Other Titles by TW Brown

The DEAD Series

DEAD: The Ugly Beginning

DEAD: Revelations

DEAD: Fortunes & Failures

DEAD: Winter

DEAD: Siege & Survival

DEAD: Confrontation

DEAD: Reborn

DEAD: Darkness Before Dawn

DEAD: Spring

DEAD: Reclamation

DEAD: Blood & Betrayal

DEAD: End

The New DEAD series

DEAD: Onset (Book 1 of the New DEAD series)

DEAD: Alone (Book 2 of the New DEAD series)

DEAD: Suffer the Children (Book 3 of the New DEAD series)

Zomblog

Zomblog

Zomblog II

Zomblog: The Final Entry

Zomblog: Snoe

Zomblog: Snoe’s War

Zomblog: Snoe’s Journey

That Ghoul Ava

That Ghoul Ava: Her First Adventures

That Ghoul Ava & The Queen of the Zombies

That Ghoul Ava Kick Some Faerie A**

Next, on a very special That Ghoul Ava

That Ghoul Ava on the Lam

That Ghoul Ava On a Roll

That Ghoul Ava Sacks a Quarterback

That Ghoul Ava has an Appetite for Deception

Dead:

Don Evans Must Die

(Book 4 of the New DEAD series)

TW Brown

Estacada, Oregon, USA

DEAD: Don Evans Must Die (Book 4 of the New DEAD Series)

©2017 May December Publications LLC

The split-tree logo is a registered trademark of May December Publications LLC.

This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, organizations, places, events, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons living, dead, or otherwise, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

This book is protected under the copyright laws of the United States of America. Any reproduction or unauthorized use of the material or artwork contained herein is prohibited without the express written permission of the author or May December Publications LLC.

Printed in the U.S.A.

Did you miss me?

You are holding a book that almost never happened. There were a lot of reasons. One of them was due to me simply growing tired of certain external forces that hate the idea of my success and go out of their way to try and smear it with hatred. Sorry, that is the cold truth.

But the biggest was a series of heart attacks that did what they could to end me. The best thing about those heart attacks were the fact that they debunked the theory that I had no heart. I now have a doctor’s note saying that one does in fact exist in my chest.

One of the factors that got me back on my keyboard to hammer this out came from some words of reflection given to me by Dave Dahl (of Dave’s Killer Bread) one night at dinner. When I explained my thoughts on stepping away from writing, and shared the reason, he had a very succinct reply. “Why would you let anybody that does not matter one bit in your life make you consider walking away from something you love…your passion?”

So, yes…the wait was long. I do hope you find it worthy. And I will try not to make you wait this long ever again.

Doctor, Doctor, give me the news…

TW Brown

July 2019

For my granddaughter,

Payton Elizabeth Fountain.

It will be a while before you can read this.

Contents

Don Evans Must Die

Marshawn

Twists and Turns

Strangers

No Rest for the Weary

All by Myself

The Death of Remorse

Pain and Suffering

New Lows

The Worst of the Worst

Hate

The Children

Incoming

Licking Wounds

Lisa Speaks

Fight

Why?

1

Don Evans Must Die

I felt terrible that I couldn’t recall the woman’s name. I knew she’d been one of the people from down in Estacada. I thought it began with the letter ‘B’ but even that was only a guess.

Whatever her name was, she’d stumbled into our camp and almost gotten shot before she could share the unwelcome news that Don Evans and some others had killed her husband along with a few others. Also, she may’ve mentioned something about one of their own people being a part of it. Unfortunately, she’d obviously run into trouble on the way here.

She had a nasty bite on one forearm, apparently where she’d thrown it up to defend herself. I saw a holster on her hip, but there was no sign of a weapon. Also, she had two sheaths that had probably held some nice blades, but those were also empty.

She had some scratches, as well as a bunch of scrapes that looked like maybe she’d tumbled or even run into the thick blackberry bushes around these parts. Seriously, some of them have stalks as big around as my wrist and thorns that can shred a person.

“She say anything else?” Marshawn entered the hut we’d moved the woman into when she’d passed out and fallen face down in the dirt.

“Not a word,” I whispered. I paused. “Well…she has said the name ‘Ken’ a few times. I think that was the big fella we met when we rolled into town. If what she did manage to get out before slipping into unconsciousness is true, that guy is dead along with a few others. And…she very clearly said the name Don Evans in all her rambling.”

“Why am I not surprised?” Marshawn pulled the stopper from his canteen and took a long drink. When he was finished, he took a seat next to me at the big picnic table bench I’d been perched on for the past hour. “So, don’t imagine this helped sway your idea of going after Evans.”

It wasn’t really a question, and he already knew my answer, so I didn’t bother responding. I just sat there staring at this woman.

I know that I’d probably seen her and probably even spoken with her back in Estacada. Now, she was just some old lady who was about to die a terrible death. To make it worse, from the little I’d been able to gather from her ramblings, she’d suffered some horrible losses recently.

“You know you can’t do this by yourself,” Marshawn said softly.

I looked over at him, my eyebrow raised in question. “You think I would ask anybody to go on this fool’s mission with me?” It was difficult not to sound sarcastic.

“Ask?” Marshawn actually laughed as he said that word. “Hell no. But I’ll be damned if I am gonna let you go out there alone.”

“And who watches over things here?” I shot back.

“We have a few bodies that can take that detail.”

“And are those bodies able to take the reins if we don’t come back at all?”

“Is anybody ready?” Marshawn scoffed. “Normal went out the window a long time ago, buddy. We’re all just flying by the seat of our pants.”

He had a point there. I know I sure as hell hadn’t come up with any magic to ensure our absolute safety. Every single day, we dealt with things that no movie or game could’ve prepared us for. The worst was the tedious boredom.

The problem with boredom is that it tricks you into relaxing. You start to feel like maybe the worst has passed. I think that is how we are wired. It had been centuries since we had to survive on our hunter-gatherer-forager traits. We’d forgotten what it was like to have to carve out our existence every single minute of the day.

I was about to make some weak argument against Marshawn joining me when the woman lying before me started to shudder and twitch. She gasped, and her eyes flew open. I could see the tracers, but they hadn’t yet filmed over which indicated to me that she was still alive.

Her back arched and her arms shot up like she was reaching for the canopy of branches above us. Her fingers were straight, but slowly curled into what almost resembled claws.

“It’s never the same with anybody,” Marshawn said from behind me.

At some point, I’d gotten to my feet and drawn a long knife from my hip. I stood above the woman, a feeling like frozen fire was churning in my gut. I stood there as her body began to convulse. One of her hands began to clench and then open in spasms that were so fast they almost appeared blurry.

When her back arched and I heard a low, guttural mewling sound, I knew she was no longer one of the living. I knelt beside her, knife drawn and, after I covered her head with a nearby towel, stabbed down hard where I figured her head to be. There was a hideous sound of shattering bone and something squishy, then…nothing.

The body went still, and the stench began to noticeably dissipate in a matter or moments. I was frozen in place, part of me still coming to grips with the fact that, while I did not relish this sort of thing, it had become so commonplace that I felt almost no emotion.

I stood and turned to look at Marshawn who was leaning against a tree, nibbling on a hunk of jerky and seeming just as unaffected by what had happened as I did.

A moment later, the brush off to the left of him rustled and a large, furry, black face peeked out of the green. Not for the first time, I marveled at how much Chewie resembled a bear as she stared at me with her soft, brown eyes. Her tongue lolled, and a line of that notorious Newfoundland drool swung from one corner of her mouth.

“Come here, girl,” I whispered.

For a split second, her head tilted to the side and her mouth shut, showing off her slight underbite. Her eyes went wide, and her ears perked. Then…she burst from the bushes and bounded to me with a deep huffing sound that was not quite a bark and more like a snort.

I caught her in my arms and wrapped them around her big neck in a hug. Before the whole zombie thing, I’d never been away from my girl for even a whole day. Now, it seemed as if I was away from her more than with her. And I was about to leave again with the very distinct chance that I would never return.

A moment later, the brush parted a second time and a young boy peered out from where Chewie had appeared. As soon as his eyes found my dog, they drifted to the ground and Michael Killian emerged. Lately, I’d begun to wonder if Chewie was more his dog than mine. The young autistic boy had bonded with her in a way that went beyond even what I had with her.

“You had to kill the lady,” Michael whispered. “She was going to be one of the monster people, so you helped her. Don’t be sad, Evan.”

I opened my mouth to respond and found that I was tongue tied. I could not recall a time when the boy had ever actually used my name. In fact, I had not been sure if he even knew any of the names of the adults in the group.

“C’mon, Chewie,” Michael turned to my dog and patted his hip as he called her.

At least the big girl had the decency to glance up at me before she headed over to the boy in her easy swagger. I watched them head back through the brush. Not for the first time, I wondered if I would see my beloved Newf again. Only, this time, I wasn’t afraid for her. She would be fine. She and Michael would take care of each other. I had no doubts in that regard.

We hauled the corpse to the burn pile and tossed it in without ceremony. Death was too common. If we stopped to make a big deal of it then we would be in a constant state of post-wake emotional hangover.

Marshawn and I decided we would leave just before first light. It was actually a bit strange when I thought about it. In reality we could head out within the next couple of hours, but there was simply something about setting up a schedule and sticking to the old ways that we imagined we should act in instances such as these.

I made my way to the small structure that was slowly being built into what I had thought to call my home. It was about the size of those tiny homes that were just starting to appear on some of the do-it-yourself channels. Personally, I hadn’t given them much of a chance. People like their stuff. These things weren’t much larger than a strange shed.

I stepped inside and allowed the blanket that was holding down a space until I could find a door fall back into place. I’d only taken two steps when I froze.

“She didn’t make it, did she?” Alex asked.

“Nope.” Not much needed saying beyond that.

The woman was a constant mystery to me. One minute, she was this badass action-hero type who kicked ass and took names; the next, she was the delicate and feminine figure stretched out on my bed.

She was wearing nothing but a pair of very skimpy shorts and a wife-beater tee-shirt without a bra. Her hair, which she had recently chopped off with her hunting knife, framed her face that was squarely in the middle of the beam of sunlight that shone through where one of my windows would eventually be. Her long, bare legs were still incredibly sexy despite the dozen or so nicks from where she’d obviously shaved in the very recent past.

I would’ve had to be one of the walking dead not to notice her shapely curves. To put it bluntly, she had an ass that would make J-Lo say “Damn!”

The problem at the moment was that I’d just killed an old lady who had come here to warn us about Don Evans. I was going to be leaving in the morning with the intent of taking the life of at least one living being. Most likely more. Despite what most fiction spewed, the last thing I felt like doing was engage in any sort of intimate relationship. Not that is wasn’t tempting, but it just was not something on my list of priorities at the moment.

If I were being perfectly and totally honest, there was also the issue of my beloved Stephanie. She’d only been dead (or dead-ish based on the last time I saw her) for a short time. A few months maybe? Hell, time was hard to keep track of these days. Sometimes, it felt as if she’d been gone forever. Other times, it was like it had been only yesterday that she was elbowing me out of the way as I brushed my teeth in the morning.

I shook my head just enough for the movement to register. Alex let out a long sigh and flopped back on the pile of sleeping bags.

“I have more to say.” The words came out almost as a whisper.

“Okay.” Alex sat up and folded her hands in her lap. Her hazel eyes locked onto mine and I could tell she was searching my face for some kind of an indicator.

“Marshawn and I are leaving tomorrow.”

I allowed that statement to hang in the air for a moment. The words almost seemed too big and oppressive for our tiny living quarters. It was as if I could feel them pushing on my chest

“Are you going into Estacada to tell those people that the lady died?” Alex’s gaze had not left mine. Her expression had not changed much, but I could see in her eyes that she knew that was not the case. I would not allow that minute trace of hope to linger uselessly.

“No. We are going to find Don Evans. We will end this once and for all.”

That sounded pretty bold. Part of me felt that it was certainly one possible outcome. Unfortunately, I didn’t yet feel like it was the most likely. The best-case scenario had either me or Marshawn coming back alive with the final elimination of Don Evans. The realistic part of my brain said that it was only very slightly possible that either of us returned, and quite likely that Mr. Evans survived.

If that was the case, then why would I even consider such a fool’s errand? The short answer was that I had to do anything in my power to put a stop to this person…once and for all. It was sort of how I had once viewed the lottery: you can’t win if you don’t play…but you probably aren’t going to win anyway. If I didn’t make an attempt to end Don Evans and his barbaric and evil ways, then anything he did was at least partially my fault since I had stood by and done nothing.

Our society had gone off in some odd directions the past several years. It had felt like all people wanted to do was complain. Nobody really wanted to do something constructive to enact change. We’d simply fallen into a place where we waited for somebody else to do it. Societal response had boiled down to protests which were often little more than vandalism-fueled havoc that did nothing to enact change or offer solutions.

Unrestrained by any sort of social deterrent, I was free to act or, in this case, react in any way I deemed appropriate. As far as I was concerned, Don Evans could only be dealt with in one way: death.

That was tougher for me to admit than I originally realized. The reason being that part of me was still clinging to the “old ways” of society and the ideas of right and wrong I’d grown up with. One of the oldest and most engrained ideas was that murder was wrong. And when it came down to it…that was exactly what this would be.

I could put any less offensive synonym on it that I wanted, but I would be setting out to take the life of a living person. That was murder. Pure and simple.

As I looked at Alex, I waited for some form of accusatory or recriminating expression to show in her eyes. When none came, I allowed myself a deep breath. I wouldn’t feel any better about what I was about to attempt, but I wouldn’t feel worse either.

“Just the two of you?” she finally asked.

“Yep.” I kept that single word answer as neutral as I could. I was now ready to start hoping that there wouldn’t be an argument over how she felt she should come with us.

“So, I guess you’ll want me to keep an eye on things here?” Alex said in a matter-of-fact tone. “Does that mean you won’t be pissed if Griffin is gone when you get back?”

Now this was a conversation I could have. “Actually, I am dealing with that next. You won’t have to worry about him.”

“You gonna kill him?” a deep voice whispered.

I jumped and turned to see Marshawn standing in the doorway to my home. He wasn’t alone, and for just a moment, I felt as if I’d just been caught with my hand in the proverbial cookie jar.

“Wow, you gonna hog all the fun?” the man beside Marshawn snorted.

I didn’t know Andrew Greene very well yet. He was the latest addition to our growing community and seemed an okay sort. However, the fact he was so new was just one of perhaps a half a dozen reasons why I didn’t think this was a conversation for him to be privy to. I shot a look at Marshawn that hopefully conveyed that thought.

“Oh, put your scowl away,” Marshawn said with a snort. “Ya know, every time you try to look tough, I try my best not to laugh. It’s like watching a kitten hiss and spit.”

“Excuse me?”

“Some folks just look like nice guys.” Marshawn shrugged his massive shoulders and stepped inside with Andrew.

“Marshawn told me that you two are going after Evans. I told him I thought it was a stupid idea for you to go at him with just the two of you,” Andrew offered.

“No way,” Alex snapped.

Here we go, I thought.

“Just take a breath…” Andrew scrunched up his face and turned a light shade of pink. “I forgot your name.”

“No way is this guy going and making me stay here,” Alex pressed.

“Hold the phone,” I said calmly. “Andrew isn’t going with us.” I glanced at Marshawn. “Right? He isn’t going with us?” I paused again and stared a bit harder at Marshawn for clarification.

“Nobody has been enlisted to join us.” Marshawn glanced at Andrew and gave him a nod.

“There is another group of people that have been giving Don Evans fits off and on since this whole thing got started.” Andrew scratched his head and chuckled. “They almost managed to kill him early on when it was obvious that he was up to no good. Unfortunately, he rolled in deep with his goons and wiped almost the entire group out in this church they’d been staying in.”

My head jerked up at that. “Out in Happy Valley?”

“Yeah,” Andrew replied with a nod. “My people had been hiding out in these apartments that were under construction. We watched the whole thing. That was when we decided to pack up and leave.”

“You didn’t try to help?” Alex snapped.

“They had machine guns on top of school buses. How would you suggest we helped other than offering up our bodies as hot lead fodder?” Andrew turned to Alex, but he remained calm. “At that time, we numbered six people, had two pistols and one rifle. I think we might’ve had a dozen or so bullets for the pistols and diddly squat for the rifle.”

“So,” I spoke up, stepping into the sight line between Alex and Andrew, “how does that help us?”

“Well, a few of them survived. They escaped. About a week or so later, we were in Boring. We’d found this little hole-in-the-wall bar and were thrilled to discover they had a little kitchen. There was a good amount of canned food as well as about two hundred pounds of potatoes. I guess they made their fries from scratch or something.” His face got a faraway dreamy look for a second. “So, we had been at this spot for about a week trying to figure out what to do…where to go. It was late one night, and I was on watch up on the roof when a huge explosion came. I turned just in time to see this big pillar of flame roll skyward.”

“I imagine this all ties in to how this will help us eventually?” I was getting just a bit impatient.

“Yeah.” Andrew nodded vigorously. “The very next morning, me and a couple of our group headed in the direction of the explosion. There was still a wispy plume of black smoke rising in that direction. When we got close, we spotted the husk of a school bus. Nothing too exciting until we made out the wrecked machine gun that was mounted on top. Felt like too much of a coincidence.”

“I am still not seeing how this helps us.” I felt like I might’ve missed something.

“We were about to leave when this man and woman emerged from some shrubs on the side of the road. They’d done that thing where they stuck a bunch of grass and branches in their clothes to blend in with the scenery. The woman leveled a rifle at me, but the guy pushed it down. He said something to her about how we weren’t the ones.”

To say that my patience with this story had expired would be putting it lightly. As he rambled on, I was now recalling how people had mentioned that Andrew Greene had been found trapped in a revolving door in some downtown Portland department store during the first days of the zombie uprising. If the stories were true, one of his best friends had been trapped as well in another part of the same door. Andrew had been forced to watch his friend die and turn before eventually being rescued. He had a tendency to talk. A lot.

“We eventually traded some of our food for some of their firepower and that was when we learned they were survivors from that church. I guess they swore not to stop until they took down the person who killed all their friends.” Andrew glanced around at us. Maybe he had realized he’d been rambling. Whatever the reason, he blushed just a little and then finished with the information that actually might be helpful. “They have a hideout in the old firehouse there in Boring.”

“Thanks, Andrew.” Marshawn patted the man on the shoulder. He nodded and walked out, leaving the three of us.

“You can’t ask him what’s for dinner without getting a twenty-minute answer,” Alex muttered.

“Regardless,” I said with a wave of my hand, “we now have a direction.”

“So, you are leaving tomorrow, and I am supposed to keep an eye on things?” Alex climbed to her feet.

I was momentarily sidetracked watching her lithe form as she stood and stretched. I heard Marshawn cough and glanced over to discover that my staring was not going unnoticed.

“Before we go,” I turned my focus fully to Marshawn, “I am going to deal with Griffin.”

“Deal with?” Marshawn arched his left eyebrow so high, it would’ve made the Rock proud.

“I am giving him the choice to leave voluntarily or under escort.”

“And you think he will stay gone?” Alex laughed.

“I don’t expect him to accept either option willingly.”

“Okay, let me see if I have this straight, you’ve been stressing over how we are getting ready to head out with the intention of taking a life, but you are going to actively try to instigate a situation that will almost assuredly force you to kill somebody.”

I considered his words. On the surface they made sense. The problem was that I was forcing myself toward a new mindset. This would be the first step.

I considered all the things that had taken place since Griffin and his people arrived. I’d had a nagging feeling that there was something off about this guy. The only real problem was that I had no hard evidence to indicate that Griffin Alistair Marshall was doing anything wrong or underhanded.

The bottom line was that I was acting on a hunch…a gut feeling. Something was bothering me like a popcorn kernel stuck in my teeth.

“What do you have in mind, Evan?” Marshawn asked.

“I am simply going to tell him that I don’t think he is a good fit for us here and that I want he and his people to move on.”

“Sounds good.” Marshawn tried to stifle a chuckle without success. “If it was really that easy, don’t you think you might’ve sent him packing earlier?”

“Let’s just say that I have new motivation.”

“You want me to come along…as backup?”

I considered Marshawn’s offer, but in the end, this was something that I wanted and needed to do myself. It only had a little to do with the fact that coming at him with backup might make it seem like I didn’t have the stones to send him on his way on my own. The other part was that I wanted to hopefully cause as little fuss as possible. Ganging up might force the scene to take a direction I was honestly hoping to avoid.

“And what keeps him from coming back as soon as you leave?” Alex asked.

“One reason is that we are not going to make a deal about me and Marshawn leaving.” I turned to face Alex and felt Marshawn exit to leave us alone. “He won’t even know I am gone. If he does anything, it is something that he would try to do whether I was here or not.”

“And that is supposed to make me feel better how?”

“I am simply saying that anything he does won’t be because he thinks he is taking advantage of my absence.”

“And if he does come back…how do you want it dealt with?”

That question hung in the air as I considered it. It was certainly valid. The gut response was that the standing order should be shoot-on-sight. The voice in my head was telling me that I was being a coward. For all my inner self-talk about stepping up and handling things more directly, was I simply ducking the dirty work and letting Alex deal with it…while I was gone?

“I think we need to make a standing order that he is not allowed back and considered potentially hostile,” I answered. The voice in my head roared that I was being weak.

Hadn’t I just told myself that I was about to make a change in how I dealt with things? Yet, here I was, pushing the issue of dealing with Griffin on somebody else.

“Potentially?” Alex scoffed.

“I am going to head over to find him now.”

I didn’t wait for Alex to push the conversation any further, I turned and exited as she mumbled something that sounded pretty angry.

As I walked along the trail, I could not help but marvel at how quickly our little community was coming together. I could hear axes hacking into trees, saws creating their rhythmic noises and the staccato and irregular beat of hammers pounding nails into place.

I paused and smiled. Under all the chorus of construction sounds, I could hear the deep bark of my Chewie. It was a happy sound and I could picture her bounding through the grassy field where a team was digging a deep trench as one of the many lines of defense we were placing.

I came to a clearing in the trees and spotted one of our lookout towers. I could see a shadowy figure at the top, rifle slung over one shoulder. There was an inverted ‘L’ with a piece of metal suspended from it. If the watch spotted something deemed dangerous, he or she would beat on that piece of metal with a steel rod that also hung from the alarm gallows.

That was the only thing that broke the spell of this idyllic setting. Otherwise, it could be any sunny day in late spring before the dead rose.

As I reached the fork in the trail that would take me to the area where Griffin and his people were supposed to be setting up camp, I could catch the occasional bitter stink of the burn pile were the undead were being disposed of on an almost continuous basis—we jokingly referred to it as the Springfield Tire Fire. I wondered if the day would ever come when that fire was out.

As I reached a widening in the trail, I gave myself a mental slap on the face to get primed and ready for what I was certain would be an antagonistic encounter. Why was I nervous, other than the fact that I was never a big fan of confrontation? It wasn’t that I was a pushover, I simply managed to fly low enough under the radar that I seldom ended up in a dispute or disagreement.

As I reached the edge of the clearing that marked where Griffin and his people were supposed to be setting up camp, I paused. This was nothing like any other part of camp.

While every other group, and even the few individuals that had joined us, were setting up something close to permanent, these people were just living in tents. Judging by what I saw, a few weren’t even bothering with tents.

“Evan!” a familiar voice called out.

I glanced around and spotted Griffin. It was hard to control my anger in that moment. And if he chose now to challenge me, it would be hard to take him seriously.

The man was sprawled in a hammock about ten feet above the ground. He had what sure as hell looked like a bottle of beer in his hand that he raised in greeting. Maybe killing the living wouldn’t be as difficult as I thought.

“You make things easy, Griffin,” I sighed as I started toward the man. I stopped a few feet away so I wouldn’t have to crane my neck as much to look up at him. “I came here to talk to you.”

“I figured this was coming,” Griffin said with a grunt as he sat up and swung his legs over, leaping to the ground. “I imagine you want us to help with that trench or something.”

Before the Z-Poc, I watched an episode or two of shows like Survivor. I always questioned if there would or could actually be people who sat by while everybody else did all the work to set up camp. Griffin and his people had certainly dispelled any of those doubts. As a whole, or maybe because they were told to do so, these people had offered almost nothing to the slow but steady process of building our community.

“You and your people need to go.” I let that settle before I continued. “I just don’t think this is a good fit. You and your people obviously don’t want to contribute…and, quite honestly…” I found that I had to steel myself for the next words that would come out of my mouth. “Quite honestly, I don’t trust you and I don’t really like you. I see no reason for you to stay here, and so I want you gone.”

Griffin stood there just smiling and nodding as I spoke. Even when I finished, and as I waited for some sort of caustic retort, he did nothing more than smile.

“Just out of curiosity,” he finally spoke, ending the uncomfortable silence, “if I say no, are you prepared to enforce this?”

“Actually,” a voice from behind me made me jump as Marshawn stepped out to join me with a rifle cradled in his arms, “we are.”

It was only an instant, but I am certain I saw a bitterness in Griffin’s expression that made his eyes squint. Just as fast, it was gone and replaced by a smile that would do a cheesy used car salesman proud.

“I guess that saves us the trouble of telling you and your people that we planned to head out next week anyway.” Griffin turned his focus back to me and continued. “We been picking up a signal out of Vegas. Seems that a community is setting up down there. Supposedly they even have electrical power.”

“I don’t think Evan said anything about next week,” Marshawn snarled.

“Easy, big fella,” Griffin said with a dismissive wave of his hand. “I heard what he said. He’s gonna have to give us at least until tomorrow to get packed up.”

“He ain’t gotta give you a motherfucking thing.” Marshawn took a step past me and allowed his rifle to shift ever so slightly.

Everything seemed to freeze for a moment. The world went silent as if even the birds and insects sensed something was about to happen.

“Tomorrow morning.” I stepped back in front of Marshawn and leveled my gaze at Griffin and the few of his people that had gathered around during this exchange.

Without waiting for a reply or counterproposal, I turned to leave. I gave Marshawn a nudge and when he shot an angry glance my way, I made the slightest shake of my head the only response to his unasked question. With a huff, he deflated just a bit and turned to follow me back to our main camp.

I was surprised to see Andrew, Alex, and perhaps a dozen of our people standing just inside the edge of the tree line.

I had more backup than I’d originally thought. I felt a warm feeling swell in my chest. It looked as if I was officially the group’s leader. These people were not only staying here and helping build my new community, but they were prepared to stand with me to defend it. They were even ready to face off with another group of the living.

It might put a few hours delay on my plans to leave with Marshawn, but now I could depart knowing that I was leaving a community that was prepared to stand together.

It was a strangely good feeling. Little did I know it would be the last such feeling I would have for a very long time…perhaps the last one ever.

2

Marshawn

I opened my eyes to the pure darkness that a world void of any electricity provided. It took a moment to adjust to the point where the glitter of stars outside the window began to flicker and appear amidst the canopy of trees.

I felt something stir beside me and had to force down the surge of guilt that greeted me this morning and had ever since Alex started sleeping beside me.

Despite the fact that we’d done nothing to further any sort of physical relationship, I could not quell the feelings of guilt and betrayal that soured in my stomach and left a bitter taste in the back of my throat.

It hadn’t helped that I’d had that dream again. It was the one where Stephanie opened her eyes in the hospital and stared at me with that undead gaze.

“Why didn’t you protect me, Evan?” she said in a hollow voice that still managed to drip with accusation despite the flatness of the tone.

“I tried, Steph.”

“You failed.”

It was always at that point where I woke in a cold sweat. My hands clenched and tears threatening to spill from the corners of my eyes. Having Alex’s warm body beside me only compounded the feelings of guilt.

Could you cheat on the dead? It was a question I asked myself every single time that I caught myself allowing my glance to linger on Alex for longer than just a few seconds.

Easing out from under the blankets, I slipped my feet into my boots and pulled the overalls I’d taken to wearing at night up and over my shoulders. Fastening the straps, I headed out into the cool pre-dawn air.

A shiver raced down my spine as my skin pebbled against the cold reminding me that it was not cool…it was freaking freezing! Spring was in mid-stride, but in the Pacific Northwest, that only meant the rain was a degree or two warmer than snow and whipped into a sideways sheet when the winds roared down the Gorge. Tonight was crystal clear, so it was probably below freezing.

My breath came in puffs of mist as I made my way to the community fire that was always kept up. It burned day and night and was fed by the various roving watch patrols that kept the community safe after dark.

Stopping at the neatly stacked supply of split wood, I grabbed a piece and took it to the fire, tossing it in and watching as a swirl of orange embers danced skyward.

“You couldn’t sleep either?” Marshawn stepped out of the shadows, a Thermos in his hand with steam wafting from the small mouth of the industrial looking device.

I shrugged. “Any noise from Griffin and his people?” Changing the subject was preferable to talking about my dreams…or nightmares as the case may be.

“They headed out just after dark. I think they left a mess for us to clean up.”

I laughed. “They think they are just gonna bop on down to Vegas and join some group that might or might not have power…I got news for him.”

I didn’t give them even a five percent chance of making it out of the metro area, much less all the way to Las Vegas. Not on foot, and the chances of the roads being open all the way between here and there if they did manage to find transport were slim to none.

“You packed?” Marshawn shook me from my dark thoughts regarding Griffin and his people. Well, mostly Griffin, but if those people were deluded enough to follow him, then they got what they deserved.

“Mostly.”

“Then what are we waiting for?”

I considered the question. I could not think of any good reason to wait. The plan had already been shared to the extent that we were willing. All that remained was for us to get moving.

I headed into my tiny house and grabbed the pack sitting next to the door. I pulled the .30-06 with the laser scope from the wall rack and the ammo pouches that would give me a hundred rounds before I needed to worry about scrounging for more. I fastened the webbed belt with my holstered .45 and the pouch with four mags, each containing ten rounds, around my waist and then clipped on three different sizes of bladed weapons. Last but not least, I grabbed my walking stick. The end had been whittled to a point and then hardened in fire. If all else failed, I could jab it into the face of a zombie…or renegade biker.

By the time the sky was brightening enough that we could start making out details, we’d managed to put a few miles behind us. We had turned right on Springwater and passed by that house where all those cats had been. I couldn’t help but grip my walking stick tighter as we moseyed by. Every rustle of the grass had my bladder tightening to the point where it felt like it was the size of a thimble.

As we continued along, keeping to the center of the road, we passed more expensive homes, U-cut Christmas tree farms, and large pastures. A sound to our left got my attention and I spotted a single horse trotting away from a lone walker that stumbled along with its arms outstretched.

Out of some sort of instinct, I began to veer toward the obviously distressed creature. I crossed in front of Marshawn and felt his hand on my arm before I realized what I was doing.

“What’s the point?” the man asked.

“I…” and my words failed me. I shrugged my shoulders. “So we just do nothing?”

“If you want to cut the barbed wire and free it, great. But that thing is doomed either way. It can’t hide or seek safety.”

“It’s made it this long,” I shot back as the snorts of the large equine drifted on the morning stillness.

“Sure, and now it won’t. We can’t save every person and animal we encounter, Evan.”

A small part of me understood what the man was saying. And to his credit, I even saw the corners of his eyes tighten when the horse let out a frightened whinny. He didn’t enjoy this any more than I did. The difference was that he seemed to be further along in his ability to adapt to the harsh cruelness of our new reality.

It felt awful as I walked away. At least I never heard the poor, doomed animal scream. I doubt I would’ve been able to handle that.

As the morning brought more sunshine and warmth, I peeled out of my jacket, tying it around my waist. Marshawn made no such change, and I could not understand how he endured the heat so easily.

At last, it finally became too much. “Aren’t you roasting?”

“Not really,” Marshawn said with a shrug. “And before you ask or even get started, my buddies used to give me crap all the time about how I wore a coat no matter the weather. I can’t explain it. I think my body stays cooler or something because it has never even bothered me one bit. If I was hot, I’d take it off, but I like wearing my coat. Okay?”

And that was that. We continued on in companionable silence for most of the morning. On occasion, one or both of us would break off to deal with a zombie or two. My mind would not stop going back to that poor horse. During one of my periods of mental drifting, I was snapped out of things by a horrible scream.

I shook my head, making sure that it wasn’t just my imagination. Marshawn had stopped as well, confirming that the sound had not been part of my daydreams. He was looking off into some trees to our left. I could barely make out an older ramshackle house with a moss-covered roof and once white siding that was a dingy brown.

I was so intent in my scanning of the exterior of the house that I missed the misshapen lump that was a body sprawled at the edge of some tall grass running between two well-worn tracks carved into the ground by the countless tires driving up and down the entry drive to the mostly obscured residence.

A second scream made us both start toward the opening to the fenced property with “No Trespassing” signs nailed to the posts on either side. We each chose one of the worn tire paths, with me in the one that would bring me to the downed figure.

It didn’t take long to discover that the body was a zombie that had been dropped by a vicious spiking to the forehead. I didn’t give it more than a cursory glance once I saw that it had been dispatched.

The closer we drew to the residence, the more noise we could hear coming from inside. There was a thud and something that sounded like cloth being ripped. There was also a deep and almost mournful moan.

“Stupid reeker,” a voice that I could not determine the gender of scolded with an almost professorial tone. “You’re only making this harder on yourself.”

I glanced at Marshawn who had pulled up short of the steps leading to the front porch and an open front door. He returned my questioning look with one of his own. As we looked at each other, I heard a grunt and then a loud crash.

“Now you’ve done it!” the voice scolded.

More out of curiosity than a sense of urgency to help, I started up the three bowing steps that creaked threateningly underfoot. I peered inside the front entrance and had to allow my eyes to adjust to the interior gloom before I could make out the scene.

A figure in jeans, workers boots, and a hooded flannel shirt had its back to us. A zombie was trapped between a toppled corner hutch and a massive wooden dining room table. It was a young man in perhaps his early twenties or late teens. He was wearing a tee shirt featuring a band I’d never heard of and sported a nasty series of bites to his one visible arm that pawed at the air in a futile attempt to reach the person standing just a few feet away.

“Everything okay here?” Marshawn said, causing both the stranger and me to jump.

The person turned, weapon up in reflexive defense. He, as it turned out, was wielding what looked like it had once been a cane. It had both ends sharpened to points and one end had fresh, dark stains on it that I guessed came from the corpse we’d passed out front. The man looked like the Unabomber in that he had a scraggly beard that grew wildly and had obviously not been groomed in some time. This was something he’d obviously sported pre-zpoc.

His bright blue eyes were shining with what I was going to take as either intelligence or insanity. I estimated him to be maybe just a shade over five feet tall and a hundred pounds if he kept his clothes on. His hair was blond, and, despite him not being much into his twenties (if my guess was accurate), it was already streaked with gray.

“Don’t come any closer,” the man warned, thrusting his sharpened cane at first Marshawn and then me.

“We don’t want any problems,” I said, raising my hands. “We heard a scream and came to see if somebody was in trouble.”

“Yes?” the man answered with a cock of his head. “Well, nobody here needs your help. You can go.”

“Was it you screaming?” Marshawn asked, apparently ignoring the request.

“Damn thing lurched out of the closet and caught me off guard. Nothing more to it than that.” The man lowered his weapon just a bit. “And…forgive my rudeness. Just seems that most folks are behaving quite poorly…if not predictably, to this new global calamity.”

“Yes, we’ve encountered a bit of that ourselves,” Marshawn said, keeping his distance, but making a show of sheathing his blade.

“Seen horrors that I never believed possible.” Now the man was no longer speaking to us. His face had gotten a faraway expression and his eyes closed, squeezing tight as he obviously recalled something horrible. “I used to read about this atrocity or that and think that it had to be an exaggeration by the media. Surely people could not perform such horrible acts upon one another.” The man’s shoulders slumped, and he gave a slight shudder. “How wrong I was…we are so much worse.”

“Not all of us,” I offered.

As all this went on, the zombie trapped behind the man had continued to struggle and swipe at the air as it reached for the diminutive person standing with his back to it. I had to struggle not to lunge past and end the creature.

“Listen, we are heading out for…” Marshawn began, but then paused as if unsure what to divulge.

“We have a camp back at McIver. Good people there,” I blurted. “You are welcome to go there and see if it is a good fit for you…perhaps settle down and become a part of our little community.”

I didn’t know why, but I had a very good vibe about this guy. Marshawn’s expression showed that he perhaps did not share in my feelings. And maybe it was not the best idea to give what was basically a stranger the location of our people, but if we weren’t going to try to build a strong and safe community, then what was the point? And we would need more people to join us if that was our ultimate goal.

The man peered at me, his eyes squinting despite there being no sunlight streaming in. Giving his chin a scratch, he seemed to consider my words like he might be searching for the catch. At last he gave his head a small shake as if coming to a decision.

“Seems like a generous offer, and perhaps one day I will consider it.” The man turned without any sort of warning and jabbed his cane into the zombie’s face and then turned back to me. “Just don’t think I’m ready quite yet. Still things I plan to see for myself. I got a few theories about these creatures.”

“Theories?” Marshawn asked.

“You don’t think this was some cosmic accident do ya?” the man rasped through a harsh laugh.

“I have no idea what to think,” I admitted.

There had been numerous theories before the world went dark. Many believed it was a terrorist attack. Other felt perhaps some strain of the flu. Hell, there were even those that blamed it on inoculations. As far as a solid, credible reason, I’d heard none from a source I would accept as gospel.

“Contrails.” The man pointed skyward as he let the word escape in a tone that was barely above a whisper.

“Say what?” Marshawn coughed.

I was about to excuse myself and had already taken a step back toward the doorway that led outside. I knew crazy when I heard it.

A low rumble froze me in my tracks. While I couldn’t swear without a visual confirmation, I felt certain I would look outside to see a school bus heading up the road in our direction.

Marshawn obviously thought something similar because he stepped to one side and moved to peer out the front room window. It was filthy and streaked with grime, so I worried that he might not be able to see a damn thing. I moved to the doorway and hugged the frame as I risked my own look outside.

A UPS truck was prowling along the road. Only, well, it was the UPS truck from Hell. Strapped to the grill were a pair of zombies—what was left of them. On the roof was a wire dog kennel of some sort. Inside it was what I could only guess had been a dog at one point. The undead version was so caked and matted in blood, filth, and gore that it was impossible to tell anything beyond the fact that it had four legs.

I could see a figure through the windshield, but the glare from the sun made it impossible to tell if there were more people inside. The vehicle slowed as it reached the T-intersection. For a moment, I worried that it might stop and come check out the house we were hiding in.

After the briefest of pauses, the truck turned left. I sighed an extra bit of relief as I realized that it was heading away from McIver and my people. While I couldn’t say with certainty, I had a hard time believing that whoever was inside was of the kind and decent sort.

“Third time in the past two days that rig has rolled by,” the stranger whispered. “Think they found somebody recently.”

“Why would you think that?” I asked, my own voice a whisper despite it being next to impossible that the person in that UPS truck could hear us as it slowly rolled away.

“Because he only had one of them things on the front last time he came by.”

I looked at Marshawn and he shrugged. It didn’t seem like this guy wanted any help from us. We kept an eye on the UPS truck until it vanished over a ridge and then we left the house. Our own travels would take us in the same direction that the UPS truck went, but it was far enough ahead and loud enough that it was not likely we would be caught by surprise by the occupant or occupants.

“Why do you think people do it?” Marshawn asked as we walked along.

“Do what?” I’d been on autopilot for a while. It was surprisingly easy to do. There was very little to see other than the dense trees that lined this long stretch of road. And since that house, we had neither seen nor smelled a single zombie.

“Turn into such vile creatures.”

I considered the question for a moment. I didn’t honestly know. I could only guess. “No law…no order…no accountability. Look at some of the crap we’ve been capable of throughout history. Any time somebody was in a position of absolute power, it seldom went well for others. Hell, even in the months leading up to this insanity, we had warlords in Africa wiping out villages, crazed zealots blowing themselves and others to bits, school shootings. It is inside us. Hell, if this story was being told from the other side, I bet we could be made out to be the bad guys.”

“I don’t buy that.” Marshawn shook his head. “We are going after a racist, murdering bastard that has no regard for anything or anybody.”

“I guess you’re right, but we are still going out with the intention of hunting down and killing somebody.”

“For the good of others…and ourselves.”

We walked along in silence again for a while and I allowed myself to try and recall some of my favorite memories of Stephanie. They came easily enough, but there was a haze to them. It couldn’t be possible that I was forgetting her this soon.

“Were you…” I paused, not sure how to phrase the question. “Did you have somebody before all this?”

Marshawn was silent for quite a while. I thought he was ignoring me. Perhaps he didn’t hear me, although I doubted it. Maybe it was a simple matter of it being none of my damn business.

“A wife and a little girl.”

I glanced over and noticed that he turned away like he didn’t want to make eye contact. I didn’t know if I’d brought out some emotion that he’d been squashing down or what, but I knew enough to keep my big mouth shut. If he had more to say, he would say it. Otherwise, I would take it as a closed topic. I wouldn’t have to wait long.

“We were just coming home from my mom’s house. Tisha was asleep in the back and Shonda was singing along with the radio.” Marshawn chuckled. “She always thought she could sing like Whitney…but I’m pretty sure there were dogs perking up as we passed.”

“She couldn’t sing well?” I asked before I realized it.

“Well?” Now Marshawn laughed, full and deep. “She couldn’t sing a lick. But that didn’t stop her from belting it out at the top of her lungs.”

There was another moment of quiet. But now, when I snuck a glance, I could see a smile tugging the corner of Marshawn’s mouth up.

“We pulled into the driveway. There were lights on up and down the street, but I didn’t think anything of it at that moment. Hell, I didn’t even notice until after.” Marshawn wiped his face with a bandana that he pulled from his pocket.

Now I knew there was no way I could speak. His expression had grown dark and clouded. It was in that moment that I realized it was the first time I’d seen him without a hint of a smile or some expression like he was remembering a really funny joke.

“I never saw the damned thing.” Marshawn resumed his narrative, but his voice was barely a whisper. There was a strangled sound like he was trying to speak past a huge lump in his throat. “I scooped Tisha out of the back of the car and started for the front door. A light rain was just starting to fall, so I was trying to get her in quick.

“I had my key in the front door when Shonda let loose with the most horrifying scream I’d ever heard. You know the one.” Now I could see the reflection of the sun off the trail a tear had left as it rolled down his cheek. “It made Tisha start and she cried out before she’d even woken up all the way. Hell, I jumped. Almost dropped her in the process.

“When I turned around, I could see Shonda and some guy I couldn’t recognize. They were struggling beside the car and she’d thrown up her arm to fend him off. The guy…we know now, but then, they were just stories popping up on television, only, minus any of the details. Remember those first days when all we’d heard about was some town in Kentucky being quarantined?”

I thought back. I’d gone to work with those stories chirping in the background. Like so many people, I’d become numb to the over sensationalized media blasts of this flu or that virus. I’d hear about a handful of deaths and think, Big deal, there are billions of people and six died? It was hard to worry. That had changed with Stephanie’s frantic phone call as I’d started my day at the high school with all my dreams of affecting lives through turning them on to music.             

“The last thing on my mind in that moment was some zombie taking a bite out of my wife.” Marshawn wiped his eyes and took a deep breath. “I ran up on that guy like I would any normal person who was putting hands on my wife. I jerked him away and he spun awkwardly and actually fell at my feet. When the stench hit me, I had no chance to stop myself and ended up staggering back to be sick. By the time I could recover, that son of a bitch had gotten to his feet and lunged back at Shonda.”

We walked in silence again as Marshawn slipped into a bit of what appeared to be a trance. I wasn’t about to break into whatever he was struggling through. I was now almost certain that this was the first time he was voicing this terrible moment in his life with anybody.

“Shonda’s screams drove me back to my feet and I charged the monster. We slammed back into the side of my car. I heard a nasty crack. When I pushed up and off the guy…the thing…I could see that his head was now just hanging limp. Its neck had been snapped to the point where it lolled in this sickening way. The creature was no longer attacking, but I could hear its teeth clicking as it bit at the empty air.

“All I could think to do was get my girl and my baby into the house. It wasn’t until after I shut the door and leaned back against it that it even dawned on me how not a single person on my street had come out to see what was happening. But even that thought was only a blip as I tended to Shonda and her mangled arm.

“I tried to call 9-1-1 and got that damned ‘all circuits are busy now’ message. With nobody coming, I had to take care of her myself.”

Marshawn chuckled, and I had to look to make sure that he wasn’t breaking down. He glanced at me and even managed one of his huge grins that I knew so well.

“She was crying and wailing, but she actually had the presence of mind to scold me for using one of her good towels when I came in to wrap up her arm. This was also before we’d been told the absoluteness of those tracers in the eyes.” Again, Marshawn went silent.

As we walked along, the warm spring sunshine a direct contrast to the terrible emotions swirling on the man’s face, I pondered how fiction made these things so simple. A part of me felt that maybe this was the wrong time to be having this conversation. We were out in the open where anything could hit us at any time. Having Marshawn deep into his sentiments might not be the best option.

“I saw her eyes and those dark…that hideous look that I had to believe at the time was just a trick of the light. She was crying and there was blood everywhere. My little girl was bawling, and I knew that thing was right outside my door.” After a deep breath              he continued with his voice barely above a whisper. “We didn’t know anything yet. I took care of Shonda as best I could and went upstairs to get her some ibuprofen and fresh towels so I could try to keep her arm cleaned up.

“I have no idea how long it took me to get her quieted and get my little girl settled in and stop crying. At some point, I was standing in the living room and I realized that I was hearing all kinds of sirens…and gunfire. We didn’t live in the best neighborhood, but it wasn’t gang central either. And this was not just a random pop or bang. There were flurries of it. Some were so close I was almost certain they were coming from right outside my door. And then there were the screams.”

It went without saying. We’d all heard them. Hell, I doubted there could be anybody left alive at this point who hadn’t. Sort of like the smell. There were at least two universal constants when it came to the shared experience of the zombie apocalypse. Those had to be the most dominant.

