Zournal (Book 1): It All Started

by Randall S. Merritt

  Unless I made a noise. I was sitting on the toilet, ankle throbbing, holding the sword between my legs with the point on the ground and feeling depressed and fairly helpless. After witnessing what they did to John, how quickly they had overwhelmed both him and Rhonda, I had very little faith that I could just jump into the bathroom with the sword and take on more than one of them. So, I sat there. I pulled out my phone and completed an entry in this ‘Zournal’. I left the title the same for the entry as it seemed ironic to me that we had been heading out a few hours ago to get some new wheels and now two thirds of our party were dead and the last third was stuck sitting on a toilet waiting to accidently make the noise that would end with him being eaten alive.

  I considered my options. It seemed like I kept being in the same predicament where I could risk death by leaving the hiding place I was in or stay in the hiding place until I starved to death. This time I had no food. I could tell by the weight of the knap sack that I had maybe two bottles of water in there and that was it. This time I had no way of causing a distraction that would lead them away from me. I had no access to an escape route. I sat there hoping something random would occur to make a noise so they would leave to go investigate. A thunderstorm would make noise, a tornado would make noise, a bunch of ducks landing in the yard out back, a dog barking, I was hoping for anything.

  After a while of hoping I realized that I was going to have to come up with a plan or I was going to die sitting on the shitter surrounded by the walking blue. All I could really come up with was flinging the door open, fighting my way to the window, shattering the window and jumping to my death. That seemed like a lot of work to wind up dead anyway when I could just open the door and yell “Dinner!”

  I tried picturing the house and mapping out a way to move through it to get out and was not coming up with much. I tried getting the water bottle out of my knapsack to have a drink but I was making enough noise that I heard one of them moan outside the door. The last thing I wanted was for them to get inquisitive about what was behind door number three before I had something resembling a plan worked out in my head. Thirsty, hungry, and exhausted I finally decided my best plan may be to just stay in there and be quiet for as long as possible. Hoping something would happen that pulled them away from the bathroom so I had a fighting chance at least of making it out of the house. I began working on getting comfortable.

  Getting comfortable in a tiny water closet surrounded by demonic Zombie type humans looking to snack on all my tender parts did not make for a relaxing stress free environment for me to fall asleep in. Every time I moved it seemed to me that the whole world should have heard it. I finally settled for putting my head against the wall and angling myself in such a way as to hopefully brace myself in that position so if I fell asleep I would not fall over. I fell into a very tentative restless type of slumber.

  Each time I did wake up it seemed like the bathroom was getting even quieter. Finally, it sounded like there may not be anyone in there at all. I decided to give it a few more hours and then test that theory out.

  After few more restless hours of being wedged between the toilet seat and the wall, using my head and neck to hold myself up, I tried to think of a way to verify if the Zombies were still in there or not. I could make a noise and see if I heard anything, I could open the door and take a peek out, I could try and use my phone to take a pic somehow, I could do a single loud rap on the door with my sword. Probably because it seemed like the easiest thing to do I decided to go with the peeking out the door route. I also had in the back of my head that last time I had seen a Zombie in the bathroom had been the hot one with the great rack asleep in the bathtub. I was really hoping the crew who had tracked me into the bathroom had all decided to pile into the bathtub for a nice long group nap

  I slowly turned the door knob and peeked out. I couldn’t see anything. It was dark in there. The kind of dark I did not even realize existed inside houses until all of this had happened. I really miss hitting a light switch and being able to actually see. I let the door swing open further to confirm I still could not see anything. There must have been a moon as I could see the outline of the window above the tub but that was the extent of my being able to see anything. I tired leaning forward to see if I could see better and in doing so I put some very slight weight on my bad ankle. I let out a muted yelp and sat back down a little too quickly making even more noise.

  I heard something moving in the bathroom. In response to my yelp or just for the sake of moving or maybe my ears were just screwing with me. The sound was over almost as soon as it had begun. My best guess was a Zombie rolling around on the floor after hearing me make those noises. If all the Zombies were asleep the easiest thing to do would be able to walk out of the house quietly. Which would have been great if my ankle wasn’t continuing to swell and hate on my chances at survival. I couldn’t even move to try and walk out of here. I reached out and grabbed the knob and pulled the door gently back into the closed position.

  A plan was forming. The plan sucked but it was all I could come up with. I would sit on the toilet until my ankle felt good enough to walk at which point I would wait for nighttime when the Zombies slept and I would walk out of here and head over to the Truck place and get myself a brand-new vehicle to drive to Tennessee. There were problems with that plan. Like I had no idea how long it takes an ankle to fix itself, no clue if the Zombies would continue to sleep through the night, I would not be able to see anything in the house when leaving so lots of issues with that.

