“What if she’s hungry? I’ve fed her lizards and mice, but couldn’t find any today.”
“Of course she’s hungry. Zombies are always hungry, but they don’t eat people food.” Mychal slapped the side of the truck. “They eat people!” He could not believe her stupidity. Maybe she’d lost her mind when she saw her first zombie. “That thing isn’t a pet, and it stinks. Colton is going to be mad that you’re feeding it. You’re ruining his experiment.”
“I bet she was cute once.” Hanna sighed. “I hate that she’s in a cage. Probably had Barbies and wore ribbons in her hair a few months ago. How old do you think she is?”
“Who cares? If she wasn’t in a cage, she’d have one of my arrows through her brain. Jeez, Hanna.” Mychal marched to where Colton and Chalice emerged from the trees. Water dripped from Chalice’s freshly washed clothes. He glanced down at his jeans.
Blood and brain matter spotted the denim. How long had it been since he’d taken a bath or a shower? Changed his clothes? Days, at least. Maybe it wasn’t the zombie girl he smelled but himself. Mom would be very disappointed. His heart sank. He missed her so much.
Blinking away tears he refused to let fall, he headed to the camper to change, knowing Chalice would be mad because she’d already finished laundry. He shrugged. It wasn’t like he asked to fight zombies that day.
After grabbing clean clothes from a bin under one of the bunks, he grabbed his bow and headed back outside, eager to clean up and then practice. He’d like to practice on the zombie pet, but knew Colton wouldn’t be too thrilled if Mychal killed his experiment.
“Hey, Bill.” Mychal joined the man who sharpened a sword in front of the motor home. One of these days, Mychal would find a katana, then he’d really kick some zombie butt. “Want to go take a dip in the creek with me?”
“You saying I stink?” Bill smiled without looking up.
“Maybe a little.” Mychal laughed. “I know I do, and it isn’t safe to go alone.”
“Sure.” Bill grabbed his weapon. “I could use a bath.” He marched to his truck, reached into his glove compartment, and then pulled out a green bar of soap. “Irish Spring.” He grinned. “I like the way this soap smells. Found a few bars at a store not too long ago.”
“Soap?” Colton appeared by their side as if by magic, his own rifle cradled in his arms. Or maybe he smelled the Irish Spring. “Mind if I borrow some?”
“Me, too,” Sarah said. “Chalice can shoot off a warning if any dead show up.”
Calice nodded. “I’ll keep watch from the top of the motor home. Now, that most of the dust from the meteors has cleared, I can see for miles.”
Mychal followed the others into the trees. A year ago, if someone had told him that he’d have to take a weapon with him everywhere he went, even sleeping with one close at hand, he would have told them they were nuts. Especially, if they explained the reason was because zombies would be around. He wished zombies would have stayed in the movies and books where they belonged. But, he did love his bow.
As soon as the group arrived at the creek, they stripped down to their underwear and waded in. Mychal did the same, tossing his soiled clothes into a shallow spot by the bank. The end of the world as they knew it didn’t allow for modesty.
They passed the bar of soap around, laughing and splashing, almost forgetting they were in a battle for survival, until Sarah reminded them they needed to actually wash their clothes and return to help Chalice.
Mychal frowned. Leave it to a woman to spoil the fun. What would it hurt for them to all hang out in the chilly water for just a bit more? The day’s heat and humidity were relieved by the water and the shade.
Sarah must have noticed the look on his face because she laughed and grabbed his clothes. “Don’t worry. I’ll scrub them for you.” She laid them across a rock and grabbed a handful of sand. “What I wouldn’t do for some laundry detergent.”
“What I wouldn’t do for some beer.” Bill scrubbed his own clothes.
Colton laughed. “I’ve never had one, but there’re a few cases in the motor home. I stocked up on barter type items before all hell broke loose.”
“Son, I want to adopt you.” Bill closed his eyes and lifted his face heavenward. “A beer is waiting for me, the sun is shining, and we’re all still alive.” He opened his eyes and grinned. “And you can have your first beer.”
“What about me?” Mychal stopped floating and planted his feet on the sandy bottom of the creek bed. “Since I do the work of a man, I ought to be treated like one.” Killing things, dead or alive, definitely made someone qualify to be treated as a grown man.