“With both of my girls asleep, I started cleaning up the mess. Blood was everywhere. It seemed that every single time I thought that I had it all cleaned up, I’d find another splatter drop. I think I became a bit obsessed.” Marshawn’s voice tightened, and I could hear the rasp as he strained with these words. “I never even considered for a moment that Shonda would die. It was a bite on the arm…right? And sure, she’d bled pretty bad, but not enough for blood loss to be that big of a concern. I’d seen plenty of people with much worse be perfectly fine. Hell, one rotation in the ER will set you straight on injuries that are potentially fatal.

“I was in the kitchen. After cleaning the living room and bathroom…I guess I dropped into a kind of cleaning autopilot. I just needed the entire house to be spotless, ya know?” He began to grip the handle of the large machete hanging from his hip. “So, when I heard footsteps coming, I expected to see a worn-out Shonda. Maybe she would need a recap…be told it wasn’t some terrible nightmare or—”

The sound of gunfire just around a large, sweeping bend that took us down at a fairly steep angle cut him off. We both stopped and instinctively drew our pistols. It’s strange, but if we encounter one of the walking dead, the habit is to reach for a blade or something that is not a firearm. However, if the source might be the living, the instant reaction is to grab a pistol or rifle.

As the echo of what I was certain had to be a shotgun blast finished reverberating off the rolling hills surrounding us, I could make out the rattle and cough of an engine. The only vehicle we’d seen since leaving the base camp was the beat-up UPS truck. This sounded awfully similar.

I pointed to the right side of the road and myself, then I pointed to the left and Marshawn. He nodded in understanding and we clasped hands in what could always be a permanent farewell.             

I ducked through the thick brush and used my spiked walking stick to move blackberry brambles aside. I reached a three-strand barbed wire fence and ducked between the top and middle strands. That put me in a massive open field. I could see a dilapidated old barn structure that had a very distinct lean to the left as if it was about to be folded down to the ground or like something from a kid’s pop-up book.             

The grass was about to mid-thigh and I had to figure that this was going to be beyond out of control before the end of the summer. I hugged the fence line as I headed toward the deep rumble that I was guessing to be the UPS truck.

As I drew near enough that I could smell the exhaust and the telltale stench of the undead, I slowed. There was no reason for me to rush, but that damned curiosity ramped up to the point that I had to push through the brush. What I saw made me gasp. I doubted that I would ever get to the point where these sorts of things wouldn’t get to me and make my blood run cold.

The man must’ve veered to avoid a collision with a small pack of about a dozen of the undead. He’d gone off the road and into the two or three-foot-deep ditch that ran alongside the road. He’d gone mostly through his windshield.             

His upper torso was dangling through the broken glass, and I could see a dark stream of blood dripping from his head and splashing the two zombies mounted to the front of the truck. They were squirming and snapping at the air to get at it.

But that wasn’t the bad part.

The undead had piled into the open front cab and gone to town on the man’s lower half. A pair of them were engaged in a gruesome tug-of-war involving part of a leg. More still were jostling for position like a litter of ten puppies each trying to nurse from only eight teats. They were ripping away chunks of the man’s lower extremities before being shoved aside for the next one to get in.

I looked across the road and saw Marshawn poke through some pine trees. He took in the scene and then motioned for me to meet him up the road. I nodded and slipped back into the grassy field. It only took a few minutes for us to be around the sweeping bend in the road and reunited.

“You don’t think we could’ve found something useful in that UPS truck?” I asked as we resumed our trek.

“I think we will be able to find lots of stuff as we travel. No reason to put ourselves at risk like that. Pick and choose, that’s how we stay alive,” Marshawn said.

I shrugged. I guessed that I could see his point. That truck was basically crawling with the undead. Considering they’d been the first ones we’d seen for a while, I had to agree there would be better opportunities.

“I was asleep when Shonda attacked our little girl.”

That sentence came out of the blue. It was also spoken so softly that I almost thought I’d imagined it.

“I woke to a shriek that was beyond anything I had ever heard. Maybe because it was my baby girl…maybe my mind has amped it up into something bigger than it really was. But then she started crying and begging her mommy to stop…to stop biting her.”

“Jesus, man…” I blurted. “I’m so damned sorry.”

“I went into my little girl’s bedroom…Shonda…the thing that she’d become…she was clawing at my baby girl,” Marshawn continued like I had not said a word. “And I stood there.”

And then we walked in quiet. The big man had sort of checked out on me. I glanced at him as we walked and could tell that he was miles away in the worst place possible these days: memories.              

I began to doubt that our expedition was going to fare well. In the best situation possible, we were heading into a woodchipper headfirst. We were outmanned, outgunned, and taking on the enemy in what would likely be his own territory.

“She tore her fucking throat out, man.” The words came out as a sob. “And all the blood…it sprayed the walls, Shonda, her stuffed animals. I could see her little snowman all splattered in red like some twisted Disney parody. And…I slammed the door. I knew it was over. My little girl had stopped screaming and just lay there staring up at the ceiling while her mother ripped her belly open and tore pieces of her out.

“I think I just passed out…fainted…whatever. Hell, maybe my mind simply switched off because it couldn’t deal. When I snapped back to the world, there was this pounding and scratching at the door to my daughter’s room. I knew it was both of them…that the television hadn’t been telling us the whole story. Still, didn’t want to believe it, but I knew, man. And in that moment, I didn’t want to be here. I didn’t want to do this without them. My whole reason for living was on the other side of that door, and in that moment, I understood how this would spiral out of control.

“It didn’t matter that we had a kick ass military or that so many regular citizens owned firearms. People can’t just kill their loved ones…friends…family. We ain’t wired that way. All that crap about ‘taking care of each other if we turned’ is a bunch of damn fiction. I couldn’t imagine driving some spike into Shonda’s head…much less my baby girl’s. Hell, I was ready to let them just take me.” He paused and rubbed his side where his own bite scar existed.

And in that moment, I knew how he’d been bitten.             

3

Twists and Turns

We made our way down the road without any real excitement. Neither of us had much to say and I almost allowed myself to enjoy the silence that is so prevalent in this dead world. It didn’t seem nearly as oppressive or ominous having somebody along with me.

We were rolling into the later part of the day now, and that meant we would probably need to find a place to hunker down for the night. My first choice was a strip mall that I recalled being just ahead and around yet another of the many twists and turns that this road offered.

If that didn’t pan out, there would be a gas station a bit further along. As a last ditch, we could try the Home Depot. What I didn’t want to do was wade into a residential area. They offered too many unpleasant possibilities.

When we reached the strip mall, I wasn’t surprised to see the little pizza place and mini mart had been hit, front windows were busted, and the door on the pizza place had actually been ripped away completely.

A small nail salon and beauty parlor (did they still call them that?) looked untouched. All we needed to do was make it inside without destroying a window or the door. That is always easier said than done.

I pointed it out and Marshawn fell in beside me as I started up the shallow incline of the entry drive. Rotting corpses were scattered around the parking lot. Several were haphazardly piled just inside the entrance to the pizza place. They were pretty old looking. This place had fallen to a siege of the undead, but it had been weeks ago at least.

I made a beeline for the door to the nail place. Reaching the front, I cupped my hands to the dirty glass and peered into the gloom. I didn’t see anything moving. That didn’t mean that the coast was clear. There looked to be at least one back room, what I was guessing to be a closet, and an alcove where I could see the hint of a desk.

I thought back to when I’d broken into that vet’s office and figured the best way would be to repeat that method. I gave the door an experimental push and pull just to be sure, and then broke in the lower half of the glass front door.

We crawled inside and discovered the place to be totally empty. After pushing a large cart in front of the hole, we moved to the back room through the archway at the rear of the salon and opened our packs to have a dinner of dried meat, a couple of carrots, and some trail mix. We washed it down with water and then settled back to relax for the night. I drifted off in the silence, Marshawn’s own soft snoring lulling me to sleep.

***

“Hey,” Marshawn hissed in my ear, snapping me out of a dream that evaporated as soon as I opened my eyes, leaving behind only a cold sweat that told me it had likely been unpleasant.

“Wha—” I started, but he put his hand over my mouth, silencing my bleary question.

He pointed to the front window. I could see the first promises of morning sunlight filtering through a few of the trees that were scattered about the edge of the strip mall parking lot and across the road. He turned his head back to me and gave a single shake of his head.

He got to his feet and I followed suit, wincing at the pain in my back. To add to my early pains, my butt was simultaneously numb and sore from sitting on the hard floor all night. If that was the worst thing to happen today, I’d call it a good day.

Looking outside, I could not even see the road that we’d been travelling along. The undead were so thick, spilling over into the parking lot of the strip mall and into the ditch on the far side of the road.

“What the holy hell?” I whispered.

This group was not heading in any specific direction. They were simply standing around. A few moved a little one way or the other, but this mob was not going anywhere. It was almost like they were waiting for something…or somebody.

“Any idea what fresh slice of hell this might be about?” Marshawn whispered.

“Maybe they are all gonna drop dead?” My answer came out like more of a question, but I was equally confused. “Or they ran of batteries?”

Marshawn snorted—whether in disgust or amusement I could not be certain. I took a look around and my eyes fell on the solid metal door on the back wall.

“We could sneak out the back,” I offered.

“That door is locked, and I couldn’t find any keys.” Marshawn turned to me. “There is no way we could bust it open and not draw those things to us. They would pour through that window like water.”

I was about to say something else when a low roar that I could feel to my bones began. Not more than a few seconds later, I felt the ground beneath me shift.

The building began to creak and groan as anything loose started to fall to the floor in a clatter that was mostly drowned out by the rumble that was now loud enough to almost hurt my ears. I staggered to one side and saw a crack start slowly and then race up one wall.

Our choices were down to staying put and possibly being crushed to death by this building that did not seem sturdy enough to withstand the terrible shaking of what I now knew to be an earthquake or making a run for it outside where a horde of the undead stood waiting. The choices sucked but staying put was almost a definite death sentence.

I made for the door and felt my body stagger to one side like I was an actor on the bridge of the Enterprise during one of those overdramatic attack scenes where everybody flailed from one side to the other. As I threw the door open, I saw what looked like a big ripple—the kind you might witness at a large pond—roll across the asphalt of the parking lot leaving cracks in its wake.

As I staggered across the mostly open space, I could see the undead toppling like dominoes. If you saw this scene from a distance, you might think they were nothing but unstable mannequins. As they fell, each of them remained basically frozen in place. I wasn’t going to spend a lot of time trying to figure out what exactly was going on. I took off at a run just as the earthquake ceased, heading up the gradually sloping road. I could hear Marshawn’s feet slapping the pavement behind me just a few paces away

A few of the undead had wandered ahead of the larger group and I glanced at them as I passed by. They were all seeming to simply stare straight up at the sky. None of them appeared to notice our passing.

I risked a glance over my shoulder. I expected to see the undead all struggling to their feet and coming for us, but not one of them moved. It was as if they were all frozen in place. We rounded a corner and I saw a single body lying in the driveway of the gas station just ahead. I veered toward it now that we were at least somewhat in the clear.

As soon as I got close enough, the stench told me it was one of the undead. Drawing my blade, I moved in with caution. I reached the thing and looked down on what had once been a young woman in maybe her late teens or early twenties. Her blond hair was matted and clumped from the filth and blood that they’d been exposed to. Her throat was missing and all that existed where it had once been was a nasty hole.

The zombie just stared up at me but made no attempt to reach for me. I toed it and jumped when it let out a soft, low moan.

“What the unholy fuck,” Marshawn gasped.

He joined me beside the seemingly impotent creature and whistled low between his teeth. After a moment, he also gave the creature a nudge with his booted foot. Again it moaned, but made no move to rise or grab at us.

“Could this be it?” I asked out loud.

“No idea,” he answered. “But we should make the best of this while we can.”

We headed up the road toward a sign that announced a few small restaurants, a mini-mart, and a liquor store.

It was no surprise that a lot of anything useful had long since been picked clean, but people always left something behind. In one of the little diners, we found a few cans of stewed tomatoes, along with a few boxes of individually wrapped crackers. It might not seem like much, but beggars could not be choosers in the apocalypse. We also found seltzer water in the liquor store.

Before long, we were on the move again, passing an opened bottle of the carbonated water back and forth. This led to one of my lesser moments as Marshawn and I engaged in a belching contest where we mimicked zombie moans. It wasn’t something I’d be proud of, but in the end, I was declared the winner, so there was that.

All day long we walked. Every zombie we passed lay motionless. We even passed a trio of zombie children and I was strangely relieved to see they were suffering the same fate.

The quake had by no means been ‘The Big One’ that local media always liked to trot out and scare people with every single time some other location had a large-scale quake that did heavy damage. But we did see plenty of signs of damage as we walked along. There were more than a few toppled chimneys, cracked pavement, and a few older homes looked like they were leaning one way or the other.

Knowing where we were, I guessed that we would reach our first target destination sometime tomorrow. The road we were on was a simple two-lane affair that wound through lots of wooded countryside. There were a few houses, and they all looked abandoned. We were about to pick one when I saw a sign that caught my eye.

“Jed’s gun repair,” I mused aloud.

“Think old Jed is still there?” Marshawn asked as we stood in front of the obviously old house that had a large wooden structure attached that was likely a workshop.

Looking around, I was willing to guess he was not. The yard had a few zombies in it, one that was in the throes of the earthquake-induced catatonic state.

We approached the door to the shed since it seemed the most likely location to find firearms. If we could add to our arsenal, so much the better.

Sadly, we were only partially correct. The shed was indeed the workshop. However, the guns we found were in various stages of having been dismantled. Neither Marshawn nor I had the inclination nor the experience to piece things together.

We moved on to the residence and went around to the back since the front door and every road-facing window had a steel grate in place that would defy any of our abilities to break in without some sort of power saw. The back yard was fenced and obviously set up to deter intruders with the heavy-duty chain link topped with three rows of razor wire. The gate was secured with sturdy chain and a massive padlock.

“Maybe we move on,” Marshawn suggested.

“Hold up.” I dashed back to the shed and returned with a set of massive bolt cutters.

It took both of us using every bit of strength we possessed, but we eventually cut the chain. I’d only taken a few steps into the overgrown back yard when I heard a low rumble. My eyes scanned the tall grass and stopped on a large doghouse.

“Crap,” Marshawn hissed.

We were both frozen in place. My eyes were locked on the grass, waiting for it to show signs of what had to be a guard dog that was on the move. Time seemed to freeze as we waited, both of us gripping a machete and waiting for the source of that noise to rush us.

After a long wait, nothing approached. Together, we began our advance into the yard. I saw it first and gasped.

“Poor bastard,” I said.

We’d found Jed. Well, more likely, what remained of him. He’d obviously turned. The open back door indicating how he’d arrived here in the back yard.

A massive dog that looked to be some sort of cross between a Pit Bull and a Rottweiler with a spiked collar that was attached to a sturdy chain was staring up at us with undead eyes. It had a few rips and bites out of it, but the remains of the man we guessed to be Jed had been savaged. In the process, the undead duo had gotten all tangled in the chain and neither could hardly move.

Marshawn and I advanced and spiked them. Once that was done, we headed for the house.

The inside smelled musty and rats scurried away as we entered. The floor was stained with old blood and an open refrigerator had been ransacked by the rodents and whatever other creatures had found their way inside.

As we passed though the filthy kitchen, we flipped open cupboards and cabinets to find nothing worth scavenging. The vermin had been enjoying a bounty here and left little for anybody else.

Heading down the hallway, we entered the living room with two open doorways that revealed what had to be a bathroom and the bedroom.

“This place is smaller than my first apartment,” Marshawn quipped.

The smell of rot and decay was heavy as we ventured all the way into the living room. I don’t know how I’d missed it, but my eyes now locked on a pair of legs I could make out in the doorway of the bedroom. Unable to resist, I was drawn to take a closer look much like passers-by at a terrible car accident.

I reached the doorway and peered into the gloomy bedroom kept dark by the drawn blinds. On the floor was a woman perhaps in her late fifties. Her white hair a shock of brightness in an otherwise dismal setting. Her throat had been ripped out and her belly torn open. Her thin form had been brutally mauled, and every bite mark stood out on her arms and legs. Missing fingers on both hands indicated to me that she had perhaps tried to fend her attacker off. The single bullet hole in her forehead had a dark halo and a dried pool of blood had mostly either evaporated or been collected by the multitude of flies and vermin that still buzzed around the corpse or skittered in the shadows.

“We aren’t staying here,” I said as I backed out of the room. “And it looks like there is nothing for us to take. This guy has either been looted or did not have anything much that wasn’t in some state of repair when all hell broke loose.”

“Seems strange that a gun repair guy doesn’t have any guns,” Marshawn lamented. “Sort of like a tattoo artist without any ink, ya know?”

“Well, if he had anything, it’s long gone.”

We went to the front door and were about to leave when a peculiar sound caught the attention of us both. At first, I mistook it for a car or truck.

“A helicopter?” Marshawn blurted as I realized what I was hearing and began to fumble for the door.

We both emerged onto the front porch and began scanning the sky. With the quiet so overwhelming, the source of this sound seemed to come from every direction at once.

At last, we spotted it. It was definitely a military helicopter. One of those big two-rotor rigs. It was flying high above everything and well off to the north. I knew it was north because I could see the glacier-capped top of Mount Saint Helens in the distance and Mount Hood was to my right. The helo was towards the direction of Saint Helens.

I raised my arms and began waving frantically for a few moments until I realized I was alone in my actions. I turned to Marshawn, confused as to why he simply stood there. My face must’ve given away my thoughts.

“There is literally no way they would see us from that far away, Evan.”

I dropped my arms in defeat with the realization that he was correct. That didn’t stop us both from standing on the porch of the rickety old house and watching as the helicopter shrunk to a dot and finally vanished off to the east.

We continued up the road a ways and ended up seeking refuge in one of those drive-thru coffee shacks. On the plus side, we were able to stuff a few bags of the ground goodness into our packs. I couldn’t recall the last time I’d had real coffee. In fact, we’d been almost out of instant, so that even that had become a rare luxury saved for the communal breakfast we held every so often.

Morning came and brought the typical drastic weather change I’d experienced every spring. Yesterday’s sunshine was replaced with a chill, wind, and rain showers. I missed having a weatherman give me at least some idea of what to expect each day. I hadn’t realized what a luxury that happened to be.

I was about to open the door and step outside to relieve myself when I froze. A lone figure was making its way along the road. The jerky movements of its head and the slow shamble told me right away that the undead—at least this one—had resumed being mobile.

I relayed my discovery to Marshawn who snorted something I couldn’t make out. With a shrug, I very cautiously opened the door and peered outside. Sure enough, I could see a few of them moving about.

“I guess it’s just a temporary thing,” I groused as I moved over behind a large truck and unzipped my pants.

I was staring up at the sky as my bladder emptied itself when I heard the crunch of gravel at the same moment something sharp and cold pressed against my throat.

“Don’t move a muscle or this is how you die,” a raspy voice hissed in my ear.

I was wracked by the bizarre sensation of feeling like I had to piss at the same time my muscles contracted to the point of cutting my current activity off in midstream. The sharp edge of the blade at my throat shifted without losing contact with my skin and I felt the sting of being cut a moment before I sensed a trickle of hot liquid roll down my neck.

“You ain’t out here without supplies…where they at?” the voice insisted.

“Look, I don’t want any trouble,” I started.

“Well that seems to be ‘zactly what you found,” the voice wheezed.

I caught the whiff of foul breath this time and had to stifle a gag. This person didn’t seem to have brushed their teeth since probably before the undead rose, I guessed.

“Put them hands up and turn around nice and slow,” the voice ordered.

“Can I at least tuck myself away?” I asked.

“You think I ain’t seen a man’s pecker?” This was followed by an ugly, braying laughter. “Just put your hands up in the air and turn around slowly.”

I turned to see a woman who’d obviously not ever considered sunscreen as an option and most likely chain-smoked. Her face was leathery and heavily creased with wrinkles that cut dark crevices in her skin. Her eyes were rheumy and squinted in a perma-glare. Her cracked lips were split with skin tags that looked ragged. Her graying hair might’ve been some kind of brown once, but it was hard to tell since most of it was stuffed under an oily beanie.

The blade in her hand was a long, sharp Bowie knife. A pair of pistols were dangling from her bony hips and a shotgun jutting up over one shoulder. If I had to guess, I would say she might weigh ninety pounds if you included the gear she was packing.

The man behind her matched her haggard and malnourished appearance. His leering smile revealed a few missing teeth, and the ones still present were shades of yellow and brown. Somehow, despite his scrawny appearance, he managed to sport a pot belly. His coveralls were filthy and looked as if they might disintegrate if exposed to water. He was wearing a floppy brimmed cowboy hat with a pack of cigarettes stuck in the band.

“So…gonna ask once more and then I might just shoot that little dangler of yours off if’n I don’t get no answer,” the woman rasped. “Your gear…where is it?”

I glanced over at the coffee shack and caught a brief glimpse of something in one window that might’ve just been a trick of the overcast morning light. I cursed myself as the man spun on his heel and started for where I knew Marshawn to still be.

I could do nothing as the man grabbed the door and flung it open. Time stopped for just a split second as the man took that first step up to enter the shack.

The sharp ‘pop-pop’ of what I had to assume to be one of Marshawn’s .45s sounded. The woman’s nasty smile turned to a look of surprise as she spun instinctively to the sudden sound. I knew I only had a heartbeat or two to react and lunged.

I’m not a big guy, but her scrawny frame almost folded over backward when I slammed into the small of her back. We hit the ground hard and her knife skittered away. I heard something crunch as her face bounced of the gravel and took the opportunity to grab her by the back of the neck and slam it down again.

Rolling off her, I reached down and snatched one of the pistols from its holster at her hips. Shoving the business end against her side, I squeezed the trigger.

Nothing.

Glancing down, I saw the safety toggle and flipped it with my thumb. She was just starting to moan and try to roll over when I fired off two shots into her side.

I scrambled to my feet as the woman tried to roll over. With one booted foot on her shoulder, I pinned her down and fired another shot into the back of her head.

The sound echoed through the large, empty lot. I stared down at the splatter stain that oozed across the ground with slow sureness. It was like watching an oil leak in a way. Or…maybe that was what I told myself as I pushed down any feelings of guilt that threatened to rise up.

“You okay?”

Marshawn was at my side, his own pistols still in each hand. I looked up at him and shrugged. Again I was struck by how easy I’d been led to believe taking another human life could be. The reality was that this woman and her companion would most likely have killed me. If I hadn’t killed her, then I would be dead.

As the adrenaline seeped from my system, I felt a sting on my throat and wiped at it with the back of my wrist. Looking down, I saw a crimson smear. She’d cut me. Not much, but enough to draw blood. Proof that she was obviously not nearly as concerned about injuring or killing another person.

“You did the right thing,” Marshawn offered. “There is no scenario where she leaves you alive if I hadn’t been here. They were gonna take your stuff and leave your corpse behind without a second thought.”

Maybe he was right, but if that were the case, why hadn’t she just killed me when she got the drop on me? I wondered.

Gathering our gear, we moved out before the undead could converge. Already I was seeing a few of them wandering out of the woods and from around the corners of houses. We hit the road and I realized not for the first time how strange everything seems when you don’t zoom past in a car with your stereo cranking some AC/DC or Van Halen.

“We should be in the area where those people were last spotted in a few hours,” I commented as we paused to eat some dried meat and sip some water.

“You think those people are still there just wasting their time trying to harass that Evans prick?” Marshawn asked after capping his canteen.

“It ain’t like they got anything better to do.” Even as I said it, I heard the foolishness of that statement.

There were plenty of things to do. For one—and this was a big one—there was survival. The look on Marshawn’s face said he wasn’t buying my response either.

We continued along, taking the back roads as we went as they wound through the wooded, sparsely populated boondocks out in this part of the area that surrounded Portland. The undead were almost totally absent as we traveled, and only once did we have to engage with them.

There was one moment where I had a chill travel down my spine like I was being watched. I stopped and turned a full circle but didn’t see anything.

Eventually, I could see a familiar sign that informed me I was entering “Boring—but never dull—Oregon”. I felt a lump rise in my throat when we rounded the lazy curve of the highway.

Suspended from the power lines that ran alongside the two-lane highway were over two dozen people. None of them were struggling which meant they’d been the living, hung by their necks until they died.

As we neared, we saw signs dangling from around their necks. Each one was a derogatory term used to announce their non-white heritage. This could only be the work of Don Evans.

It wasn’t that I didn’t believe there were more people like him, and I certainly would not be foolish enough to believe he was the only one to make it this far into the apocalypse, but I had no doubt whose work we were witness to.

I overcame my initial desire to cut them down. For one, they were too high up and we had no means to reach them. That didn’t mean the desire wasn’t there.

“This is why we are out here risking our asses,” Marshawn muttered as if to himself as he stood below one of the dangling corpses, staring up at it with his hands shielding his eyes.

The sound of gravel crunching behind us made us both spin around. I had a pistol in my hand, Marshawn whipped the shotgun he’d taken from our last encounter up to his hip.

There was a tall hedge blocking our view into the parking lot of a small mom and pop café as well as one of the countless drive-thru coffee carts. The greenery rattled a bit and then a hand reached through.

I didn’t need to see the body attached to it to know a child was about to emerge. Sure enough, a moment later, a boy of perhaps seven or eight peered out at us. As soon as his gaze locked on us, he froze. I didn’t move, but my eyes began to scan the area.

No encounter with zombie children had ever gone the same way twice. I’d also noticed a trend for the child version of the zombie to travel in groups. I still hadn’t figured them out, but I was at least starting to learn some of their tendencies.

Sure enough, movement to our left got my attention. A pair of children were peering from behind an old pickup truck. One of them even pulled back and vanished as soon as it realized I’d spotted them.

Realize? That would imply cognition, and that would screw with my head if it came down to having to kill them.

“Evan.” Marshawn’s voice broke into my thoughts and I glanced over.

“Oh fuck.”

A small park was just a little farther up the road. Emerging from it were at least twenty zombie children. I was not surprised when I spotted several cats weaving in and out of their legs. Dragging itself along in their wake were a few of the adult versions. Oddly enough, they were all missing one or both legs. I didn’t want to dwell too long on that.

I backed up a step, my head now on a swivel. Marshawn and I both had the same idea. There was some sort of equipment rental place almost a half a block away up a street that branched off from this one. It had a tall chain link fence around it with no barbed or razor wire on top. We shouldn’t have any trouble outdistancing them and getting over without a problem. From there we could probably just exit from a different side and be away from them without any actual confrontation.

I looked over my shoulder as we reached the fence and saw that the children had ceased their advance. The crawlers were still coming, but they were far enough away that we didn’t even need to climb the fence and escape through the equipment lot.

Marshawn reached the fence first and hit it at a jog not realizing that I’d already pulled up. The fence made a metallic rattle that sounded much louder than it probably was in all reality. A sound from behind a small forklift parked in the lot caught us both by surprise.

The children still remained in place which was a huge relief. The two big dogs that crawled out from behind the forklift were much scarier. Their ribs were visible enough that you could count them individually.

Both animals pulled their lips back to reveal very wicked looking teeth. The lack of film over their eyes told me they were very much alive, although obviously starving. Still, their muzzles were coated with dried gore which had me searching the area. When I saw the legs jutting from under a toppled stack of pallets, I had an idea what had kept them fed. I didn’t see a ready source of water, but there was a good portion of the lot that I could not see clearly, so I assumed there was something somewhere.

A closer look at those legs revealed that what I really saw were a pair of booted feet at the end of bones that had been stripped clean. In their current condition, I thought that they should be fairly easy to fight off, but that was not a theory I was willing to test.

“They’re moving again.” Marshawn poked me in the ribs.

I turned back to see that he was right, the zombie children and their entourage of cats were making their way in our direction again. It was almost as if—

“They can see we are trapped,” Marshawn breathed.

We weren’t exactly trapped. We could skirt the edge of this lot and slip down the back side of it…into what was definitely a neighborhood. Even from here I could see the destruction as well as a few shadowy figures stumbling along the streets.

I decided I would rather take my chances with zombies that I could at least somewhat predict. We would have to go into the neighborhood and find our way from there.

I started along the fence, only a little annoyed that the two dogs limped along making a huge fuss. One of them sort of threw itself at the fence when Marshawn got close because the path was so narrow and the brambles on our left were thick and nasty, promising to cause pain.

I was just a step or two in front of him and lost my footing, falling to my knees. Out of instinct, I reached for the fence and felt a solid pain explode in my wrist. A second later, there was a crunch and a yelp. I rolled over to see Marshawn yanking a knife free from where he’d driven it into the eye socket of one of the dogs.

The animal had not even hit the ground when its companion began to tear into it. I started to stand up, rubbing my wrist.

“Did you have to kick me so hard?” I groused.

“No, I coulda let you get your fingers bitten off.” Marshawn reached out and helped me to my feet. “Now get moving.”

We scrambled along the path and in no time were to a point where the zombie children were no longer visible. That didn’t mean they’d stopped following us; that only meant we couldn’t see them for the moment. I, for one, did not trust that in the slightest.

We pulled up at a tall wooden fence that ran along the back of a house that sat at the edge of this neighborhood. From what I could see, these were not houses on the upper end of the price scale. I was guessing this neighborhood to have been built in the 70s. Maybe even before.

I could smell the undead and knew damn well that our relatively easy trip had just shifted into something much more dangerous.

I joined Marshawn who had pulled himself up enough to get a look into the backyard. A rusty swing set was the only real form of decoration in the yard that was equal parts dying grass, weeds, and crab grass.

There was a single step up to a small concrete pad that sat at the back door. The door itself had been white once but was now filthy, faded, and actually very inviting. Mostly because there was not a single splatter of blood on it.

We both climbed over, crossing the yard slowly as we kept our eyes on the two windows that faced the back of the small house. Nothing seemed to stir, and none of the blinds moved at all. Again, these were all good signs. It didn’t promise that there would be no zombies inside, but this was at least a promising start.

We reached the door and I gave the knob an experimental turn. I could not help but be surprised when it turned and the door opened just a crack.

We waited a moment and I know that I gave an experimental sniff. The stench of the undead didn’t come flooding out. In fact, it seemed worse out here than it did inside.

We opened the door, still staying alert for anything that might come lurching out of the shadows. Stepping inside, we were in a filthy kitchen. The sink was piled with dirty dishes that had long since molded and added their own stink, although it was just a normal one that we could ignore.

The cupboards were all thrown open and I had to guess that the former residents had grabbed what they could and took off. Very little remained for us to scavenge, but I did find a jar of homemade pickles in the back of one of the cabinets.

Grabbing it, I twisted the top and allowed the pungent vinegary smell to cleanse the odor of rot and decay as much as it could. Setting the jar down, I peeled off one glove and plucked one pickle from the brine and offered it to Marshawn. He wrinkled his nose, but he still removed a glove and accepted it.

We both wandered through the empty house and ensured it was indeed vacant. Once we were certain, we returned to the living room and plopped down to finish our snack.

“Well,” Marshawn groaned after his second pickle, “you think it is safe to venture out now?”

“No, but I guess that we should do it anyway. We aren’t gonna get anything done sitting here.”

“I saw what I am pretty sure was that small tavern that those people supposedly were using as their base. It is about three blocks up from that park with the zombie kids.” Marshawn grabbed his canteen and popped it open to take a drink. “If we can slip through this neighborhood, then we should be able to get there without dealing with those damn children.”

“Sounds like a plan.”

I took a drink and then we made another walk through of the house to see if we could scavenge anything before we headed out. Other than a half a tube of toothpaste that I considered a great find and a pint of some generic brand of vodka that Marshawn tucked inside his coat, there wasn’t much here worth taking.

We went to the front door and peeked out the window beside it. The street was not that busy. I counted less than a dozen zombies scattered about. Getting out would be relatively easy as long as we stayed quiet and tried to hug the shadows and use cover as much as possible.

My eyes traced a potential route for us, and after a moment of quiet conversation, Marshawn and I had agreed upon the path we would take.

Opening the door as quietly as possible, I slipped out onto the rickety front porch, wincing at the slightest creak from the loose boards underfoot. We hopped to the ground, using the trees beside the porch as cover and moved in a crouch to the edge of the next house.

A large hedge ran along the front which gave us excellent cover. We used it and when we reached the end, I pushed through as quietly as possible.

I emerged and instantly threw myself backwards, colliding with Marshawn and sending us both tumbling to the ground in a heap.

A low chorus of moans made the hairs on my arms and the back of my neck stand on end.

The zombie children had gathered en masse, and I’d popped out with my head just a few feet from the nearest. As I’d fallen back, I was certain that every head had turned my direction.

4

Strangers

I scrambled to my feet and brought my pointy-ended walking stick up and to the ready as the bushes vomited a horde of zombie children all reaching and clutching at the air for us. I’d seen them revert to a “normal” zombie anytime they’d been confronted with a weapon. Since it was unlikely they’d seen mine, I had to guess that perhaps the sudden fright or whatever had been the catalyst.

Marshawn was up as well and had a blade in each hand. We were both bracing for the first of the undead children when a moan from behind us made me spin around. A pair of regular adult zombies were trudging toward us from across the street, obviously drawn by all the racket.

We needed to get the hell out of here. This was quickly reminding me why I didn’t want to venture into a neighborhood.

Marshawn took off toward the regular undead and I came after him, hot on his heels. Both of us stepped up and made short work of the closest, but it was now clear that we’d rung the neighborhood dinner bell.

Zombies were emerging from practically everywhere. I spun in reaction to a loud crash and saw three pour through a shattered living room window. This was another bit of proof to the age of this neighborhood, because that window had been nothing more than a single pane by the looks of the jagged remnants. I saw one of them struggle to its feet with an enormous shard of glass jutting from its face.

A low moan brought me back around and I easily dispatched the next closest of the approaching undead with my blade plunging into the temple of a short, skinny woman with a chunk ripped out of her face that had allowed her left eye to come out at some point leaving behind a massive crater on that side of her head.

We pushed on, breaking free of what was becoming a constricting noose of the undead. Our choices were to go straight, which would lead us deeper into the neighborhood, left which I was pretty sure would take us in the direction of that tavern where those people were supposedly hiding out, or right which I was certain would also take us into the neighborhood as well as towards the zombie children—provided I hadn’t been spun around in this little melee.

I had not realized that neighborhoods were this bad. I’d guessed, and had seen some examples, but I think I’d been secretly hoping that maybe some of them had thinned out by now.

It was not lost on me that I was only seeing adult versions. I had to guess that perhaps every child in this neighborhood had gathered together into that little pack we were now fleeing.

Marshawn veered away from me to take down a trio of undead. All three were wearing scrubs and I shuddered to think of how many people in the medical profession had likely fallen in the first wave. Law enforcement as well as any other first responder types would likely be hard to find.

I slowed as I approached a girl of perhaps twelve. She had been gutted, for lack of a better term, and had more of her insides dangling from the gaping hole in her gut than remained inside. Later I would need to try and figure out where the age cutoff might exist. She was clearly a child, but she was not exhibiting behavior I associated with the child versions.

I let her close the last steps and brought my blade up under her chin. Snatching it back, I stepped over her downed corpse and kept pushing on for what I was hoping would be the right direction to the tavern.

We cleared the neighborhood and arrived at an intersection with the highway that wound through Boring. I almost missed it because of how small it was, but my eyes finally found a sign that announced the “Not So Boring Bar & Grill”. There was a reader board out front announcing, “Sat nite par y wit RPM—9  M”. Obviously a few letters had fallen.

I altered my direction and reached the tiny parking lot. I skidded to a stop in the gravel and felt my stomach turn.

“Dammit!” I hissed.

Staked to the ground were five dark-skinned individuals. Somebody had taken the time to drive four stakes into the ground for each of these poor bastards. It wasn’t hard to guess who considering that they had all been staked hand and foot with arms and legs out wide to make human Xs.

Now, what remained were five undead. Each of them struggled and thrashed at my arrival. They snapped their teeth and moaned at me as I stood staring down at them. The savageness and brutality of their injuries were varied, but each gruesomely violent. The ones on the edges seemed to have taken the worst of it. But I had to imagine the horror of those fortunate to be in the center as they had undoubtedly been forced to watch the fate that awaited them.

Again…there was no doubt as to the culprit.

One of the victims, the one in the very center actually, was a dark-skinned woman. Profanity had been cut into her forehead.

“Seriously,” I blurted. “The fucking world is falling apart…the dead are eating the living and this bastard has the time to do this?” I pointed at the woman for emphasis.

I looked at Marshawn and saw absolutely no expression on his face. How could he not be blood-boiling pissed right now? After all we had seen, I didn’t understand how he was not grinding his teeth and seeing red.

“We need to get out of the street,” Marshawn said.

He looked back the way we’d come, and I saw a few of the undead stumbling from the street that emerged from the neighborhood we’d just escaped. One of the zombies in the lead of the pack looked like a moldy version of an extra from Deliverance. He was barefoot and wearing tattered coveralls. One of the straps had been unclasped and dangled in front of him. He was shirtless and I could see at least three individual chunks ripped from his shoulder and arms.

I stepped around the writhing corpses on the ground and took maybe two steps before I spun and spiked each one in the head. By then, Deliverance-zombie was a few yards away. He opened his mouth to moan and ropy, grayish-black drool spilled from his lips. With a snarl, I rushed him and drove my spiked walking stick through his face.

I couldn’t explain it if I had to, but for some reason, that guy made me think of every racist piece of crap I’d ever known. Hell, he could’ve been the nicest guy in the world in life, but at that moment, he was a symbol.

I yanked my staff back and turned. Marshawn had not stopped to wait for or watch me. He was jogging up the highway.

I took off after him, glad when he slowed up after what felt like forever. By the time I caught up, I was gasping for breath.

“You need to get your shit together, Evan,” Marshawn said by way of greeting.

At first I wasn’t sure I’d heard him correctly. I squinted against the sting of sweat rolling into my eyes and then fell into step beside him.

“Not sure I follow.”

“Your emotions, man. You have them on your sleeve on the regular.”

“You mean my getting pissed about what we just saw?” I couldn’t hide how incredulous I was at what he was saying. How was he not seething?

“We already know what we are dealing with. Why would anything that human filth does come as a surprise to you? He’s hung children for Christ’s sake…based on skin color. So how is what we just saw with that sister back there any different?”

“So we just stop caring about what an animal this guy is?” I snapped.

“No, dumbass. That ain’t what I am saying. What I am saying is that you can’t keep letting your emotions get the best of you. People make mistakes when they get emotional. That’s how a mother fucker ends up dead.” He paused and even stopped walking as he turned to face me. “And if you screw up bad enough, I end up dead as well. That’s not something I plan on letting happen. You feel me?”

I opened my mouth two or three times, but nothing would come out. Was he seriously getting on me about this? How could he not feel something? How could he not be seeing red right now?

“I feel plenty,” he said as if reading my mind. “But here and now is not the time to be consumed by it. We are out here in the fucking wastelands for all intents and purposes. We could cut ourselves climbing a fence, get an infection and die…toss in zombies and crazy people…this is the worst possible situation to be in. We have to keep our heads if we want to have any chance of surviving this to return home. And hell, that’s even if we didn’t find this Don Evans prick.”

“But how can you not be mad?” I winced at how weak my voice sounded to my own ears.

“You think I’m not pissed?”

“You sure don’t—” I started, but Marshawn cut me off.

“I want to skin the piece of shit alive. But if I let those emotions out, I might not be able to get them back in and I won’t be focused on what is happening in the here and now.”

Marshawn turned and started walking again. I followed in silence for a while. I wasn’t sure what to say so I mulled over his reprimand for several minutes.

Nothing sucks more when you know somebody is right, making you…wrong. The problem was how I could change things. It wasn’t something I was all that familiar with…the shutting off my feelings and not showing them.

Stephanie had pulled those strings out a long time ago and I don’t think I knew how to cut them off or stuff things back inside. It was like the rubber bands inside a golf ball—once they were let free to uncoil, there was no way to make them fit inside again.

As we continued up the two-lane highway, I lost myself in the thoughts of what was ahead for us. We were out in the Wilderness, as Marshawn called it. And we were going to murder another person. That was not a thought I could ever imagine just a short while ago.

I’d already killed somebody on this excursion. A woman at that. I hadn’t been forced to do it. I’d made the choice. I knew there was no way I could let her go unless I wanted to be looking over my shoulder ever minute.

“Hey,” Marshawn whispered.

I froze.

Looking around, I didn’t see anything. Not a zombie, and not a living person that was for sure.

“Ahead and to the right,” he said out of the corner of his mouth. “The light reflected off something and then the bushes moved.”

I looked in the direction he indicated, but I didn’t see anything. I was about to say something when the distinctive crack of a rifle caused me to jump and then dive into the deep ditch that ran along the road to allow for the volumes of water that would come during a snowmelt.

“Evan?” Marshawn called out after a moment where the only sound I heard was that of my heart pounding in my ears.

“I’m here. You okay?” I called back.

“Grazed my shoulder, but other than that…” came the answer.

As if in reply, the sound of shattering glass came, followed by a ‘whoosh’ noise. I peeked up to see a pool of fire on the road close to the ditch that ran on the other side. Whomever had thrown that Molotov was scarily accurate as I saw Marshawn pop up into a crouch right on the other side of the flames and rush forward a few steps and then dive out of sight again.

My eyes tracked back over in the direction I was pretty sure he’d indicated just in time to see a figure dressed in camo gear emerge close enough to hurl a second bottle with its flaming cloth. This time it was coming for me.

I had just enough time to utter an expletive as I scrambled forward. Just as I dove forward with a final lunge, there was another crash and explosion of flames. I felt the heat wash over my back and looked over my shoulder to see that it had landed almost exactly where I’d been only a moment ago.

I stayed on my hands and knees and moved forward as fast as I could, hoping that this person would not make the right adjustments. The thought of being burned alive was almost more terrifying than that of being eaten by the undead.

To my left, the sound of Marshawn opening fire with his pistol gave me a boost of confidence. The person would likely have their attention away from me.

Once I’d gone far enough that I guessed myself to be very near the brush this person had used for cover, I risked a peek over the lip of the ditch. I squinted like that would help me see better, but I wasn’t seeing any signs that a person was, or ever had been, hiding in those trees and bushes.

Marshawn had stopped firing and another eerie silence fell over the world. I blinked a bead of sweat from my eyes but didn’t dare move enough to wipe it away with my hand. Something about this person made me think that I was dealing with somebody who knew what the hell they were doing. I was almost willing to guess military.

“You can hide in that ditch for only so long,” a raspy voice growled from behind the burned-out husk of a minivan. Somehow this person had managed to change location and not only be in the road, but he was also behind us!

I didn’t dare move now. My fear was that he wouldn’t need much of my head to appear in order to put a bullet in it.

“Evan?” Marshawn called out after another long pause.

I already knew what he was going to say. “Yeah…I see them.”

Coming from all over, basically every direction, were dozens of the undead. There was no way we could stay in the ditches. Shifting onto my side confirmed that notion as I saw a few lumbering along in my ditch, their heads cocked, and their gazes obviously fixed on me.

“We don’t want any trouble,” I shouted.

I know it was cliché. After all, what self-respecting villain of the apocalypse would admit to being up to no good? Still, I really didn’t have any other ideas.

“Shoulda thought about that before you murdered my Celia,” the voice barked in response.

“She was holding a knife to my throat,” I shot back. After all, the only person I’d recently killed had been that lady at the coffee shack. “I’m sorry, but—”

“LIAR!” the voice roared. “She was playing on her swing, not hurting anybody. She wouldn’t hurt a soul, much less be so bold as to come out and attack somebody.”

Okay, now I was officially confused. My mouth must’ve opened and shut three or four times with nothing to show for it.

“You got the wrong people, fella,” Marshawn said.

“Don’t try to plead for your miserable life now,” the man shouted.

“We really don’t have any idea what you’re talking about,” I called out.

“You killed my little girl!” the man insisted.

“No, we really didn’t,” Marshawn countered. “Did you get a look at the guy?”

There was a long silence. Then, with much less bluster in his tone, the man replied, “All I saw was the bus as it took off up the road.”

Jesus, I thought. Was Don Evans out there just picking off random survivors?

I looked up and around at the tightening circle of undead. We’d managed to avoid them for so much of the journey thus far. But that situation had changed drastically in the past few hours. At the moment, we still had enough room to make a run for it without having to engage too many. That window was quickly slamming shut.

After a few more heartbeats of silence, I raised my hands. “We’re looking for the same guy.”

After a moment, and when no bullets tore through my exposed hands, I got up to my knees. I looked over at the mini-van and waited another breath before climbing to my feet.

“We know how you feel,” I commiserated. “He’s taken loved ones from us as well.”

Okay, so maybe not any of our children. At least he hasn’t killed any that we know of. Michael had told us that much. Of course, that had been a while ago, and there are worse things than death in the apocalypse. But finding common ground was my best tactic to try and diffuse this situation.

When the man stepped out from behind the blackened husk of a vehicle, it clicked into place. The man was in full camo gear, including a hat with a veil, but his dark skin was easy to see despite the cover.

“Marshawn?” I called.

My friend rose up from his spot and I was not surprised to see that he’d done the same thing as me and made his way towards where we’d believed the man to be hiding. Had he stayed put, we could’ve actually had this guy in a crossfire if things went south.

“Let’s see your hands, too,” the man snarled.

This guy was not showing any signs of fear. He was obviously angry, and maybe just a little bit crazy from grief. But afraid was off the table. He had found a crease in the mangled minivan that allowed him to keep his back covered while being able to shift back and forth between me and Marshawn.

“Cool, man,” Marshawn said easily as he raised his hands. “Like my friend said, we aren’t here looking for trouble. And it sounds like we’re hunting the same guy.”

“When did he come through here and…” My voice trailed off. I didn’t really want to say the words, but there wasn’t a way around it.

“Kill my little girl?” the man finished for me.

For the first time, his voice lacked anger. All I heard in those four simple words was a bone-deep sorrow.

“Yeah.” Marshawn took one step up onto the lip of the ditch. When the man didn’t react, he hauled himself up onto the road, making sure to keep his hands up.

When the guy didn’t open fire, I followed suit. I checked the approaching zombies. It was clear that we had to move soon if we were going to have the best chance of escaping unharmed.

“Maybe we talk this over someplace with less…foot traffic?” I suggested.

The man looked around and, for the first time, seemed to really notice the undead. He brought his rifle down and his shoulders slumped.

