Cajun Zombie Chronicles (Book 2): Island Dead

by Smith, S. L.

  He was not downwind of them, thankfully, nor even upwind, if that even mattered, but he could still hear the moans. They were not the excited moans that would rise from their rotting throats when living flesh was in sight. The moans were vast, however. It sounded like a giant, bored pipe organ made up of a thousand, thousand throats. It was horrifying, too.

  Isherwood tried pulling his eyes away from the terrible scene. He eventually forced his eyes to scan the roadway up and down for exit ramps, especially directly behind him to the Whiskey Bay ramp. When he finally spotted it, he could see only the leading edge of it. But he could see enough. There was general, though still aimless, movement towards and leading down into the ramp. The river of zombies was narrowed there to thin rivulets where the cars were crammed too tight for zombies to pass abreast. No, it wasn’t that the cars were crammed so much as – Isherwood blinked at the sight and felt his stomach lurch. Rotting flesh, scratched and torn from a thousand passing bodies was gradually damming up the exit ramp.

  It didn’t matter, though. Isherwood could see the zed heads spilling over the sides of the roadway. He couldn’t see where they fell. The tree tops blocked that. He was pretty sure, though, that they just got right back up again.

  Isherwood estimated that there were maybe two to three thousand per mile. God, where had they all come from? If they started shooting at any point along the roadway, they would merely break the dam at that point. The dead would eventually start raining down on them. It might only be a trickle at first as the dead slowly surged against maybe one hundred feet of roadway. They would eventually mound up, Isherwood imagined, against the sides of the roadway, maybe across the whole width of the road. The dead would start using the still-squirming mounds below them as a ramp. The river of dead would flow, then, up and over the sides of the roadway. The whole river would start spilling down over the sides of the road, right down on them.

  He realized that Sara’s family was lucky to be surrounded by only a few thousand. Any intrusion by their own rescue party would likely only add to these numbers. And by quite a lot.

  “My God,” he finally said to himself, lowering the binoculars. “What the hell are we gonna do?”

  CHAPTER TWO: PLAN CHICKEN

  “Well?” Patrick asked, as Isherwood emerged from inside the chain link enclosure at the bottom of the cell phone tower. They were several new corpses littering the roadway. Besides fending off the low to moderate concentration of zombies, they had all been watching as their friend climbed up the tower and as he stared into the distance southward. Even from all the way on the ground, they could tell that Isherwood had not liked what he’d seen.

  Dropping the pretense of their defensive position, they had grouped around Isherwood’s Jeep, as he walked back to it in silence.

  “That bad, huh?” Marshall asked.

  “Yup,” Isherwood said finally. “That bad.”

  “Like how bad?” Justin asked. “Are we talking thousands? Tens of thousands? Millions?”

  “My guess is that if we started shooting at the exit ramps we’d probably drawn in fifty, maybe sixty, thousand before it was all over – one way or the other. The Interstate looks like it’s clogged almost solid between Lafayette and Baton Rouge.”

  The men reacted in different ways. Patrick threw his head back, letting it loll back and forth between his shoulders. Justin actually bent over and put his head between his legs. Father Simeon may have blinked.

  “There’s just no passing the exit ramps that lead from I-10 to the mainland part of Whiskey Bay.” Isherwood concluded.

  Patrick was squinting at him with a look of confusion on his face. “I thought you said Sara’s family were trapped on the Island part of Whiskey Bay, not the mainland side. Why would we even try to come up on the mainland side?”

  “One option we had,” Isherwood explained, “was entrenching near the exit ramps and using our seventy-five yard strategy to build up a corpse wall of such enormous height that we’d clear the whole area of zeds.”

  “Wait,” Marshall said. “You’re saying the camp is on the other side of the Atchafalaya? Clearing out this side of the river wouldn’t do nothing to help those folks, am I right? What am I missing?”

  “Those things,” Padre interjected. “Once they start moaning, they draw others in for miles and miles. It’s conceivable that our gun fire would draw the zombies away from the camp, allowing Sara’s family to escape. They’d be lured towards us, but would probably just get swept up, harmlessly, into the Pilot Channel and never even make it to us.”

