by L. H. Tide
With a heavy heart, she averted her eyes and looked in the direction of the trunk of the tree, at its rough surface, wanting to avoid watching the scene a second longer.
She sobbed silently amidst the sounds of tearing flesh coming from beneath.
Darkness, all around her, was quickly invading the wood.
***
Xmas
Her forehead was still pressing against the trunk when she heard something…
Something weird…
A kind of scratching, at irregular intervals.
Looking down, she saw a zombie climbing the branch on which she was sitting.
The rather skeleton-like creature, which had probably been rejected by the others, more flesh-like and powerful ones, was trying to reach her.
It had probably begun the climb along the branch after having used the roof of the car, which it had been able to reach. She told herself that this one was cleverer than those she and her parents had been used to, during these last years, since the beginning of the Plague...
My parents! I'm alone... completely alone...
The reality of their loss during this terrible evening burned her mind, like the flames which were continuing to burn inside the car below her. Near it, there was the view of the mass of creatures continuing to cover and eat her mother's corpse.
In a way, the fact that she couldn't see her mother's body anymore made things a bit less unbearable, because, like vultures hiding their bleeding meal under their sheer numbers, the creatures were completely covering it. Lit by the burning car, she saw that they were fighting between them, like animals.
And this one, slowly but surely, was approaching dangerously, ready to offer her the same fate..
Suddenly, her fear disappeared completely.
Fear was replaced by anger, burning inside her. Anger which made her mad, feeling a huge appetite for revenge.
She adjusted the straps of her little backpack upon her shoulders, and then bent over, one hand grabbing a thin branch.
The living dead was now just under her. It extended an arm, almost touching her with its rotting fingers, which stank so much that she felt nauseous.
All of a sudden, she let herself fall off the branch, breaking on the way the twig which had remained in her hand. She fell precisely on the creature which, carried away, fell back.
They both fell, with the child kneeling on the chest of the undead, and she plunged the tip of the branch into one of its red eyes. Finally their trajectory finished on a soft patch of grass, the shock finishing the push of the branch deeply into the creature’s skull.
The hit on her knees because of the fall wasn't too hard, since they were luckily preserved by the soft body of the zombie. Carried away by her momentum, the little girl rolled away, instinctively rolling like a ball.
After rolling a few meters more, she finally fell on her belly, her face plunging in the grass.
She was unable to move, shaken by her fall. Breathing with some difficulty, she felt a need of respite.
Her eyes closed, and she felt that she was falling asleep.
A welcome rest so that I can forget for a moment this nightmare. Justa blissful moment of rest...
That's when she heard it.
The sound.
A friction noise.
Turning her head so that half of her red hair was in the grass, she opened her eyes.
Again that rubbing noise.
Painfully, she turned her head slightly and recognized, a few meters away, the zombie which had fallen with her. It was still lying on its back, the thin branch remaining set deep in its eye
It was completely immobile... and she had the faith that it would never move again.
The thought made her smile.
Again a rubbing noise, near her. Another one, she old herself. How many are they? Will this nightmare ever finish?
She turned her head in the opposite direction and was startled.
Two feet wearing red boots were moving, slowly, near her head, lifting slightly, rubbing the grass. Looking up, she saw the owner of the feet, and had a shock...
Santa Claus!
Not the Santa Claus she had dreamt about, when her mother had told her about what Christmas was, before Hell had devastated the World. Before it had erased the notion of the Christmas Spirit, as everyone had known it.
No, this fat man was probably a poor lad, who had been working in the red and white costume in a supermarket, when the Plague had devastated the surface of the Earth, in December of that year.
Despite the fact that, like all the other zombies, this Santa Claus was one of the victims of the Plague, the little girl knew that this creature was a source of extreme danger. It was still wearing a false white beard, hanging with strings from its face. A rotten face showing the skull and, under the red eyeballs observing her with appetite, a hole, which had replaced its nose. Impressive, horrible yellow teeth, without any skin or lips on them, completed this vision of a complete nightmare.
The creature opened its ugly mouth, revealing a black, decaying tongue, and roared loudly.
It bent over and, grabbing her backpack with one of its big hands, lifted her from the ground.
She shrieked when it brought her eyes to the level of its horrible face.
It opened its gaping mouth, making her smell a mixed odor of old blood and decaying flesh, making her feel nauseous
It brought its sallow and rotten teeth closer to her tender throat.
She suddenly lifted her legs while bending them and hit the belly of the creature with all her strength. The push surprised the thing, and almost made it lose its uncertain balance.
But it didn't react, clearly insensitive to pain, while she rocked back and forth, suspended by her little backpack at the end of its arm. The little girl flapped all over the place, seeing the horrible mouth of the creature alternatively approaching and moving away.
It suddenly shook its hand, showing some impatience.
The rudeness of this movement freed her completely from the laces of her backpack.
She fell and found herself sitting on the grass. She wasn't the only thing to fall, since her backpack, not well closed, and still hanging in the creature's moving hand, lost most of what it contained. Things rained on her.
