by Mark Tufo
“Running?” I asked. Paul nodded.
“How many?”
“Ten, twelve maybe.”
“Let’s get this shit and be gone.”
“Not that I want to stay in here any longer than needed, but what’s the rush now?” BT asked me.
“Unless Mouser King just opened up around the corner, something has them spooked,” I said, grabbing the handles of the duffel bag and standing up.
“I hate it when you’re right,” Paul said. “Couple of speeders headed this way.”
“Well, it’s a good bet there’s a bunch of their slower brethren behind them and I am not getting stuck in here as my final stand. I hate this house,” I added.
“I’m outta here,” Gary said, pushing past BT.
“Don’t let me get in your way,” BT told him.
Gary was already at the foot of the stairs and not turning to respond.
I shrugged my shoulders and followed my brother.
The two speeders had blown completely past the house in pursuit of the cats. The twenty shufflers following had just shambled onto our street and seemed to redouble their efforts with quarry in sight.
The zombies were within thirty yards by the time we were all packed and ready to go. Not close enough for any immediate danger, but how close does one really want to get with one’s waking nightmare?
“Hey G, let me see that rifle,” BT said as he stepped back out of the car. He carefully placed five shells in the rifle’s cylinder.
“BT, make sure it’s tight against your shoulder,” I told him right before I covered my ears.
BT slightly rocked on his heels as he fired a round. Doesn’t sound like much, but it was the first gun I had seen that could even do something as much as that to the big man.
“OOOOOH WEEEEE!” he shouted. “It took three of them down!”
We all looked through the back windshield. Two were completely out for the count and the third one’s legs were still moving, but it was only doing circles in the pavement as its head was on the ground in an ever expanding pool of its own jellified blood.
BT was still celebrating when I tugged on his arm that he might want to get back in the car with us so we could go.
I had a flash of panic in my gut, wondering if anyone had deemed it necessary to check and see if the car actually started.
Paul turned the key in the ignition, a slow churning whirring sound quickly became the rapid tick of a dying starter and then it caught. The engine roared to life just as the first of the zombies banged into the rear bumper.
“That was close,” Paul said, looking in the rearview mirror at me and the zombies outside.
“Um, dude, it’s still close; we haven’t left yet,” I told him.
“Right,” he said as he placed the car in drive.
“How did he end up in the driver’s seat?” BT asked as he watched the zombies retreat.
The speeders up ahead turned when they heard us coming. They started running full speed towards us, the smaller cats completely forgotten.
“Run them over!” BT yelled.
“Don’t!” I yelled trying to match him in volume. “There’s a chance they could stop this car,” I said, thinking of Tracy’s long defunct Jeep Liberty.
“Bullshit!” BT said.
“Okay, how about crash through the windshield? You want one of those things in your lap? Just think where its mouth might end up,” I told him.
“Stay away from the zombies!” BT begged.
“Easier said than done, guys. The road is only so big and they’re fanning out,” Paul said as he slowed the car down.
“Do your best,” I told him as I braced for impact.
“Anyone want to switch seats?” Gary asked from up front.
Hitting at least one of the zombies in front looked to be a foregone conclusion. Gary grabbed the bag I had taken from the house and placed it in his lap. Not a one of us thought it wasn’t a wise move.
Paul wrenched the wheel quickly to the left and the car shuddered as the lead zombie smashed into the side view mirror. The zombie’s tongue left a saliva string down the entire length of Gary’s and my windows. I swear I could see the mega germs swimming in that toxic stew now eating through the glass. (Flair for the dramatic? Sure, I’m not above it.)
The car flung back to the right, but it was either too much or too little of an adjustment. I couldn’t tell because I was still transfixed on the zombie spit inches from my face. That was, of course, until the side of my head slammed up against Gary’s headrest. The impact, I think, brought the rear tires of the small car off the ground for a fraction of a second. My head was ringing from the smack. I was shaking the cobwebs away, but I didn’t think I was doing such a good job when I looked out the windshield. A zombie was halfway up the hood, his outstretched hands latched onto the windshield wipers, and he was trying to pull himself up.
