This Dying World (Book 2): Abandon All Hope

by James D. Dean

  I was bothered by that revelation. Was I now the man who did not feel normal unless I was in the throes of violence? In the beginning of all this, I felt sadness to the point of guilt whenever I was forced to dispatch one of the undead. Now I looked forward to it. I wanted it. I needed it.

  What did that make me?

  I was stunned out of my thoughts when I almost plowed into Matt. The three had barely crossed onto the driveway before skidding to a halt. They were in retreat, raising their weapons and firing.

  A wall of zombies advanced, pressing into one another in a way I had never seen them move before. Not that I am some kind of wild kingdom expert on the migration habits of the North American undead cannibal, but I’d seen enough of them to say this was strange behavior.

  I brought my weapon up, sidestepping Matt as I’m sure he wouldn’t appreciate me firing through his body. My first shot was off, shaving a deep canal through the loose flesh of a Walmart employee’s left shoulder. I squeezed the trigger again, this time sending a round through its milky eye. Its head twisted to the side, but the thing was packed so tight into the undead wall that it couldn’t fall.

  “What the hell are they doing?” Matt shouted over the gunfire.

  “No idea,” Chris shouted back as his bullet split the top of another’s skull. Brain matter violently dissolved, spewing from the top of the creature’s head like an erupting volcano. “Aim for the ones in front, they’ll trip up the others.”

  We formed a line, shoulder to shoulder, firing into the rotting mass as we slowly retreated. Creatures unfortunate enough to be at the head of the class fell under our barrage. The snow turned grotesque shades of dark green and black as their brains dissolved in the frozen air. The thick burning stench filled our senses until our eyes began to water.

  We expected them to fall over each other. As a rule, zombies have all the coordination of a college kid on a cheap whiskey bender after spending 6 hours on a tilt-a-whirl. (don’t ask how I know what that’s like) Instead, the pressed mass of bodies shifted around, filling in spots as fast as we could punch holes in their line. They stepped over their fallen as if their bodies were not even there before continuing on.

  “What the hell?!” Chris screamed.

  “Lexi!” I shouted. “Find a high spot. Shoot Paul Bunyan! This shit wasn’t happening until the screamers showed up!”

  “Paul who?” she shouted back as she slammed the rifle bolt home. With lightning speed she sent another monster to its final death before popping the bolt back to reload.

  “Just look for the one that looks like a lumberjack!”

  “What the hell does a lumberjack look like?!”

  “Big and tall, flannel shirt, bushy beard! Jesus Lexi, didn’t you ever watch Looney Tunes?”

  “Looney what?” she questioned, shooting me an annoyed glance before firing another round into the head of a badly decomposed corpse.

  “I’ve never hit a girl before, don’t be the first!”

  “Oh for fuck’s sake!” Chris screamed. “Just find it and shoot it!”

  Lexi shot Chris an angry look before turning her ire on me. “Be more specific next time,” she mumbled close to my ear as she backed away from the group.

  I turned my attention back to the horde, squeezing the trigger as fast as I could. The rifle pounded against my still sore shoulder like a jackhammer. With every shot my lack of skill with firearms grew more apparent. Even with the ACOG scope, it appeared that I couldn’t hit the ground if I fell on it. I was doing a good job of shredding shoulders and perforating soft tissue. I was even an expert marksman when it came to killing the wind. Matt, who had never touched a firearm before coming to the farm was racking up kills like Rambo. I, on the other hand, might have killed maybe two of them, and possibly a bird in the next field over.

  I killed the shit out of that air though!

  I went dry before I could embarrass myself any further. I was ready to turn the rifle around and start swinging for the outfield. Yes, I know…the barrel is hot, but let’s be realistic. There’s a wall of zombies in front of me, a field of zombies making their way to the house behind me…probably on fire thanks to my mad bomber brother! Yeah, second degree burns on my hands didn’t seem like a big deal at the time.