  My plan was to wait. It seemed like the only thing to do at this point. I carefully got the bottles of water out of my nap sack and drank half of the first one. Carefully sitting both of them on the ground at my feet. Using a quick burst of light from my phone I verified the toilet water was not blue so I filled up the water bottle from the bowl and drained it again. I filled it back up and set it down in front of the toilet and resumed sitting there.

  Entry 15: …. or get off the pot

  I sat there for two days waiting for either the Zombies to roll out or my ankle to stop hurting enough for me to be able to sneak out at night without making any noises. During the day, I mostly tried to stay completely still and keep my weight off the ankle as much as possible. In the day time the Zombies seemed to be more restless. I could hear them moving around and the occasional moan or something being knocked off a counter. When it started getting dark they seemed to shut down. You could hear them for about an hour settling in and then it was pretty much dead quiet the rest of the night.

  I used the night time breaks to stand up, putting most of my weight on my good ankle and the sword. I was paranoid I would make a noise causing a mad rush of Zombies into the bathroom each time I did it. Standing up allowed my legs to get some blood flow into them. It also let me carefully test out my ankle each night to see if it seemed ready to support my weight or not. Standing up also gave me access to the toilet which I used to fill up my water bottles twice each night. Once I had the bowl emptied out I was able to use it for what it was intended for. Albeit trying my best to piss slowly at an angle to avoid making much noise.

  By the second night I had carefully removed the cover to the back of the toilet and had been using it to get refills on my water bottles as well. I had no food. I was starving and during the day I lived in fear of my stomach gurgling loud enough to catch the Zombie’s attention. I prayed my ankle would be better by the third night.

  On the third night, my ankle still hurt but it seemed like the pain was at least bearable. I was starving and out of water and did not know how much longer I could hang out in the tiny room without accidentally making a noise during the day. I decided I needed to go for it or there was a really good chance I would not make it out of this house. At least not with the same skin color.

  I waited about an hour after it had gotten dark and all the noises in the bathroom had died down. I slowly pushed the door open and tried to peak through but once again the room was pitch black. I slowly st
ood up and tested my weight on my ankle. It did not seem like it was too bad so I risked taking a step on it. It hurt but was doable. I positioned the sword in front of me with the point about a foot off the ground and began slowly moving in the direction I remembered the door being in.

  I had one heart stopping moment in the bathroom when the tip of the sword nudged into what was seemingly a Zombie laid out on the ground. I carefully took a few steps to the right and was able to fumble my way around it. I made it over to the bathroom wall near the door and felt my way over to the door itself. Using the same technique with the sword I made it through the master bedroom and slowly felt my way into the loft.

  In the loft, I could hear more motion than I could in the other rooms. I could not see anything but there was an overwhelming stink in the air and there was a lot of rustling and moaning as bodies seemed to be shifting around all around me. It was very humid in the house as well which probably was not helping with the smell. I was covered in sweat.

  I encountered my first real navigational issue about halfway down the stairs. My sword poked into something fleshy where the landing should be before the stairs went the rest of the way down to the ground floor. In the total darkness, with a bad ankle, carrying a sword I was having a hard time figuring out how I was going to be able to get around this.

  I continued to poke the sword around in front of me trying to determine how many of them were sleeping on the landing. The sword was almost wrenched out of my hands as one of them let out a scream when I poked the sword down and I heard them all moving and jumping up so I took a step back and just stood there as quiet as I could be. I think I must have poked one in the eye. I felt one of them go past me up the stairs and heard the other ones in the loft moving around as well in reaction to all of the noise. I continued to stand still and eventually the ruckus died down and they all seemed to be setting back in as the house slowly became quiet again.

  On the plus side, in all of their moving around they had left a narrow space for me to be able to get around them on the landing and make it down the rest of the stairs. I made it to the bottom of the stairs without incident. The bottom floor was just as dark as the top so I took a minute to try and get my bearings when I reached the bottom. My immediate plan was to get out of this house and try to get into another one so I could find some food and continue to rest my ankle. Long term plans did not really seem worth the energy to think about at this point.

  I made it over to the mess around the sliding glass door and used my foot to slowly push broken glass out of the way so that I could quietly get out on the back porch. As I was moving the glass out of the way I could see there was definitely a small mound on the back porch. Tears came into my eyes as I avoided looking at the mound knowing it must be what was left of Rhonda after the monsters had been feeding on her. Once on the porch, by the scant light seeping in from a weak moon and a cloudy sky, I could tell it was her. I did not see Johns body lying around which got my brain spinning around the Zombie theory again. Either they had eaten him completely, carried him inside to eat him or he had Zombiefied and joined them. Thinking of what I had just gone through and thinking back to his injuries I did not think he would have been able to escape on his own.

  I moved around Rhonda. I went out the screen and over to the hole that had been bashed in the fence and started limping my way through backyards. Once I had gone over a few I started testing back doors. I needed one that was unlocked since I did not want to risk making any noise by trying to bash my way in. It took me six houses but I finally found one where the sliding door was not locked. I slid it open and quietly went inside. I stood in the house for a solid minute listening and sniffing. Trying to get a sense for if there any Zombies in it or not. I did not hear or smell anything that I could directly attribute to a Zombie infestation so I slid the slider shut behind me and felt my way into their kitchen on a search for the pantry.