“Get off!” Paul screamed at it.
Gary was frantically hitting buttons on the console. The static-laced radio shot through the speakers, the sound not a welcome addition to the pain blossoming in my head. At some point, Gary turned on the hazard lights, which was actually fitting, and then he found what he had been searching for. The windshield wipers began to sweep back and forth, the added strain of a one hundred and eighty pound zombie snapping them off in its hands. The zombie looked to me to be surprised as it slid back down the hood and thumped under the bottom of the car. The radio was still blaring, the blinkers were still clacking and now the twisted metal from the broken windshield wipers was etching a groove through the windshield. I turned, the first zombie was already up and running, while the one that had perched on our hood looked like its legs were crushed. He was out of the race and the third had already turned and was still entirely too close for comfort.
“Nice driving, Paulie,” I said in all seriousness.
His knuckles glowed a brilliant white where they made contact with the steering wheel.
“You alright, buddy?” I asked him.
“Yeah, why wouldn’t I be?” he answered a few octaves higher than normal.
“Gary, you think maybe you could take care of the radio and the wipers?” I asked him.
“Sure thing,” Gary answered. If I hadn’t known better, I would have sworn they had both found some helium, and had just moments before, been sucking some down. Gary was nearly as high pitched as Paul. But after some initial fumbling, he was still able to shut down the radio and the wipers. Curiously, his hand had hovered over the hazard button and he decided to leave them on. I could deal with the minor clacking, my headache and the possible concussion that I figured was going to ruin my entire day had already faded into obscurity. I could at least thank Tomas for that.
We had driven a few more blocks. The car was pretty quiet as the first of the fat droplets of rain began to fall. Paul, without any conscious thought, turned the non-existent windshield wipers on. I don’t think he even noticed the grating sound of metal on glass or that the rain, that was now coming in sheets, was not being pushed from his field of vision.
Luckily, the rainstorm did not last long. By the time we got back to the storage yard, it had dwindled down to something resembling an ant pissing on a flat rock. (Think about that for a second, it’ll come.)
“Are those zombies?” BT asked, sticking his head out the window and into the soft spray as the car came to a stop.
It was still difficult to see through the wet, streaked windshield so we all rolled our windows down to take a better look.
“Better yet, where are Brian and Mrs. D?” I asked.
“I’ve had better days,” Gary intoned.
“That’s like comparing whether or not you’d like to get kicked in the nuts or eat an ice cream sandwich,” I said to him.
“Ice cream sandwich,” Gary said, without even blinking.
“Wise choice,” I said as I got out of the car. The zombies immediately started heading towards us.
“Do you hear that?” BT asked as
he placed his new rifle on top of the car door frame.
“Sounds like someone is banging on the locker,” Paul said.
“Canned zombie?” I asked.
“Hopefully it’s Brian and Mrs. Deneaux,” BT said as he aimed for the approaching zombies through his steel sights. The rifle blast rocked the car slightly as the lead zombie’s head disintegrated. It was the first zombie kill that actually looked like a movie prop. The head looked like someone had stuffed it with some C4 and just blew it up.
“That was disgusting,” Paul said, turning away.
Gary was already gagging.
It took me six shots with my .22 before the second zombie stopped. I may have missed a couple because he was running full tilt at us. But I watched the connecting hits. Its head would snap back a little, like it had got caught up momentarily on a small branch, and forward it would keep coming.
By the fifth shot, I could see BT in my peripheral vision. He was wondering if he should finish the thing off. The sixth shot dropped him like a penny from a skyscraper. Its knees just buckled and he went down, no skidding, nothing.
“What the hell is going on?” BT asked, still sighting through the rifle to see if there were any more targets to acquire.
“Zombie 3.0,” I said as I went forward to check out the increased banging on the orange steel doors.