  Lexi’s rifle cracked overhead before I had the chance to burn myself. Yellow pus erupted from the lumberjack’s head, arcing over the heads of the horde like a gory fountain. I spun around to see Mark had pulled the pickup to the top of the driveway. Lexi stood atop the roof, her eyes still sighting across her smoking rifle.

  The creatures stopped in their tracks, their faces looking almost sedated. Their tight bunching fell apart as they shifted away from each other, shuffling around haphazardly and paying no attention to us.

  “Oh my God!” I gasped. “What is that smell?!”

  Chris and Matt were already in full retreat, covering their mouths and noses against the intense olfactory assault.

  I gagged, eyes watering as the stomach acids worked their way to the back of my throat. Due to the lack of eating that morning, I was able to force back the nausea. The others were not so lucky, each one of them losing every bit of their breakfast. Lexi, still standing on the roof of the truck, covered the windshield with half-digested eggs.

  As I looked up between heaves, I was surprised to see the horde that only moments prior were hell bent on devouring us had turned away, making their way back to the road. Emitting fierce growls, they all but climbed over each other to get to the bottom of the driveway.

  “Where are they going?” Lexi coughed from above.

  “Don’t care,” Matt replied, wiping tears from his eyes. “We ready to go?”

  “Are the kids in the bus?” I questioned.

  “I saw Rosa bring the kids out when I got Mark,” Lexi said, hopping into the truck bed. “Anna was right behind them.”

  “In that case, I say we blow this pop stand,” Matt said.

  The multitudes of dead were advancing through the smoldering fields by the time we returned to the bus. Dozens of walking fireballs moved in and out of the ranks of the dead, their forward movement unabated by the inferno that consumed their bodies until the flames finally destroyed their malfunctioning brains. The dead army simply stepped over their burning bodies, marching ever closer to our clan.

  Chris sighed, moving toward the passenger side of his truck. He looked over his home, his eyes gleaming with moisture. He turned his head slowly, taking in the property that had become his family’s homestead. The land he had worked for years to provide for Anna and Faith. He dropped his head, taking in a deep breath. “It’s time.”

  Anna and Rosa ran out of the house again, bundles of clothes in their arms. Our eyes met, and they nodded in understanding. We were leaving.

  They climbed inside, Matt and Lexi following behind. I looked back at that small hill, watching the glittering ice sway on the branches of the willow tree. It looked so serene amongst the death and chaos bearing down on us, as if it just didn’t belong on this Earth anymore.

  The truck horn blared behind me. I looked over my shoulder to see that Mark had pulled the truck in behind the bus. I nodded to him, and climbed inside the rolling fortress. The warm air circulating inside was a welcome relief from the bitter morning cold.

  Joe sat in the driver’s seat, the bright monitors lighting up his face. Rosa and Anna sat behind him, staring out through the rectangular holes toward the burning fields. Matt sat in the front row seat across the aisle, shoving bullets into his spent magazine as fast as his hands would work. Lexi sat behind him, working the bolt on her rifle.

  Save for the heavy churning of the diesel engine, the bus was morbidly silent. Everyone wore their fear openly as they awaited the moment that we would finally speed away from the oncoming nightmare.

  “I see Chris was using my hammer again,” I said to myself as I bent down to pick it up from under Matt’s seat. “The kids in back?” I asked looking up at Rosa.

  “They
’re under a blanket fort in back. They shouldn’t have to see any of this,” she replied. Her voice trembled, hands shaking as she continued to glance outside at the ever nearing dead. Her eyes overflowed with silent tears as they streamed down her reddened cheeks.

  “Thank you,” I said, squeezing her shoulder. “I’ll go back with them.” She nodded.

  The bus lurched slightly as Joe finally dropped it into gear. As the vehicle picked up speed, I watched through the window openings as the house slipped away from view. The bus rocked a bit as I made my way to the blanket fort stuffed between the last two rows of seats.

  I lifted the blanket, wanting to be near my daughter when we rolled off the farm. Smiling faces met me, dolls in hand and with three buckets of Lego’s spilled out over the floor.

