100 A.Z. (Book 3): The Mountain

by Nelson, Patrick T.

  “Should I…!” Dalbec began, motioning toward Carlos and the guards.

  “No, let him go. He’s done his service. Let him die out in the wilds when his time comes, like it comes for all of us,” Sara said, strangely fatalistic. She turned and continued her arduous walk to the west. She refused to have a cart or carrier built. It was time for her to walk herself. In a strange, painful way, it felt good.

  Dalbec stared at the rocks as a group of injured soldiers caught up to the main group. One was about to step on them when Dalbec shouted, “Stop!” He quickly scooped up the precious stones. He clutched them in his hands and went to find a pouch for them, preferably something Sara would be willing to wear on her person.

  From a distance, Carlos watched Dalbec. John had been right. He’d said it would play out exactly as it had.

  Chapter 13

  JUST WHEN I THINK I’VE DETERMINED A WAY TO PREDICT ZOMBIE BEHAVIOR THEY BEFUDDLE ME COMPLETELY.

  -Notes from Victoria studies on Zombie behavior

  “El! Stop screaming, you’ll bring them on us!” Sal screamed.

  “I can’t! It hurts! My side hurts so bad!”

  They couldn’t see the herd, but knew it was out there. The moans echoed down the mountainside from throughout the trees. Sal surveyed the road heading down the mountain, it was completely clear. He noted how odd that was, but Ellie’s screams jolted him back to the crisis.

  “What hurts?!” Sal shouted.

  “My side, my right side!”

  “Uh-oh,” Chambers responded. He’d seen this before.

  “What do you mean, uh-oh?! What does that mean?! Sal!!!”

  “What does uh-oh mean?!”

  “I’ve seen this before. Ray?” Chambers turned to the most experienced man on the team, who nodded in response. “Get me the book.”

  Ray dropped the pack off his back and pulled out an ancient mess of plastic bags that protected a worn, coverless book.

  “Don’t worry, ma’am, I’ve got the US Special Forces field guide. It has everything we need to know!”

  “Know about what?!”

  Chambers ordered all the men to form a perimeter around them while he flipped through the book. “Hold on! I’m looking for it!”

  The men began letting off rounds into walkers down the road from them. There were just a few undead milling about, but no all-out assault yet.

  “Got ‘em boss!” one of the men yelled, proud.

  “Great! Now if you could keep it quiet while I read this...Okay, found it! ‘You should not conduct an emergency field appendectomy unless the patient will die otherwise.’”

  “What?! What is that?! NO!!!”

  “Chambers, what are you talking about?!” Sal cried as two more shots sounded off at zombies in the trees.

  “Everyone needs to shut up! I need concentration! This is a difficult operation. I need two men to hold her down, she’s going to fight!” Two loyal men grabbed Ellie and helped her to the ground before holding her arms down. She nervously complied, but then thought better about it.

  “I need two more men, she’s kicking an awful lot. Ideally we’d have some sort of pain killer so she doesn’t fight back when I cut her open…”

  “Cut me open!?”

  “Ma’am, there’s no easy way to say this. I’ve got to conduct some surgery, some very difficult surgery. If I don’t do it, you’ll die, though. Do you want to die?!”

  Ellie stopped struggling against the hands holding her down, breathing heavy. The pain was terrible. If Chambers could make the pain stop, then she would cooperate. She stared into his eyes, probing for any lack of confidence. Her eyes flashed to the knife he drew from his belt. It was the same knife he cut jerky with. As if reading her thoughts he rubbed it against his pant leg. Ellie let out a shuddering groan.

  “Now, I’m going to have to access your stomach. I just don’t want you to be surprised.”

  “Access?!?! Is that what you call cutting me open?!”

  “No. That is what I call lifting up your shirt. Men, look away, I don’t want you invading this young woman’s privacy. I must, for medical purposes, but her honor will be respected during this process, understand?”

  “Boss! Walkers, a lot of them!”

