by J. Thorn
“What’s the problem?” I asked; my eyes were slowly adjusting to the darkness.
“Just come with us,” Curtis urged.
I slipped into my boots and did as he asked. We left the house and I shivered. The night air was cold, a reminder of the changing seasons on the horizon. I stuffed my hands in my pockets and walked in the still strange silence of this newly dead world. The sliver of moon cast just enough light to see by as we made our way down the hill to the entrance road.
Walking in the alley-like trench between the two earthen berms cast us in darkness again. I could barely make out the person in front of me—Melissa—as we moved. Fortunately, Curtis had a Maglite flashlight with a red filter over the lens that he used as we continued on to some new and fresh nightmare—and I was certain that this was going to be bad—that fate had in store for us.
Then we stopped. Melissa and Curtis swapped places and he directed his beam of light to the right of the entry road, into the woods. It took me a moment to realize what I was seeing. There was a four legged wooden tower that stood about ten-feet high. A platform was in place at about the eight-foot mark. I could see a couple of handles or rungs that would make it easy for a living person to climb, but no way for a zombie to manage. A safety rail topped the structure and a seat had been bolted into place. That wasn’t what they brought me out to see.
What looked like a clothesline was tied to the top railing. Jillian dangled from that line. Her feet brushed the tops of the ferns beneath the tower.
“What the…” my voice trailed off.
“I came out to relieve her,” Melissa’s voice trembled. “When I flashed her the signal and she didn’t return it, I thought she’d fallen asleep. But then—” her voice broke at that point.
“I was on watch in the tower,” Curtis explained. I’d just relieved Sanchez. When I didn’t see the double flash indicating that the watch had been changed at the tower, I sent Sanchez to see what was up—”
“He never got here,” Melissa cut in.
“And he’s not in the house?” I asked. I knew Sanchez wasn’t the killer; he wasn’t here when Randi was murdered. But still…if he wasn’t here, where was he?
“Nope,” Curtis answered.
“Did you guys do a head count to see if anyone else is missing? Perhaps Sanchez saw or heard something. If so…he might be chasing down the killer. Knowing who isn’t accounted for—”
“Damn!” Curtis swore. “I was so intent on getting you that it never crossed my—”
A loud crash in the woods cut him off. Each of us had weapons in our hands in an instant. I didn’t relish the idea of shooting in the dark. Besides the fact that it would draw every zombie for miles, we had one of ours out there and I didn’t want to hit him. Curtis swept the area with his torch, but whoever or whatever it was remained hidden.
“Sanchez?” I risked calling out. That beat firing a gun. Al-though I did have to admit my voice sure seemed loud. No reply. I tried again. There was another crash and then I heard a voice.
“Coming out,” it wasn’t really a whisper, but it was damn quiet. That’s probably why all three of us screamed when a dark figure popped up out of the brush less than fifteen feet away.
“Jesus Christ, Sanchez!” I barked.
“It’s Hay-Soos.” The man slid a wicked looking knife into a sheath at his side. “And my middle name is Philipé.”
“You scared the hell out of us!” Melissa snapped.
“Yeah, well, sorry about that,” Sanchez said. “But I was chasing somebody.”
“Any idea who?” I asked.
“Nope,” he replied sounding angry. “But whoever it is, they’re good. Put me off their trail quick.”
“Is it one of our own?” I didn’t really want the answer.
“No idea,” Sanchez said with a shrug. “Never got an actual look.”
“Are they still out there?”
“Like I said,” the anger and annoyance boiled over in his voice, “I never got a clean look, and whoever it was ditched me like I was a boot camp nub.”
“Nub?” Curtis asked continuing to sweep the area with his light.
“Non-Useful Body,” Sanchez said with a scowl.
“Then we better get back to the house and do a head count,” I offered.
“No need,” a voice hissed. I felt only marginally better that Sanchez yelped like the three of us regular people. “I did a check before I left.” Ian stepped out of the shadows. “Everybody is snug in their beds.”