“You guys can go,” he muttered. Now there was absolutely nothing in his voice. No emotion at all as his head dropped. I could see his shoulders shudder a bit, indicating that he might be crying now.

I glanced over at Marshawn with an arched eyebrow. Was he going to insist that we leave this guy behind? Was this just another case of how we couldn’t help everybody? If this was how we were going to be, I didn’t see the point of fighting so hard to rebuild a society.

“Why don’t you come with us?” Marshawn surprised me when he took a few steps toward the man while still keeping his hands up. “We have the same target. I bet we stand a much better chance. And to be honest, we could absolutely use the help.”

The man seemed to consider the offer. The only problem was that the time he had for that sort of thing was frighteningly short. We had to run now.

Without waiting for an answer, Marshawn started jogging up the highway towards the thinnest concentration. I followed and was only a little surprised when the man appeared at my side. Fighting through the handful zombies were no problem and we were in the clear after only a few minutes. We cut down a dirt and gravel road that led into some woods and eventually pulled up to catch our breath and get a drink of water from our canteens. I turned to offer a sip from mine and saw the man leaning against a tree with his own taking a long drink.

Once we’d all caught our breath, I approached the stranger. “Name’s Evan Berry.”

I noticed the man stiffen for just a moment. “Any way you know a fella named Don Evans?” the man asked.

“That’s exactly who we are hunting.” Marshawn stepped up beside me.

“Seems that fella gets around and leaves a lot of damage in his wake,” the man said with a deep and weary sigh.

“That the person went and killed your girl?” Marshawn pressed.

“Surely was.” The stranger wiped his face with one hand and closed his eyes for a moment.

When he opened them again, I saw the same faraway look slide over the man’s expression as I’d seen Marshawn get when he’d told his story. I had to wonder if maybe there was something worse about losing a child than there was about losing a spouse.

“Where are my manners,” the man said, with a forced laugh that did nothing to lighten the mood. “My name is Vance Johnson.”

Marshawn clapped the man on the shoulder and introduced himself and then gave a recap of our situation and what our ultimate plan was regarding one Don Evans. Vance chuckled softly and gave a shake of his head.

“What?” I asked.

“How does one person cause so much trouble and not end up dead? You figure he’d mess with something that might pack a bigger bite,” Vance explained.

“Bullies don’t usually go after targets bigger or stronger than they are,” Marshawn offered.

“So, you have an idea where he might be hiding out?” I asked.

“Oh…I know exactly where he’s been keeping himself lately. There’s a strip mall in Happy Valley. Got a grocery store, a clinic, and a few other restaurants and shops that hadn’t been looted too bad when all this went down. He also has a few school buses, UPS trucks, and regular eighteen-wheelers he is using to clean out everything in the area.”

“Happy Valley,” I sighed. “Damn, I thought he might be closer…somewhere around here.”

“Nah, he just finished cleaning the best stuff out around these parts. Not much in Boring, but he sure did take an interest in a few places that had equipment…forklifts, backhoes, small tractors. He is probably setting himself up with the equivalent of a damn fortress. Not sure how much farther he’s gotten, but he already hit the National Guard depot on 224 and rolled out with a handful of Hummers.”

“Then why the school buses?” I asked what I felt to be an obvious question.

“They’ve hit a few jails, rolled out with more…likeminded folks,” Vance managed to choke out.

“He’s building an army,” I gasped. “Jesus. If we don’t stop him now…I don’t even want to try and guess how things turn out around here.”

“Maybe we should reconsider,” Marshawn whispered.

At first, I thought perhaps I’d imagined it. Surely he couldn’t mean that. How could he even consider walking away…letting somebody like that continue to exist and exert his will on people based on something as insignificant as skin color.

“Maybe getting out while we still can is the way to go,” Marshawn said, this time with more conviction…and volume.

“You boys can do what you will, but I think I have to see this through. Ain’t got nothing to keep me tethered to this world no more,” Vance said with a shake of his head.

“We can’t just let this guy keep doing what he’s doing,” I insisted.

“You aren’t worried that you end up dead and that bastard is still alive when this is over?” Marshawn spun on me, but there wasn’t anger in his voice. It was something else that I couldn’t pin down.

“Hell yeah,” I shot back. “But I’m worried more about how things shake down if I do nothing. If we die doing this, we at least tried.”

“Do you realize how stupid that sounds?” Marshawn scoffed. “You still think this is some kind of adventure? This is not a game, man. There ain’t a reset button.”

“I’m not an idiot, Marshawn,” I snapped back. “I get it. But I refuse to sit back and do nothing. I won’t be the reason more people are strung up…murdered,”

“You aren’t the reason,” Vance said softly. “It’s that piece of human trash. Your friend is right. It is okay in these times to think of yourself. You can’t save everybody. All you can do is hope to save yourself…not become one of those things.”

“And if I can bring Don Evans down, then it is worth it, and if I die in the process, I go down knowing that I did my best to make this world a better place.” I had allowed myself to get swept up and my voice had grown louder.

A moan from somewhere in the distance was my reply as Marshawn and Vance both stared at me. Finally, Marshawn shook his head.

“I’m with you, Evan. But just know that we can walk away from this at any point.” He capped his canteen and slung it over his shoulder.

“Yeah,” I agreed. “Look, I know I sound like I am a bit crazy, but I promise, if we get there and we see something that is obviously too much to consider handling, I will back off. Hell, I’ll even consider making a run for it out of town.”

What they didn’t understand was that for the past several days, I’d heard my Stephanie’s voice like a faint echo in my head reminding me to make the world a better place than I found it.

We started walking again, letting Vance take the lead since he knew where we were headed. Considering the fact that we had to go all the way to Happy Valley, I knew we had at least one day of hiking if not two. I also knew that we would be venturing into more populated areas which meant more of the undead.

There wasn’t much to say the rest of the day. We took down any zombie that got too close or too curious. We came out of the woods and did our best to stay out of the main neighborhoods, but it was growing more and more difficult. If we saw a chance to poke around and search for anything useful, we utilized it.

It was on one of those checks that we came across a man pushing a shopping cart. He had a variety of spiked weapons jutting up from the cart as he emerged from what had once looked to have been a decent middle-class neighborhood.

When we got closer, we could see that many of the weapons were made of bone. Even closer, things became a bit more disturbing.

As soon as the man spied us, he changed course to intercept us. He waved his arm in greeting and shouted out, “Rag and bone!”

A handful of the undead shambled along behind the old guy, but he didn’t even seem to notice their existence. He just kept heading our way, the cart rattling and making all kinds of nose.

I glanced at Marshawn who simply shrugged. I did notice he had his hand on the grip of one of the pistols at his waist. It was only then that I discovered I was doing the same thing without even having realized it.

“Rag and bone, gents!” the grizzled old man hooted again.

“You okay, man?” I asked hesitantly.

“Got me the finest weapons in the Rose City,” the man crowed. “Ain’t nothing like ‘em in the world and I can make you a deal.”

As the cart came to a stop, I couldn’t help but eye the zombies about forty or so yards behind. They were making their way closer which meant that we would have to deal with them very soon.

I glanced into the cart and now saw the weapons fully for what they were. Sections of long bone had been wrapped in what I had mistaken for simple leather. Closer inspection revealed it to be human skin. That was a proven fact when I was able to make out what was left of a rose tattoo. The long bones were all topped with a human skull that had been dipped in something that might be a type of resin. Many had metal spikes embedded in them as well.

I glanced at Marshawn and Vance who both seemed equal parts fascinated and repulsed. I turned back as the wiry old man that made me think of Rip Van Winkle with his ratty beard and sleepy eyes that still somehow managed to burn with an intensity that screamed crazy but strangely intelligent.

“Just observe,” the man cackled.

I watched as he drew one of the handmade weapons from the cart and spun around to face the pack of undead approaching him with a slow certainty like a tidal change. His long coat flapped with a flourish and I was now reminded of some sort of low-rent wizard.

He homed in on a short, pudgy teenager with relatively fresh blood dripping from his chin. His wounds were old and dried indicating that he’d been undead for quite a while. His filmed over eyes appeared to lock on the old man and he adjusted his shambling course slightly to approach its target.

The man pretended to yawn in an exaggerated manner as he waited for the zombie to come within range of his weapon. Once it was almost close enough, he set up like a baseball player digging into the batter’s box.

It drew closer and the man swung. He couldn’t have that much strength behind his swing, but that did not seem to matter. The bulbous head of the weapon struck the undead teen around the temple and pulverized the head in a chunky explosion of black and gray chunks, bone, and dark fluid.

“Woo-hooo!” the man crowed. “Outta the park, baby!”

“Jesus,” Marshawn breathed.

“See for yourselves, boyos!” The Rag-and-Bone Man ushered us to his cart and then jutted his chin toward the remaining undead shambling our way.

I was closest and grabbed one of the weapons. It was surprisingly heavy but even more surprisingly well-balanced. I picked out a young man in board shorts with most of his throat missing. I swung, not really putting everything into the swing, but still with what I considered a decent amount of power.

The head damn near evaporated as it exploded into a gory mist. If I saw the remains of this thing without witnessing its demise personally, I would guess it had been hit at close range by a shotgun blast.

Marshawn and Vance both had similar results. Their targets each suffering the same fate.

I turned to the old man. “What do you want for these?” I asked, the awe seeping through my voice despite any attempts not to seem overly anxious to obtain one of these babies.

“The Rag-and-Bone Man needs a favor,” the old man cackled.

“What kind of favor?” Marshawn did not attempt to hide his skepticism.

I knew nothing came free these days, and I would not have a problem paying a fair price for the weapons, but my idea of fair and this crazy old man’s might be at opposite ends of the spectrum.

“Lost my workshop.” Rag-and-Bone Man’s face almost seemed to clear. There was a hint of a regular person for just the briefest of moments before the crazy sparkle returned. “Man in a bus with big guns came through and ran right through my gate. Broke my tools or stole ‘em. Now the Rag-and-Bone Man gots no home. Can’t make no more of his weapons. How can a man feed himself without a job?”

I looked at Marshawn and Vance with a raised eyebrow. I am certain we were all thinking the same thing about who had to be behind the man’s problem. But I had an idea as to where we could relocate the Rag-and-Bone Man. It would mean taking down a suffering and emaciated guard dog and making sure there were no nasty surprises lurking, but it shouldn’t be that hard to pull off.

“If we can get you a new place to stay and make your weapons, we each get one.” I turned to the old man who was peering up at me through his wild, filthy gray hair. His crazy eyes focused on me and he cocked his head to the side.

“Everybody gets his pick,” the man said with a maniacal chuckle. “Two if you like.”

I didn’t see the need for more than one. The weapon I was holding in my hand felt pretty damn sturdy. I had serious doubts that it would break any time soon.

“Maybe we take one extra just in case for a total of four,” Marshawn whispered as the old man scuttled to his cart.

“Solid idea,” I agreed.

“So where are we gonna set this guy up?” Marshawn asked.

“That shop with the dogs.” It seemed like a no-brainer to me.

The only problem we would face would be heading back toward a bunch of the undead. And there was the possibility of having to deal with the child-zombies as well. That was the downside. The upside was that we would get a real, honest-to-goodness field test with these apocalyptic cudgels.

I saw something flash in Marshawn’s eyes, and for a moment, I expected him to reject my idea. After a pause, he nodded. Whatever his misgivings might be, he obviously put them aside.

“You up for this?” I asked Vance who had been silent throughout the encounter.

“Seems like a good deal.” The man shrugged.

“Then let’s get to it.”

I started back up the highway the way we’d come. I wasn’t thrilled about the possibility of dealing with a large number of zombie children, but there was always the chance that they had returned to wherever they were congregating now that we were long gone. Since we didn’t have to actually pass that close to the park where I’d spotted them, I gave us at least some chance that we wouldn’t have to take them on.

I didn’t know what it was about the child versions that had me so creeped out, but I’d surprisingly reached a point where I wasn’t really afraid of regular zombies. I wasn’t sure if that was a good idea or not.

5

No Rest for the Weary

The quiet was what had me the most concerned. Even the Rag-and-Bone Man was not making a peep. In fact, until now, he hadn’t shut up almost since we’d started out for this place.

I stopped at some brush that gave us cover and pushed them apart just enough to get a peek into the fenced lot of the equipment supply place. I didn’t see any sign of the one dog that I knew to still be alive, but I did see chunks of what remained of his former watch dog partner.

A low whistle was all that came from our temporary companion. Vance and Marshawn squatted beside me and studied the open area with critical gazes.

“You think there’s any of them things in there?” Vance finally whispered.

“We were right up at the fence earlier. Those dogs made quite a racket, but nothing came stumbling out,” Marshawn answered.

“Dogs?” Vance gulped.

“Yeah, one of them ate the other.” That was all I really wanted to say about things. As it was, I didn’t like the idea that we were going to have to kill the other one. I didn’t see any other way around it, and in the long run, we were likely showing the thing mercy, but that didn’t mean I had to like it.

“Evan, you come up to the fence and draw Fido’s attention,” Marshawn whispered. “Vance, you and I will slip around to the far side. See that gate over there?” He pointed out a drive-up entrance to the lot and Vance nodded. “You get there and be ready.”

“Ready for what?” Vance was sounding more uncertain about this plan than I felt.

“Whatever happens.” Marshawn shrugged his shoulders as if it was obvious.

Vance glanced over at me like I might have some sort of insight. I repeated Marshawn’s shrug.

That seemed to do it for him, and he dropped his head and walked away, vanishing into the woods. It was only a moment after Marshawn vanished that I realized I had been left with Rag-and-Bone Man.

I turned back to look at the old guy. He was sitting on the ground. He did not seem to notice anything going on around him. He had one of his weapons across his lap, and he appeared intent to fidget with it.

Since I had something that needed doing and he looked fine with the situation, I turned back to the fence. I could see that the dog must’ve been able to smell us. The dog had crawled out from wherever he’d been and was raising his head, giving the air a sniff. I could actually see a large knot where his belly was distended from gorging on the other dog.

As soon as he saw me, he dropped his head and curled back his lip. A low growl came from him as he began to stalk towards me. I’ve been around a lot of dogs. I’ve never seen anything so horrifying. It was looking at me in a way that made my body clench in some of the most unpleasant places. But oddly enough, at the same time, I had the overwhelming need to urinate.

“Hey, boy,” I managed to finally get out. The dog actually stopped. For a brief moment, I thought that maybe he was going to remember that he was domesticated. Perhaps that whole “Man’s Best Friend” thing would kick in.

An instant later he was flashing a mouthful of teeth and the growl was back. His body tensed, and then he sprung at the fence. The metal links bowed, but there was absolutely no way that dog was coming through.

Deep down, I knew that the dog couldn’t get me. But despite that, I jumped back. To add to my momentary embarrassment, I screamed…a bit.

The dog bounced off the fence and landed on its side with a heavy thumping sound. The next sound was so foreign that it took me a moment to recognize it.

I spun around to see Rag-and-Bone Man flat on his back. Laughing. The old bastard was actually laughing. He threw both hands over his mouth, but the puffs of sound were almost more annoying than his open laughter.

“Screw you,” I muttered. I turned back just as the dog struggled to its feet.

Looking past the animal, I could see Marshawn come out of the woods and approach the fence on the far side of the lot and Vance to the left. The old concrete building bordered the right side.

Marshawn climbed the fence; the sound instantly causing the dog to turn and face the new potential threat. When Vance jumped up and started over from his side, the dog turned again. Now it was a matter of which of the men it would choose to lunge for.

It began to creep towards Marshawn for whatever reason passed as logical in its doggie brain. As soon as it was a few yards from me, I returned to the fence and kicked at it, creating a new racket. The dog threw a look over its shoulder, but then returned its focus to Marshawn.

“Must smell the urine and figured you aren’t a problem,” Rag-and-Bone Man stage-whispered.

“You know…” I shot my best withering glare over my shoulder, but the man didn’t seem bothered any more than the dog.

I gave him a dismissive wave and returned my attention to the open lot, the dog, and Marshawn. I started climbing my side as well since it was obviously unconcerned with what I did.

Marshawn threw a leg over the top and gave me a wave, then pointed to Vance. The man had reached the top, but he’d frozen and was looking off past the building. I looked, but from my position, I could only see the lip of the roof. If there was something up there, I wasn’t seeing it.

Marshawn dropped to the ground, a machete in his hand. The dog was slower than it most likely would have been if it was fully healthy and not having just gorged itself on its companion. That made Marshawn’s job almost too easy as he brought the weapon down hard, cleaving off about a third of the dog’s head. It didn’t even get a chance to yelp. For that I was grateful.

I threw myself over and hurried to the door to the concrete building. No surprise, it was locked. I was just starting to wonder what exactly we could do to get inside when Marshawn came up and placed a hand on my shoulder.

I glanced at him to see that he was holding a pretty large prybar. I didn’t know where he’d seen it, and it didn’t really matter. I stepped back and he went to work, wedging it into the frame by where the door latched.

I heard something and turned to see that Vance had dropped to the ground on the other side of the fence. For whatever reason, he wasn’t joining us. Since I wasn’t doing anything much to help Marshawn as he worked on getting the door open, I started over towards Vance who was now looking up his side of the fence almost to where Marshawn had climbed over.

“Hey, man,” I called. “Where are you going?”

He was taking one slow step after another as he walked along his side of the fence until he reached the corner. Instead of turning and heading down along the perpendicular side to his, he kept going straight.

“Vance!” I hissed as the familiar stench of the undead drifted up my nose. Zombies were close. This was no time to go wandering off by one’s self.

The man didn’t seem to notice me. He kept walking away almost as if he were in a trance. I shot a look over at Marshawn who was just getting the door to open.

“Evan!” Marshawn called, and I saw the fingers come through the crack in the door. At least two of the undead were inside.

I hate to admit it, but it wasn’t even a consideration. I bolted back to the door and moved to the side where I could see one face pressed to the widening gap. Marshawn had shoved his foot against the bottom to keep it from flying open.

The face looking at me was so dried out that it reminded me of those shrunken head kits you could get as a child and turn apples into these cheesy looking trinkets. I had my knife in hand and shoved it into the filmed over, tracer-riddled eyeball that was staring unblinkingly at me as its teeth gnashed in anticipation of taking a chunk out of me.

I jerked my blade back and stuck the next one to shove its face into the gap. As the third one came up, I heard Vance hollering something, but I couldn’t make it out over the hissing, teeth snapping, and groaning coming from the slowly opening door.

“Jesus, how many people were in there?” Marshawn said through clenched teeth. The door gave another little surge and I could see two more faces and more shadows flitting by in the gloomy shop office.

I stabbed yet another of the undead. This one sort of slumped forward and was kept in place by the still animated zombies behind it.

“You’re gonna have to step back,” I said as I saw no way to get to the others inside.

“On three,” Marshawn grunted.

He counted down and then jumped back. Actually, he mostly stumbled as the surge against the door clipped his boot and caught him just enough to make the man lose his footing and end up on his butt.

Once more I could hear Vance shouting something, but I was in no position to look, much less offer any help if the man had gotten himself into trouble. Seven undead came stumbling out. Luckily, they had absolutely no coordination or awareness of the corpse that dropped to the ground almost directly in front of them. Four of the zombies fell in a tangled mess.

The three that didn’t fall were trying to decide which way to go so they could go around the rotten meat barricade that lay in their path. I used that time to jump in and stick the nearest one.

This one had been a huge woman. Not just obese, but easily over six-feet-tall. Her sagging skin gave her thick folds of flesh that flopped as she toppled. For some reason, my eyes locked on that for just a moment. She had bites up and down both arms and one on her right cheek that allowed a piece of her face meat to flop wildly as she moved. There was something about her that tried to register in my mind, and I cocked my head as I couldn’t help but study her. That allowed the next zombie to stagger forward and within range of my dripping blade.

The next one was a man in oily coveralls. I was now starting to guess that perhaps the employees and their families had come here perhaps to try and fortify it. But obviously, from the injuries I was seeing, I had to figure that at least one of them had been bitten.

No sooner had I begun to form that possibility when what I would now be convinced was the cause behind these people’s demise stepped through the doorway. A little boy of perhaps seven years old peered out. He almost seemed to survey the scene as he stepped into the open yard.

He was chubby, and despite the altering that death causes in all the muscles relaxing and giving the face an almost melted appearance, I could see a similarity in this child’s features and that of the huge woman I’d just dispatched.

As soon as I yanked my blade free from the coverall-clad zombie, black fluid dripping from the blade’s tip, the child changed into just another zombie and lunged. Out of reflex as much as anything, I stabbed out and drove the blade into the open and mewling mouth of the zombie child.

Marshawn shoved a zombified woman back that had somehow slipped up behind me and then spiked her in the forehead with a nasty crunch that seemed to vibrate my back teeth. We ended the last few and it was then that I realized that I hadn’t heard from Vance for a while.

“You two boys are something special,” Rag-and-Bone Man said with his usual cheer as I ushered him in through the gate. A large ring of keys hanging on the wall allowed us to not only open the padlock on the gate, but it also let us hand the proverbial keys to the kingdom over to the man who literally danced a jig.

“As promised,” Rag-and-Bone Man hooted as he handed over six of his weapons to us.

I examined mine and was pleased to see that they all had a leather tether allowing us to sling the spare over one shoulder. It was also in that moment that I felt a sinking feeling in my stomach.

Marshawn seemed to have the same realization at that moment. “Vance!” he blurted.

We both ran out the front door into the street. What I saw made my heart lurch into my throat and my blood turn to ice.

Vance was standing in the middle of the street. All around him were the mob of zombie children that we’d seen and run from earlier. The thing was, they were all just standing around the man. None of them were attacking.

As I watched, the man seemed to be saying something to the children. We couldn’t hear it, but his lips were definitely moving. I had no idea why they hadn’t done anything to him, but I was seeing with my own two eyes as this man stood in their center untouched.

Well, not exactly untouched. Every so often, one of the zombie children would reach out and touch the man. Either gently pawing at his coat or running one of their hands down his arm.

Adding to this macabre scene were the dozens of cats winding in and out between the children’s legs. I glanced over at Marshawn to see that he was equally at a loss. I could only speak for myself with certainty, but I’d never seen anything like this. I was making a guess that Marshawn hadn’t either.

“Hey…Vance,” Marshawn finally hissed.

The man’s head popped up and his expression was a really odd mix of happiness and confusion. There was something in his eyes that had me instantly worried. I hated to admit it, but it was almost an overblown Hollywood expression of madness. I was convinced in that very moment that something had broken in the man’s mind.

“They’re all here,” the man said in a voice that was creepily flat considering his expression.

I flashed to an old documentary I’d watched years ago about the Jonestown mass suicide. I remember hearing Jim Jones calling for all his people to just willingly kill themselves and their children and being sickened by the nonchalance in his voice. This was very much like that.

“The children,” Vance gushed in a voice that only served to confirm that he was teetering on the edge of hysteria. “We tried to get to them. The bus got stuck and we were on the phone with the driver, but then we lost them.” He spread his arms wide over the cluster around him. “They’re all here. The lost children!”

I could hear his voice on the edge of breaking. How was he not seeing the horrific injuries on them all? Some were so young, so small that the injuries looked all the more horrific. I saw more than one missing one or both arms, indicating they’d likely been caught in the middle of some nightmarish tug-o-war.

“Why don’t you come on over here, pal?” Marshawn said calmly.

I knew that if I opened my mouth right now, I wouldn’t have sounded nearly so composed. Already my bladder was threatening to burst again.

“The children!” Vance repeated.

“Are dead,” I gasped, and then clicked my mouth shut as a few of the undead children turned around, finally seeming to notice us.

Vance’s expression tightened, and I could see him scanning the group he was standing in the midst of, but it was clear by what could only be called wonderment on his face that he wasn’t seeing them. Not really.

Almost as an illustration to that point, he reached over and ran his hand through the hair of a little girl missing an eye. There were blade handles of knives jutting from her body, and her mouth was a dark mask of dried blood.

“I found them,” he repeated, and his gaze dropped to them.

“Vance,” Marshawn snapped, “come away from there right now.”

The man ignored him. I glanced over at Marshawn, my eyebrows raised in question.

“Let’s go,” the big man finally said in a hoarse whisper.

“We leave him?” It wasn’t that I didn’t see the fact that Vance had gone mentally offline. But it was still so difficult to just walk away like this.

“There is nothing we can do.”

“Yeah, but…” My voice faded as I realized there were no ‘buts’ to be had here. The man was beyond our help.

“There is one thing we can do,” Marshawn suggested.

Before I could ask what that might be, he drew his handgun. The moment he did, the few zombie children that had turned our way went through that scary transformation where they became basically just like any other zombie. They began to shuffle our direction. That caused a few more on our side of the pack to turn, but there was another thing that happened at almost the same time. I saw it first, of that I am sure since Marshawn was busy lining up the shot that he was intending to end Vance’s life with. And a second sooner, he might’ve been successful.

From behind the man, hands reached out and clutched him, dragging him back. Somehow, the man lost his footing and toppled backwards. Since I lost sight of him, I will never know what really happened after that. Maybe he had a sudden realization. Truthfully, I hope not. I couldn’t imagine that moment of terror that took place just before the unspeakable agony of being ripped apart and fed upon occurred.

And when I heard the scream, I had no doubt that his fate was sealed. Even in some off chance that he was immune, the jet of blood that erupted from the pile of children in a crimson geyser told me there was no saving him.

Marshawn dropped his arm. He holstered his weapon and turned away from the terrible scene. I wished I’d been as quick to turn away. One of the zombie children in the midst of the crowd had something in his hands. From where I stood, not to mention all the blood, I couldn’t tell what part it might be, but the zombie child ripped a chunk free. Blood flowed down the little boy’s face as it chewed.

I spun on my heel and took off after Marshawn who had already started back toward where we’d left Rag-and-Bone Man. When we reached the place, I was still trying to shake off the feelings of what had just happened.

I asked myself why this was still hitting me so hard most of the way back. By the time we reached the building, we could actually hear the old man singing some song about rags and bones. It was catchy, but my mind was busy coming to grips with the answer I’d deduced in a surprisingly short period of time.

If it ever reached the point where seeing another person die so violently stopped having any effect on me, then maybe I was no longer fit to live in what was left of this world. I was also reaching another conclusion: Vance had known exactly where Don Evans and his people had relocated. We would be back to searching in a general area and likely following the trail of bodies he and his cronies left in their wake.

The old man had already secured the building and was checking the fence to ensure it was sturdy enough to pass his desired levels of security. When he spied us, he stopped his song and almost transformed before my eyes. In that instant, he appeared almost fatherly. There was a sadness in his eyes that reflected in their shiny surface. A tear even leaked down one cheek, carving a muddy path through the grime and dust.

“Lost one of yours,” the man said in a raspy whisper that was made even more coarse by his apparently tight throat that he cleared in order to continue. “So many lost…so few to carry on. And most ain’t worth the stuff you scrape from your shoes after stepping in a wet pile of shit.”

Perhaps not the most elegant eulogy, but it was certainly heartfelt. The man wiped at his face and sighed. Then, almost as if a switch was thrown, he returned to the mostly crazy persona we’d first met.

“Rag-and-Bone Man sorry ‘bout this, but it’s time y’all moved along. Gots me more of my weapons to make…things to trade for,” he crowed, turning in a flourish as his long, ratty coat swirled in his wake.

“Yeah, we have somebody we need to find anyways,” I said to his back.

Oddly enough, the man skidded to a stop and turned back to us. He hopped back and forth from foot to foot. “Give the name. Maybe we’ve passed and made a trade.”

“Don Evans,” Marshawn spat after I found myself unable to speak the name for some reason. “Likes to ride around in school buses and gun people down with a machine gun…unless he’s set on hanging them.”

The Rag-and-Bone Man staggered back as if Marshawn had struck him. He shook his head as if to clear it of cobwebs and then made some odd gestures in the air with his hands before hawking up a gob of phlegm and spitting it into the dusty ground at his feet.

“Man’s the devil in human skin,” Rag-and-Bone Man hissed. “Y’all best be runnin’ and hidin’ so as to not gain his notice. If’n you do…then your friend just suffered a merciful death. And he’s hiding out by the high school.”

With that, he hopped through the doorway and slammed it on us.

Marshawn looked at me. He had to be meaning Don Evans. That was the only reasonable deduction. The only thing we had to decide now was exactly which high school. I considered busting in the door and making the crazy old man tell us. The thing was, I doubted he could give us any more of an answer than what he’d given.

“We need to get moving,” Marshawn said as the moans of the undead could be heard from all sides.

We’d made more than a little racket in the past several minutes. Vance’s death had been a beacon for the undead to home in on, and I had no doubt that they were coming. Rag-and-Bone Man could deal with the issues himself. We had someplace to be.

***

Highway 212 was a wasteland of decaying bodies, burned out husks of vehicles, and the occasional mobile undead. We avoided some if they didn’t appear to notice us. And surprisingly, that number was much higher than I would’ve thought.

There was more than one case where we passed a home or small business with as few as one, but sometimes a dozen or more, zombies pawing and clawing at a door or window. The possibility that a living person might be inside had crossed my mind more than once, but not once did a person call out or try to get our attention. We certainly weren’t going to investigate each and every incident.

Eventually, we came to where the Highway 212 passed over Highway 26. I knew that Sandy was to our right. The easiest way to make our way to the high school would be to veer off and use that to travel.

Looking to the left, away from Sandy, I could see the dark plumes of numerous fires burning. That would be in the direction of Gresham if my internal compass was working. As we started along the long on-ramp that would dump onto Highway 26, we passed a sign for the Guide Dogs for the Blind school.

I had a thought so horrible that it sent a shiver through me. What had become of that place in this insanity? And with dogs apparently showing the same possibility for immunity that the living demonstrated, would that make things all that much worse.

As we walked in another of our long stretches of silence, I had to imagine how many people were either suffering, dying, or dead from any variety of illnesses. Diabetics, asthmatics, and the like. Their lives were no doubt ending in the most horrific ways. And then there were the mentally ill. So many of those who depended on others were facing such a terrible fate. Not for the first time, I had to wonder what the point would be to try surviving this nightmare?

Were we really surviving? Living? How could we feel good when every single day was a struggle? Had those that died early on truly been the ones spared?

“You okay?” Marshawn asked.

He was right beside me and his eyes held a curiosity that fought for its place amidst the sadness. I decided to just spill all my concerns and worries.

When I was done, there was an actual feeling of what was almost peace. I had unburdened myself of all the things sitting on my chest. The only question now was whether or not I’d just dumped it onto Marshawn.

“Yeah.”

It was only one word. But it conveyed so much that I found I actually did not need for him to expound or clarify.

We reached Highway 26 proper and started the trek up the long, straight, and gradual incline. I knew we had a couple of hours before we would even be close to our destination. That would give us plenty of time to discuss it.

We’d gone only a short way, and I was about to ask Marshawn what he thought our plan of attack might be, when I could hear the low and distant sound of a vehicle’s engine. It was growing gradually louder.

We were trudging up the middle of the southbound lane, and that was the very direction the vehicle was coming from. At the moment it had to still be over the ridge because we couldn’t see anything.

Bounding down into the deep ditch dug out enough to catch the runoff from Mount Hood’s snowpack, we dropped to our bellies and waited. Eventually, an old Volkswagen Beetle drove past. I thought I could make out at least three people inside. That seemed like an odd choice for a vehicle to trundle about in during the ZPOC, but to each his or her own, I guessed.

Once we were certain that the vehicle was the only one, we climbed out onto the road and resumed our journey. We had just passed a burned-up AM/PM and were approaching the local Fred Meyer store on our side of the highway.

Even through the trees and with the small strip mall that sat close to the highway, I could see a lot of activity in that vast parking lot. There were zombies milling about everywhere. Through one break in the trees, I could see a large entrance. From the looks of it, somebody had torn the doors off, leaving a gaping hole where the doors once existed.

“Why the hell would somebody do that?” I mused aloud.

“Poison the well,” Marshawn replied.

“Say what?” I asked, unsure whether he had heard me right or not.

“Like the old days during wars. Troops would ransack an area for supplies and then poison the water wells so that armies chasing them could not utilize the resource.” He paused and leaned forward to peer past me at the crowded parking lot. “Somebody comes through here and empties out everything they can from the store, and then, to ensure that nobody else ventures inside, they rip the doors off giving the zombies full access. You would have to be stupid, desperate, or a combination of the two to go inside that place now.”

I nodded and returned my attention to what was ahead of me. I’d seen a few curls of smoke here and there, but up ahead, I could spot another. It looked to have almost burned itself out. Whatever it was sat along the side of the road just over the small ridge we were approaching.

As we crested the hill, I could see the hulking and charred remains of…a school bus! My steps were already picking up in tempo as my heart jumped to my throat with the excitement of this potential discovery.

A very small part of me held a kernel of disappointment at the possibility that somebody else had taken down Don Evans. A very small kernel. The overwhelming feeling that was building was one of relief.

Could we possibly be so lucky as to have come across the end of the evil son of a bitch? The closer we got, the more excited I became. Also, I was almost jogging as my tempo got faster and faster as I drew nearer. Marshawn was obviously feeling something similar as he matched my increased speed.

At last, we reached the remains of what had once been a standard yellow school bus. As we neared, I noticed that the parts not scorched by the fire were covered in some pretty vile graffiti. A lot of it seemed rather juvenile. The next thing I noticed was that the windows were all covered in aluminum foil for some inexplicable reason. The last thing that drove home the probability that this was not one of Don Evans’ vehicles was the lack of any firepower mounted on top.

Once we reached the bus, I could see that there were a few bodies strewn about that had died as one of the living. None of them sported the telltale head wound. One young man had most of his chest blown out with what had most likely been a close-range shotgun blast. His face was still twisted in pain and one of his hands looked to have been gone at with a blowtorch. The flesh was blackened and split. The nails had curled up out of the cuticle beds and each finger had plumped up like an overcooked sausage.

Now that screamed Don Evans despite the color of the young man’s skin. I had to guess that he’d clashed with Don Evans without realizing what he’d just bitten into.

This one had merited special treatment since all the rest of the corpses we discovered had simply been murdered outright. Some with a shot to the chest, others were gut shot, but each had been killed by a shotgun.

I was about to turn away and resume our journey when I heard a low moan from underneath the bus. It was not one of the moans of the undead. This was a pained sound.

I got down on my knees to look and saw a figure cuffed to the rear axle. When I shimmied underneath, I saw that the young man was possibly in his late teens. His dark skin was covered in a sheen of sweat.

I was now absolutely positive who’s handiwork I was witnessing. All the young men who were white had been simply executed. The only one that showed any signs of torture had also been white, but he’d been executed in the end. This young man was chained to the underside of the bus in a location where he’d easily been attacked.

There was another body under here as well, and it didn’t take a CSI specialist to put the scene together. This zombie had spotted this young man and crawled under the bus to get at him. There had been an obvious struggle, and somehow the poor, doomed man had managed to use his feet to pin the zombie’s head against the inside of a rear wheel and then stomp it until it was crushed under the onslaught. Unfortunately, the zombie had taken a chunk out of the man’s leg in the skirmish.

The man was walking on the razor blade of consciousness. I could hear him muttering something, but it was unintelligible. I crawled closer and drew my knife. The least I could do was end his suffering. Not that I owed him anything. But seeing a person suffer was never going to be easy. And it was such a simple thing to just stick him in the head and end him.

I was almost to the man when I heard a burst of gunfire. The concrete just to my left erupted in puffs of dirt and rock as bullets strafed a strip. As the sound evaporated on the wind, I could hear what sounded like boots hitting the pavement fast. They were growing distant. That had to be Marshawn, and he was obviously running for cover.

I had to bite my tongue to keep from calling out. It was possible that the shooter might not know I was under the bus. I had stopped moving and now tried to remain as still as possible. I couldn’t hear a thing over my heavy breathing and pounding heart.

I stayed still and did everything I could to get my heart rate down to something closer to normal. As things began to settle and quiet flooded back in, I stayed put and listened. Part of me wanted to call out to Marshawn, but I simply couldn’t. I just had a feeling that giving up my location was a bad idea.

As my heart settled and my breathing became normal, I realized that it had grown totally silent. Not a bird chirped, not a bug clicked. Then it struck me. The guy had stopped moaning and mumbling.

I craned my neck to get a look and saw that the man had gone still. His head had lolled over so that it faced my direction. His eyes were closed, and it was clear that he was no longer breathing. The man had died at some point in the past moment or two before I’d brought him mercy.

It was also at that moment that I got the first hint of the stench of the undead. Almost on cue, I saw one finger twitch. He was coming back!

Before he could open his eyes and fix me with their rheumy and tracer-riddled gaze, I scooted forward just enough so that my outstretched arm could reach, and I drove my knife into one of those closed eyes. There was only a moment of resistance, but the blade went in and that was the end of it.

As I pulled my knife back, I heard a new sound. It was the sound of feet on gravel.  They were coming from the direction we’d been heading. I also remembered distinctly that Marshawn’s retreat had gone in the opposite direction. This was quite likely our shooter.

Reaching down, I drew a pistol from my hip. If the opportunity presented itself, I could take this person out. If he was close to the bus, it would be more difficult. I might have to take him out at the legs and then finish him when he fell.

I couldn’t see anything, but I did hear a whispered voice. That meant more than one person most likely. Granted, I talked to myself plenty, but I was going to make the jump here and figure on multiple targets approaching.

I continued to wait without making a sound and ensuring that my pistol was ready to fire. My patience was eventually rewarded when three sets of legs came into view.

I considered the situation and decided now that perhaps just hoping they moved on would be better. If I got the drop on them, I could put at least one down, and perhaps two before they reacted. But I had serious doubts about three.

“Saw him go runnin’ off that way,” one of them men hissed in a voice I could barely hear.

“Donnie would pay nicely if we bring one back in time for the party,” a second man added in a voice that was squeaky and annoyingly high for a dude. It was enough to make me want to shoot him first.

“He’d prob’ly give us one of the newbies we rounded up from that last raid,” said the third.

I changed my mind after I heard the disgustingly sleazy laugh that followed. I wanted to drop these guys, and now that I was certain they were part of the Don Evans crew, that desire was amplified. The only problem was my desire for self-preservation.

I shifted slowly and silently to keep them in my sights as they crept past. It was as they passed me that I realized none of them were actually carrying a weapon in their hands. They had what I had to guess were automatic weapons slung casually over their shoulder. I could see a variety of pistols on their hips and the requisite machetes and long knives dangling from belts. None of them were carrying anything that resembled supplies. That was an assurance that they were camped close by.

I wanted desperately to take all three of these guys down. Despite having what I was certain had to be a sizeable entourage following him, three people would make a difference. That was simple post-apocalyptic math.

By now, they were giving up their backs to me. Things were looking very much like I would have my opportunity. I extended my pistol arm and gripped my weapon with both hands. Despite that, the moment I squinted one eye to take aim, I could see the slight wiggle of my weapon as my hands began to shake just a bit.

I inhaled slowly and held it. The muzzle of my weapon was sighted in on the middle of the back of the man in the center of the trio. I’d made that choice with the hopes of causing the most disorientation. If the guy in the middle took a bullet, it was possible that he might trip up at least one of his companions.

Holding my breath, I squeezed the trigger. The sound of my weapon firing was amplified by the echo as sound crashed off the underside of the bus and was reflected by the road. I didn’t wait, though. I shifted slightly left and fired again. I barely registered the first man I’d shot stumbling forward and going to his knees. The second man was as unlucky as I was fortunate when my bullet slammed into the back of his neck.

That left one. He was spinning out of reflex, but his eyes had not even begun to scan under the bus. I fired three quick shots that hit him in the chest. Each bullet made him back up a step with its impact.

Scurrying out from under the bus, I was almost crab-walking to them before I’d fully emerged. Once I was clear, I sprang to my feet and ran to them. Only one was still moving. The first one I’d shot was on his stomach and trying to pull himself away.

Every image of brutality I’d seen in the past weeks at the hands of Don Evans and his people flashed in front of my eyes and I kicked the man in the ribs hard enough to lift him off the ground. He didn’t flip over, and so I kicked him again. Oddly enough, it took three more kicks before the man ended up on his back.

He was looking up at me and a small voice in my mind recoiled. If this guy was even fifteen, I would be stunned. A look of terror filled his eyes and he opened his mouth, most likely in an attempt to plead for his life, but blood gushed out in a dark fountain. Rivulets ran down his chin and some of the droplets had come down to splatter his cheeks and even his forehead.

My eyes fell on something dangling around his neck, and any pity or sympathy I felt was snuffed. A piece of dark leather like the type used as boot laces hung there. Three ears were dangling from that cord.

Each of them obviously from a dark-skinned individual. I reached down and snatched it from the man’s neck and held it in front of his face like I would a tattered sock when Chewie was a pup and had gone through a period of fondness for my socks and Steph’s undergarments.

“You piece of shit,” I hissed.

Oddly enough, the look of fear was quickly replaced by one of hard defiance. Once more the boy opened his mouth, but I had no intention of letting whatever he might manage to spit out reach my ears. I stepped down on his throat.

His eyes seemed to bulge from their sockets and his face began to turn a deep red. I stepped down harder, and that was when I heard a crunchy pop. I’d crushed his windpipe. I knew that for certain when I pulled my booted foot away and the boy continued to change from red to purple. His feet began to kick, and his heels pounded the pavement in futility.

Once he quit moving, I looked around for signs of any more trouble. After I was as certain as possible that all was clear, I started off in the direction I was almost sure I’d heard Marshawn run.

“Marshawn?” I called out.

My only answer came in the form of yet another moan from a nearby zombie. After several minutes of searching and calling out in between putting down the occasional zombie, I came to an unsettling conclusion.

I was alone.

6

All by Myself

I crept up to the back door of the house and tapped on the sliding glass door. When nothing came pawing from the other side, I slid the door open and almost dove in.

For the past three hours, hell, maybe longer—daylight was certainly waning—I’d been evading the zombie children. For whatever reason, they’d decided that I was their target and the bastards had been doing a lot to convince me they had something special about them. The group had broken into smaller clusters that had managed to basically surround me. It did not take long to realize they were trying to essentially herd me to a specific area.

I realized it almost too late when I’d been escaping one pesky pack of kids that had cut off my escape from another group. I turned down a narrow bit of road that was little more than a pair of well-worn ruts from the countless tires that had once travelled up and down its length to a horseshoe shaped gravel strip with three houses set about it.

Each of the houses had tall fences and it was clear that these folks had not welcomed strangers with the plentiful “No trespassing” signs nailed up all over. What made this a dead end were the barbed wire strands topping each of the fences.

I’d had to throw my jacket over the top strand and climb over. When I cut across the yard and threw open the back gate after having to work furiously to get the bar that had been in place to keep it shut, I almost stumbled into the waiting arms of still more of the zombie children.

I had to backpedal and actually tripped, falling on my butt. I had to roll to the side as a pair of the pint-sized fiends came at me with an odd degree of determination. This was not the hang back and wait approach I’d seen so often. Maybe that should’ve been my clue.

I made it to my feet and dashed for the patio door of the house I was in the back yard of and threw it open in haste. The smell hit me at the same time as four children between the ages of maybe four and ten came lurching out of the shadows.

The best I could figure was that maybe they’d been trapped inside. Somehow, the zombie children had made me the unwitting accomplice in freeing them.

I had to turn around and duck back outside. Of course, by then, the children that had been outside the back gate were shambling across the yard. Luckily, they were still no more agile than the average walking corpse and I evaded them easily enough and darted back through the open gate and into the woods beyond.

I came out of the woods to the back side of a new housing development. In fact, less than half of the homes had ever seen occupants. I chose one of the homes that at least appeared vacant. Still spooked from earlier, I’d taken the precaution of knocking on the sliding glass door.

Now that I was inside and the adrenaline was being allowed to recede, I was suddenly exhausted. After going from room to room and making absolutely certain there were no surprises, I found a walk-in closet upstairs and flopped down on the floor.

It took almost no time for the exhaustion to overwhelm me. I felt my eyes sliding shut, and I doubted I could’ve kept them open if I’d tried.

***

When I woke, it was to an explosive crack that I first thought had to be a shotgun blast. I was still trying to find the doorknob of the closet when a flash of light burst through the cracks in the doorframe as well as underneath the door. A moment later, there was another rumble.

“Thunder,” I whispered to the darkness. As my eyes adjusted to the near perfect black, I found the knob and opened the closet door.

I stepped out into the empty bedroom that would never feel the warmth of a new family moving in. A set of french doors opened out onto a second-floor deck. I imagined it offered some sort of beautiful view once-upon-a-time. That was not the case now as I opened the doors to a driving rain. Another flash of lightning revealed dozens of undead drifting along the road, mindless of the downpour. It was likely that they were being drawn by the sounds of the thunder since that seemed to be the direction the storm was drifting.

Every time a new flash of lightning came, I could see that there were still more zombies passing by. I very quietly pulled the door shut and retreated into the darkness of the empty bedroom.

I had not intended to fall back asleep, but obviously I did when I jerked my head up and cracked the back of it on the wall behind me. My eyes opened to a blinding brightness of sunshine.

It seemed that the storm had passed. Getting back to my feet, I eased up to the doors and peered outside to find the street empty except or a lone zombie that was just standing in the middle of the street as if waiting for a signal to tell it where to go.

I was also able to confirm my previous guess about this house offering a view. Across rolling fields and gentle hillsides, I could see the distinct outline of Mount Hood. Any other time, the view would be peaceful, relaxing, and enjoyable.

Unfortunately, I had no idea where Marshawn could be…if he was even still alive. I’d lost my way running from those damn zombie children and would now have to try and find out exactly where I’d ended up. I had to at least get eyes on Don Evans and try to come up with a new plan.

My new worry was that he’d been recruiting more likeminded idiots. That would likely mean that even if I could get a shot at him, snipe him from a distance, somebody would step right into his spot and continue on with their agenda.

I was standing there, lost in thought when I caught movement to my left. I immediately stepped close to the wall so that I would have less of a chance of being seen.

I scanned in the general area I was certain I’d seen movement. After what seemed like several minutes, I started to convince myself that I’d been seeing things…or, more accurately, imagining them. That was when a flash of something dark caught my eyes just a bit farther along a row of hedges that served to separate two lots.

