Copper heard her anyway, and responded. “No, I don't , and you'd be stupid to think so too. There were way too many of those fucking things out there. They might have delayed them by a few minutes.” He looked up at Archer. “Can we make any more arrows?” Archer told him that he had the tools needed, but he needs something for fletching and heads, and of course wood for the shafts themselves. I told him, while rolling a joint, that we had it all on the list. We smoked in silence, Copper joining us as well, and drove on into the night.
January 22nd Year 1 A.Z.
morning
Little had changed overnight. We were now out of all fresh meat, so we broke our collective fast upon the salted beef. The clouds still roiled overhead, though there had been no more rain. Archer was on the roof of our bus, keeping an eye out for any Dead, either ahead of us, or the group following. Copper was having a hard time dealing with the suddenness of it all, as for him the world only ended yesterday. Biker was spending a lot of time with the newcomer this morning, maybe she doesn't entirely trust us yet and feels comfortable around his uniform. Junior and The Twin, and Apocalypse Girl and myself, for that matter, felt distinctly uncomfortable around our new uniformed comrade.
Archer jumped down from the roof, telling us that we should get moving pretty soon. He had spotted the group following us on the horizon, and we needed to find somewhere we could refuel before too much longer. It turned out that the machine guns from the police station had been smuggled out of Archer's old army barracks, coincidentally on the day Archer himself had been discharged. He and Fat Dealer had been conscripted, and served together in Vietnam and had needed money to set up their commune when their time was up. Stealing weaponry to sell on the black market seemed the logical thing to do.
We gathered our equipment and piled on into the bus, Apocalypse Girl taking the wheel, and off we went, long before any of the Dead were near enough for us to smell, let alone see. Junior suggested that maybe we should have taken a few of them out before leaving, Archer replying curtly that we didn't have the ammo to spare for that, and that there were far too many of them to engage up close. From up front came the call to “HANG ON!” as Apocalypse Girl revved the engine mightily and the Greyhound dove into a second group of Dead ones, and over them, to relative freedom.
noon
Pulled over by the side of the road was, of all things, a light aircraft bearing the logo of the flying doctor service. A ladder leading up to the cockpit beckoned invitingly, and we decided we couldn't pass up the opportunity to score some medical supplies. Junior took up his club, I took my sword and inside we went.
Blood covered almost every centimetre of the planes interior. The cockpit was bare, though those seated there were quite clearly no longer among the Living, they were nowhere to be seen. Junior snagged the fire extinguisher from behind the pilots seat and we ventured inside. Doctor and nurse, both quite Dead, stumbled and fell about a third Dead that had been restrained, though clearly not nearly enough. A fourth, the co-pilot, lurched out, trapping Junior in the doorway. My blade sliced through its head, and Junior went in to clobber first the nurse, then the doctor. I joined him just as his club crushed the skull of the restrained Dead. Together, we swept the plane, still not finding any trace at all of the pilot.
“Anything we can use in here?” Came Coppers voice from behind, startling us. He came in, The Twin following him, the pair of them holding empty suitcases to fill with medicinal supplies. There was not a lot around that we could really use, though we grabbed everything we could find that was clean. This amounted to a couple of scalpels, some surgical scissors, a few bandages and a small amount of morphine in tablet form. There was a portable defibrillator on the floor, but the cables had been torn out in the fray and one of the paddles was absent, so we decided not to waste time with it. Apocalypse Girl shouted that there were Dead approaching from behind, and we fell back to the bus and left.
evening
Before the sun set behind the clouds we gathered around a fire, boiled up some salted beef and feasted. I rolled up the last of our weed, and we smoked together, deciding that we needed to put some more distance between ourselves and the group of Dead we had left behind us before we could sleep safely. We drove until the sun was well below the horizon, then Copper pulled the bus over.
Archer pulled out his map, and we pored over it in an attempt to locate our current position. He had found a marker from somebody's luggage and marked the approximate position of the commune and had been tracking our progress by comparing the map with the amount of distance travelled according to the bus's odometer. It seemed fairly accurate, from what I could see, but Archer clearly knew his stuff when it came to cartography. He reasoned that it would be a good couple of weeks at our current rate of travel before we made it to Melbourne, and a couple more to Canberra. I still think that going to either or both of those places is a bad idea, but we have weapons, we have the bus. Providing we can find some more fuel tomorrow we should be alright.
Apocalypse Girl had come up to me earlier expressing concern over the amount of time we had been taking to get anywhere, but honestly, there was little we were able to do in our current state to get anywhere faster than we were going. The fact that we were barely outrunning the Dead that pursued us was far more disconcerting in my opinion. Junior, overhearing our conversation, once more suggested that we wait for them to nearly catch up to us, then we kill a few before heading off in the bus. As long as we keep on doing that, by the time we hit Melbourne there shouldn't be that many following, he reasoned. I agreed that it was worth trying a couple of times, just to see if it made any real difference. Biker and Copper agreed to accompany myself and Junior when next the horde appears, and together we will do some permanent damage.