The Xmas Zombie roared, clearly impatient now, and bending over again, it grabbed one of the little girl's white arms, lifting her once again. It made her wince because of the pain, and she was now suspended again near the horrific creature's mouth, which opened wide again.
A rubbing noise was suddenly heard, and a sudden light forced the creature to fold its eyes.
It was a flame, the small flame of a lit match held by the girl's free hand, while there was a matchbox in her captive arm’s hand. She had ignited the match with the box and now maintained the flame in front of the face of the thing.
Watching the flame, the fat creature emitted a plaintive sound, fear seeming to paralyze it. Seemingly, some zombies were afraid of the fire, like animals… The child hadn't seen a similar reaction in other living dead, in the past.
She moved her hand lower, and the little flame, beginning to fade out, licked the hair of the thing’s false, synthetic white beard. Doing that, she lit the beard with the match. The flame ignited the whole dirty, synthetic – and flammable - fabric, running over its surface like a bush fire, while emitting the roaring sound of a wildfire.
The plaintive growls of the creature redoubled, as the flames ran on the just as flammable tissue of the red costume.
The creature released the kid's arm, letting her fall to the ground, as its whole body and hair ignited.
Lying on her back on the grass, she saw the thing, now a mad torch, rotate wildly, like an impressive, luminescent spinning top. Sitting up, the small girl noticed, despite its ever accelerating spin, that the burning living dead was carrying, strapped to its back, a big basket. She discerned in the basket, turning with the creature, many silvery, multicolored gift-boxes.
&nbs
p; Suddenly, the creature stopped its crazy tour and became completely immobile, facing her.
Its inflamed face had a blinding yellow and orange color, its eyes replaced by two holes devoid of any light. It opened a wide gaping mouth looking like a huge hole under its eyes. It was a kind of hellish smiley, or more, a grimacing Pacman face.
The holes forming the eyes and mouth became bigger while the round face seemed to inflate like a balloon. The body swelled too, giving the creature the appearance of a flaming Michelin Man. The red-haired child immediately understood what was happening, and quickly turned her head away toward the grass, her belly lying on its green surface.
The ignited Santa Claus exploded.
The deafening blast startled her as thousands of its burning pieces flew everywhere.
Objects fell around her while she kept her head lowered, her face toward the grass underneath her. She remained for many seconds in that position, until things stopped falling, and a relative silence came back.
Looking up, she recognized, in front of her face, on the grass, a still smoking gift-box. My first actual Christmas gift?
During many years, having her stomach full had been the most wonderful gift for her, because of the deprivations she and her parents had known, while fleeing endlessly the living dead roaming the world. Mom, Dad, so I deserve this gift, today?
She then shook her head. She was becoming aware that the loss of her parents was driving her nuts… As painful as the thought was, she had to concentrate on the present, and not on the past, if she wanted to live…
She then saw the dirty shoes of another zombie, which, clumsily, was approaching, growling. She sighed. Again, another one…
The little girl stood up and opened the match box. Inside she found only one, lonely match. Her last chance to survive?
She wiped the red end of the match against the rough surface of the box. The match lit up, and she held it in her hand, in front of her face. That's when the face of the now bending zombie appeared in front of her face. It had a missing cheek, showing one side of its teeth, the big wound extending from the teeth toward one of its ears.
The flame of the match made it retreat a meter back. She was dimly illuminating this part of the wood, the night having come.
But darkness began to come back, falling on her like the shadow of a big predator. Her heart pounding in her little chest, she saw with horror that the match was slowly extinguishing. The silhouette of the thing in front of her stopped stepping back; more and more undistinguishable from the dark surroundings, almost disappearing. She shivered.
Suddenly she had an idea and, seizing her backpack, she opened it, getting out a small kerosene lamp. She tried to light it, putting the almost extinguished match inside it. She finally withdrew the match, which emitted a small amount of smoke that quickly faded away. Darkness was quickly returning, and in front of her, she discerned the silhouette of the creature approaching her again, with a reinforced confidence.
Light burst suddenly as the lamp finally lit, more intense than before, making the zombie in front of her retreat again, a look of deception on its reddish face.
She now had hope again, and even felt stronger now, more confident, with the lamp at her side.
She felt something on her right shoulder, and through the tissue of her dress covering it, she felt some humidity. Turning her head slowly to the right, she saw a bony hand covered with blood.
Looking back and up, she saw a skeleton-like face with long white hair. The creature's head was almost in the dark because the lamp was on her left side and in front of her, and the lack of light had encouraged it to approach her. And she knew that the blood was her mother's blood...
Disgust invaded her as, turned forcibly around by the thing's hand pulling on her shoulder, she finally faced the zombie. Behind her, she heard the grunts of the face-wounded creature, which, no longer seeing the lamp's flame, had found the courage, again, to approach her.
She thought the kerosene lamp at her side would frighten it. Opening its mouth with some apparent avidity, it approached dangerously, paying no attention to the feeble flame of the lamp... Her last moments approaching, exhausted after all that she had been through, she sighed, trembling.
