Zombies! (Book 3): Violence Solves Everything

by Merritt, R. S.

They ran to the sliding glass doors leading out to the backyard patio. There were still Zombies standing around, but it wasn’t the massively packed group it’d been before the grenades. They paused as each of them took out weapons and made sure they were good to go. There were too many Zombies out there for them to have a hope of doing this quietly.

  “Loud, brutal and fast. Let’s get to that fence and get the hell out of here.” Tony said before sliding open the glass door and stepping out on the patio with his M-16 pointed at the back of a Zombies head. The Zombie began to turn around as Kelly and Randy joined Tony on the patio. Tony pulled the trigger.

  The bullet ripped a hole through the Zombie’s cheek and went out the other cheek in a splatter of blood, gums and teeth. Tony had to fire again straight into its forehead to put the Zombie down. The screeching picked up in tempo at the sound of gunfire. The opening in the fence of the little patio they were in was immediately clogged up with Zombies trying to get at them. They blew away that wall of flesh with automatic fire. Watching bits and pieces of humanity get flung all over the place as the bullets cut flesh and bone to clear their way.

  Charging forward Tony went through the gap in the fence. He had to jump to get over the pile of dead bodies. Kelly was right behind him with Randy pulling rear guard. He looked down before jumping when he felt splashing beneath his boots and saw that the pile of bodies had created a deep puddle of blood that was spreading across the patio. Shaking off the cold tingling shiver that puddle sent up his spine he jumped over the bodies and joined Kelly. She was standing still sending shots downrange into the Zombies coming for them. Tony had taken off for the fence to clear a path. As soon as Randy got to where Kelly was, she turned and sprinted after Tony.

  Randy posted up on the spot Kelly had just vacated and shot Zombies as fast as he could pull the trigger. They were coming at them like a wave now. There’d be no way to survive if that wave crashed over him. Not bothering to look where he was aiming, he just kept pulling the trigger as he carefully walked backwards. When the firing pin clicked on an empty chamber, he dropped the rifle to hang off its bandolier and reached in his pocket for a grenade. They still had a few left and it’d been decided for Randy to throw this one into the oncoming Zombies before he turned and ran after Tony and Kelly. They’d be doing their best to clear a path to the fence. From the sound of the steady stream of shots being fired behind him they were holding up their side of the bargain.

  Randy pulled the pin and tossed the grenade at the screaming wave of gnashing teeth and claw shaped hands bearing down on him. Not bothering to see where the grenade landed, he turned and ran. Tony and Kelly were all the way up by the road. Tony was blasting away in full auto while Kelly had her rifle in semi mode and was picking off the Zombies who kept heading for Randy. Tony slapped in another magazine as Randy got close to them screaming for them to run.

  Kelly was already running for the fence. Tony took one look at the mass of Zombies behind Randy and he was running also. A very muffled thump behind them indicated the grenade Randy had thrown had gone off. None of them expected it to actually do much damage to the mob bearing down on them. They were running full speed now. Each of them expecting to feel a Zombie slam into them from behind at any second.

  The metal fence in front of them looked to be about six feet tall. It was coming up fast and none of them had a great idea on how to get over it. Tony was the tallest of the three of them. He poured on some extra speed and slid on his knees to the fence. He put both hands on the ground and let Kelly use him like a springboard to scramble over the fence. Without missing a step Randy put one foot on top of Tony’s back to help himself spring over the fence behind Kelly.

  Kelly bounced to her feet instantly once she landed on the other side of the fence. She had her rifle barrel shoved through the gaps in the fence firing as fast as she could into the oncoming Zombies. Randy joined her a moment later trying to slow the Zombies as much as possible to give Tony time to get over the fence. Tony put both hands on the top of the fence and jumped like an Olympian. He cleared the fence by a good foot with his whole body before crashing down on the other side. It was a nice jump, but he lost a ton of style points on the landing.