  I looked around in the pantry area in total darkness until I found a box with a bag of powder stuff inside it and a two liter of some sort of soda. Not wishing to push my luck any further I took my box of random powder and bottle of who knows what over to where I found a couch. I took off my nap sack and sat down on the couch where I began eating out of the box of powder and drinking out of the soda bottle. The powder tasted pretty horrible, kind of like powdered milk, but I was so hungry I ate my way through it anyhow. Using the soda to wash it down. When I felt like I could not choke down any more of the stuff I stretched out on the couch and fell fast asleep.

  Entry 16: Regroup

  It turned out to be Enfamil I had been eating the night before. I assumed that was fine since it had a smiling baby on the cover. I didn’t really see why babies smiled so much if they had to actually eat this crap. The soda turned out to be diet Cherry Dr Pepper. If you think that combo sounds pretty puke inducing you would be absolutely right, but compared to some of the stuff I had eaten already during this horror show it actually was not too bad. Sitting up on the couch I looked out over the back of the couch towards the sliding glass door and saw movement in the backyard.

  It coalesced into a fairly steady stream of the Zombies cutting through the yard headed towards whatever had peeked their Zombie interest. What it meant for me was another day of staying immobile and quiet to avoid detection. Laying on a couch munching on Enfamil with a dull pulsing pain in my ankle while Zombies were safely outside the house I was in was nirvana after the last three days of sitting on a toilet in much worse ankle pain trying to get all of the water out of the toilet bowl and into my plastic bottles for drinking. I spent a bit of time getting comfortable on the couch and then went back to sleep.

  When I woke up again it was later in the afternoon and everything still basically sucked. Zombies were still strolling through the backyard, I still had nothing good to eat, and the warm diet Dr cherry pepper still tasted horrible. I had developed new levels of tolerance for things such as this though and again felt I was doing pretty good to be laying on a couch and at least having something to eat and drink. I decided then and there what I needed to do was try and slow my roll a bit by spending some time on this couch in this house until my ankle was better. I could wait until it got dark and then explore the house a bit better to see what else I could find to eat.

  I was also thinking I could find a room downstairs with curtains that maybe did not have as much possibility of me being seeing from the outside as there was now. That way I would not have to lay flat and still all day if I did not want to.

  Once darkness had settled in I put my plan into motion. I quietly explored the first floor of the house. I did not even consider going upstairs. I’m done with stairs for a while if I can help it. I found a den that looked like it would provide exactly what I was looking for including a large day bed that seemed comfortable when I tried it out. I began to limp from the kitchen to the den dragging supplies quietly through the home.

  Since I could not see anything and I was racking up some pretty good pain in my ankle by wandering around the house I decided it would be a good time to go to sleep. I considered a snack but did not feel like playing food roulette. For all I would be able to tell the next powdery thing I decided to eat may be ant killer. I went ahead and positioned the curtains in the small room to allow some light in the morning through the shades without actually opening them all the way. The den was on the side of the home so I was not anticipating too much Zombie traffic trekking through anyway. Those tasks all completed I lay down and looked forward to a morning of inventorying whatever I had managed to drag into the den from the kitchen.

  The following morning the sun peeking through the blinds woke me up. I sat up slowly looking around and getting my bearings. The room I was in was small, one wall was painted a light tan color while the rest were a creamy white color. There was the daybed I was sleeping in on one side and a large wooden desk with a couple of monitors on it on the other side. All the stuff I had drug in last night was laying in random piles up under the window frame.
It looked like I had managed to pull in:

  · 8 cans of green beans

  · 2 cans of corn

  · 5 cans of random soups from Progresso

  · Another big aluminum packet of Enfamil

  · A large box of generic looking corn flakes

  · A smaller box of Lucky Charms which was around half full

  · Another 2 liters of soda

  · Half a case of bottled waters

  In addition to feeling pretty good about the haul, I also knew that there was a lot more in the pantry where these supplies had come from. I went ahead and loaded my nap sack up with a few of the canned foods and the Lucky Charms in case I had to leave quickly. I put a few of the waters in there as well.

  I sat down and stared at the wall while drinking a water. As boring as it was to be sitting there I felt absolutely no compulsion to feel sorry for myself. I now knew what it was like to sit on a toilet seat for three days with real monsters waiting to tear me apart if I made a noise. Chilling on a day bed popping Lucky Charms in my mouth while slowly growing attached to the taste of Diet Cherry Dr Pepper definitely did not compare in misery to the former experience. As long as there was more food in the house than I could easily carry I felt no strong compulsion to leave. The longer I sat there the stronger I got and hopefully the weaker the Zombies got.