Tomahawks & Zombies

by Joe Beausoleil

  She really needed to work on her bedside manner. In her defense there was no use getting to know someone who you may have to be put down if they have signs of illness.

  “I heard a rumor that Natives are immune to the infection.”

  “I wouldn’t say immune,” she said as she continued to prod and poke my body.

  She wrote in my file and left the room without letting me know the results.

  I was led down a cattle shoot into another wedding type tent. Inside there was a kiddie pool. I was ordered to stand in. Next came two guys who must have washed elephants at the circus before this all went down. They came with course brooms and scrubbed me until I was red and raw. Without ceremony, they hosed my down with cold water.

  Jesus! It was cold.

  “Welcome to the Gathering,” they said as they placed a clean set of cloths on a chair leaving me to get dressed. I was in the middle of putting my Hard Rock Café Albuquerque T-shirt on when Ron was led in, watching him be put under the same torture as I went through put me in a better mood. To be helpful, I pointed out a few places they missed as they roughly scrubbed him down. They were thorough, very thorough.

  Twelve hour quarantine until we would be introduced to the surviving population. Just us alone in the oversized tent, two army type cots, a jug of water, a package of crackers, and a deck of cards we waited out the time, getting some much needed rest. Could have used some of those books we had back in the Jeep. We didn’t talk much but Ron did ask if I noticed anything strange.

  “Other than being in a coral at a Hard Rock Café in the middle of the zombie apocalypses after being stopped by a squad of storm troopers? No nothing strange.”

  “Wise ass. No. We’re on a reservation but other than the Doctor I haven’t seen a Native.”

  I didn’t notice, “So how was that special physical? Special enough for you?”

  “Shut up,” he said as he turned his back to get some sleep. I’m guessing it was.

  January 28

  We’re in.

  Now that she knew she didn’t have to pull a gun on me, Doctor Starr was friendlier. I reported in for a quick check up. On the next bed was an older Navajo man nursing his arm. She was changing the dressing when the old man saw me looking at the wound.

  “Got bit a while back. Hurt like hell. More than a rattler but then again a rattler is just biting not trying to eat you. Just tryin’ to sink those fangs in, poison you. I used to play with rattlers for the tourists. If you live through that first bite you build up a tolerance for the venom. Maybe that's what’s going on, the lucky few of us don't turn when we get bit. Hell, we can still get eaten though. No one is immune to that. Not even an Indian.”

  Dr. Starr finished, “It’s healing nicely, George, but you have to take it easy.”

  She turned to me, “The only ones I’ve seen bit and live have been Native and even than not everyone makes it. Some do, so don’t. But no whites, no blacks, no Asians. Not that I’ve seen. When they are bit they turn. No idea why. I’m a pediatric doctor not a scientist. ”

  Once Ron mentioned it I was on the lookout for it. He was right, we are on a reserve but it’s rare to see a Navajo face.

  “I was still at the hospital, I was there until… well until the end but George told me the army rolled in early on evacuating everyone. Taking them someplace safe somewhere called Fort Pontiac. The ones who didn’t want to leave went to the mesas.”

  George leans over; he sensing what I was going to ask.

  “Why did I choose not to go with the long knives? When in our shared history have they kept their word? When have they earned our trust? I’ll take my chances with my own people, join them on the mesas.”

  With a clean bill of health I’m allowed to explore the area. Other than the hotel, there are tents and trailers set up in the parking lots, the camping area and on the golf course.

  I make sure to catch up with the sand troopers just as they were getting off duty. Taking his helmet off I approached the one I first talked to, the one with the glasses, Buddy. His real name is Emmitt Allison but Buddy suits him better:

  My story? Oh the armour and all that? The Mayan curse wasn’t big news yet, strictly second page, and that wasn’t going to stop me from coming to Star-Con, the largest science fiction conference in the tri-state area. I came a few days early to meet up the rest of the unit, it was going to be the first time most of us met in the real world. The Staked Plains Lancers (That’s me, Joe, Jerry and Charles, Charles couldn’t get out of work, haven’t heard from him or any news from Lubbock since) were going to hook up with, the 1st infantry Ragged old first (represent), The Corsicana Invincibles, even the Sabine Pass Guard and the Swamp Angels from around Galveston were all going to showing up. We’d totally dominate the convention. Pretty much every Sand trooper and Storm trooper garrison in Arizona, Texas and Louisiana were going to make it. We were mostly internet dudes with the same interest. I live for Star Con, I even built a new T-21 light repeating blaster. It was sweet. There was no way I was not going.