  The Zombie wave crashed into the metal fence. Directly in front of them the Zombies had lost some momentum due to being shot in the face a lot. They’d also had to hop, skip and jump over the dead bodies of their comrades to get to the fence. That didn’t hold true for the Zombie wave crashing on either side of them into the fence. With loud snapping and grinding noises that temporarily cut through the screeching of the Zombies the fence began to give in.

  Not wanting to be there when the fence completely collapsed Randy and Kelly helped Tony to his feet. They quickly continued sprinting through the weeds and the bushes and briars towards the subdivision adjacent to this one. In less than a minute they were running down a sidewalk with a pack of the faster Zombies trailing them by about fifty feet. They needed to get back into stealth mode and lose these pursuers as quickly as possible. Instead of turning and shooting them they began weaving in and out of yards. They’d run into a gated backyard and jump the fence to get to the next yard then run through a house.

  The ones that caught up to them they killed. They used knives and hatchets and attacked any Zombies that got too close. All of them would pounce on the pursuer and drag it to the ground to stab to death. They repeated that gruesome task ten times until they finally were clear of their pursuers. They could hear screeching all around and knew the subdivision would be filling up soon, so they kept moving rather than risk getting stuck again. They jogged across another parking lot to the main road. They jogged up the road past a Publix and across the street to the pharmacy on the corner.

  There was a DVD vending machine blocking the front door, so Tony and Randy pulled that out. Kelly slipped through the gap they’d made and with her pushing and them pulling they got it open enough for the two men to slide in beside her. They pushed their way through the store grabbing snacks and water. Kelly was hoping the pharmacy would be open and not looted yet. She’d love to get them all some antibiotics and pain killers and settle in for the day to heal up from that last push to escape. Her arm was totally useless to her at this point and the pain kept hitting her in waves when she wasn’t expecting it. She wanted to be healed and healthy by the time the sun went down so they could start the search for the kids.

  When they got to the back, she saw that the iron curtain had been pulled down and locked for the pharmacy. Looking to the side she saw where someone had beaten their way through the drywall to get at the drugs inside. Whoever it was they must’ve been super skinny to fit through that hole. Not wanting to make a ton of noise beating on the wall any more right now Kelly sat down with her back against the end of the aisle. Randy sat down next to her and reached over to hold her hand. Tony wandered up with a six-pack of warm Corona and sat down to drink himself to sleep. Randy glanced at Kelly’s face expecting to see a big scowl directed at Tony for deciding to get drunk again.

  “What are you smiling about?” Randy asked surprised by the look on her face. Kelly was staring across at the broken drywall with a dreamy look in her eyes and a small but goofy grin on her face.

  “The drywall just reminded me of watching HGTV with the girls. I have a feeling we’ll be seeing them again soon.”

  “Me too babe.” Randy echoed. He let go of her hand so he could wrap his arm around her and pull her in close.

  Chapter 13: Death is Harder on those Left Behind

  Myriah kept to the woods and skirted around the backs of houses until she arrived back at the lake house. She was wet and miserable. Her body hurt all over from the fall out the window and then slamming into the fence. She focused on the physical misery. It was a million times easier to endure than those moments when her mind would replay Eric charging the line of Zombies. She’d remember him playing Candyland or cards with them then she’d slip and remember the sounds from behind her when he fell. She didn�
��t remember a scream or anything. She wondered if Eric had held in the pain on purpose to keep her from stopping and looking back. One last unselfish act to protect the girls whose lives he’d been entrusted with. That seemed like him.

  She didn’t think she could cry much more. Then she’d think of something else that’d set the waterworks off again. There was no rule saying Eric had to stick with a bunch of girls and try protecting them. There was no rule saying he had to pick them up in the first place. If he’d just stuck with his original group of men, there’s a good chance he’d still be alive today. He could’ve dropped them off somewhere and just kept his niece with him. It was amazing he’d survived as long as he had considering how often he’d put himself between the girls and danger. Now he was gone. Gone because she hadn’t made him wake up. For some stupid, lazy reason she’d let him sleep. She’d slept. Eric’s death was on her.

