Zombie Lake: Still Alive Book One

by Javan Bonds

  "Jolly Rancher strawberry? I want one!"

  I didn’t really care if the Jell-O was warm, that was one of the best flavors they had. Crow reached around her injured girlfriend and grabbed one from the box to toss in my direction. I caught it and began drinking the warm quasi-liquid as soon as I broke the seal.

  My dad said something that nearly made me choke, "I don’t like that kind; it has a flavor."

  It took me a second to realize that he wasn’t going to continue and that this was actually the end of his statement. I would’ve asked the obvious question, but I was in the middle of laughing my ass off. I’m sure he would’ve defended himself and clarified and even as I walked away, he could be heard over my raucous laughter, but the moment was too perfectly comical to be ruined with an argument regardless of how uproarious it would be. The hilarity had to ensue.

  I was one of the lucky few to unload our last armfuls of boxes of MREs. The sky was not completely dark so it was easy to see the pile of boxes beside the pile of guns. Shit, the MREs were in sealed packages and could be stored anywhere on the ship, but firearms need to be stored in a dry place. I knew we had to bring them onboard for at least the moment and thought maybe Hammer had some kind of waterproof gun safes or something. The ladies had just finished their supper of fish; I had not yet eaten anything except the Jell-O and I was starving, I was tired, and I’m sure there are plenty of other things I could bitch about but realized we couldn’t leave guns exposed on a boat.

  "Jesus Christ!"

  "–Loves you and me," my mom sang.

  Doesn’t seem like it most of the time, Mama. Just as I was about to say something to her, Smokes appeared from somewhere and threw a massive tarp up and perfectly squared over the pile of firearms; okay, Mama, maybe He does. I briefly wondered where the huge tarp came from but

  chose not to ask. As I sat down to eat with the others, I wanted to say something about the fact that my mother was supposed to teach Crow to cook something besides fish but was too hungry to care.

  Around mouthfuls of food I said, “Hey Gene…tomorrow.”

  He looked back at me and nodded.

  "Smokes, you too."

  He pointed at me over his own piece of fish and said with a stuffed mouth, "Fo sho homey."

  The Following Is An Excerpt From The Upcoming Next Installment Of The Still Alive Series

  ZOMBIE ISLAND

  Robert Coe walked halfway down the hill from The Hampton Inn towards 431 and saw that Mortimer wasn’t lying. There were Stop, Yield, Beware Of Road Construction Ahead, And Slow Signs driven into the curb, hanging from the inactive red light wire at the intersection, and nailed to several light poles leading up to the causeway. On farther, there stood what looked like a large wooden guard shack erected on the opposite side of where the bridge used to be. Robert thought it was some kind of lookout post. He had evacuated Gadsden, Alabama with six other survivors. Now only three remained: himself, Mortimer, a senior citizen who had escaped from a nursing home, and a woman in her twenties who carried an evil little dog in a pink purse and thought every piece of clothing had to be covered with sequins. How did these two morons survive while construction workers, like Dennis, and cops, like Dale, wound up getting killed? Mortimer had appeared in Attalla, carrying a pump shotgun and a revolver, so he wasn’t completely worthless; Delilah, was another story. She had been Dennis’ ditzy blonde girlfriend, and while most would admit she was drop dead gorgeous, she happened to be a fucking idiot. Delilah refused to carry a gun because "It could just go off for no reason!"

  Robert headed back to the hotel and gathered the others where he would discuss with Mortimer what should happen. If that really was a guard shack, the city ahead was probably controlled by some type of lunatic biker gang that would charge them some type of "payment" to pass through. He glanced over at Delilah and knew what the payment would be. Approaching the bridge would be tricky; should the three of them simply walk slowly down the causeway with their hands up and hope not to get riddled with bullets?

  "Roberrrt," Delilah whined, "Those People! Those people in the room right next to mine! They are making just, like, so much noise! Coco is like, totally upset. I screamed at them that I was going to tell the, like, manager, or whatever, and, okay, so. They, stopped, okay? But, I can’t be responsible for, like, my actions, you know? Like, if it happens again or whatever."