I continued watching and saw a second figure pop up in some tall grass of a lot that had not yet been cleared. The figure brought up a pair of binoculars and scanned across the rolling valley that unfurled into the horizon towards the mountain.

I scanned in the direction they were looking and didn’t see anything, but since I had no idea what they were looking for, I might be staring right at whatever this mystery subject might be without knowing it.

I continued to watch and was eventually rewarded with discovering exactly what I had to figure they’d been searching for when a signal flare burst in the sky. I was questioning their wisdom in giving away their position when a second flare popped up.

From where I was watching, I could tell that these people were in a sort of a triangle formation from each other. I had to now consider that they were either hunting or scavenging. This was a group using coordinated efforts in some united purpose.

Still, I had no idea what these people’s motives or demeanors might be and decided that it would be best to stay out of sight. As desperate as I was to find Marshawn, I knew better than to reveal myself to strangers. That thought was more than a little unsettling when placed beside the bigger picture of humanity’s ability to survive this new global extinction event.

I continued to watch as the warm sun began to heat up things inside this house to the point where I was actually starting to sweat. The air was thick and muggy as the rising heat helped the wetness in the ground start to evaporate. The Pacific Northwest isn’t known for its heat or humidity like places in the South, but we still get it to a degree that is made to feel worse by how rare it is.

I peeled off my jacket and tied it around my waist, and in that small amount of time, the group closest to me had emerged from their cover. One of them had a headset and was saying something. While I envied their technology, I knew it was a short-lived advantage that would eventually go by the wayside.

I now had to guess they were part of a camp that had a generator or something providing them with power of a sort. I was pondering the possibilities when a second group of five appeared.

The doors leading to the patio were open just slightly, and I could now hear them talking amongst themselves. They were still too far away for me to make anything out.

My curiosity was getting the best of me and I decided to creep downstairs. Once on the main floor, I peeked through the crescent moon-shaped window inset in the front door to confirm they were still out there. Once I’d done that, I slipped through the house and out the back.

Moving along the porch, I reached the gate to the wooden fence that enclosed the back yard and paused. If I held my breath, I could hear them talking, but still could not make out what was being said.

I didn’t dare try to open the metal latch that kept the gate secure. Instead, I hurried across the back yard to the rear of the property, and after pausing and trying to determine if I might be able to be seen, I scrambled over.

I closed my eyes for a moment and visualized where I’d seen this small group gathered. I went to where I figured the farthest corner of the fence would be in relation to them and crept along. I took the first corner and paused. Once I felt ready, I started along again until I could hear voices.

Each step now became a chore as I scanned every bit of the ground to ensure I didn’t step on a stick or something that would make a noise and give me away. When I reached the end of the fence that would now put me right beside the empty driveway, I crouched down and held my breath.

“…care what you think,” a man said in a gruff voice that screamed of chain smoking. “We lost three of our own and the rover saw something over in this direction. It don’t even matter if we catch the person responsible, as long as we come back with a living body to give over to Natasha.”

“Why you think Natasha stayed behind this time?” a female voice said.

“She still ain’t all the way recovered. One of my buddies says that the doc had to cut off another bit of her leg. I guess the stub was infected and startin’ to rot,” a young sounding man said.

“I bet she didn’t even let him drug her,” the first man said. “I ain’t met no tougher bitch than her.”

One of the others chuckled. “Man, I’d pay money to be in a room when she heard you call her that.”

“I wasn’t callin’ her a damn thing.”

The argument ensued, but I tuned them out. I now had confirmation that these were more of the bad guys. The issue was what I would do about it. I’d gotten lucky once. Did I think I could nail these guys without getting myself killed?

I peered around the end of the fence.

Six against one simply wasn’t realistic. Not to mention they had more showing up some time soon. Almost on cue, I heard somebody call out.

“Nothing out our way,” a woman snarled.

I chanced another look now that it seemed that all three groups had converged. This third group was decked out in hunter’s camo minus the orange vests. They all had rifles slung over one shoulder and a small arsenal of assorted small arms and blades dangling from them. What set this group apart was that they were also sporting backpacks.

“Spotted some new fires out towards Kelso Road,” one of the pack toting men said as he pulled out a foil pouch and dug into it, stuffing what I guessed to be chewing tobacco into his mouth. A moment later he spat on the ground before continuing. “Since it don’t seem like whoever was sneakin’ around was dumb enough to stay, we’re gonna head that way and see if it might be a new target of interest.”

“Them fellas from the jail show up yet?” a female voice asked. There was something to her tone that sounded like she might have more than a casual interest.

“A few, I guess something went wrong at the jail and a patrol came back saying the place was a bust,” one of the men answered.

“But Travis had a group hit that place. After they had a little fun, they were supposed to bring anybody worth a damn back with them,” the woman almost whined.

“It’s the fuckin’ zombie apocalypse, Cassie. Shit don’t always go the way you hope,” one of the men snorted. “Guess that means you are gonna be back on the market with poor old Travis not makin’ it back.”

“Fuck you, Dave,” the woman, Cassie I guess, snorted.

I couldn’t see the two from my position, but I heard the distinct sound of a slap. It sounded pretty sharp, but it was the deeper sound like dropping a roast on the counter, followed by a shriek that only partially allowed to come out before the shrieker apparently had the wind knocked out of them.

“Hey, Dave,” the woman I recognized by voice as one of the ones wearing a pack snarled. “Why don’t you try that shit with me.”

“The little bitch slapped me, Linda!” Dave protested. “You know as well as anybody how she been running ‘round like some sorta princess tellin’ folks how things was gonna be this way or that way when Travis showed up.”

“Don’t let me see you put hands on a woman like that again,” Linda growled so low that I barely heard her.

I ducked back down the fence. There was no way I would go up against this group. They were well armed and there were simply too many of them.

I decided maybe this plan was a bust. I’d found where I believed Don Evans and his people were set up. I could go back to my people and gather an actual force. That would have to be enough.

Once I was around back of the house I’d spent the night in, I took a moment to figure out what I should do. Obviously, it would be best if I returned to McIver and my people. Once there, I could ask for volunteers. We could make an actual plan and then hit Don Evans and his people who were now making Sandy High School into some sort of base.

I already knew they’d acquired some heavy machinery and were fortifying the place. It seemed like a strange location to set up, but then, I couldn’t talk. I was setting up my own base at a freaking campground.

“Hey!” a man shouted, causing me to look up and seek out the source of the voice.

The first thing I realized was that it was awfully damn close. Then my eyes tracked the sound to its source. A man was standing just up the gradual slope that went up and away from where I was hunched down by the fence.

My first thought was that I’d been discovered. When I saw that it was a trio, my stomach soured, and a bit of bile rose into the back of my throat. I was a dead man. Even if I could drop the three uphill at the edge of a tree line, the other nine around front would be on me in a flash and that was it.

I wished I could say there was some sort of peace and acceptance that settled over me. The only thing that settled anywhere was the deep fear and dread in my gut. Still, I would not go down without a fight and was about to bring up my pistol and get off as many shots as possible.

Just before I was about to fire, one of the newly arrived trio pointed…but to my left. A second later, a gunshot rang out and one of the three staggered back, a dark stain blooming in the center of their chest.

The two remaining returned fire as I hit the ground and covered my head with my hands out of a sense of self-preservation. Suddenly, the relative quiet was a cacophony of weapons being fired. There was the ‘pop-pop’ of handguns, the ‘boom’ of shotguns, and the chatter of automatic weapons spraying their sheets of leaden death.

I could hear all kinds of shouting and a few screams as the firefight blazed around me for a few minutes. I took the opportunity to crawl to the back gate. I popped my head up to look around and saw that only one of the trio was still standing. That individual was pressed tight up against a tree. The people who’d started shooting were now caught in a sort of crossfire as the group that had been out front were now involved.

I was able to wedge the gate open enough to be able to squirm through. As soon as I could, I scurried to the back door and ducked back into the house. The battle outside continued. I rushed upstairs and peeked out front. Two of the original nine were still there and they were scanning the area for trouble.

If I was going to get out of here, I would have to either wait this out and hope they simply moved on, or else take a chance with this pair still in front. I hated doing nothing, but I was not feeling good about trying to go up against these two. They were not simply standing there. Nope, this pair were actively scanning and, while I could not make out the words, they were communicating back and forth. Even if I caught them by surprise, something told me that the other one would take me down before I finished the job.

I sat down on the floor with my back pressed against the wall as I listened to the gunfight happening just feet away. I don’t know when, but eventually—and mercifully—the shooting stopped. I let out a long, slow breath and waited.

I didn’t have to wait long.

At first I thought it might just be one or more of the injured perhaps being carried to the front of the house. But the moans changed to yelps and cries. Something was happening and from the sounds, it was bad.

Very bad.

I got to my knees and risked a peek out front. What I saw made the hairs on my arms and the back of my neck stand up. I was hit by a queasy feeling in my gut. And even worse, an overwhelming sense of helplessness.

“We gots ourselves a couple of real live ones,” a woman snarled. I had to really look to figure out which one she might be, but when she yanked on the clothesline or piece of cord she had wrapped around the neck of a Hispanic woman and let loose with a braying laugh that was punctuated by several expletives and racial slurs, I knew which one was her.

“This ‘uns an honest to goodness Mexican jumping bean,” she crowed when the woman at the end of the makeshift noose lunged.

The woman holding the line easily side-stepped and lashed out with one gloved fist to punch the tiny Hispanic woman in the side of the head. There was a chorus of cheers from the group standing around. There was also one more prisoner. And while I was already horrified by what I was seeing in that cluster of five. It was so bad I couldn’t even let myself feel good about how they’d obviously taken a significant hit in the battle.

Standing in the midst of this group that was now cheering wildly as the Hispanic woman was being dragged over to a nearby streetlight pole was a young boy no more than in his early teens. His tan skin revealed his heritage, and when he started screaming, “No, mami!” I had to figure he was the woman’s son.

“Your mommy is getting’ what she deserves, boy.” One of the men punched the boy in his stomach, knocking the wind from him and ending his cries for the moment. “But don’t you worry…you’ll get your time soon enough.”

By now, the Hispanic woman had been dragged to the pole and the woman had tossed the cord up and over the extended arm that held the useless streetlight. I noticed that the end of the line had a ball-shaped knot that I’d heard called a monkey’s fist more than once. That knot served to male the rope heavy enough to allow the person to toss it. To me, that said this was a normal event for these people.

I’d encountered some of their handiwork and now was certain beyond a shadow of a doubt that these people all needed to die. Of course, right this moment, I was basically powerless. Sure, I might take down two or three, but the result would be that I would be killed, and they would continue on doing what they’d been doing for who knows how long.

As much as it sickened me, I slid back down to the floor and listened as the young boy got his breath back and began screaming and crying for his mother. Unfortunately, I could also hear her choked struggles as she was hoisted off the ground and hung.

I was still sitting there waiting for what I had to figure was the boy’s turn when I heard a terrible shriek. I popped up, doing my best to remain out of the window to avoid being seen, but I knew from that scream that somebody was meeting a terrible end.

It was the boy.

They’d taken him to the same pole that his mother hung from and tied him to it. Apparently, his cries had brought the undead and they were now gathered around his tiny bound form, ripping away chunks of him. I was embarrassed again by my sense of relief when one of the ghouls ripped out his throat, effectively ending his screams and reducing them to gurgles.

The entire time, the remaining members of that group stood just far enough away and laughed. If a zombie stumbled their direction, they simply ended it and continued watching the horrific scene playing out a short distance away.

My emotions warred with each other. I wanted desperately to put these animals down. But in the back of my head, I could hear Marshawn warning me to “Get out of those feelings!”

I sunk back down and waited for the horrible noises to end. Once they did, I peeked back. I’d pulled my hunting rifle off my shoulder but didn’t risk bringing it up…yet. I wanted it handy if an opportunity presented itself, but that was all.

A few of the group had wandered off at some point. Now there were only three of the pieces of filth loitering around the area. I also noticed more than a dozen undead had been dispatched and were on the ground.

Movement over by the light pole drew my gaze and I looked just as what was left of the boy struggled to roll onto its belly. He’d been ripped free of the pole during the attack. I could hear its hissing and moaning from my location. I couldn’t help but watch as the pathetic creature began to start dragging itself toward where the trio were conversing without seemingly a care in the world.

I was holding my breath as the boy drew closer and closer. One of the trio was the woman I’d watched hang the boy’s mother. I was seriously hoping their degree of obliviousness continued at least until that boy maybe took a chunk out of her calf.

It was now just a few feet away and slowly crawling nearer as its hands reached out and dug into the ground to bring it ever closer. When he was at last just on the edge of being able to reach out and grab the woman’s leg, the woman did an impressive quickdraw of one of the pistols hanging on her hip and shot the zombie boy in the top of his head.

They never even paused in their conversation!

I’d had it. I brought the rifle to my shoulder and sighted in on the woman that was now laughing about something one of the men had said with absolutely no regard for the corpse at her feet. I had my aim pretty much dialed in on the center of her chest. Just as I was about to squeeze the trigger, I adjusted my aim down a bit.

The rifle bucked against my shoulder and I was already adjusting to the man who had his back to me. I briefly registered the woman stagger back and thought that I caught a glimpse of a dark stain radiating from her gut. I could enjoy that victory later. Now, I squeezed the trigger and saw the man with his back to me stagger forward. He was dropping to his knees as I sighted in on the third individual.

It was the one I’d seen punching the now dead boy in his stomach. He was running away. In a few seconds, he would be in the brush and I’d not be able to see him. He was darting left and right, but apparently he wasn’t creative enough to mix it up.

Left.

Right.

Left.

I pulled the trigger. I saw him stagger a little, but he kept running and vanished into the tall grass and brush at the edge of the cleared lot that would never see a house built on it.

I took off out of the room and bounded down the stairs. As soon as I burst out through the front door, I was slinging my rifle over my shoulder and pulling a pistol from its holster at my hip.

The man I’d shot in the back was lying sprawled on the street. A dark stain was growing around him as the blood left his body through the hole I put through him. He was still trying to move, much like the zombified boy just moments earlier. I slowed enough to aim at the back of his head and pull the trigger. The pistol fired, sending the small projectile smashing through the back of the man’s skull. 

I passed the woman and slowed just enough to see that her eyes were staring blankly at the sky above. The feelings of self-disgust did not seem to be leaking through as I viewed my handiwork.

I sprinted across the empty lot and plunged into the woods beyond in pursuit of the man I could hear crashing along just ahead of me. I noticed a few red smears on some of the flatter leaves that were just starting to open and stretch out to soak in the sun.

I kept pausing just long enough to get a bearing on this guy’s direction. It was clear to me that I was gaining on him. The noises were getting louder, and now I could hear muffled curses after what sounded like somebody losing their footing.

I paused when I spied more blood. This time, it wasn’t just a smear. There was a fat droplet of crimson liquid hanging from the tip of this particular leaf. As I watched, gravity won the battle and the droplet plummeted to the ground. I took off at a sprint, certain now that not only was this guy seriously injured, but I was also very close.

And then I spotted him. He had paused and was bent over at the waist. Even though the foliage, I could see he was laboring to get his breath. His body was heaving with each strenuous attempt.

As I drew closer, I could hear him panting. His breathing sounded strange. It took a few seconds to realize that it was a wet sound. I had to guess that I’d caught him in a lung. Once I pushed through the last barrier of branches, the man merely turned his head. He wasn’t making any attempt to run.

I brought the pistol up and circled around him until I was not at his side any longer, but directly in front of him. I had no idea how long I would have until backup or the undead arrived, but this was an opportunity I would not allow to go to waste.

7

The Death of Remorse

“You’re with Don Evans,” I snarled.

“Never heard of the guy,” the man slurred around the blood trickling from his lips.

“You know, I always think it’s funny how you fucking sheep do that.”

“Do what?” The man lowered himself to his knees and braced his hands on them to keep himself from faceplanting.

“Act like you are obeying some code of honor when it comes to protecting assholes like Donnie Boy.” I squatted down on my haunches so I could look into the man’s eyes.

“What would some punk like you know about honor?” the man shot back and then broke into a fit of wet coughs.

“Yeah, this is a waste of time.” I stood and brought the gun up, lining my barrel with the top of the man’s head.

“Fuck you.”

“That really what you want your last words to be?” I asked.

“Last words?” The man looked up at me and his eyes widened when he saw the pistol aimed at him. His smug expression faltered, and now he just looked like a pathetic piece of human garbage.

“You aren’t walking away from this…you gotta know that,” I said.

“You just gonna murder me in cold blood like this?” the man asked with a slight tremor in his voice.

I couldn’t help myself. I laughed. It was as if I’d just heard the funniest joke ever. There was no way this guy was making that sort of a statement.

“Sorry.” I wiped at my eyes when I finally got myself under enough control to speak. There was still a bit of that humor in my voice, but I needed to move this along. “But did you just say that after what you did to that woman and her child?”

“What?” The confusion in his tone almost sounded genuine, then his eyes widened, and he looked at me with what almost appeared to be confusion. “That beaner and her little brat?”

“This is a waste of my time.” I raised the pistol just a bit and closed my left eye to intensify my focus as I curled my finger tighter around the trigger.

“Wait a minute!” the man coughed, his voice breaking just a bit as his sense of self-preservation kicked up a few notches. “This is America dammit! You can’t just do this…I got my rights!”

I almost laughed again. But my anger was in full control by now and I was seeing red. “No. You don’t. This ain’t America anymore…America is dead.”

“Fuck you!” the man repeated.

I pulled the trigger. The bullet slammed into his forehead and an eruption of blood, bone fragments, and brain exploded out the back. He fell backwards, his dead eyes staring up at nothing.

“Fitting final words.”

I let the arm holding the pistol drop to my side. I waited for the rush of adrenaline to leave and be replaced by the gut twisting sensation of remorse. Nothing came. Even once fatigue began to seep into my system, there was no guilt or shame. I’d looked a man in the eyes and ended his life, but I hadn’t felt a thing. And I wasn’t numb. I just didn’t feel bad.

I walked away from the dead man and headed back around the home I’d been hiding in. To the best of my knowledge, that would take me away from the high school where Don Evans was based if my information was accurate; and at this point, I had every reason to believe that to be true.

I did a quick check on the dead bodies and was not surprised to find nothing useful. Either they hadn’t been carrying much, or the people who’d already left had stripped the bodies before slinking off to their encampment.

I have no idea how long I’d walked before I realized that my throat was parched. I leaned up against the base of a giant pine tree, slid down onto my butt, and pulled my canteen around and twisted off the top. After a long drink, I let my eyes close.

I let my hearing take over for a few minutes. The sounds of the woods drifted in. Slowly washing everything else away. The birds, the hum of insects, the rustle of branches as gentle breezes blew. While I sat against the tree, I searched inside myself for any feelings at all about what I’d just done.

When it dawned on me that I was actually okay with it, I allowed myself to simply relax and take in a moment of peace. That also let me consider what my options were regarding Don Evans.

When I heard the first snap of a twig just seconds after I’d gotten a whiff of the undead on what would have otherwise been just a pleasant spring breeze, I knew that I had to at least scout his encampment. It would be foolish to believe that I could single-handedly mount an attack.

As I considered the situation, I realized that Marshawn and I had been nothing short of idiots. We’d convinced ourselves that we could charge in and somehow pull off some sort of ninja-like stealth attack.

The reality was that, unless he had withheld some sort of Special Forces background, our chances were slim and none. This had been a testosterone-driven fool’s errand.

Once it was dark, I would make my way to the high school. I would find someplace where I could hole up and make some detailed observations. That was as good as it was going to get.

After I scouted his location, I would have to make the tough decision of either giving up and making a run for someplace far away, or, if the numbers weren’t too lopsided, I would try to rally the community to launch an attack.

I had the feeling that the latter choice was going to be the most likely. Still, if there was a chance that a well-planned surprise attack had any possibility, and I could convince everybody else that this was worth the risk, that was what I would shoot for.

I opened my eyes and spied the zombie that was drawing close. It hadn’t taken notice of me as of yet and was simply staggering through the woods for whatever reason.

I watched it. Even in the shadows I could make out plenty of detail. This one was a woman that had perhaps been in her thirties or forties. She had dirty blond hair that was now a tangled mess. Between the blood and filth, I was actually surprised I’d been able to discern a color at all.

She had a lot of what I was starting to view as “typical” injuries. A ripped out throat, bites on her arms, and a rip in her belly where a knot of her insides had balled up and perhaps dried into a visceral scab preventing anything else from spilling out of her body.

She had been shot perhaps a dozen or more times judging by the visible wounds I could see—including what I was certain had to be a shotgun blast to one shoulder that left her arm a dangling and useless appendage.

When she turned so that she was at about a three-quarters profile to me, I noticed the handle of a knife jutting from the center of her chest. Yet, she continued on despite the obvious attempts to bring her down.

As soon as I climbed to my feet, I apparently made enough noise to draw her attention. She stopped her current course and in those herky-jerky fits and stops turned to face me. I pulled the bludgeon that the Rag-and-Bone Man had given me and took a few practice swings like I was in the batter’s box.

Once she closed to within range, I drew back and brought it around in a full swing. Her head seemed to almost explode. I’d taken down a few at pointblank range with a shotgun, and even that did not compare to the destructive carnage that this weapon offered.

The spiked, resin-coated skull connected with the side of her head around the cheek and simply destroyed most of the upper two-thirds of her head in a misty cloud of gore. I almost shouted my triumph and amazement at what I’d just done, but slammed my mouth shut with a click of my teeth.

After I tore away a strip of her filthy tee-shirt to wipe away the worst of the blood, brain, and skull fragments with clumps of hair still attached from the head of my weapon, I resumed my trek through the woods.

I only had a very basic idea of the layout regarding the town of Sandy. Fortunately, there were still enough street signs that indicated the general direction of the high school. I would regroup and wait for dark. Once I had the cover of night on my side, I would go find a location that I could use and do my RECON.

Once I was clear of the woods, I looked around to get my bearings and realized that I’d come out near a firehouse. The small building was buttoned down, and when I got close enough, I realized that the vehicles were gone. Most likely the poor bastards had died responding to something that they were simply not prepared for. It had not seemed possible as it had unfolded in those early days.

The old saying of “Seeing is believing” hadn’t really kicked in on this one for most folks. Hell, I’d had a hard time accepting even as my Stephanie came at me with those dead eyes and chomping teeth.

I went around the building and found a side door. It was locked, and I didn’t really want to try and bust it in. I headed back to the front, wrapping my leather coat around my left hand and forearm. The garage-style doors had large, square windows starting at about chest height.

After busting one in and cleaning out the frame so I didn’t slice myself up, I hoisted myself up and in. It was a typical small firehouse with a few offices and a blown-up map of the city of Sandy on one wall of what I guessed to be the captain’s office.

There were lockers and closets with ample cleaning supplies and tools. I hadn’t considered the plethora of useable materials inside these places. It would certainly be something I had to make a mental note of for later. Up to this point, we’d focused on homes and stores…the typical locations.

There was a small open dorm with two bunk beds and three singles. They looked surprisingly comfortable. Once I could ensure there would be no surprises, a nap on an actual bed was simply too luxurious to pass up. All that remained was the kitchen.

As soon as I reached the door that was propped open with a small, rubber door stopper, the stench of rotten food hit me. It made my eyes start to water with the thickness of the odor. As soon as I walked in, I understood why. There was a large package of some sort of meat on one counter. Obviously it’d been left there when the company here responded to what would prove to be their final emergency.

It was swarming with flies. And from across the room that was rather gloomy with only a small window set high on one wall, I could see the writhing mass of maggots feeding on the rotten meat. What I didn’t see was any signs that a zombie might be about.

Armed with that knowledge, I headed to the bunkroom, closed the door behind me, shoved a chair in front of it, wedging it under the doorknob and then flopped down on a bed in the back corner.

I am not sure what happened first. My head hitting the pillow, or me falling asleep.

When I opened my eyes, it was to pitch darkness. It took me a few seconds to get my bearings and my wits about me. I was still deciding on whether I wanted to get up and stumble over to the bathroom I remembered being over in the corner off to my left when I heard the crunch of glass followed by a loud hiss and somebody shushing.

I was no longer alone.

I rolled off the bed and onto the floor away from the door. I had a chair wedged in place, but I wasn’t counting on that keeping the living out for very long. I went through my weapons and laid a rifle on either side of me and gripped the butt of my pistol.

It wasn’t long before I heard whispering outside the door. The knob rattled and then there was the soft “whump” as if somebody had tried to use their shoulder to force the door open. The chair made a slight grating sound as the back legs scooted an inch or two.

Another thud pushed the chair another little bit. And now I could hear whispered voices. They weren’t loud enough to make anything out, but I was pretty certain that I heard at least three different people.

Another thud scooted the chair several inches and I could see an arm reach inside and grope around. Once the chair was located, the person gripped it and then pulled the door so they could dislodge my makeshift door stop.

The chair clattered to the floor and that brought on a round of scoldings and more shushings. I felt my finger begin to tighten on the trigger.

“For crying out loud, Gene, you want to bring every fucking zombie for miles?” a woman’s voice scolded.

“I lost my grip, Bev. Jeez, cut a guy some slack,” a deep voice retorted, but it was almost clear just from the tones as to who was in charge.

“I don’t smell no skags,” a third voice piped up, this one sounding like maybe a young boy or girl.

“Would you stop calling them that, Kira?” Bev hissed. “It hasn’t caught on and it isn’t going to.”

“Fiiiine,” the young voice, Kira I had to guess, said in a drawn out and very teenage tone of exasperation.

The door opened and a beam of light shone into the room. Currently it was directed almost in the entirely opposite direction. The problem was that it would hit me eventually, or at least come my way. If it hit me in the face, I would effectively be blinded.

“This place is spoken for,” I blurted when nothing more decisive or clever came to mind.

My announcement was greeted by a squeak indicating that I’d at least startled one of them. The flashlight beam wavered and then plummeted. There was a clatter and the light went out as the holder obviously dropped it.

I heard a bunch of scuffling noises and then something clattered on the tile floor of my room. I didn’t have a clue what the hell was going on until a bright flash came with a loud pop and hiss.

Fuck, they’d thrown in some sort of flare or something and now all I could see were bright flashes and dark blobs dancing before my eyes as it became my turn to let out a yell and reflexively throw my forearm over my eyes to try and shut out the dazzling white-blue light.

There was a loud bang that I knew had to be the door flying open and hitting the wall. A second or two later, I heard boots thumping on the floor as the people rushed in.

My only hope was that I got lucky. Still blind, but certain that my gun was still aimed in the general direction of the door, I squeezed off a volley of shots. As I fired, I let my arm move to my left, hopefully following in the direction my attackers might be moving.

I heard somebody bellow in what certainly sounded like pain. Unfortunately, that victory was short lived. I felt the person beside me just before the boot slammed into my ribs.

My body slid sideways, and I yelped as I a second explosion of pain erupted when I slammed into something. Most likely it was the small dresser beside the bed. No matter what it was, I was in a bad place. Another kick to my ribs came and this one caught me right in the belly. It was enough to make me vomit.

“Gross!” I thought I heard somebody exclaim, but I was too caught up in trying to regain my vision, not choke on my puke, keep the ability to continue drawing breath, and most importantly, not lose my grip on my pistol.

I was still mostly on my stomach at this point, and with all the reserves I had in me, managed to get almost to my side. I brought my arm around and now gripped the pistol with both hands as I was finally able to make out a dark blob that had a vague human shape to it.

I squeezed the trigger once…twice. And heard a groan that sounded like I might’ve done significant damage to somebody. A moment later, another person let out a terrible cry. Another shadow burst into view and I fired again, this time in a flurry of four shots.

I could hear what sounded like wet choking noises as I tried my best to move my body around. I felt the small bedside dresser I’d been kicked into and pressed my back against it to help me move to a sitting position.

My vision was slowly returning, but it was still far from good enough for me to make out anything with clarity. Now I could see a second shadow and something on the floor that had to be the individual that had been kicking me.

For whatever reason, that second shadow was no longer interested in me. Since I could not recall how many shots I’d fired, I fumbled for a new magazine and tried to reload. It was terribly awkward, and I dropped it twice before finally swapping out and letting the slide chamber a new round.

“You fucking bastard…you killed him,” a female voice cried.

My vision was returning to normal and I could almost take a full breath. I looked across the room at a couple of damned kids! The girl was perhaps fourteen or so and about the age of the students that I would’ve been teaching. The boy couldn’t be much older. I could see the beginnings of a darker peach fuzz starting to sprout on his face. He was bleeding out and would not last long if he was even still alive.

Beside them was another woman perhaps in her thirties. She was in full military combat gear and I could make out two silver bars glittering in the single beam of sunlight coming through the window. I had to guess that she was military…unless she’d simply stole a random soldier’s uniform. She was undoubtedly dead.

The girl was becoming drenched in the blood of the boy she held clutched to her chest. Looking closer, I saw that the pair were way overloaded with assorted weapons. I wasn’t sure how long they’d been carrying them, but it could not have been long.

On the girl, I saw what I was almost certain had to be an M4 slung over her shoulder, as did the two corpses. That begged the question as to why they hadn’t used it since they were each sporting one. There were belts around all their waists with pouches that I was certain contained magazines. She had a pair of military issue KABAR knives dangling from one belt as well as a badass crossbow that was on the ground beside her. The other thing that gave me chills were the assortment of grenades dangling from her like fucking Christmas ornaments.

I made it to my feet and winced as I tried to draw a deep breath. At the very least I had some severely bruised ribs.

“What the hell did you come at me for?” I tried to growl, but my voice was a bit slurred from the pain and disorientation I was dealing with.

“You came to our safe place and attacked first,” the girl said through the tears that ran freely down her face.

“All I did was say that somebody was here,” I shot back, wincing as I raised my voice.

“In our house!” the girl retorted. “We claimed this entire street weeks ago.”

“You claimed a street?” I tried not to laugh, but that was utterly ridiculous. “And this is a fire station, not a damned house.”

“We stay in the home next door, but these are the places we use for supplies,” the girl said with a sniff. “The Carsons have the street behind us and that weirdo, Russell Chan has the one across the way.”

So, if I was hearing her correctly, there were at least two more groups or whatever using this neighborhood to ride things out. That meant there were living, breathing people here. Did they realize how close they were to Don Evans and his people?

Then something the girl said broke loose in my brain.

“You said that I started this…that I attacked first.” I paused as the girl sniffed and then leveled her weeping, bloodshot eyes on me. “I might’ve intruded into your living space, and for that I can apologize. But I sure as hell didn’t attack you guys.”

“You shot Chad!” the girl shrieked.

It was in that minute that she remembered her weapons. I saw her eyes widen and then harden to a glare of pure hate. She went to jerk one of the rifles from her shoulder.

I want to use the excuse that I acted on some sort of reflex, but I brought my pistol up and fired. The bullet hit her in the center of the girl’s chest, and she slumped back against the wall behind her. There was a splattering of crimson from where the bullet had exited her body and sent blood spraying from her back.

I let my arm drop and stared at the girl. Her eyes had already lost their light. Dull orbs were all that remained, and they returned my stare with an emptiness that froze my insides.

I holstered my weapon, got up to my knees, and crawled to her. With the same hand that held the weapon I’d ended her life with, I reached out and closed her eyes so that I would no longer feel their incriminating stare. I let myself sort of fall back onto my butt and I drew up my knees. I wrapped my arms around them and squeezed them to me as I looked at the three dead bodies. I don’t know how long I simply sat there, but eventually, I drifted off.

When my eyes opened next, it was still light out. I didn’t think I would sleep through a whole day. Getting to my feet, I went to the window, ignoring the fact that I had to step over the bodies on the floor; corpses that were solely my fault.

As I stood in the window, I listened for any sounds of these other people that supposedly lived in this neighborhood. When I didn’t hear anything, I turned to regard the three dead people that had shared this room with me.

I decided I didn’t need to be weighted down with a bunch of weapons. What I was carrying would suit me fine. However, in the off chance that I lost my weapons and needed a secret stash, this place would do nicely.

I ended up slipping their stuff under one of the beds. I used my knife to open a seam in the bottom of the mattress and stuffed most of the weapons and ammo there.

I kept an assortment of the grenades they were carrying. I was very curious as to where they’d come across these things. That encouraged me to do a very thorough house-to-house search along this street.

On the plus side, I did find more than enough food and water. In fact, if I could remember where this place was, it might behoove my group to return here for supplies.

As soon as that thought arrived, I scolded myself. This was a small community. At least, from the way that girl had made it sound. And despite that, here I was planning what would amount to nothing short of a raid.

Was I becoming more like Don Evans? I had just killed three people and to this point still had no sense of remorse. I was not punishing myself for what amounted to murder.

Hell, I was in the process of planning a scouting mission that would lead to mass murder. I was crossing so many lines that everything had become a blur of gray. Black and white were washed out and swirling together in a morass of inseparable designs.

As I sat at a messy kitchen table that showed signs of recently hosting a peanut butter and honey sandwich meal where dry ramen noodles were substituted for the bread, I considered where my head might be going. At some point, I’d come to a realization. If I was going to have any hope of surviving, I would be forced to kill not just the undead, but some of the living as well.

None of the rules from our old world applied any more. It wasn’t that we couldn’t be social or nice, but this was literally all a matter of survival now.

I was just about finished making my own sandwich of sorts when a voice called out, “Hey in there. Whoever you are, we know you ain’t one of the Bordens. If you come out…maybe we can talk this over. Ain’t no need for anybody else to die today.”

I paused in the making of my meal and considered the words. After only a few seconds, I continued making my peanut butter and honey snack. Once it was made, I grabbed a bottled water and headed to the living room. I stayed out of sight as I peered out front.

Two men were standing in the street talking amongst themselves and pointing to the house. From here it looked like they were arguing over who was going to go inside.

I took a bite, almost relishing in the crunch of the dry noodles and the burst of sweetness from the honey as the peanut butter made up the glue to keep everything together. I began to hum a song as I watched the pair continue to argue. It took me a moment before I realized I was humming “Waterfalls” by TLC. I had no idea where that song had come from in the vast catalog of music in my mind, but I went with it.

“Listen, whoever you are, we don’t want any trouble. Just come out. We can talk it over. If’n you claimed this place fair and square, we just wanna know who we might be dealin’ with,” one of the men hollered.

He was a tall, skinny man either in his fifties or very prematurely gray. He had on some dark green coveralls that looked like there were strips of metal attached. He was wearing what appeared to be an actual shin guard on one leg, but the other had…was that a phone book? Yeah, he had an actual phone book strapped to his other leg. He was wearing clear goggles and a respirator or air filter of some sort was hanging around his neck.

The second man who was hanging back a few feet was what I imagine Chunk from The Goonies would look like today. He had a mop of curly hair and at maybe five and a half feet tall was still easily over two hundred and fifty pounds. Somebody was eating well in the midst of an apocalypse.

“They attacked me first, I was only defending myself,” I called back after swallowing a mouthful of sandwich. “I don’t plan on sticking around, and I don’t want any trouble, but if I have to, I will do what it takes to defend myself.” I had decided to answer only because it did not look like these two were going to leave unless I did.

I had to bite back a laugh when the guy in the coveralls almost landed on his butt after scrambling backwards so quick at the sound of my voice. And the one I’d dubbed Chunk actually turned and ran back into the trees. A moment later, his head peeked out from behind the one he had tried unsuccessfully to hide behind.

“So you ain’t laying claim to this spot?” Coveralls hollered back. His voice sounded a bit squeaky at first and it was clear he was more than just a little bit scared.

“Nope. Just passing through.”

Chunk slipped out and very slowly approached his comrade. The two began to whisper back and forth for a moment. At last, Coveralls nodded and turned back to face my general direction. “If you’re looking for a place to settle, you might try the high school. Seems a small community is taking root there.”

That was interesting. Were they trying to send me to my death? Have they encountered Don Evans and his people? I had to believe they had. That would mean they were actively trying to get me hurt or killed…or worse. And yes, knowing Don Evans, there are worse things than death.

“Why aren’t you folks there if it is such a good idea?” I finally shouted back.

Either they had no idea I was watching them, or they were just plain stupid. They looked at each other, and even from here I could see the worry and confusion cross their faces. They leaned together and started whispering frantically and pointing in my general direction.

“We got a good thing going right where we are,” Coveralls finally replied.

Chunk was actually nodding his head. Slowly at first, then like a frantic bobblehead doll. The fact that these people were trying to actively get me killed was not sitting well. Truth be told, it was downright pissing me off.

I’d had enough of people and their crap. How had we devolved so quickly? How could anybody worth a damn make it a point to try and have somebody killed.

“How about you go see if they are okay with me maybe showing up at their door?” I asked, my voice tight as the anger turned to a cold ball in my gut.

Once more their reaction was visibly obvious and a giveaway. I swear I could see the sweat beading on Chunk’s forehead. They looked at each other, each one gesturing for the other to either say something or at least make a valid suggestion. When they did break the silence, I was admittedly caught off guard.

“You one of them, ain’t ya?” Coveralls shouted. I watched as he gave his rifle a quick once over. Meanwhile, Chunk was creeping of towards the hedge that ran down the left side of the house.

“One of who?” I watched Chunk as he vanished and felt the coldness in my belly spread through my body when the last thing I saw before he vanished from sight was him gesturing to Coveralls to keep talking.

“Th-th-them folks over at the school,” Coveralls stuttered. “You come here and killed those folks when they refused your demands. That fella with the big mouth and the school bus sporting that machine gun.”

That confirmed at least one part of my suspicion. They at least knew about Don and his people. It also seemed likely that, until they had jumped to the erroneous conclusion that I was one of his people, they were trying to send me that way to have me ended.

And then I heard the creak of a board. It was very slight. It came just as Coveralls ended his little accusatory rant. I turned sideways so I could see out the door of the bedroom as well as out the window and Coveralls.

“Why would you think I have anything to do with those people?” I asked as I drew my .45 and very carefully and quietly deactivated the safety.

I watched the stairs and was rewarded with a tuft of very curly hair bobbing into view. He paused for a moment.

“Them folks been trying to tell us that we got one week to start delivering a certain amount of goods to their front doors…” the man started hollering, but I stopped listening as I focused my attention on the mop of blondish hair.

When Chunk’s head cleared what was the floor of this level and turned my direction, I saw his eyes widen as he took in the pistol pointed at him. His eyebrows shot up and his mouth formed an almost perfect ‘O’ as he realized that I had him.

I gave only a slight shake of my head right before I squeezed the trigger. I saw his head rock back and gore sprayed from the back of his skull as the bullet exited. I heard his body tumble back down the stairs and I spun back to the window.

“Perry? You get him?” Coveralls shouted.

I closed one eye as I focused my aim on the man down in the street. Once I felt I had him, I stepped into the open window frame.

“Nope.” I squeezed the trigger.

The bullet caught the man in the chest. I watched a dark stain spread across the fabric. The man looked at me and his mouth opened and closed twice before blood began to trickle from the corners.

He sorta fell to his knees. The rifle in his hands slipped from his grasp and fell to the ground with a clatter.

I stood there for a few moments as I let it all sink in as I watched, a pair of zombies stumbled out of the brush. They made their way to Coveralls who was sprawled face down on the ground. They paused briefly, but then continued on. Apparently they only dined on fresh meat. I wasn’t sure if I knew that before this moment or not but made a point to remember it now.

I checked the safety on my weapon and holstered it. After one more walk through the residence and a pat down of Chunk—who was apparently named Perry—where I found little worth taking, I headed out.

I was now determined to go scout the Don Evans compound. I stepped outside and caught a whiff of the undead. I looked toward where the couple that had stumbled into view had headed. They were gone, and I also realized that the wind was blowing in the direction they had vanished. That meant it was likely I had company coming.

I knelt beside Coveralls and gave him a good pat down. His rifle looked good and worth taking. As an added bonus, he had a pocket full of shells that I also confiscated.

On his belt there was a really ornate looking knife handle. I drew the knife from the sheath and smiled at the razor-sharp blade. Unfortunately, he wasn’t carrying any sort of food or water, but I guess he didn’t really need to considering he was right by his home or whatever he called it.

The only other thing that caught my eye were his boots. They were in much better shape than mine. I gave a push and was even more excited to discover they were steel-toed. The best part was that they were my size.

I sat down and removed his and then unlaced my own. I figured I could stash my original pair back inside the house and grab them on my way back through.

I just finished putting on my new pair when I heard a voice from behind me.

“How could this be possible?”

8

Pain and Suffering

The sound of Natasha Petrov’s raspy voice made my stomach curdle. I turned around to face the woman and almost didn’t recognize her.

She was dressed in leather adorned with metal strips and studs. Her gloves had three-inch spikes across the knuckles. There were also large spikes at each elbow. Her face had changed. She had a still-healing, and obviously deep, gash that ran across it from just above her left eye and all the way down to her chin. She was wearing an eyepatch, so I had to imagine there would be nothing but an empty socket underneath. But that all paled compared to the ugly stump smashed into an ill-fitting prosthetic.

Her lips were twisted to a sneer, but it was made even more sinister due to how that gash on her face ran through the right side of her lips.

“Evan Berry,” the woman practically crooned as five men emerged from the bushes behind her, “had I known you were here, I might’ve come sooner.”

“After our last date, I didn’t think you’d be interested in hooking up again,” I retorted. Okay, so not super witty, but it was better than standing there like a mute idiot.

“Donnie is going to be so happy to see you,” she said, apparently ignoring my weak barb. “Do you know that he is simply one of those people who can’t let things go? He really felt slighted when you ran off. And when he found out about the company you keep…well, he was more than a little disappointed.”

The team travelling with Natasha fanned out. They were not going to give me a snowball’s chance in hell of escaping. As they did, her one good eye narrowed, and it took me a moment to realize that she was staring at something over my shoulder.

“That weapon…I’ve been seeing those around lately. You must tell me where you obtained it,” she said, her voice flat as she seemed almost transfixed by the club that the Rag-and-Bone Man had given to me.

“Found it,” I replied with a shrug.

“Oh, Evan, you are such a terrible liar,” she almost purred in her rough voice. “But that will make our time together so much sweeter.”

I was caught. There was no way out. If I drew my pistol, chances were good that I would be dead before it cleared the holster. I’m no Ah-nold, or Sly, or Bruce Willis. Also, I was the only one that did not have a weapon drawn, and I was willing to bet that the safeties were off on everything pointed at me.

“But we can get to the fun stuff later,” Natasha said as she approached me with her awkward limp. “I’m curious when you became a raider. You seemed more like the hide-in-a-group-of-sheep-and-start-a-farm sort. Never pictured you as a raider…an actual survivor.”

“I guess you never really got to know me.” I shrugged my shoulders and allowed a kernel of hope to start growing. Maybe they would be foolish enough to offer me a place with them. If that happened, I would simply bide my time until I got close enough, and then I would kill Don Evans.

Okay, so it was unlikely that things would be quite so easy, but still, as it stood, my options were slim. I had to hold on to that tenuous hope that I would get a chance.

“Take his gear,” Natasha ordered.

I could now count ten men and women total besides her as half of them converged on me. The other five hung back, weapons still aimed at me. They were not going to make any stupid mistakes and give me a chance to go out in a blaze of glory.

I felt a strange anger when the weapons that the Rag-and-Bone Man made were confiscated. Somehow, those seemed more personal. The fact that Natasha seemed so interested in them only amplified my feelings. I noticed that she made a gesture to the person holding one to bring it to her.

“This baby has barely seen any action,” the woman observed as she examined the weapon. “You just got this, which means you either found his cart, or know where he is.”

I stared back at her, not willing to say a word. I had no idea how she knew about him, but her degree of interest seemed dangerous…for him.

With another nod, my hands were pulled behind my back and zip tied. One of my captors kicked me behind my knees and I fell to the ground hard enough to cause me to yelp.

In a flash, Natasha was in my face. “If your pain threshold is that low, you are in for a really bad day.”

I looked up at her with as little emotion on my face as I could muster and said, “Why not just kill me if you are so set against me for whatever reason.”

“Whatever reason?” she snarled as she backhanded me across the face. “Is your memory that poor?”

I felt the sting and then my mouth filled with the coppery taste of blood. I made a point to return my gaze to her slowly. When she started to lean in again, I spat a mouthful of blood at her. The bright red splatter caught her square in the face, and I don’t think I was able to hide my smirk.

Of course, that earned me a serious beat down. In a flash I felt boots kicking me in the back. I landed on my stomach and could do nothing as I felt more blows to my legs and already aching ribs.

I could hear Natasha shouting something, but in the chaos, I couldn’t make out what was said. It was a mercy when somebody kicked me in the side of the head.

Everything went black.

***

When my eyes opened, it took me a few moments to realize it. Sound was actually what helped me deduce that I was conscious. The room itself was pitch-black. I couldn’t even see an outline of light where there might be a door.

Outside, I could hear what sounded like…cheering?  Or was that screaming? Could it be both. Knowing Don Evans, the answer to that was most assuredly yes.

I have no idea how long I lay on the floor before I realized that my hands were no longer bound. Once I did realize, I climbed to my feet. Stumbling about, I managed to figure out that I was in a room not much bigger than a closet. Three of the walls felt like concrete, and the door felt like it was made of metal.

I considered banging on the door, but after careful thought, decided that letting them know I was conscious might not be the best course of action. There was still a chance that somebody might come here, open my door, and then I could take them down and possibly escape.

After what felt like an eternity, I heard somebody jangling keys on the other side of my door. I’d had plenty of time to consider all my options. The best plan seemed to be for me to play possum. I would likely only get one shot at this. My element of surprise was the best choice as far as I was concerned.

The door opened and my plan disintegrated in the bright beam of light that burned even through closed eyelids.

“On your feet,” a male voice barked.

It was not easy to stand as I struggled to open my eyes even the tiniest bit. It was even worse as, just that fast, all the various plans and contingencies I’d come up with as I sat in the dark had been foiled by something as simple as a high-powered flashlight. Hell, it could’ve been a normal flashlight for all I knew.

I was yanked forward, stumbling over my own feet as I remained blind. Rough hands shoved me face first into the wall and zip ties were applied once more.

