by Bonds, Javan
STILL ALIVE
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BOX SET
BOOKS 5 & 6
Javan Bonds
Foreword
Right out of the gate, you know Javan’s story will be different. He has a keen eye for the absurd and sometimes his characters are laugh out loud funny, sometimes brain bashingly brutal. There’s not a whole lot of political correctness in his books and he has no qualms skewering all the sacred cows. If you’re laughing at something others would find a little offensive, keep reading. He’ll probably get around to offending you later on so the others can laugh at your offense. It’s all in good fun.
I believe the stories resonate with his readers and fans because they are about everyday people making the best of the end of the world. No up armored gun bunnies with an apocalyptic stash of MRE’s and machine guns, no Tier One operators kicking ass while chewing bubble gum. Javan’s characters are slackers and posers, strong and weak, smart and dumb. Men and women. Black and white. Everyday people who got lucky and survived then got smart to stay alive.
If you’re reading this, you’ve probably already followed all of Mo and company’s adventures up to this point. I’m in the same pirate boat as you, I haven’t read the following adventure yet and I’m sure you’re anxious to get to it, not listen to me prattle on about how awesome Javan is. It’s been said that Southern men tell better jokes and Javan takes that skill and transfers it to the written page. Enjoy the adventure that awaits!
David A. Simpson
Author of the Zombie Road Series available on Amazon
ZOMBIE
RIVER RUN
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STILL ALIVE
BOOK FIVE
Javan Bonds
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The events of
Book Five
Zombie River Run
Take place simultaneously as
Events in
Book Six:
Zombie Paradise Lost
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Prelude
“Mo. Gray Fox here. Do you read?” I was sitting on the main deck with the rest of the crew when the radio sounded.
“Wow. You’re alive. How about those nightly debriefs?” I hadn’t heard from my father at the scheduled time last night, and I’d been somewhat worried. It took threatening not to go to Tuscaloosa to keep my brother from just turning the damn boat around.
He fell into a more conversational tone. “Yeah, sorry about that. We were at the church all night.” I could hear his smile through the radio. “Some temporary replacements are showing up.”
He said this for the benefit of The Oracle. I turned to see my husky friend grinning as if he already knew. I asked into the radio, “Replacements for who?”
“Bob showed up. We also have a preacher now, and a new sheriff.”
I was happily surprised. “I knew Bob had to make it.” Shit, I kind of want to go back now just because Bob’s there. “Why were you at church last night? It wasn’t Sunday.”
He didn’t seem to catch my sarcasm. “Brother Brown was elected as the interim pastor. He gave us quite a story.” My dad’s choice of wording told me that he didn’t believe the story was true.
“‘Gave?’ I take it you considered it was bullshit?”
I could tell he thought so. “Meh. There were a lot of holes in it.”
“But you voted for him anyway?”
He shot back immediately. “No. Neither did your mother or Bob. But everybody else seemed to be in love with the guy.”
He continued telling us about how this charismatic speaker was immediately accepted by almost every resident of the island. Charismatic, huh?
I thought about asking if this guy could become The Dictator, but knew my dad had probably already been thinking about that. After a pause, I spoke into the radio. “We’ve gone through a few dams. Most have been quiet. No losses.”
My dad added on to the end of my sentence. “Yet.”
I begrudgingly reaffirmed, “No losses yet.” It’s like he wanted us to barely make it. If we made it to the Gulf, he probably didn’t expect three of us to be alive. I know as The Hero I would have to be included in the three, but he would only accept that because it’s the way things are supposed to be.
He waited a long moment. “How’s Easy?” I knew it was coming.
“I’m here.” My brother was sitting across from me.
“How’s Aka?” Daddy asked.
“She’s here, too.”
She immediately chimed in, “Hey, Randy.” She, like everyone else I’ve ever met, has already taken to calling my dad by his first name. I was guessing my mom would be “Mrs. Collins.”
Speak of the devil. My mother came into the room and entered the conversation. They managed to talk to Smokes and every other member of the crew. Shit, even Crow got some air time! I sat in lonely silence like an unloved stepchild.
Eventually, my father remembered that I existed. “Hey Mo, your cousin is going to do a few flyovers of the county and look for more survivors.” It’s great that Guntersville now has a big plane with a trained flight crew. I was glad Benji’s skills were being put to use.
I was about to speak when he started again. “If he sees any hordes, he’ll drop some 120s on them.” I was hoping he would do just that.
My mother chimed in. “Elmo, Ezekiel, watch out for one another on your trip.” I cringed at her use of my full first name. We smiled and nodded then realized we needed to answer verbally. We both sounded back that we would.
“Well, good talk. Buzz you tomorrow night.” Daddy was winding down the conversation.
I laughed. “You sure about that? You don’t want to start making them bi-nightly?”
He fell back into his usual radio stance. “Mo. Yes, I’m sure. And no, we will continue with our set schedule.” Ugh. “Gray Fox over and out.”