  She found herself in the yard behind the lake house. She didn’t know how to get Cait’s attention without scaring everyone in the house. She knew she didn’t want to startle the scared teen girl with the automatic rifle. Cait was probably expecting Zombies to attack at any second. She tried the door. It was locked. That made sense considering Cait had been a bit paranoid even before the apocalypse. She’d always locked all the doors and turned on every light in the house when their parents had gone out for date night.

  Myriah took her knife out and started lightly tapping on the door. She kept it up until Cait appeared out of the depths of the house. She watched Caitlyn’s face register that it was Myriah standing out there and not a Zombie. She was enormously relieved when the barrel of the M-16 shifted away from being pointed at her. She hadn’t realized how large that barrel looked until she was staring down it. Caitlyn unlocked the door and slid it open so Myriah could come in.

  “Where’s Eric?” Cait asked. She was looking into the yard expecting Eric to show up out of the darkness at any second. It was a logical response as he’d trailed behind them plenty of times to provide a rear guard. Myriah shook her head from side to side and started bawling. Caitlyn slid the door shut and pulled Myriah into a hug. They stood like that for a long while.

  “What do we do now?” Myriah said when she was finally able to talk. She was ashamed to say how Eric had died.

  “What happened?” Cait asked.

  “We fell asleep. He wanted to rest before we came back. We got the medicine and everything he needed then he wanted to rest. Then he had to charge the Zombies to save me. He died for me.” Myriah started bawling again. Tears and snot dripping down her face. She wiped at her nose with her sleeve and avoided Cait’s eyes.

  “What do you mean you fell asleep? Why would you fall asleep?” Cait asked. She was trying to grasp what’d happened. How could they have lost their protector over something as trivial as him falling asleep. There was no chance she was getting an answer anytime soon. Her questions were sending Myriah even deeper into her depression. She was inconsolable now.

  Cait told her it was ok and that she loved her. She kept repeating those words while she took Myriah to the spare bedroom and got her tucked in. She was careful not to say anything about sleeping but hopeful Myriah would get the hint and rest. She tugged Myriah’s boots and clothes off. She wondered how come she was soaked but decided to ask about that some other time. For now, she just went with getting Myriah tucked in. Zoey and Ali came in with Doreen in the middle of them. All they seemed to grasp was that Myriah was sad. They all crawled into the bed and snuggled together around Cait and Myriah.

  Caitlyn hadn’t slept since Eric and Myriah had left the day before. Lying in the bed surrounded by all the kids and torn apart with depression she closed her eyes. Within about thirty minutes all of them were asleep on the bed except for Zoey. Zoey got up to go down to the bathroom to pee. They’d been using milk jugs filled with water to wash down the pee and flush the toilets. One of the big advantages of the lake house being that it was on a lake.

  A loud noise scared Zoey. She pulled her clothes back on quickly and decided not to waste time trying to flush her pee down the toilet. They’d been mostly trying to let the toilet fill up a little bit before flushing it since none of them were positive how long the trick with the water jug would keep working. There was the sound of glass shattering and something beating on the front door. Zoey cracked open the bathroom door and saw men in the hallway with guns. She saw one of them dragging Caitlyn out of the bedroom while Cait screamed and swore. Myriah and the other kids were marched out of the bedroom at gun point a minute later.

  Zoey did what she’d been told to do if something like that happened. She jumped in the bathtub and closed the curtain. A second after she got in the tub a man kicked open the door and stepped into the bathroom. Zoey stayed as quiet as she could. She was pressed up as close to the side of the tub by the curtain as she could get. The man stuck his gun into the shower curtain and moved it to the side. He took a quick peek but didn’t look far enough over to see Zoey. As quickly as he’d blown in to the bathroom he left. Zoey was shaking with fear. Tears were streaming down her face. She wanted to run out into the hallway and find Caitlyn.

