Zed Days (Book 1)

by Harland, Nick

  Blocking the door was actually quite tricky and like I said, I didn’t want to use the hammer and nails. I ended up filling a load of big stackable food container tubs with clip on lids with water and stacking them in front of the door, two birds with one stone. I managed to make two piles of seven containers on top of each other and together they weighed a ton. I got a bit wet doing it which really pissed me off. It was emergency water and if the door did give way, it would take a while before they could break through them. If they did break through they would have to climb over them and from the brief peek I’d had of them walking, I wasn’t sure balance or climbing was their thing.

  By the time I’d blocked the door I was hot and sweaty, my headache had come back, and I was starting to get hungry. It was time to investigate the full extent of the food in the Pizza shop. It had a small walk in fridge that was stacked with tubs of everything you put on a pizza. Outside the fridge there were small barrels of cooking oil and sacks of flour and salt. If it had been a giant slug apocalypse I would have been set.

  Although I hadn’t ever done any cooking when I had worked for them, I had seen them do it a lot and it was time to try. I managed to fire up the main oven and while I waited for it to heat up I considered the potential positives of being a lone survivor. Obviously there was as much pizza as I could eat, until the electricity went off at least. It wouldn’t take long to run out of the chilled pre-prepared pizza bases but with sod all else to do I figured it wouldn’t take long to learn how to make a decent one.

  Everything else depended on being able to leave the building and survive outside. I had killed one of them so obviously I could kill others, but I would have to avoid groups or be very fucking careful about how I managed them. I would also need a better weapon. One advantage I have is fitness. Yes I’m a 22 year old occasionally employed gamer who loves to eat pizza, but I like my body and for girls to like my body, so I’m also a runner. I’m not that fast, I think marathons are just a socially acceptable form of self-flagellation, but I run 3-5 miles 3-4 times a week and my pace isn’t bad. Both on Project Zomboid and that movie, Zombie Land, fitness is useful if not essential, and I have it. The question was, where to get a decent weapon and which one to choose.

  Weapon choice for an actual Zed apocalypse is important, your life literally depends on it. Tradition would say baseball bat or axe, though Walking Dead has certainly extoled the virtues of the sword. Guns are also an obvious choice but as any Zed aficionado knows, kill one or two with a gun and at least ten or twenty more will come running. Also, this is England not America so a gun could be a hard find. It was North Yorkshire however, so perhaps a farmer’s shotgun or rifle wouldn’t be out of the question. But that was for later, the oven looked hot enough.

  I grabbed a pizza base from the fridge, filled the small tubs in the shop they used to top pizzas from and made my favourite, the explosive; chilli, spicy sausage, peppers, onion and garlic. I was tempted to go wild but I knew I would only spoil it, so apart from making sure there was a decent amount of sausage I went with what I knew. I grabbed a coke from the small counter top fridge and waited for the magic to happen. The banging was still going on which was annoying but I couldn’t change that. It was like they endlessly did whatever they were last doing until something made them do otherwise. I tried really hard not to look at Lucy’s body shoved in the corner. After eating I knew I would have to think of a way of redirecting the ones at the door.

  The pizza was good and I sat cross-legged on the counter top and ate it. I went back to trying to think of the positives. If I could survive for a while at least I could take anything from any shop and, provided I could find keys, drive any car. Images of me cruising in some massive SUV or pickup, knocking Zeds flying at will, flooded my mind. There was a huge Ford F150 pick-up in bright orange I regularly saw drive pass the flat, that would be sweeeet. Then I remembered the scene outside the shop. The road had several stationary and a couple of crashed cars you could drive around or push out of the way, but cruising at speed was out of the question.

  I guessed some of it must have happened quickly, people turning while they were driving, or driving into Zeds wandering onto the road and getting eaten if they stopped and got out. I guessed there must be some places where cruising was viable, but I didn’t have a clue where they might be. I had a car parked outside, it was small and slow and generally shit, but I had one; a 1998 Corsa if you really must know. I was pretty sure one hit from a Zed and that would be it so I didn’t even think about it. One of the stationary cars outside was a nice looking Range Rover but if it had been abandoned and left running it might be out of gas, and with all the really annoying daytime running lights cars had the battery could be flat. There were so many things to think about. If the electricity went out soon then gas station pumps wouldn’t work and if I did end up wanting to use a vehicle I would need fuel. The nearest gas station was nine miles away and that suddenly seemed a very long way indeed.