Well, this carefree adventure is going to be business as usual, no twists and no surprises. Don’t expect to read about any clashes with the evolving peevies. Their northward push started over a month ago, so the damn creeps have to be in New York by now. At least in DC. I can imagine the monsters trying to bite Nancy Pelosi and getting silicone poisoning. Shit, never mind. You can’t kill something that’s already dead, plus she was only at work four days a year anyway!
We won’t come across a single living person. If we do, of course, they won’t have any ill intent. We are all just people trying to avoid becoming naked cannibals! Dammit. I don’t remember coming across any incarnations of The Villain, The Dictator, or even The Betrayer in my fourth journal.
Tomorrow I will start a new journal. It will detail my boredom and our uneventful, short trip as we travel to find The Cure. You can expect absolutely, positively nothing exciting to happen on our zombie river run!
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1
How Do You Like Me Now?
MORTIMER LESTER WOKE up. I’m not dead. Why? How? Where the hell am I? Where the hell is that darkie and his worthless girlfriend? The cannibals should be eating me right now!
When he opened his eyes, he was still naked and laying on the cold tile. The old man lost consciousness while he was hanging from the ceiling by his feet. There was no one alive around there or anywhere in Huntsville, as far as he knew, that could've even gotten him down. Simply falling would have shattered his old bones. Someone had to have gently placed his body on the ground and untied him. Mortimer was dumbfounded to find that his head was resting on his neatly folded clothes. Surviving this must’ve been divine intervention!
Mortimer quickly stood and began to dress. The boiling cauldron to his side was now nothing more than a room temperature p
ot of water; the fire had died hours ago. It was getting later in the day now, and Mortimer thought it might be a good idea to stay in this building for the night.
“Oh shit, the cow!” he screamed to no one in particular.
The old man had to go out to the truck and check on his sickly heifer. The peevies were able to come out in the day now, so it would be dangerous, regardless of what time it was. Besides, that fucking interracial couple would be coming back at some point. I better get the fuck out of this shithole while I got the chance.
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With the sun shining in his eyes Mortimer stepped out the back door of the Burger King. Just before the door slammed shut he lit a handkerchief and tossed it at the kitchen wall, which was conveniently coated in cooking oil. Taking his time, walking back to the truck he could feel the heat from the blaze behind him rolling up his back. Mortimer thought he remembered a quote from some old movie. The scene was with a guy who had long, gray hair and his chest sticking out of his shirt. This revenge was best served, fucking hot!
Mortimer backed the four-wheel drive across the parking lot, the building being quickly consumed by flames. The geriatric man laughed himself into a coughing fit once the roof caved in. That stupid girl and her porch monkey will be sorry they tried to eat Mortimer Lester!
Once the building had been devoured by fire, the old man cranked his vehicle and started heading north again. He killed the engine a couple times just to bask in the dead quiet. Besides the occasional scuffling or grunting from his cow in the back, the silence was perfect. There was no one in this dead city, at least, as far as he knew.
A few miles down the highway, he stopped again to revel in the sound of silence. This time though there were distant popping and small explosions from something on fire. Fire? Where? The distance was too great for the sounds to be from the Burger King fire alone. Mortimer scanned the horizon all around him, looking for a glow or a column of smoke. Off to his left. There! The engine turned over and he was off.
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Approaching Huntsville International Airport, he wasn’t sure how he should feel about finding more survivors. Maybe I should just keep heading north. These bastards can’t be worth it. Fuck em! Mortimer didn’t need anyone. He certainly didn’t want them needing him. He especially didn’t need them eating him, or his cow for that matter.
This place had been bombed. There were destroyed cars, craters, empty shells, and even small fires in the road ahead. The old man steered around the larger obstacles and turned onto the runway inside the open chain-link fence. There were dozens, if not hundreds of bodies neatly piled up on the tarmac. Almost every one of them was naked and sporting at least one gunshot wound. It was difficult to tell if they were just a dead body or undead given the skin color, but the fact that none were wearing clothes made him decide they were all infected. Or someone just had a weird fetish!
Why had so many zombies gathered here? And what had killed them? The old man was pondering this when he pulled into the parking area. He was contemplating stopping the truck and getting out to walk through the airport terminal. There might be things useful left behind in this place.
He stopped the truck. Before he could shut the motor off, a slender, middle-aged woman came running out of the building.
She ran to the passenger side, swung open the door, and jumped in. “I don’t know if there are any of them left, but it’s getting dark. The peevies will smell blood and be here soon. Go!”
Mortimer wanted to ask who she was, where she came from, what the hell she was doing in his truck, and a million other questions. Maybe the sleeping pills that black boy fed me still have my muddy water stirred up. None of his usual comebacks came forth. The only thing he could think to do was put the truck in gear and began moving. Northbound it WAS!
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2
The Boss
ELMO “MO” COLLINS: The Hero, and his brother, Ezekiel “Easy” Collins: The Protector, slashed and slammed every naked, blue, cannibalistic, yellow-eyed, starving, undead monster they could find. These former humans are infected with a bioengineered sickness that turned them into rabid apes. These bloodthirsty animals have a craving for human flesh, not to mention no bowel control. One bite from an infected resulted in immediate infection, every single time. Within eight hours after exposure, a person could expect to become a zombie. Though the casually coined peevies would ignore a newly bitten human these blue crazies once turned begin craving, searching out, and chomping all surrounding uninfected persons. Primates and humans were the only known species susceptible to the virus but The Medicine Man was currently investigating a possible avian connection.
