Anno Zombus Year 1 (Book 3): March

by Dave Rowlands

  “We're in luck!” Came the call from The Colonel, inside the tank. “She's fully loaded with both shells and machine gun ammo, all we need to do it fill her up and we're good to go!” followed by Viking's booming laughter.

  Through the gloom of near noon Apocalypse Girl spotted motion in the distance, and called it out. “Looks like Dead coming for us!” Viking asked from within the garage how many. “Ok, at first guess, I would say shitloads,” He swore loudly. He called out that the battery was in and working, but they needed more time to fuel up. I shouted back at him that we'd take care of it, wishing I felt half as confident as my voice sounded.

  noon

  The Dead slowly shambled towards us, and Apocalypse Girl's estimate of shitloads was proven quite accurate. Every round fired from either of our pistols felled a Dead one, many of those dead Dead tripping up those that tried to stumble over them. We emptied our weapons, reloaded, emptied them again, a never ending cycle of destruction. Well it would have been, until we ran out of bullets. We holstered our guns, and drew our melee weapons.

  My sword had cleared its sheath when the rumble began behind us. I grabbed hold of Apocalypse Girl's arm, pulling her back inside the garage, cutting down the leading pair of Dead along the way. Viking waited atop the tank, hand outstretched, and I thrust Apocalypse Girl towards him, spinning around just in time to slice another Dead head apart before leaping up myself. Viking, astride the main gun, swung his mighty hammer at any Dead that drew near enough to be pulverised, as Apocalypse Girl and I joined The Colonel inside the tank.

  The Colonel ordered me to man the machine gun turret, which I did with pleasure, mowing down any Dead that dared shamble into my field of fire. The Colonel ordered Viking inside, which he refused, as somebody had to keep the Dead off the outside of the tank. She spoke urgently with Apocalypse Girl, for a few seconds, then a moment later the tank began to move forwards. A couple of seconds after that, the wall of Dead in front of us simply exploded. The ringing in my ears, coupled with Apocalypse Girl's expression of pure joy told me what had gone down, and The Colonel began to move us onwards again. After a minute of travel, Viking joined us inside, blood and gore dripping from the head of his hammer, his hair and beard covered in Dead glorp, eyes wild with delight.

  The Colonel had a little trouble at first getting the tank under control, but after a couple of minutes she had the hang of it, and began showing us all the basics. We came across several cars that at first Viking bemoaned having to get out of this nice cozy armoured vehicle to move, until The Colonel simply drove straight over them. After that, Viking insisted on flattening every single car we came across, whether it was in our way or not. Clearly he was having fun.

  evening

  Arriving back at the Mech-Tech home base shortly before full dark, Viking showed off his newest toy to his men, describing the mess one shell had made of a group of densely packed Dead, telling them how Apocalypse Girl and I had stood firm against an unending horde while he and The Colonel made the tank ready.

  Gathering the six of us together after the evening meal, Viking told us that as promised, we were welcome to any of the vehicles his group owned, a full tank of fuel for it, any modifications they could make in the time it takes The Colonel to teach a couple of his men how to operate the tank. He also told us that any time we needed his help all we had to do was ask and he would be there.

  I thanked him for his generosity and hospitality, saying that we would decide on our new car in the morning. It had been a fucking long day.

  March 20 Year 1 A.Z.

  morning

  The Mech-Techs had an impressive array of vehicles. Anything you could think of, they had already built it, modified it, stripped it down, rebuilt it again, made it better, put spikes and blades on it, and in some cases had even strapped a heavy machine gun on it. The five of us, The Colonel busily teaching others how to operate the tank, perused each and every vehicle carefully. The jet black Lamborghini with scythe blade attachment looked like fun, but impractical for our purposes.

  Most of their cars would suit our needs, were there only four of us, but with six we needed something a little larger, more roomy inside. There were a couple of what looked to be reinforced parking shuttles, one with a cow-catcher painted to resemble sharks teeth on the front, definitely enough room for everyone, but they seemed a little too frail. Maybe for something like a short run to another form of transport, a train or a boat perhaps. No good for a trip of several hundred kilometres, not anymore.

  Viking was beginning to get almost as frustrated as we were with our apparent lack of ability to choose, when a small man with a stutter came up to our host and tried to tell him something. Before he could even get a word out, Viking had guessed it. “It's finished?” The little man nodded, smiling nervously. His booming laugh erupted from deep within his powerful chest, startling all nearby. “You might like this one, then!” He said, then strode off into the shadows in the back of the warehouse, the small stutterer following close on his heels.

  The wall was covered in bizarre diagrams, strange contraptions, some clearly vehicles, some totally unidentifiable as anything in my limited realm of knowledge. A strange, huddled figure scribbled away at a work bench for a full five minutes until Viking coughed once, loudly. The figure leapt up almost to the ceiling, it seemed, shrieking shrilly. When he realised it was only his boss, he sighed in relief, and ran up to the tarpaulin that covered something. Something rather large, by the looks.