  I needed to prioritise my survival plan. First issue, Zeds at my front door, really not good and could attract others if they wandered by. I didn’t want to end up surrounded. I remembered the small loft hatch at the top of the stairs just in front of my door. I had never investigated it but a decent lookout point where I wouldn’t get noticed would be good. The pizza shop was part of a small strip of shops with a cut in the middle leading to houses behind. The pizza shop was between a doctors surgery and a very fancy bike shop that had always pissed me off, or at least its clientele did. I mean for fucks sake, who spends seven grand on a bike with wheels that couldn’t even go up a curb without buckling. You could buy a decent 10 year old BMW for that.

  After the cut was an estate agent, a small chemist, an Indian takeout place, and a small overpriced local supermarket. The area was an affluent suburb with lots of 2.4 kid families with decent cars, jobs, and a good school just down the road. There weren’t any other shops for a few miles so the strip was basically it. I figured if I could get into the loft I could probably break through the walls between the loft spaces and get access to the bike shop. If I needed to, I could probably get onto the rooves this side of the cut. I thought I could jump the gap where the cut was but I really didn’t fancy a broken leg and having my face eaten. I thought I could try and make some sort of bridge across though.

  It was kind of fun thinking of out of the box about survival. I thought about using furniture to build a bridge over the cut but then I thought fuck it, pull up some floor boards and do it properly, who was going care. I will admit, I was pretty naïve that first day, but that changed quickly.

  But that was all in the future, right then I needed a distraction to get the Zeds from my front door. I thought of some kind of fire-bomb but I didn’t want to attract more or risk the fire spreading. I guessed I could cause a bit of noise by throwing something to hit a car in the road. I hoped it would be enough to attract the locals but wouldn’t be loud enough to draw in too many more. I grabbed a chair, slipped the hammer through my belt, and pushed the loft hatch open. It was pretty small and not easy to lift myself through but with some grunting and groaning, one bang on the head, and some scrapped arms, I manged it. Again, strength and fitness…essential.

  There was no skylight so it was dark in the loft but there was some light from the open hatch. My universal fixing tool, that’s a hammer if you don’t know, soon made a small hole through the wall between the loft spaces above my flat and the bike shop. Once one brick was loose it wasn’t too difficult to make a hole big enough to squeeze through. I assumed weakening the wall wouldn’t make the roof collapse straight away. Then I made a hole in the roof above the bike shop. A couple of tiles did fall into the yard behind the bike shop but I manged to get the others through the hole I’d made until I had enough space to get through myself.

  I grabbed a half brick and climbed onto the roof. It was sturdy with thick tiles so I assumed it would be safe. I knew I was making a lot of assumptions my life was depending on but you don’t have
much choice in an apocalypse. The roof gave me my first look behind the shop into its backyard and the other yards close by. The back of the pizza shop was clear, but there were two in the yard behind the bike shop. They started to bang against the back door because they had heard the tiles fall. I recognised the two guys who ran the bike shop. They had always been friendly when I’d seen them and if people wanted to spend bloody thousands on a bike then I suppose someone had to serve them; but really, seven grand for a fucking bike, a bike!.

  I crept to the crest of the roof with the half brick in hand and got a look around. I could see up and down the road and up the road opposite. It was the same story with abandoned cars here and there, the odd body, and the odd Zed, some just stood there, some banging against doors, some shambling slowly along. I tried to ignore the half eaten bodies, it was grim.

  I threw the brick at one of the crashed cars and didn’t hit the screen as I had hoped. I hit the roof which was loud but did the trick. Sure enough my uninvited guests all walked over to the car; job done. Within a few minutes about ten other Zeds arrived, but at least my front door was no longer under duress.