After a few unsteady and staggering steps forward, I began to see blurry shapes. There were sounds all around me that I could not recognize at first. Eventually, I realized I was in some sort of kitchen. Since I knew Don Evans had taken up residence at Sandy High School, I had to figure this was the cafeteria kitchen.

As my vision returned, I could, in fact, see several people chopping, washing, and prepping veggies. Cans were being opened and the contents poured into large pots. In one corner, a trio of deer were hanging from pipes. They’d been field dressed and were now apparently curing.

I could also smell fish, and at one counter, I saw a group of women and children pulling fish from a plastic bin and gutting them. Everything here appeared to be running with an almost military efficiency.

Despite my thoughts and feelings, I was impressed with what Don seemed to have put together here. There was one big thing missing as I took in my surroundings.

I saw not one single smile.

I walked along, occasionally, my escort would jab or shove me. I think he was simply trying to set the tone that he was in control since I was actually walking along without putting up any resistance.

We emerged from the cafeteria and continued along a hallway. It was definitely the high school. I passed by classrooms—most of them empty, but a few of them converted into what appeared to be living quarters—as we wove through the complex. At last we came to a set of double doors and the gymnasium.

This was a huge dorm now. Only, from the looks of it, this was not a family zone. Everybody I saw was sporting a variety of weapons.

In an instant, I was hit with a chilling revelation. There had to easily be over a hundred people here. And these were just the ones I’d seen so far. As we had approached the gym, I could hear a lot of noise. Some of it just general conversation, but there were also moans and cries.

I was led through the gym and found it strange that my presence did not seem to garner more than a casual glance. Did that mean this sort of thing was the norm?

We exited the gym to outside. We crossed a parking lot and I could now observe that the fencing had been extended to seal off this area as well as the ball fields ahead. There was a large metal construct that acted as a gate, and a giant pulley system that would open it. This parking area had a dozen heavily armored school buses. Three of them had machine guns mounted on their tops.

Don Evans had certainly been busy. This was a bona fide post-apocalyptic compound. It was almost textbook from any zombie book or movie I’d ever seen. Whoever said that pop culture was useless would be eating their words if they were to observe this.

I couldn’t deny being impressed. And that feeling was dominant until I passed the first cage-like structure. That was when the reality of what I was facing hit me full force.

Several Hispanic and African-American men, women, and children were huddled together inside. Their crying mixed with pleas for food and water tore at my heart. This was why I’d set out on my fool’s errand.

As I drew nearer to the softball and baseball fields, I could see a dozen or so individuals in small clusters. In the midst of those people was the object of my hatred: Don Evans.

“Look who we have here,” Don said as soon as he noticed me being led through the gate that granted access to the ball field area.

He had changed very little since I’d last seen him. The biggest being that he’d shaved his head completely, no longer sporting that ridiculous mohawk. I also noted that he’d done away with the outlandish clothing. He was now wearing black jeans, a black tee shirt with the sleeves cut off—probably to show off his very muscled and well-defined arms—and a leather vest.

A pair of wicked looking blades hung from his hips and he still had that massive sword jutting over his shoulder. His skin bore a few tattoos that were either new, or that I hadn’t noticed before. The most prominent was the iron cross that covered his right forearm.

A collection of rings adorned his fingers, and as I drew close, I saw that they were a variety of skulls. One had a pair of what I assumed were rubies in the eye sockets. But one of them stood out from the rest. It was an emerald swastika. Obviously he’d fully embraced his racism.

My eyes met his for an instant before they focused on the ground where several peculiar objects were being worked on by the groups. There were straps and some sort of harness that looked extremely intricate.

“I hear you might’ve turned over a new leaf.” Don stepped around one of the groups working on the odd contraptions. “Natasha says you hit those idiots that think they are hiding over in that new development. Killed a few even.”

I considered my options and decided to see if I could fit my toe in this possible door that seemed to be opening.

“New world…new rules,” I answered with a shrug.

Don smiled wide and for a moment, I took it as him liking my answer. “Easy to say when you are the worm on the hook. But I’m not sure I am buying it. Last I saw, you was running with some undesirable types.”

It was getting more difficult to keep my expression neutral. In fact, I had no idea if I was even close to pulling that off.

“Tonight, I think I will give you a chance to show me this new leaf you claim to have turned over,” Don whispered in my ear.

Just his proximity made my skin crawl. I wanted to slam my forehead into his face and hear the crunch of his nose shattering.

“Can’t wait,” I said flatly.

“And if things turn out well…I might have a special reward for you.”

I was confused. What could he offer? I was considering that when I almost staggered as one of the men working on the odd contraptions stood up and turned to face me.

Carl Higgins, one of my original group stood up and dusted off his hands. His eyes passed over me and I didn’t see a hint of recognition. The man walked over to where a toolbox sat and put away whatever he’d been using before coming over to Don.

“These babies are all done. I’m gonna head over to grab some chow,” Carl said.

He walked off and my throat tightened with the swirl of emotions coursing through me. I was certain that was Carl. He looked a little different with his woodsman’s beard shaved off and hair buzzed away, but it was him. I was as certain as I could be about anything.

I hadn’t known him but for a few days; meeting him on my first day at my new job of being a teacher which just happened to coincide with the zombie apocalypse kicking into full gear. That was also the day I’d lost my Stephanie.

If Carl was here, I had to wonder if the others might be as well. And if they were, was it possible that they were staying of their own free will?

“Until our little demonstration, I am gonna have to return you to your cell.” Don’s deep voice broke my train of thought and I turned to look at him.

I felt my face grow warm as he looked at me with a raised eyebrow. Had I been obvious as I’d watched Carl walk away? The others were heading back to the school as well, so technically, I could’ve been looking at anybody.

“Last time we were together, you did me dirty, Evan,” Don said as he pulled me away from my initial escort. Obviously he was going to see me back to my cell personally. “I just don’t think I am buying that you are really ready to join our cause.”

“To be clear,” I glanced over at Don, “what exactly is our cause?”

“Restore the proper balance,” Don said casually. “The damn bleeding hearts did everything but throw the white men in chains the past few years. Hell, the damned illegals had more rights. You tell me why the fuck I gotta press ‘one’ to hear some automated message in English! Damn homos being treated like they’re normal instead of the sick perversion they really are. Whole country done went and shit all over itself. This here…” Don waved his arms out toward the fences where I could see a few of the undead had gathered. “This is a reset button. God Almighty has had enough.”

As he spoke, I felt my stomach turn. I’d always known about people who had leanings towards racism, sexism, and homophobia. Never before had I seen it on display so prominently and voiced so openly. It was almost impossible for me to actually believe he could feel these things at his core. Surely he was putting on an act to at least some degree.

Right?

“Way I see it…we got a chance to put things back to the way they belong.”

I continued to walk alongside Don as he went on preaching his perversion. Every step only convinced me that I had to kill him. This was a sickness that had to be put down. And while perhaps not all of his followers shared his views to the extent he claimed as he informed me of how it had been so easy to find others that knew the “truth” as he called it, they were complicit. I would not feel a shred of remorse for any of the deaths I would cause if given the chance.

I discovered that my cell was nothing more than a stripped janitor’s closet according to the small placard above the door. To maintain its total darkness, some sort of black padded insulation had been applied all the way around the frame.

As the door shut, I thought over everything I’d seen. The one thing I determined was that, despite him being a total creep, and a disgusting stain on humanity, he was no idiot. I’d noticed that there were roving guards inside the compound. That meant he was either very careful or didn’t trust all the people he’d managed to bring under his thumb.

Also, even as minimal as something like some insulation strips around the door frame to block the light meant he used this cell and that it wasn’t just where they happened to throw me. Another thing I noticed were the women.

It hadn’t hit me at first. Maybe I was in shock, or perhaps just so fixated on my hatred for Don, but they were absolutely not dressed for the apocalypse. If anything, they looked like they’d stepped out of an old Van Halen video. Many of them were wearing an abundance of makeup and jewelry. Their clothing was either very skimpy, very tight, or a combination of the two. And they were all sporting well-coiffed hair in a variety of styles.

That made no sense. Unless the women never left the relative safety of the compound. And as odd as that seemed, it was not beyond the realm of possibility with somebody like Don Evans.

Sitting down, I rested my arms across my knees, let my head droop, and went to sleep.

***

I heard the door being unlocked and jolted awake. My neck was stiff and my whole body felt like I’d been beaten with a baseball bat. Once more I had to wait for my eyes to adjust to the searing pain of light after being in the pitch black for so long. I climbed to my feet and was met by Don Evans, Natasha, and a few others including Carl who was carrying a rifle over his shoulder. I looked at him and saw not even the slightest glimmer of recognition in his eyes. Was it possible that I had changed that much?

“So, Mister Evan Berry, you probably had no idea that you’d arrived on such a special night. It almost seems like fate.” There was a cryptic tone in his voice that told me something very wrong was happening.

I stepped out and waited for somebody to grab or shove me. Instead the group actually stepped back and made room for me to limp over to where I was being beckoned by Don to join him.

“And tonight, we will see if you are all talk and no action…or a bona fide badass set on making the world right.”

I had no idea what he could possibly mean, but the laugh in his voice was as cold as the grave and devoid of any humor. I stole another look over at Carl. Was he deliberately ignoring me?

As we continued outside, I saw people all emerging from the various doors of the school. They were all headed for the ballfield. Some seemed extraordinarily excited. However, I noticed some looking very reluctant.

As my eyes scanned the people, I spied a group of what looked to be teenagers. Hanging in the back of the crowd was one kid in particular. The loose clothes and a baseball cap pulled down low made any identification impossible as to if it might be a boy or girl, but the woman in her twenties that had to keep pushing her forward was seriously pissing me off.

I had no idea what was going on, but these people obviously did. It was clear that more than a few were unhappy, but that child was being physically forced to partake.

“What exactly is it that we are about to embark on?” I asked.

Don stopped and turned to face me. His eyes were glittering with an evil glee and I was reminded of one of those famous Charles Manson pictures where he is staring into the camera and doing his best to display his particular brand of crazy. I’d never been around somebody that exuded evil until now. There was an actual physical sensation just by being in his presence.

My stomach churned and the hair on the back of my neck felt like it was standing on end. It had nothing to do with my situation because I realized that I was not really afraid. Simply resigned. Everything I felt came in a wave the moment that I was in his presence.

I wanted this man dead so badly that I seriously doubted my ability to hide it. Yet, as he looked at me, there was no sign that he felt any of the contempt I held for him.

“I realized that the hangings weren’t the best way to send the message.” Don came to a complete stop, and his crowd of weak-minded sycophants did as well.  “What I needed was to take things to a new level. To use the tools provided and send a message that left no doubts as to who is welcome.”

“Uh-huh.” I just had no words for him. Even worse, as I looked around at the people in our little group, I saw a lot of heads bobbing in agreement.

One person in particular caught my eye. She was one of the only women that I’d seen not dressed like she fell out of a Madonna or Wham video.

Her long blond hair was straight. Blue eyes sparkled, but not with madness. Instead, she was eyeing Natasha with a vehement hatred that she made no effort to hide. She was dressed like something out of “Road Warrior” with a sawed-off shotgun stashed in a holster on one hip and a pair of wicked blades strapped to her forearms. Her leather attire would make any fetish fan drool with envy. It was a series of straps that crisscrossed her lithe frame. And while it covered everything, it left nothing to the imagination.

While I could not tell if she was on board with what was going on—or about to—it was clear that her eyes never left Don…unless they shifted to Natasha. My mind raced with all the possibilities as to how that might be used against Don Evans.

“Hey, Carl, why don’t you take your old buddy down to the VIP box,” Don said. It wasn’t a request or a question.

“Sure thing, Big D.”

I hadn’t heard the man’s gravelly tone in a long time. I’d always hoped that I would find my people and bring the ones managing to survive out from under the thumb of the living monster, Don Evans. It was now clear that at least one of them would not be joining me.

I recalled how he’d abandoned us in the early days. He’d gone on some rant about being practical and wanting to survive this. It seemed that he’d found a group more to his liking.

And I would kill him too if given the chance.

“Let’s go, Evan,” the man snarled, grabbing me by the arm and yanking me forward and then shoving me toward the ballfield.

The VIP section ended up being one of the dugouts. A foul stench hit me hard as we drew near; it was a mix of rot, undead stink, vomit, and human waste. Basically, the worst smells possible all swirling around.

As we opened up distance between us and Don, I waited to see if Carl would whisper something dramatic like he was just going along with things until he could save what was left of the people I’d left behind that dark morning.

Nothing.

To make it worse, he’d even jabbed me a few times with the barrel of his rifle as we’d walked along. Once was hard enough to make me yelp in pain.

He opened a sturdy metal gate that sealed the dugout and shoved me inside. I was stunned to discover that I was not alone.

A young girl in perhaps her late teens was huddled in the corner. I didn’t even notice her until Carl had chained and padlocked the gate, sealing me inside. When I first realized she was there, I was sure that she was one of the undead and I scanned the area frantically as I searched for a weapon to fend her off. I’d come to the conclusion that my only choice was going to involve slamming her head into the concrete floor or wooden bench that lined the back wall.

When I heard her sniff and bite back a sob, I realized she was one of the living. At least for now.

“You can do this, Karasinda,” I heard the girl whisper. “That damn thing is slow and stupid. You just gotta knock him off his feet ‘fore he gets them teeth into you.”

“You think I’m a zombie?” I whispered. I’d done my best to keep my voice low so as not to startle her…but I’d failed horribly.

The girl screamed and jumped to her feet, pressing her back to the wall she’d been leaning against just a moment before. Her scream prompted me to scream as well.

I threw myself back before I’d realized it, but quickly recovered from my scare. The idea of what had just played out made numerous scenes from a variety of movies flash in my mind. And that made me start to laugh.

I wasn’t sure if it was delirium, relief, or simply my mind not being able to process everything that was happening. Whatever the case, my laugh began as a chuckle. When the girl started to laugh as well, it was like the flames were being fanned. Soon, both of us were near hysterics.

“Well,” the girl said as she wiped the tears from her eyes, “if I’m fixin’ to die…least I got me one more good laugh. My gan-gan always said that laughter healed the soul. Not sure if my soul is healed, but that sure felt good.”

I nodded. “Not exactly sure what is going on, but whatever it is seems bad. That coupled with all the horror since this began…not sure I’ve laughed like that since it all started.”

I had to admit that, despite how odd it had been, and the desperate and hopeless situation we seemed to be in, laughing had felt amazing. Now that things were settling down, I examined the girl and was sickened by what I saw.

“How long have you been locked up in here?” I asked softly, casting a wet blanket on the situation.

I could see her discomfort cast a dull sheen over her eyes. I didn’t have to specify. There were two buckets by my feet. Now I knew where some of the stink emanated.

“Four days.” She looked away, her eyes not able to meet mine as embarrassment washed over the both of us.

A dirty water bottle sat on the bench beside her, and I could see a few paper bowls with some sort of crusty substance that looked like oatmeal dried to it scattered on the ground.

“So, what is the deal?” I asked.

“I don’t know. That man and his people caught my mom, baby sister, and a few friends as we were digging through the slim pickings at a Safeway. They split us all up and I don’t know who is alive if anybody. I hear…” she stammered as she tried to speak, and her voice cracked from the strain of trying to get the words out. “I hear screams at night. Sometimes I am sure it’s my mama. But at night…this place is a whole new kind of scary.”

“Scary? What do you mean?”

“The sounds…the laughter that ain’t laughter…not like from something funny at least.”

“I don’t understand.”

“Mean laughter…like the kind an evil person would do. And it is usually around the same time that terrible screaming starts.”

That didn’t need an explanation. Anybody still alive this far into the apocalypse had heard it. Most of us on the first day or so. But once you heard it, you never forgot it.

I hated that I was running her through all these terrible questions, but I had to know what the hell was going on. As I stared out of the dugout into the field, I studied the structure that had been built in the center of the diamond.

I’d watched my share of UFC fights. I knew an octagon ring when I saw one. This one was much larger than the ones I knew of by about three times. In fact, it extended past the base paths. Also, it didn’t really have a raised ring area. It was simply an octagon-shaped steel cage. There were two entry gates and a catwalk above that had access ladders on the outside.

“What is that?” I asked, almost afraid of the answer.

“Don’t know. But they built it over the past few days. A few of them guys came over to me a few times and just stared, whispered, and then started that mean laughing.” The girl gave a shudder and hugged herself.

I considered moving closer and seeing if I might be able to soothe Karasinda’s unease, but we were still strangers and she had no reason to trust me other than I’d just been thrown in here with her.

It was also about the time I started noticing a rise in the noise outside. Because of being closed in, I couldn’t really see, but I knew the sounds of a crowd filling the bleachers.

I could detect a degree of anticipation and excitement. Despite not being able to witness the growing crowd, that feeling was carrying on the snippets of conversation I could catch as well as the tone of the buzz.

Eventually, a group of men—Carl among them—went around and lit a series of Tiki Torches that had been planted around the octagon. They cast flickering shadows that only added to the peculiar vibe.

I watched Carl as he finished his task and studied him for anything that would show me he was not really part of this. When he fist bumped one of his co-workers and then broke into a deep laugh after the man pointed to the octagon and said something, I grew more convinced that this was his choice.

I slumped down on the bench seat and let my head drop. I guess I shouldn’t be surprised or let it shock me. In truth, how much had I known the man? We’d been thrown together under duress. It wasn’t like he was some lifelong friend that was now betraying me. It was what it was. Pure and simple.

This was all about survival now. And everybody would go after that goal in his or her own way. I’d been telling myself that the old rules no longer applied for quite a while. And while, I’d made steps toward changing how I went after things, there was still so much about me that resisted this new ideology.

My mind replayed the last couple of days, and I had to wonder if maybe I was fooling myself. Didn’t we all have a certain degree of self-defending rationalization? And now, wasn’t that exactly what I’d been doing?

I’d killed people without remorse within the past twenty-four hours or so. And yet here I was looking at Carl with condemnation for trying to carve out his own path.

The fact that we were going about it differently made it a personal issue. And while I could certainly never condone or accept what Don Evans believed, how many of these people here were simply doing what they had to do to survive?

I shook my head to clear it from all the ideas cluttering it at the moment. I glanced at the girl who appeared to have retreated back into her own thoughts. I wondered what reason Don might have for putting this girl here by herself. I knew for a fact that it couldn’t possibly be anything good. If anything, it was probably so much worse that she would wish that she’d died rather than serve whatever sadistic plan she was no doubt going to be featured in. And judging by the crowd growing right outside our enclosure…that would be sooner rather than later.

I noticed a few people walk past the dugout and glance inside. The evil leer they usually shot me…us…was enough to creep me out. But when Don Evans appeared with Natasha on one side and the blond wrapped in leather, I sat up straight.

“You ready to prove yourself, Evan?” Don hissed, almost as if he didn’t want anybody to hear him. “You are about to get your chance. And I’m even gonna make it easy for you.”

“What the hell are you talking about?” I worked to school my voice and not sound angry or disgusted.

“Last time I gave you a chance to show me what you were made of…you failed me.”

I was about to challenge him on what the hell he meant. I mean if it was escaping, then I was pretty sure anybody in my shoes would’ve done the same. I didn’t get the chance because he turned his back on me and stepped out toward the octagon ring.

Obviously he was about to address the crowd. When he turned, he had a smile plastered on his face that looked like any cheesy salesman I’d ever met. There was nothing real in that expression. All I had to do was wait and see what he had up his sleeve. Around that same time was when I noticed the telltale stench of the undead.

“Ladies and gentlemen, the moment you have been waiting for…”

9

New Lows

Don Evans looked past where I was locked up to address the crowd gathered. From the sounds of it, the numbers were substantial. I was torn between watching him and seeking the source of the smell of undeath that grew stronger.

“We almost have ourselves to blame,” Don continued as if nothing was amiss. “We sat back and kept waiting for others to fix the problem. And when those courageous few stepped forward and tried to right this sinking ship, we did nothing as the societal sheep shut them down and called them racists, bigots, or rednecks.”

A murmur rippled through the crowd. I glanced over at Karasinda. She was on her feet, her face pressed to the steel mesh that sealed off the dugout. I was certain that I heard her sniff. My guess was that she smelled them as well. She knew what the walking dead smelled like.

They were drawing near, but Don continued his monologue. “We let the poor live off the sweat of our brow, but then the illegals swarmed into our country and nobody lifted a finger. We turned a blind eye, and pretty soon, we had to press one for English when we called our doctor or banker. We sat back and did nothing as billions of dollars were spent making sure that illegal fucking Mexicans and lazy ass blacks had food, housing, and health care. And meanwhile, the real Americans, the hard-working white men and women were deprived of even basic needs.

“The blacks wanted their own colleges and demanded reparation for something that happened before their grandparents were alive. As if welfare and food stamps weren’t enough! All the while, you just sat back and allowed it. And anytime somebody questioned it…they…we were told that we were intolerant. But those days have come to an end.”

Don paused as a roar of approval and furious applause exploded. Again, I glanced over at Karasinda. She was no longer pressed to the fencing. She’d taken a few steps back. The look on her face was a brand of horror that I’d never seen on a person’s face before.

There was something about it that was like a cross between fear, revulsion, and a sadness beyond anything I’d ever known to be possible. But there was something else there. And that was perhaps the worst part. I saw a resignation.

Don turned to his left and a smile broke across his features that actually made me take a physical step back. Maybe it was the shadows playing tricks, but in that moment, his eyes seemed black. Like two pieces of obsidian.

“What we do tonight will hopefully send a message. The time is now to reclaim what is ours. There will be no rest until we have completed the mission I have set in front of us.” Don motioned to his left, and I could hear the sounds of clinking chains…and crying?

I had no idea what I would see when whatever it was came into view, but I had a feeling it was going to be bad. I don’t think I could’ve imagined in my worst nightmares what came into view.

A few of Don’s people were holding long chains. At the ends of those chains were shambling undead. That part was no big deal. I’d long since become numb to the sight of them.

It was what was on their backs that made me shudder. Each of the zombies was fitted with a harness. In fact, they were replicas of the odd device I’d seen earlier. Strapped to the back of each zombie was a child! Between the ages of maybe two or three to perhaps ten, these children were secured into the harness devices. All of them were crying, some were calling for their mommy or daddy.

In total, there were five zombies with a child secured to their backs. And of course, since this was Don Evans, they were all either Black or Hispanic.

I was a mix of confused and horrified. Neither emotion could gain enough of a foothold to assume a dominant position in my psyche. It was another moment before I realized that some of the crying I was hearing was coming from Karasinda.

I looked over at her and saw that she’d pressed herself to the cage again. She was looking at the undead and doing her best to reach her fingers through the fencing.

I looked back to Don and saw that he was overseeing this monstrosity with a benevolent smile that you would expect to find on the face of a loving parent. I was sickened by the thought that I could actually discern true joy and happiness at what he was witnessing.

The handlers led the undead into the octagon, and a terrible feeling rose in me that threatened to cause me to be sick. I honestly had no idea what was about to happen, but nothing good was going to come from this. That much was a certainty.

“Bring in the special guests!” Don barked like a ringmaster or carnival game barker.

The woman with the long, blond hair stepped away, and a moment later, she returned with a young Hispanic woman in perhaps her early twenties and a dark-skinned boy in his teens. Both were barely able to walk. When they were yanked forward by Don and turned to face the crowd, I staggered back a step.

Both had black tracers in their eyes. It would not be long before they died and turned. The young woman swayed back and forth, and I don’t really think she was aware of her surroundings. Her tan skin was waxy and already taking on a sickly hue. Her gaze was unfocused and her long, black hair was matted and hanging in her face, occasionally falling in her eyes, shielding them from view.

The boy was not as far gone, and it was clear he was terrified. He had an unbandaged wound on his forearm that was an obvious bite. The woman had one as well, but it had become an angry, red, swollen wound that dripped yellowish fluid.

The woman who led them into view came towards me. She drew a massive, chrome plated revolver that was reminiscent of Dirty Harry’s .44 Magnum,”…the most powerful handgun around, and it will blow your head clean off.” Those words resonated in my head as I found myself staring down the business end.

“Step away from the gate,” the woman snarled.

I did as I was told as Don bent at the waist and stage-whispered to me, “Now is when you get to show me what you are worth.”

The two infected individuals were shoved through the entrance to the dugout and she quickly slapped the padlock back on, effectively securing me inside with two people who would become zombies very soon. Immediately, the foul stink washed over me. It was made worse by the rotten smell of the festering wound on the woman’s arm. It reminded me of raw chicken left out on the counter in a hot house for about three days with an underlying sickly sweetness that cause my mouth to fill with saliva as my stomach threatened to launch its contents.

“Now, if you can survive their turning and allow them to turn that little bitch in there with you, you will find the key to your cell in her stomach,” he said with almost no emotion at all. “But…” and now he looked up to address the crowd, “…first, there will be entertainment. While we wait for our guests to transition, I offer you the first of what I promise will be many more spectacles for your pleasure.”

I looked up into the octagon and saw that the handlers had brought their charges into the ring and set the three zombies away from each other. They all dropped their controlling chains and hurried for the exit. As soon as the last one had stepped out, the door to the octagon was slammed shut with a metallic clang.

At first, nothing happened. I was momentarily confused as to how this would suffice as entertainment. Even the crowd had gone silent and I thought that perhaps they were just as confused.

Then…one of the children cried.

Almost in unison, the zombies all turned for the sound. Even the one with the child strapped to its back that had made the noise was trying to turn in circles to get at the sound. In any other situation, it might’ve been comical to watch the zombie turning in circles like a dog chasing its tail.

The two other zombies were now closing in on the one with the sobbing child. I could see now that it was a little girl. Her dark skin glistened with the tears gushing from her eyes and I could see her expression change as one of the zombies drew to within just a few steps away.

“Mommy!” the child wailed as she reached for the approaching zombie.

This little girl was the youngest of the three children and obviously had no idea what was happening. I could only watch in fascinated horror as the zombie moved closer to the child. The zombie carrying the child on its back stumbled and collided with the fence surrounding the octagon.

The little boy on the back of the zombie that was now only a step away from the little girl that was screaming for her mommy began to yell at the child to be quiet.

“Hush, Lawonda!’” the little boy pleaded. “That ain’t mama. She one of them things now.”

The little girl did not seem to understand. And then, the woman zombie managed to get her hands on one of the outstretched arms of the little girl.

“Noooooo,” Karasinda wailed. “Not the baby!”

She flung herself at the cage and began to smack it with open hands. She shouted the little girl’s name, but it was too late. Not that she would’ve done anything but possibly delay what was a forgone conclusion.

The child’s cries for her mother quickly changed. At first there was one heartbeat of silence. It was as if the world paused and awaited the reaction.

The scream.

It started as a yelp and changed almost instantly. I closed my eyes, but not before I saw the zombie rip away a chunk of the little girl’s arm in a spray of crimson. And it continued. That terrible scream that only a person being eaten alive can produce.

And then I heard another sound. And it was enough to make me finally lose my bout with nausea.

The crowd cheered.

I bent over, hand on my knees and threw up. With very little in my belly, it was mostly the stinging burn of stomach acid forcing its way up my throat.

“You aren’t being very convincing,” a voice whispered.

I looked up to see Don leaning against the door. His expression was complete disapproval. I wiped my mouth and tried in absolute futility to ignore the continued screams of the little girl.

Despite not wanting to see what was happening, I glanced over for the briefest of moments. Both zombies were pawing at the one carrying the girl. It had turned and was being shoved into the fence. It was also the exact moment that one of them stumbled back. It was holding what I knew had to be at least part of an arm that it had managed to wrench free.

The screams rose in that second and went mercifully silent. Only, by now, both the children on the backs of the other two zombies were wailing. The little boy that I assumed to be related to the toddler that had just been savagely mauled was yelling threats and curses at the undead much too harsh for his young years.

The zombie that had been carrying the little girl shoved free from where it had been pinned to the cage and swiped at him. I heard a meaty smack followed by a pained yelp.

I squeezed my eyes shut again. Unable to watch what was unfolding just a few yards away. I could hear Karasinda weeping and muttering something over and over that sounded like it had the cadence of a prayer.

“Open your eyes, you weak fuck,” Don’s voice hissed. “Don’t make me regret giving you this chance.”

I opened them and met his gaze. He was glaring as he leaned close, lips curled in a sneer.

“If you can’t hang, then I have no use for you…not that I expected you to be of any use. Don’t think I didn’t peg you as one of those weak-kneed liberal bastards that ran this country into the ground with your race mixing and blind eye to a goddamned invasion of Mexicans that took jobs we did in grade school. Hell, we used to look forward to the summer berry picking sign-up sheet at the end of every school year. Make a few bucks and eat enough strawberries that you didn’t want to see another…’til next summer.”

I had to literally bite down on the inside of my mouth not to reply. It was only a small and hard to hear voice in my head that reminded me that I had a task to complete.

The crowd continued to cheer, hoot, and holler as the carnage in the octagon continued. Another scream started and transformed. Don actually paused to look over his shoulder. When he turned back to me, he was smiling and shaking his head.

“You don’t think this is a bit…” I was at a loss for words. Nothing seemed to fit the absolutely senseless and purely evil violence taking place.

“Inspired?” Don finished.

Not even close to what I might’ve said.

“I can’t really take all the credit. That key in the stomach thing? I stole that from Saw…at least I think that was the movie.” Don rubbed his chin in thought before shrugging. “Anyway, I think this will send a message.”

“How…” I started, but another scream cut me off. Don glanced over his shoulder and clapped his hands together once, cutting me off.

“That one was too fast.” He shook his head in disappointment as the scream ended just a split second after it began. “We might have to put collars on the bait to keep the zeds from biting their throats and ending the show so fast.” He turned back to me. “And your part of the entertainment is about to begin.”

At first, I was unsure as to what he might be referring to…until the smell registered. I knew without looking that at least one of the two individuals thrown into the dugout had turned.

I turned to see that Karasinda was backed into the far corner. She was staring straight ahead, but shock had won over and she was basically catatonic. Her eyes were glassy, and she was not seeing anything as far as I could tell.

“This is your time, Evan,” Don sing-songed.

I watched as the girl with the suppurating wound began to stir from where she’d finally collapsed to the floor at some point in this nightmare. Shadows made it impossible to get a good look at her face, but I didn’t need to see.

I could smell.

I stepped back behind the stirring figure. That put me closer to Don. He’s come down to the gate that had the dugout sealed and was leaning beside where the hinges were.

“Let the zombies do their thing and then you can end them all.” He tapped his temple as if suddenly remembering something. “Actually, I want you to leave that little whore so that she is still able to move around. I have plans for her. But carving her open to retrieve the key won’t kill her once she has become one of them.”

“That’s nasty,” I whispered. I thought I’d said it under my breath enough so that he couldn’t hear me. I was wrong.

“Gotta love them Saw movies,” Don crowed. “Damn those were classics.”

I’d never been a fan of what I had always considered torture porn. Films like Saw and Hostel weren’t horror. They just made people cringe. Of course, now I was living the worst of both worlds.

By now, the girl had managed to reach a sitting position. Her head jerked around as she searched her surroundings. When Karasinda let loose with a muffled cry, the zombie’s head snapped to her like it was locking onto a target.

The moan that she emitted made me shudder and I held my breath as she rose to her feet. By now, the boy that had been brought in as well had slumped against a wall and the stink of the undead was growing stronger.

The girl zombie was trying to get to her feet and had ended up on her hands and knees. Being so close to her intended target, I guess she decided crawling was sufficient. She was only a few feet away from Karasinda.

I wanted to tell her to do something. Anything.

“Nona?” Karasinda croaked. “There gotta be something left of you in there. You remember me. You babysat me and my brother when we was little. Your brother Trayvonn is my baby’s daddy…” Her gaze shot to the octagon as her voice faded.

“Oh…Trayvonn,” Don said with an evil glee. “We still got him up in the pen.”

“The pen?” I mumbled. Then I remembered that cage I’d passed. It stood to reason that the cage was probably what he was referring to.

Considering all I’d already seen, I had no idea what Don was so happy about involving this Trayvonn character, but I was certain it would not be good.

By now, the zombie had reached Karasinda. It was my moment of truth. Every part of me was screaming to leap into action.

If I was some sort of action hero, I could save that girl and still get out of this. I knew better. Hell, I still had no idea how I might actually be able to kill Don Evans, but I knew for a fact that, if I didn’t play along, I would die right here in this dugout.

Karasinda seemed to suddenly become aware of what was happening and let loose with a shriek. It was so sudden and jarring that I put my hands to my ears. When the zombie latched on to her ankle, I knew that it was all but over.

The next moments all blurred together. Time either stopped, or flew by, I honestly have no idea which the most accurate description would be.

I could see the teeth sink into the girl’s flesh despite the shadows. I saw blood well up around where the mouth had latched on. The details were a blur…but crystal clear at the same time.

I must be going into shock, was the thought that repeated itself over and over in my head. I felt confirmed in that supposition when I realized that a flashlight was being shone on the horrible scene.

A hand clasped my arm and I initially believed it was Don set on scolding me for not paying close enough attention to what was happening just feet away. I looked down to discover a hand that definitely did not belong to Don Evans.

The young man had gotten to his feet and I’d apparently been the closest target. As he pulled my hand closer to his mouth, Karasinda continued to shriek. By now, she’d fallen to the ground and her undead attacker had buried her face into a meaty thigh. At some point, she’d already ripped away a swath of denim to revel the flesh underneath.

I shoved the boy away, but he didn’t lose his grip on my arm and merely tried once more to lean in and take a bite. This time, I punched him in the side of the head. I felt a dull pain in my fist, and the blow had almost no impact on the zombie. Its head had moved, but that was it.

I swung my body around and tried to slingshot him away from me as I stopped suddenly and simultaneously yanked back. The zombie was far too uncoordinated to handle the sudden movement and sprawled onto the concrete floor of the dugout…right towards Karasinda.

“Way to go, man!” Don cheered.

I screamed inside my own head that it hadn’t been on purpose. It hadn’t. Had it?

Now both zombies were on top of Karasinda. She screamed again, kicking and flailing to no avail. One of the zombies caught an arm and pinned it to the ground at is dove in for a bite.

There was more screaming, and then her shirt was ripped away. I’m not sure which one slammed its face into her soft belly, but a moment later, her legs began kicking with a new ferocity and the scream began. A piece of something dark and jelly-like was ripped from her abdomen and bit into by the female.

She begged, she cried, and then, mercifully, she was quiet. The two zombies continued to feed on the still form as I stood there trying not to be sick.

“Better hurry and handle your business. If my memory serves…you got maybe a minute or two before they grow tired of what they are feeding on. You’re next up on the menu list. And you’ll have three of them things to handle pretty soon.”

I started for the zombies and realized I had nothing to take them down with. I glanced over my shoulder at Don with my eyebrow raised in question.

“The walls and floor are concrete. Should be plenty strong enough for you to smash their heads in and finish them off.” Don smiled big like he was offering me some sort of amazing bit of assistance. “And from the looks of things…they did the hard part in tearing that little bitch open. Now you just need to find the stomach and the key.” He paused and tapped his chin with one finger like he was contemplating something deep. “Unless it already moved on to the intestines. Then you’re job just got really shitty.”

His laughter burned my skin as I spun back to face the two undead ripping away chunks of poor Karasinda. I could feel my skin heat and prickle as I stepped up behind the female zombie.

I could smell the stink of the undead swirling with coppery blood and raw meat that was already turning bad. Either the girl’s bowels had already let go or one of the zombies had ripped open the intestines as the bitter foulness of feces made itself known in the olfactory death buffet.

Taking a deep breath while my mind chanted, this will get you closer to Don, over and over, I grabbed the female zombie by the hair and jerked her back. While the thing was certainly uncoordinated, it still did a good job of turning towards me and swiping with its blood-soaked hands. I jumped back as I let go of the hair and cursed.

Moving in as the thing tried to get to its knees, I grabbed it by the hair again and slammed it face first into the wall. I heard a hollow thud, but the zombie showed absolutely no effects of my attack. I yanked the head back and slammed it into the wall.

Again.

Again.

Again.

At last I heard a terrible crunch. I slammed it once more and felt the body go limp in my grasp. When I let go, the zombie landed on its side and there was just enough light for me to see how I’d obliterated the face and busted open the right side of its forehead.

By now, the boy was getting to his feet. He turned to me, his face a mask of crimson that looked almost black in the shadows. He shambled my direction and I grabbed him by the back of his neck and repeated my assault. It took longer. (At least that is how it felt.) At last I heard that satisfying and wet crunch as the skull gave way. Light a switch being thrown, the zombie dropped, tearing free from my grip and landing on the ground with a meaty thump.

I could feel my heart slamming in my chest. I knew part of it was due to the exertion, but it also had to do with the anger combined with the revulsion of what I was now willingly participating in. I wiped my hands off on my pants and gulped in a lungful of much needed oxygen.

There was still one task remaining.

I turned to the destroyed body of Karasinda. Her wounds were too numerous to catalog. The worst visually being her ripped open belly. There were things hanging out of her that caused my gorge to rise despite how often I’d seen these sorts of awful things. Maybe it was because we’d shared a few moments as co-prisoners. Whatever the reason, I forced it down and stepped over to her and knelt.

“I’m sorry,” I mouthed, afraid that even whispering it might be heard and give me away to the personification of evil glaring laser holes into the back of my head.

After taking a breath through pursed lips as if that would help, I dug my hands into her splayed open belly. I had no idea what an actual stomach looked like beyond cartoon drawings and the game Operation (which was no help since it was called the ‘Bread Basket’).

I felt a puffy pouch of sorts and hoped that I’d found the stomach. I pulled it free and then squeezed it to see if something felt like a key. The organ made a hissing sound as foul air escaped it. I didn’t feel anything solid and decided that either I did not have the stomach, or that the key had…passed on to the next stage.

The only way I was going to accomplish my assigned task was to plunge my hands back in and just start feeling and squeezing until I came across something solid. I let my breath out and then drew another that I promptly started holding.

I began to rummage around in the still warm gut of this young woman I’d been speaking with just moments earlier. I was aware that Don had resumed some sort of droning narrative, but I wasn’t listening.

I continued tuning him out until the words, “Oh shit!” broke through. I shook my head and looked around. Nothing had changed as far as I could tell.

“You better hurry up, man,” Don crowed.

I turned back and found myself staring into the open and tracer riddled eyes of Karasinda. She was just staring at me through her milky, black streaked orbs. She didn’t blink, and she showed no signs of registering that I was rooting through her guts on a twisted scavenger hunt.

“Fuck,” I whispered and began to search more frantically.

At last I felt something hard and jagged between my fingers. I closed my fingers around it and pulled free a strand of ropy intestine. With being so slicked with blood, getting a solid grip was easier said than done, but I was able to basically squeeze it in my fist until the key punctured the membrane and I was able to grab it.

I got to my feet and regarded Karasinda. She was still simply staring up at me. I could easily stomp her down and end her.

“Ah, ah-ah,” Don sing-songed. “I have plans for that one.”

I approached the gate and brandished my key. “Whatever, then I guess I need to get out before I’m left with no choice.”

He stepped back as I reached the lock and shoved the key into its place. Twice I had to pull it out and wipe it on my pants, but at last I was able to turn it and the hasp popped free.

As soon as I opened the gate, three people materialized with guns aimed at me. One of them was the straight-haired blond.

“Lisa,” Don barked. The blond turned her head slightly so she could regard me and him at the same time. “Take our guest to the octagon.”

“Wait!” I yelped, taking a step back. The sounds of shuffling feet told me Karasinda was now up. I didn’t want to go back into the dugout, but I sure as hell wanted nothing to do with that octagon ring. “You said—”

“Easy, man.” He turned to the woman, Lisa I guess was her name. “I want him in the VIP booth for this next part.”

I wasn’t convinced that was necessarily a good thing. However, I was staring down the barrel pf her M4 and her expression as one that made me feel certain she wouldn’t hesitate a second when it came to pulling the trigger.

I walked past her and felt the jab as she directed me to turn right. And now that I was out of the dugout, I could see the gathered crowd. A quick guess put them at easily over a hundred people. How was it possible that my group numbered maybe close to a couple dozen while Don Evans had collected so many?

I walked until I reached a set of wooden stairs that led up to a platform. This platform was sitting right on top of one of the eight sides of the ring and gave a frighteningly close view of the carnage.

Three zombies still wandered about. But on the back of two of them was a child. Each of them had also turned. On the floor of the ring, I spied what was left of the youngest. Her upper torso was about all that remained.

It was on its back staring up at nothing…until it registered my presence. The head turned in slow jerks until she was staring at me with the eyes of the undead.

“Jesus.”

I jumped at the whispered words of the woman beside me. I turned my head and saw her looking down at the scene below with a look of disgust. Was there an opening here I could exploit?

The sound of heavy booted feet climbing the stairs ended any speculation as her face went blank as if she felt nothing in regard to what we were standing over.

“Bring Trayvonn to the octagon!” Don shouted.

This caused the crowd to erupt in what I could only describe as bloodthirsty cheers and applause. A man was dragged forward. His kicks and struggles were of little use against the pair of behemoths that I was seeing for the first time.

Both of these men were easily over six-and-a-half feet tall and I had to guess them in the three-hundred-pound range. And it wasn’t fat. These men were monsters.

One of them was an albino with skin whiter than I’d ever seen before. He wore no shirt, and his chest was massive and sculpted with arms that were corded with bulging veins. He had his shockingly white hair braided and all the braids pulled back and bound by a bright red piece of cord. His legs were tree trunks. The lazy smile he wore was made sinister by the pink hue of his eyes.

The other man was ruddy and tanned. His wavy hair was flowing in the wind and he kept flipping strands from his eyes with a toss of his head. He was wearing jeans as well but had a blue tank top that looked a couple sizes too small.

“Demetri, Gregor, put him inside, but one of you give him your baton,” Don called out.

They seemed to confer through raised eyebrows and nods until the albino finally made a loud huff and pulled a baton from his hip and thrust it into the man’s hands. There was a moment where it was clear that Trayvon was considering whether to try and use that weapon to make an escape attempt.

His eyes turned to the crowd that included at least ten sentries positioned in various locations with rifles cradled in their arms. His chin fell to his chest and I saw his shoulders slump. He obviously realized the futility of any such attempt and stepped into the cage.

“Go get the bitch in the dugout,” Don instructed.

The big men gave nods and headed over to where I’d been captive just moments earlier. I heard the metal gate slam open and a low moan carry to where I now stood with no idea what horrors awaited.

The men had the Karasinda held by those long poles that dog catchers used. They brought her to the octagon and as she came up and into view, I heard a terrible cry from close by. It took me a moment to realize it was the young man, Trayvonn.

I mistakenly thought it was because of him seeing Karasinda. When I turned, the man was on his knees near the center of the ring. The mangled half-body of the child was pulling itself toward him with its bloody hands that looked to be missing a few fingers.

I watched as the gate was thrown open and the body of Karasinda shoved roughly inside. The albino slammed the gate shut and then both men returned to stand on either side of Don.

“So, Trayvonn,” Don turned to face his people. This was all part of his performance. He wasn’t talking to the man as much as he was to his followers. “You and your people thought it was a good idea to attack my citizens while they were out searching for food to put on the table.”

He pointed to the crowd and a woman stood. A child stood beside her, hands clasped under his chin and a look of fear etched on his face.

“You turned Amy and her little boy…” Don paused and stepped forward. Despite the distance between his arena and the bleachers, it was still obviously a calculated move to make him seem like he was now closer to the woman and the child. “Ricky is it?”

The boy nodded.

Don spun to the cage where the child was now almost to the man kneeling and Karasinda-zombie was getting to her feet. The man seemed to be paying no attention to Don, nor did he seem to be prepared to defend himself against the two zombies that were coming for him.

“Your people killed this woman’s husband…left that poor child an orphan.” Don walked to the gate and slapped it with his hand. Both zombies ceased their advance on Trayvonn and adjusted to the new stimulus. “And now your people are gonna pay. Starting with you.”

Something in the man seemed to snap and he jumped to his feet. He ran at the fence where Don stood and flung himself at it.

“Your people attacked us! They hung my mom from a streetlight! Made us watch! Then they came and stole our supplies. They killed women…children…in the worst way. Not even merciful deaths. They hung people and let the monsters attack and rip them apart while we were forced to watch.” Trayvonn dropped to his knees and sobbed. “They hung my nephew…he was four years old and they hung him…then let two of them…them things rip him apart in a tug-a-war.”

“That’s not the story I heard,” Don shouted, making himself heard by the crowd.

I didn’t doubt Trayvonn’s story for a moment. I’d seen what Don Evans and his people were doing out there. This sounded absolutely like something he and his followers would do. My question was why he would be pretending that it wasn’t the case. If these people were okay with the horror show they’d just witnessed, then why would they have a problem with any of the other things going on?

“We are simply defending what was ours and you people tried to take it from us. You attacked us for no reason and killed a good man in the process,” Don shot back. “Were we supposed to just allow that to happen and do nothing to protect ourselves?”

“That son of a bitch,” the woman, Lisa, muttered from beside me.

“And that has been exactly how you people have been manipulating our society for years. No matter how much our government gave, you always wanted more. And it just kept going on and on until…this!” Don threw his hands up and turned in a full circle. “The world finally broke. God decided to send down his judgement on the world and it is people like you that made this happen.”

I had no idea how he was tying all of this together, but I looked out to the crowd and they were eating it up. I was even hearing a scattering of “Amen!” and “Hallelujah!” from the crowd that was now on its feet.

“And now…” Don turned to the octagon with a nasty sneer curling his lips. “Judgment is being served.”

10

The Worst of the Worst

By now, both Karasinda-zombie and the toddler were closing in on Trayvonn. I noticed that the toddler was hanging back behind its mother. Part of my mind wanted to convince me that it was simply moving slower since it had to drag itself forward with its mangled hands. But from where I stood, I could see that it was clearly studying the scene.

“Now…you are gonna have to make a decision pretty soon, Trayvonn,” Don practically cooed.

He grabbed a knife from his belt and tossed it over the top of the gate. It landed perfectly, sticking point down into the ground just a few feet from Trayvonn. The man looked at it like he didn’t know what it was.

“I suggest you grab that before they grab you.” Don pointed past the young man and toward the looming threat stumbling closer.

