Flowers Vs. Zombies (Book 6) Native

by Perrin Briar

  Ernest gritted his teeth and stumbled through the jungle with his heavy load. Love was a fool’s errand. He would have no part in it. Especially when it was competing with his handsome muscular elder brother for a single girl’s affections.

  By the time Ernest met Fritz and Jenny, they were laughing and joking. Flirting. No doubt at Ernest’s expense.

  “Let me give you a hand with those,” Fritz said.

  “I’m all right,” Ernest said.

  His body had never ached so much in his whole life.

  “Let’s just get these setup,” Ernest said.

  He took out a measuring tape and began to figure the size of the plants as well as their angles. Fritz and Jenny were still gossiping amongst one another. Eat it up, lover boy, Ernest thought.

  And then he had an idea.

  “Hey Fritz,” he said. “Bring one of those tripods over here, will you?”

  Fritz lifted it with ease and carried it to Ernest, shooting a look over his shoulder at Jenny as he did so.

  Yes, you have the muscles, Ernest thought. But do you have the one that matters? The one between your ears.

  “Set it up right here,” Ernest said, pointing to a fern.

  Fritz dumped it down, careful to ensure the greenery covered the black legs.

  “No, you know what, I don’t think this is the right location,” Ernest said. “Why don’t you give me a little hand with my calculations?”

  Fritz’s grin faded a little, remaining affixed to his face like it’d been tacked there with elephant glue.

  “What?” he said.

  “Check my calculations,” Ernest said. “You’re a couple of years ahead of me at school. This should be a walk in the park for you.”

  Ernest flashed Jenny a winning smile. She smiled back. Fritz did not smile.

  He leaned forward and lowered his voice.

  “Are you sure you want to do this?” he said.

  “You’re the one who started it,” Ernest said.

  Fritz glared at his younger brother. He took the piece of paper with the calculations on off him and began to read through them. He handed them back to Ernest.

  “They look good to me,” he said.

  “Are you sure?” Ernest said.

  He checked his own work.

  “That’s strange,” he said. “Because I just handed you Einstein’s equation for the General Theory of Relativity. Are you saying we should counter for the effects of gravity in setting up these patrol guns?”

  Fritz glared even harder.

  Under his voice he said: “I’m going to kill you.”

  “Sorry?” Ernest said. “What did you say?”

  He’d directed his voice at Jenny.

  “It almost sounded like you didn’t know how to figure out these calculations,” he said. “Which is strange, because you’d hardly be able to move to the next grade without doing them. Unless of course you cheated on your final exams?”

  “I must have forgotten about it,” Fritz said. “I hardly need them in the world now.”

  “You’d have thought not, but here we are, needing them right now,” Ernest said. “I suppose we can’t all have photographic memories, can we? Where the gun is is fine.”

  Fritz, ego a little bruised, moved to the next tripod and hefted it. He couldn’t bring himself to look at Jenny, herself a former confessing bookworm. She could do the calculations, Ernest knew. He could see the small smile on her face.

  Ernest had surprised himself. He had never tried to win the affections of a girl before, certainly not when in competition with his elder brother, and certainly not while at school. He’d simply hunched down and focused on his studies. Now, that hard work was beginning to pay off.

  They set up the rest of the guns in their hidden positions, from a variety of locations. Once they were finished, they stood back to admire what they had created. Standing on the opposite side of the trap, they checked to ensure they couldn’t see the guns from this angle. Thankfully there was a lot of foliage.

  “We ought to check to make sure they fire, don’t you think?” Jenny said.

  “They’re not loaded, right?” Ernest said.

  “Right,” Fritz said.

  Ernest arched an eyebrow.

  “Would I harm you?” Fritz said.

  “Do you seriously want me to answer that?” Ernest said.

  “You guys,” Jenny said, shaking her head in exasperation.

  She walked forward to set off the traps.

  “Jenny, wait!” Fritz said.

  “There’s something wrong with the guns, isn’t there?” Ernest said. “I knew it.”