  Chambers looked down the road. Hundred were lurching up the road toward them. Moans were still coming from the trees. Why hadn’t the ones in the trees attacked? Sal wondered.

  “We’re gonna be overrun in no time, we need to move the patient to somewhere out of sight!”

  Chambers helped the men lift Ellie off the ground and prepare to carry her. Ellie screamed at the movement and Chambers cursed their luck. Of course there would need to be an emergency field appendectomy when a herd attacked.

  “Over to that gulley! Provide us cover! Hold them off, men!”

  They set Ellie onto a bed of pine needles as gently as they could. Chambers had his knife and the book out again. He studied the diagrams and looked at Ellie’s stomach – where he would need to make the incision – and then looked back at his book. It didn’t make sense. How was he supposed to know what to do?

  “I think I cut right there!” Chambers said, sounding more unsure than Ellie was comfortable with.

  “You think?!”

  “It’s just a drawing in here. They say I need to have a surgeon on my radio to talk me through this.”

  “Do you have a radio?!”

  “Well, no. Even if I did, who would I call?”

  “Someone who knows what they’re doing!”

  “I don’t know anyone who knows how to do this. I’ve only seen it once, it wasn’t pretty. Lots of blood. Internal organs.”

  Chambers was interrupted again by approaching walkers. Hiding was futile. He realized there wasn’t going to be any time for this operation with this herd. They were a blasted impediment between Chambers and saving Ellie’s life.

  “I’m not gonna lose you!” Chambers shouted.

  “No one is losing Ellie, we can’t lose her!” Sal said, looking genuinely concerned.

  “There’s just no time, we need to move.”

  It was true, the herd was on them again. They needed to put a large distance between them and it.

  “Ellie, you’re going to need to get back on your horse.”

  “O-o-okay…” she replied, her voice weak from the excruciating pain.

  They lifted Ellie onto her horse. She did her best to suffer silently. Finally atop securely, She crumpled forward and rested on her horse’s neck.

  Sal led them as quickly as Ellie could bear away from the herd, a couple miles back up the highway where they’d come from. Off to the left of the road a thicket of young trees was growing up around some boulders, and they took shelter there, out of sight of the road.

  “We’re clear.” Ray, the last man into the tree stand, saw no following walkers.

  “Alright, start a fire. I need to sterilize my knife,” Chambers said. Tyler helped Ellie down from her horse and she leaned against him, barely able to stand.

  “Down…” she mumbled. Tyler helped her sit to the ground, where she gripped her side in agony.

  One of the men quickly cleared a small space and piled some twigs and leaves. Ellie stared with dread as he and pulled out his flint stone and lit the tinder, blowing on the small ember. As it flamed up, Chambers held his makeshift surgical instrument over the flames. Once it was cooled, he scooted over to Ellie’s side and bared her stomach again. He was mumbling to himself, repeating the instructions he’d read in the book as he eyed the blade, then Ellie’s stomach, then his blade again.

  “Stoke the fire up, we’re going to need to cauterize the opening when I’m done.” His voice was shaky as he tried a couple different grips on the knife for the procedure. His normal bluster was gone. His face completely washed of color.

  “We’re going to need to hold you down. I’m sorry. You’re gonna fight... Sal?”

  “Yeah?” Sal looked sick, himself.

  “Ellie should drink as mu
ch of your alcohol as she can stand. It might help.”

  “Sure. No problem.” Sal rummaged through his things, producing a bottle. He took a stiff swig of it before passing it to Ellie.

  She looked at the bottle with apprehension, but then sat up and put it to her lips to take a small sip. The burning liquid made her cough.

  “You’re going to have to drink a lot more than that,” Sal said.

  Ellie took a deep breath and tipped the bottle back and took a large glug of the stuff. It burned, and tasted foul, but she took another, and another. Anything to dull the pain. If she struggled while Chambers was cutting her, it could mean her life.