He turned and his anguished cry renewed. I don’t think he’d actually realized—or perhaps recognized—the young woman put in there with him.

“Baby,” the man wept, his hands reaching out then pulling back from the approaching zombie of what I was guessing was probably his wife…or at least his girlfriend.

“You better handle your business, boy,” Don snarled. “Or you’ll be just like ‘em in a bit.”

The man glanced at the knife, then back at the two undead that were drawing frighteningly close. He reached out with a tentativeness that I could understand. I recalled back to when I’d stared into the eyes of my believed Stephanie. I hadn’t been able to end her. It still haunted me that she would be out there…one of those things. No semblance of the happiness and beauty that I knew her to be in life.

“The man looked between the child and Karasinda. He picked up the knife and held it out in front of himself. He kept warning the pair to stay back. Every so often he would slash at the air half-heartedly.

Twice he shoved Karasinda back and warned her. He moved away so that the child could not reach him, but at no time had he tried to do anything physical to stop the baby from getting to him. He kept moving around the octagon to avoid it, but the problem was the other zombies with the children on their backs.

The man was having to struggle to keep from being grabbed. He was fighting a losing battle and I had no doubt that one of those things was going to get him.

At one point, he shoved Karasinda away only to be caught by the little boy that had been trying to shout encouragement to the toddler. When Trayvonn tore free, he let loose with another anguished cry. Pulling away caused the zombie to spin so that I got a really good look at the boy. His head was lolling to one side due to most of his throat being ripped away. It might’ve been my imagination, but I was almost certain that I saw bone.

He was more than likely doomed, but I could not help but silently cheer each time he escaped. I just wished he would take down the zombies that he was locked in with.

“They aren’t us anymore.” The words escaped my mouth before I could stop them.

Don’s head snapped around to me and I saw that dark glint in his eyes. Despite anything I’d tried, I knew right then that he would not be letting me live.

“You really are one of them types…aren’tcha?” Don accused as much as asked.

“What type is that?” It was as if knowing that my fate was sealed had stripped away any of my hesitation or fear. Sure, I would likely regret things later when I was being tortured—or whatever form of sickness Don had in mind—but at the moment, I found I could not muster the strength to care.

The man was an animal and I had to believe in my gut that he would make a mistake that would end his life. If there was a god, then it would be gruesome and horrible.

There was no denying that the man loathed my existence. I didn’t know why. I doubted he knew. But my charade had not gone undetected. And by his expression, I doubted that my fate had ever been undetermined.

“The bleeding-heart types that worried more about giving the lower class everything handed to them for free while us hard working types paid for it with our taxes,” Don spat. “The kind that walked in their marches and protests every time one of them got shot by the police and wanted to let the illegals have better healthcare than the working folks.”

“Do you really know anything about what you’re talking about?” I challenged.

“Lisa, bring our…guest…down here,” Don barked.

I felt the barrel of her rifle poke me in the back. “You heard him.”

It might’ve been my imagination, but the jab didn’t feel as harsh as earlier. I started down, but I could not help but watch Trayvonn as he continued to shove the undead away from him without attacking. It was obvious that the man was tiring. I didn’t give him another five minutes.

“You know…I had something I was going to give you once you proved yourself,” Don said with a smirk.

He made an exaggerated attempt at patting himself down as if he were searching for something. At last, he threw one finger up in an “ah-ha!” gesture and reached inside his leather jacket. He came out with something all wrinkled and creased from being folded.

As he unfolded it slowly, I felt my stomach twist into knots. I knew what it was before he shoved it in my face.

“Look familiar? Don crooned.

I could only make out the image for the briefest of moments before my vision blurred from the tears welling up.

The faded image of the picture I’d kept next to my heart until the day I’d been unfortunate enough to cross paths with this despicable bastard standing before me with his cocky grin.

It was the photograph of Stephanie and I together at Mount Hood. He’d had it this entire time. I could not begin to fathom his reason. How would he possibly know we would ever meet up again? It seemed unlikely. The only way that would happen…

I dropped my gaze to the ground. In that moment, I had no choice but to acknowledge that I was an idiot. Maybe he’d been told by Carl that I would come for Selina. Or maybe he just read me for the fool that I was.

I’d played right into his hand. I was beaten and there was no way out. As that thought hit me, I heard the scream erupt from the octagon ring. I let the sound of Trayvonn’s death seep through me and feed my feelings of failure and stupidity.

I wasn’t some sort of action hero. I was a high school music teacher. And now…I was probably about to suffer a terrible death at the hand of a man who was a bona fide sociopath.

“You disgust me,” Don snarled. Flecks of his spittle hit my face, but all I could hear was the whoosh of my blood pounding in my ears.

“Carl?” Don barked. The man appeared at his side, his presence like salt in a wound. “Take this piece of shit down to the boiler room.”

“You got it, Big D,” the man rasped.

“Lisa, go wait for me in my room. All this excitement has gotten me a bit worked up,” Don said as he leered at the woman standing behind me.

The woman stepped around me and headed for the school without a word. I guess I’d misjudged her reaction if she simply went to Don’s room without a word.

“Let’s go, Evan,” Carl snapped. He grabbed me by the shoulder and shoved me ahead of him.

We walked in silence the entire way. Eventually we came to a metal door with the words “Boiler Room” painted above it. I kept waiting for the man to say something…anything. But the silence hung over us like a physical thing.

When the door opened, the first thing I noticed was the smell. If there weren’t any down there at the moment, zombies had absolutely been kept down here.

We walked down the concrete stairs and arrived in a room that had large pipes running through it and at least three massive boilers that I could see in the gloom. The boilers were silent, and that allowed me to pick up on the sounds of clinking chains and the moans of the undead.

“So, you’re feeding me to the zombies,” I scoffed, doing my best not to sound afraid.

Carl said nothing as he continued to lead me deeper into the depths of shadow that held court here in the bowels of the high school. Eventually, he came to a stop at an orderly intersection of pipes.

A set of cuffs appeared in his hands and a second man stepped out of the shadows with a crossbow pointed at me. It was the massive albino. I only knew that because of his size and pale appearance. He was wearing what I imagine he fancied to be some sort of executioner’s hood.

“He’s all yours, Drake,” Carl said as he secured me to one of the pipes so that my arms were above my head.

I watched my former travelling companion walk away. Eventually, I heard the clang of the metal door as Carl exited the boiler room.

“I suppose you are here to torture me,” I said with surprisingly little tremor coming through in my voice.

“Nope, just beat the crap outta you.” The man’s voice was much higher than I expected for somebody so large.

“Wow…you got dealt a pretty bad hand,” I said with a forced laugh as the man approached. He cocked his head like a dog hearing a whistle.

“What?” the man finally asked as he stood directly in front of me now, staring down into my eyes with a hatred that I did not feel I’d deserved yet from this relative stranger.

“An albino and that voice? No wonder you hit the weights…and probably rode the roid train for a few cycles at least.” I stared up into his eyes, watching his brows knit in the large eyeholes of his executioner’s hood. “You probably got your ass kicked plenty in school.”

I never saw the first punch that smashed right into the center of my face. I heard as well as felt my nose crunch. Warmth flowed past my lips and I could taste the coppery flavor of my own blood.

The next punch caught me in the stomach and sent all the air from my body in a loud “oof”. And then the beating really began. Blows slammed into my ribs, gut, and a few more found my face. A vicious kick between my legs brought what little contents remained in my stomach out in response to the pain. Something slammed into the side of my head.

The world exploded in a blinding flash that was followed by darkness.

***

When I came to, it was almost pitch black. Somewhere in the boiler room there had to be a lantern or something, because there was just enough ambient light for me to make out shapes. And then there was the smell.

There were zombies down here. I didn’t know where, but there was no doubt as to their presence. Then I heard the first of the most chilling sound of the zombie apocalypse and shuddered involuntarily.

The baby cry.

Whether or not it was on purpose, at least one of the undead down here made the frightful sound. I closed my eyes to try and find a calm place, but it was useless. Between the physical pain I felt from the beating and the real fear of what being eaten alive would feel like, there was no chance I was going to find inner peace.

The sounds of chains rattling from almost directly behind me caused me to jump. But that was also the thing that finally brought me fully awake so that I could inventory myself.

What I found was unpleasant to say the least. Breathing was a chore that caused me considerable pain. When I did breathe, there was an unpleasant rattling that I felt as well as heard. My vison was blurry around the edges suggesting that my eyes were swollen. I could not breathe out my nose. And then there was the realization that by bodily functions had let go at some point during the beating. That included the dried vomit on my shirt and chin.

I could not recall a point in my life where I’d felt so miserable. As I tried to compartmentalize all my pains and discomforts, I kept going back to the picture.

It made no sense that Don Evans would hold onto that for so long. Or at all if I was being completely honest. He simply could not know that he would cross paths with me again.

A distant sound got my attention and I could hear what sounded like boots clomping down the concrete stairs. A raspy whistle struck up a tune that my mind swore it knew…but could not identify at the moment.

A dark figure wove through all the pipes and machinery as it approached me. For whatever reason, despite my dire situation, I was focused on figuring out the song being whistled.

Eventually, the face of Don Evans emerged from the gloom. His lips were pursed as he whistled, but once he was close enough, he raised the lantern he was carrying, and the whistling ceased.

“Oh, oh, oh…Evan’s crying…” he sang, helping me recall the old Van Halen song he’d been whistling. “Always loved that band. Wonder if any of them made it. If what I saw on that reunion tour is any indication…I doubt it.”

Don actually looked sad for a second before he looked back up at me and turned on his fake smile. I took in his current attire and was not really surprised to see Iron Crosses and even a swastika emblazoned on the leather bands he had wrapped around his forearms. He had on a knit cap with a skull and crossbones which seemed to be my breaking point as I stifled a chuckle.

“You much for the classics?” Don asked as if we were two old friends hanging out in a tavern. “Van Halen and groups like that.”

“AC/DC was more my thing,” I answered.

“Which version?”

“Excuse me?”

“Bon or Brian?” Don leaned against a large pipe that went from the floor and vanished into the myriad of pipes in the ceiling.

“Both.”

“No, man,” Don pushed away from the pipe and laughed with a sarcastic bitterness. “You can’t say both. It’s like the Dave and Sammy thing. Either you like one or the other. Only the really weak sheep would be okay with both.”

“But they both fit the sound,” I argued, trying to ignore the surrealistic nature of this conversation and the conditions that it was taking place in.

“Bullshit. Bon was sleaze and sex. Brian was growl and power. The two have nothing in common,” Don argued.

“But Back in Black is as much a signature for the band as Highway to Hell,” I retorted with a shake of my head that caused the room to swim.

When I could see clearly, I saw Don open and close his mouth a few times as if he wanted to refute my statement somehow. Eventually, he shrugged his shoulders.

“It’s almost too bad that you ended up being one of them damned hippie, Liberal sympathizers.” He sighed as he slumped back against the pipe and folded his arms across his chest.

I didn’t want to even ask him how he could justify any of what he was doing. The man was as insane as they came. We remained in silence for quite a while. Eventually, Don snapped his fingers as if realizing what he’d come down here for.

“You made a pretty good argument for your music stance. So I am going to do you a solid.”

“A quick death?” I snorted.

“Not really,” Don said with a sinister chuckle. “More like you can choose the lesser of two evils. I can either skin you alive…or you can be eaten by old Dirk.”

“Old Dirk?” I asked with a raised eyebrow.

Don grabbed me by the shoulders and spun me around. The cuffs bit into me causing me to wince, but I managed to bite back the yelp of pain.

Behind a grated barricade of poorly welded together bars were a trio of the undead. One in particular stood out. He looked like maybe he had been in his late forties or early fifties. His hair was almost a comical mess. It stuck up all over, but as my vision grew sharper, I could see that it was not just sticking up in spots, it was stuck that way. A mousse of dried blood and other unthinkable fluids had it dried into place. His face was a sagging mess of loose skin that hung in folds like one of those wrinkled dogs that I could not recall the name of at the moment.

His clothing was stiff and even crackled when he bumped against the bars. As soon as I made eye contact with the creature Don had called “Old Dirk”, it reached for me and opened its mouth. While all that came out was the typical zombie moan, I could swear the thing was trying to say something. I flashed on the peculiar behavior of the children and wondered if perhaps this man might be like them in some way.

“Old Dirk is an animal.” Don let loose with a laugh. “Almost put him down, but then he showed me something special.”

I have no idea why I asked…but I did. “Special?”

“We found him with a group. Had a blond wife, pretty little thing. And then his adopted daughter popped her head out of that RV.” A look crossed Don’s face like he’d just bitten into something unpleasant. “Had one of them mail order babies or something. Personally, I blame all them Hollywood bitches with shriveled hootchies that felt the need to bring all those damn Chinks and Africans over here. Didn’t they know there were plenty of white trash welfare bitches giving up perfectly goof American babies?” Don walked over to the makeshift cage and planted his hands on his hips.

“He was the one that inspired the arena.” There was a sickening degree of what could only be described as affection in his voice as he continued to talk. “We infected him and that little honey of his and then locked them in that dugout.”

I knew that there was a lot more to this story, but now I was hoping he would just let it be. I didn’t need the details. I also had no doubt I would hear every brutal detail.

“Threw that little chink brat in with her parents and figured they would rip her apart. But Old Dirk…” Don smacked his thigh and rapped on the cage with his fist. “He shoved that little honey of his away and wouldn’t share. He dragged that little kid into the corner and chowed like a fat man at a buffet. Every time that wife of his came over for a piece, he’d shove her away. Then, he got tired of her and stood up as she was coming in again. That time, he shoved into a wall so hard that her head cracked like an egg. He just stood there staring at her and I swear he tried to tell her that she’d been warned. Damndest thing I ever seen from one of these things. So now, every so often we toss him in at random. But now that we have the arena done, Old Dirk is gonna get some real action. Didn’t use him today because we needed Trayvonn to get in there and have something left to put down. Too bad he couldn’t sack up and handle his business.”

“So you are saying that…Old Dirk is…what? Different?” I pressed out of curiosity. I’d seen something in the disheveled zombie as well.

“Different? He’s a warrior,” Don crowed. “Hell, give me ten of him and I would rule the world.”

The sad thing is that I truly thought Don believed what he was saying. And even worse, I did not doubt the depths of his megalomaniacal yearnings. This was what dictators and despots were made from. And in this new world, I suddenly had to wonder how many more Don Evans-types were lurking…or out in the open now that the system of checks and balances…consequences…all of that was gone. The world was absolute chaos now and if I needed any further confirmation that violence was the answer to how we would be able to survive…this was proof positive.

“And it is Old Dirk here that is gonna put you down if you would rather not be skinned alive by yours truly.”

And we were back to that.

“I’m just gonna be left hanging here and you will let him go?” I asked. “And I assume you will be watching from someplace safe.” It wasn’t a question.

“You think I’d miss it?” Don said in a low tone that changed the mood instantly. There was something dark under those words. Or…darker.

“Do you do this with everybody that doesn’t agree with your code?” I asked.

I’d just seen something cross his expression…and heard something in his voice that made the hairs on the back of my neck stand up. For some reason, this seemed like it was personal. Maybe it was just my own ego, but I didn’t think so. Don Evans had a personal grudge against me.

“Just you, Evan. You’re a special case.”

I let that hang for a moment as Don and I stared each other down. I wasn’t going to look away. I had nothing to lose at this point. I had to admit, when he blinked and dropped his gaze…there was a satisfaction to it that warmed my chest.

Then he muttered something under his breath, and I swore I heard him say Stephanie’s name. My mind whirled and then grabbed onto a memory from almost four years ago.

There had been a foreman at one of the sites where Stephanie worked. We’d just started dating, and it was something she hadn’t gone into that much detail about. All I could recall was that the guy had come on to her and she’d shut him down. Then things started to happen to her car…things in her office…and there was even one night when she woke up and was certain that somebody had been inside her apartment.

One day, she was in her office closing down for the day when the door opened, and this guy walked in. He closed the door behind himself and told her that she seemed to be having trouble and that maybe she needed a man to take care of her. When she told him to leave, he walked her into a corner. Right around then, the project manager came in and caught the guy in the act. Fired him on the spot. I seemed to recall that the guy was named…

“No fucking way,” I gasped.

“I told her she needed a man,” Don stepped into my face and snarled. “And she chose…” He stepped back and waved his hands up and down to indicate me. And not in a good way. “She chose this?”

“So you were fucked up beyond repair before the dead got up.” I couldn’t keep the disdain from my voice.

“You know what!” Don shouted, and in a flash there was a very long and sharp looking blade at my throat. “Maybe you don’t get a choice. Maybe I skin you to the point where you only wish you were dead.” I felt the tip of the blade pierce the skin just under my chin.

“Do what you are gonna do,” I said back, sounding strangely calm to my own ears. Why was I not ragged with fear? How could I stare into this man’s face and fell…nothing?

“She was stupid…and now, thanks to your inability to handle your business…she’s dead. You don’t deserve this.”

Suddenly, I had the picture shoved in my face. He thrust at me so viciously that my head snapped back, and I felt blood renew its pouring from my nostrils.

“You are one sick individual,” I said after spitting out the warm coppery fluid that was draining down my throat.

“Keep talking. Give me more reasons to stretch out your death.” Don stepped back and pressed the tip of the blade to my forearm.

There was a moment where I felt nothing. Then the sting of the razor-sharp cut fired off and I sucked a breath in between my teeth. I bit down on the inside of my cheek so that I wouldn’t scream.

“I love it when little pussies like you try to act all bad and shit.” Don ran the blade down the other forearm.

I heard something and it took me a moment to realize it was Old Dirk. He was reaching through the bars, his almost skeletal fingers grasping at the empty air as he moaned and even hissed.

“You’ll get your chance, buddy,” Don called over his shoulder. He turned back to me. “The smell of blood gets him going. Sorta like a shark.”

“You know what?” I managed through clenched teeth.

“What?” Don was looking at a spot on my left arm and paying me almost no attention.

“Fuck you!” I’d been sorta swinging a little during this encounter. Not much…but just enough to allow for a little momentum.

I swung my left leg as hard as I could and brought it up between Don’s legs. He grunted in pain and staggered back before dropping to his knees. He clutched at his groin with both hands and dropped forward so that his head rested on the concrete floor.

He was trying to say something. No to doubt hurl a threat or ten my way but was currently having trouble getting the words to form correctly. All he could do was make these pained mewling sounds and a few gagging noises.

I felt my eyes widen when I saw Old Dirk’s hand swipe at the air where Don’s head had just been. If he sat up without paying attention…

I tried to school my features so as to give nothing away as I watched the man rock forwards and backwards. I also had to work very hard not to look at Old Dirk. I had to hope that Don might’ve grown careless.

After a moment, the man turned his head so that his cheek rested on the floor. I could see a pool of something had spread out. Maybe I’d made him puke. That seemed fair turnabout. And if I was about to die a horrible death. Maybe I could call on that memory to help me endure.

“You are fifty kinds of dead, you little bitch,” Don finally hissed.

“Pretty sure there is only one kind. Dead is dead,” I snarled.

If I could make him angry, there might be a better chance that he didn’t pay attention to his surroundings. He had no idea how close he was to death, and I sure as hell wasn’t going to tell him.

He pushed up just a little and I could see that he had my photo crunched up in his hand. When he lifted his head, his eyes followed my gaze and when I looked back at him, he smiled and then sat up on his haunches and began to make a big show of ripping the phot in half.

He was still grinning like a madman when one of Old Dirk’s hands caught Don by his collar and jerked him backwards. I heard something pop and Don yelped as his right knee bent at an awkward angle.

Then he hit the bars and made a loud bark of pain that was partially drowned by the moans of a visibly excited Old Dirk. His teeth gnashed together in a rapid series of clacking sounds and his tongue flicked from his mouth almost like he was licking his lips in anticipation.

Don began to struggle, but his back was against the bars and his leverage was off. Add in that he was obviously favoring one leg, and he was now sporting a new expression that I hadn’t yet seen on his face.

Fear.

He jerked to the side and only ended up with a second of the zombies inside getting a grip on one of his shoulders. That elicited a yelp from the man, and I could not deny the almost perverse level of enjoyment that I was taking from what I was witnessing.

“Let go, you fucking freak,” Don practically wailed.

I was sure that, whether I ended up dead or not, I would at least see the end of Don Evans. To me, that was worth whatever happened next.

“Jesus,” a voice hissed in the darkness.

My heart sank as the big albino charged into the scene with surprising speed. He grabbed Don by the ankles—obviously not foolish enough to put himself in harm’s way by getting within reach of Old Dirk and the others—and jerked him back. I figured it would be simple to wrest Don away from Old Dirk, but apparently the zombie had quite a grip.

It took three more tries, and through it all, Don was hollering and yelping like the coward I’d always thought him to be. When he was jerked free, it made me laugh out loud. He actually went airborne just long enough to be perfectly parallel to the floor when he came free.

I heard the man hit with a meaty thud and the albino fell backward and landed even harder. I realized that I’d winced just at how painful it all looked. And then I realized that my hope had been dashed when Don crashed to the floor…free of the clutches of Old Dirk.

It still took a few minutes for Don and the albino recover. Once Don got himself under control, he walked up to me with his usual sneer, but minus a bit of that swagger I’d seen him sporting.

“Bet you thought you were rid of me for a moment there, didn’t you Evan?” he said with a hint of amusement in his voice. “Well I got news for you…I’m like herpes, baby. You couldn’t get rid of me if you tried.”

“And you’re a virus that too many people ignored until it got out of control,” I shot back.

A backhanded slap rocked my head back and once my vision cleared, I could make out the blurry face of the albino. He had been joined by the other giant, and now I was confronted by Don and two men who dwarfed him despite him being so much bigger than me.

“You just don’t know when to shut your mouth, do you?” Don chuckled. “I think I am going to make this last as long as possible.” He snapped his fingers as if suddenly remembering something.

Drawing his blade, he gave a nod and the two large men moved in and grabbed me. Best I could figure, they’d been lurking in the darkness and seen me kick their illustrious leader in the crotch. I wouldn’t be getting a second chance at it.

“I am going to savor every minute of this,” Don whispered in my ear.

He stepped back and made a point to show me the razor-sharp knife he’d used earlier. His eyes seemed to lose their focus for a moment, and he almost appeared to go into a trance.

“I could have saved her…but she wanted to be with some pretty boy that let her become one of those horrors. Probably filled her head with all sorts of your hippie crap. Turned her into one of those bleeding-heart types,” Don muttered to himself.

He stopped talking and just stared at nothing for a moment. Then his head snapped up like he had suddenly come out of his little reverie. He looked me in the eyes, and I felt like I was staring into the abyss. His eyes were almost black and lacked any sort of human compassion.

Without another word. He brought the knife up to one of my already sliced forearms and made another small cut of what turned out to only be a few inches but felt like it went the length of my arm as pain slammed into me.

I clamped my mouth shut and stared at him, but I could do nothing to prevent the tears that leaked from the corners of my eyes. And when he stepped back, I was confused. He’d stopped and seemed very pleased with himself.

He held something up and it took me a moment to realize what he was holding. Between his finger and thumb was about a three-inch strip of the skin from my forearm.

“I’ve decided that you are going to suffer two deaths no matter what you say about there only being one,” Don announced.

I watched as he walked over to Old Dirk. The zombie stood there, inanimate for all intents and purposes as it remained stock still and simply stared at him. Then I realized it was not staring at Don. It was staring at what he held in his hand. The zombie was fixated on that piece of my flesh.

“Hey, fella,” Don greeted the zombie as he stopped just a few feet from the bars. “You want this?” He held of the strip of my skin and there was a moment where the zombie just stared.

Then, without warning, and faster than I would’ve thought possible, it threw itself at the bars. It slammed into them so hard that I was certain I heard something crunch. Both arms jutted from between the bars and its hands opened and closed in impotent desperation.

“You want this, Old Dirk?” Donny crooned like he was talking to a puppy.

The zombie snapped his teeth together and moaned as it strained for that tiny swatch of my forearm skin. I wanted to close my eyes, but for some stupid reason. I watched as he tossed the scrap of meat at Old Dirk.

The two behemoths that were restraining me chuckled when the meat hit with a wet splat and stuck to Old Dirk’s face for just a moment before sliding off and to the floor. I felt my gorge rise when the zombie dropped to its knees and clawed around until he managed to scoop up the piece of skin and shove it in his mouth.

“Fuck me…” I gasped.

11

Hate

“Wake up!”

The command came from far away, but the slap is what brought me back. I felt a pain in my shoulders and struggled to get my feet under myself as I made my way back to consciousness.

I hadn’t even realized that I’d fainted…passed out…whatever. But it was obvious that I had since the two giant goons were now standing behind Don who was starting to materialize as my vision returned.

“You don’t get to take the easy way out of here.” Don slapped me again despite my being awake.

“Don!” a voice hollered from the direction I assumed to be the stairs.

He looked annoyed at the interruption, but stepped back and shouted over his shoulder, “What?”

“One of the teams is back…they brought guests.”

Without a word, the two men flanking Don turned and headed into the shadows toward the voice. Don nodded and turned back to me. “We’ll resume this real soon. You just stay here and keep Old Dirk company. I think you two are gonna be best buds before too long.”

I hung there as the man stalked off. I wasn’t actually facing Old Dirk’s cage. He was sort of off to my left side.

It wasn’t long before my overall discomfort began to overshadow the pain from the part of my forearm that had been sliced away. My shoulders were screaming and felt like they were both on fire. And then there was the smell. I was becoming very upset that my senses were becoming…acclimated? Not sure if that was the word I wanted to use, but it was the closest I could come up with.

It was no longer so overwhelming.

I faded in and out. Not actually losing consciousness, but more like zoning out. The adrenaline had long dissipated and I could feel aches and pains everywhere from my beating, the slices, and whatever else was hammering me.

“Hey!”

I didn’t know if I was imagining it or not, but I swore I heard a woman’s voice. I blinked my eyes and tried to turn as much as possible without causing too much pain. I didn’t see anything, but then I saw Old Dirk push his face against the bars and start to drool in a thick rope of grayish slime that made me gag just a bit.

“Fuck…did Donnie already put you down?” I heard the voice whisper.

“No.” I didn’t bother to whisper. I had no idea who this was, and I found that I was having difficulty caring in the slightest.

I doubt I was able to hide my reaction when a figure stepped out of the shadows and revealed itself to be the blond with the straight hair. I was struggling to remember her name.

“Lisa…right?” I rasped, my voice a bit haggard from the screaming no doubt. Add in the total lack of water for the past several hours and I was surprised I could speak at all.

“Yeah. Lisa Hargrave…and you are Evan Berry. Current thorn in Donnie’s side.” Her tone held no humor and even less warmth.

“You my next torturer?” I eyed all the blades hanging off her and tried to steel myself for the next round of pain.

“What? No!” She said it like I’d just accused her of some horrible crime.

“Then you were what…just curious about the latest victim?”

She planted her hands on her hips. I had to admit, with the tight leather and blades, it was a pose that suited her. I pushed that thought and wherever it threatened to go out of my head.

“I’m here to let you know that if you can hang on and not die for the next ten hours or so, I might be able to get you out of here.”

That statement caught me totally off guard. I’d heard Don order this woman to his room once. I’d seen her shoot daggers from her eyes when some of the other women such as Natasha clung a bit tightly to Don. I guess I’d just assumed she was one of his groupies.

“Wait,” she said with what was almost a laugh. “You think I am part of his harem…one of the concubines.”

“You’re not?” I blurted.

She opened her mouth but shut it just as fast. Twice more she looked as if she was about to say something, but each time, she clammed up and pressed her lips so tight that they turned white.

“So that’s a yes? Then what gives. Is this some sort of setup? I mean, I don’t see what that would serve. Unless part of the torture is to get me to believe I am being given a chance at survival.” I paused as she continued to stare at me. When she didn’t offer up anything, I continued. “You’re wasting your time. If you’re legit, great. I will do my best to stay alive another ten hours.” I made no effort to hide my sarcasm.

“Listen, Donnie hasn’t been totally honest with us. He’s been telling us that his patrols have been dealing with raiders looking to take what is ours. That they have been murdering our people. He claimed there was some sort of gang war out there and that both sides had come together and called a truce to take us down just because we are white.”

As I listened to Lisa, everything she said seemed like something that Don Evans would do in order to gain control over his population. He didn’t need everybody to believe the way he did. They just needed to believe a certain version to stay pacified as he committed his atrocities.

He was no idiot. And I only felt slightly better that maybe not every single person in this place was bigoted extremist.

“If they don’t kill you before tonight, I can get you out of here.” She looked closer at me and appeared to make a catalog of my injuries. “Not sure if you will be able to make it, but if you have a chance, then my conscience is clear.”

“Why wouldn’t your conscience be clear?” I asked. It seemed a valid question. It had been Don Evans that perpetrated these acts. And if this lady was not in the know as far as how things were going down, then that wasn’t her fault.

“I should’ve known better. I saw the signs but chose to ignore them.” And then, without another word, she turned and strode off into the shadows.

I returned to my zoning in and out and began to wonder if just maybe I was going to make it out of this alive. Being down in this boiler room, I had no idea of the passage of time. When I heard the door open, I waited, and while it certainly did not seem that several hours could’ve actually passed, there was still a bit of hope.

“Evvvaaaann,” Don’s voice sing-songed like a bad attempt at imitating that guy from The Warriors. “Come out to play-yay!”

At last, he strolled into view. I didn’t see his goons, but I hadn’t seen them last time either until they just magically appeared.

“So, I have something special for you. We are going to head up to the arena because I don’t think you will want to miss this.”

And just like that, the two goons arrived. They were all suited up in gear that looked like they were headed into battle. Their assorted bits and pieces of armor, sports equipment, and some parts that look to have been handmade adorned them and turned them into what amounted to nothing less than walking weapons.

I was pulled down from where I’d spent the last several hours hanging. As soon as my arms dropped, blood rushed to my hands and began to burn. The agony in my shoulders increased as the muscles protested.

I took an unsteady step and collapsed to my knees. A heartbeat later, I’d been jerked to my feet from under each arm. I kept trying to get my feet to help, but they were slow to the party and kept dragging along and tripping over each other.

By the time we reached the stairs, I was at least partially under my own power. We emerged in the corridor of the school and I heard what sounded like distant cheers. Every once in a while they would be punctuated by a swell of noise.

At last we stepped outside, and I could tell that it was late afternoon. I’d spent a good bit of the day down in that boiler room. That was at least promising. I had been told that I might be rescued if I could survive a certain length of time.

As we exited the school, I could tell that it was still quite warm outside. Judging by the light, I would guess we still had an hour or so before sunset. And it was no surprise that the bleachers were once again full. I could see a cluster of men with weapons gathered at the dugout where I’d been held earlier.

I was surprised when I was taken away from the dugout, but then decided that Don obviously didn’t want me to see what or, more likely, who was inside. Truthfully, there was only one person I could think of and I felt my stomach clench as I awaited to have my suspicion confirmed.

I was taken along the rear of the backstop and then led to what had earlier been called the VIP section. The platform already had a few people sitting there including Lisa and Natasha. Neither made eye contact with me more than to glance at me as I arrived and was shoved down in a chair.

Once I’d had my wrists cuffed to the armrests, Don grabbed his megaphone and walked over to the crowd that were assembled in the stands. I had to crane my neck to see them, and did so, searching for but failing to locate Selina.

“I gotta tell you, people,” Don began, “today has certainly smiled on us. Our good fortune seems to be like a snowball rolling downhill.”

A chorus of hoots and cheers erupted, and he let it go on for a moment before raising his hands to quiet them. When they had dialed down to a murmur, Don began to pace in front of the stands and talk.

“We have had some real problems out there lately, and as I have said earlier, much of it comes from these pathetic remnants of street gangs that are out to do nothing less than terrorize the good, honest, and God-fearing people like you.” This brought more cheers and the scattered evangelical cheers.

Once the audience had settled again, Don pointed to the dugout. “We found one of those responsible for the death of those women and children from that settlement over in Boring.”

An angry murmur swept through the crowd and Don pointed to the goons. I had decided at some point to label the albino “Thing 1” and the other guy “Thing 2”. And as a unit that almost seemed rehearsed, they bowed and opened the gate.

Thing 1 vanished long enough to duck inside and then emerge with somebody in tow. My heart sunk when my suspicions were confirmed.

They had Marshawn. His hands were bound in front of him and it looked like the two Things had had a go at him. His face was bruised and battered, and his lips and nose were still trickling blood.

“We found this…person,“ Don spat the word out like it was something foul that he could taste, “…in the act of killing two of our own.”

The crowd wasted no time in shouting out for Marshawn’s death. Don actually closed his eyes as if he might be absorbing the negative energy rolling over him from his people. I had the realization that his was how he kept them going. He used moments like this to further his agenda. He spun events to fit his purpose. He wielded hatred and fear with an expertise that was terrifying.

“This…mongrel of a human was the sort in the old society that would suck from the teat of government programs like welfare and food stamps. The kind that would use your hard-earned money to buy drugs and then blame society, the white race in particular, for all his woes. And then, when he robbed the local grocery store or robbed innocent people on the street, he would cry about the injustice perpetrated against him based on the color of his skin.” More shouts and curses rained down from the crowd, but I could tell that Don was just getting started.

“This was the sort that would pull a gun on a policeman trying to protect and serve, then have people protesting in the streets when that officer that was looking down the barrel protected himself. These protests were nothing more than more excuses for the blacks, the Mexicans, and the bleeding-heart whites to loot and vandalize. And it was always our fault.”

People started standing up now. They were shouting over each other as they demanded revenge. After all, there was no need for a trial. Their king had spoken, and his infallibility was even more certain than that of the pope. It was clear that they were eating out of Don’s hand.

But as I scanned the people, I picked out a few faces that were images of doubt. And the more I looked, the more it became clear to me that there was an illusion here. From the outside, this was a camp of likeminded racial extremists. But if you looked past the veneer of anger and hatred, there was something much more prevalent…and understandable.

Fear.

How many of these people were here because they were terrified of being out there on their own. How many of these people folded under and compromised themselves simply to have a chance at surviving?

“We are going to send this degenerate to the arena and let him become one of the soulless zombies…which…” Don made an over-exaggerated chuckle that was obviously for show, “…is probably normal for his type. Hell, just like the days of being stoned and playing video games.”

I was listening to this tirade and wondering how he could make all these leaps? And yet, I kept seeing faces that were blank, or disturbed, or…just plain scared.

I felt a surge of adrenaline run through me. My eyes locked on a familiar face. Selina Dubois was staring at me and from her expression I saw hope in her eyes. For whatever reason, she believed that I could somehow do something about this terrible situation. I wished there was a way that I could tell her with my eyes that I was sorry, but I was perhaps even more helpless than her at the moment.

“Put him in, boys,” Don called over his shoulder.

The two big goons grabbed my friend under his arms and I suddenly looked around. I was frantic. There had to be something I could do. I couldn’t just stand here and watch. I certainly couldn’t do nothing once the undead started in on him.

I looked in the octagon and saw the undead versions of Trayvonn and Karasinda along with a few others. Even worse, the children were still in there. One way or another, they had all managed to get free of the harnesses that they’d been in earlier.

Marshawn jerked away from them just as they opened the cage. They lunged and he stepped aside. Instead of making an attempt to run, he simply walked into the opening and pulled the gate shut behind him.

It did not go unnoticed by me that every man or woman with a weapon had brought it up to bear on Marshawn. Maybe that was why he seemed to simply accept his fate.

As soon as the gate was shut, Marshawn seemed to assess his situation and quickly ran over to the smallest of the child zombies. That proved to be a good call since they all just continued to watch him. They were, as usual, exhibiting peculiar behavior.

He paused just for a heartbeat before lunging in and snatching up the smallest of the children. This one was perhaps two years old. Except, he didn’t actually pick it up. He grabbed one arm and then stomped down on the child and yanked with all his might.

The arm ripped free and I actually staggered back a step at the brutal ferocity of his actions. I had no idea what he could be thinking. Even some of the crowd—I was willing to bet it was the ones who were already showing some semblance of discomfort—groaned out loud in response.

That was also all it took to up the number of “active” undead in the ring with him. All the children lurched forward to attack. But now, Marshawn was…armed!

“Brilliant,” I breathed.

Don also had a reaction to what was going on, but it didn’t match mine. His look of eager anticipation that almost bordered on lustful changed to one of astonishment that turned to anger.

“Foul!” Don shouted. You can’t do that!”

“Can is a question of ability,” I mocked. “Seems to me he was perfectly capable.”

I felt something slam into my kidneys. The pain was instant and dropped me to my knees. I hadn’t even been able to cry out. All that came from my mouth was a pathetic squeak.

“Shut your mouth!”

I’d forgotten that Natasha was there. I’d been so caught up in what was going on that she had managed to vanish from my circle of awareness.

I was on my hands and knees and had to wrench my head around to see her. She was standing over me with a COBRA baton. She was holding the base with her left hand and slapping the end of it into her open right palm.

“You hit like a girl,” I managed once I could breathe.

Her eyes widened and I almost laughed. In fact, had I been capable, I would’ve. But there was still the issue of getting my ability to take a breath back without it being pure agony. Then a trickle of blood came out of the corner of her mouth.

I had to blink a few times to be sure that I was not seeing things. When Lisa stepped around Natasha, I understood. That was also when I saw the tip of the blade push the rest of the way through Natasha’s chest.

“I always hated you,” Lisa whispered. Only, instead of hate and venom, her voice was almost a purr.

Natasha opened her mouth to say something. I imagine she had some sort of nasty retort, but all that came out was blood and a sound that was equal parts gaging and choking.

“I didn’t quite catch that,” Lisa cooed as she yanked her blade free and let Natasha drop.

“What the fuck!” Don’s voice boomed, causing me to turn my head way too fast.

“Donnie, dearest…do you remember how many times I warned that bitch about crossing me?” Lisa stepped past me with no visual care or concern for the half dozen guns that spun her direction.

I, on the other hand, wondered how many of those people had the ability to hit a target from any real distance. Since she was now standing directly beside me, I had a feeling I was going to be more than a little disappointed in their various skill levels.

“Have you lost your mind, Lisa?” Don fumed as he began to stomp over to the platform. And that was when I noticed that something was just a bit off. Not every gun was aimed at Lisa. As I scanned the area in front of me without trying to be obvious, I could see a few guns were pointed at the other guards. I had to make the deduction that perhaps these were Lisa’s people.

Wait…did Lisa have people?

Natasha was now sprawled in a growing pool of blood and I had to move to keep it from getting my hands. And then I heard a meaty thud that brought my attention back to the arena.

Marshawn was standing over a zombie and jerking the arm out of its face. He’d stabbed it with the jagged end. I had to imagine he’d plunged it through the eye socket since that would be the easiest area to pierce and stab the brain.

Trayvonn was shambling up from behind, but Marshawn was ready and kicked backward. He sent the zombie careening into the fence. Before it could recover, he sidestepped one of the children and swept its feet from under it and stabbed down with a vicious attack using the apparently pointed end to dispatch yet another of the undead.

Karasinda was the next to close on him and he grabbed her by the hair and slung her forward. She collided with Trayvonn and the pair went to the ground in a heap of tangled limbs.

“You disappoint me, Lisa,” Don scolded like he was a parent speaking to a wayward child. “I gave you a place in my bed as one of the chosen. You were my favorite. I brought you with me when all this started and swore to protect you.”

“You never said anything about…” She paused and turned to octagon where Marshawn was dispatching yet another of the undead. “You never said anything about this.”

“Don’t act like you didn’t know what we were building here. You were just as adamant about this as me,” Don scoffed.

“What?” she spun back to the man as he reached the bottom step of the platform. “When did I say anything that made you think I would be okay with what you are doing?”

“We used to watch the news and you used to say—” Don began.

“Are you even kidding me right now?” Lisa snarled, cutting Don off. “I never said anything about what is going on here. Being upset about crime, or gang violence, illegals being given special privileges, or people abusing the system has nothing to do with wanting to try and commit genocide!”

“You went on the patrols. You see what is out there.”

“But never once did I see anything that justified using children as zombie bait…strapping them to the zombie versions of their parents. That is a special kind of evil.”

Don stopped his advance. I wasn’t sure if it was because he just realized that she was holding a nasty looking curved blade in front of her and he didn’t have a single weapon on him. I used their confrontation to sneak a quick peek at the armed sentries scattered around the area.

After a quick look, at least from what I was seeing in front of me, Lisa had the numbers in armed guards. Had this been in the planning for a while and this was just a happy coincidence?

“Lisa, put the weapon away.” Suddenly, Don’s voice was soft. Almost kind. “We can talk about this. You’re still my number one girl. We can work this out.”

“No…we really can’t.” Lisa backed up a step to maintain a distance between herself and Don. “This is not something I can be a part of. And you are not even close to the man I thought you to be.”

“Think about what you would be giving up,” Don said with a sickly sweetness that did not come across at all sincere; especially when he waved his hands up and down his body to indicate himself.

“I am sure you won’t have any problems filling the void,” Lisa shot back.

There was a moment when Don looked confused. I wasn’t sure if he could not believe somebody had spurned his offer or perhaps Lisa’s statement in general.

“You know I can’t just let you go, babe,” Don said, his tone dropping to a combination of dangerous and almost pleading.

He glanced at me and then gave a dismissive sniff. I’d gotten up and was now looking back and forth between the faceoff happening between Lisa and him as well as Marshawn as he finished off the last of the zombies in the octagon. He was now looking between me, Lisa, Don, and past the dugout for some reason.

From my vantage point, I couldn’t see past the bleachers. The dugout was off to the side and, while I could see the entrance to it, I could not see beyond.

Don paused and looked around. For the first time, he seemed to realize that not all the armed sentries were pointing their guns where they should. He turned back to face Lisa and his expression had transformed to the evil sneer I was more familiar with.

“Is that right?” he scoffed. “You been planning a bit of an overthrow?”

“We just want to leave,” Lisa replied. “All you have to do is let us walk out of here and nobody has to get hurt.”

I was more than a little impressed. Lisa had no tremor in her voice. Clearly that outward badass she projected visibly with the leather and blades were more than just image. The hand that still held the blade out in front of her was not shaking at all. She was calm and steady.

Fearless.

“You have to know I can’t let that happen.” Don shook his head for emphasis. “You know every inch of this place. Hell, we might have a weakness that you could come back to exploit. Or…” He glanced at me. “Him? You gonna leave with that twerp?”

Twerp? Seriously, did anybody use that word anymore?

“I doubt it,” Lisa said with a sniff. She shot me a sideways glance that was almost disdainful. “We just want to go our way. We have no desire to fight you and the people here. But you should know that not all these people are here because they want to be. If you press this…you might find yourself on the losing end.”

Don opened and shut his mouth like a fish out of water a few times. He glanced around again like he might be trying to gauge how many people were really on his side. I took that time to shoot a glance at Marshawn again. He was no longer looking this direction at all. His gaze was locked on something that I obviously could not see.

Was help coming?

Where would he find anybody to help us? He certainly had not had enough time to return to our place and bring back any of our people.

“Lisa, since you are my main girl…here’s what I am gonna do.” Don clasped his hands in front of himself like he was about to give a lecture to an eager class. “I’m gonna let you go.”

I wasn’t the only one to hear the emphasis he put on that one word. Movement out of the corner of my eye drew my attention to the goons. They had left their spot by the arena and were now moving over to flank Don, arms folded across their massive chests.

“But the people that are holding my guns, pointed at my people? I can’t allow that. They stay. They will be given a fair opportunity to explain their actions. If they have compelling arguments, I will be merciful and banish them from this place. If not…” His gaze drifted over towards Marshawn. “Then they face the…” His voice trailed off. I looked over and realized that Marshawn was still looking past the dugout. Only, now, he had a smile on his face.

“Maybe our guest here can prove just how much of a badass he is. Taking down a bunch of zombies with the arm he ripped off a child is one thing. But how long can he last in a knife fight?” Don turned back to Lisa for a moment, then shifted his gaze to me. “And I’ll even toss in this little bitch. Last person standing is set free.”

“No.” Lisa let that single word sit for a moment before she continued. “My guys come with me.” She glanced at me for a second. “Do what you want with this one. I would’ve brought him with us, but not at the expense of any of my people.”

“YOUR people?” Don roared. “None of these idiots is yours. Every one of them owes me their lives. Hell…so do you for that matter, but I am willing to let you go out of respect for what we once had. Hell, I have another dozen or so waiting to take your place.”

Nice to know where I stood. I couldn’t really blame her. In fact, I wasn’t sure why she’d made the offer to bust me out of this place to begin with.

There was this moment where everybody seemed frozen. It was a total standoff in just about every sense of the word. None of Lisa’s people were flinching and she had made no move to lower her knife.

Then, a few people in the stands started to make some noise. Only, it wasn’t directed at what was going on here. The ones at the top were standing and looking back behind them. They were pointing, and more than a few were shouting.

And then others began to stand and turn, but by then, the ones at the top were backing away and making their way down the bleachers. A few were actually turning around and shoving their way past other people that were just now starting to get up and try to see what was going on.

That was about the time that the wind shifted and picked up. The mystery was solved before I heard the first moan.

The undead were inside the compound. When I shot a glance over at Marshawn, I was more than a little surprised to see his expression.

He was smiling.

12

The Children

I saw them now as they poured in from both sides of the bleachers. It was almost comical. A cliché of sorts as the undead finally made their way in just as they had in the mall of the original Dawn of the Dead. Only, this time, there was no biker gang. I had no idea how they’d breached Don’s compound.

What I did know was that this was my opportunity to get my ass out of here. Don and his goons were now turned with their backs to me. Lisa had vanished as people began to run every direction. Some were trying to escape, others were heeding Don’s shouts as he told people to get to the arms locker and grab weapons in order to push these things back.

I got up, wincing in pain and holding my ribs as I made my way to the octagon ring. Marshawn was just climbing over and dropping to the ground now that there were other priorities.

“How the hell did you end up here?” I asked.

“Actually, I’d just found you when you got snatched up by that bitch Natasha.” He looked over at the dead body of the woman that Lisa had literally stabbed in the back. “I was figuring you to be dead meat.”

“So why did you come here then? If I was dead, what would’ve been the point?”

