spotted the smashed box of animal crackers. She’d noticed the group of small children as well. He smiled to himself when he realized she wasn’t willing to share her chocolate bar as well. She’d always had a wicked sweet tooth.

  Jack was pulled away from his dangerous thoughts of what had been at Mitchell’s soul-wrenching sobs. Mary must have told him of the young girl they had buried. Yet again, he was reminded of all the loss in the ZA. Time and time again, families were ripped to shreds.

  His hands clenched into fists. He closed his eyes and all he could see was Selena’s sweet smile and her bright-green eyes. He would put his family together.

  Chapter Nine

  Paul, Suz, and Josh

  Paul Luther’s Log

  Brannan Island State Park

  State Route 160

  Spring, 1 AZ

  The Humvee were a great find although we were not able to use them until the next day. We have lost Jim Evans. The news of his daughter’s death hit him hard and his already weakened heart was unable to take it. Doctor Shannon was forced to put him down but we will take him with us to bury in a safe place.

  Paul stood at the edge of a grassy field with his back to the river. Suz and Josh stood to his right and Doctor Shannon stood to his left. Her heartfelt sobs carried over the silent gathering. The young boys of Rogue Vantage stood ready with their shovels to bury Jim. The idea of the little boys as a burial detail broke his heart but they had begged to be allowed to help.

  Shannon’s shoulders were hunched as she huddled next to him. Her usual tidy bun was missing as strands of pale blonde hair blew in the wind. He bowed his head and felt as Suz took his hand, her strong fingers wrapped around his. She was warmth at his side.

  His thoughts wandered to all the times he had been here at Brannan Island, camping with friends and boating on the river. Fun times that seemed a million miles away. Another time. Another life.

  Wildlife was already claiming the deserted campground. Had probably been a never-ending battle with nature before the apocalypse. If you had to believe things happened for a reason, then Jim’s death brought them here to spot a small herd of deer that would feed the group for the rest of the journey ahead. A small thing, but nowadays that seemed all they got, small things to be thankful for.

  “Say something,” Shannon whispered at his side.

  He cleared his throat. “I’d like to believe Jim is now in Heaven, watching over us with Jed and Beth at his side. Their travails and pain are gone. The rest of us must continue on without them.”

  “Amen,” the group intoned quietly, Shannon’s a bare whisper at his side.

  She pulled away and ran to the grave. Her knees gave out and she fell to the ground. “Why?” she cried out.

  Paul didn’t have an answer. None of them did. The past year had been harsh and harder than any of them were used to. They were living outside, or pretty darn close to it. Food and water was in constant short supply. Things like vitamins and medicine were becoming scarcer by the day. Paul shuddered to think what they would look like in ten or twenty years. Probably like the pictures his mother had of her great-grandparents, worn out by the time they were forty.

  He started to move, but Josh beat him to it, as he knelt beside Shannon and pulled her gently to her feet. He didn’t catch what he said, but Shannon moved toward the vehicles with Josh cradling her in his arms. Suz came to his side.

  “We’ll get through this. We always do,” she said, her arm around his waist. She nodded in the boys’ direction as they started shoveling the dirt over Jim’s wrapped body. “We have to protect the next generation.”

  “What about Beth and Jed? They were the next generation too.”

  She pulled him in tight, her face against his. “We can’t save them all.”

  He shook his head. Suz knew him so well. He wanted—no; he needed—to save them all. To save the group. To save California. To save the world.

  Like a sheepdog with a herd, Paul noted where each member of the group was at all times. The boys of Rogue Vantage finished up their duties and ran to the vehicles, pushing and shoving each other. He knew they were arguing who got to ride with the turret gun on the lead Humvee. He saw as Sarah and Stephanie, the tow-haired twin orphans ran and slammed into Shannon until she pulled them into a hug. He breathed deep. One less worry, two if you counted the doctor herself. He smiled as Josh peeled off and Joseph Jones came up to the doctor’s side and shared the twins’ hugs. Another family unit forming before his eyes. They would all help each other heal, the orphans and the left behind.

  His mind was ripped away from his thoughts at the low hum of a horde on the move. Whipping around, he could do nothing but stare as the undead walked out of the shallow water by his feet. Vegetation hung from gray flesh. Their water-soaked clothing fell into pieces with a splash into the water. The moans rose as they scented fresh prey. The stench of rotting flesh reached him before the first skinbag cleared the river and shambled across the grass.

  He grabbed Suz by the hand and set off in a run to the Humvee. “Get a move on. We are out of here.”

  Counting heads as doors slammed, he let himself breathe as he and Suz jumped into the lead vehicle and slammed the doors with Josh’s foot already pushing the gas pedal to the floor. Rubber burned as they peeled out of the campground that had become the land of the undead.

  He couldn’t wrap his head around the thoughts swirling inside. Had they walked across the bottom of the river? He rejected that thought almost before it was fully formed. Had they sat in the shallows and waited for food? As scary as that thought was, he was sure that was pretty close to exactly what had happened out there. He turned his face to the window and stared as they just kept coming from the river, row after row of skinbags, no end in sight.

  Suz leaned against him, her body shivering. “It will never be over, will it? If even one survives somewhere until a human comes along, it would start all over again. They can hide and wait—forever.”

  * * *

  She didn’t really expect an answer from Paul, but she thought he would at least comfort her. But he was lost in his own thoughts. Thoughts probably just as dark as hers. Suz leaned back against the seat and closed her eyes. Paul’s hand grabbed onto hers, his fingers wrapping around tight. She smiled and allowed herself to fall asleep.

  The nightmares rose up
and claimed her. They were the same every time she let herself sleep without help. The pills in her knapsack were getting low and the doctor hadn’t found anymore yet. She didn’t even know what she was taking, but they worked. They let her sleep with no dreams at all. One moment she was falling asleep and the next it was morning.

  She usually was fine on the nights she slept with Paul and could cuddle afterward, only allowing herself to take a pill when it was Josh’s night with their husband. She’d tried cutting the pills into small pieces to make them last, but it wasn’t enough. The further they traveled beyond the cities and towns, the harder drugs would be to come by.

  The hordes rose up and chased her. Her athletic fleetness, her hunting and killing skills were gone. She barely kept a few steps ahead of the shambling skinbags. Their stench overwhelmed her until she couldn’t breathe. Their skeletal hands grasped her, the bones scratching her skin. Black ooze coated her body and fell into her mouth.

  Fingers tangled in her hair and pulled her to the ground. Her eyes stared into a pale-blue sky but all she saw were bloody mouths and gleaming teeth preparing to feast on her.

  She awoke with a scream bursting from her throat. The vehicle swerved as Josh fought to get it back under control. Paul wrapped his arms around her and she pushed him away, the terror clinging to her even as she awoke fully and realized what she’d done.

  “Jeez, Suz,” Josh yelled, his hand clenched on the steering wheel. “Are you trying to kill us?”

  “That’s enough,” Paul said in that tone of voice that everyone in the group recognized as his angry voice.

  “Sorry,” her brother gritted out.

  “It’s nothing,” she stuttered. “Just a bad dream.”

  “I’d say it’s more than a bad dream,” Paul muttered.