by Brown, TW
Mato screamed and reared up before toppling sideways after his rear legs were slashed by the same man and a long sword that seemed to have magically appeared in his hand. I hit the ground hard and had the wind knocked out of me. I could do nothing but gape uselessly and stare up at the man who was about to kill me.
He raised his sword high and was about to bring it down when something long and pointy came exploding through his chest. That was when I was reunited with Betty. She was covered in blood, and her nose might have been busted, but honestly, and she would be the first to agree, it was so hard to tell.
She reached out with her blood slicked hand and pulled me to my feet. I started to hug her but hesitated because of all the gore. So she snatched me forward and gave me a huge bear hug that left me looking almost as bad as her.
We waded into a nasty fight to add our weapons to the cause. Perhaps I should be clearer; there were battles all around us, none of which looked to be favoring General Carson’s flock.
We managed to catch our breath for a second and I told Betty that I had seen the general and some of his men take off. I pointed which direction and started that way, but she stopped me.
“He won’t get far,” was all she said.
Just then, I saw two figures charging up behind Betty, each with an axe raised high. I did not even think, I simply stepped past and swung my sword. It was a very clean kill; one that you could be proud of in a perverse way. Two heads flew away from their bodies and rolled into the muck being created in the sand by all the spilt blood.
However, the two bodies continued on another step or two before falling at my feet. Blood spewed from the neck stumps of each, splashing my boots in bright red arterial fluid. The coppery scent was overwhelming…or maybe it was amplified by my feeling of sudden dread and horror.
The bodies could not belong to a person any older than ten or twelve. But it would get worse as a dozen of their “friends” rushed to try and get revenge. These children all had looks of hatred that had no business on the faces of people so young.
Betty turned, and I swear that she paused for just a fraction of a second. That was enough for a little girl whose fierce snarl revealed the gaps where two baby teeth had fallen out and not grown back in with permanent ones yet to stick her dagger into Betty’s left thigh. Betty howled in pain and snapped back into combat mode. The spear she was holding whipped around and caught the girl square in the nose.
I have heard that you could kill a person by shoving their nose up into their brain. I had always dismissed it as a wives’ tale…until that moment.
That single moment seemed to put a pin in the bubble of hesitation for both of us. We swung with ruthless efficiency, and when it was done we were surrounded by the corpses of a dozen or so children between the ages of eight and maybe fifteen. I know that none of them were close to my age…that much I am sure about.
I wanted to get away from the scene of our battle. It was as if I was afraid that others would see and be disgusted by my actions. I was actually embarrassed to be victorious. I think Betty felt something similar because she just grabbed my arm and shoved me forward.
We ran from one fight to the next, but the numbers were simply too great for the army of General Carson to stand up against. I saw flashes of more young faces as the fighting continued, but I always made sure to veer away from those conflicts. I honestly did not know if I had it in me to do something like that again.
I truly believe that I would have just stood there if another confrontation with anybody so young would have happened. I do not think that I was alone. I may have been imagining it, but it looked like Betty and I were not the only ones giving any fight with children involved a wide berth.
Twice I was on the receiving end of a cut or slash. The first was a slice I took that could have ended me. It caught me just below the right collar bone. Had I not jumped back at the last instant, I do believe that woman would have decapitated me. Betty cut that one down before she could come back with a return swing. The second one is what put me out of the fight.
Betty and I saw a cluster of what had to be tribal members. They were dressed in this hideous burgundy and gold with huge eagles embroidered into the backs of their leather tunics. We veered that way to avoid a handful of children who were being cut down by three men who all looked like they were crying as they swung these huge hammers that required them to be wielded with two hands.
As I got there, one of the enemy soldiers had just tackled this man and was about to plunge a nasty curved blade into his chest. I came in low and kicked the person in the head. When the face turned my way, I paused. It as an Anomaly and those black eyes caught me by surprise. I had thought we were done with them. I should have known a couple would escape.
Anyways, my pause gave her time to swing that blade at me. Like an idiot, I threw up my hand. I remember looking down and seeing that blade stuck just past the halfway point in my wrist. I wanted to scream. After all, just because the message of extreme pain had not reached my brain yet did not mean that I should not just get the preliminaries out of the way.
Then I had the dumbest thought. Oh…good, at least it is not your writing hand. Seriously, that was the first real cognizant thought that I had…until the pain actually hit.
That was where my time in the fight ended for that day.
When Betty reached me, I am certain that I was in shock. I don’t recall much, so this next bit is second hand information. She yanked off her belt and slapped a tourniquet on my arm just above the wrist.
“It’s a nice, clean cut,” Betty marveled. “That blade had to be sharp and sturdy to do such a tidy job.”
Tidy? My hand is gone and she is talking about the amputation being tidy? When did the rest of that cut happen? I swear it was only halfway a second ago.
