by Glen Krisch
The zombie (no longer Charlie, was never Charlie) lowered its snapping jaws into the ruins of Kendra’s throat.
Her failing eyes found and focused on Billy’s. She reached out to him, her hand seeming so heavy in her weakened state. Billy’s own hand extended, as if there was a way to save her.
“Ah!” Tanner screamed, breaking the spell. One of the undead had its jaw locked onto Tanner’s forearm.
The bearded man shattered another skull, and shoved it away, disgusted.
“Help me!” Tanner cried, his voice weakening. “Please, someone!”
A mass of ten or more zombies blocked Tanner from view, ready to feast on his still-warm flesh.
“Come on, kid!” the bearded man said, placing a strong hand on his shoulder.
The terrible noise of the attack retreated from Billy’s mind. The world seemed to slow, and his thoughts began to slur.
“Snap out of it, kid!” the man said, shaking him roughly.
“Right …” Billy muttered.
The noise returned in full-force, the sound of madness, of a world gone insane: the ceaseless throaty groans, the chomping of jaws on human meat, the shattering of skulls.
The bearded man grabbed Billy’s arm possessively and dragged him toward his van, beating away the zombies with his splintered gore-soaked bat.
Strength returned to Billy’s legs, and he no longer needed coaxing to sprint toward the van. He broke away from the bearded man and reached the passenger side door.
Locked.
The man took down the last zombie in his path with a vicious uppercut swing and then hurried to open the driver’s side door. He slammed his own door closed, greeting Billy’s panicked expression with a look he didn’t like, as if a veil had lifted from the man’s face, revealing an unguarded, lecherous thing beneath.
“Open up!” Billy rattled the door handle as the path they’d cut started to close like the Red Sea after the passage of the Israelites. “Please, Mister!”
Just as quickly as it had appeared, the madness on the man’s face was gone; in its place: the concern and fear he’d shown while trying to save them.
The bearded man leaned over and unlocked the door.
Billy apprehensively got in, hesitating long enough that fingernails scraped the door a second after it closed.
“That was a close one,” the man said with a straight face.
He offered Billy a smile, and it looked real enough, but he couldn’t shake the glimpse of what he’d seen: a look, a creeper look. Somehow familiar, even though he couldn’t remember ever meeting him. The feeling was strong, insistent, like déjà vu, but more real.
Billy remained silent. The truck was now inundated with countless zombies, no trace of anything living. In a few short minutes, he’d lost his brother and sister. The sudden loss, and the reality of the zombie horde, was too much. The feeling of gauziness returned, and the warm empty stare that would let him forget everything, at least for a little while.
“I know you’ve been through a shock,” the man said, starting the engine and slowly maneuvering it through the rutted grass. Undead slammed into the van from all sides, either run-over in painstaking slowness, or smashing their fists against the metal hull. “I don’t blame you. I’ll take care of things. Don’t you worry, Billy. Dylan’s got you now.”
The zombies continued to tear at the door handles and side mirrors, but as the man steered onto the road, they were able to pick up speed and put the main body of the horde behind them.
Billy leaned against the window, his head tilted up and away. He stared out at the brittle branches in the canopies, writhing in the chill wind like frantic fingers held heavenward.
They’re gone. Kendra. Charlie. Even asshole Tanner. They’re all gone. He felt the urge to repeat their names in his head until they blended together into one rhythmic chant: Kendra, Charlie, Tanner. Kendra, Charlie, Tanner. KendraCharlieTanner… Kendra…
Names were more significant than mere words. Names held meaning. Emotions. Memories. Names were—
“Wait,” Billy blurted out, turning toward the bearded man.
“Yes?” he said. Dylan said.
(Yes, he’d mentioned his name just a moment ago …)
His eyes locked onto Billy’s.
“You said—” Billy stammered.
Did I hear him correctly? Did he call me Billy?
“I said what?” the man said with a chuckle. He returned his eyes to the road, steered them through a tree-lined curve.
Billy thought back to the horde’s attack as selectively as possible. Perhaps someone (KendraCharlieTanner) had mentioned his name in the chaos. No matter how hard he tried, however, he couldn’t remember that anyone had. The harder he thought about it, the more he drudged up images of blood and torn flesh, the sounds of feeding, of screaming …
“Kid, you okay? You ain’t bit, are you? Because, if you are, I’m pretty sure that turns you. And that would be a Goddamn shame.”
“No … no, it’s nothing,” Billy said. He looked Dylan in the eye, tried his best to compose his expression. “You said … you said your name is Dylan, right?”
“Dylan Primrose, at your service,” he said, pretending to tip a cap.
“I’m Billy. Billy Upton. Thanks for … you didn’t have to—” Billy said.
The images and sounds of the horde came back at him like an avalanche, and he couldn’t keep them away. He sobbed in long, wrenching heaves, until his eyes blurred. The whole world seemed flooded in tears.
“Shh … it’s okay, kid. That’s much better. Much better than clamming up and just giving off that vacant stare. I seen that look a thousand times in my tour of ’Nam. That stare leads to darkness and nothing else. Better to let it out. Better to scream and let your pain and anguish out for the whole neighborhood to hear. Understand?”