  Jenny stepped on one wire. It tightened around the triggers of half a dozen guns, each positioned just so. There was the clack sound as each gun registered empty. Anyone who came in contact with the wire would find it difficult to avoid getting shot.

  Jenny stepped forward again. She was impressed the wires were so difficult to see. It meant it would be easy for the pirates to trip on them. She stepped into another wire, and more guns clacked. This time there were fewer shots.

  “Something wrong with those triggers,” Jenny said. “We’d best get them sorted before it’s show time.”

  “Jenny, I really think you should let Ernest take over now,” Fritz said.

  “And why’s that?” Jenny said sweetly, innocently.

  She took more steps forward, setting off another round of clacks. But this time there was a whistle sound as something sailed through the air and struck Jenny hard in the stomach and exploded in a bright purple burst. A paintball.

  Jenny gasped, doubling over.

  “Why did you do that?” she said.

  “I didn’t mean for you to get hit,” Fritz said. “It was supposed to be Ernest. And he’s a little taller than you, so I was hoping it’d hit him in the… in another place.”

  Jenny pushed Fritz away from her. She was angry. Evidently she didn’t find the funny side. She stormed off, in the direction of Falcon’s Nest.

  Ernest sidled up beside Fritz and slapped him on the back.

  “Never mind, huh?” he said. “You did some good work there. Shame about the finish.”

  “I’m going to kill you,” Fritz said.

  “If you were in charge of our plans, and they came off like that, I suspect you would have already succeeded,” Ernest said. “Give me a hand with fixing these triggers. Then you can help me load them.”

  Fritz sighed, shoulders hung, watching Jenny’s departing figure. The only eligible girl for a thousand miles, and he’d shot her with a high-powered rifle. Great move.

  Chapter Seventeen

  A SPINNER was right behind the tree that both Bill and Liz were crouched behind. They held long lengths of vines in their hands, like lassos. It was the only effective method they had used to deal with Spinners in the past.

  Bill and Liz shared a look, nodded, and then took off around the tree, in the direction of the Spinner. It stood forlornly against the trunk of a tree, leaning into it. It instantly began to spin, moving faster and faster, its limbs a blur.

  The key to capturing a Spinner was to catch it as quickly as possible, or else it would go too fast and then there would be no way to capture it. But this Spinner had gotten a head start, and it was going to be difficult to slow it down. The good news was a Spinner was easy to capture, unlike cattle, which tended to run quickly.

  “Bill!” Liz said. “Throw your vine at the same time as me!”

  “What for?” Bill said.

  “Just do it!” Liz said.

  The Spinner was getting close. Bill watched as Liz pulled her arm back and released one end of her vine. Bill did the same. They dived to either side as the Spinner spun toward them, then veered left, in Liz’s direction.

  The vines hadn’t slowed the beast at all yet. This was because its handlers hadn’t put any resistance against it yet. The Spinner was going far too fast and hard for Liz and Bill to stop it alone. Their arms would get wrenched from their soc
kets.

  Liz dived behind a tree. The Spinner slammed into it, showering Liz with leaves. Liz looked up.

  The tree branches. The tree could hold the Spinner. Liz tossed the end of her vine up. It looped over and dropped down on the other side. Liz tied the strongest knot she knew and then ran around the tree on the other side, in Bill’s direction.

  “Bill!” Liz said. “Tie the vine to the tree! To the tree!”

  The Spinner bore down on her, gaining speed. The vines were still unfurling. Liz cursed herself for making her vine so long. She ran, but she knew she wasn’t going to make it. She could hear a wurbling sound, like a chubby child shaking his head rapidly side to side. And it was getting closer.

  Bill hastily tied his end of the vine around the tree and turned in Liz’s direction. He opened his eyes wide and shouted: “Liz! Get down!”

  Liz obeyed, throwing herself to one side. She curled up into a ball, knowing what the unrepentant blows would do to her if they struck her.