  My heart froze. Arcs of terror shot across every nerve in my body. My muscles locked as the bus started to pick up speed. The scream built up in my lungs until I finally exploded.

  “Where’s Katie?!”

  Chapter 9

  The midmorning sun was shining by the time Dunford led them out of Fallbrook. The city was in ruins, buildings still ablaze weeks after humanity had made its last stand. Pillars of black acrid smoke plumed high into the deep blue sky from a city gasping out its final breaths. Soon, only ash and twisted debris would be left to mark the land where mankind once dwelled.

  Those who had tried to escape in the initial fungal assault had fallen victim to the second round of infection. The trigger spores had worked their way into the air, killing and turning people as they fled. Many vehicles had simply stopped in the middle of the road, their former occupants still inside to suffer the ravages of the California heat.

  They pressed their faces against the glass, grimy fingers leaving oily black streaks sliming across the soot stained windows. Their damaged brains were unable to grasp the horrifying reality that they were doomed to spend the rest of their eternity rotting away in their steel tombs.

  Massacred bodies littered the roadway, their cracked and broken bones nearly stripped bare of flesh. Scavengers busied themselves picking clean whatever the undead couldn’t rend from the corpses.

  Jason detached himself from the horror around him, feeling nothing as they passed the corpse of a young child, a black bird on top of its skull, driving its beak into the eye socket to scavenge the last bits of meat inside. The bird barely looked up as the heavily armored vehicle rocketed by.

  Jason barely took notice of the scene. He stood on the front lines when the first of the hordes tore through their outer perimeters. He saw firsthand the destruction the creatures had wrought, bearing witness to atrocities he could not have imagined in his seventeen years of service. He had hardened himself against most of it, knowing full well that it would only be a matter of time before his resolve would be tested again.

  The men were silent as they weaved through the dense maze of stalled and wrecked cars, each taking in their own little piece of personal horror. The monsters had come, devouring everything, leaving nothing but blood stained scraps as a monument to their unending hunger.

  “Jesus Christ!” Jeffries gasped. His face plastered against his window, staring at a gathering of undead. They piled atop each other, writhing and thrashing in an animalistic frenzy.

  “Oh my God!” Murphy exhaled.

  Jason squinted against the bright sun to see what had captured the men’s attention. When he did, he wished he hadn’t.

  A woman reached out to them from under the pile of rotting corpses. She was young, her raven black hair wrapped around her horror stricken face. Her deep blue dress and ivory white skin stood out against the grime coated bloody clothes and mottled decaying flesh of the dead ripping into her. Bright red blood poured across her skin like paint across a clean white canvas. She howled in agony as a strip of forearm disappeared into the gaping maw of a feeding corpse.

  Help me! She mouthed, her hands reaching out to them as she saw the vehicle slow.

  “Keep going,” Jason said, turning his head away from the horror.

  “We’re not going to help?” Dunford blurted.

  “Do you always answer an order with a question, Marine?” Murphy asked, breaking his gaze from the terrible visage. He scratched Titan behind his ear. The dog whined, as if he felt his master’s grief.

  “No Gunny.”

  “She’s gone,” Jason added, his eyes lowering to the floorboards. “There’s nothing we can do for her.”

  “Aye, Gunny,” Dunford’s responded in a trembling voice.

  “It’s a shitty thing to do,” Murphy said. “But stopping to help her could get us killed, and it would have been to save a woman who was bitten. She would have died and turned soon. It sucks, but that’s the new reality.”

  The vehicle grew silent once again as they turned onto the highway. They snaked through the mountains on the narrow two lane road. Jason thanked whatever deity might be listening for the noticeable lack of stalled vehicles and random pile-ups along the winding road.

  As they reached the outskirts of Pala, the bright blue sky darkened as gray clouds slowly rolled in. The dying sunlight eventually was overtaken by a gray bleakness, bathing the landscape in dreary colors that better suited a world that was dying around them.

  The numbers of dead steadily increased as the miles ticked by. Tensions rose as larger gatherings of walking corpses started to appear, mobbed together in tightly packed groups along the road.