  The Albuquerque international convention centre was nowhere near as nice as here. The Hard Rock is pure opulence compared to that toilet. A crap continental breakfast and a bunch of annoying trekkers. Can you believe that bullshit? Klingons with their monkey butt foreheads, both new and old school Federation geeks, red shirts, and some Borg. Serious dicks. The convention hadn’t started yet and only a few on my Sandtrooper regiment had reported in. We were all in the hotel bar watching the news. The whole zombie things wasn’t much of a news story until one of the House Wives of Malibu got bitten. When that happened the gossip sites ran with the story and the mainstream news followed suit. During Montana’s party to celebrate the launch of her designer purse line was when it all went down. Dakota and Mercedes were about to confront Montana, accusing her of not designing the purses, being a bitch and having fake tits. I assume they were right on all three counts. Montana was going to counter by bringing up Dakota’s stripper past. We were all anticipating drinks thrown in faces, hair extensions flying all over the place, a good cat fight but instead Mercedes bit Dakota. We couldn’t believe it. Bit her right on the face, taking a huge chunk out of her cheek. From there it was hard to tell who was biting who and who was trying to get sucker punches in while the melee was going on. Even the guy with the boom mic got taken down. The microphone picking up the moist sound of teeth ripping flesh from bone. The network aired it all. It wasn’t even the season finale. Well, I guess it turned out to be. The infections spread from there. A few movie stars got turned, both A and D listers and then pretty much the whole world.

  And we watched it all from the safety of the bar. There was stunned silence until a Doctor Who came in yelling something about the undead in the lobby. No one believed him. It was a sci-fi convention, people dressed up in all sorts of crazy outfits. We had a round of drinks coming besides a very convincing Ivy Valentine from the SoulCalibur Series, and her friend dressed as Bayonetta were looking our way. I ordered a round for them as well, cuz that’s just how I roll. They were so hot I was sure I was going to get a nosebleed. If I were a Jedi, I’d try a mind trick to pop their tops off. No way was I leaving for a Doctor Who fan. Have you seen that show? The robots look like garbage cans. The Federation guys dared the Klingons to go check it out. It was a matter of honour. They went, walking out of the bar with their chests puffed out, chins held high, singing in Klingon.

  They were ripped apart. Their rubber butt heads were no match for the undead. When the screaming died down, we all sat there eyes wide, no one said a word, no one moved until the undead rushed into the bar as the first freak came in, blood all over its face, everyone freaked, bolting to the back. The Federation jerks beamed themselves back to their rooms as fast as they could, leaving us to deal with everything.

  Nerds or not, our armour is actually useful against bites. It’s durable, hard and lite. We managed to save a couple evil cheerleaders, a sexy Pikachu and even a Tomb Raider as we fought our way out. We lo
cked ourselves in to one of the halls using a Harry Potter scarf to tie to door. We had been hearing planes take off all day, a few explosions and then silence. I cautiously opened a fire door just as they sent fighters up and shot down a 747 trying to land. I saw it with my own eyes. Harsh as it is that’s the reason why Albuquerque isn’t totally over run. They didn’t let anyone land, no risk of letting a plane load of the undead into the city. Just the undead that were already here but there was a lot of them.

  Hours later the planes and helicopters from Kirtland air force base flew off to who the hell knows where. After the airplanes bugged out convoys of trucks, loaded with supplies, ordinance and men started heading north. We could see it from our window (by then we made our way to the third floor huddling in a suite). They just bugged out leaving everyone. The soldiers controlling troubled areas like the airport and hospital were left behind too. A few patrols were trapped in other parts of the city as well as individuals who couldn’t manage to report in when the call went out for the reservists. Anyone who managed to show up found the front gates locked and no signs of anyone at the base. The base is locked up either that or whoever is left is staying silent and underground until this whole thing blows over. Those were the guys that got us out of the convention centre. They were pretty pissed at being abandoned. They cleared out the whole hotel starting with the bar. We took what food we could from the kitchen and cleaned out the bar. Got a few bottles myself, that’s on the down low.

