by Matt Hart
“Yes, I agree,” said Jen wryly.
“Did I say that out loud?” I asked, standing up and breaking open the gun. I removed the spent .22 shell and replaced it with another from the stock—last one.
“Yep,” said Jen.
“Heh,” I laughed. “Give me a couple of those .22 rounds I gave you.” She dug in a pocket and handed them to me, and I put them into the empty slots in the stock, then handed the gun back to her. “Remember, just pull both triggers if it's a zombie or someone close by and threatening.”
“I remember,” she said, returning the flashlight. “Let's go, Marksman.”
I smiled. We walked on toward the store, staying well away from the fallen zombie. The super-bright XT11 flashlight easily reached the old truck parked in the front. We angled to the right, off the road, moving toward the big spruce where my backpack was hidden. I kept the flashlight moving, aiming at the store, the trees, all around us. It looked like there was movement inside the store, but I didn't see any more creatures wandering around. We crawled under the spruce branches.
“Deja vu,” said Jen.
“I hope not,” I said. “I've had enough of chasing you and zombies in the dark.”
Jen put a hand on my arm. “Me too,” she said. “Let's not separate again.”
I put my hand over hers. “Okay,” I agreed. “Let's both go get that truck.”
Chapter 11
—————
Jen
Mark let go and crawled out from beneath the tree. I followed him, my thoughts and emotions all jumbled up. I felt much safer with him around. I was afraid and knew I might be latching onto the closest thing that made me feel safe.
This is no time to be thinking like that.
I tried to put it out of my thoughts, but couldn't. How long could I stay with him? Where were we going? What would happen?
There are zombies trying to eat us, a crazy fat man trying to kill us, and I really have no idea who I'm with.
I deliberately looked away from Mark and shined my little flashlight around, checking to see if anything was getting close. There was nothing I could see, so we continued on toward the store. Mark didn't crawl underneath a truck this time. He walked around all the vehicles instead of between them. I followed him, holding the double-barreled gun in my left hand, pointing down. Mark stopped and held up a hand.
I guess that meant stop... and maybe be quiet? I don't know, but I stopped. He shined his light at the storefront, and I could see what looked like movement of some kind. “Still something in the store,” he said. I didn't say anything.
We kept walking, shining our lights in every direction. My heartbeat kept speeding up and I was scared to death. We moved past the truck and I could see several creatures inside the store, pounding on the windows and trying to get to us. There were some half-eaten victims of the zombies lying around.
“Mark!” I whispered.
“Yeah?”
“Are those people going to turn into zombies?” I asked, pointing at the victims on the ground. He looked at me, shining his headlamp just above me. His face scrunched up in thought.
“I don't know,” he said. “Maybe?” He took out his machete and gave each of the victims a good couple of whacks on the head. “Mongo's mom,” he said, bashing the skull of a short, fat woman in an ugly jumpsuit. The machete stuck, and he had to put his boot on her face to pull it out. I turned my head, hating to think what I’d gotten used to seeing and doing. I turned back.
“Mongo?” I asked.
“Richard and his family. I called them the Mongo's.”
I looked at him like he'd lost his mind. He looked at me like I’d lost mine. “You know, from ‘Blazing Saddles’.”
I still had no idea what he was talking about. “A movie my dad liked,” he added.
“Oookayyy,” I said.
“Never mind. Richard's mom, or wife, or whatever she was.”
“Right, I got that part,” I said.
“Can you check that old truck you were in, see if it still starts?”
I turned and shined the flashlight into the truck; luckily, there wasn't anyone in it—zombie or human. I reached in and turned the key. It only turned a little bit and made a grinding noise. You know, the regular noise a car makes when it's starting? I don't know what it's called.
“It was still turned on,” I told him. “I think it must have ran out of gas since we stopped.”
Mark sighed and his shoulders slumped. “Damn. Okay. Turn it off and take the keys.”
“We could stay inside of it for the night,” I suggested. Mark shook his head.
“Too risky, I think. The zombies in the store might know we were there if they're able to break out. And Richard might come back for the truck.”
“Yikes, good point.” I pocketed the keys from the truck and followed Mark as we went across the street. He checked every truck, bulldozer and front-end loader, but all of them were locked.
“We can't break into them,” he said. “That would just give the zombies an easy way to get to us.” He turned in a circle. “Dammit!” he said, a bit loudly. He looked at me, but I didn't have any bright ideas.
“Alright,” said Mark, “this way.” We walked around the side and up to a chain-link fence. He shined the light around, checking out the fenced-in area, then pulled at the bottom of the fence and it lifted up. “Inside,” he said, holding it for me. I crawled under and he followed me. “I took this apart before you got here. I was going to try and take one of these mowers, gas it up and ride it home,” he said.
“If you've ever ridden a lawn mower to the gas station, youuuu might be a redneck,” I said.