“Don Evans has to die, man. And if I went down in the process, it would’ve been fine. But then I found help.”

He started across the outfield and made his way to the football stadium. It was obvious that preparations were already underway to convert this space into a garden area. We wove through the raised boxes of earth until we reached the switchback entrance and exit.

Marshawn had started off at a jog until he realized that I wasn’t keeping up. He scowled when he took in my limp and how I was clutching my ribs and wincing with every step. Hurrying back, he’d thrown my arm over his shoulders and helped me across the open area and out of the fenced in area of the high school that Don Evans was converting to a compound.

We crossed the street to a series of homes that looked as if they’d been fire bombed. He headed for one house in particular that had the blackened husk of an SUV jutting from where a front room window looked to have once looked out at the school across the way.

He went to the SUV and crawled under it. As he did, something flashed out of the corner of my eye. I turned to see a red flare floating lazily to the ground from the opposite side of the compound. A moment later, another flare burst to my right.

“That’s the signal. They are waiting for me.”

I turned to see Marshawn dragging a large crate from under the wreckage. He flipped it open and came up with a flare gun of his own that he loaded and pointed skyward.

“But you were captured,” I stated what seemed like the obvious. “If you were still there, then…” I let that sort of fade as I waited for his response.

“Then they fire again in two hours. If they do not hear back from me, they go ahead with the assumption that I didn’t make it.”

I nodded. That seemed logical. I had no idea what they were going ahead with, but it felt like they had the bases covered. I watched as Marshawn pulled out a tube-like contraption. It took me a moment to realize what it was.

“A mortar?” I asked more than a little incredulous. Surely they couldn’t be that easy to come by…much less operate with any degree of efficiency.

Before I could ask, he pulled a wrinkled piece of paper from his boot and began to read it as he assembled (or whatever they called it) the mortar launcher. As I watched, something began to niggle at the back of my mind. I didn’t know what it was, but it was not going away no matter how hard I tried to shove it out of my mind.

Then it hit me.

“Selina!” I gasped.

Marshawn looked up at me and glanced around as if expecting to see somebody approaching us. I glanced back at the school and then at Marshawn.

“You can’t do this,” I said hurriedly.

“Sure I can, Teddy showed us. Plus, he wrote down very easy steps to follow including how to adjust fire,” Marshawn replied absently, not looking up from what he was doing.

“No, I mean one of the kids I was travelling with that got snatched from my old camp we found Chewy at is in there. You might kill her in the process.”

Marshawn stopped and looked up at me. I saw something in his eyes that I did not like in the least. There was a deep sadness there, but it was tempered with determination. He was going to do this any way.

“I’m sorry, Evan. But one person sacrificed for the greater good is an acceptable loss. And maybe we get lucky and she doesn’t get hit.” He went back to what he was doing.

“She isn’t the only one in there that is being kept against her will. Plenty of those people do not agree with what is happening,” I argued. Then another thought hit me. “And maybe you don’t hit Don either. What about that?”

“We have eyes inside,” Marshawn said with almost no emotion. “That is where we are going to concentrate our attack.”

They had eyes inside? So they’d seen what went on in there. If they were as sickened as I was, then my argument would hold no water at all. That meant Selina and who knew how many others might perish and be considered collateral damage or “acceptable” losses.

That had always been a term that “stuck in my craw” as my grandpa used to say. I did not see how a life could be deemed acceptable to lose. It was one of the things that had bothered me about movies like Saving Private Ryan. How were all those other guys considered to be acceptable losses to save one kid no matter that his brothers had died in a separate incident? Whether one mom loses five or another loses one…how can there be a situation where one life is deemed more valuable or important? Or less.

I looked at Marshawn busily preparing the mortar launcher and then back at the high school where I could hear screams and shouting along with sporadic gunfire. I knew I was in no shape to do much, but I also knew that a little girl that had once trusted me was just on the other side of the fence that closed in Sandy High School.

I started back. Just as I managed to cross the road, I heard Marshawn call after me. “Evan! What the hell are you doing?”

“Going back for Selina,” I said through clenched teeth.

“You can’t,” he shouted.

I reached the switchback turnstile and started to push through. I could hear feet slapping the asphalt of the road behind me. I was through as he reached the fencing.

“Evan, if you go in there…you are probably going to die,” he said, a pleading sound seeping into his tone.

“You got eyes on Don,” I reminded. “If I stay away, I will probably be okay.” I sort of felt bad throwing his words back at him, but I would feel infinitely worse if I sat back and did nothing and Selina died in the attack that was about to come.

“Dammit, Evan…this is stupid. Our people need you. Throwing your life away is not only stupid…but it is selfish.” Marshawn slapped the fencing for emphasis.

I stared at him. I looked back over my shoulder at the school where the sounds of people dying was starting to hurt my soul. It was possible that Selina was among those dying right this moment.

I looked back at Marshawn. “And if it was your daughter? If it was Tisha?”

It was a crappy thing to say. I knew it. It stung my throat just saying the words. Marshawn looked as if I’d just slapped him. He opened his mouth and then snapped it shut.

“That is a shitty thing to do, man.” Marshawn turned and walked away.

I wanted to apologize. I wanted to call out to him, but I knew that every moment I stood here made it more likely that Selina would die either at the hands and teeth of the undead or by mortar fire.

Neither were acceptable.

I started across the football field and was almost to the fencing that separated the baseball and softball grounds when I could smell the undead. I knew there had been a lot, but I had no idea how many. For the smell to hit me already when they were still so far away was an indicator that they had arrived in huge numbers.

Zombies…the new Weapon of Mass Destruction.

I could see them in clusters on the ground and new that there was a person under each of those writhing tumors of undead that dotted the area. There were people still in the bleachers doing their best to fight them off, but it was clearly a losing battle as more rounded the corners and stumbled their way up the steps.

What I saw no sign of was Don Evans or either of his goons. To my left were the tennis courts, and it was in that direction that I heard and saw larger clusters of zombies converging. Gunfire also came primarily from that locale.

I was limping that way when a hand clutched my shoulder with an iron grip. It was then that I realized I’d gotten way too carried away. In my haste to come to extract Selina, I’d gone off with no weapon at all.

I was defenseless.

“You’re an idiot,” a voice rumbled in my ear.

I dropped my head and let loose with a sigh. The hand on my shoulder spun me around and I winced as my ribs protested the twisting motion.

“That was still a shit thing to say,” Marshawn grumbled. “But you’re right. I wouldn’t be okay with this if that was my daughter.”

“I’m sorry…I…” The words died on my tongue as another one of those gut-wrenching screams sounded from just beyond some tall shrubs that walled of some sort of open commons.

“Later,” Marshawn said with a dismissive wave. “Let’s go find that little girl.”

We started for the entrance to the gymnasium. That was where I’d been led outside from. Having never been inside Sandy High School before now, it was the only starting place I could think of.

The undead were going to become an issue shortly and now that I was past the sports field complex, I was able to appreciate how many of the walking dead were present.

Hundreds. Maybe close to a thousand. Later I would ask Marshawn how they’d managed to get them here.

We rounded the shrub partition and almost fell over a cluster of the undead. Marshawn had to grab my arm to keep me from falling which turned my hiss of pain to a full-on yelp.

My noise caused a few of the zombies not already involved in the carnage to turn our direction and start shambling for us.

The closest was a small woman that had obviously just turned. Blood still dripped from all the rips and tears she’d endured, and her drag-step approach was leaving a trail on the concrete that looked as black as the tracers in her eyes.

Once he was satisfied that I wasn’t going to topple, Marshawn advanced on her and slammed a machete blade into the crown of her skull. I was looking around for the next threat, but I doubted how much help I would be in fighting them off. Lifting my arm was painful, swinging with any force would probably be enough to blur my vision.

After taking down a few more, Marshawn pulled out a radio. It must’ve been in the box with the mortar launcher was all I could figure.

“This is M.” He paused and then keyed the radio again. “We have an issue inside the wire. Hold ten before unleashing weapons free.”

“Negative, M. We have confirmation of target,” a voice I didn’t recognize replied.

“Intel on site is inaccurate,” Marshawn insisted. “Report of sympathetics as well as children held against their will.”

The radio crackled for a moment and then a voice came on. This one was female and there was obvious hesitation in her words. “M, this is B. You have…five minutes to try and clear. We have to take this chance before target manages to evac.” More static. “I am sorry, but that is the best I can do.”

“So we just kill these people who have been sold a bad batch of goods and kill innocent children?” Marshawn snarled.

“Acceptable losses.” The male voice was back and sounded aggravated. “And the clock is running. You need to get moving and stop wasting time.”

“This isn’t like before. I don’t think acceptable losses can be defined the same way,” Marshawn argued. Despite protesting, he was still pulling me along and moving us toward the gym doors. “There aren’t enough of us alive for such a thing as acceptable losses any longer.”

“Four minutes and thirty, M,” the male voice said with absolutely no emotional inflection.

I had yet to meet this guy, but I hated him already. I hoped and wished for some adrenaline to kick in and numb the pain, but so far, every step was painful, and hurrying made me breathe faster which made things worse.

Once we reached the doors to the gym, Marshawn yanked them open and made me wait until he’d ensure the coast was clear. He finally pulled me inside and I had to let my eyes adjust to the change. When they cleared, what I saw were a handful of people clustered together and looking at us like we were the walking dead.

“If you don’t want to stay here, then you need to get your asses out to the burned-out houses across from the football field,” Marshawn announced.

At first, the people, mostly women and a few younger teens and small children, looked at one another as if waiting for somebody to decide for them. Finally, there was a commotion and one of the children pushed away from the others.

“Evan?” a young girl’s voice said tentatively. “How come you are not dead?”

“Not for lack of trying,” I said with a grin as I recognized Selina under the baseball cap she had pulled down low on her head to hide most of her features. “And I missed you too, by the way.”

The girl at least had the sense to blush as she realized how that last statement had sounded. She looked back at the others and then to me. Without warning, she came for me with her arms out wide.

I knew she was happy to see me, and I was so relieved, but as she slammed into me, I realized what a bad idea her enthusiasm would be for my pain issues. I tried to brace for the impact but failed miserably. I moaned that sounded more like a yelp when she squeezed with a considerable amount of enthusiasm.

That set off a near disastrous chain of events. Marshawn turned suddenly in response to my sound. The people clustered together apparently assumed that the girl had attacked me. Each of them drew some form of knife or machete and they began to spread out as if to attack me and Marshawn.

“Whoa,” I croaked.

Selina turned and planted her hands on her hips. “This is my friend that I kept telling you would come for me,” she scolded.

It was nice to see that she was still the fiery little girl that I’d last known before this whole thing with Don Evans began. If anything, she was even more spirited.

“This will have to wait,” Marshawn snapped. “We are against a clock.”

I nodded and reached for Selina’s hand. She glanced at Marshawn and then the people still spread out holding weapons—many as if they were afraid they would be bitten by the things—with a frown.

“I’m coming.” Selina shrugged her shoulders and wiped the frown from her face. “But you shouldn’t let Carl join us. I think he is one of those jerkface Donnie Evans followers now. He turned mean right after we were captured. He even smacked me once when I told that jerkface that I hated his guts and hoped he got eaten by the zombies.”

I started backing toward the door with Marshawn and Selina. The people still seemed undecided, and as much as I hated it, I couldn’t wait around for them to make up their minds.

We were just reaching the baseball diamond when the radio crackled to life.

“Sixty seconds.”

I pressed my lips together and clenched my teeth against the pain as we tried to hurry. Unfortunately, there were now a number of undead wandering around and we couldn’t swerve to avoid them. To my surprise, although it shouldn’t have been, Selina stepped away from me with a nasty serrated blade. She ducked under a zombie’s arms and came up under and shoved the blade up under its chin. It was a long, slender blade that was obviously long enough to drive into the brain pan and end the creature.

When she danced back, pulling her arm free with a twist, I was more than a little impressed. It was clear she’d dealt with her fair share of the undead.

“Not so fast, my friends!” a familiar and unwelcome voice shouted.

13

Incoming

Don Evans had appeared around the far side of the bleachers. One of his goons, the albino, stood at his side, but he was gasping for breath…and splattered with blood.

“I was lied to,” Don said with an overdramatized gasp. He pointed at Marshawn. “I was told you were killed. Good help is so hard to find these days.”

“You expect the types of people you hang with to be honest?” Marshawn laughed.

“The kinds of people?” Don shot back. “You mean white, hard-working Americans?”

“Yeah…sure, we’ll go with that.” Marshawn glanced at me and winked. “Present company excluded.”

“Thanks, man.” I clapped him on the shoulder.

“No problem.”

“My people are simply taking back what is ours and cutting off the dead weight.” Don took a few steps forward to allow another half dozen of his people to fan out around him.

There was no doubt that we were outgunned. The only people near me that looked ready for a fight was Marshawn…and oddly enough, Selina. I remembered the crack shot little girl I’d first met and had to smile. She’d gained a considerable amount of confidence since she’d been gone.

“I know you think this is a done deal,” Marshawn said calmly. “And I guess when you look at it one-dimensionally, you would seem correct. But that might be one of your many short comings. You look at things with such a limited scope of vision.”

“What on earth are you babbling about?” Don snapped.

“Yeah,” I whispered out of the corner of my mouth. “You want to clue me in?”

Then I heard the whistle. At almost that same moment, Marshawn barked for everybody to get down. I glanced up to see Selina standing beside me with a confused expression. I reached up and grabbed her by the wrist, yanking her to the ground hard enough that she cried out. The thing is, I barely heard it as the hard thump and then the explosive blast followed. I covered my head with one arm as I hugged Selina tight to my side in a feeble attempt to protect her from the blast fallout.

I looked up and saw a big cloud of smoke and debris where I’d figured Don and his people to have been standing just a moment ago. I couldn’t really see, and I wouldn’t get the chance as Marshawn was urging everybody to their feet.

I was up, and then the pain hit me and put me back on my knees. In the rush of excitement, I had a moment of adrenaline-based painkiller. That seemed like a bit of a rip off since its respite was mere seconds, but I didn’t have long to think about it as two hands reached down to help me up. I didn’t recognize either of the people, but I gratefully accepted the help and climbed to my feet.

Our group started toward the football field. We were just passing through the gate when I heard a barrage of gunfire. One of the people that had helped me to my feet staggered and fell facedown. I could see the dark stain spreading across his back and with his face turned mostly my direction, I knew he was dead.

I had no idea about the second person. I knew that stopping or even slowing down was going to be a way to end up dead. All I could do was hope that I was one of those that made it.

I could see Selina and Marshawn ahead of me, so at least I was certain they were both still okay. I was basically bringing up the rear and was almost certain that the next rounds would find me.

That is likely what would’ve happened except for another explosion that vibrated under my feet and caused me to stagger just a bit. I glanced back to see another cloud of smoke and debris. Again, I had no idea if Don Evans was among the casualties.

I kept going and actually breathed a sigh of relief when I reached the far side of the football stadium complex. Selina was standing there and grabbed my arm as soon as I came through.

Marshawn was in the yard of the ruined house and waiting. When I got there, he looked at everybody and nodded as he took a head count. I counted fourteen nods.

“Okay, we need to move. I have a group and we have wheels. But we need to head to the Safeway. That is the rendezvous location,” Marshawn announced.

“You’ll just let us come along?” a man said, skepticism dripping from his voice.

“Should we not?” Marshawn replied with a pointed look at the man.

“Do we have to come with you?” another asked.

“Nope. You can do whatever the hell you want. But I am not going to stand here and debate the merits of bringing you along and I am sure not going to force anybody to come along.” And with those words, Marshawn started down along the side of the blackened home.

I didn’t waste any time. I kept hold of Selina’s hand and we followed. I waited until we emerged on the next street before I bothered to glance back. What I saw were nine people. None of them looked like they were ready for a fight. None looked prepared to make the trip to McIver. A couple didn’t look like they could make the less-than-a-mile trip to the Safeway parking lot.

Considering how I felt, I wasn’t entirely sure that I was up for the brief trip. Not that quitting was an option, but I felt awful.

“Is Michael with you?” Selina asked as we kept a brisk pace cutting through a few yards as we headed for the highway.

“He is back at our camp,” I answered.

I heard her say something, but it wasn’t loud enough that I could make it out. I bumped her shoulder with my elbow enough to get her attention.

“What was that?” I asked.

Selina looked around, presumably to ensure that she couldn’t be overheard. Once she was certain, she leaned closer to me. “Carl said he cut his head off.”

I glanced at her with a raised eyebrow. “Excuse me?”

“Jerkface sent him back when one of the people with him said that a little boy escaped. Carl told him he knew where the boy hid and could probably find him.” Selina was fighting not to cry, that much was obvious with her strained voice and the tears welling in her eyes.

“I promise you, Michael is fine. In fact, he and Chewie are like two peas in a pod these days,” I offered with a smile and a shrug of one shoulder.

“Chewie is okay too?” she blurted and then looked around to see if she’d drawn the attention of anybody. “Chewie is okay too?” she whispered, her cheeks flushed a bright red.

“She is fine. She was a little messed up when we got there, but she was in the bushes and luckily, none of the zombies found her.”

“How did she get to the bushes?” Selina said more to herself than anything else.

I wasn’t sure what she meant, but I could tell her mind was churning. She was deep in thought about something. And as she ran it through her brain, her lips moved as if she might be having a conversation.

“We got incoming,” Marshawn said over his shoulder just loud enough to be heard.

I looked up to see a smallish herd of perhaps thirty or so of the undead coming for us from out of a side street. I was really bummed to have lost that weapon the Rag-and-Bone Man had given us.

Oddly enough, all the people that Selina had urged to come along pulled an assortment of weapons free and advanced on the herd. Selina glanced at me and gave me an appraising look that ended with a frown.

“Maybe you should stay back.” She put a hand on my chest and then turned and dashed into the fight.

I watched her, my heart turning into a lump in my throat as she ducked under the arms of the first zombie she reached. As it tried to stop and then turn to seek out the tasty morsel that had just evaded it, she kicked it behind the knees and then thrust her blade through the back of its head so that it came out the mouth. A dribble of dark fluid oozed from the blade tip just before it vanished as she yanked it back and let the corpse fall to the ground on its face.

Already the next one was on her and I was about to scream out for her when she dropped to her knees and spun with one leg extended. She swept the little female zombie from its feet and popped up quick enough to stab down into its face.

As I watched, I had to wonder what the hell she’d been through. She was a miniature warrior. I could see her face most of the time and I never saw her flinch or show even the slightest bit of fear.

She even moved in once and jumped on the back of one moving up behind Marshawn. Riding it to the ground as she plunged her blade into its temple. When it was all said and done, everybody had come away without a scratch.

Selina wiped her blade off and said something to a few of the people from the gym as she made her way back to me. My expression must’ve been obvious because she gave me a scowl and planted her hands on her hips.

“You think boys are the only ones that can fight zombies good?” she challenged.

“Not at all, but that was some pretty impressive stuff,” I said.

There was a splatter of blackened blood on her cheek. I pointed it out and she scrubbed it away with her sleeve.

“When did you learn that?” I asked as we resumed our trek to the rendezvous point.

“Every week, we had to fight for our spot in the food line,” Selina explained. “And if you didn’t hold your own, they sent you out with the patrols.” She dropped her head. “The first time I had to fight, I got beat up really bad. They made me go out the next day with a food patrol. I got paired with this woman named Lisa.”

“Long blonde hair?” I asked.

‘Yeah.” She drew that word out like she was curious as to how I might possibly know that. “She was one of Donnie’s slave girls. Called a porcupine or something.”

“Concubine?”

“Yeah…that!” Selina answered with a nod.

“And she taught you how to fight like that?” I asked.

“Yeah. She kept me with her. We used to slip away sometimes, and she would lure one zombie over and then show me how to kill it. The first time that one of them got her, I started to cry.”

“Got her?” I had a feeling I knew what she meant, but I wanted to make absolutely certain.

“One of them bit her on the hand one time. It had broken teeth and she was only wearing regular gloves. It tore through and I was scared that she was going to get sick. Then she showed me that she had four or five other old bites that were just scars now. She said that I could never tell anybody in the camp.”

I had to wonder how she would be able to keep her status of being immune from Don. That was especially true if she was his concubine or whatever.

“She was nice to me, but she would get kinda mad when I lost in the weekly fights. She told me that I had to treat my opponents like zombies. After I learned that…it got easy.”

“What got easy?” I asked, not liking the tone her voice had just taken. There was an emptiness that made me shiver.

“Fighting.”

That one word just sort of hung in the air. There was something I was missing. I wasn’t sure what. And I didn’t have any time to think on it as the Safeway came into view.

I could make out at least four military trucks that I am pretty sure are called Deuce-and-a-halfs. There were several people forming a line from the busted entrance to the store and they were passing items down that line and into the trucks.

“Marshawn,” a woman exclaimed when she saw us approach the work detail.

“Hey, turns out my friend Evan wasn’t dead after all,” Marshawn said by way of greeting.

“That is great, but we will have to save the introductions and stories for later,” the woman replied, her demeanor growing instantly serious. “We got word that Don Evans survived the attack and is on the move. We think he might be headed this way.”

“How did we miss him?” Marshawn snarled. “You said your guy had this all sewn up.”

“He gave us a good set of coordinates for the first volley, but then we lost him.”

I didn’t need a translation. That meant that their guy on the inside was dead.

“We are clearing this location in five with all the supplies we have loaded. Your people can come along.”

“What direction you headed?” I asked.

“The depot,” the woman replied and then turned back to the job of helping with the loading of supplies.

“Over on 224?” I asked.

“Correct,” the woman called over her shoulder as she handed forward a large pack of toilet paper to be loaded.

I turned to Marshawn. “Have you seen their place?”

He shook his head. “I ran into them outside their encampment. I actually did something kind of stupid when I think it over. I was crouched down in some bushes when I saw this convoy coming up the road. I decided that they at least looked legit and I stepped out to flag them down.”

“Not like you had much of a choice with that herd on your ass,” the female soldier hooted.

Marshawn frowned and shot a nasty glare that went unseen. He turned his attention back to me and shrugged. “They turned out to be useful.” My eyes went wide, and he nodded. “Yeah, that herd that swarmed Don’s compound…we led them there. But I’d been on the run from them for several hours and couldn’t seem to slip them.”

“You couldn’t escape a group of zombies?” I challenged.

“Bastards kept finding me. Seriously. It was like they were being led.”

The first thing I thought of was the children zombies. It was very possible they’d been hunting him like they’d done with me. This sort of disturbing behavior was starting to add up to a problem.

I continued to think on it as I joined in with the loading assembly line to get as much moved over from the store to the trucks as possible. Once the time came for us to climb in and split, my body was one giant ache.

“You should see our corpsman when we get to the base,” the female soldier said.

“Oh, I can’t stay at your base.” I shook my head and winced as even that hurt. “I have to get to my people.”

“Yes…you have a camp somewhere up in the foothills.” The soldier glanced at Marshawn and gave a tight smile. “Your friend here was very adamant about not revealing your location despite us picking him up and discovering that we were in the process of launching our own attack on our mutual enemy.”

“You don’t expect me to tell you, do you?” I snorted a laugh that also caused me to wince. “I don’t even know your name.”

The woman had the decency to blush just a bit. “Where are my manners. I’m Captain Bernice Burrell. I apologize for not giving you my name sooner. Things have been a little crazy.”

“Evan Berry.” I shook her offered hand and admired the firm confidence she put into that brief physical exchange.

“Maybe your people would like to come down and join our little group.” Captain Burrell sat back and rested her head against the canvas that acted as a shell over the back of the big truck that rumbled along with its loud diesel engine that I figured had to be drawing any undead for miles around.

“And be that close to the populated areas?” I scoffed. “No thanks. I’ve seen the size of the groups that are flowing down 205. And you have no actual cover. Anybody will be able to see you from miles away and that just leaves you open to problems I don’t care to be bothered with.”

The captain opened her mouth and then shut it. She looked at me and didn’t say a word for long enough that I started to get more than a little nervous. Had I come across as threatening or something of that nature? Had I simply been rude and was about to be kicked off the truck still a good couple of miles from Highway 224?

“Sounds like you have given this a lot of thought,” the captain muttered.

“I wouldn’t say I’ve given it that much thought.” I didn’t want to come off seeming like some nerd that spent all his free time “what-iffing” how I would respond to a zombie outbreak. I mean, who hadn’t had the occasional conversation?

“Listen, we have a few problems in our camp. One of them is a solid faction that still think this might be reversible,” Captain Burrell said in a whisper, leaning close to me. “And our major is a damned minister that insists this is the Rapture or some crazy shit.”

Because an unexplained zombie apocalypse wasn’t crazy, I thought.

I glanced over at Marshawn who just shrugged. Obviously he didn’t know these people all that well. The more I took in, the more I felt this was more of a “the enemy of my enemy is my friend” situation. I still hadn’t met the male voice that had denied our request for more time when Marshawn had asked for it.

These people had problems, in my opinion, and were now officially the second to last group I wanted to join up with. Racists and religious fanatics were tops on my list. Both were an extreme point of view. I have always felt that anything, in extreme, is bad.

I glanced at the handful of strangers and was distressed that I didn’t really know which ones had joined us from Don’s compound and which ones might be part of the captain’s detail. Her eyebrows rose as she must’ve figured out my thoughts.

“Look, some of us might be planning to abandon our post,” the captain whispered. Still, the diesel engine was so loud that her voice had to be made louder and it was unlikely that everybody in this cargo area hadn’t heard it. The few nods from around the group confirmed that suspicion.

“Then why would you ask us to join you at your base?” I challenged.

“Numbers. Hopefully you would be likely to be on our side of things if the situation went south.”

While I appreciated her possible honesty, her reasoning did not sit well with me. I had to school my features and voice to keep from tipping her off to how I really felt.

“So we would be human shields or just meat for the grinder. Numbers to give your side weight and then bodies to be used and thrown away?” I felt my voice tighten as I spoke, but it couldn’t be helped.

“No…I just figured that you might be more likely to be normal than to be some extremist. And our numbers would act like a deterrent,” the captain explained.

“And if it came to a coup or some sort of battle for power?”

“Then we would decide whether to fight or leave.”

That was admittedly a good answer. I still had no idea why she was dumping so much information on a relative stranger. And no matter what she said, I wasn’t going to give up my group’s location.

We drove on in silence for a few minutes. I stared out the back since I was sitting closest to the opening. I watched the road zoom past, but when I would look up, the scenery seemed to be moving so much slower. It was one of those strange optical illusions.

I was just zoning out when a sound caught my ear. It was not my imagination, and when I looked up, I could see that we were heading down a hill. The road was twisting and winding which had us moving even slower. I knew where we were now. Once we reached the bottom, we would be on Highway 211. To the left, the road would take us to Estacada. Turn right and we would go through the Carver Curves. Both directions would allow us to return to McIver Park.

As I was considering which direction to take, I strained my hearing to try and make out what was behind us. Just as we ducked around a bend, I saw it. The nose of a school bus.

“He’s back,” I spat.

Everybody in the back with me scooted or stood in order to look out the back, I could feel how we all held our breaths while we waited for the vehicle to round the bend behind us. When that easy to identify yellow nose came into view, the swearing replaced the tension of our collective held breath.

I felt something pushed against my side and turned to see a shotgun being thrust my way. I didn’t even think as I took it, checked it, and brought it to my shoulder. I had to wait because I knew that range was not my friend with a shotgun.

A loud crack from my right made me wince. I almost dropped the shotgun as my eardrum felt like it had been smacked with a ballpeen hammer. I looked over to see Selina with a hunting rifle pressed to her shoulder.

She didn’t even acknowledge me as she took a deep breath and held it. There was a pause, and then she fired again.

I looked to the bus and saw two holes in the front windshield. I also could not see a driver! I was waiting for the big yellow vehicle to veer over the deep drop off to the left or slam into the sheer face of the hill that rose to our right.

Neither happened.

A moment later, a figure popped back up in the driver’s seat. Then I saw movement on the top of the bus. Somebody was getting into position behind the .50 cal that was mounted to the top of the school bus. I could see the safety barricade in place that the person was clipping into and felt my mouth go dry.

The opening scene of Saving Private Ryan popped into my head. The part when that amphibious craft hit the beach and opened the hatch.

“Fuck me,” I whispered.

14

Licking Wounds

Somebody yelled something to the driver of our truck and the vehicle accelerated while beginning to weave erratically. The roar of that machine gun was perhaps the most terrifying thing I’ve ever heard.

Luckily, many of the people in the back of the deuce were firing back. The driver had no choice but to weave as well and that made it almost impossible for the gunner to do anything but spray and pray. Luckily, none of those prayers were answered as we rounded the turn that would put us on the highway.

The bad part was that our impromptu hosts had no choice but to take us with them. They certainly couldn’t take the time to stop and let us out.

We turned right and started into the winding section of the Highway known as the Carver Curves. A river ran alongside the left of the road and heavy trees with only an occasional residence bordered on the right.

The best thing this stretch of road had to offer were all the twists and turns. I could hear the bus, but it would always just come into view as we rounded a curve. The speeds we were now moving at felt very dangerous, and a few times, we were tossed around with the assorted supplies stacked back here with us.

We sped past a few residences on the left and I know we would be emerging from the curves in a moment. The next stretch of road heading toward the depot would be a very long and straight stretch of road that was not going to offer us much chance of escaping unscathed.

The captain had been tossed to the bed of the cargo area and struggled to her knees. Selina helped her up and then said something. The captain looked at her with a strange expression for a second until the girl gave a little nod. Captain Burrell crawled to the window where the driver sat on the other side.

She hollered something, but I couldn’t make it out over the engine of the deuce compounded by her shouting forward and me being in the back by the tailgate. As we roared past a tiny diner that had a small claim to fame with being used in the filming of the Twilight movies, the bus emerged from behind us.

It had fallen behind a bit, but not nearly enough. We were coming up on a three-way split in the road. Turning right would point us toward the guard depot.

It took me a moment to realize that we’d turned left. I could look out now and see the other two trucks speeding away toward what they hoped would be safety. We rumbled down a slight decline and then hit the flatness of the bridge that would take us over the Clackamas River.

I held my breath as the school bus reached the juncture of the three-way split. It didn’t even slow as it raced after the other two trucks.

“Where are we going?” I shouted over the noise of the powerful diesel engine that was propelling us toward the foothills.

“McIver Park, Evan,” the captain said calmly. “I think we can hide out there for a bit.”

I shot a look at Selina, but her eyes suddenly found more interesting things to look at on the ground. How would she know that was where we had settled? Had I talked about that in front of her? It all seemed so jumbled.

“Not sure of the logic behind such a location, but I am curious to see the place for myself. I don’t think I’ve ever been,” Captain Burrell said with a shrug.

“Not from around here?” I quipped.

“Actually, I lived just outside of Troutdale.”

“But you’ve never been to McIver?”

“Honestly, not a big outdoors person,” the captain answered with a shrug.

I opened my mouth, but then shut it as I realized that I had plenty of friends who didn’t get into the hunting, fishing, or camping. And if you were into things like hiking, then you probably took to the mountains or the Columbia Gorge.

“Then what did you like to do?” I asked, leaning back against the tarp that covered the cargo area of the big truck.

“I had a garden.” The captain closed her eyes and I could tell by the smile that began to tug at the corners of her mouth that she was enjoying a pleasant memory. “I never bought herbs from the store if I could grow them. And then there were all the fresh fruits and veggies. It was so nice to stop on the way into the house and grab something for that night’s dinner.”

I nodded as she spoke, recalling how Stephanie and I had failed three years in a row to get tomatoes to grow. Our biggest problem was always thinking the other was doing the watering. But one year…we actually got one Roma tomato plant to survive long enough to give us three whole tomatoes.

They had been delicious.

“Other than that, I was a software designer. Hell, when all this happened and I got recalled, I was packing for my trip to New York. Had tickets to five shows and was even going to be shown around the floor of the stock market by a friend who works there.” She frowned and opened her eyes. “A couple more days and I would’ve been…there.”

Her face paled and I saw her fists clench. I hadn’t caught much of the news, so I had no idea what happened where. Judging by her face, the Big Apple had not fared well.

“The last image from that media helicopter as it bugged out was a city on fire with probably millions of those things clogging the roads and pouring across the bridges. They say that over a hundred thousand people died there on the clogged roads. Trapped in their cars, they just got swarmed in a tsunami of rotten flesh with teeth and claws.”

I closed my own eyes as I realized that this was even worse than I’d considered. I couldn’t imagine a hundred thousand—much less a million—of the undead marching along. I’d seen some large groups that might’ve even numbered into the thousands. But to consider the numbers I was hearing from the captain, I once again had to wonder what our actual chances of survival truly might be.

We rode in silence after that, chewing up days of foot travel in a matter of about forty minutes. I saw the house where the cats and all that horror existed roll past as we slowed and then turned into the long entry drive of McIver Park.

I winced the few times we bounced over a body. They made a very identifiable crunch that set my teeth on edge.

We slowed and stopped. I could hear a lot of shouting and threatening. One voice stood out from the rest.

I got up and jumped out as I shouted, “Alex! It’s us. Stand down.”

I peered from behind the big truck and was impressed to discover that I didn’t see anybody. They were all using cover. Smart.

Raising my hands, I stepped all the way out. “It’s me…Evan. Marshawn is with me and we have a few…guests.”

“Come away from the truck, Evan,” Alex called from somewhere to my left and on the opposite side of the truck.

I skirted down the side and reached the front bumper, making sure to keep my hands up. I peeked out and waited. After a moment, a fully camouflaged person emerged from the brush. When the veiled hat was pulled off by one gloved hand, I saw Alex’s familiar somewhat lopsided grin.

She took a step toward me, but her eyes kept flashing over to the cab of the truck. She had closed half the distance when the brush rustled and then a large black dog bounded out. She loped past Alex and slammed into me, her paws coming up and resting on my shoulders as her mouth opened and a huge wet tongued made a few sloppy passes on my face.

“Chewie!” I laughed, dropping to one knee so I could ruffle her ears and hold her big head in my hands.

I’d no sooner dropped when a small voice spoke from behind me. “Chewie was supposed to stay in the camp.”

I looked over my shoulder to see Michael standing there with his hands behind his back. As usual, he was looking at the ground, but I swear I caught just a flicker as he looked up and flashed just the slightest smile.

“I think I have somebody that you will like to see also,” I said calmly as I continued to plunge my fingers into Chewie’s thick, black fur.

“Michael?” a timid voice squeaked.

The boy turned around. And in that very moment, you would have never known he was autistic. His face lit up. He actually staggered back a step before almost wailing, “Selina!”

He took off, arms thrown wide. It should have been in slow motion. It was such a wonderful scene to witness as the girl swept the boy into her arms and the two laughed as tears streamed down both their faces.

Chewy broke loose from my grip and trotted over as well. She leaned in to sniff Michael and then Selina. It apparently passed her inspection and she returned to me and sat down.

It was then that I realized I’d sort of forgotten somebody. I glanced over my shoulder at Alex. Her hands were planted on her hips, but she wasn’t looking at me. She had tears in her eyes as well as she watched the two children reunite. I gave an inward sigh of relief as I realized that I might not be in trouble after all.

“Are you going to ask us to get out some time soon?” Captain Burrell called from the back of the huge, covered military vehicle.

Crap. I stood up and dusted myself off. “Yeah, come on out.” I turned to see a few of my own people emerge from the brush, all sporting some pretty impressive weaponry.

The truck emptied and Marshawn basically took on the duties of ambassador and host as he started introducing people. The thing was, I saw a few faces of our own that I didn’t recognize. It was obvious that our numbers had jumped a bit in my relatively brief absence.

I started to walk towards the main camp and felt somebody grab my arm. I turned to see Alex. She was wiping the tears from her eyes but smiling.

“Not exactly the welcome home reunion I thought we’d have,” she said as we walked through a copse of trees.

I saw that the trench had come along nicely in my brief absence. There were about a dozen large tents and a handful of small ones as well that had not been here before I left.

I glanced over at Alex and then pointed out the new arrivals. “Umm, so what do we have here?”

“A group that were trying to get away from Oregon City. They had planned to stop here just for the night on their way up to Mount Hood, but once they saw what we had going on, the jumped in to help and are really turning out to be very helpful.” Alex stopped and turned to face me. “They’ve heard of Donnie. I guess he has been very active.” She paused and swallowed. “Please tell me you guys killed him.”

“Nope. And it is worse than we thought,” I blurted. I’d struggled in my mind how I was going to address this during those few quiet moments in the truck as we approached McIver. That was not how I’d intended to let the news be known.

The look on Alex’s face almost broke me. I hadn’t realized how much hope she’d had that things would return to some form of normality.

“Well,” she sniffed, and it was obvious that she was fighting back the tears, at least you’re okay…and you brought that kid back with you. She sure made Michael smile.”

“Has he been okay?” I asked.

“He’s been…Michael.” She shrugged her shoulders and kinda threw her hands up. “He only talks to the dog when you are gone, but he says all this crazy stuff that makes no sense. Half the people think he is some sort of creepy kid with magic powers and the rest tend to just ignore him.”

I didn’t really like either of those options and had to wonder how he would fare if something were to happen to me…or God forbid…to Chewie. She was his lifeline from all appearances.

This wasn’t the first time for cursing myself because I didn’t know the least thing about autism. I heard laughter and barking in that moment as the boy, Chewie, and Selina came racing through the brush and burst out in this old park that was turning into a decent living area.

My eyes roamed over things and I saw three new tiny houses in mid-construction. There were paths being cleared and all sorts of things being put into place that were giving this place a real feeling of community.

And just as quickly, I saw how deficient we were in comparison to what I saw at Don’s compound. Granted, he had a full high school set up to work with and didn’t have to build from scratch. However, I still recalled the way the football field was being turned into a massive garden area. The way the kitchen was being run with what certainly seemed like precision.

Perhaps making an encampment here was a mistake. There were so many places that would be better suited to call home.

Right?

“Hey…Evan?” Alex snapped her fingers in front of me, snapping me out of my gloom. “You okay?”

“Just wondering if I am doing this right.”

Alex stared at me for a moment as if I’d suddenly sprouted a second head. She clucked her tongue and frowned.

“Is there a right way? Did somebody pen a manual or something? I think everybody is flying by the seat of their pants. How can we know if this is right or wrong until it falls apart or works as we hoped when we set it up?” Alex practically scolded.

“But we don’t really have a plan…do we?” I shot back. “I mean, we’re trying to throw up living quarters and dig a deep trench around our place. We don’t have any sort of plan in place for maintaining a sort of self-sufficiency. Everybody is just sort of drifting.”

Alex opened her mouth, but it was a voice behind me that beat her to the punch. “That’s crap, brother.”

I turned to see Marshawn. His scowl was etched deep and he practically stomped over to where Alex and I stood. His eyes flicked to the kids playing keep away with Chewie using a mossy stick. His gaze softened for just a second before returning to me and hardening.

“We have people coming in and finding peace. They step in and help once they get their bearings. We don’t need to point to each person and assign a job because folks are stepping in to help where they see it needed.”

He looked around for a moment until his eyes spied what they were looking for. He pointed past me and I turned.

“Every single person taking a turn on the watch in the towers has volunteered for that spot. There is no set schedule. Yet, people show up and relieve each other. We are never unmanned. Same with the rovers. All volunteers.”

“I thought we had a schedule…a watch leader,” I argued.

“This ain’t the military, man. It’s a bunch of store clerks, office managers, accountants…and music teachers…all coming together to try and carve something out of this mess and make a place that is safe,” Marshawn countered.

“We got incoming!” a voice shouted from somewhere.

In a flash, I watched my camp transform. Suddenly children were being ushered past me to what looked like a big lump of dirt. I saw a very difficult to spot door of sorts open. A handful of men and women started counting as the children passed. Michael grabbed Selina’s hand and led her to it as he fell into line. No surprise, Chewie was right by his side.

The girl went willingly a few steps until she seemed to realize what was happening. She cast a look over her shoulder at me and I gave her a curt nod.

Meantime, other people were hurrying past with all manner of weapons and all the tower watches were now sporting scoped rifles instead of field glasses. I had no idea when all this had happened.

I vaguely recalled mentioning something about having a safe place for the kids to be kept if we were faced with a herd or raiders. I’d been the one to insist on scoped rifles in the towers. But a lot of what I was seeing were what I only remember as requests and items on a list of things that might be helpful. At some point, it looked as if many of those things had been implemented.

I guess it was like weight loss. You never notice on yourself because you are exposed to yourself every day. But if you look at a before and after photo six months apart, sometimes you have to do a double take.

I shook my head and then felt something shoved into my hands. I looked down to see a rifle. When I looked up, Alex nodded.

“Let’s go see who comes a knockin’ at our door,” Marshawn said.

I followed him through our camp and took notice of people that were now taking cover behind a variety of barricades set up to offer cover.

I made it to the big dirt berm and saw Andrew Greene standing at the top of the ridge. He had binoculars up to his eyes and was waving at some unseen person or persons.

I climbed up beside him and clapped him on the shoulder to let him know I was there. “What’s the story?”

“Group of what appear to be at least fifteen individuals,” Andrew reported. “They rolled up in a pair of pickup trucks. A single member has separated from the group and has closed the distance alone. She is about a hundred yards away and not showing any signs of carrying a weapon.”

I took the binoculars and looked towards the clearing where he pointed. As soon as I spotted the individual, I didn’t need to see her face.

“Lisa Hargrave,” I whispered. “I’ll be a son of a bitch.”

“Who?” I heard Alex ask as I skidded down the berm and started across the open field to where the woman had come to a stop holding a stick with what looked like a pair of white boxers tied to it.

She set the stick down but held her arms out at her sides as I approached. As I got closer, I could see that she’d had a bit of a fight before she’d arrived. Of course, none of that mattered except for the fact that she was standing here at the edge of our little compound.

How the hell had she found us? The thought that she had simply shown up here sent a shiver down my spine.

“I gotta admit,” Lisa said once I’d closed to within about ten feet and come to a stop. “I thought the kid was pulling my leg.”

“Excuse me?” I managed around the sudden dryness in my mouth and tightness in my throat.

“Selina?” Lisa raised an eyebrow at me.

“But she wasn’t even with us when we got here,” I insisted.

“Yeah, but I asked her once where she and I should try to escape to if we decided to bail on Don.” She smirked. “Kids are so easy to get information from if you go about it the right way. That was just one thing of many that Don had no clue about.”

“So why are you here?” I asked, trying not to allow my anger or concern show.

“Because we are finished with Don’s crap.” I gave her my own skeptical look. “I’m serious. None of us knew he was doing that shit out there.”

“And the octagon?”

“You were there for the debut,” Lisa insisted. “He hadn’t done anything like that before.”

I struggled in believing her. And then another image hit me.

“What about the people in the cages?”

Lisa didn’t even flinch. She looked me right in the eyes. That was when I thought we had a problem. They were brought in and Don spun this story about how they’d attacked one of our patrols.” She paused and looked away for a moment. When she looked back, I could see that her crystal blue eyes were shining with unshed tears. “The children…that is when I realized what was going on.”

“It took people in a cage?” I snorted, unable to hold back how incredulous I was at her denial.

“Look, I was out there on my own those first days. I thought that everybody I knew was dead…or worse…one of those things. When I ran into Donnie, I was trapped in a damned car and nearly dead. I’d figured that he had died days ago. When he—”

“You knew him before all this?” I cut her off.

“We had been together almost seven years,” Lisa replied.

“Was he this big of a dick?” I snorted.

“He was…different,” she said slowly, drawing out each word. “He said stuff, but I just always thought he had a sick sense of humor.”

“Such as?” I raised an eyebrow.

She closed her eyes and pinched the bridge of her nose between her fingers. “Like when some disaster would hit in someplace like Mexico or someplace. They would mention a death toll and he would chuckle and say something like, ‘It’s just brown people…they’ll make more.’ Or something to that effect. Then the whole thing with that girl…”

Lisa’s voice trailed off. I stared at her with an expectant look. I knew she had more to say. But something in her eyes told me that she wasn’t ready.

“Look, you know he was the guy that your wife got fired, right?” She looked down at her hands and found something under one nail that suddenly needed her immediate attention.

“I’m aware.”

“But you don’t know half of it. If you did, you wouldn’t have that look on your face.”

“What look is that?” I glanced back at my people, wondering how long we had before people on both sides started getting antsy.

“You are waiting for me to tell you what happened between your wife and Don. That means you don’t really know.”

“He told me.”

She stared at me and then shook her head. There was something I was missing. I had no doubts of that at this very moment. I’d been poleaxed by his revelation as it was. Something told me he’d not been entirely straight with me…or the truth.

How did I not for a moment believe that there was more to the story than what he’d told me? I wanted her to tell me what it was that I could see almost dripping from her tongue and leaking from the glitter of her blue eyes.

By the same token…I didn’t want to hear one single word.

“We would like to join you guys,” Lisa said softly after a long silence. “If you’ll have us.”

“How do I know this isn’t some sort of trick?” I asked, knowing that no matter her answer, I’d made up my mind.

“Because I know where Don went, and if you give me the chance…I can help you kill him. Today.”

Fuck me.

15

Lisa Speaks

The group of men and women and even a few younger people in their teens were escorted to what was now officially known as our holding quarantine area. It wasn’t much more than a partitioned off military tent, but we had people posted at all four corners and one person inside who was required to check in with those outside about every ten minutes and used a windup kitchen timer since so few people actually had watches. That was just another reminder as to how much our phones had become an umbilical to everything in life.

Lisa was allowed to stay back. I wanted to hear what she had to say about Don. She was insisting there was more to this story between him and Steph. I debated on having anybody else present. After all, this could just be a part of some elaborate trap. Don had already shown that he was unhinged and not above anything.

In the end, I decided that I had to hear this, but that it was part of my personal life and I wasn’t in a place where I wanted to share.

After we’d seen to Lisa’s people, she and I walked down to the river. I sat on one of the many massive rocks and she took a seat on a fallen tree.

There was a long silence and I could see that she was trying to focus. I wasn’t sure what to expect. But I was certain that it was not going to be pleasant.

“Did you know that Don was stalking your wife?”