The pair of main protagonists weren’t all that worried about being bitten at this particular moment. Mo and his bodybuilder brother were armored and in Battlestar Galactica’s Cylon themed armor and Iron Man’s red and gold trimmed battle suits, respectively. Mo wielded a Klingon bat’leth while his massive sibling carried a giant Warhammer 40,000, Thunder Hammer. The endless wave of revenants swarmed the brothers. They had switched from rifles to melee combat when the departed drew too close for projectile weapons to be safe and effective. The monsters paid no attention to the fact that they couldn’t bite through ‘ceramite reinforced plate armor’ or to the piles of bloody, eviscerated, dead and dying zombies all around the brothers covered in visceral carnage. They only wanted the taste of succulent, raw meat!
The brothers were defending Akambiya Ngona Collins, the only crew member of the Viva Ancora with the knowledge to successfully operate a hydroelectric dam. The replica pirate ship had passed through the locks, and they were now returning from the control room. Easy and Aka had recently married back in Guntersville, and the newlyweds had spent most of their honeymoon slaughtering peevies. She stood behind them wearing her Storm outfit, ready with her demonic-looking, onyx halberd. She was prepared to slice the creatures with it’s razor-sharp blade, but they seemed only to be seeking out her husband and brother-in-law, never once attempting to attack the ebony goddess behind them.
The group moved at a snail’s pace, gaining no more than a few inches with each defeated enemy. The Hero thrust one end of his blade into the face of a former middle-aged man with a receding hairline. “This doesn’t make any sense! Why are there so many?”
“Damn right it doesn’t.”
Easy, in his Iron Man suit, chose to blame his older brother for the horde. “There’s never this many of them unless I’m with you!”
Mo tried to shake a yellow eyeball from the end of his bat’leth. “What? It’s not my fault. They must come after some of the others. The script wouldn’t be entertaining otherwise.”
“The fuck it ain’t! You just don’t know how few of them there are when you’re not here because there’s a shitload at every dam you go into.” The Protector slammed the head of his hammer into the back of one of the creatures, shattering the spine and ripping all the way through the ribs. “I’m not coming with you, anymore!”
Mo acted insulted. “Fine! Fuck you, too.” He spoke solemnly, remembering the words of The Oracle. “We were paired randomly. I had nothing to do with it!” He lowered his voice and said, “Do you really think I want to smell your fucking cologne all day?” He continued at his earlier volume. “Besides, this is just how it’s ‘post to be.’”
After destroying a zombie’s legs with his mallet and stomping its head into a paste, Easy turned to his brother and scoffed condescendingly, “Well, I ain’t ‘post-to come off the boat with you anymore.” He tacked on to respond to the insult in an equally low tone, “It’s Neiman Marcus. Eat shit.”
The Hero shot back stubbornly, “Good. I don’t want to be with you anymore, either!” He dropped his volume once more. “And I don’t care what it is. I would rather bathe in the ass batter of peevies than wear that stuff.”
Uncountable numbers of shit-covered nudists littered the ground around them. Reeking diarrhea masked the scent of everything beyond the coppery blood at
their feet. They were relieved to see the exit door finally. Peevies had been nocturnal until around a month after May Day when they suddenly became tolerant of sunlight. The undead’s eyes had evolved to be able to withstand UV rays, but they still were not fans of the bright afternoon sun. They usually preferred to hide in dark, damp, musky enclosures soaked in a wet coating of feces with the color and consistency of boiling asphalt. Stepping into the midday sun would hopefully end the majority of the undead assault.
Finally, there was peace; but not without the pain. The burning muscles and near exhaustion was an ever-present reminder of today’s battle. The onslaught had immediately ceased as if it never happened at all. Perhaps it’s all a figment of my imagination, thought The Hero.
Slinging the bloody filth from his two-handed blade, The Hero let out a weak chuckle. Met with sunny warmth and sweet silence, Mo mangled an old Bruce Springsteen song, “I guess they were revved up like a deuce. Cannibals are just runners in the night. Thank God peevies are blinded by the LIGHT.”
3
Drive On
JUST HOW LONG? Three days? Four? Maybe a week? Mortimer wasn’t sure of the date. That bothered him honestly. Keeping track of the time and day was something he had always done, always routine. Things had just been crazy since he picked up that damn woman.
Margaret. She was the most amazing woman he had met in his long life. The senior citizen would have considered her simply a girl if they had met earlier and under different circumstances. In her late forties or early fifties, she was younger than him by decades. Regardless, she was more than willing to tell her story. And for once, Mortimer was more than willing to listen and actually hear it.
There was nothing to dislike about Margaret. It was strange that the old man loved hearing her talk. It goes without saying, that he loved watching her walk as well. Also, her name was Margaret. Not Maggie or some other stupid shit nickname. She was the full package, in more ways than one. Maybe a couple fries with that shake? Mortimer smirked to himself at the image.