  Her head got foggy and she felt dizzy, oddly detached from the world around her. That was good. She needed as much detachment as possible. She laid back and they put a stick in her teeth, readying for Chambers.

  As the men were about to hold down her arms and legs she felt a disturbing rumble in her intestine. It started up high and moved its way down to her waistline.

  “Wait!” she said. “Let me go!”

  “It’s not going to get any easier. If I don’t get that thing out of there, you’re dead, Ellie,” Chambers said.

  Ellie stood up, the men holding her down wavering in their resolve, and began to limp away.

  “Grab her!” Chambers ordered.

  Ellie drew her pistol and pointed it at the men. “No, just give me a minute!”

  Chambers fumed at this delay. There wasn’t time to waste.

  “Walkers, sir,” Tyler noted. It was true, a couple were coming through the trees toward the group.

  “How am I supposed to operate in these conditions?”

  They quietly stabbed the walkers with knives as they waited for Ellie to return. Ten minutes later she was back, looking much healthier.

  “I-I-I’m fine now,” she said, her face a little red.

  “Wait, what?” Chambers asked.

  “All fine. No issues. I took care of it myself. F-f-false alarm.”

  “Oh, so you… It’s gone…”

  “Y-y-yes. I’d rather not talk about it.”

  And none of them ever brought it up again.

  After Ellie was ‘cleaned out,’ the terrain below them cleared out of zombies as well. It was like the undead left once the episode had passed. Ellie continually thought how lucky she was that Chambers’ earlier attempts at operating had been interrupted by the undead. Those interruptions were the reason she was alive now.

  Chapter 14 – September 101 A.Z.

  MEN ARE LESS INTELLIGENT, THAT IS WHY THEY GO FIGHT FOR US. HOW DO I USE THIS TRUTH TO CONTROL THE UNDEAD?

  -Notes from Victoria studies on Zombie behavior

  “I will take you north for a price.”

  Tock stared at the man. He and Obevens were in a small village, three days north of where they’d left the Martyrs. They’d run out of food and couldn’t find the main road north. Asking for help of a farmer the day prior had gotten them here – to a local gang controlling a railroad line travelling north. They’d built makeshift railcars pulled by a team of 200 walkers. All they had to do was keep the walkers pulling and the cars clanked along at a slow and steady speed. The train was the fastest way north, even faster than a cart. Carts had to travel the rutted, indirect, and dangerous roads. The rail was direct, encountered no resistance, and never rested.

  “What’s your price?” Obevens asked.

  “You two look like strong fellows who can handle themselves,” the gang member stopped to brush a fly out of his face. He sneezed, and nervously wiped his nose. Tock and Obevens didn’t seem to have much choice but to hear out this deal. Their progress had stopped.

  “You work for me, just once. We are carrying precious cargo up north in two days. We will give you transport if you help to protect this shipment.”

  “What’s the shipment?” Tock asked pointedly.

  “Not for you to know. Just that certain people would kill to have it. We will give you guns, food, and transport north.”

  “It’s no good being transported north if we’re dead by the time we get there.” Obevens noted.

  “There will be another fifty guards on the train. No one will try anything. Our gang is strong and no one is crazy enough to rob us.”

  Tock and Obevens talked it over before agreeing it was worth the risk. They would never make it north in time otherwise.

  “We’ll do it.”

  The train was three cars long, with the precious cargo in the middle car. The high ranking men in the gang were with the middle car and the lower ranking men in the first and last. This included Obevens and Tock.

  The cars weren’t like cars from pre-zombie trains. They were smaller, lighter, and with thinner steel on the walls. It had a homemade look to it, and Obevens wondered how they’d managed to construct it. When it came to turning a profit, though, it seemed like people always found a way. Obevens studied the walls and determined they would only stop small caliber bullets, which wasn’t reassuring. Inside each car were some chairs, a stove, and a few cots. Short chains connected the cars. Additional seating space had been created on the roof so guards could keep a lookout. Obevens noted the inadequacy of the walls and was told again by the gang, “No one will mess with us.”