  Chapter Two – Seven

  After getting the Zeds away from my front door life was easy for a few days; eat, drink, sleep etc. Of course, I knew I was only delaying the inevitable, that at some point I would have to venture out. I did look at the bridge between the rooves idea but the gap was wider than any floorboard I could get a hold of and way too wide to jump. I used its loft hatch to get into the flat above the bike shop. The bike shop owners were too fancy to have someone live above them and used the flat as extra storage and space to fix bikes. There were a load of tools which was what I had hoped, including a couple of decent hacksaws.

  With time on my hands, some tools, and a shop with really expensive bikes downstairs, I screwed around with crafting a decent weapon. I had to be quiet and wait until dusk to search the bike shop itself, as it was open at the time it all happened. I locked the door with a latch on the inside and carefully moved a couple of bikes up against it without getting seen. Some Zombie lore says Zeds might be more active at night and have good night vision, but that didn’t seem to be the case. It was still nerve racking sneaking around the bike shop with a big window looking out onto the street.

  The trick with a Zed killing weapon is to have something not too heavy that can cause enough brain injury to kill without getting stuck in the skull. With more than one Zed around, having your weapon stuck in the head of the one you just killed isn’t great when his mate comes at you. I cut the crossbar off a titanium bike at the front bit, then cut just below the upright that attached to the back of the crossbar below the saddle, leaving the little bit the saddle stem slotted into intact. I was left with a really sturdy, light metal tube that had a couple of nasty circular cross sections sticking out of one end, enough to crack a skull without getting stuck. It was a good length and with the fancy logo on the side it even looked good! I figured carbon fibre would shatter and who needs aluminium when price is no object. I made sure I chose a really expensive bike to ruin, not that any titanium bike is cheap, and I was quite proud of the end result.

  I decided to name the weapon ‘Seven’ because it came off a seven grand bike, because I always liked the film, and because now all I had were my thoughts, it would make me think of the Star Trek character I always fancied. I found some decent tape to wrap around the end so my hands wouldn’t slip and used a file to sharpen the cut ends for maximum skull cutting ability. Fuck baseball bats and axes, if you want an awesome weapon for an apocalypse, hit your local bike shop.

  The bike shop also had some expensive clothing including gloves, shoes, and helmets. I figured some light breathable clothing would be good for the inevitable running I would end up doing. I also figured having some under layers that went right up to my neck and down to my wrists and ankles was probably sensible. I still had no idea if the Zeds could pass on the infection by biting or scratching, but I had to assume they could. I didn’t even know if they could pass on the infection at all, or if the danger was just from being eaten. I didn’t even know if it was an infection. Either way I figured the less skin showing the better.

  It was time to test the weapon in a controlled situation. If I couldn’t take out the two Zeds in the back yard of the bike shop I wouldn’t survive long outside, so all the dicking around in the meantime was pointless. I was also getting rapidly bored with the pizza shop diet, even if it had quite a lot of salad in it that I liked. I found the keys to the bike shop’s back door in a draw, put some fingerless gloves on for extra grip, and tried to control my breathing before I opened it. It didn’t exactly go to plan.

  I opened the door and figured I had a second or two while they came towards me, I couldn’t have been more wrong. The fucking bastards sprinted at me, they didn’t run, they sprinted. Luckily the doorway wasn’t very big and they collided trying get through it. I managed to hit the front one and Seven worked well. With the other one pushing forwards I fell backwards with both of them on top of me. If the dead one hadn’t landed on top of me I would probably have been dead. The remaining one couldn’t get to bite me in the close quarters and flailed around with its hands and mouth. I had fallen with my right above my head and I had managed to keep hold of Seven, so I had a little swinging room. It scratched at my arm but the layers I had on worked well so it didn’t break the skin. The helmet had stopped me banging my head on the way down and protected me from it scratching at my head. Although it randomly blocked a few attempts to hit it, eventually I got a couple of decent hits in and silenced the bastard.