  Robert looked sideways at Mortimer. Did she really just say that?

  Mortimer shrugged and Robert tried to explain to her. "Delilah, we are squatting in a hotel during the apocalypse. If you heard something in the next room, I doubt it was a paying customer of The Hampton Inn."

  "Well, like, they will be. I mean, everybody has to pay, if we do, right? I am definitely telling the Manager on them. Like, for evvvvrything. Right, Coco?"

  Robert pinched the bridge of his nose. Maybe handing her over to the bikers wouldn’t be such a loss. He moved closer to Mortimer to begin making their plans.

  "Here’s what you do," began the senior of the three amigos. “You walk to the end of the causeway unarmed and alone. Once you have discussed the situation with the people on the other side, you can motion for us to come join you." Mortimer tacked on as if it were comical, "unless they machine gun your ass, then we know not to come out."

  The younger man was incredulous. "Why do I have to be the one to make first contact with the bikers? Why can’t we just send Delilah?"

  Mortimer gestured for Robert to keep his voice down. He whispered in reply, "Because she is our bargaining chip. We might need her after the introductions are out of the way."

  Mortimer was a cold-hearted old bastard, but Robert had to agree that the high maintenance bitch and her ugly little rat might have some value after all.

  Once the plan was agreed upon, Robert started back down the hill. He cautiously approached the guardhouse; it looked abandoned. Just as he thought he might be in the clear, an unseen female voice commanded: "Get on your knees with your hands up and state your name!”

  The young survivor stopped in his tracks and complied with the command stating his name. “Robert." He searched around the bridge for the source.

  An unseen male voice said, "Robert?”

  "Uhhh, yeah?" he answered.

  "Robert Roberts?" came the voice again.

  Robert paused and replied. “No…it’s Coe.”

  “Well…okay then. And you can put your hands down." The voice could be heard speaking softly to at least one other, then came back with, ”And are you alone?"

  This discussion had come to the point of either going well or ending in death for Robert, so he went for it. "Well, I have a couple of other survivors waiting for my signal."

  The female asked, "A couple?"

  "Yeah, a man and a woman."

  "Call them up here before we bridge the gap."

  Robert lifted his arm and was about to wave to his compatriots as a bloodcurdling scream rang from their hotel. He wordlessly turned and hustled back to where he’d left his weapon to see what had gone wrong at The Hampton Inn.

  "Sum bitch. Fine, whatever," came an exclamation from behind the guardhouse.

  Mo was stationed on the South Causeway, flanked by Hammer and his Old Friend, Bradley and his familiar, Mary. They were armed with a wide assortment of weapons, AR-15s, SKS, sawed-off shotguns, various pistols, along with an insane number of knives covering the body armor of the three-man army. Hammer was instantly suspicious of this "Robert" character. She would refer to it as being vigilant. But Mo had won out over her paranoia. Although his argument was getting to be overused, it had yet to be refuted. "We won’t die here; it’s not part of the script. Besides, what would Smokes do?”

  They tracked Robert back to The Hampton Inn, the place they had assumed was his destination. As they approached, several gunshots were fired. Hammer hit the deck and the other two took cover.

  Hammer instinctively recognized the shots and shouted, "Pistol!”

  Robert heard the shots. He ro
unded the corner to see Mortimer with a smoking revolver in his hand.

  “Dude! Why the fuck did you shoot her?" Robert yelled as he saw two naked, blue bodies lying beyond the body of the sequined Delilah.

  Mortimer answered while dropping the empty shell casings into his pocket. "She was screaming about ‘the people in the other room making a racket.’ I guess she went to tell them she was going to ‘report them immediately to the manager!’"

  He turned to face the younger man. "I’m guessing the door was unlocked and she just walked right in and was immediately attacked."

  Robert seemed upset that they had lost the only thing they had to bargain with to get them across the causeway. The senior added in defense, "And they would have killed her as soon as they saw her, she’s been bitten right in the face."