  “He told me about this design a few weeks ago, saying it could come in handy for someone. I don't know how the hell he knew you'd be coming along, but this lunatic is never wrong. The fact that it's finished today means that it has to be for you guys.” Viking told me, in the most serious tone I had heard from him yet. The tarp had caught on something, and the stutterer joined the nutter in attempting to remove it. Eventually it tore loose, and what lay beneath took our collective breath away.

  Nutter and Stutter had taken the cabin of a semi trailer and fused it with the rear end of a Volkswagen Combi van. To start with, at least. A machine gun turret stood proudly atop the cabin roof, and the rear door of the Combi portion had a mounted machine gun seated in a window that had been modified to fit. Blades so sharp they gleamed stuck out from the sides of the bullbar at all angles and heights, some with bits of tarp still attached.

  Apocalypse Girl and I shared a glance and a smile, before I told Viking that it was absolutely fucking perfect.

  noon

  Viking had asked me exactly why we were looking for a government that had allowed this to happen to us after lunch, and I really didn't know how to reply. I just told him that I owed it to The Colonel to get her where she wanted to go, then Apocalypse Girl and I planned to head back to Melbourne and live at The School. He nodded, saying that all the people he had met from The School were good folk, and that they needed protectors like us. The blonde giant then went on to say that should anything go wrong with them, or should we just wish a change of scene, we would always be welcome with The Mech-Techs.

  Redbeard had gotten himself into trouble with one of the locals while we were out, it seemed. He had gotten himself into a drinking competition with Viking's right hand man, a one-eyed brute with an evil sense of humour. For losing, Redbeard had to wash all of the Mech-Techs cars wearing nothing but a bikini. Fortunately for him, it was just all the cars in this warehouse. Still, hungover almost to the point of chundering, he washed them all, to the light-hearted taunts and jeers of the onlookers. Firecracker's face was redder than her hair watching the whole procedure. When he was done, The Cyclops threw him his clothes with a big grin.

  “Next time, how about we just get shitfaced together without making stupid bets?” Redbeard asked him. The Cyclops replied that he wasn't the one who had set the stakes, to the renewed laughter of all onlookers. The shamefaced Redbeard went off to change clothes in private.

  evening

  Viking threw a feast for our last night with The Mech-Tec
hs, declaring us all welcome to come and stay any time we wanted. The Cyclops and Redbeard were drinking together again, fairly heavily, though not competitively this time. The Colonel was being toasted by her students, all of whom she said were more than competent at tank operation, even capable of teaching others. Firecracker and Sister were quietly talking among themselves about what we might find on the more than six hundred kilometre journey ahead of us to Canberra.

  Sister wondered if things were different elsewhere in the world. Not with the Dead of course, mainly with the weather. Nutter told her that if things were different, chances were good that they were quite a bit worse. Viking asked me what I thought had turned the weather foul on us over the last couple of months. I told him that we were working with the idea that it was a nuclear winter, perhaps exacerbated by the burning of the Dead. He nodded, saying that made sense.

  If it was cold enough to start snowing in the height of summer where it generally didn't snow even in the coldest of winters, that only meant that as we passed into the middle of the year it would grow colder still. In the coming months we would have to be concerned more with the Cold than the Dead. It was a sobering thought.

  March 21 Year 1 A.Z.

  morning

  The Nightmare, as we called our new transport, was far more comfortable than it had any right to be, judging from all the pointy bits on the outside. A CB radio enabled contact with The Mech-Techs, and potentially others. The cab was more than roomy enough for three to sit up front at any one time in comfort, and there was even a bed in the back, and a small hatchway leading into the rear of The Nightmare and another leading up to the turret. The Combi attachment, however, was less comfortable but well supplied. They had left us with a few spare cans of fuel, and more ammunition for our two heavy weapons than we hoped we would ever need. Viking had even given us several cartons of his home-brewed beer, in case we either need to trade it for something, or just get bored.

  We were able to make reasonable time, considering the fact that all the roads out of Melbourne were clogged with abandoned traffic jams. Viking had suggested that we might find travel a little easier if we were to go along the coastal route, rather than inland. Fewer towns, less traffic used that route before the Dead got up and walked. That would hopefully mean fewer Dead to contend with, and fewer less dense traffic jams to unclog.

  noon

  It wasn't long before we ran across our first obstacle. Ironically, a semi trailer had jackknifed in the middle of the road, presumably to avoid running over somebody that it probably wouldn't have affected much. No Dead were evident, so Apocalypse Girl parked The Nightmare on the shoulder of the road so that we could examine the truck's contents.

  Upon discovering that the semi had been transporting a load of baby food, we decided to collect a few boxes for ourselves, and call it in to The Mech-Techs asking them to share it with The School. Viking himself promised that it would be so, and we moved on once again.

  No more than a kilometre down the road from the semi a small group of Dead milled in the road. Apocalypse Girl shifted into a higher gear and ploughed straight through. The spray of reddish black splat that resulted had the six of us hooting in joy for a moment, until Apocalypse Girl stopped the truck, asking someone in the back to clean up the rest. Machine gun fire erupted from the rear of The Nightmare, cutting down the few Dead that had not been caught by the blades.

  evening

  Apocalypse Girl finally remembered her phone, and put it on charge after she and Sister had massacred the group of Dead we encountered after the baby food truck. There were several messages from The Smart Couple at The Facility, most updates on their status, a few of the later ones expressing concern that we hadn't replied in several days. Apocalypse Girl messaged them straight away telling them that her phone had died and we had only just managed to charge it.