“What the hell are you doing out here?” Sanchez asked. It wasn’t the tone I would have used, but it was the question in my head.
“I heard Curtis and Melissa wake up Steve,” he explained. “Considering recent events, I made an educated guess as to why. I checked to see who might be missing and came up with Jillian, Curtis, Melissa, Steve…and you.”
“Recent events?” Sanchez asked. Obviously confusing their recent arrival with Randi’s murder which he knew nothing about. His tone was instantly defensive, and I heard something very deadly underneath waiting to spring.
“We recently had somebody here murdered.” I blurted. “It happened a few days ago and we just started looking into it.”
“And you didn’t think to let anybody know?” Sanchez barked. “What the fuck is wrong with you?”
“It was made to look like a suicide,” I said, and quickly explained everything; making it a point to defend our choice not to let anybody in on it in the hopes that we could sniff out the killer without letting him or her know that we were on to them.
“Well, it looks like you’ve got no choice now,” Sanchez pointed out. “Nobody is going to buy two apparent suicides that close together. You’ve got to tell everybody what is going on.”
“The killer is going to know were on to them,” Melissa said.
“I don’t think he’s trying to hide it.” Sanchez pointed to Jillian’s body.
“He?” I asked, catching the emphasis.
“Whoever did this physically overpowered his victim and strangled her,” he explained. “I bet your doctor would find the same cause of death. Then, whoever it was had to hoist and tie off the body. There ain’t nothing easy about hoisting dead weight.”
“You saying a woman is too weak?” Melissa bristled.
“I’m saying, that of the women here, I don’t think any of you sport the arm and upper body strength to hoist a dead body,” Sanchez said flatly, unmoved by Melissa’s confrontation.
“Pig,” Melissa scoffed and stomped away.
“I’ll go.” I help up my hands. “Sanchez, can you and Ian take care of Jillian?”
“Where should we bring her?” Ian asked.
“That first camp site off the main trail where that big picnic table is,” I decided. Then I took off after Melissa.
***
Getting back to sleep wasn’t an option; it took me almost two hours to get Melissa calm enough so that I wouldn’t have to worry about a third murder. Since there wasn’t really anything that I imagined could be done, I let Dr. Zahn sleep. She’d be busy soon enough.
I watched the sun rise with Melissa next to me on the porch. She actually drifted off under my arm. I heard movement in the house, but waited. This was going to ruin everybody’s day. Including the killer who obviously thought that we were gullible and stupid.
“Morning, Steve.” Jonathan Saunders stepped out onto the porch and stretched.
“Morning…err…Sarge? Or should I call you Jonathan? Saunders? What the hell do I call you?”
“Jon is fine,” the man said with a bemused laugh.
“All right. Good morning, Jon.”
“See my man Sanchez any place?” he asked.
“Yeah…” I hesitated. “He’s helping Ian with something.”
“Good.” Jon nodded and moved down the stairs and continued stretching. “I want my men pulling their weight around here.”
“I’m sure that they will be fine.”
Doctor Zahn wal
ked out with a cup of something that had steam rolling off of it. She sipped and went over to the porch swing and had a seat. More pleasant greetings were batted about, waking Melissa who joined in. I considered putting the announcement off until after breakfast and quickly decided against it. After all, there was a murderer walking amongst us. Walking around Thalia and Emily. Walking around Melissa.
“Get everybody up and tell them to come down to the picnic grounds,” I announced, climbing to my feet and trying to smooth out the wrinkles that were chiseled into my clothing. I extended a hand to Melissa just as Ian and Sanchez came around the corner and stopped at the foot of the steps looking grim. My hand was slapped away, which shocked me a bit. However, when I turned to Melissa, her glare was fixed on Sanchez as she stood without my assistance. Great, I thought, this is exactly what we don’t need right now. I made a mental note to talk with both of them later.
“What’s up?” Jon asked, catching not only my tone, but everything happening around him.
“Once we’re all together,” I said. I glanced at Dr. Zahn who was also taking everything in with her usual observant eye. She looked from Ian and Sanchez, then back to me. I nodded slightly.