“Brian?” I asked directly outside the banging door.
If he didn’t answer, would I have to open the door to see if it was them? Deneaux, I think, I could shoot without too many issues; Brian would be another matter.
“It wasn’t my fault,” a whiny sounding Mrs. Deneaux said.
“How the hell wasn’t it? You fell asleep,” Brian said. It sounded like I was interrupting a repetitive argument.
“You killed all the zombies?” Brian asked through the doorway.
“How many did you think there were?” I asked him as I pulled up on the handle.
Brian shielded his eyes from the light as he stepped out. Mrs. Deneaux sat in the shadows a few moments more, letting her eyes adjust slowly.
“That’s it?” Brian asked, looking at the two prone bodies. “I figured there were dozens,” he said, a little embarrassed.
“Wanna start from the beginning?” I asked him.
“I was looking in the lockers and Mrs. Deneaux was supposed to be watching my back.”
“I was, but I got tired of your repeated failures,” she interjected acerbically.
“You’re priceless. No wonder nothing ever took root in that cold, barren womb of yours,” Brian shot out.
“If it were you coming out, I would have made sure to wrap the umbilical cord around your neck a few more times,” she said, not missing a beat.
“Whoa, whoa!” BT yelled, “How long have you two been locked up?” he said, stepping in between them both.
“You’re lucky it was dark in there!” Mrs. Deneaux yelled, “or I would have shot you!”
“That would have been preferable to listening to you drone on or almost die from your carbon monoxide emissions.”
“If I could have smoked more in the hopes that it would have suffocated you, I would have!”
“Alright this is all very entertaining, but our day has also been less than stellar,” I said.
Brian was about to unleash some new verbal assault on Deneaux, but stopped when he looked around at the four of us and our hangdog expressions.
“Sorry,” he said to us, careful to make sure that Deneaux did not believe she was included in that apology.
“Any luck before they came?” I asked.
His bowed head answered before he spoke. “We’ve been stuck in that shed almost since you left.”
“Alright, let’s just find someplace relatively safe to hunker down for the night. I think we could all use a break from today’s festivities.” Nobody argued, at least that was a step in the right direction.
“Got any good ideas about that?” BT asked, “Because I’m a little hesitant about going into other people’s homes right now.”
“Oh come on, Mike,” Gary said as he saw me looking back at the storage space Brian and Mrs. Deneaux had just been liberated from.
“We’ll chain up the front gate and we’ll post a guard,” I said.
“Hopefully, one that doesn’t fall asleep while they say they’re watching your back,” Brian said for good measure, looking across BT at Mrs. Deneaux.
I smiled inwardly as the old crow stuck her tongue out at him.
“Come on. I’m sure there’s plenty of blankets,” I said.
“Tons of sleeping bags too,” Brian added. “I’ve found all sorts of camping gear.”
“I wish we had some S’mores,” Paul said. “Oh that’s right, you don’t like them, do you, Mike?”
“Isn’t that un-American? Not liking S’mores?” BT asked.
“They make his hands sticky,” Gary said, adding his two cents.
“Think of how many more germs you can pick up with sticky fingers!” I said, trying to defend my position. If making my opponents laugh was victory, then I had defeated them all.
“Didn’t you ever think to lick your fingers off?” Mrs. Deneaux asked.
I shuddered at the thought.
“Wash them off in a stream maybe?” Brian asked, trying to be helpful.
“Ever hear of giardia?” I answered.
“Come on, as a kid you were thinking about a parasite in water that came from the refuse of wildlife?” BT asked.
I nodded. “I read a lot as a kid.”
“Poor bastard,” he said, smiling. “I’ll take first watch. Won’t get much sleep thinking about your S’mores issue anyway.”
I didn’t tell him that since Tomas’ bite, I didn’t feel like I’d ever need to sleep again and could pretty much take every one’s shift without an issue. I decided I’d take the other watches after his. That’s what he gets for making fun of me.