  The vines tightened, stretching out and becoming rigid. They made a boing! noise as they became as taut as they could possibly get. The trees jerked as they took the brunt of the Spinner’s pent up energy. There was a snap as the branch Liz had attached her vine to broke. It did not snap completely.

  Liz looked up, finding a pair of gnarled fisted bones perched above her. They were frozen in place, shaking side to side in their effort to reach Liz’s body and beat her. Liz’s eyes were wide. She glanced at the tight vines, before crawling up out of the way and getting to her feet. She didn’t trust those vines to hold for long.

  She rushed to Bill, who extended his hands to grab her and pull her behind the tree. He hugged her tight, but he also knew they wouldn’t have much time if they were to get the Spinner and get out of there in one piece. So, he parted from her and together they moved around the tree and toward the Spinner.

  It was encased in a cocoon of vines six inches thick, and though it struggled, there wasn’t enough give for it to work its way free. But it would, given enough time. They had to hurry.

  Chapter Eighteen

  JACK climbed the tallest tree he could find. He could usually recall with remarkable ability the location of anywhere he had been in the jungle. It wasn’t difficult for him. Every tree was different, with different markings and texture. They reacted differently to his bodyweight and the wind. He could almost do it with his eyes closed.

  But the last time he had been through this particular part of the jungle he had been semi-conscious and afraid he would lose his footing. But from the vantage of this tree he saw the sheer rock cliff face he was looking for.

  “There it is, Nips,” he said.

  Nips coughed and hawed. Jack recognized it for the warning call that it was, and followed the little capuchin’s extended finger.

  A large band of men was heading through the jungle, more than halfway through now. The sun was high and Jack could feel it beating on his darkened face, but he couldn’t afford to linger.

  “Come on, Nips,” Jack said. “Let’s go.”

  He would need to climb as well as he had ever done in the past, and do it in record time if he was to get what he had come for. He leapt from the tree and latched onto a vine.

  He sailed through the air and scaled bark that, to the lay person, wouldn’t have held any handholds at all. But Jack knew better. His muscular hands fit into the grooves and around the knobs of wood like they had been specially made for him.

  At his shoulder, and occasionally using Jack’s own body to propel himself through the jungle, was Nips.

  Chapter Nineteen

  “HOLD UP,” Kristian said. “Break time. Ten minutes.”

  Any hope Kristian had been fostering that he might garner some friendship from his crew with his kindness had clearly been wide of the mark. The other pirates sweated profusely but did not offer a whisper of gratitude.

  They had been nurtured to be that way, Kristian knew. It was a state of mind he had never achieved and frankly, never would. Yet another reason why he could never survive amongst the rest of the crew.

  The men leaned their weapons against a pair of tree trunks that had fallen and lay in parallel to one another. The men didn’t pass through the middle of these two trunks, but instead wound round either side, into the foliage.

  Kristian’s imagination leapt to new levels of paranoia as he imagined what the men were planning for him from behind their leafy enfolds. He fingered the pocket watch. So easily he had come by it, easier still how it could be taken from him.

  The men returned and continued on their journey through the jungle.

  And then he noticed something.

  The tree trunk showed evidence of having fallen not by nature, but by the hand of man. The tree had been hacked, the flat unnatural angle a fingerprint of evidence.

  And then he noticed something else.

  There wasn’t just one felled trunk, but a line of them, down either side of the route they were taking. They believed themselves to be taking this route because it was the easiest to traverse, but perhaps it had already been chosen for them, and they were merely following the route someone had made.

  A trap.

  “Uh, wait,” Kristian said.

  But the men, so used to ignoring him and his orders, continued walking.

  “Guys,” Kristian said. “I’m not sure we should be…”

  A series of short sharp cracks, and the ground gave way beneath Vlad. A short yell, and another pirate sank beneath the earth, then a third, and a fourth. One stood on the edge of a hole and flailed his arms in an effort to prevent himself from falling in. It was no good. One of the other pirates was close enough to grab him, save him, but that would hardly help the pirate once they were back on the ship now, would it?

