Dead 09: Spring

by T. W. Brown

  One day, as Emily-zombie stumbled across the path of one of the larger ones that had come seeking to reach and bite into her special warmth, she had pushed away a metal garbage can that was on its side. The large metal bin rolled noisily, and the sound had been enough to send the larger one off on a new direction away from her precious warmth. That tiny kernel of Emily-zombie’s mind that functioned sporadically made a connection. For the first time, that connection did not fizzle and melt away to the sea of forgetfulness.

  Emily-zombie now realized that, if she could manufacture sound, then the larger ones would move towards it. Over the next several days, repeating this action ingrained it into her being. It took time, but eventually she showed the others with demonstration after demonstration. She watched as, one by one, the others picked up this particular skill and began to utilize it with regularity.

  Using a variety of items that spanned from bottles to fallen tree branches, the zombie children fanned out in a rough perimeter and would create a distraction of sound any time one of the larger ones came near. While members of the group wandered sporadically in and out of the area that they now seemed to have laid claim to as their home, each of them took turns just sitting in a spot in the sun with the tabby. Each one allowed the cat to nibble at loose bits and pieces as he or she sat still. Muscle memory spasmed and the actual act of petting the cat came, slow and awkward at first, but eventually evolving into a gentle caress.

  At night, the zombie-children would come together into a tight cluster, standing so close that none of the larger ones would be able to spot the cat through the tiny forest of legs.

  The zombie children were learning.

  The zombie children were teaching!

  ***

  Vix swatted aside the first zombie and brought her axe down on the next one in a fluid motion made sharper by all the times she had done this in the past year; injury be damned, the adrenaline was kicking in and acting as a natural pain killer for her sore shoulder. Harold was coming up from behind her, and she heard him spit out a string of profanity.

  She had thought much the same thing. Gemma must have heard them back there when they were looking down on that aircraft and the condemned souls that were camped on top of it. More than likely, she had heard Harold call out and either decided to reunite with her old travelling mates, or (and this was just as likely) she had decided to run off so that she could sulk some more.

  Whatever the case, she was in it deep now. The girl had scrambled up on top of what looked like a moving van that had fallen on its side after slamming into a small passenger vehicle.

  In a strange way, Gemma was in a similar-but-different situation to those poor people on the spine of the United Airlines jet. Left to her own, Gemma had nobody to kill and eat, so she would just end up starving to death slowly unless she decided to end it quick by diving into the zombies that were already five deep all the way around the van-turned-island.

  Harold pulled up beside Vix and a small cry slipped from his lips. He drew a weapon so that he held one in each hand and took a step forward as if he were prepared to march into battle. Vix grabbed his arm and yanked him back, spinning him to face her.

  “Are you trying to get yourself killed?” she said in a hissing whisper, hoping that she’d not been loud enough to attract the attention of the zombies. “You go down there and you will get torn apart.”

  “I have to save Gemma,” the young man pleaded. There was something in his eyes that made Vix tighten her grip.

  “This is not your fault.”

  “She left because she thought that I was…” Harold’s voice faltered.

  “No!” Vix shook the young man and made him look at her. “You did nothing wrong. She was being a silly girl in a world where that gets a person killed. We can’t pretend that things are the same…or that they might ever return to what we knew. The world is dead and we are all on borrowed time.”

  Harold’s head dropped and she felt his shoulders tremble. Where were all the supermen with six-pack abs and the ability to fashion a weapon from a candy wrapper and a bar of soap all while making witty comments and clever observations? If she ever ran across one of her favorite horror writers, she would have a few words to say about how ridiculous their books had been. There was nothing fun or clever about a zombie apocalypse.

  Turning, she looked at Gemma who still stood atop the wrecked moving van. What would some of her fictional characters do? she wondered. A couple came to mind and she brushed aside the urge to follow what she believed their reaction would be: to walk away. Then a thought hit her so intensely that it was almost physical.