Mark laughed. I smiled. He took off the backpack and opened it and dug around a bit. He pulled out a package and handed it to me. It was a roll of thin rope. “Tie off that fence so it can't be pulled up without untying or cutting the cord,” he told me.
I took the cord to the fence and spooled out a few feet. “Mark, I need a knife.”
“Oh yeah,” he said, and took one from a pocket. “Swiss Army,” he said. “It's what I used to unscrew the fence bolts in the first place,” he added.
“Thanks,” I said. I looked at the knife, trying to figure out how to open it. I started to ask Mark for help, but stopped myself.
Forget that... I'll figure it out.
I turned it over in my hand, shining the flashlight on it. Then I pulled a blade out, certain I'd break a fingernail, but it came out easily. I cut the rope, tied up the fence, then did it a few more times until the fence was reconnected to all of the posts.
“Done,” I said. I looked back at Mark. He was cutting the seats out of the other lawn mowers. I pondered this bizarre behavior but didn't say anything. He stood up.
“Good, move these three mowers over to the fence to block it,” he said, gesturing at three of the mowers without seats. “I took them out of gear, so they should move easily.”
I started pushing one of them, and it did move quite easily. I steered it into the fence, then got the others moved into place. “All done,” I said.
Mark shined his light at the fence. “Line them up sort of neatly. That way if someone sees them, they won't immediately notice anything odd.”
Good point, I thought. I shoved and heaved them around—they were a lot heavier if you were trying to shift them rather than just roll them. I finally got them into a semblance of order and looked back at Mark. He had arranged a few of the larger ones into a kind of square against the side of the building, and he had moved one of them right in front of the door that went inside. I walked over and looked into the square. There were seat cushions bits arranged on the ground like a lumpy mattress. He was cutting and trimming the seats to make them flat.
Mark looked up and gestured to the seats. “Ta da,” he said. I smiled.
“Looks cozy,” I said.
“It'll do. Better to be off the ground than worry too much about a roof over your head. I don't think it'll rain, but this area
is covered so we should be fine.” He rummaged in his pack. “Here,” he said, handing me a spray bottle.
I took it and looked. It was insect repellant. I sprayed it all over myself, put some on my hand and rubbed my face, then handed him back the bottle.
I spread my hands out and looked down at my outfit. “Gonna be cold,” I said.
“Nah,” said Mark. He sprayed himself and put the bottle back into the pack, and then pulled out a bright red felt jacket. “This'll help, and I have some emergency blankets.”
I took the jacket and scooted closer to him. “Thank you,” I said. I leaned over and kissed him on the cheek. It tasted a bit like bug spray.
Mark nodded, reached into another pocket in his pack and pulled out two tiny packages. “Here you go.” He handed me one of the packets. “Emergency blanket.”
The package was about half an inch thick, the size of a compact mirror, and weighed about as much. I held it up with a wry look. “A blanket?”
He laughed and opened his, then started to unfold it. It was shiny, like aluminum. He kept unfolding and unfolding and unfolding. It really was a pretty big blanket.
“Space blanket, Mylar,” he said. “Holds in body heat.” Mark spread his blanket down, then reached into his pack. He pulled out a small bag and opened it. He removed some of the items—bullets and shells—and put them into his pockets. He replaced it and zipped up his pack, and then he turned his waist pack around so that the pockets were all in the front.
I opened my space blanket and unfolded it. I set the rifle and flashlight down on the floor of one of the mowers and stepped into the square of bedding. Mark put his pack inside the square and lay down, sliding under the noisy Mylar blanket. He switched off his headlamp and we were plunged into darkness. I lay down under my blanket and tried to be as still as possible.
“Noisy blankets,” I said.
“Yeah,” Mark agreed. “I don't really have anything else.” He paused. “Except...” He shuffled around in the darkness and I heard him unzipping his pack. My eyes were beginning to adjust to the partial moonlight. I saw him pull something out. “Fold up your blanket,” he told me. I saw him folding his.
What a mess—it took ten times as long to fold those things up, and they were never going to be as small as they were. I grumbled under my breath, but it was impossible to hear with all the crackling sounds. I finally had mine somewhat neatly folded. Mark took it and put it in his pack, then spread a new blanket out. “I forgot about this one,” he said. “It's my dad's heavy duty emergency blanket. Shouldn't be as noisy, but we'll have to share it.” He spread it out and lay down beside me.
Sure enough, it made a lot less noise and was pleasantly heavy on me. Mark's hips touched mine and I could feel his body and mine heating up the blanket, making it nice and warm.
I reached over and found his hand and squeezed it. “Thank you for saving my life,” I said. I felt him shrug next to me.
“I'm glad we're both okay,” he said. Then he took a deep breath and blew it out. “I just wish...” his voice trailed off.
“Your dad,” I said.
