The Last Days (Books I, II, & III)

by Julie Cooper Brown

  The woman tried skittering away, begging him for her life, but he saw her and pulled her back to him, fell onto her and tore into her breast.

  They were both covered in blood and the camera man was getting even closer.

  The man was crying in great anguish and now we could hear that he was screaming that he was sorry. He stopped biting her long enough to vomit on the ground beside her. Then with a look of disgust he continued to tear into her body.

  The woman had stopped screaming by then, but the cries of the man continued as he ripped something out of her and resumed eating. His face was a mass of different emotions, but the emotion that showed most on his bloody face was pain.

  The camera guy got a little too close, the man saw him and his expression changed into one of a predator, then he sprang up off the ground quick as lightning and rushed him. The camera fell to the ground. The people began screaming and running in all directions. The video was over.

  The soldier went on to explain to us that not all of the people infected became this way, just a few.

  It was something to do with an individual’s immune system. They were actually normal except for the Hunger controlled them, and they had uncanny speed. That after about three hours of being in this state, they then became your ‘regular ole zombie’.

  He told us that all infected were taken over on Bayshore to the Sweet Bay parking lot to be put down and burned with the rest of the Infected in a great big bonfire.

  He said that since our neighbor hadn’t returned yet, that she was most likely roasted by now, and if we took a big whiff of the air we would smell her burning, and he said all that with a smile.

  He said for us not to mention what we saw on the video to anyone, (knowing we would) and then he told us to get on back in our house lest the same thing happen to us. He was feeling pretty good about his new found position of authority.

  I found myself taking a deep breath through my nose and saw that Evan had, too. I could sure enough smell the faint stench of burning flesh.

  A wave of anger swept through me and I raised my hands as if to grab his throat and choke the life right out of him.

  Evan grabbed me just in time; he bear hugged me from behind and folded my forearms down across each other in front of me. The fucker laughed at me.

  How fucking dare he, I wanted to slap the smile off his face so bad I could hardly control my limbs, I was shaking with self-restraint, trying not to fight to get away from Evan and box that boy’s ears.

  I was so mad that I felt my face burning as if I could suffocate from the heat of it, and I became a little faint.

  Sue was not just my neighbor, I considered her my friend. She had a husband and two little boys waiting at home.

  As I thought of these things I screamed so loud and long in the boy’s face that he flinched and raised his gun, but he kept smiling.

  Evan was angry as well, but remained in control to keep me from getting myself killed.

  The guy did have a gun, and could shoot us and say he had to because we were infected.

  As calmly as I could through a clenched jaw, I told him that his mother should have choked him to death with his own umbilical cord and accused him of joining the military just so he could kill people.

  (I had forgotten for the moment that anybody could sign up and be a soldier in the midst of this mess and I’m willing to bet, that’s how he managed to get a gun.)

  I asked him if he would be smiling if that were his mother, or sister, or wife.

  He said that his mother was a whore, his sister was a cunt and he had never taken a wife.

  I told him it was because he was a greasy little bastard with no respect for life.

  Evan told me to shut up for my own good and turned me in the direction of home and walked me a safe distance away from the soldier and let me loose.

  The little bastard was still smiling, UGH!

  Sorry about the language, I just can’t help myself when I think of the things he said and how they didn’t even affect him. I was sure that he would get his. They say every dog has their day. And I’m a firm believer in ‘what comes around goes around.’

  I was furious! Why this video wasn’t made public, I don’t know. I could only guess it was to keep the panic down. People should know about this so they know how to better protect their selves.

  I knew when they said cannibals on TV, but this took the cake. This was no ordinary zombie, these mother fuckers could think, feel and run so fast! And they had absolutely no control over their actions.

  That made them more dangerous (and scarier) than any other zombie ever written of.

  I couldn’t imagine the pain of eating the flesh of my loved one, unable to control it and KNOWING ABOUT IT! SEEING IT! Oh my God is right.

  When we got back to Jake’s to tell him what the soldier said about Sue being returned when she was well, we decided not to tell him the rest.

  We were afraid that if we told him, he would get his self killed because he would run down there demanding answers and the arrogant little son of a bitch would shoot him just because he would be running at him.

  Jake knew we were holding something back, I was sure he had seen my sudden display of anger, but he did not press us. He hung his head and went back into the house.

  We told Old Joe about the video and the things the soldier said. He went into his house and got out his shotgun.

  “If that boy comes walking down this way, I’m gonna blow his cold - hearted head off. Men like that is a disgrace to our country.”

  To make a longer story short, the next day, Thursday, the soldiers came back to Jake’s and took the two boys. Jake was begging them, to let him go with them, the boys were crying and struggling in the arms of the soldiers.

  Old Joe, Evan and I, were all crying and pleading with them as well.

  “What could it hurt?” I asked them. “Just let him go with them.”

  The fucker I talked to the day before was standing there holding the door on the back of the truck open and I thought about what was going to happen to them and I cried much louder, unable to control it. He seemed to enjoy watching this unfold. We were unable to convince them. Asshole told us to mind our own business or we would be shot, ignoring the evil eye he was getting from the other soldiers. One of them spoke up, seems they didn’t like him either.