  Almost immediately a message came back, saying only spare batteries!

  Apocalypse Girl replied that next time we're near a mobile phone shop we'll look into it. The Smart Couple sent another one several minutes later saying that they were researching something important at The Facility, something that could change the world. They needed tissue samples from somebody that the Dead virus had bonded with at a molecular level, apparently. Whatever that meant. Apocalypse Girl asked them.

  We need your friend from the commune that got infected but survived was the reply. They needed to study The Kid.

  March 22 Year 1 A.Z.

  morning

  Nothing more from The Smart Couple since last night. We decided that, no matter how badly they needed the tissue sample, finding The Kid was likely an impossible task right now, though Archer might have some ideas where to begin. We would have to attend to it when we returned from Canberra, there was no way we were able to do anything sooner than that.

  The road was mostly clear for a couple of hours, however eventually we came to the wreckage of a plane that had evidently fallen out of the sky at some point. Or else it had been deliberately flown into the ground. Thinking about it, from the way the debris was scattered about, the latter was more likely. The pilot had no doubt either been bitten himself, or else somehow knew what had been going on behind him amongst the passengers. Either way, it was months too late to do anything for any possible survivors, and highly unlikely anyone survived anyway. Redbeard carefully navigated around the obstacle course provided by the plane debris, and we were away once more.

  Apocalypse Girl and I sat in the rear of the cabin on the bed, resting, while Redbeard and Sister alternated driving for the day. The Colonel and Firecracker were taking their turn in the rear of The Nightmare. We had decided on two in each position for a couple of reasons, one being that there was always somebody ready to jump onto either of the guns, if need be, the other so that we could have relative privacy.

  noon

  We came to an abandoned town shortly after noon and decided that it was a fine place to stop for a bit to see if there was anything we might be able to make use of. Redbeard found a fairly comprehensive toolkit inside the lone service station, but other than that the town itself had been picked dry, either by those who had once lived here and fled, or by others passing through as we were.

  We filled The Nightmare's fuel tanks, though since there was no electricity it had to be siphoned directly from the tanks below ground. That was fun, let me tell you! Afterwards, however, Apocalypse Girl and I rested in the rear of The Nightmare, while The Colonel drove us towards the coast, Sister yammering in her ear the whole way about nothing much in particular. Redbeard and Firecracker took the middle position, the former often jumping topside to 'catch the wind in his beard' he said, but I think he was sitting up in the turret, playing games, pretending to shoot down imaginary enemy fighter planes. Of course, it is entirely possible that I only think that because I was doing much the same thing with the rear-mounted gun.

  On an impulse I called out “Got him, I got him!” only to hear, from Redbeard, “Great, kid, don't get cocky!” followed by all six of us pissing ourselves laughing. We spent the next couple of hours entertaining one another with memorable quotes from a whole bunch of movies that we weren't likely to ever see again.

  evening

  We stood atop a cliff, overlooking the ocean. It had turned from a blue-green colour to a dark grey sludge. As we watched something lifted out from below the waves, slime-covered and massive, with a larger than normal mass of tentacle like appendages that flailed about wildly. Even up here, a couple of hundred metres above the thing the stench hit us. Whatever the fuck that is, it's very existence is wrong. Apocalypse Girl leaned over the cliff edge to take a photo of the abomination with her phone and duly sent it to The Smart Couple with a note attached asking WTF is this thing?

  They replied after a few minutes that it was clearly some kind of mutated cephalopod, and they would look into it further. As we turned away from the abhorrent vision of disgustingness that lay below us, Apocalypse Girl asked me quietly, “Things are only goin
g to get worse, aren't they?” I told her that no matter how bad things get, we will always face them together.

  late night

  None of us had slept well, or easily in the hours since seeing whatever it was at the bottom of the cliff. Apocalypse Girl was the only one still asleep now, and she whimpered quietly. I could see tears streaming from her eyes in the glow from her phone. The Colonel had been using it to check in with The Smart Couple to see if they had seen or heard of any other mutations of this scale. So far they hadn't, but then none of us had seen many animals at all since just after all this began. It could be far more widespread than we thought. In any case, none of us were going to be eating fish fresh-caught from the sea ever again.

  When Apocalypse Girl finally awoke, she asked me why I had let her sleep through her nightmares. I replied that one of us, at the very least, should be well-rested. She thanked me, but a haunted look came across her face when I asked her about her dream.

  All she would say about it was “You weren't there.”

  March 23 Year 1 A.Z.

  morning

  On the road once more, silence reigned. We were all too fucked up by the sight of that bloody mutant kraken or whatever the fuck it was to even think about speaking. Apocalypse Girl's phone jangled, but she ignored it and focused on the road. Nobody wanted to know what The Smart Couple might have learned overnight.