“Yes. He was great. We wanted to help that couple in the truck, and we sensed those others were up to no good. We didn't expect them to outright attack people, though.”
“Why did they?”
I felt him shrug again. “Big disasters can bring out both the best and worst in people,” he explained. “My dad... we just got back from a survival skills camp. We...” He paused for a moment. I squeezed his hand again, still holding it.
“We learned a lot of stuff, and there was this one guy with us who kept asking about apocalyptic scenarios.”
“Like what?” I asked.
“EMP was one of them. Meteor strike, super volcano eruption, even alien invaders.”
“What's a super volcano eruption?”
“You know Yellowstone National Park?” asked Mark.
“Yes.”
“It’s one. Yellowstone is a super volcano, many times larger than a normal one like Mt. St. Helens,” he said. ”Practically the whole park is the volcano. It covers three or four states. When a super volcano erupts, the world's climate will change.” Mark paused. “Mini-ice age, crop failures. Disaster.”
“Sounds pretty bad,” I said. “Is it possible?”
“Oh yes,” said Mark. “It's happened before and it will definitely happen again. There are a half dozen or so super volcanoes on the planet, I think. If Yellowstone erupts, we'll get ash clouds all the way out here in New England.”
“Doesn't sound like fun,” I said.
“My dad thinks...” He took a deep breath, then squeezed my hand. “My dad thought that an economic collapse was more likely. We're going deeper into debt all the time. Somebody's going to have to pay the piper.”
“I've wondered about that myself,” I said. “But mostly about how the planet can sustain such a huge population.”
“Yeah, something's gotta give. That's why he's a prepper.”
“What's a prepper?”
“A person who prepares for a disaster. We started prepping after Katrina. The government response was pathetic. Clearly people need to be able to fend for themselves.”
“I guess that makes sense,” I said. “So you're prepared for all this?”
Mark was silent. “I don't know,” he said. “We have some supplies and knowledge. But zombies? There was no such thing until now.”
It was my turn to be silent. I squeezed his hand again. “You've brought us this far.”
“I suppose,” he said.
I lay there for a time, lost in my thoughts. Mark was clearly awake as well. He started caressing my hand, probably unconsciously, just sort of touching each finger then starting over. It was comforting, like someone combing my hair. I closed my eyes, hearing the night sounds. Peeper frogs and crickets.
The touch of his hand lulled me to sleep.
Chapter 12
—————
Interlude: U.S.S. Trinity Attack Submarine: Pacific Ocean
“Try it now!” yelled Chief Marcus. He released the cable he'd spliced and held a thumbs up to the seaman down the hall. The man flipped a switch and a rumble sounded.
“It's working!” he called. Chief Marcus nodded. The boat had been at neutral buoyancy, cruising at just ten knots when all the power and communications went out. They were able to leak oxygen into the closed atmosphere, but the pressure increase was uncomfortable. He wondered if they would experience the bends if they were able to resurface. He and Seaman Anchors, an ironic name, he thought, had rigged a battery directly to the ballast pumps. He'd crossed his fingers that the voltages were right, and so far it seemed to be working.
“Stay on the switch, ye idiot!” yelled the Chief as the seaman stepped away. “Turn it off if there's a problem!”
“Aye, aye,” said Anchors, smiling a little at the Chief’s brogue accent. Anchors figured that the Chief was probably from Ireland originally or something, or he just affected the dialect under stress.
“We're going up,” said Chief Marcus. “Switch it off, we don't want to rise too quickly.” Seaman Anchors nodded and flipped the switch again. The rumble stopped but the boat continued to rise.
“Are you sure we're going up?” asked Anchors.
“Oh, aye,” said Chief Marcus. “Ye can feel it in yer stomach.” Anchors shrugged, feeling nothing. “Now we must figure out how to equalize the pressure without blowin' yer ears off,” he added.
Chief Marcus beckoned to Anchors. “Let's go, playtime's over!”
“It was anything but playtime,” thought Seaman Anchors as he followed the Chief. It had been hours since the power went out, and no one knew anything. They'd been trying to get the ballast pumps restored for at least half that time.
The pair made their way up the ladders to the bridge. All of the officers were dead, their chewed bodies moved into the Captain's ready room. The XO had gone insane, biting and clawing at the bridge crew and anyone who came to h
elp. Whatever struck him seemed contagious, as every one of the officers, including a brand new Ensign they just took on, had succumbed to what the rest of the crew took to calling “Officer Madness”. The Chief had opened the weapons lockers and armed the crew, and they killed the officers, but not before losing most of the crew as well.
Six remained, including the Chief and Seaman Anchors, two Petty Officers and two other Seamen. Anchors was technically just a Seaman Apprentice, the lowest rank on the boat, but Chief Marcus had stopped calling him “Seaman Apprentice” and now just called him “Seaman”, “Anchors”, or, more often, “ye dumb git!”