January 23rd Year 1 A.Z.
pre-dawn
I awoke as the bus began to lurch forwards. It turned out that the Dead, who need no rest, had caught up to us far sooner than we had expected, and even now Archer and Copper were heading up to the roof in order to gun our way through the horde once again. I grabbed my katana and went up as well. I discovered that by leaning over the edge of the bus I was able to hack away at a few heads, but the weight of the horde pressing against us made the risks too great, and before long I was back inside the bus as we moved off. After a few hundred metres, Apocalypse Girl stopped the bus. Biker strapped on her helmet and grabbed the crowbar, Copper removing his nightstick from his belt. Junior hefted his club, and I took out my katana, and the four of us left the bus to do battle in the pre-dawn gloom.
We advanced on the rotting army as they shuffled slowly in our direction. We closed in, the stench nearly overpowering us, but we spread out from each other and waded into the crowd swinging away, severing heads, crushing skulls. The sun rose as we fought our relentless foes, and the four of us kept giving ground, running back a while, then turning to fight some more when the Dead came near. By the time we fell back to the bus my katana was completely covered in gore, the weapons of my companions in much the same state. I looked out the rear window as we fled the scene, no trace could be seen of our bloody work.
noon
Archer had taken over the wheel, and we continued on the route that Junior had laid out for us. We stopped only once, at a deserted truck stop, to check for fuel, but there were no vehicles in sight, nor were there any Dead, but the petrol tanks were all bone dry. The interior had been stripped of everything, including the cash register, fridges, even the shelving had been taken. I asked aloud who would take everything, to which Archer replied with one word, “Military.”
Once we were again on the road, we had gone no more than a few kilometres on a road that had been totally cleared of vehicles though evidence remained that collisions and even explosions had occurred, we came across a roadblock manned by four men in military uniforms, one of whom waved at us to pull over. As the other three men were pointing fully automatic weapons at us we immediately complied. Archer jumped out of his seat and went to deal wit
h the soldiers. Immediately he saluted them, and they relaxed visibly, returning his salute. They spoke for several minutes, then one of the soldiers went to their Jeep and radioed in. He waited for a response, then replied back into the handset before putting it down. He looked at the rest of us in the bus for a long minute, then looked back to Archer, nodding. Archer saluted once again, then jumped back in the bus. Apocalypse Girl drove us forwards as the soldiers raised the barricade.
“There's a camp near here, about two klicks down the road. We need to go there, they've got things under control.” Archer told us. Apocalypse Girl looked doubtful, but continued driving anyway. Junior asked if he told them about our pursuers, Archer replied that he had. The soldiers had told him that they could handle any amount of Dead that came their way. Apparently their entire division had been out in the field on training exercises when the shit had hit the fan. They were well stocked for a good couple of months, to start with, and now that they had commandeered every piece of food and equipment in a fifty kilometre radius they had supplies enough for at least a year.
evening
This camp is pretty big. There are easily a couple of hundred soldiers here, though they have naturally suffered heavy losses those remaining are well prepared to face masses of Dead. As we made our way to the camp two of the four soldiers we had met at the roadblock went to scout the horde chasing us. They had estimated the Dead numbers at several hundred, maybe a thousand and that they would arrive at the roadblock tomorrow morning. The Colonel had chosen to defend the roadblock, then if it became necessary, they would fall back and mount a second defence at the camp. Naturally there was a rear exit to the camp that we were shown, and our bus was filled with fuel. Archer had used his status as a veteran to acquire a few guns and some ammunition for us.
At one point I was taken to see The Colonel, a short round woman with short round blonde hair. She interrogated me at length about our journey, how many Dead we had encountered, and where. She seemed especially intrigued when I told her that one of my companions and I had come from as far away as Adelaide, saying that we must indeed be survivors if we could make it that far under these conditions. I told her my idea about how the rain had been caused by the Dead being burned by any survivors. She thought about that for a while, then shook her head. She said that it was doubtful that anything like that could affect global weather patterns, and that it had to be a coincidence of some kind. The Colonel's own theory of the weather was simply that somebody had used nuclear weapons at some point, perhaps to contain an outbreak. She went on to say that she had heard some countries had done that in the first couple of days. I asked her if there was any kind of central military command that she was in touch with, at which she laughed and told me not to be ridiculous. There was a hint of desperation in that laugh, however.
I went back to the bus after that 'debriefing' and asked everyone to gather inside. I informed them that I didn't believe The Colonel had any contact with any of her superiors, and that I thought she was insane. Archer nodded, saying that he had a bad feeling about the entire situation, from the point we found the stripped truck stop. We decided it would be a good idea to keep a double watch, just in case.