  “I am such a dunce!” Vix muttered. She glanced over at Harold who had turned into a huge sack of useless. “Stay put and don’t do a thing until I get back!”

  She took off before the questions could commence. She knew that she only had a limited amount of time before either Harold or Gemma did something absolutely stupid. Stupid would get a person killed these days.

  Jogging back to the house where she’d seen the cricket bat, Vix steeled her resolve and ducked inside, doing her best to ignore the horrendously evil feeling of cobwebs brushing her skin. She was probably more afraid of spiders than she ever would be of zombies. Spiders were aliens from another world as far as she was concerned. They had been left behind to observe humanity and eventually take over the world…ugly little blighters!

  When she emerged from the house, Vix allowed herself to finally take a breath. She had not wanted to risk sucking in a mouthful of that downy demon silk while inside that house…especially if it meant the possibility that an actual spider might be hiding in it, lurking like they do.

  Vix shuddered and then scanned the overgrown yard until she found what she was looking for. In a moment, she was back at Harold’s side holding the cricket bat and a rusty metal lid to a rubbish bin.

  “What the—?” Harold began, but Vix cut him off when she smacked the bat to the lid with a loud clang.

  The heads of almost all the zombies turned to face this new source of distraction. Beating on the lid a few more times, Vix yelled a string of obscenities. They came slowly at first, but before long, almost all of the zombies that had the van surrounded were coming for Vix.

  “You go get that idiot girl and meet me back at the house,” Vix paused from her clanging long enough to tell Harold what to do since it appeared as if the boy was just as touched in the head as Gemma.

  “What if she won’t come?”

  “Then you knock her in the head and carry her over your shoulder.”

  And with that, Vix moved away and resumed banging on the lid. Since being quiet was not a current priority, she took the time to yell out a few more choice obscenities. It felt good to get it out of her system, and just maybe, if she yelled her voice raw, she would not rip Gemma a new one when they got back to the house.

  Looking around, Vix continued her role as the zombie version of the Pied Piper. As they followed, she wondered how in blazes the whole of humanity had fallen so fast to something so simple-minded. She was basically outwitting a hundred or so of the creatures with a rubbish bin lid and a cricket bat.

  She could not help herself as she banged out a rhythm and sing-songed all of the most foul profanities that she could think of, Vix began to caper about. Still, she remained vigilant, it would do no good at all to go and get herself killed in all of this. However, she had to admit that she was feeling quite a bit liberated.

  At one point, she climbed up on the hood of a crumpled Mercedes and began to sing and perform “The Safety Dance” by Men Without Hats. All the while, she mused if perhaps she had finally lost her mind. Certainly what she was doing had to be at least a little bit insane.

  “Oi!” a voice yelled, snapping her out of her momentary lapse of reason.

  Vix turned to see Harold and Gemma jogging up. They were both looking at her like she was six kinds of crazy. Well, if they’d been watching her for any length of time, she could see where they might have
some concerns.

  Vix jumped down and it was like the flipping of a switch. She laid into Gemma with both barrels.

  “What in blazes were you thinking?” Gemma opened her mouth, but Vix was just getting started and held up a hand to silence the girl. “Oh…that’s right. You WEREN’T thinking, you stupid girl!”

  Gemma tried once more to speak, but Vix held up both hands. She simply did not want to hear anything that the girl had to say at the moment. With a deep breath, Vix spun on her heel, ready to head back to the house. Now she just had to hope that Amanda and the others would be forgiving.

  “Umm…” Harold spoke up and Vix stopped. If he was about to say what she suspected, she might club them both over the head with the cricket bat and leave them for those zombies that were getting closer as the three of them just stood there like fools.

  “Maybe we could go help that group on the jet,” Harold said, catching Vix by surprise. While this was a close second to the stupid things the young man could utter, it had not been what she was prepared for; and thus, she had to take a moment to prepare her retort.