  “Shut the fuck up, Clark. We’ll do no such thing. These kids here are infected. We have to take them.” He bent down to Jake and said “I’m sorry.”

  With tears in his eyes and a stone cold face, Old Joe told the still smirking soldier, ”I got you in my sights, boy.”

  And he replied “Whenever you’re ready old man.”

  With that Old Joe nodded and said, “I’m gonna show you what this old man can do. All in due time, boy, all in due time.”

  They kept Jake pinned face first into the ground until the truck was gone around the corner.

  The soldiers that had held him down let him up and sympathized with him, the female, I noticed her name was Roland, she told him they weren’t trying to hurt him only restrain him, that everything was gonna be okay and that they would be with their mom.

  The doctors would make them better and they would come home.

  I don’t think she believed what she said either, but it was nice of her to be so kind to him. She tried to give him a hug. He pushed her away and stormed into the house.

  I looked up at Dan and Dawn’s house and saw movement behind the curtain. I wondered why he didn’t come out.

  We went over to talk to Jake; he wouldn’t let us in and refused to come over to sit with us. What else could we do?

  We went on back over to Old Joe’s porch and devised a plan to get more supplies because this wasn’t gonna be over any time soon.

  We asked Old Joe if there was anything he wanted, and he said “Just some chew and an opportunity to kill that boy.”

  We waited until dark.

  The only problem we would have would be getting around t
he soldiers. We knew that ‘asshole’ Clark was on the corner we needed to cross, there would be another soldier on the other side of the street, at the opposite corner at the dead end. There would probably be one patrolling the main street between blocks as well.

  Old Joe waited until the soldier on the dead end turned into the yard of an empty house, to relieve himself I guess.

  He walked up toward Clark under the pretense of wanting to talk to him. I didn’t think it was gonna work on account of what he had said to him earlier, but it did.

  While he did this, Evan and I sprinted through the backyards and shot across the street unnoticed.

  Evan busted the glass of the convenient store and unlocked it, while I kept watch. We were still unnoticed. There were no Infected in there and we were able to quickly fill two duffle bags with mostly nonperishables. They did not sell tobacco of any kind so they didn’t have any, but there was a connecting door between the store and the tobacco shop. It’s a good thing, too. I would be needing cigarettes soon, and since my chances of dying increased a hundred fold over the last few days, I was going to get my smoke on. Evan kicked the door in and we proceeded to go into the store room beyond.

  We weren’t expecting to find Infected in here, supposedly it hadn’t spread like that yet, but we discovered that they had lied to us. And neither one of my sisters had called me back yet. I wanted to get this over in a hurry, I had to get back and get a hold of them.

  There were three infected people in the tobacco store. I know one of them was the owner, Shirl.

  A forty-something husky voiced biker chick, with bad teeth, who obviously wasn’t as tough as she looked, because here she was all zombiefied and looking to eat us for dinner.

  I shouldn’t say mean things about her because she was always so nice, and would give you store credit if she knew you.

  As I was saying a silent prayer for her, Evan’s hand shot out as faster than I can blink and split Shirl’s head clean open with one powerful swing of the chucks. She went down and brain matter began seeping out of the large gash that he put in it. It was so gross. I was hoping we wouldn’t have to see a lot of that.

  The other two were young boys somewhere between sixteen and twenty years old, both with a good strong build. One was blonde and the other was a redhead. I didn’t recognize either one of them, but I think they were her sons.

  I didn’t think I had it in me, but when I saw the blonde one turn towards Evan and he wasn’t very far from him, as quickly as I could I whacked his head with my pink, shiny club. He must’ve been ‘undead’ for a while by then because his skull gave way very easily, and I leaned back away from him just in time to avoid a huge sluice of blood coming right at my bare face.

  Eww. I would’ve puked so hard if that shit had hit my face.

  I threw down the club and turned around in time to see Evan front kick the redhead into the wall display, which fell apart when he hit, causing a slightly heavy bong in the shape of a dragon to fall on its head. It did not kill him, but did put a dent in his skull.

  Evan picked up the dragon, (made a sly comment about how much they were asking for it) held it high above the zombies head and dropped it on him. His head collapsed easily as well.

  The tag said $59.95. It’s value to us… priceless.

  (Those commercials crack me up; I knew I’d find a way to use it someday.)

  That was our first encounter with actual zombies. If I implied that we weren’t afraid, that couldn’t be further from the truth. We were terrified, but in a situation where you have hungry zombies ready to eat you and they were the only thing between you and what you need, you either run, fight, or die quickly. Well, you get attacked quickly; you only WISH that you would die quickly.

  We grabbed a few cartons of cigarettes and several cans of chewing tobacco for Old Joe. We got rolling papers, three Zippo lighters, lighter fluid, a flashlight and a .357 magnum with six boxes of bullets that were behind the counter. What a find! That’s a hell of a gun! Somebody up there was looking out for us.

  In the Resident Evil games, it could take a zombies head right off! I had hoped it worked that well for us and it later proved to be true.