  They were all quiet for a moment mulling this over. “So,” Isherwood continued. “Our other option would be crossing the Pilot Channel between I-10 and where the Pilot Channel branches off from the Atchafalaya. We could entrench somewhere north of I-10 and that would bring the hoard spilling off I-10 towards us, as well as drawing the rest of the zeds on the Island to us.”

  Justin was nodding. “But the downside of Plan B would be –”

  “We leave the vehicles behind,” Isherwood answered.

  “Right.” Justin said, sighing.

  “And Plan C?” Patrick asked.

  “Plan C would be backtracking to Krotz Springs and sticking to the western bank of the Atchafalaya. We’d have the vehicles, which is good, but I just don’t think we’d be close enough to I-10 to lure enough zeds toward us and into the Atchafalaya. Of course, the zeds probably wouldn’t get anywhere near us. The flow of the Atchafalaya would push them right back against the northern end of the Island. But I just don’t think this approach would work fast enough. The camp’s been out of food for two days now. We could also float down one side of the Island or the other and attack from the south of I-10 but that would likely mean we’d be drawing thousands of zeds past their camp.”

  “Are they – Sara’s family – expecting us to follow one of these plans in particular?” Padre asked.

  Isherwood shook his head. “We discussed the options, but they knew we’d have to assess the situation before we could pick a route.”

  “What’re you, thinking, old man?” Marshall asked Isherwood. Marshall was actually at least a decade older than Isherwood.

  “Well,” he said, taking a deep breath. “I’m thinking we ditch the vehicles and go with Plan B, because I’m itching to get on the Island.”

  “But wouldn’t that leave us surrounded by a wall of corpses?” Patrick asked. “We’d have to scramble over the top and probably get munched on in the process or worse – get stuck under an avalanche of gore.”

  “You know,” Padre said, raising the forefinger of his right hand. His head was lowered in thought. “There is another way. All these ideas have us attacking from land. What if we stayed in the water?”

  “Like an amphibious assault?” Isherwood asked skeptically.

  Padre shook his head. “No, what if we stayed put in the water? I’m thinking the Pilot Channel over the Atchafalaya. We could lay anchor, hopefully in the middle of the channel, and draw them in with gunfire or whatever – maybe the flares.”

  Isherwood was now smiling broadly. “Heck yes! Brillant, Father. This is like an idea I had for floating chicken farms. The idea was to draw the River Dead back into the water once the river had belched them up onto the shore.”

  “Uhhh,” Padre was frowning in confusion. “I guess – yeah, but we’re the chickens in this scenario.”

  “Speak for yourself, Father.” Justin interrupted.

  Padre just ignored the remark. “We’d need to find a couple boats and load them up with ammo. We’d want to lay anchor upstream of the I-10 bridge, too, I’m thinking. They’ll start dumping into the river from the shores and probably float by us without getting close, but the ones dropping from the I-10 bridge might swarm the boat like ants in a flood if we’re downstream of the bridge.”

  “Perfect.” Isherwood said. “Y’all in? I think I saw a sign back up the road by the park shooting range that pointed to a boat launch and landing. I bet the park rangers have a
few boats tied up there.”

  “I like it. A lot.” Patrick said. “I’ve been having nightmares of sinking into a sea of corpses and zombies. Like when Kevin Arnold sank into that pit of candy in The Wonder Years – y’all remember that? No? Okay. Nevermind. But yeah, I’m in.”

  “Me, too.” Marshall added. “I like it. I’m pretty good with a boat, too.”

  “Me three, or – well, five, actually.” Justin added. “Whatever, sounds good. Plan ‘C’ for ‘chicken.’”

  *****

  They parked along 975, which was actually called the Whiskey Bay Highway. They left the vehicles in the same diamond formation as they had at the cell phone tower. They locked the troop transport with the little girl still inside. They left her still strapped the ironing board, but they took out her gag and released one of her arms. They left food and water within her reach and prayed they’d return, at least for her sake.