  Tock sighed. “You know what that means. Someone is going to mess with us.”

  The cars bucked as the 200 walkers, in four columns, lurched forward after the human lure in front of them. They were connected with strong rope-and-chain harnesses to the lead car. Obevens watched as a walker occasionally tripped on a railroad tie. The ropes connecting it to neighboring walkers were tight and strong enough to keep it standing. It was a sight, seeing so many walkers pulling these hulks.

  “I prefer a horse or cart, even if this thing is fast. Anyone who wants to attack us knows exactly where we’re going. They can set up an ambush, easy.” Obevens said as he and Tock sat on the top of the lead car surveying the passing landscape as the sun set.

  “Scrub-brush, scrub-brush, and more scrub-brush,” Tock complained.

  “Say that three times fast.”

  “What you mean? I just did?”

  “No, it’s a saying.”

  “Never heard it. Must be a northern thing.”

  “Aren’t you a northerner? I mean, you don’t look much like people around here.”

  “Very observant, Obevens. Nope, I grew up in the outskirts of Tenochtitlan. Kind of sheltered, never learned Spanish, nothing. One of those weird, insular kind of deals, you know?”

  “No, not really.”

  “Well, just pretend, ‘cause I don’t want to explain. There was a drought. Crops failed. Parents sent me to the city to find my way. Never saw them again.”

  Obevens shifted in his seat, not making eye contact. “I never met my parents. I was raised in the desert by an old hermit. He said my mom was a…well…”

  “…not an upstanding lady?”

  “I guess. Never found out who my dad was. For all I know just some guy. Probably didn’t love her. I guess it doesn’t really matter in the grand scheme of things.”

  “Naw, man, it does. Kids should be growing up with parents. It just ain’t natural, people abandoning their kids,” Tock scowled.

  “I don’t know. Who’s to say it isn’t natural? It’s natural for this world. Maybe not natural for some idyllic pre-zombie world.”

  “Shoot, man. I don’t know. Look at John. That man loved his family. Loves his family. I wish I could build a world where every dude loves his family. Loves and takes care of his kids.”

  “Well, get me out of this and I’ll make sure and have lots of kids for you, Tock!”

  “Oh yeah? Well, there’s more to it than just making them, lover boy! Captain‘I gotta go save my lady friend and have lots of babies’ Obevens.”

  “You know it. I’m gonna…”

  “Hold up, hold up. What’s that ahead.”

  The sun had completely set, yet something shone bright a quarter mile in front of them
.

  “Hey, amigo!” Tock yelled back to the middle cart. “Something ahead.”

  The crew chief saw it and whistled out for the lure in front of the walkers to stop.

  “Should we put hoods on the walkers?” Tock asked the crew chief.

  “No, it’s dark enough. They’ll be fine.”

  “Go investigate,” the crew chief ordered.

  “Investigate?! I’m only supposed to stay on the car and guard it. Going out into the dark to investigate strange lights isn’t my job!” Tock balked.

  “Come on, let’s go. Better than sitting on this car,” Obevens urged Tock. “Don’t want your future kids thinking you’re the kind of guy who sits on the car and does nothing.”

  “The guy who sits on the car lives to have kids!”

  Obevens shook his head and hopped down. He flicked the safety of the bolt action rifle they’d given him. Tock followed, loudly complaining, and drew his old revolver.

  They struck off into the brush, away from the tracks. Whoever was making this light, they would be prepared for people to come along the track. No point in making it easy for them.

  “No one would dare attack this train,” Tock said sarcastically.

  The two crept along through the dark, arid landscape, the light growing larger as they got nearer. It appeared to be a large fire on the track in the distance. As they got closer they noticed there were figures moving around in front of the flames. A few more yards revealed the silhouettes of humans – or zombies.

  “Do zombies like fire?” Tock asked.