  “Bunch of cowarrrrds!” the man said with his dying breath.

  There was a sickening crunch and an abrupt end to the man’s cry as he slammed into whatever was awaiting him at the bottom of the pit.

  The land around them was flat. Too flat. Unnatural. It seemed to make the situation all the more dangerous to Kristian. He saw pitfalls around every corner. In the old world he had been a safety inspector and it constantly appalled him how frivolous with other people’s health and safety people were willing to be.

  Two of the pits the pirates had fallen into had become deathly quiet. No surprises for what would be awaiting them in those holes. But groans came from the others.

  “Get those men out of there!” Kristian said.

  The crew looked at him with dangerous eyes. They didn’t want to rescue the crew in the pits. The victims had made a mistake, suffered bad luck and should be left to their fate. It meant an easier time of it on board The Red Flag once they returned.

  They moved slowly toward the holes and took their sweet time in retrieving vines from the trees that surrounded them. They began to lower them into the holes.

  Kristian edged toward the pit Vlad had fallen into and peered inside. Vlad had been impaled. The universe wasn’t without irony. The sharp tips of the protruding pikes had thrust through his body, blood dripping from the sharpened ends. There was no hope for Vlad.

  Then Kristian heard the heavy footstep of a large man on the ground behind him. A moment too late, as the man shoved Kristian forward. Curiosity had gotten the better of Kristian, and now he was paying for it with his life. At least it would be a quick death. He was relieved that for the first time in his whole life he didn’t feel afraid.

  Chapter Twenty

  JACK came running through the jungle, and dumped a bag full of purple and pink flowers with green stripes on the ground.

  “These are the same as we were infected with before?” Liz said.

  “They are,” Jack said. “These are all the ones I could find.”

  “Good boy,” Liz said. “Now, you should all get out of here. If something goes wrong and I inhale their poison, it’s better if it affects just me and not the rest of you.”

  “I agree,�
� Bill said. “But I’d prefer it if it were me.”

  “I’m the one with the mask,” Liz said.

  Her eyes smiled, but they carried a look of concentration that Bill had seen on his wife’s face before. She wasn’t about to back down on this.

  “Just be careful,” Bill said.

  He turned and headed toward Falcon’s Nest.

  Jenny crossed the clearing, carrying even more weapons toward what remained of Falcon’s Nest. She followed in Bill’s wake. She put the bag of weapons on the winch and began climbing the ladder. Bill was already pulling on the ropes, bringing it up to their home.

  Meanwhile, following in Jenny’s wake were Fritz and Ernest. They were arguing about something, pushing and shoving one another. It didn’t look like it would come to blows, as it used to when they were much younger, but more like a childish playful argument.

  “What’s up with Ernest and Fritz?” Jack said, watching them. “They’re acting crazy.”

  Liz couldn’t make out what they were saying, but it was obvious what they were arguing about.

  “That’s just another word for having a crush,” Liz said.

  “A what?” Jack said.

  “A crush,” Liz said. “It’s where you find yourself liking someone else.”

  “Like me and Nips?” Jack said.

  “I hope not,” Liz said. “I mean, like your father and I.”

  “Oh,” Jack said. “Like love?”

  “That’s right,” Liz said. “But a lower level of it. Perhaps it’s the first step to love. But every bit as serious if left untreated. One day, if you’re very lucky, you’ll get to feel it too.”

  “I hope not,” Jack said. “Not if it makes you act stupid like Ernest and Fritz.”

  “It can,” Liz said with a nod. “Sometimes. But sometimes it makes you act smart. Look at your father. He was lost before he met me. He’ll tell you so. In fact, you can ask him yourself when you take this to him.”

  She handed Jack a bag full of what looked like packed bags. Jack moved to Falcon’s Nest and scaled the ladder to the top. Bill, Fritz and Ernest were sanding down the walls. It seemed a strange thing for them to be doing. Why make the walls thinner? Wasn’t it already drafty enough?