January 24th Year 1 A.Z.
morning
We rested reasonably well, considering each one of us shared a bed with paranoia. We ate with the soldiers, and were instructed in the basic use of the seven Colt .45 pistols we had been gifted with. As we were also given several thousand rounds of ammunition to go with them, we now had no excuses. Target practice was going to be a daily ritual once more, and though the guns we now had access to were utterly alien to most of us, we became familiar in record time.
In time the call came from the roadblock team, informing us that the horde of Dead had arrived. We watched in amazement as the soldiers sprung into action with military precision. Troop carriers were loaded with men and materiel in seconds, and on their way to the front. Within minutes the battle was joined, and the sound of gunfire filled the morning air.
The Colonel invited us into her tent while the battle raged a scant two kilometres away. We waited in silence while the gunfire blazed, occasionally slackening only to pick up pace once more. In time, however, the gunfire was punctuated by the occasional scream of pain and terror as a soldier let a Dead one get too close, and eventually all sound ceased.
A squawking sound came from The Colonel's radio. It was one of the initial four from the road block, saying that everything was clear, they had suffered a few casualties, but the Dead were all dead. This news brought a sigh of relief from our group, and a smile from The Colonel.
noon
The soldiers had returned triumphant, and were celebrating loudly, cheering their victory against the Dead. The Colonel had assured us that they would be victorious, and victorious they had indeed been. They were all courteous, all friendly, though boisterous, and yet we all felt uneasy. Our group was mostly keeping to the bus still, though Archer wandered about the camp, as if trying to get a feel for military life once again.
The Colonel sent one of her men to me to invite me for tea. I could in no way refuse such a civilised, reasonable invitation, and so a few minutes later I found myself once again within her tent.
We had just finished the first cup, she was pouring the second, when a shout from without interrupted our conversation. This suited me fine, as it was getting to the point where it seemed she was going to start throwing her weight around and demanding that we stay and be part of her army. She was being polite about it, but that was clearly where this discussion was headed. She put the tea-pot down and we rushed outside.
Bedlam ensued. Though they had no intoxicants, the simple lack of vigilance that these soldiers' celebration had caused resulted in a second group of Dead pushing their way past the roadblocks, which had been left unguarded in our exuberance, and they were now chewing and gnawing their way into the camp. I spotted Archer and gestured in the direction of the bus. He nodded and casually walked over to it, as if flesh eating Dead were not eating soldiers mere metres from him.
Idly I wondered where this horde had arisen from, as I grabbed hold of The Colonel's uniform and practically dragged her screaming from the battlefield. I drew my shiny new pistol and blew the head from the shoulders of one Dead that got a little too close, and then another. A third, and we were at the bus. I shoved The Colonel through the open door, Archer then taking over as I spun around just in time to blast the head off of a fourth Dead. A fifth was crawling towards me, having had a leg blown off at some point. Its head joined it in oblivion.
Now that I had time to, I surveyed the scenario. Many Dead lay dead on the ground, many Living lay dying, or worse yet were already rising Dead. The grey gloom that perpetuated throughout somehow made the blood brighter, more vibrant. My gorge rose upon seeing the carnage before me. Some soldiers lived still, several pockets of resistance to the ocean of Dead crashing wave after wave over them. I looked at the several hundred Dead swarming between us and them, then turned and got on the bus.
evening
The Colonel was too quiet. We had finally stopped for the night, and were eating. Biker and Copper were making sure The Colonel ate something. Apocalypse Girl wanted to keep going after nightfall, but this time I decided against it. We had only just encountered the outer radius of The Colonel's resource gathering operation about an hour before, and were therefore a good day ahead of the Dead, by my reckoning.
Junior and The Twin both expressed distrust at having a member of the military with us, Archer offering to keep a close eye on her, make certain she doesn't do anything stupid. I reminded them all that she had just lost her entire command. That would have to fuck with your mind.
We decided on setting two separate watches tonight, one on the roof of the bus, to keep watch for the Dead, one inside the bus, in case The Colonel decided to do something stupid. I elected to take Colonel-guarding duty for my first watch, and so sat down across from her. She glanced up, tears in her eye
s, and looked back down at the floor. I just started talking to her, softly, telling her my story, my decision on the very first night to write this journal of my experiences. Quietly she told me that her men died doing their duty. I looked into her eyes. Clearly she wishes that she had died alongside her men. “Why did you save me?” She asked.
I replied that it seemed the right thing to do at the time. “Thank you.” She said. “I know you've put me on suicide watch. No need for that.” She visibly straightened, pulling her proverbial shit together. “As I said, my men died doing their duty. Protecting civilians. That duty has now fallen to me, clearly. Besides, someone needs to show you people how to shoot straight!” Her lips turned upwards in the semblance of a smile. Saying nothing more, she reclined in her seat, closing her eyes. Inside a minute she was asleep.
Anno Zombus Year 1 (Book 1): January Page 9