  “How many of those things you reckon are in that valley around that jet?’ Vix finally asked as she eyed the approaching zombies that she’d led away from Gemma. The leading edge was probably fifty yards or so from where they now stood.

  Harold shrugged. Gemma just stood there. Turning, Vix started away. “A few thousand is my guess. And while they are all gathered around that plane and those poor souls, they are not coming after us. Besides…” Vix spun, the look on her face actually one more of pity than of anger, “…you saw them. Those poor souls are already lost.”

  Not waiting for a reply, Vix started off. For a while, she almost thought that the duo had chosen to go off on their own. Then she overheard Gemma whisper.

  “…promise not to tell her I was bit.”

  ***

  “You waited to tell me this now?” Juan barked. “What the hell is wrong with you?”

  “Just hold on,” Keith shot back, holding his hands up in a physical gesture to get Juan to calm down. “For one, you have not been in any condition to really do much good. And for another, we already have a plan and I was just letting you know. You are the person folks see as the leader. It would be pretty shitty of me to enact some sort of plan and not fill you in.” Keith saw something in Juan’s face and added hastily. “We are not asking you to be a part of it. As it is, we have been planning for a few days and I honestly don’t want to take the time to try and get you up to speed. Besides, you need to remain here.”

  “Wait…you’re leaving?” Juan asked with a shake of his head. “Why would you leave? You have the benefit here of being on an island for one…and for another…” Juan paused and then shook his head. “Nope, that’s pretty much it. You are here on an island. Whoever this is, they would have to come to us. We hold the advantage.”

  “There is one problem with your idea,” Keith countered. “We have kids here on this island. They have been through and seen enough. We slip out, we get a good look at their numbers and determine if we feel they are coming here with good intent or bad.”

  “You make it sound simple, but it never is, you know,” Juan said, clasping the man’s shoulder.

  “Look, if this force is anything to worry about, we will be coming back on the run. But if we can either assess them and bring them in as new members of the community or, if need be, hit them hard and make them think coming here is a bad idea…then that is what we will do.”

  “And is anything being done here to ready the island in the event of the worst case scenario?”

  “That is why I wanted to talk to you. We had some guys working on it, but after seeing the size of the smoke pillar yesterday, we have concerns about the size of the group. We needed to enlist some more help. We have been keeping this from everybody and did not want to start raising alarms. When you were obviously up and about, we decided that we needed to fill you in and then have you see to getting this place ready.”

  Juan felt his stomach churning. Part of him would much rather go out and see what the hell was out there. But by the same token, Mackenzie had made it clear on more than one occasion that his presence here was vital. He needed to be the one to get the citizens informed and prepared just in case it came to something nasty.

  “Fine,” Juan agreed, “but when are you leaving?”

  “Actually, we would have left this morning, but we all felt that it was important to stay for the sentencing. Also, the guys who took the boat will be staying up river. If things go badly, they are sort of the last ditch escape plan.”

  Juan nodded. “Sounds like you have given this a lot of thought.”

  “I think you and I both know what sorts of people can be out there. We have a good thing here. There are going to be folks who want it. Some will want to join, but others will want to take it. That is the way of things.”

  Keith reached out his hand and Juan accepted it. The two men shared a knowing nod. Juan turned to leave, but Keith kept his grip. “You can fix this with Mack. She is a good girl. She thinks the world of you and loves you like crazy. Just give it time. She’ll come around.”

  Juan gave another nod and walked away. His mind was going over everything from the past several weeks. Maybe he didn’t belong here. All his life he had been out for himself. Had it been any different when things were stripped down to their barest parts?

  He’d killed Donna and Frank…left them in a basement to be eaten by zombies. It didn’t matter that such a thing had not been his intent. When that gate did not shut, he had sealed their fate. He had been set on killing April when she told him that she knew about his criminal past. He had relented, but hadn’t that just been a case of him trying to prove to himself that he was a changed man? Did that make it real?