Now, if you believe Betty, I yelled at her and made a fuss. Since I have no recollection of that incident, I am going to deny everything.
She scooped me up and carried me through the battlefield. Several people say that she was actually running. They say that I looked like a child, and many people believed that Betty had actually snatched up one of the vicious children that were apparently all over the battlefield.
I ended up in a tent. Somebody came over and gave me this vile tasting paste that I had to eat. I don’t remember a thing after that until I woke up in a bed, all bandaged up.
I was expecting to have some time to recover, but the army was on the move. They had the wounded in wagons because they feared leaving anybody behind until the general was eliminated.
The second day, we came upon the location where the general intended to make his last stand. He must have sent his actual army ahead and then sent all of the ‘civilians’ into battle against us. The best guess is that he probably did this after the first night of the attack. With the fog, not to mention all their little secret passages, it seems like the logical conclusion.
The general had strung out a wall of bodies between us and them. Yep, you guessed it…all of the prisoners. Each one had a person behind them with a blade to their throat.
It did not work quite as the general intended. Without exception, our people were yelling for us to just kill them and finish this. And with that, the final battle began.
Unfortunately (or fortunately depending on your point of view) I was forced to sit up on a high ridge as the battle raged. I watched through binoculars, and it was a strange…surreal experience. Almost as if none of it were real.
It was often difficult to tell who was who. War looks a lot different from far away.
As the fighting continued on through the day, I searched until I spotted the general. I felt a lump in my throat when I finally managed to put eyes on him. He was systematically fighting his way to the edge of the battle. I knew what he was doing and I was helpless to stop it. Sure enough, he broke free with about a hundred or so others and raced away once more.
I guess we just got too caught up in what was happening down there and that
is how a small cluster of zombies managed to sneak up on us. When I say ‘sneak’, I mean stumble along like they always do, and when I say ‘us’, I mean the large group of the wounded that had been left at the top of the ridge along with a few small reserve forces.
I heard the first scream from just behind me and only a stone’s throw away. I turned as I saw a relatively fresh zombie fall on a woman on a cot just inside the flap of the tent that had been set up and was actually awaiting fresh patients from the ongoing battle.
Looking around, I spotted a small hand ax in a stump that was probably being used to chop down kindling from some of the larger pieces of wood. That was when I really noticed that we had set up camp. Not just a stopping place for the day. This was obviously where our group felt we would be finishing this once and for all.
I knew from some of our talks over the several days that this had stretched that the plan was to make camp once we finished this ordeal and let everybody heal up. There was a possibility that we would not move until spring if we found a suitable place. That meant that whatever they were slipping into my tea was doing a heck of a number on me if I was so out of touch with what had been happening. Betty would later confirm that the Natives had some pretty strong herbal medicines and that most of the injured—me included—were sleeping several hours at a stretch.
So, back to the undead attack…I made my way to the axe. Walking seemed a bit tougher than I recall, but I reached my destination…and then had to catch my breath. Shaking off the wooziness, I grabbed the weapon and headed into the tent, or rather I started that way. Actually, several of the men and women who were in position as reserves came running to our aid. It seemed that every time I would reach a zombie, somebody would step in front of me and put it down.
I have no idea how long it took, and I really did not do one single thing to help other than stumble from place to place and watch the less drug addled people dispatch with the walkers. However, I was able to notice that ALL of these zombies were relatively fresh. Also, there was something else that my brain was trying to get me to see through the haze, but it wasn’t clicking.
That got me to thinking, and once the commotion started to die down, I sort of stumbled over to the other side of the ridge away from the battle. I felt my throat tighten. I wanted to scream, but I couldn’t…I was too terrified. I guess we had been hit by the leading edge of the horde being led to us by a bunch of Anomalies.
Click!
The fresh zombies were all missing a hand!
I stumbled over to a few of the warriors that were already cleaning their weapons after this little battle. I told them what I saw as I pulled them over to the ridge. Coming out from these huge boulders were the undead and their Anomalies, leading them along like a bunch of wanna-be Pied Pipers.
They had used a deep gulch to hide their approach. Were it not for the fresher ones that hit us just a bit early…it might have ended in disaster for us.
In the end, it was rather anticlimactic as our people began to gather torches by the armload. They had those of us amongst the injured that were able light them up and pass them forward. I think I mentioned before how flammable the older zombies tend to be.
The cloud of smoke that rose off that herd was putrid, but the alternative would have been so much worse. The men and women who were able-bodied all mounted up and took off after the Anomalies. I guess General Carson had instilled a certain degree of arrogance in these things.
The look of surprise was quickly replaced by fear when our riders came over that ridge and barreled into that fleeing group of freaks. The best anybody can guess is that the plan was for the general to engage our forces and keep them busy while this other group came from behind. They obviously did not count on our making camp and leaving a decent amount of warriors in reserve on our flank.