  The Pala Mini Mart came up on their right as the road opened into a four lane highway. A mass of zombies aimlessly milled about the parking lot until the Hummer rolled into view. Terrible hunger drove groups of undead to move into the road ahead of the Hummer, brittle bones shattering with the sudden impact of steel on decaying flesh.

  “Shit,” Jason spat. “I forgot about the damn Casino! That place would’ve been packed when everyone turned! Get this piece of shit moving!”

  “She’s beat up pretty bad from that off-roading trip, Gunny!” Dunford shouted as he smashed the accelerator to the floor. The engine growled in protest as their speed only marginally increased. “We’re only going to get so much!”

  The vehicle slowly picked up speed as they passed the casino’s four story parking garage. One by one, a cascade of corpses tumbled over the rooftop, oblivious to the final death that awaited them as they cart wheeled down to the concrete below.

  Idle corpses had gathered outside the imposing desert tan casino, stumbling around as they shambled lazily in various directions. As the armored Humvee neared, a deep guttural roar erupted from amongst the disorganized horde. The creatures gathered in close, pressing together in a bone crushing mass. Another roar, and the horde was on the move. The mass of flesh spilled onto the blacktop, standing between the men and their escape.

  Yet another ear piercing shriek echoed from the charter bus lot to their left. Dozens of milky pale eyes stared back at them from between parked buses that once carried patrons to spend their time and lose their hard earned money at the Pala Casino. Those now dead patrons were funneling between the vehicles and spilling out onto the road.

  “I don’t believe this!” Dunford spat. “Those things were hiding?!”

  As the dead continued their migration to the main road, a lone female creature stepped toward the tightly packed group. A circle formed around her until she stood alone within its center. Her intense white eyes glared at the Hummer, lips curled up in a furious snarl. She stepped forward, the group moving as a unit in lockstep with her.

  “Does this have an ambush feel to anyone else?” Jeffries asked incredulously, his eyes darting back and forth to either side of the road.

  “Get us out of here!” Murphy shouted as the Hummer sideswiped an old woman in a sun dress. Flesh tore from her cheek, smearing clotted blood across Murphy’s window. A ribbon of skin stuck to the glass, flapping in the wind like a birthday streamer.

  Titan suddenly found himself off balance, falling into Murphy’s lap as three undead bodies deflected off the fr
ont fender. Dunford swerved around to avoid a mass of the things as the horde tried to close off the men’s escape. Corporal Dunford hammered down on the accelerator until it would go no further, the transmission grinding as they sped beyond the clawed reach of the undead.

  Jason glanced at the side mirrors, watching the separate groups of undead come to a stop in the middle of the road, eyes fixed on the Humvee. Like an ocean tide, the dead withdrew, slipping back to where they lay in wait. Within seconds, the highway was clear again, only the bodies of those too badly damaged to drag themselves away remained.

  “Okay,” Jason spouted. “I wanted to wait until we stopped to discuss this, but we need a coming to Jesus meeting right now.”

  “A what?” Murphy demanded.

  “Confessional,” Jason replied. “Time for everyone to spill what they know. Because I’ll be damned if that wasn’t an ambush!”

  “Agreed,” Murphy replied “What do you know about this infection?”

  “Not much,” Jason replied. “There was a lot of chatter on comms, but nothing that would give me the full picture. I know it was fungal, and some people who thought they had the flu turned into these rotting sacks of shit.”

  “Okay,” Murphy said, face twisting in disgust as he eyed the flapping skin stuck to his window. “Well the infection was twofold. You’re right, the first zombies were the ones who were sick. Did you notice that every time you kill one of those things, their brains turn to snot?”

  “How could I not? It smells like shit and looks worse.”

  “Well,” Murphy started again. “That’s more spores. You remember the flu that took down half the base over the last couple months? Did anyone in here catch it?”

  Everyone shook their heads no.

  “That’s why we’re not all one of those things. That flu wasn’t the flu at all. It was the first wave. I’m guessin’ it needed time to incubate.”

  “How did you hear all this?” Jason demanded.