  Like most animals, the infected normally went for the fleshy part of the neck and rarely munched on the head or face. Even though most bites on the neck were not immediately lethal, the zombies occasionally ended the life of their victim on the first bite, which would stop infection and the spoiling of their meal, that way they could pick their victim down to the bone.

  Mortimer still felt the need to justify his actions. "I did us all a favor and put her out of everyone’s misery,” he added with almost a grin. “Come on, did you really want to listen to her whine until she turned?”

  Robert relented. It was a reasonable bet that she could have remained human for several hours, up to a day. Then they would have had to worry about her losing it in the middle of the night and attacking them both. He shook his head. The old man might be heartless, but he was a survivor. Robert noticed that the little hairless vermin she called a dog was lying beside her, guts spilled where a peevie had taken a bite.

  Meanwhile, Hammer had rounded the corner and raised her rifle at the two men looking over the bodies. "Freeze!" she ordered.

  The two men were facing the other way and simply dropped their weapons, raised their hands carefully, and tried to remain otherwise motionless.

  "Turn around and walk this way!"

  Robert took the group in carefully, weighing their chances. Was this a biker chick? Shouldn’t she have tattoos, scars across her face? What was up with that cool eye patch? Two more figures appeared behind her. Hold on…a handicapped biker with a monkey on his shoulder? Well, anything’s possible. None of them were wearing leather...but check out the cool armor! These guys looked more like SWAT than Hells Angels. The lady walked forward as she gestured for the two refugees to get on their knees. She walked past them to inspect the bodies. Her compatriots kept firearms trained on their hostages. Two of the bodies were clearly infected, but the fully clothed female that lay before the door had been human when she died.

  "So why did you shoot her?" the lady asked.

  Without turning around, Mortimer answered. "She got bit pretty bad and I was just making it easier for her." Robert kept his thoughts to himself.

  "Well that’s too bad. She appeared to be a pretty girl." said the strange lady.

  Oh dear God, get ready to squeal like a pig, Robert thought. He looked at the soldier’s rifle trained on his head.

  The standing soldier was sporting a shaggy flat-top. He said, "I guess that makes only two of you now." At that Robert nodded. The soldier gestured in Mortimer’s direction. "What’s his name?"

  Why does this guy need to know everyone’s name? Mortimer thought. Then answered, "I’m Mortimer.”

  Flat Top laughed. "No shit. Can we call you Moe?”

  This didn’t seem like a question you would ask of a person you were about to brutally rape and murder. This made Robert want to ask what was going to become of them, but he simply waited in silence.

  A sickened scowl crossed Mortimer’s face as he spat on the ground. "I’d rather you not. My Mama used to call me that and I hated that old crone."

  The standing guard looked amused. "All right then…probably just confuse things anyway.”

  By this time the lady was through inspecting the bodies and had returned to stand before them. "I guess y’all ain’t gonna overthrow our island with a 357 revolver, an 870 with four shells, and a half-Mag-9. Nevertheless, I’ll just hold on to these for now. Please follow us."

  Follow the crazy biker chick to your possible death in a sadistic torture chamber or try to stay alive in a cheap hotel with absolutely no defense? Robert and Mortimer exchanged glances and shrugged. They got off their knees and followed the armored trio and their monkey.

  They trailed their captors across the pontoon bridge and waited while the lady hopped on a jet ski to move it aside. She simultaneously radioed to someone that she would need "replacements on the causeway," that her team was "en route to the courthouse with ‘new visitors.’" Robert almost asked if it was really necessary to make air-quotes with your fingers while using the radio, but before he was allowed to think about it, the party arrived at a large white truck. Everyone loaded into the vehicle. Robert stared in amazement as the crippled guy threw his chair into the back, then launched himself into the cab by hooking a hand over the top, and landed perfectly into the seat without disturbing the creature on his shoulder whatsoever. Robert ad really tried to remain silent, but that was ridiculously badass and he congratulated the guy with an expression of amazement and respect.