Bill shrugged. “Fair enough.”
Bushes rattled on the opposite side of the creek. Like one, the group lunged for their weapons.
*
Colton peered through the scope of his rifle as a boy around Mychal’s age stepped onto the bank. He glanced once over his shoulder, reached into the trees and grabbed a smaller girl by the hand. Then another girl joined them, and they splashed their way across the creek.
“Don’t shoot.” The boy said. “Unless you want to shoot all the zombies chasing us. I’d run if I were you.” With that, the three cleared the creek and sprinted in the direction of the motorhome, leaving Colton and the others staring at themselves.
“How many do you think are coming?” Mychal asked, his skin paling under his tan.
“From the look on that boy’s face,” Bill said. “I’d guess a lot. Move back.”
They grabbed their clothes and backed up, keeping their guns aimed across the creek.
The woods were too quiet. No birds chattered. No leaves rubbed against each other. His blood chilled, and he increased his pace. Whatever was coming would not be good. Before he knew it, he ran and burst into the clearing like a dog after a rabbit.
Chalice was already herding the new kids into the motorhome. How many more strays could they possibly pick up? Colton would need to find another vehicle soon or he might find himself riding on top.
Mr. Hightower had found a gun from somewhere. Sadie clung to his arm like a leech. Stupid girl. Her father couldn’t shoot with her hanging on him. If she caused someone to get killed, Colton would shoot her himself.
“What is it?” Chalice joined them, leaving the motor home door open but standing in front of it to prevent any undead from shuffling inside.
“I don’t know.” Colton wanted to throw up. Whatever they’d been through before, he had a feeling today would be the worst yet.
“Everyone keep your back against the motorhome,” Bill yelled. “Weapons ready, backs covered, eyes peeled.”
“Shit, I’m scared.” Colton took a deep breath and immediately regretted it. The air was so foul he could taste it. Full of a rotten sour odor that hung like a cloud. The stink of a zombie, and several of them at that. “Bill, I’m thinking we should take cover inside. This group might be the biggest we’ve had to fight. We could shoot from the windows.”
“I agree. Everyone in!” Bill stepped forward a bit to allow the others inside, and all hell broke loose.
Four zombies came around the opposite side of the motorhome. Colton’s first shot took one in the eye, exploding it like a stepped on grape. Bill didn’t have time to bring his gun up, instead he used it as a bat and crushed another’s skull.
Sadie screamed. Her father cried out and tried to shove her away.
Colton turned as a zombie latched onto Mr. Hightower’s neck, shaking him like a pit bull with a side of beef. Blood poured down Hightower’s chest like a scarlet river. Colton had never heard a man scream so shrilly. Another zombie grabbed Sadie and bit into her shoulder, pulling back with a chunk of her hanging from its stained teeth. Blood squirted. He couldn’t help them. They were both goners.
He couldn’t reload his gun fast enough. “Get inside, Chalice!”
“You can’t hold them off by yourself.”
At least twenty Zombies poured from the woods with one intention. They all wanted human fle
sh.
Colton grabbed Chalice’s arm, then clapped Mychal on the shoulder. “We’re going inside. Bill! Sarah!”
“Right behind you, boy.” Bill practically shoved them inside. Once they were all in, he closed and locked the door.
Thuds reverberated as zombies launched themselves at the sides of their shelter. Colton opened a window just enough for him to shove a machete through. His first jab went through the open mouth of drooling woman, splitting her face from ear to ear. “Save your ammunition if you can.”
Mychal grabbed the skewer he’d used before, then handed a butcher knife to Chalice. The new kids, along with the others huddled on the bed. The youngest screamed, the sound as grating as a squealing pig.
“Kid, grab something sharp and help.” Colton pointed to a pair of barbeque prongs. “Stab them in the eye. Deep. Into the brain.”
The took them and turned to a vacant window. “The name’s Eddy.” He set in with helping rid them of zombies like he’d been doing it his whole life.
Colton grinned and went back to work. Within minutes, the sleeve of his shirt dripped with foul-smelling blood, and zombies lay two deep on the ground, yet more kept coming.