  They never even attempted the five or so miles back to the docks that Isherwood thought he had seen by the Sherburne WMA Shooting Range. Before they got there, they realized that there was a solid mile or so of fishing camps along the eastern bank of the Pilot Channel, itself. These camps were just close enough to the interstate that any noise, even the quietest of generators, would have drawn in swarms of the undead. Either they had all been abandoned early on, or the swarms had come and gone. The camps all appeared now to be deserted, but the men were extremely wary nonetheless.

  Isherwood and Marshall left to scout for boats, while the remaining three started organizing the gear for transfer onto the boats.

  “Oh man,” Isherwood said to Marshall. He had a pretty good view before leaving the road of the channel beyond the camps. “I was thinking these camps would have piers. You know, something for the boats to be tied to, and we’d just have to untie and go.”

  “Nope.” Marshall said, matter-of-factly. “I bet the current’s just too strong ‘round here. Boats would just slam into the piers. Both’d get pretty messed up.”

  “Channel might be deeper than I was thinking, too.”

  “Well, yeah, but even so, they could pontoon a pier – hey, now.” Marshall broke off and pointed. “There’s a pretty girl right there.”

  As they rounded the first camp they came to, they saw a large sport fishing boat sitting on a trailer in dry dock. The dry dock consisted of a simple aluminum carport-like structure.

  “You think we’ll be able to launch her right here? Just back the trailer into the water?” Isherwood asked.

  “I wouldn’t under normal circumstances, but ain’t nothing normal about nothing anymore. I ‘magine that motor will start drawing the creatures in pretty fast. If not, we can go up the road a piece to a launch.”

  “You know of—?” Isherwood made to reply but was interrupted by the sudden look of fear spreading across Marshall’s face.

  “Head’s up!” Marshall cried drawing his pistol.

  Isherwood spun in place, somehow managing to push Marshall’s arm down so he lowered the gun. He pulled out one of the katanas from the double sheath harness on his back. The motion of bringing the sword over his head to unsheathe it was perfect. He continued the motion downward, bringing the blade down with both hands. The katana sliced through the skull of a zombie diagonally. The creature fell to its knees before Isherwood, as though kneeling in homage to the blade.

  “Oh, wow.” Isherwood whispered. “I barely felt the blade make impact. That’s just – wow.” He stammered relaxing the long handle of the sword in his grip.

  “Yeah, well. Thanks for not cutting my head off while you were swinging that thing.” Marshall grumbled, as he looked over the body of the decapitated zombie.

  “Sorry about that. I didn’t want the report of the pistol to draw anymore in, you know?”

  “Would’ya lookey here?” Marshall said. He had taken something out of the zombie’s pockets. It was a set of keys on a little chain attached to a red float. “Looks like we’ve met the proprietor of this ‘ere establishment.” Marshall said smiling, as the keys twinkled back and forth between his fingertips. “Why don’t you go ahead and take care of those fellas – the neighbors, probably – while I take a look-see around the boat?”

  “What?” Isherwood burst out. He whirled back around in tacit acceptance of Marshall’s plan. He had been so absorbed in the power of the katana blade that he hadn’t noticed the small group of zombies staggering toward them.

  “Alright. Okay, let’s do this.” Isherwood said. He squared up his feet in what he thought he remembered was the right stance for the sword. He bent his knees and aimed his body perpendicular to the oncoming zombies. He raised the sword behind his head and readied himself to bring it down onto the next skull. He practiced pivoting at his waist for extra strength.

  A blood-stained beard hung from the mangled jaw bone of the first zombie. Isherwood made the mistake of looking into the creature’s yawning mouth instead of his target. The small distraction brought the blade streaking through the creature’s mouth. Isherwood was yanked from his feet as the blade came to a sudden halt as it embedded halfway into the creature’s skull.

  “Ah, crap.” Isherwood’s eyes were darting back and forth as the zombies began to flank him. He released his grip on the priceless katana and reached for the second sword sheathed across his back. He realized he had been overthinking the blade – the first, perfect swing had been on instinct. But how do I purposely revert to instinct? He asked himself. Fortunately, the needs of the present quickly cleared his mind.