In his distressed state, Billy heard only snippets of unrelated words, but he nodded just the same. In doing so, he gained some control over his emotions. And as they neared the point where they would either have to turn to head toward the Upton household or to the exit of the campgrounds, Dylan Primrose slammed on the brakes.
“Goddamn, will you look at that?”
He didn’t have to point out the zombies; there must have been a hundred pouring in through the front gate, heading right for them.
“They’re coming at us from all sides,” Billy said, sniffing back a tear.
“The fuckers are blocking my way out of here.”
“Not if you turn left.”
“I don’t want to go left,” Dylan said petulantly, slamming his fist against the steering wheel. “My place is outside that exit.”
“Turn left,” Billy said. “My house is that way anyway. It’ll be safe.”
“Really?” Dylan said, his voice oily. “Who’s home?”
“Mom …” Billy said, and then added, “Dad should be back any minute. He just had a couple things to do around the campgrounds.”
“Such a shame,” Dylan said under his breath. Before the zombies could get any closer, he steered the car to the left and gunned the engine.
Drawn by the motion of the van, the horde altered their advance.
“Does your dad have any weapons?”
“Why? What does it matter?”
“Because this is all I got.” Dylan reached under his seat and pulled out a handgun.
Billy sucked in a breath, held it.
“Don’t worry, Billy. If you ain’t a zombie, I’m not gonna shoot ya’.”
Billy turned away, and spotted someone in the road in front of them, a living person jumping up and down for them to stop. He pointed and screamed, “Look out!”
Dylan yanked on the steering wheel, even as the man in the road jumped away. The van dipped off the road into a culvert, and that’s when the world became a tumbling, cr
unching blur.
CHAPTER 18
Dr. Soto: Time is Entropy
Home and Keely were so close. Soto had returned to the HVAC room on so many occasions that he feared it would never lead to a path where he survived. But, eventually, after wandering through the woods, he came across a fence. When he felt a strong desire to climb it, he did, even though zombies milled about on that side a quarter mile distant.
And when he came across a young man walking along a winding crushed limestone path, he knew just as strongly that he should avoid him. Concentrating, Soto realized he knew his name: Blake Tanner. Nothing good would come from speaking to the young man. He didn’t look like much of a threat, not with his tear-streaked face and lanky limbs, but it didn’t matter. He trusted his gut on the matter. Their paths had already crossed in any number of todays, and the result was never a good one.
After waiting behind a tree trunk for Tanner to pass, Soto cut across another stand of woods, then through ranks of campsites already overgrown with weeds.
He put the campsites behind him and came across another road, this one more promising since it was blacktop, and most likely led to the campground’s exit.
A handful of zombies took note of him and were heading in his general direction. As long as he walked at their rate of travel, they would never catch him.
The road hugged a gently sloping downward hill before curving up and away from a small body of water he could barely see through a stand of prairie grass turned sickly brown from the season. As he approached the bottom of the hill, a car approached him from behind. He felt no instinctive pull that would indicate he should hide, so he took up position in the middle of the road and waved his arms above his head as a white van trundled into view.
Again, he felt no subtle guidance from the universe telling him to change his behavior, so he remained, even as the van closed on him. At the last possible second, he saw two faces through the windshield: a bearded driver, and a young boy riding shotgun; their faces were filled with shock and terror, and the driver yanked on the steering wheel.
Soto leapt aside, even as the van slipped off the blacktop and down a steep embankment blanketed in desiccated prairie flowers.
The van flipped over on its side, and still had momentum to flip completely on its head as it broke the surface of the water.
Soto ran down the newly-blazed trail and came to an abrupt halt when he pushed through a few spindly trees. The van’s wheels—facing the fly-strewn sky—still reeled. The engine sputtered and spit. A rush of water invaded the van’s interior. A vast number of zombies groaned nearby. They encircled the small pond’s shore, stumbled through the lily pads and reeds and now alighted on the new entry to their small world: the van, still moving, still filled with living flesh … as well as Soto. All at once, they began to move in his direction.
“Damn it,” he muttered and started back up the crash trail. Three zombies stumbled toward him from the blacktop, others twenty or so feet away, others coming in waves.
No path of escape.
Screams emanated from the van, the windows submerged below the water line. Soto could easily swim out and climb on top of the wreckage. There was no other option.
He shoved a zombie from his path, then hurriedly stepped into the muddy water. He nearly lost his footing on the pond’s slick bottom, but caught himself. Eventually, it was quicker to doggy paddle, and he did that the last stretch until he took hold of the rear bumper, which sat slightly lower than the passenger compartment.
“Please … someone, anyone,” a muffled voice called from inside the van. “Help me!”
The boy riding shotgun; had to be.
Soto started to lift himself out of the muck, to turn back, when he felt a surprising tug on his heartstrings.
“Please …” the boy sobbed, his voice cracking.
Soto groaned, checked his surroundings. Zombie were closing in on him, clamoring into the water, slipping, falling, getting knocked over and pushed underwater by their numbers.