The motor home rocked. Thuds echoed. The survivors kept fighting. Exhaustion weighed Colton’s shoulders.
“Where’s Hanna?” Chalice glanced toward the bed. “Did anyone see her come in?”
“No.” Mychal pulled back. “You were responsible for getting the younger ones inside. Did you leave her?”
“I couldn’t have.” Chalice glanced out the front window. “I can’t believe it. She’s hiding behind the zombie cage. Why aren’t they attacking her?”
Colton rushed to her side, sure he’d see Hanna torn to pieces. “They can’t smell her.” Was it possible? Could they actually walk among the dead if they smelled like them?
Hanna must have seen them watching. She stood up and waved.
Colton hurried to another window. “Stay down and be quiet!”
“God help that child.” Sarah reached for the door.
Chalice laid a hand on her arm to stop her. “The zombies are nowhere near her. If you go out there, you’ll attract their attention, and you might both die.” Tears poured down her face. “I don’t think they know she’s there.”
“Whoa, that’s going to leave a dent.” Bill stepped back as one zombie, who must have weighed three hundred pounds when he was alive, rammed into the motorhome door. “He keeps that up and that door is going to buckle or at the least, not open, then we’re all screwed.”
“Any chance of driving out of here?” Sarah rammed an arrow through the neck of a zombie.
“Not if we want this machine to be drivable for much longer.” Colton sighed. There had to be a way to draw the zombies away. His arm felt ready to fall off, not to mention the stench and the way the zombie blood congealed on his arm. “How many more are there?”
“Three.” Bill pulled out his pistol and fired three shots. “The hell with the noise. But, I do think our plan of sticking around was just shot to hell.” He motioned to Mychal and Eddy. “You two come help me drag these awful things from the front of the motorhome while the others guard us. It’s time to move on.”
The minute he opened the door, Hanna jumped from the back of Bill’s truck and raced inside the motorhome. Eyes wide, she stared at Chalice. “They didn’t even look my way.”
3
Bill stepped outside, put a bullet in each of the Whitetowers’s heads, then grabbed a shovel. “Time to bury these poor folks. They were with us for a while. Any helpers?”
Colton nodded. “I’ll help.”
Chalice swallowed back the bile rising in her mouth. He’d shot the man and his daughter as if they were rabid dogs. Maybe they were the same as, but she was still glad she didn’t have to be the one to shoot them. She glanced at the group of children. What must they be thinking of the man’s callous attitude?
“Wait.” She put a hand on Colton’s shoulder. “If we have to leave anyway, I’d like to go south, to Henrietta, and check on my grandma. She owns a small farm on the outskirts. Maybe she’s still alive. We could stay there for a while. She’ll have fresh vegetables.”
Wouldn’t that be wonderful? They were overdue for something good to happen to them. They seemed to run into survivors everywhere, even in the woods. So, why can’t she have hope there might be another piece of her family still breathing?
He nodded before following Bill.
With a deep sigh, that started in her gut and expelled forcibly from her mouth, Chalice turned to their newest members. “I’m Chalice, the one with the bow is my brother, Mychal, and that,” she said pointing at Hanna, “Is my sister, Hanna. Colton is the one who followed the older man, Bill. The woman is Sarah. Those two are Junior and Sissy.”
Eddy stood stiffly by the fold down table. “I’m Eddy. Those are my sisters, Alyssah and Trinity. We’ve been on our own for two weeks. Dad went hunting and never returned. Mom never came back after the meteors fell.” He closed his eyes for a minute and ran a hand through his short, blond military style haircut. “We went looking for Dad, saw the zombies, and took off running. We’ve stayed out of their way, mostly, but ran across that big group a few minutes ago. It all seems like a bad dream. Zombies aren’t supposed to be real.”
“Well, they are. Let me get you something to eat.” Chalice squeezed past them and opened the cupboard above the propane stove. At the way they collected survivors, the food wouldn’t last nearly long enough. They’d need to go scavenging again. And that meant going to a previously populated area, which would most likely be full of zombies. Her shoulders sagged. No help for it. They couldn’t turn anyone away, much less children.