Chapter Six – Mike Journal Entry 5
BT finished up his watch. The sun had long since departed. We had a small flashlight going in the corner of the ten by thirty foot-shed, but it did little to shield us from the darkness within. Every time I even contemplated shutting my eyes, images of the infant from earlier today crept in. I should have just let sleeping zombies lie, so to speak. BT raised the door as quietly as he could, which was still as loud as you would expect a metal rolling door would be. Paul and Brian immediately awoke, Deneaux slept on, snoring like a sailor, (which I guess is an unfair comparison to sailors everywhere because I don’t really know what they sound like when they’re asleep.)
Paul started to get up. “I’ve got it, bud,” I told him.
“You sure, man?” he asked even as his head was traveling back down to its resting spot.
“Can’t sleep anyway. No sense in both of us being up,” I said. He grunted something about thanks, in return, or he belched, sounding just about the same.
“Anything?” I asked BT, who was eyeing my bed longingly.
“I think I heard a couple of cars off in the distance and maybe some gunfire, but it was so far away, I can’t be sure.”
“Thanks, man,” I told him. “Enjoy your beauty rest.”
“You have any phobias about other men sharing your bed?” he asked.
I didn’t answer, I wanted to hold onto some secrets.
“Okay, so I know it’s not because I’m black. Is it because I’m a man?” he asked solemnly.
“BT, I don’t like my kids in my bed,” I told him truthfully.
“You’re kidding me, right?”
“Why would I? Like you need some new and improved reason to think I’m nuts?”
BT just shook his head and grabbed the scant bedding remnants not presently being used.
“No retort?” I asked him.
“Talbot, I am so damn tired and I really think I’m beginning to realize the depth of your illness.”
Oh, I doubt it, I thought. “BT, seriously, I’ll be lucky if sleep comes at all tonig
ht, sleep in that bed (I couldn’t, as hard as I tried, say it was “my bed”.)
“You’re cool with that?” he asked. “You’re not going to try and slip in there with me later tonight, are you? I mean, Tracy did leave today.”
Was that just today? Seemed like a sanity ago.
“I think I’ll be able to restrain myself,” I told him.
“Even with this pretty face?” he asked, smiling as he got down onto the sleeping bag. “You’re alright with this?” he asked as he placed his head on my pillow. “Because you look like you’re regretting your decision.”
“I’ll be fine,” I told him as I tried to shut the door more quietly than he had opened it, with far less success.
The night had a distinct chill to it. I could register that fact, but I felt slightly removed from it. I was comfortable and I had the feeling, I could be running around naked or wearing seven different layers and I would feel the same. And for some damn reason, Pop-Tarts kept leaking into my thoughts, which was disturbing, but still better than splattered, baby zombie brain. (Unless, of course, we were talking about cherry-flavored Pop-Tarts because that might be the singular, most disgusting thing left on the planet.)
I walked the entire perimeter of the storage facility. But after thinking about it, I don’t think I ever looked out beyond the chain link fence. My head had been down and I was deep in thought or shallow in disregard. Either one works just fine, but I was paying absolutely no heed to the outside world. I could have walked into the waiting arms of a zombie and not realized it until he or she had bitten me.
My next lap I vowed to pay more attention, but I didn’t make it halfway around before I began to daze out again. It really does suck having the attention span of a coconut-laden swallow (whoever picks this journal up may or may not get that reference; it will be a slightly better world if you do). I started to think about life, a normal life, mortgage, taxes, death, pretty much everything that I would never experience again. How the hell is it possible that I’m now missing any one of those things? And then I kept circling back to arriving at Ron’s and seeing Tracy and the kids again. Was Nicole showing yet? And what the hell is in Ron’s false floorboards in his closet? After kissing my wife and hugging my kids, that would be my utmost priority. I was going to have to be careful though, I wouldn’t doubt it if he had a security system in place.
