by Bonds, Javan
ZOMBIE
RIVER RUN
☠☠☠
STILL ALIVE
BOOK FIVE
Javan Bonds
Prelude
“MO. GRAY FOX here. 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 had 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 this. I asked into the radio, “Replacements for who?”
“Bob showed up. And we have a preacher 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 with Randy, Ezekiel, and Akambiya. 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 verbally answer. 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 or The Dictator or even The Betrayer in this 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!
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 have gotten him down. Simply falling would have shattered his old bones, so someone had to have gently placed his body on the ground. Mortimer was dumbfounded to find that his head was resting on his neatly folded clothes. This had to be some kind of intervention!
Mortimer quickly stood and began to dress. The boiling cauldron to his side was now nothing more than a room temperature pot of water, the fire having died hours ago. It was getting later in the day now and Mortimer figured it would 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…
☠☠☠
With the sun shining in his eyes Mortimer let the door to the Burger King swing shut behind him. Just before it slammed shut he tossed a flaming handkerchief at the wall, conveniently coated in cooking oil. Taking his time he walked to the truck so he could feel the heat from the blaze behind him. Mortimer thought he remembered a quote from some old movie with a guy with 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 laughed himself into a coughing fit when the roof caved in. That stupid girl and her porch monkey will be sorry they tried to eat Mortimer Lester!
There was no one in this dead city, at least, as far as he knew. 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.
A few miles down the highway, he stopped again to revel in the sound of silence. This time though there was a 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. 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.
☠☠☠
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.
This place had been bombed. There were destroyed cars, craters, empty shells littering the ground, and even the occasional, small fire. The old man steered around obstacles and came around to the runway inside the 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 dead or undead given the skin color, but the fact that none were wearing clothes made him decide they were 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, but 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!
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 he could find. The former humans were infected with some sort of bioengineered sickness that turned them into rabid apes. These bloodthirsty animals had no bowel control and a craving for human flesh. One bite resulted in immediate infection every single time. Though the casually coined “peevies” would ignore a newly bitten human, the person could expect to become a zombie, craving and chomping all uninfected persons, roughly within eight hours. Primates and humans were the only known species susceptible to the virus. 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 Battle Star Galactica Cylon armor and Iron Man 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 reinforced plate armor or to the piles of bloody, eviscerated, dead and dying zombies all around the brothers. 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 her razor-sharp blade, but they seemed only to be seeking out her husband and brother-in-law, never once attempting to get to 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.” Iron Man 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?” 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 turn 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 finally see the exit door. 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. They normally 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
THREE DAYS? FOUR? Maybe a week? Mortimer wasn’t sure of the date. That bothered him. Keeping track of the time and day was something he had always done. 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 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. Also, her name was Margaret. Not Maggie or some other stupid shit nickname. She was the full package, in more ways than one.
Though some would find it surprising, they had been fucking like rabbits. Old don’t mean dead Mortimer laughed to himself. He had been having more fun in the past few days than he could ever remember having. The couple had not even covered much ground because they had been busy with other activities!
Ma
rgaret told him of how she had been a singer in Nashville. Never made it into the big time, but she had a set of pipes on her. She had the most angelic voice the geriatric ever heard. He was happy to listen to her sing and talk all day.
“I was in the airport the day everything went down. The TSA guys tried to keep order for a while. Of course, that didn’t work out for them. I guess people aren’t willing to be bossed around when there are no more rules. Before everything could go to hell, a few National Guard soldiers showed up. One of the guys that were trapped at the airport with the rest of us turned out to be one of those crazy prepper guys.” Mortimer kept his foot to the floor as they sped down the mostly empty highway.
She noticed as they passed a sign. “Welcome to Tennessee.”
“The survivalist dude was going out to Yosemite or something. He had a backpack full of solar powered lights and heirloom seeds. The soldiers decided those would be great for anyone that wanted to stay at the airport. They promised to keep order and protect us as long as we treated one another fairly. A couple of the TSA guys pitched a fit and thought they should be in charge. The guardsmen won that argument. The TSA dumbasses got mad and left. That was in the first week. We never saw them again.”
The old man chuckled, thinking about those government morons dying horribly. She continued until she ended with “And then I walked out to your truck and we drove away.” How many times had he listened to this story? It could be repeated a thousand times and he would love it every time she told it.
☠☠☠
After a few more counties of pastureland and woods, they started getting into suburbs and urban wastelands. Nashville? Chattanooga? Mortimer didn’t remember seeing any signs giving indication of where they were. Wherever here was, they appeared to be on the wrong side of the tracks.
From the looks of this disaster of a metropolis, there didn’t appear to be a right side. They began passing people moving out of the street. Uninfected humans wearing clothes and everything! All the dismal souls in view kept their eyes down and seemed to force themselves to the next task. They appeared to be working, but definitely not because they wanted to be. Were these subjects? The few that did glance up all but cowered away from anyone with the gall to keep their eyes forward.