“Damn it,” he repeated, and waded to the side of the van. The side-panel door handle was still above water, so he was able to pry it open, and water filled a small air pocket.
The boy’s cries silenced, and he feared he’d drowned him, but after a few seconds the voice was back: “Yes. Please! I’m here. I’m alive.”
Soto couldn’t see two feet ahead of him.
“I’m alive!”
Soto screwed up his courage, took a deep breath of air, held it, and dived into the muddy water. At first, he couldn’t tell which way to go. Groping around did little to help the situation. He dared to open his eyes, and when he saw a flash of light, he closed them again and swam toward it, pulling himself along the overturned interior.
His fingers broke the surface of the air bubble, then desperate hands took hold of him, pulling him to the light.
He broke the surface and sucked in a ragged breath. Filthy water dribbled from his mouth, burned his nose and eyes.
“You came for me!” the boy said, nearly hugged him.
He was perhaps twelve years old, with long, mantis-like limbs. The other passenger floated face-down near the driver’s side wheel well. Blood stained the water surrounding him.
“Is he dead?” Soto said.
“I hope so.”
The boy shivered, and so did Soto.
“Is that your dad?”
“God, no. It’s a long story. He’s a … a creeper.”
Soto nodded, thinking he understood.
“Are you injured? Can you swim?”
“I’ve got this,” the boy said and turned, revealing a gash in his cheek, “but nothing’s broken. And yeah, I can swim. I spent a good amount of time in this water this summer.”
“Good,” Soto said. “Now, this isn’t going to be easy—”
The van shifted, silencing him. The tail end levered lower in the water, and the passenger compartment lifted so that sunlight gleamed through the spider-webbed windshield.
“What’s happening?” the boy asked.
“I don’t know.” Soto thought he knew what was happening, but he didn’t want to panic the boy in such a small space. “What’s your name?”
“Billy Upton.” The boy’s brow furrowed. “I think I know you.”
“Probably not.”
The boy was experiencing a ripple in time; in one of the many permutations of today, their paths had crossed.
“Did you rent one of the cabins this summer?” the boy asked.
“No, afraid not. I’m a scientist from the Institute of Applied Temporal Mechanics. Or, I guess, I used to be. I’m Elliot. Elliot Soto.”
He hadn’t thought about it in all his todays. Every aspect of his life was now past tense. Every aspect but one: Keely.
“Is that the big concrete building out in the woods?” the boy asked.
“Yeah.” He felt like apologizing for bringing the horror of the undead to his world. If it wasn’t for him, Hellickson wouldn’t have realized the breakthroughs that led to the microscopic black holes cast off from the collider. He shivered, felt an overwhelming self-hatred.
The van shifted again, sending them tipping higher out of the water. The corpse shifted away from the driver’s seat and slipped into the falling water.
Groans confirmed that there were multitudinous undead close by, persistent.
“Did they follow you?” Billy said.
“I guess so.”
“I didn’t know they could swim.”
“I don’t think they can. They just don’t need to breathe.”
Apparently, the zombies had walked into the water until they reached the back bumper, and there their numbers built up until they wedged the van deeper.
The corpse inside with them began to twitch, then lifted its face from the water, eyes gleamed crimson. It began to thrash wit
h hunger, flailing to reach them.
“Oh my God!” Billy shouted.
The zombie’s excitement alerted the others outside, and their noises intensified.
Soto pulled a long knife that was tucked into his belt. He’d found it at one of the campsites—a filleting knife, blade gouged and rusted.
He stabbed the bearded zombie in the temple, and the dead-again body slipped back into the water, but it didn’t remain still; instead, it writhed and dipped in the water, and soon zombie arms pushed on either side of it, then more …
“They’re inside!” Billy screamed.
Soto pressed his feet against the headrest of the passenger seat and stretched until his nose nearly touched the windshield. As the sounds of the zombies filled the van, and the boy continued to panic, Soto smashed the hilt of the knife against the windshield. He couldn’t get much leverage, so even as more cracks feathered out across the glass, it didn’t shatter.
Billy climbed next to him. “What are we going to do?”
“I won’t see you again,” Soto said. “Even if I see you, you won’t know about it. This wasn’t the right path to Keely. So, whatever you do next time, stay away from people like the bearded man. Monsters aren’t always obvious. Trust your gut.”
“I don’t … I don’t understand,” Billy said.
The zombies below them filled the back seats; they continued to pile inside, climbing on top of one another, groaning and snarling with savage hunger.
The van tipped again, and the water began to rise.
“I need you to remember. That’s the only way through this. It’s the hardest thing, remembering. You want to be with your family. Make that happen. I’m sorry, Billy.”
“Please … I don’t—” Billy said, and his words ended when Soto dragged the blade across his throat.
The boy’s eyes went wide as he grasped his opened neck. He fell on top of the zombies below, and they did what they always did to living flesh.
Waves of emotion tore through Soto. His eyes filled with tears, and with trembling hands, he again slammed the knife hilt against the windshield. The fissures spread, crackling like thawing lake ice.