  With no place to go we made it here and are just chipping in doing our part. The army dudes pretty much went to the uni area near their base and made a foothold there.

  January 29

  Everyone is hard at work making an elaborate defensive perimeter, excavators both large and small digging rings of ditches around the perimeter, dumping the buckets of dirt to make a twelve foot wall with a rampart on top. At the base is a ditch lined with sharpened branches and stakes. The unofficial uniform seems to be the Hard Rock T-shirts from the gift shop.

  Furthest from the wall was the first obstacle, a wire thicket using a haphazard tangle of barbed wire salvaged from nearby farms and rebar hammered into the ground. Twenty feet closer they are busy stringing up waist and neck high coils of razor wire. Then interlocking pits with spikes waiting at the bottom, after that the ditches start. Designed to slow the undead, they are eight feet deep and twenty feet wide dry ditch, followed by a ditch lined with spikes. If the undead manage to clear these obstacles they have a hundred yards of open field, which the defenders have a clear line of site and a height advantage to shoot them before they run into spikes at the base of the wall.

  One crew was using chainsaws to cut down trees stripping them down to nothing. Another group was sharpening sticks to make spiked logs. “That lady calling the shots said, they were called chevel-de-frise.” He leaned against a half complete one, wiping the sweat from his eyes. They could be moved quickly to help block a breach. Many more were being used as added barriers in the spaces between the ditches.

  “They used these to stop Calvary in the civil war; it’s kind of funny how low tech we are being against these things,” He smiled taking a drink from his canteen. We told him we were new arrivals. He pointed us to the foremen of this medieval crew.

  Before all this started, Travis was a civil engineer and a city planner. He is a short man with a rapidly disappearing pot belly. Sadie was an ancient history professor at the state university, bookishly cute with serious eyes. Now they are in charge of building the defenses. “Always happy for more hands,” Travis said with a grin, “As you can see it’s a labour intensive project.”

  Sadie explained, “We decided to focus on simple earth walls and ditches. I’m basing our plan around what the Romans built in Alesia. Something to slow down an un-mechanized army that outnumbers the defenders. And that’s just what we’re facing.”

  “And I’m basing Sadie’s dreams… I mean plans on what resources we have, manpower and fuel for the excavators. Soon it’s going to be down to manpower and we don’t have enough of that.” Travis continued.

  “Not yet anyway but people are trickling in. Like you two. Mexico I heard.” Sadie said with hope in her voice.

  I didn’t tell her that we saw few survivors out there.

  They plan to encircle the whole area not just the hotel but the golf course, so they can plant food and accommodate more refugees, the RV park is nearly full, the hotel at capacity. It’s going to take months.

  Ron and I have been assigned to help the crew working on the two level towers that were to be placed on top of the wall to give defenders an even better vantage point. They salvaged scaffolding from a nearby half-finished construction site but they don’t have nearly as much as they would need for Sadie’s dream project. Even if they did, they wouldn’t have enough people to man all the towers. There are under two thousand people here. More than we’ve seen in days but still a small number of survivors…all things considered.

  Ron and I spent the rest of the day trying to figure out how to assemble the scaffolding. Most of the crew was from the pueblos in the surrounding countryside. Those that are off the main roads chose to stay in their small isolated communities. If they were along the highway then the number of undead dictated whether they made their way here or not. When it was done it looked reasonably safe. Another crew was working up on the wall making a sturdy base so the poles wouldn’t sink into the packed earth. Both crews hauled the tower to the top. After some hard work and careful directions, the tower was placed on the base. It was pretty impressive standing high on the hill. There is still a lot of work to be done but with a little a lot of imagination I can see how impressive this place could be.