As dusk began to creep in, the fighting came to an end. Not a single survivor remained. And already scouts had been sent to track down the general and his final few remaining followers.
By that evening, having not taken any more of the mysterious herbal concoction that had kept me loopy for the past few days, my stump was beginning to throb. I chose to grit my teeth and bear with it. And that was also the first time that I was awake when they changed out my bandages. It was really quite gruesome looking.
I was told that I needed to rest and that I should not be up and around, but I refused, and instead started doing all I could to help around the camp. There were plenty of those who were injured far worse than me.
The next day, I went with Betty to patrol the area. Mostly it was just to get up and move around. I was getting really sick of doing absolutely nothing. It was not like I could do anything. Truthfully, I was as helpless as a kitten. But being with Betty is about as safe as you can be. Also, I did not expect us to actually run in to anything.
While we had a large force out after the general, that little zombie surprise attack had us a bit nervous. That was when we found what had once been a pretty decent sized town. Of course it was falling apart, and many of the buildings showed obvious signs of past looting and vandalism. Cryptic messages in faded spray paint could be read on some of the walls.
We were not about to go poking around inside any of the buildings. For one, they looked as if they would fall over the moment that you touched one of them.
I still can’t get over the idea of this many people living and working here even after travelling with our large army. I went up on a hilltop one evening just to see our camp and how it was so full of activity. I try to take that image and superimpose it on a city like this and I simply am unable to fathom such a thing.
Anyway, we were moving down what I imagine was some sort of main street. So many crumbling signs that made me curious. One in particular that made me wonder what must have been happening to the world in those first days that a place would have to proclaim that they had “Live Nude Girls”. It still has me scratching my head. Seriously, the alternative would be super creepy.
It was just a few buildings down from there that we made a terrible discovery. We found Selina (and several others I should add) spiked to the wall of a building. The ground was black with dried blood and flies were thick on the corpses that had turned an ugly shade of gray. To make it worse, birds were perched on many shoulders, pecking at the tender bits of the face. Most were missing one or both eyes.
It took me and Betty a few minutes to ride down the length of the building and observe all the faces. Most were not people that either of us recognized, but a lot were, and seeing Selina die in such a terrible fashion was heartbreaking.
A few of the bodies had slipped. In other words, the weight had become too much to the point where the spike held, but the flesh and bone gave way.
We wanted to return right then, but decided that it was important to search the area for anything else. That was when we discovered the heads on sticks. It was Betty that recognized Ethan first. Honestly, I could barely make out that it was him even once she pointed it out to me.
We returned to the camp and revealed what we had discovered. We had the word spread in case anybody wanted to go and check to see if a missing loved one might be among the dead.
I was not actually all that surprised when nobody wanted to come. Instead, a group of us went the next day, gathered the spiked heads, laid them inside and then burned the building. I think most everybody had come to grips with the thought that missing meant the same as dead. Nobody wanted to see one of their loved ones in the condition that we described.
We were just returning from that detail when a group of riders came from the south. It was one of our scout teams…and they had prisoners.
When they arrived, I started to scan faces. Funny, they didn’t look all that tough or scary. They looked tired and beaten. They were dirty and scraggily.
They were all bound with hands behind their backs with a stick slid into the crooks of their bent elbows. Within just a couple of hours, a structure was built. It was really just a series of
long poles about as big around as my waist (I later discovered that they were just telephone poles that came from nearby) that were mounted on these tripod looking things. The horizontal poles were about eight feet high. Each of the prisoners was then hoisted up until their feet were a foot or so off the ground.
There was a lot of screaming. The fact that it did not faze me in the slightest is something I should probably be concerned about. I still refuse to apologize for feeling no remorse or shame because of our actions. Call it torture or whatever you like. And yes, I have heard things like “two wrongs don’t make a right” and “do unto others” while growing up. First, this is so much nicer than what they had intended on in the “do unto us” portion of their plan. Second, I will admit it right here…I wanted them to suffer for a bit. Maybe Selina’s and Ethan’s deaths are still too fresh for me to think straight, but I do not believe I will ever regret our actions.
They were left that way for the rest of the night. After the first hour, once the screaming and crying subsided, I began to notice some of the Natives wander over. Some of them would take a knife and make a single quick slice on one or more of the men and women hanging. I walked over to get a closer look; also, I wanted to find the general for myself.
As I walked the length of these prisoners, I noticed that several of them now bore a dozen or more slices to their arms and legs. I wove past some as it was being done and started to hear the Native making the cut utter a name. So, my best guess is that this was a symbolic sort of revenge for a lost friend or loved one. I don’t really know for sure, and I have not gotten around to asking.
Anyways, I was well down the line when I saw his face. He was a mess. This man had very little resemblance to the man I saw leading his army. This person looked only a couple of years older than me! I stood there staring up at him for a few minutes and eventually realized that he was looking back at me.