  Old Joe was still occupying the asshole on the corner keeping his back to us. Again we shot through the yards and into the back door of our house.

  We came out of the front of the house as he was returning from his talk with the soldier and he came up on the porch to sit with us.

  I gave him the chew he asked for and we told him about having to kill some Infected, and about finding the gun. He asked us what we did with the weapons we had, and I told him we left them there.

  I didn’t want to bring them home with that nasty shit on them, we had the gun now. We didn’t need them.

  I went back in the house to get my cell phone and I had a missed called from April and she left a voicemail.

  April and Marie were on their way to a shelter in downtown Cincinnati. She said that soldiers came and evacuated everybody, directing them to drive their vehicles to a supposedly safe place, The Y.M.C.A., and she would call me when they got there, if I didn’t call her first. She said they loved me and hoped I was okay. So, I tried to call her and there was, again, no answer. I was a little ticked off that I missed the call.

  Downtown? That’s the last place I would go, downtown is so heavily populated, and if there are infected there, and I would think it would be in large numbers. That didn’t sit right with me, now I was crazy worried!

  I never got the call. Thirty minutes after I got her message I tried to call again. My phone just beeped three times and said “NO SERVICE’ on the screen. So I tried using Evan’s phone, he also had a ‘NO SERVICE’ message on his screen. I then got on the computer to try to get on Facebook because she had internet on her phone, but the little computer icon at the bottom of the screen had a red x across it. I clicked on it and it said ‘No Internet Access’. What the hell? Now they were cutting us off from the rest of the world? We still had electricity; I plugged both of our phones in to charge, thinking that it may just be temporary.

  I don’t know why, with everything I knew about zombies, I just wasn’t willing to accept that this was real. I just went with the flow, of course I did what I had to do at times, but….it was surreal. ****

  We could do nothing at that point except obey the orders of the military to keep ourselves safe, maybe if we’d have tried to run away soon after, we wouldn’t have lasted a day. Who knows?

  I know you’re probably wondering what happened to Evan’s family, he had none, just me. He was orphaned as a child and spent most of his teen years in foster homes until he ran away at the age of sixteen and went out on his own. He did spend some time in prison for felonious assault in his early twenties, (the reason why we couldn’t just out right buy a gun). He had calmed down by the time I met him. Thank God, because he would’ve been a handful. ****

  I went back out to tell him about the internet and phones and just as I started to speak, we heard a gunshot from Jake’s house.

  So, of course we ran over there and Old Joe was the first in the door, he told Evan to come in, but I was to stay outside.

  I didn’t want to see anyway, I already knew in my heart what he had done.

  They had taken his wife and his children; he knew they weren’t coming back, so he killed himself. We didn’t even know he had a gun, he didn’t mention it.

  When they came back out, Evan had Jake’s gun. It was a .357 as well.

  We were suddenly finding ourselves fully armed.

  We stepped down off his porch, and again I looked up to see movement behind the curtains at Dan’s house. We hadn’t seen him since the day before and with that, I thought of Evelyn. I had to go and check on her.

  On the way to Evelyn’s house, the Holts and Briars were outside, huddled together talking. I waved and no one waved back. They only glared at me. What was that about? These people didn’t come out when they were taking Brian and Bobby and acted like they were th
e only important people on the street. Whenever we did see them I was used to them ignoring me like I wasn’t even there. I mean, we’d never spoken before. I never really had the opportunity. When I was working I left for work at six a.m., and didn’t get home till late afternoon sometimes. I didn’t really associate because I was tired and had things to do at home as well. So, fuck ‘em.

  I didn’t have time to buzz around the neighborhood making new friends.

  Oh, well. No love lost. We kept to those close to us, our neighbors on each side, Evelyn and sometimes the Pattons.

  Evan has been moving restlessly in his sleep. He tried to speak but I could not make out the words even when I put my ear up to his mouth. His lips are dry and cracked now and his nose and mouth have formed a sticky white film inside them. I drizzled the last of our water into his mouth, and lovingly placed my hands on his face and kissed him.

  I don’t care how gross that may seem to you. He is the love of my life and I will have killed us both by the time the virus could disable me. With that kiss, everything we’ve ever done together raced through my mind… I saw our first kiss, first fight, our first apartment, the sexual chemistry between us, and our wedding. It’s true, your life really does flash right before your eyes.

  I am afraid that Evan will be a Halfer. So I tied him up with some rope I found in a box up here along with a photo album, a utility knife and the pen and paper I am using to write this with. I only bound his feet and hands. I did not hog tie him because I don’t want him in more pain than he’s already in. He has begun to jerk around a little bit, and a couple of times I thought I heard him say my name in a whisper, but I’m not sure.

  I won’t kill him yet. I can’t because I know that he’s still in there somewhere, and yet another part of me tells me that it’s cruel to let him lie here like this just because I can’t bear to let him go. I think he’s probably ready, but I’m not. I also know that what I’m about to do will definitely land my soul in Hell (if I weren’t already headed there), but I keep praying for forgiveness. If not, then I can only hope it will be a much nicer hell than the one I’m in right now. I don’t think it can get any worse than this. ****