***
Help
The zombie’s head literally exploded as a deafening gunshot was heard. The creature remained standing up in front of her, blind, because the upper part of its head, along with its eyes and nose, had disappeared in a thousand pieces. What remained of the lower part of its opened skull was gushing out a mix of old blood and brain matter, as the thing had now immobile, opened jaws.
Surprised by what had happened, and not understanding why, the little girl felt disgust, and pushed the thing in the sternum with the hand. Losing its grip on her shoulder, the zombie fell on its back. She watched it with a kind of morbid fascination, its arms twitching while what remained of its brain poured out, mixed with dark blood, on the grass. Only a few seconds were enough for the cranial cavity to empty totally, and for the flow to stop. Finally, after a few more seconds had passed by, the thing remained completely immobile.
A roar came from behind her and she turned around to see the half-faced zombie walk clumsily toward her, its big hands in front of it, ready to grab her. It put its hands on her shoulders, its weight becoming too much for her, making her kneel, but she looked at it straight in its worm-clothed eye, its opened mouth with its fetid odors, as it was approaching her throat.
She heard a swift cutting noise and saw the half-faced head bend on the side in a strange way…
Finally the head separated from the neck, and it fell down on the ground. Rolling, it finally finished its short ride at her feet.
Lifting its arms, the girl got her shoulders free of the hands of the headless creature, which had dark blood rushing out of its neck, its cervical vertebrae now apparent. Disgusted, she pushed it at the level of its torso, the same way she had done with the previous zombie.
The trembling corpse fell on the ground near two black leather boots… and that's when she saw him: an old man, alive, who had clearly Asiatic origins.
A flash attracted her gaze. Looking in more detail, she realized that it had been the reflection of light which had come from something metallic. She saw that he was holding with both hands a strange, slightly curved sword. He was en guard, sword held high, and an intense concentration visible on his face. Their gazes crossed, and all of a sudden, his impassive face relaxed, as he smiled at her.
She smiled back, and instantly his grin disappeared as he looked somewhere else, on which he was focused. Two shabby zombies had arrived behind him and tried to grab him.
The unknown man turned around and cut the extended forearms of one of his opponents, while tripping the other in a reckless manner, making it fall clumsily on the ground. With a swift movement of his sword, the warrior beheaded the creature. Its head went rolling a meter away, joining the two cut forearms on the ground, their hands' fingers still twitching.
The ex-possessor of these, a thin-looking male zombie wearing an old T-shirt, roared and tried to approach the Asiatic.
The latter moved to the side, and with a Karate-style side kick, broke one of its knees. The thing fell and growled, looking up with a kind of anger at the man. With a slight movement, and within a fraction of a second, it was beheaded too, just as four undead surrounded them both.
A gunshot made the bald head of one of the creatures snap back because of the shock, a big hole apparent on its side. The undead fell on its knees, its gaze empty of any trace of soul. It finally fell forward, its face plunging with a splash in a puddle.
Two running, armed men arrived in battledress and joined the Asiatic, who methodically chopped the heads of two of the other arriving zombies.
The little girl, completely immobile, admired the action when, methodically, the swordsman cut the legs of the fourth creature. One of the two entrants, a huge black man, joined him, just as a fifth undead arrived. Red had never see
n such a big man in her life.
The big guy inserted the barrel of a huge rifle gun in the wide open mouth of the arriving female zombie and said, "Eat this!”
His finger pulled the trigger and the head of what had once been an old lady flew high under the impact, its whole clumsy body falling on the spot.
An immense clamor rose from the large group of zombies which had been concentrated on the child's mother's corpse. Standing up, the undead mob, blood-soaked, began to walk, slowly but surely, toward the four humans.
"Dad!"
This call made the little red-haired girl look behind her, and she saw a colored teen, almost a child, leap toward the older, bigger one, and the new entrant continued, "It's getting pretty dangerous, let's all go to the van with her, and get out of here!"
"Good idea,” answered the big guy, and looking at her, he said, "Sweetie, you must go with us, we've come for you."
She hesitated, remembering what she had often been told by her parents. Don't follow strangers. Even living human beings, when unknown, can sometimes be worse than the living dead!
He added, seeing she didn't move, "We saw on a screen that you needed help!", and the man pointed an index finger toward something, in one of the branches of a nearby tree. She saw a webcam which had been installed on a branch. Whirring slightly, it moved, a red LED illuminated on it, its light showing that someone was controlling it from a distance, and observing them.
She peeked at the still burning car and, behind the mob tainted in red, approaching dangerously, at a big dark zone of humid, red grass, and she couldn’t avoid thinking, painfully: Once again, the cavalry moved in once the battle was over
“Move!” shouted the big black man, startling her. He was becoming impatient, watching her with a hard gaze.
His big voice had made her shiver, and stressed, she felt literally paralyzed.
“Harry, let me talk to her.” The old man had spoken, for the first time, and he had a rather thick accent.