I headed for the picnic grounds. I’d let Melissa follow if she wanted. One thing I didn’t have time for now was a bunch of petty crap. I didn’t slow down until I reached the picnic grounds. I wasn’t surprised that the only person to follow me was Dr. Zahn; and she was several paces behind.
I smelled it before I saw it.
Stepping out of the shadows cast by all the trees and headed straight for me was a zombie. A fresh one.
“Oh, Chloe,” I gasped. The woman had been bitten…torn apart by who knows how many of those cursed things. Her throat was a mangled mess and one leg had been gnawed extensively from knee to hip. She was stark naked, her already pale skin taking an obscene blue-gray hue. She was slumped over where most of her midsection had been ripped open and scooped out. This was definitely the work of more than one of the cursed creatures. But if that were the case—
“Steve!” Dr. Zahn’s voice was sharp. I turned to find three more coming out of the brush to my left and six more from the right.
My hand went to my holster. “Shit!” I swore. I’d taken my pistol out of my holster when Melissa snuggled in and set it on the mounted bird feeder attached to one of the pillars on the front porch. Gads, I must be more tired than I realized. Rule one in the new world: never go anyplace without your weapon.
“Hey, Francis?” I called. “You wanna go ask the others to hurry. Oh…and could you grab my pistol from the porch? It’s on top of the bird feeder.”
“But—”
“Just go!” I barked. “These things are still slow and clumsy. It looks worse than it is.”
With that, I darted towards a cluster of three picnic tables. Lying on the ground was a nice-sized branch about as big around as my wrist and twice as long as my arm. I couldn’t bring myself to beat Chloe down. She deserved better…something much quicker and cleaner than having her skull crushed with a tree branch. Instead, I set out for the one with the fresh blood smears on its face. That would be one of Chloe’s killers.
It came at me in typical fashion: arms out in that stereotypical zombie-imitating-Frankenstein’s monster pose; mouth open wide, exhaling that putrid, rotten meat and fecal slurry stench. This one was a crier. That eerie sound never failed to make the hairs on my arms and back of my neck stand up.
“A little closer, you bitch,” I snarled through clenched teeth. I’d made the transition into being totally pissed off. I was sad and still mourning the loss of Randi Jenkins, but if I was totally honest with myself, there was a small part of me thankful that I wouldn’t have to see the incrimination in her eyes everyday over the loss of her husband.
It was my mission that resulted in his death. I’d sent him out with two people who had no business being in close proximity to one another. If anybody was supposed to go out on that mission with those two, it should’ve been me. I put her husband in a dangerous situation. Well, to be fair, there is no such thing as a safe situation these days; but this situation was worse than normal. Also, my conscience—that same conscience that convinced me I did the right thing when I killed Dave Ellis that night—was telling me that she was better off now that she was reunited with her daughter and husband in Heaven. Problem was, I didn’t totally believe in Heaven…or God. I let all that flash through my mind in a matter of a few seconds. I wasn’t going to get into the inner debate on the existence of Heaven, Hell, God, or Satan. Not right this moment any way.
I knew in some dormant and probably dying portion of my brain that this creature wasn’t really at fault for Chloe’s death. No more so than a shark is at fault for biting a swimmer splashing around in its territory. Still, I swung my branch with all the fury of a steroid-infused ball player. The limb shattered, my hands went numb, and the length of my arms felt as if they were being dipped in a pool of hot electricity. The zombie spun and hit the ground.
Then, it got back up.
Dammit!
I jumped off the table I’d chosen to make my stand on and drove the jagged end into one of the creature’s milky-white eyeballs. There was the slightest resistance…then…schlock! The sound and feeling of plunging through the orbital socket and into the brain was sweet. Putting one booted foot on its face, I pulled the half a branch that remained, free from the downed corpse.
A cold, dead hand pawed at my arm. I spun away, bringing my lame excuse for a weapon up to bat the hand away. On the follow-through, I came up under the chin. That was a mistake. The branch became lodged in place.