  Juan walked into the house and flopped down on the couch. A big black head came and rested on his knee. Reaching down, Juan gave Tigah a scratch behind one ear. The dog’s head tilted to allow for more and Juan obliged. Pretty soon, there was a huge wet spot on his pants from the copious drool of the massive Newfoundland. It seemed like the dog doubled in size every other week, and with it, the pools of slobber that were now reaching a point where a person could slip and break a leg if they were not watching their step in the house.

  The house, Juan thought. How odd was it that he was living in Mackenzie’s home and she was staying someplace else? That was one of about a million things that did not make any sense. And while he might not be able to do much about some of these things, he could damn well do something about this. Getting to his feet, he patted the dog and then headed for the door with Tigah in his wake.

  The pair were cutting across the neat rows of the farm that were already starting to show sprouts of whatever it was that had been planted. He saw a few people run past, but they didn’t wave or try to talk to him so he didn’t give them any thought.

  He reached the house he had sought and flipped open the latch on the gate, He thought that he saw some rustling behind the curtains and was not at all surprised when the door opened and a woman stepped out, quickly shutting the door behind her.

  “I want to talk to Mackenzie,” Juan said calmly. He could already tell by this woman’s pursed lips that it was not going to be as easy as that.

  “She does not wish to see you at the moment,” the woman replied with a crisp curtness.

  “Listen, lady, I don’t know who you are, and honestly, I really don’t care. I came to talk to Mackenzie. I am going to talk to her. So…you can either move aside, call her down, or else I will move you out of the way.”

  “You’ll do no such thing,” the woman huffed.

  Juan felt some of his “old” self flare up. Did this woman have any idea who she was talking to? He’d seen it back before the world got dumped upside-down. Some folks would run off at the mouth, thinking that they were safe. The thing was, unless the cop was standing right there…nobody was safe from a damn thing. He had always enjoyed that loo
k on some clown’s face who gave some lip and got knocked on his ass. How had that commercial put it? Oh yeah…priceless.

  “Lady, there ain’t nothing in this world that can stop me from getting to Mackenzie. So unless you got some special sort of sukiyaki training and can karate chop me into unconsciousness…you don’t stand a chance of stopping me.”

  Juan took a step forward and the woman took three quick steps back, turned, and then bolted into her house screaming like some folks had done the first time they’d seen a zombie eat somebody.

  He was on the porch when the door opened and Mackenzie stepped out. She gave a look over her shoulder and then turned her gaze to Juan. He expected anger, maybe fear, but he sure didn’t expect…

  “What’s so funny?” Juan asked dubiously.

  “That was not nice…scaring Miss Schaeffer like that. She is a nice little old lady,” Mackenzie answered with a smile. Still, Juan could see the fatigue in her eyes.

  “Yeah…well she told me that I couldn’t see you.”

  “So you’ve seen me…now what?”

  Juan opened his mouth and then shut it with a click. This was not going at all like he had imagined. He was confused and at a complete loss for words. Tigah flopped down between the two and made a huff that fluttered his jowls as if he was annoyed that this might take a while.

  “It’s just…” Juan began, and then it came in a flood, “…it is stupid for you to not be in your house. If anybody should find another place to stay, it should be me. As for why you are pissed…I get it. But I didn’t do it for one, and for another, things ain’t like they used to be. If somebody were to endanger you, you can bet that I would have them gone before they could blink.”

  “I know, Juan.” Mackenzie laid a hand on Juan’s arm. “I just hate that it has come to this. Miss Schaeffer was saying almost the exact same thing you were before you barged up and frightened her out of her wits.”

  Juan scratched his head and shot a glance at the curtained windows. He was almost positive he saw them flutter again. Looking back down at Mackenzie, he was relieved to see her smiling up at him. The words “I love you” were on the tip of his tongue when an explosion sounded, followed by the clanging of metal on metal.