“I’ll help,” Alyssah said. She grabbed some cans of spaghetti O’s. “Thank you for saving us.”
Chalice nodded. “I’m sorry about your parents. I lost mine, too.” As usually happened when she thought of her Mom, her fingers rubbed the marks on her wrist.
“Seems like it’s mostly the grownups that die, doesn’t it?” She opened drawers until she found a can opener. “They’re the ones who go out looking for food, then never return.” She glanced at Trinity. “She finally quit crying, now this.”
Chalice glanced at the younger girl who lay on the bed. “She’ll be all right. You all will.” After lighting the stove, she handed Alyssah a pan, then turned to Eddy. “Can you shoot?”
“Yes.” He sat across the table from Mychal. “My Dad taught me. I’m an okay shot.”
“There’s a pistol in a trunk under the bed. Keep it with you. Whenever we’re out and about, you can keep whatever weapons you find.” Chalice pushed open the door to the motorhome and stepped outside, the peace of the day shattered beyond repair. She made her way to where Colton and Bill buried the Whitetowers under an oak tree.
Bill had removed his hat. “I said the Lord’s Prayer. Don’t know what else to do.” He glanced back at the motorhome. “We need another set of wheels and more weapons. We’ll be lucky if the motorhome makes it your Grandma’s. That means a trip into town, unless a tackle store I know of still has some things. We’ll stop there first, then head to Henrietta.”
“Okay.” Chalice was more than happy to let Bill take control. It relieved a lot of pressure letting an adult run things. She motioned her head toward the zombie pet that thrashed against the bars of her cage. “Hanna has been feeding it whatever she can find.”
Colton nodded. “Yeah, I figured. I found pieces of a mouse the other day. At that rate, we’ll never find out if they die without food.”
“I’ll talk to her.” Chalice crossed her arms against the approaching night’s chill. After the herd of undead that almost overtook them, she had no more desire to stay in that location, especially at night. “How far is the bait shop?”
“Two or three miles down the highway, then another mile down a dirt road.” Bill tugged his hat back on. “Guess we’d better go.”
“Can we get the motorhome ther
e?” Colton asked. “I don’t want to leave the kids behind. Not after today.”
“We’ll have to get it there, or at least as far as the turn off.” Bill hefted the shovel over his shoulder. “Then, I figure just us three can go check out the place and leave Sarah and Mychal to stand guard.”
Mychal wouldn’t be happy being left behind. Chalice headed back to the motorhome. Her brother wanted to be a part of the action more than he wanted to guard a bunch of little kids, but he was a sharpshooter and getting pretty good with his bow. He’d have to understand.
*
Colton watched Chalice head back to their home on wheels. Her thin shoulders looked like she carried the weight of the world on them, but the sun shined on her freshly washed hair, making him wish they had time for him to bury his faces in the silky strands. Maybe even get a kiss or two. Zombie killing and survival didn’t leave much time for romance, though. Not if someone wanted to stay alive long enough to have a chance at love.
By the time he climbed behind the wheel of the motorhome, with Chalice in the passenger seat, the kids had found spots to sit or sprawl out in the back. Not enough seatbelts, but he’d bet that didn’t matter nearly as much anymore. Who were they going to crash into? They followed Bill’s truck back to Highway 40 and toward Oklahoma.
They sure weren’t making very good time toward the Air Force Base. They’d been on the road a month and they weren’t even out of the state of Arkansas. That’s what happened when you traveled with a bunch of little kids. Now, Chalice wanted to head out of the way to find someone who most likely was dead.
They hadn’t gone far before Bill pulled over and ushered Colton ahead. The truck he drove wasn’t big enough to push other vehicles out of the way. At the speedy rate of ten miles per hour, Colton forged the way ahead, cringing every time the motorhome crinkled a bit more.
Zombies lined the sides of the Interstate, trapped in their lifeless world, focused only on their pursuit of flesh. One woman crawled, dragging the lower half of her body which only attached to the upper half by a few feet of intestines. It was inconceivable that a body could even move in that condition. A man glanced their way, his teeth showing through the missing half of his face. Is this their life now? To wander aimlessly in search of living food?
The Zombie Awakening (Complete 6 Volume Series, plus prologue) Page 10