  Robert had been through Guntersville more than once in his life and he was pretty sure they were traveling north on a southbound-only road. They pulled to the side of the road in front of the County Courthouse, executing a perfect parallel park. Their captors led them through glass doors opening on an extensive complex.

  They crossed through the lobby and were halfway down the hall before Robert noticed the lights; they were on. Pondering the presence of electricity was cut short by Mr. Flat Top, who must have read his mind. He was wielding what looked like an AK. "Yeah, it’s a government building so it has limited solar panels. We can run some of the electricity basically all day." He smiled devilishly at Handicapped Biker. "Well, besides the elevator, that is, so it’s a good thing Daddy is on the first floor."

  Robert’s anxiety grew at the mention of this "Daddy." What kind of cult had captured them? The walk continued a little further down the hall. Mr. Flat Top AK asked, "So, where you guys from anyway?"

  Maybe they won’t kill us then, Robert thought. Maybe we will just be repeatedly raped. He was fairly certain no one would be this friendly with people they were about to seriously harm. "Down around Gadsden. What about you?" Robert hoped that if he made some kind of personal connection with these people, maybe they would keep his sweet ass around.

  The soldier replied. "I grew up just up the mountain, but for a year or so, I’ve been on the crew of the Viva Ancora."

  Robert’s question came out childish and excited. "The pirate ship?"

  Flat Top AK rolled his eyes as if he had heard this question a thousand times. "Yeah. And before you ask, yes you can see it."

  They finally turned into what appeared to be a waiting room. They faced a woman sitting at a desk who jolted to attention when looking up and noticing them.

  Flat Top spoke fondly to her. "Here they are, Mama. Daddy in there?"

  Rather than using a buzzer or some type of intercom, she simply called through the open office door. "Randy! You’ve got guests!"

  "Send ‘em on in." came the reply from within.

  The group began moving to the door. Flat Top Pirate Dude whispered to the captives to excuse the primitiveness. "We got Gene working on a phone system for the entire island.”

  They entered "Daddy's" office. The man sitting behind the broad wooden desk wore a camouflage cap and T-shirt and jeans. The room was mostly lit naturally from a shade-less window. He stood, pushing his rolling chair back, and addressed the entire room. "So I heard there was some shooting at the hotel before the team got to you."

  Randy, Robert guessed, paused and was obviously waiting to hear the details of what happened. The biker chick answered, "Yes sir, there were jihadists at the motel
who attacked the third member of this visiting band. This gentleman here, she pointed at Mortimer, eliminated the bitten in order to ease her suffering. These two survivors remained unscathed." She then thrust the two survivors into the spotlight. Randy sometimes found the military respect that the former pawnshop owner gave him to be somewhat charming; it made him feel important and respected. But other times he just wanted to have a simple conversation with The Expert without all the saluting, standing at attention, and all that other meaningless crap.

  Mortimer answered with all the deference and dignity he could muster. "Yes sir. Delilah Weed was a valued member of our team. She was bitten so I put her down with the two infected that had attacked her."

  Randy appreciated one of the rare surviving senior citizens being respectful. But he was dumbfounded that anyone could have survived this long and not realized the zombies attempted to seal themselves into small, abandoned houses and rooms and hibernate there. It hadn’t taken long for the main protagonists to figure that out. Maybe the peevies were afraid of open spaces such as warehouses, even when it was dark. The survivors could only guess at the reason. Most assumed that it had something to do with the instinctual knowledge of animals that smaller areas are easier to defend. Or maybe it was just that smaller areas held body heat more efficiently. Who knew?

  He said, "Hotels are prime spots for the infected to hide out. What made your team mate charge headlong into a closed room?”

  It was obvious to Robert by now, these people were not from Deliverance or Road Warrior. He unclenched his butt cheeks. "We had no idea. Since the virus hit Gadsden, our group has spent nights in tractor-trailers and warehouses. That hotel was actually the first building we have stayed in that had a real bed."

  "How many people did you start out with?" Flat Top asked from behind them.

  Robert responded without turning. "Counting myself, seven." The entire room erupted in a mumbled chorus of profanities at the number lost.