  She stuck to what she’d been told to do. Eric had drilled into their heads to hide if bad men broke into the house. They’d even had designated hiding spots in case something like this happened. Zoey wasn’t in her spot right now, but she was in one she knew Eric would’ve approved of. Knowing it was what she supposed to do kept her pinned there almost as much as the fear in her stomach did. She’d never really thought this might happen. She didn’t know what to do now. What if the bad guys took everyone away with them and left her in the house all by herself? Who was going to take care of her?

  Caitlyn had gone for the M-16 when she’d heard the glass break. By the time the men entered the room she’d been standing bleary eyed at the foot of the bed with the rifle in her hands. The men had come in fast. Yelling at her to drop the weapon or they’d shoot her little sisters. There were a lot of them, and they all had rifles too. Not knowing what else to do Caitlyn pointed the M-16 at the floor. One of the men had walked confidently into the room and backhanded her after grabbing the M-16 out of her hands.

  Myriah and the other girls on the bed were all crying and yelling at the men coming in the room. When one of them hit Caitlyn and yelled for them to all shut up if they didn’t want to get beaten, they all shut up. The man shoved Caitlyn out in to the hall. Another guy with a big bushy beard got the other girls to get up and get out. Myriah was busy getting dressed as she was shoved out of the room. In the hallway Myriah happened to glance over her shoulder and saw Zoey peeking out the bathroom door. Hoping Zoey would take advantage of the distraction to hide Myriah started cussing and yelling at the men who’d just thrown her into the hallway. It didn’t take a lot of motivation to yell at them since they’d shoved her out before she even got her boots laced up.

  “Is this all of you?” A tall man in camouflage asked. He’d come in from the main living area in the house.

  Caitlyn hesitated. She knew Zoey must be hiding somewhere. She didn’t know if they should try and find her so she could go with them or if Zoey would be better off left alone in the house. She didn’t know if they’d have a chance to come back and get her later if they left now. She did know these appeared to be bad guys. She just didn’t know how bad they were.

  “This is all of us.” She answered. The man looked at her closely. He’d noticed the hesitation.

  “You sure this is everybody?” He asked again. Getting close to Caitlyn’s face. He’d pulled a knife out at some point as well and started flipping it in the air and catching it by the handle. Caitlyn gulped hard.

  “We’re all that’s left. Everybody else is dead.” She stuttered out.

  Gunshots rang out from the front of the house. One of the men poked his head in the hallway from the front of the house and yelled that they needed to get moving. Without asking any more questions the men herded the girls out the front door of the house. Multiple
Zombies were coming through the woods on the opposite side of the street and approaching the house. The noise from shattering the sliding glass doors must’ve carried.

  Caitlyn and Ali were shoved in the back of a Ford Expedition. Doreen and Myriah were put in the back of an extended cab Nissan Titan with windows tinted well beyond any reasonable expectation of legality. Caitlyn had no idea why they were separating them unless it was just to keep them from all trying to escape together. She watched out the windows as Zombies started getting close to the men. The men had swords and spears out now as they dealt with the single Zombies attacking them. A couple of men were standing in the backs of the pickup trucks with bows in hand taking shots as well.

  In less than a minute the first wave of Zombies had been put down and everyone was in a vehicle. More Zombies were streaming towards them though. The trucks all rolled out down the road. Some Zombies followed them, but way more than Caitlyn expected kept running towards the house.

  “Why are the Zombies still headed for the house?” Caitlyn asked the sweat covered man sitting in the seat in front of them. The man had somehow managed to stay fat this far into the apocalypse. He smelled like fried chicken, body odor and booze.

  “We left a boom box going inside. It’s screeching out all kinds of sounds like people talking and screaming and gun shots. Stuff like that. Works really good to distract the Zombies. Most of them will probably hang out at that house until the batteries die.” The man responded.