  January 30

  Worked on the towers again. It’s long hours, and hard work. We ran out of construction material in the late afternoon. There is talk about heading to the university to trade for what we need. Just because we couldn’t build towers didn’t mean we had the day off. We hauled buckets of dirt for the rest of the day. There is no end in sight to the work. It’s funny that those who make the plans aren’t the ones who have to carry them out. That was how things were in society before all this too. We eat in shifts .Indian tacos on the menu tonight. I haven’t had bannock in some time. It’s just as good as I remember.

  Emmitt and the storm troopers sand troopers traded bullets with some of the Navajo girls for peyote. They invited Ron and myself to the party. For our part we have plenty of junk food from Yuma to bring to the party.

  Emmitt is all smiles as we dump our snacks, “Snacks and drink now all we need are the girls to show.”

  At the mention of girls Ron had a drooling smile on his face and quickly checked his reflection in a car’s side mirror. Emmitt continued “Supposed to give you hallucinations, visions if you’re Navajo. I don’t know but it’s going to break the boredom of working the gates all day.”

  By the time we got to the 13th hole of the golf course the party had started. People were sitting on the grass, and a couple of car seats. A fire was going and beers passed around. It’s like a bush party or a party on someone’s acreage. Everyone is chilled and friendly, you wouldn’t know the hell that’s out there in the unknown and for now it doesn’t matter. Out of uniform, the sand troopers don’t look nearly as nerdy. Still nerds but not a pocket protector to be found. Plaid seems to be their uniform when they aren’t on duty. A couple of Canadian boys can relate, we were wearing it before it was cool, before and after grunge, before the hipsters too .

  A girl with honey brown skin and eyes so dark I couldn’t see her pupils sat down next to me on an old truck seat. The seat was light blue, like a robin’s egg, and cracked by time and heat. She has a beer in each hand, smiled and gave one to me. Ron held his hand out for the other one but she opens it, taking a deep drink before pointing with her thumb towards the cooler. Ron shuffled off. I like her already.

  A string of solar patio lanterns flicker to life as the sun set. Pastel greens, yellows and blues softl
y glow under a sea of stars. The Big and Little Dipper and the North Star are the only constellations I know. I point them out. The only facts I can pull out to impress her. Soon little buttons of peyote were passed around. My seat mate, Cindy, fed one to me. Bitter, but I don’t spit it out. We go back to talking; she was studying at the university when it all went down. She wanted to be a nurse. Just when I think the drug is not working the sky changed. It pulsed like a heartbeat; closer then fading back, closer then back with each beat of the heart of mother earth.

  Lub dub lub dub

  Looking at the people near me it was clear I was the only one seeing this.

  Lub dub lub dub

  Cindy slumped against my shoulder. Her hair smelling like sage and sweat.

  Lub dub lub dub

  I could feel her pulse through her silky long hair. It came a half second out of sync with the sky.

  I placed two fingers on my wrist but couldn’t find my pulse. I was thankful. The added pulse would have made me panic, run out into the night. I rolled away from her. She slumped down lying on her side, her eyes locked on the orange glow of the fire. In the reflection of her eyes the flames shot up as if a billows was breathing life into the fire. Someone tossed another log on causing a shower of sparks.

  Then things got strange.

  The sparks drifted upward taking their place in a giant connect the dots up above. Slowly against the dark sky each orange spark forming outline of a moose. The antlers turned cobalt blue and shimmered into blue/green flames. I knew I was tripping out but at the same time powerless to shake loose. Just sitting there like a bystander watching everything develop. The moose started to walk, its legs moved but it did not move across the sky, it was like a children’s flip book. Flip the pages and the legs would move getting nowhere. Above the moose, the moon shimmered as if reflected in a lake, a canoe full of voyageurs paddled above. The moose looked up and gave a mournful call, as they paddled high about him, dipping their paddles into the sky causing ripples through the universe. As the canoe crossed the sky, a solitary spark flew from the fire landing in the bow of the canoe. The spark glowed red slowly changing into a little horned devil. It leaped up encouraging the crew to paddle harder. The canoe sailed off, a handshake with the devil sealing the deal to take them home.