I had nothing to fight the zombies off with now as the creature toppled to the ground, snatching my weapon from my still slightly numb hands. The branch was actually flush against the body from where it stuck out below the chin. I could see wood filling its mouth behind partially barred teeth. It is weird, the things you fixate on in a crisis.
“Hey!” a voice yelled. Several of the zombies turned on Jon, Billy, and Aaron; my rescuers.
Chloe still had a lingering crush. At least that was what my mind told me as she continued towards me, oblivious of the new arrivals. My plan was to jump up on to the picnic table and off to the other side. From there, avoiding her outstretched hands would be a breeze. Had my left foot landed on the bench-seat, it would have gone flawlessly. Instead, it slid awkwardly between the bench-seat and the table. My body turned and fell the wrong way. That’s when I heard that awful snap.
I screamed. Then…nothing.
***
“Hey there, graceful,” an angelic voice whispered in my ear.
My head felt like it was stuffed with cotton and my mouth felt like sandpaper was wrapped around my tongue. Great, I’m—
“…a zombie?” I rasped.
“What?” a strangely familiar voice asked.
“Am I a zombie?
“No, Steve,” the familiar-but-stern voice scoffed, “zombies don’t talk.”
“Although they do moan and cry a lot,” a male voice I know that I should remember chuckled.
I opened my eyes to the bright glare from the sun that poured through a nearby open window. Melissa was sitting beside me holding my hand. Dr. Zahn was in a rocking chair jotting things in a notebook. She looked tired. Sergeant Saunders…Jon…was in the doorway wearing a freaking arsenal.
“What in the hell happened?” I said, wondering who had used my mouth for a toilet then filled it with the kitty litter that, according to how my throat felt, I had obviously swallowed.
“Lots.” Melissa’s eyes brimmed over with tears.
Crap, I thought, I’ve been bitten and they are waiting for me to turn. The last thing that I remembered was—
“Chloe!”
“She’s dead…for good,” Dr. Zahn said with more than a hint of sadness in her voice.
“Did she…?” I couldn’t bring myself to actually ask.
“No,” Melissa answered with a laugh that
was also partially a sob.
“Billy put her down quick,” Jon offered.
“Okay, you guys all have the same expression.” I looked around the room. Each time my eyes met somebody’s, they turned away. “Thalia!” I tried to sit up and felt dual sledgehammers pound their way out of my skull through my temples.
“She’s fine, Emily’s fine.” Melissa placed her hands firmly on my chest and pushed me flat, not that it took much effort. “Teresa is fine.”
“Then what the hell?” I really wanted to raise my voice, but it felt like talking was only a shade less painful than letting somebody take a Garden Weasel to my throat.
“Not right this moment,” Dr. Zahn got up and walked over to the bed. And since when did I have a bed in the middle of the Visitor’s Center main foyer? I mean, why not just put me on the front porch.
“Doc…” I shook my head and tried to swallow.
“Give him some water, Melissa,” Dr. Zahn said.
“No, dammit!” I made a feeble attempt at shoving the water glass away. “What happened?”
“Somebody led a fairly large herd here,” Melissa said, glancing back at Dr. Zahn who already had her lips pressed so tightly together that they were nothing more than a pencil line across her face.
“What?” I was stunned at this possible turn of events. “How do we know that? How can we be certain somebody did such a thing intentionally?”
“We’re pretty sure,” Jon said, his expression grim.
“What else?” I demanded, accepting the glass of water Melissa still held out for me.
“We lost a few people.” Jon glanced at Dr. Zahn who finally nodded, albeit reluctantly. “First…you owe your life to Jamie. He’s the one who tackled that girl Chloe as she was about to take a bite out of your face. He saved your ass, Steve. It was him and that boy Billy that carried you out of danger. Aaron…well…he went down covering your rescue.”
I felt a coldness fill me from head to toe. That was one of the last things that I expected. It didn’t seem possible. I’d watched that young man go from frightened boy to fierce fighter in the past several weeks.