  Stuck half way through a doorway on your back with two dead Zed’s on top of you isn’t actually the easiest situation to get out of. I was sweaty and covered in what I can only describe as goo before I wriggled free. It hadn’t gone to plan but I had learnt an invaluable lesson without dying, some Zeds can bastard sprint. I knew the guys’ from the shop were super fit and I figured it must be related to that rather than being random luck. None of the ones outside had sprinted even though they weren’t all fat bastards, so I hoped Sprinters, as I’m going to call them, were uncommon. I made a mental note to watch out for Zeds wearing fitness gear.

  It had become increasingly clear that staying where I was wasn’t a long term option. There was a big housing estate behind me and over the few days since it had happened there had been a couple of larger groups of Zeds that had wandered through. These hordes or herds as Zombie lore has come to name them were a bit random. Individual Zeds would occasionally either stop and break off from the horde and not every Zed they passed would necessarily join it. One of the hordes of about thirty stopped on the road outside for a while before moving off again, and that worried me. Then the electricity went off and I suddenly realised there was one more thing I hadn’t thought of, not that I could have done anything about it, but it would have been nice not to have jumped out of my skin when it happened.

  When most alarm systems suddenly find themselves without a power supply it triggers an inbuilt battery. If the battery is flat the alarm can go off, even if it isn’t supposed to. I can see the need for this with an art gallery but honestly, do burglars really take the time to cut the electric supply or raid houses during a blackout when there are perfectly good shops to hit, I don’t fucking think so. Where I come from they kick down the back door when you’re out, ignore the alarm like everyone else on the street, take what they want, and walk out again waving to the bloke they know from down the street.

  I suppose it was lucky several different alarms went off, and that they all went off together. It was also lucky that the pizza shop’s alarm sounded elderly and lame-ass compared to some others. If it had just been the pizza shop I would have had a swarm of Zeds surrounding me in minutes. As it was, the road cleared as they shambled towards the nearest one and started banging against whatever they came across first. By the time all the alarms stopped I had a headache from hell, but I digress.

  For long ter
m Zed survival you want a base which is out of the way but close enough to houses and shops for decent scavenging. I couldn’t risk staying so close to a densely populated area. If a horde came by whilst I was scavenging and saw me, my flat could get surrounded and I would be fucked. I had the perfect place in mind. Every time I passed it running I always thought it would make great base in an apocalypse. As things were turning out, I had no reason to change my mind.

  Just half a mile down the road there was the arse end of a big country park. It was hilly with big wooded areas and paths for joggers and mountain bikers. It had some open areas, playgrounds, and a visitors centre, but all that stuff was at the other end of the park where the proper entrance was. There was a dirt road up a hill into the back of the park that was on my regular jogging route. About two minutes up the road on the left, just before the road narrowed to a footpath, there was a Blue Diamond water treatment building. It was perfect in every way. I know better now, as you will see, but I would stand by my decision at the time.

  The building itself was like a one story house without windows. It had two strong metal double doors on opposite walls. Most perfect of all was that it stood on a big plot of land surrounded by an eight foot metal fence made out of really sturdy upright metal cross sections cut to a point at the top. They were really serious about keeping people out. There was also a radio mast or something further up the hill behind the building that was also within the perimeter fence. It had a ladder and must have been about 60 or 70 feet tall at least. Even without the radio tower the base was on a hill which was one of the highest points around. I didn’t really fancy climbing it but I figured the view over the surrounding area would be awesome.

  So yes, perfect base close by… check. At the bottom of the path into the park, on the opposite side of the road, there was a dirty great big building site at the foundation digging stage. There were two JCB’s, a couple of porta-cabins, some huge metal storage containers, piles of breeze bocks, metal fencing etc etc. I figured some of it could come in handy and Zed survival rule two after you set up a base is to have an emergency base or at least a separate food and equipment store. I figured one of the metal containers might be useful for that, even if it was a bit close to the base itself. I also wondered if I could find the keys to one of the JCB’s but wasn’t so much of an idiot not to know that the, ‘Yo dude, how fucking fun is this’ factor would probably be outweighed by the, ‘You fucking idiot your making loads of noise and will never get out alive’ factor.