  The bearded zombie still stood in the middle of the oncoming crowd. He looked like a ghastly version of Pinocchio with the blade jutting out from his skull right under the nose. Inadvertently, Pinocchio was diverting the flow of zombies toward Isherwood into two streams. The two streams were surrounding him.

  Isherwood backpedaled out of the inadvertent pincer attack of the oncoming zombies. He strafed to one side of the crowd, and attacked the nearest zombie from its flank. It was a teenage girl wearing just a long t-shirt that read “Grumpy” and depicted the cartoon dwarf. She had apparently been attacked in the night while still wearing her pajamas.

  Isherwood aimed this time for the back of the creature’s slender neck. A thought rattled around somewhere in his head. He knew slicing right between the cervical vertebrae of the neck was really difficult, but maybe the katana would slice through the bone just as easily as the gaps between. Slicing through an inch or so of vertebrae had to be easier than slicing through an entire skull, he thought. Right?

  Grumpy’s head was flying through the air before Isherwood even realized that he’d made impact. He nodded in satisfaction. He began circling around the oncoming hoard. Heads began flying here and there. Pinocchio was still wobbling on his feet at the center of the maelstrom, turning as Isherwood revolved around him. He was jerking the blade, which was still protruding several feet out of his skull, as he turned. From above, the scene looked like a massive clock, advancing erratically through the hours.

  Despite the clock, Isherwood had sliced through the entire company of zombies in under a minute. When it was nearly over, he strode back over to Pinocchio and wrapped his hand around the hilt of the katana. He felt like a whole different swordsman since trapping the blade in the creature’s skull. Still holding the sword, he reared back and simultaneously kicked out, planting the sole of his boot across the creature’s chest. The zombie was thrown backward. Isherwood watched as the creature sprawled backward onto the ground. He was standing now with a sword in each hand.

  He remembered suddenly the scene when Maximus pulled two Gladius swords from the chest of an enemy and then decapitated him with them like hedge clippers. He started reciting to himself as he advanced on the zombie, “My name is Maximus Decimus Meridius, Commander of the armies of the North, General of the Felix legions, loyal servant to the true emperor – Ah hell, nevermind.” He sheathed the sword he had retrieved and sliced through Pinocchio’s neck with the remaining katana. “Don’t get cocky,
kid.” He said to himself, remembering a particularly bad paper cut he’d given himself just the day before.

  *****

  Isherwood had continued clearing the area of zombies. He worked his way through the yards of the two neighboring camps and found himself back on the road. There, his path intersected with Padre’s. The priests was keeping a low profile along the roadway. Fortunately, the road curved not far from their position. They would have been much more visible on an open roadway. The few moans the zombies had made, however, before Padre could dispatch them would likely draw more in. Their time was running short.

  “Ready for Plan Chicken?” Isherwood asked as he came across the priest. Padre answered with a rolling nod and a thumbs up. Before either could say anything else, their heads turned abruptly back to the first camp, to the sound of a boat motor. Marshall had the motor running. After letting it run a couple minutes, he let it throttle back down and switched it off.

  “I’ve been thinking, Padre.” Isherwood said as they jogged back along the road. “That Pilot Channel – it’s got a pretty strong current at the center and deep, too. A normal anchoring might not work. We might have to think of other options, or at least not anchor right in the middle. Last thing we want is to start slipping under that bridge and the zombies start dropping on our heads at thirty or forty feet.”

  The priest nodded, considering this. “Maybe we make sure we’ve got some extra rope and – doesn’t one of the trucks have a grappling hook launcher?”

  Before Isherwood could respond, they ran into Justin and Patrick. “Not much going in the way of zombies back the other way,” Justin said. “How ‘bout y’all?”

  “Getting a little thick,” Isherwood said, taking a moment to wipe the blood from his blade before re-sheathing it. “Sounds like ol’ Marshall got us a ride.”

  Padre disappeared and reappeared holding a little case that held one of the Army-issue LGHs and some extra rope. They all grabbed or two of the bags of ammo and supplies Patrick had put together for the boat. “Jeez, Patrick.” Justin complained. “You pack like my wife. I thought this was just going to be a three-hour tour, Gilligan!”