That question landed like a lead balloon. That seemed like a stretch to me. And if that was the case, why hadn’t Steph ever said anything to me.

“And that is the best thing you are about to hear.”

I felt my stomach clench. My mind was already whirring with thoughts that I was doing everything in my power to shove away and stuff into dark corners where they would never see light.

“Less than a month after he was fired from the construction job where he’d become obsessed with her, he followed her after seeing her at some party with a bunch of girls.” Lisa wiped her face with her hands and ran her fingers through her hair as she took a breath.

“Can I ask you something?” I piped up before she could continue.

“Sure.”

“How do you know this stuff?”

Lisa closed her eyes. She let out a long breath that sounded like it held the weight of the world.

“He and I were together for a long time. I used to be a detective with the Portland Police Department. When he got fired, he lied to me about it. I found out through a mutual friend that it’d happened, but he was acting like he was still going to work every day.

“And I’d only been told that he’d been let go. I wasn’t told why. So, after I found out he’d been fired, I had to do some digging to find out the reason.” I saw her cheeks flush a bit and had to wonder what she’d done to get that info. Something told me it might not’ve been on the level.

“When I found out why he was fired, I left him.” Lisa shook her head. “But then he made this big deal about how he needed help and wanted to see a shrink. Like an idiot, I listened.

“I did what I always told others not to do…I got back together with him and let him tell me all the things that I wanted to hear. Then got arrested for attempted…” Her voice faded and the woman dropped her head into her hands.

Once more we sat across from each other in silence. I tried to shove away what her unspoken words screamed. For one, how could Stephanie keep something like that from me? We didn’t have secrets.

“You had no idea.” Lisa shook her head. It wasn’t a question. “Do you have any idea how often that happens? More than you would think.”

“No way.” I stood and started to pace. “She would never keep something so big from me.”

“The charges were dropped,” Lisa continued, not seeming to hear or understand that she had it wrong.

“You must be confused…or lying,” I snarled.

“So many women foolishly blame themselves. They think they have done something wrong or somehow deserved what happened to them.” Lisa followed me with her eyes as she spoke. Not once did she flinch at the looks I threw her way. “And that shame is what makes them do things like…drop the charges. Not tell their spouses or families.”

“Steph wouldn’t keep something like that from me,” I insisted. “I would’ve never thought she’d done something wrong…how could she…”

“She didn’t do it to hurt you,” Lisa said with a degree of calmness that I couldn’t believe or understand. “She likely believed that she was protecting you.”

“That is the most ridiculous thing I’ve ever heard,” I spat.

I stepped up into Lisa’s space, her height had us eye-to-eye. She’d stood as I stomped over but made no move to attack. She simply stood there with her arms folded across her chest.

“I’m sorry, Evan.” Lisa continued to hold my gaze.

The fury that seethed inside me began to change into something else. Shame. How could I have let something like this happen. How did I not know? How did I not see something?

“There is nothing you could’ve done. And who knows, maybe she would’ve eventually told you. But then…all this…” She threw her arms up to the sky as if indicating everything.

I turned away and walked to the bank of the river. The sunlight danced across the surface sending dazzling white gems of light dancing across the surface. I thought back, searching for signs or indications. Could some of those days when she dropped into a bout with depression be from what she was carrying in her head and for whatever reason, unable to unload it onto me so that I could help her carry it.

A thought bubbled through my brain and escaped from all the stuff swirling around that was threatening to make me explode. I looked up at Lisa and felt my fists clench.

“If you knew all this…you wanna tell me what you were doing still following him?” I said in a low whisper that carried every bit of the anger boiling inside. “If he was the monster you claim…and I don’t doubt that he was…what does that say about you? You were still with him. Intimately if I was reading the scene correctly.”

“I was as good as dead.” Lisa had sat silently for a while before finally speaking. “I’d just left from confronting Don and was heading home when the freeway simply turned into a parking lot. I’d had my radio on and heard the traffic guy say that there was a mob of people on 205. When he said that people were being pulled from their cars, I locked everything up. I could see a mob up ahead as well as one behind me and I was on an overpass, so I couldn’t make a run for it.”

She closed her eyes and I could see her wincing as she was obviously reliving that nightmare. We all had our own, and I had to imagine hers was just as bad as mine.

When she finally opened her eyes, they were shiny with tears that I knew she would do everything in her power to prevent from falling. She wasn’t going to cry in front of me.

Once she was under control, she continued her story. “I ducked down in my car and tried to hide. The screams were coming from everywhere. Children were screaming for…or sometimes at…their parents. It was like what you might expect Hell to sound like. I had my eyes squeezed shut and my fingers in my ears to try and remove myself from what was happening. Sometimes there would be s heavy thud or a scraping sound, but I stayed put.

“When my phone rang, I almost didn’t answer. I saw Don’s face on the screen. I finally answered when I realized that I might be trapped…that I was very probably going to die. He said that he was calling because of something on the news about riots near my house. I told him I wasn’t there and explained where I was. When I realized that the line had gone dead at some point without me even knowing, I resigned myself to what was going to eventually happen.

“I slipped up just far enough to take a look and saw that my car was surrounded by those…things. They weren’t paying me any attention, but there were so many, I knew I was trapped. I was going to die here.” She stopped and shook her head. “Of course, we know now that groups of those things move on if they don’t find anything or if a sound distracts them and lures them away. But at that moment…I was certain that I was going to die.

“At some point, one of those damn things found me. It didn’t matter how. All that mattered was that they were now crowding around and banging on my car. Hands were slapping windows and I knew they would eventually get in. I was about to die. There was no making peace or any of that fiction crap. I was terrified. I was crying and at some point I guess I started screaming. That was why I didn’t hear the first shots.

“When a bullet shattered the driver’s side window in back, I thought it was over. I didn’t know it was a bullet and assumed they had finally gotten in and were about to rip me apart. I was trying to think of any way out when I heard Don’s voice.”

Lisa closed her eyes again. This time, she smiled. There was something about that smile that gave me a chill. It wasn’t a happy smile. If I thought about it…it was downright scary.

“He said that he couldn’t just leave me to die. If I’d listened to his words, maybe I would’ve realized what I was getting myself into. He wasn’t telling me that he was glad to see me. To this day, I have no idea why he came to save me. I think that, despite what he has become, what he was becoming then, there was still a part of him capable of feelings.”

Lisa slipped down and sat on the sand with her back against a rock. She was looking at the ground. Her shoulders shook and I knew that her emotions had finally won out. Whether she liked it or not…she was crying.

If she thought that I was holding even the tiniest sliver of compassion for Don Evans…she was sorely mistaken. I was still set on killing that bastard.

“Look, you have no reason to trust me. But I saw more than enough back there,” Lisa said, her voice still constricted with emotion. “I want to help you and your people because I think you are actually trying to save people…and not based on color. I swear I had no idea he was doing that. And yeah, he used to say things, but I never once thought he was…like that.”

I considered what she said. Her story made sense. But I still wasn’t ready to just trust her at her word. I could let her and her people come in, but they would be watched until I felt they could be trusted. And if they didn’t ever give me a warm and fuzzy feeling…I could just boot them.

I’d done it before.

***

The next couple of days were quiet. But there was obvious tension and unease. Lisa and her people were ignored at best, and more than once I had to step in between individuals that were nose-to-nose.

All that time, I was mulling over Lisa’s story. Could it be possible that my Stephanie had lived with such a horrible secret? I had a hard time believing it, but the more I considered things, the more I found signs that I’d missed.

I thought about how it must’ve felt…holding something like that in. Our culture and society had done a lot of demonizing when it came to the victims. And the longer they held onto that pain…the more credibility they seemed to lose. Heck…I’d even said things when stories broke on the news. It was offhanded, but now that I thought about it…

I wiped my arm across my forehead to keep the sweat out of my eyes and plunged my shovel into the ground. I was working with a detail that was widening the trench that now completely encircled our camp. We also had a series of funnels that were connected by PVC pipe. The pipes had four barrels full of kerosene that fed them. If the hand pumps at each barrel were operated, they would send that fuel into the funnels that were each capped with handmade sprayer fixtures. There would be people in the towers with flaming arrows that could be fired down.

Of course, the initial idea was that it would be a great defense against a herd. However, most of the living that tried to make a run at us would have to drop into that deep trench as well. Before we lost the backhoe, we’d managed to make it over ten feet wide and around eight or ten feet deep. It was basically a moat without water.

“Hey, Evan,” Andrew Greene greeted as he came jogging around the corner of the trench. He had been ensuring that the sides were holding and had been building the brick retaining wall that would finish this project off. So far he and his crew were only about a quarter of the way done. Based on the supplies remaining…I doubted we would be able to finish any time soon. Even worse, we were nowhere near where we needed to be in supplies and we’d already emptied the nearby Home Depot. We would need to range out farther. And we would also need to find a fuel source.

“S’up, Andrew.” I sat on the edge of the trench, my feet dangling.

“Yeah, don’t get comfortable,” the man said with a frown as he shielded his eyes from the sun that had been holding court for three straight days.

I sighed. This was a lousy way to start a conversation.

“We have an individual at the first checkpoint. Says he needs to see Lisa?”

“That’s new.” With a groan I hauled myself up to my feet and followed Andrew back to the closest drawbridge.

When I reached it, I arrived to see Alex and Lisa standing in what looked like a bit of a stare down. Both women had their hands planted firmly on their hips. To some, that might seem like a good thing. Those would be the people that had never seen either woman use one of those nasty blades dangling from their belts.

“What’s the problem?” I asked as I stepped up, making sure to be very careful as I edged between the two women, effectively forcing them to take a step back.

“I thought that she said she and her people came here without anybody knowing or following,” Alex snapped, her eyes not leaving the other woman’s.

“And that is the truth,” Lisa shot back. “Gideon was with us, but I sent him back to check on Don’s people who had followed the military vehicles. I wanted to be certain that he didn’t double back.”

“You didn’t think that was important to tell us?” I asked, turning all my attention to Lisa.

The woman opened her mouth, but then had the decency to look contrite as she snapped it shut. “I wasn’t certain we would be staying. I wasn’t going to give anything away that didn’t have to do with us being here.”

“Lame excuse,” Alex muttered, and I had to agree with her.

“Well, you might want to hear what Gideon has to say before you dismiss this…” She paused and turned her crystal blue eyes on me. “Or kick us out.”

“Where is this person?” I asked.

“Detained in holding cell one,” somebody called back.

I shot a look at both women. “You two gonna stand down?”

They both nodded with about as much reluctance as they could get away and still make me think that maybe they would back off from each other for a while. At least for as long as it took for me to see what this new arrival had to say for himself.

The best thing was that I would be able to talk to him before Lisa could perhaps drop him any clues on how to answer the questions. If the stories matched, then at least we were on more stable footing when it came to trusting her and her people.

I reached the line of sheds that we’d turned into holding cells, I veered over to the first one. It was also currently the only one that was occupied. The guard nodded at me as I approached the doors and pulled out the pin jammed into the latch.

The person inside was sitting with his back against the wall. He was in a patchwork of protection that would fit in in any post-apocalyptic scene. He had thick leathers on, and the only exposed flesh were his hands, but I imagined he likely arrived with gloves, but those were most probably taken when he’s been placed here. He had a pair of goggles hanging around his neck and a few flaps dangling from his belt where I was certain his assorted blades had once hung.

“You the boss here?” the man I assumed to be Gideon asked calmly.

I continued to observe the man for a moment. He had skin that was a light brown and eyes that were so dark, they almost appeared black. His hair was definitely black and cut close enough to be considered a crewcut. He had a scar on his face that looked nasty. It was like he’d been laid open and instead of being stitched, the wound had healed on its own accord.

“My name is Evan. I wouldn’t say I’m the boss…but I have a say in things.” I stepped all the way inside and crouched down on my haunches to put us more at eye level.

“Lisa came here.” It wasn’t a question. “Is she still here?”

“She and her people are still here. So how did you find us?”

“I stayed in touch with her until she ditched the radio. We had a series of codes in place, so I knew which direction to go.” He cleared his throat and made a face. “Look, I have been out in this crap for a while and my canteen got lost last night. I need some water if you don’t mind.”

Without me having to say anything, an arm jutted through the door with a canteen. That told me that backup was close at hand if I should need it. I grabbed it and handed it to the man who gave me a nod of thanks before unashamedly guzzling the entire contents. He slid the empty canteen back with a mumbled thanks.

“So, you want to tell me why you decided to show up here?” I asked after the man seemed content to simply sit in the silence.

When his head jerked, that was when I realized that he’d apparently dozed off. The shadows in this shed made his eyes basically impossible to see clearly.

“Sorry…it’s pretty rough out there when you are on your own.” The man, Gideon, sat up straighter and even patted his cheeks brusquely as he made an effort to ensure he stayed awake.

I knew all about being out there on my own. I’d done a couple times and had to agree that it absolutely sucked.

“Look, here’s the short version…I followed Don and his crew as they chased those military trucks. I really thought that he might’ve finally bitten off more than he could chew. After all, they are the military…right? Fully trained and the strongest armed force in the world? The problem is that I think these are mostly reservists, and they weren’t very dedicated to defending something with the undead running wild.

“He rolled up on that reserve depot with absolutely no fear. Of course, he had some of his drones charge into the mouth of the lion first. Once the first volley was done, the soldiers dug in and Don set up a siege. From what I could tell, the soldiers were just about out of water and food when I left. I imagine they will fall within two weeks at the most.”

“So Don is taking down the National Guard? He has that much firepower?” I challenged.

“Actually, it isn’t so much his firepower, it’s more what those poor bastards are lacking. The rumor is that a few of the grunts turned on their own and defected to Don way back when all this started. He was able to snag quite a cache from them with almost no opposition.” Gideon sighed and shook his head. “The detachment that was supposed to come down from Fort Lewis never made it and a lot of the troops that were called in never answered. The only ones that did show were a handful of locals, and most of the enlisted types bailed in that first week when the martial law declaration. The ones that did stay…well, they sort of got out of control and went all Stanford Experiment.”

It took me a moment to catch his meaning. But all this information left me with a question. “How do you know all this? You have a source?”

“I was assigned here,” Gideon said flatly. “And before you get too excited…I was a clerk. Sure, I had to train on weapons like any other guy, but your average hunter probably has more skill and knowledge and is most likely a better shot.”

I stared at the man for a moment before I couldn’t help but laugh. “So I have a soldier sitting in front of me. Next to medical type…probably the most sought-after type of person that you would want to add to your population…and you’re a paper pusher.”

“Sorry…but that is the way of it.” Gideon gave a shrug. “I mean…I am not entirely useless.”

I managed to bite back my chuckles and put a straight face back on. “Of course not. I didn’t mean it to sound that way. Just…I’m not gonna lie and pretend that having a Ranger or some other Special Forces bad ass wouldn’t be amazing.”

“Yeah…I get that.”

We sat in silence for a moment and I just got a really good feeling about this guy. I would definitely say that I preferred him to Lisa, but I think it was more that the woman made me nervous. There was a cloud of danger that surrounded her and always put me on edge.

“So, I guess we need to go talk to the others and see what we are going to do, if anything, about this situation. I mean, I can’t say I am that motivated to go head-to-head with Don and his buses of the apocalypse. We simply don’t have anything to combat those .50 cals,” I admitted.

“There is a shitload of gear on that facility…if you know where to look,” Gideon said with a sniff.

“I take it you know where to look?”

“I do, and I can promise you that, unless Don has somebody from admin that was part of the inventory team, they won’t get anything but some very basic firepower.” Gideon smiled and winked at me

“Well,“ I got to my feet and dusted myself off, “I will consider what you’ve told me and let the rest of the folk weigh in on what they think we should do.”

I stepped out of the shed, but as the door shut, I heard Gideon call out, “Don’t wait too long. Those people won’t last long. And if we get there quick enough, we can put Don Evans down and get the goods.”

I headed back to the main camp. It took longer to get the people I felt needed to weigh in on the situation than it did to come to a decision.

We would choose what we felt was a reasonable group consisting of myself, Marshawn, Andrew Greene, Lisa Hargrave, Alex (there was no way she would stay behind with Lisa being included), Miranda Swells—who had been strangely happy to fade into the woodwork since we got established here—and a handful of men that Marshawn and Andrew recommended. And, of course, we would have Gideon as our guide. That gave us a total of an even dozen.

As I slipped out of the meeting to return to my tiny home and get some much-needed sleep, I felt somebody before she actually stepped out of the shadows.

“I want to go.”

I sighed. With a shake of my head I ran my hand down my face to try and wipe away the fatigue. Funny how that did nothing to help.

“You can’t go, Selina,” I said to the girl as calmly as I could.

“Why not?” she challenged. “I bet I can outshoot any of the people going with you.”

“Targets and zombies are one thing.” I flashed back to the first time I’d killed a living person. I remembered the terrible feelings that haunted me than and still eat at me today. “Killing a living person is different.”

“They’re the bad guys…right?” Selina pressed.

“It isn’t that simple.”

“You think I’m just a kid.” Selina threw her arms out and planted her fists on her hips as she continued to argue with the anger building in her voice.

“You are a kid,” I said calmly.

“You don’t know what I have seen…what I had to do,” she refuted.

“Whatever you did while out there…with Don’s people…you did it because you had to. You don’t have to do this.”

“Maybe I want to. If you knew all the things he made me do…all the kids…you…” Her voice was consumed by sobs. In a shriek of frustration, she turned and fled into the darkness.

I desperately wished I knew what to say or do to make her feel better. And there was not much I wouldn’t do. All with the exception of letting a twelve-year-old girl come with us on what was going to be a quick and nasty assault on a group of people being led by one of the most despicable people I’d ever had the displeasure to meet.

I got to the place I shared with Alex and started going over my weapons as well as a few basic first aid items. I also made sure I grabbed a few odds and ends in case improvising became necessary—which it always seemed to out there.

Each of us would each be responsible for the loadout of his or her own pack along with weaponry. That night, I went to bed thinking that just maybe this would be the chance I longed for. Tomorrow, I would set out to put an end to the human filth that was Don Evans.

I slipped under the covers beside Alex, barely registering the fact that she turned away from me. When sleep came, it brought with it a host of nightmares…just like any other night.

16

Fight

We rolled out the next morning. As we headed along the two-lane highway, I almost laughed out loud. Then, when Marshawn came up beside me…I did. Mostly because he was doing it as well.

Twelve adults dressed like Mad Max extras…on mountain bikes. Nothing special or tricked out about the bikes. In fact, Alex was on a pink one, Miranda’s was a horrid yellow and mine was a glitter purple.

We all had probably more weaponry that we should be carrying, and after about an hour, my pack was beginning to dig into my shoulders and arm pits. Looking around, I wasn’t the only one adjusting the straps and shifting around to try and find relief.

“We look so ridiculous,” Marshawn chortled.

“Yeah, I can’t argue with that.” I gave a nod as I swerved just enough to avoid a corpse rotting on the pavement.

“How convinced are you that this woman ain’t setting us up?” Marshawn said barely loud enough for me to hear his words.

“Eighty? Ninety?” I gave a shrug of my shoulders. “I mean, really…can we be totally certain about anything these days?”

“Good point, but you should be aware that Alex and Miranda have been talking. Not sure what about, but I did hear Lisa’s name come up a few times.”

“I will keep my eyes open…as if I don’t have enough to worry about.”

We rode in silence for a while and saw very few of the walking dead. What we did see were signs of fires left to burn themselves out, bullet-riddled homes and shops, as well as plenty of bodies left to rot.

The days of rain we’d been having followed by these sunny days were exacerbating the decaying process. At least, that was what it looked like to me. Some of the bodies almost appeared to be melting. The smell was this sickly-sweet stench of rotten meat swirling with all the gasses that the bloated bodies were emitting.

Some of the yards we passed were now growing out of control. Lumps could be made out in the verdant green of all the lawns that would not see a mower…perhaps ever again.

The other thing I was seeing—and I imagine everybody else—was how the wildlife of the area was creeping out now that the noise of humanity had faded away. I saw deer, coyotes, skinks, raccoons and all sorts of other animals as we rode. Most of them ignored us, a few watched with interest, their muscles vibrating as they prepared to bolt at the slightest sign of danger.

When we reached the highway intersection and turned left, the entire group slowed. I’d been here, so what we encountered wasn’t new to me. But most of our group had not seen all the bodies hanging from the power lines.

Despite having seen it before, it still gave me a sick feeling in the pit of my stomach. I hoped that one day we would have the luxury of returning here and cutting all these bodies down as we had some of the others we’d encountered.

It simply did not feel right leaving them hanging, but at the moment, we had things that took priority. We continued along the highway, passing the burned out remains of a mobile home park and a huge open field with what looked like at least a dozen homes that had been taken from their foundations and brought here. I would keep that place in mind in case a need ever arose.

We sped past a gas station that had obviously suffered a huge explosion. I was pretty certain the building next to it had once been a McDonald’s. There was also a metal structure that I had no idea as to what purpose it once served.

As we continued to pedal along, the sounds of occasional gunfire became more and more pronounced. It was obvious that we were heading directly toward it and eventually I gave the signal for us to stop.

Our group pulled off into a parking lot of some sort of manufacturing complex. There was an open roll-up door that revealed a huge open and empty loading bay. We stashed the bikes there and everybody did their own pat down and check of his or her weapon of choice.

We quickly divided up into small groups and then Gideon called us over to a large, gray concrete wall. Other than a few stress cracks, it was completely bare. He began to draw out the National Guard complex and point out where he’d last seen Don Evans. He also gave us some insight as to some of the best areas with heavy foliage that would serve to cover our approach.

“So, if everybody will get into position and then stay put until I fire the signal flare, we might be able to pull this off,” Gideon said with a nod to me.

“Marshawn and I will be accompanying him to the location where this herd is rumored to just be milling about,” I said as I stepped forward.

Most of the ride had been spent going over the general plan, but we’d all agreed that it was possible that this herd might’ve moved on. They could be closer or farther away. And if we could not locate them, then we would be forced to fall back on to a secondary plan that offered a considerably small chance of success.

“If all goes well, we will be attacking a few hours before sunset. Be sure that each of you has your flashlight secured onto the weapon you will be using if this fight lasts into dark.” I tapped the rifle currently slung over my shoulder for emphasis.

“Also be sure to watch for the red armbands,” Marshawn added. He displayed the one he had tied to his left arm just above the elbow. “It is something small, but this is our best chance to try and minimize if not eliminate the chance for friendly fire casualties.”

As he spoke, I shot a sideways glance at Alex. She was with a young man sporting a mohawk-style haircut and Lisa. It wasn’t lost on me that they put the poor guy in between them, and I hated that I had not managed to keep them from grouping up together. All I could hope was that they kept focused on the task at hand.

“And right after the flare goes up, that is when we lob our grenades?” Andrew asked for perhaps the hundredth time since we’d left McIver.

He, Miranda, and another woman that would have passed for your average soccer mom a few months ago, were carrying the only five explosive grenades we possessed. It had surprised most of us that she was insanely accurate in lobbing grenade-sized items to a specified target location.

“Yes, so once you get settled into your location, have them handy. Don’t wait and dig them up after the flare is fired. We need to hit Don right away before he realizes what is happening,” I reminded…for at least the same number of times as he’d asked that question.

With the questions all done, Marshawn, Gideon and I took off on our bikes down a side road across the highway from the building where everybody else was wishing each other luck before heading to their assigned location. It didn’t take long for the stench of the undead to carry on the breeze.

The low moans and occasional baby cries did the work of leading us to where this herd had finally come to its unexplained stop. It also did not take us long to figure out what had drawn them.

Hanging from one of the long, tan buildings was a sheet with the word ‘HELP’ spray-painted in huge black letters. Somebody had been inside. It was possible that they still were, but we would not be taking the time to check.

“Jesus, there has to be a few hundred,” Marshawn breathed.

“And there was a lot of noise here when I first arrived.” Gideon gave a deep sigh. “Then, one night, I heard a series of single gunshots. Very slow and methodical. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out how that played out.”

I bet a lot of survivors went out that way, I thought as we moved closer to the heard. Marshawn pulled out a strand of firecrackers and let it unspool.

“Why do you think they never turned around and headed for the gunshots?” I asked, my voice barely above a whisper.

“All the pounding they are doing is keeping up a steady racket. Plus, if you noticed, something about the taller buildings between here and there had really done a good job of muffling the sounds,” Gideon explained.

I paused and listened. Sure enough, I could hear the muted pops that came every once in a while. Turning back to the building that was completely surrounded by the undead and winced at the loud pounding sounds of so many hands on the metal siding.

I looked back the way would need to go just to make absolutely certain that the way was clear. Nothing was moving and I felt like just this once we had things going our way. I also very quickly scolded myself for possibly cursing our chances.

Marshawn lit the fuse and tossed it toward the nearest bulge of zombies at the corner of the building. As soon as it started, a few heads began to turn. By the time the strand had run its course, Marshawn had thrown the second string of firecrackers.

It was like watching a vile glacier come apart as the undead turned in droves and came away from the building. The ones leading the way were a wall of open mouths and grasping hands. I didn’t even realize until I almost tripped over my own two feet that I was instinctively backing away. It didn’t matter that they were a good hundred or so feet away and moving slow…there was something a bit horrifying about the wall of undead trudging toward us.

I glanced at Marshawn and Gideon and noticed that they were both staring wide-eyed and backing up as well. Regardless of how many times I’d told myself that these things were losing the ability to instill fear, I could feel my heart pounding against my ribs with an almost painful ferocity.

We turned our bikes around and started walking just a bit faster than the zombies. By the time we had covered two full blocks, I glanced back and noticed that we’d managed to bring along perhaps three-quarters of the mob that had been surrounding the building. A good number had turned back and were once again banging on the sides of the warehouse.

Still, I tried to guess how many were following and found it was almost impossible. And what I also noticed now that they were strung out was a good number that were dragging themselves along the street. These legless horrors were bringing up the rear and it managed to give this group an even more frightful appearance.

They were filling the street from side to side and the tail end was just now clearing the edge of the lot the warehouse sat on. Some were tripping over curbs, fire hydrants, and who-knew-what-else and vanishing. One small old man that had been in the front stumbled as he stepped one foot on to the curb but the other remained on the street. I watched in morbid fascination as he was trampled underfoot. Eventually, enough trekked over him to the point I could no longer see him. The last thing I saw was what I was fairly certain had to be an eyeball exploding from its socket as a booted foot came down on the face.

We rode along just fast enough to keep a good distance. When a few came wandering out from the side streets as we passed by, we simply swerved wide and let them fall in with the herd. Only once did I have to stop and hop off my bike to take down a pair of them when there was no way to get past them due to another small group that were coming from the opposite side of the tee-intersection.

We kept moving, drawing the zombies along like post-apocalyptic Pied Pipers. The horde that had peeled away from that warehouse structure continued their slow march. The front line was a melded wall of reaching arms and grasping hands; undead serpents wanting to drag us into their clutches and devour us whole.

When we reached the highway, we were surprised to discover several small clusters coming from both directions and across a few of the open lots. By the time we reached a few blocks from the Guard depot, a new flurry of gunfire sounded. Many of the undead reacted and adjusted their course, but it was clear that proximity to us was a big factor in how the undead responded to the new stimulus.

We also had one small group of twenty or so that stood directly in our path and had no visible intention of altering its direction. We were the oasis and they were thirsty sojourners in the desert.

“We need to spread out,” Gideon said with a surprising trace of panic lacing his words.

“Sticking close lets us keep our back defended,” Marshawn growled as he pulled a machete that was curiously shaped like a miniature sword from a Sinbad adventure. I’d have to ask him later where he’d found it.

I pulled one of the Rag-and-Bone Man cudgels and wondered how that crazy bastard was faring. Gideon pulled a pair of long knives as he allowed his bicycle to clatter to the ground. I understood how easy it might be to show no regard for something as inconsequential as a bicycle, but I certainly was not about to risk breaking something on mine by letting it fall to the ground so carelessly.

I moved over towards Marshawn, making sure to give us each enough room to wield our weapons but still remain close enough to help if the situation called for it. I shot a look towards Gideon and felt my annoyance warm as he moved to the far side of the two lanes that made up our side of the highway and wedged himself against the husk of some sort of generic compact car.

As the first of the undead reached us, I shot one final glance back at the enormous herd we were leading along. We still had enough distance to work with, but I doubted I could allow myself to feel comfortable.

As the first of the small group came in range, I cocked back and swung for the fences. The head erupted in chunky gore and the body tottered for a moment before crumpling to the ground. That seemed to act as the signal as the next couple of moments became a festival of carnage..

When we were done, bodies lay scattered about and the herd behind us had covered over half the ground between us and them. We weren’t in immediate danger, but none of us took our time getting our stuff in gear and getting back on the bikes.

By the time we drew near enough to home in on where the shots were coming from, the sun was almost directly overhead, and I was sweating hard inside my leathers enough that I could definitely smell myself. So nasty.

My eyes were stinging, and I could feel rivulets rolling down my back and into…other places. Marshawn swerved over beside me and leaned close.

“We have a tail.” He managed to keep his lips from moving and I wanted to make a joke about him taking up ventriloquism, but those words chilled the humor from my lips and I instinctively looked behind us. All I could see was the sea of undead.

“Not behind us, about a street over. I just caught a flash from something reflecting in the sun.” He gestured with his eyes in the direction.

“Maybe it was just—” I started to try and explain his paranoia away, but he cut me off.

“Then a dark shadow shot across the intersection.”

I slowed my bike. Gideon pulled up beside us and slowed as well. We had opened a good distance between us and the herd, so we could come to a stop figure out what to do.

“I only saw one person,” Marshawn said, speaking in a whisper as if the person, who was at least two blocks away, might hear. “Doesn’t mean there aren’t more, but I just saw the one.”

“And we don’t even know if they are from Don’s people,” I added. “They could simply be a survivor that is rushing to the sounds in the hopes there might be help.”

“So what do we do?” Gideon asked. “It’s not like we can just ask the zombies to hold for a moment. Excuse me, zombies, would you mind terribly just waiting here while we go investigate another matter?” Gideon affected what I guess he thought passed for a snobby accent but really just sounded like he was trying to hold in a full bladder.

“I will go,” I offered. “You two keep rolling and bring this herd into play so we can try to end this before nightfall.”

I glanced back as a few unpleasant scenarios ran through my mind involving us trying to mount an attack in the dark with hundreds of undead around us. I felt a shiver run through my body and shoved those thoughts way in a hurry.

“Just don’t waste a lot of time on it,” Marshawn warned. “If you don’t see something in just a few minutes, break off and join us. I don’t like the idea of us splitting up.”

I gave a nod and sped off ahead of them and then veered off toward a street that took me back into the warehouses that seemed to be in abundance in this area. I heard the pop-pop-pop of a strand of firecrackers going off and figured that Marshawn was keeping the herd on his trail instead of breaking away to follow me.

I went less than a block when I caught the sight of a shadow moving up the street about a block away. Whoever it was, they apparently spotted me and were trying to duck back around the corner they’d just passed.

I stood up and began to pump my legs as hard as I could, throwing everything I had into gaining speed. Something told me that I didn’t want this person to get away. If Don had a warning about our incoming herd, he could either set up a defense or just bail and get away.

I rounded the corner and saw my intended target less than a block away. The figure was geared up, that was the first thing I noticed as they visibly started and tried to speed away.

I was surprised at the fact I was gaining on this person. I’d never been much of a cyclist and was surprised at my apparent leg strength. Slowly but surely, I was eating up the road between us.

The person glanced over their shoulder and saw they were losing ground. The hoody they wore made it impossible for me to really make out any distinct features, so I still had no idea if it was a boy or a girl. I tried to put on just a bit more of a speed burst, but I could feel my legs starting to fail. If that person could maintain their speed for another minute or two, they would start to pull away.

Luckily, I wasn’t the only person starting to fatigue. I saw when the rider’s shoulders slumped that they’d given up and I allowed myself to coast up to them. I could hear the heavy panting and what almost sounded like sobbing.

I pulled up and stopped, making sure that I had my pistol drawn with enough distance between us that I maintained my advantage.

“Get off the bike, keep your hands where I can see them, and turn around very slowly,” I ordered.

“It’s me, Evan,” a familiar voice said with a hitch.

I felt my stomach clench. “Selina?”

“Don’t be mad,” she sobbed. “I needed to be here…I needed to help.”

“Dammit, kid,” I huffed, my breathing still a bit ragged from the chase. “This isn’t a game. This is going to be ugly business. Killing people…zombies everywhere. And I don’t have the time to be watching over you.”

“Then let me help,” the young girl pleaded.

“You can help by staying out of the way. You could’ve really helped by staying back at the damn camp.”

“I’m not a child, Evan,” Selina managed to choke out as she stuffed down the tears.

“But you are,” I replied, finding a degree of calm that I don’t think I truly felt consider the situation.

“Maybe I was before…but it’s different now. And I can help. I know I can shoot better than anybody here. Just let me help.”

I considered her request. This little girl who should just now be getting crushes and hanging out with her friends was begging me to let her basically become a sniper and murder living beings. It did not matter a whit that these people were about to face off with needed to be taken down. It didn’t matter that I would be killing people; what mattered was that this would not be something she could simply undo.

I had to make a decision. On one hand, I sure could not afford to be distracted with keeping an eye on her. And no matter what she said, or I told myself, that would be exactly what I would do if she went with us. On the other hand, we did need every gun we could bring to bear, and she was a hell of a shot.

“No.”

The word dropped like a lead weight. She actually flinched. At first, I thought she might burst into tears again. I quickly wished that would’ve been her response. Instead, her face went beet red.

“You can’t stop me. You aren’t the boss of me.”

“If you are living with us, then I am. You don’t always get your way, and my decision is not up for debate. You need to go…” I looked around and saw a small coffee kiosk. “You need to get in there and hang out until we come back for you.”

“What if I don’t?” she challenged.

“The find another group to live with.”

I really hoped that she did not call my bluff. There was no way I would be able to follow through with a threat like that.

The look on Selina’s face had me fighting not to give in…not to just hug her and tell her that everything was okay. Still, the fact remained that this was not a place she needed to be.

“Listen,” I schooled my voice to try and not sound exasperated, “I care about you. I care too much to let you be a part of this. This is something you don’t get to come back from. Once you kill a living person, it changes you forever.”

“But…” the tears trickled down her cheeks, but it was as if she had chosen to ignore them as she blinked hard to try and force them away.

“No buts.” I looked around and spotted a small shop with a heavy shed beside it. “Get up on the shed and then stay put unless the situation becomes dangerous.”

I didn’t want to send her inside of anyplace where she could encounter danger. And I did not have the time to make sure the building was secure.

I lifted my front tire and spun the bike in the direction I’d indicated. A few seconds later she was pedaling beside me in silence. The only sounds were distant moans of the herd being led away and the sporadic sounds of gunfire.

I watched her climb up before I started away. Just before I turned the corner that would put her outside of my field of vision, I saw her flop back flat on her back. I knew she was upset, but I would take that over the alternative.

As soon as I reached the highway again, I picked up my pace. The trailing end of the herd was still in sight and if I swerved over far enough, I could see that the front edge had rounded a corner. That meant they should just about be reaching the depot.

Things were about to get hot.

***

I stashed my bike in some bushes that lined the front of some sort of shipping building with a sign still asking for “good drivers” to apply now. A few of the undead had broken away from the herd and were wandering the open parking lot of the building as well as one of the ramps that led to closed loading bay.

Not wanting to have them lock in on me and catch us by surprise from behind, I made short work of them and then followed the herd. I was able to climb a fence of some empty lot with a building declaring that it was “ready for your small company needs” according to the sign hanging inside and on the main window. I skirted along the edge, keeping my eyes peeled for anything that might be trapped on this side with me as well as watching the masses that were trudging along on the other side of the tall fence.

It wasn’t lost on me that the sheer numbers made that flimsy cyclone fencing about as effective as a paper towel in keeping the zombies away from me. In those numbers, a simple shift of attention would turn them towards me, and that fencing would fold over in the blink of an eye.

With no warning, there was a sudden flurry of gunfire as well as shouting. It seemed that our plan was about to go into the next phase.

I picked up my tempo and veered away from the herd and towards a cell tower that we’d spotted on the way in. When I reached the base, I started up, the first bit being a bit of a challenge since the first twenty feet or so had solid grating effectively enclosing the ladder and keeping me from being able to climb it.

I had to basically wedge myself against the tower and the grating, with my back against the structure and my feet pressed into the grating. I started shimmying up and had to catch my breath after I’d reached the top.

From there, it was a long climb to a very small platform. Out of habit from my video game days, I did a quick look for anything that might’ve been left up here and was disappointed, but not surprised, to find absolutely nothing.

I brought my binoculars up and started scanning. It only took me a few moments to find my groups. From there, I let my gaze move inside the depot. There were three main groups set up behind assorted barricades. They were in a sort of triangle that prevented them from being flanked.

It didn’t take long to realize that they’d stopped returning fire. They were watching as the herd came up and started welling up at a few spots against the fence. Other parts of the herd had fractured into smaller groups that were advancing into the bursts of gunfire. That allowed me to get a better pinpoint on where Don’s people were set up besides those positioned on the school bus that were easy to spot from my vantage point.

I was puzzled as to why nobody seemed to be set up on the .50 cal. That weapon should be able to make short work of many of the undead. It was actually part of what we were counting on. The last thing we wanted or needed was a group this size taking up residence at the depot. Part of our plan was for the machine gun to bring the herd down to numbers we could manage once we’d eliminated Don Evans and his crew.

I started trying to locate what I considered the primary target and became flustered. All of the people outside the depot were geared up in protective equipment that made any sort of positive identification virtually impossible.

After a sigh of frustration, I allowed my pack to slide to the platform. I opened it and pulled the flare gun and case of flares from it. Not really waiting to try and determine a threat level, I aimed for what looked like what might be the largest group of Don’s people and fired a flare.

The flare spiraled to the ground, and there was a brief moment where I thought that perhaps they hadn’t heard it being fired.

Then…every head turned up towards me. A hail of gunfire came with bullets pinging off the rails and even the underside of the platform I was standing on. I hugged the center to try and stay safe. Seconds later, my people were moving in. I know because the sounds of ricocheting bullets ceased.

I was learning that the sounds of a gunfight had a very distinct sound and energy level to it. It was not the lazy sound of people picking off the undead. This was bursts of shooting mixed with shouts and yelps or cries of pain and surprise.

Once a few heartbeats had passed with me not being the focus of the gunfire, I leaned over the railing and peered down. Sure enough, one of our teams was moving in from either side of the group of Don Evans’ people. In addition, a big group of the herd had broken off and were now shambling into the battle zone.

I wanted to watch for a few minutes but didn’t have time. I scanned the area for the next group and found a handful of people running for the bus with the machine gun mounted on top. That was not a good thing at all.

I loaded another flare and fired it at the bus. It was parked beside a building, so it was very possible that the groups on the ground didn’t see it.

Once the flare landed and began sending out its smoky signal, I felt my mouth go dry. It was one thing to be fired at by people with a variety of pistols and rifles. But now, there was a .50 cal machine gun to worry about. They didn’t really have to aim that thing. Just point in my general direction and fire. They would hit something sooner or later.

That weapon would shred me. There might not be enough left to scoop into a travel mug. It was quite possible I’d just signed my own death warrant.

I had to try and locate any other groups and then hope I could get down quick enough. I began to search frantically, but my eyes kept drifting back to that damn bus and the weapon mounted on top of it.

The flare gun was reloaded, and I was trying desperately to locate any other groups to target, but I could not tear my attention away from the bus long enough to get a good look.

I forced myself to look away and try to find another group to tag. As another gunfight erupted, I turned back to the bus and realized that nobody had climbed up to man the .50 cal. Could it be that they’d run out of ammunition? Did I dare hope?

As I watched—instead of doing the job I’d been tasked to do which was finding targets for the folks on the ground—a trio of my people moved in and started opening fire on the folks gathered near the bus obviously trying to figure out a way to take me out.

The beauty (or horror) of being in a gunfight while hundreds of the undead flooded the battlefield is that you don’t need to land a kill shot. Simply taking out a leg is more than enough.

One particularly grizzly scene unfolded as one of the wounded tried to crawl under the bus. They were only halfway there when several zombies fell—literally—onto the backs of the person’s legs. Even from up here I could hear the scream.

I shook my head to clear it now that I felt relatively safe from being torn to shreds by that big machine gun that, without any ammunition, was nothing more than a chunk of useless metal. I searched the area and then my gaze locked onto something.

I knew without a doubt that I’d just located Don Evans.

He was back from the fighting, and by the looks of things, pulling out. He had about a dozen or so people with him and they were skirting a tall fence that had thick shrubs on his side. He could not see inside the grounds, but nobody could spot him either.

The direction that he and his group were headed would eventually lead to Interstate 205. The flare would be useless. I dropped the flare gun on the platform and unslung my scoped rifle.

Checking to ensure the safety was off, I brought it to my shoulder. There was a brief flash of disappointment as I realized how impersonal this kill would be. There would be no face-to-face moment where I could tell him of his failures. No moment where I could look him in the eyes and tell him that he was a monster before the apocalypse and that his death would not be mourned by a single soul.

I had to slowly scan with my weapon once my eye had lined up to look through the scope. Once I found him, he’d stopped moving and was looking back in our direction. Perhaps the sun had flashed off my scope. Whatever the case, he was staring right at me. At least that was how it seemed.

When he raised a hand in the universal one-finger salute, I was certain that he saw me and knew exactly who it was that had him in his sights. As my finger tightened on the trigger, I felt my mind clear. I was going to rid the world of perhaps one of the worst so-called humans that remained. At least as far as I knew.

I squeezed.

It would replay in my head a thousand times in the next few days. I would tell myself over and over that I could not have anticipated the outcome despite knowing his lack of conscience. I still had to wonder how he’d managed to pull it off.

In the blink of an eye, he’d yanked the person closest to him in front of his body. My round slammed into that person’s chest and probably killed them instantly. The only thing that I could feel good about was how a bullet did not magically stop when it reached the first body.

Don still took damage and staggered back a few steps. Unfortunately, he and his group had reached the corner of that stretch of fence. He staggered back a few steps and then vanished from sight.

Cursing, I slung the rifle back over my shoulder and grabbed the flare gun. Cracking it open, I fumbled for a cartridge and slammed it home. I lined up my shot and fired in the direction I knew he’d gone. The round fell short, but even from up here I could see where they’d trampled the tall grass. In an instant, that dry grass had caught fire and was now a double-edged sword.

I looked around for signs that any of my people might be in pursuit. I spotted two groups, both converging toward the growing wisp of smoke that was growing at a frightening pace. I wasn’t sure that pursuit was a good idea now as the fire started to grow into something more dangerous than I’d taken into account.

I felt a sinking sensation in my chest as I now realized that my target was likely going to escape. I would have no idea if the injury he’d taken would be enough to kill him.

Looking around, the entire area was now in full blown chaos as the undead wandered about in singles and groups. I could see the violent remnants of the firefights we’d managed to engage in. But I had no idea how many of my own people were down.

I was about to start down when I saw something that froze my blood in my veins. A figure was racing from the direction that Don Evans and his people escaped. I didn’t need my scope to recognize the figure as it vanished behind a clump of trees and scrub brush. The person was heading for an area that I had no doubt intersected with Don Evans and his retreating survivors.

“Selina, no!” I shouted, doubting that she could hear me above the sounds of the growing fire and the moans of the undead.

I swung my body over the lip of the platform and began to slide down, using an open grip on the sides of the ladder while bracing my feet outside as well. When I hit the ground, I took off at a sprint in the general direction I had seen Selina.

I hadn’t gotten twenty yards when I had to stop to take down a few of the undead that were in my way. The fire on one side and the tall fence on the other was now acting as an alley that I had to be an idiot for charging down.

Yep, you guessed it. I’m an idiot.

I sprinted down the narrow passage of fence and fire, feeling the left side of my body heat up quickly to the point I was afraid that my hair might catch. I could hear something just barely louder than the roar of the growing flames and it did not take long for me to realize that it was the moan and cry of the undead.

I wished in that moment that I was faster, but even pushing as hard as I could, it felt like I was in one of those nightmares where you run as hard as you can but go almost nowhere. I finally reached the corner of the fence where Selina had disappeared and skidded to a halt.

Fire is a scary thing. It does not really follow the wishes of people. It just does what it wants. In this case, the fire had hopped across some tinder-dry brush and now made a wall that turned my alley into a dead end.

The problem with that was I could now see Selina. She had stumbled into a dead end of her own in a matter of speaking. The fence had come to a halt with a tan building on one side and the razor wire-topped fence on the other and at the terminus. The fire had cut her off from coming back to me. What added to her terrible situation were the two dozen or so smoldering—or in a few cases, actually flaming—undead.

“Selina!” I shouted.

I was looking around, doing my best to figure out a way to save her while taking the least amount of pain. When I looked up at her, I could see her eyes wide with fear. I could not actually recall having seen her express fear since I’d met the girl. There was no denying it now, though. The girl was terrified.

The undead were closing in on her and shooting them was out of the question. It was too likely that I would hit her in the process. And even if I scored a hit, bullets don’t just stop when they hit a target.

I slipped my Rag-and Bone Man club from my shoulder and decided that I would have to dive through the flames. Hopefully, my protective clothing would keep me relatively burn free.

Throwing an arm across my mouth and nose after sucking in a deep breath, I charged.

17

Why?

I landed on the other side and collapsed into a forward roll in the hopes that I would put out any flames that might’ve caught. I ended up on my knees facing the backs of the pack of zombies closing on Selina.

I caught a glimpse of her through the forest of shambling corpses. She had her back to the fence and her mouth was open in a silent scream as if her fear had stolen her voice.

I could see hands swiping at her and she was swatting them away. I grabbed the closest of the undead and just jerked it back hard and slung it away, not even bothering to watch how or where it landed. I had to get to Selina first. That was all that mattered.

I dropped my shoulder and charged between a few of the zombies. Something horrible and cold slid along my face, my lips, and, since I was apparently shouting, inside my mouth.

I jerked my head to the side and gagged on the foulness that slid down my throat like rancid syrup. Zombies pinballed off each other and began to fall over each other. This was exactly what I’d hoped for.

I lost sight of Selina for just a second. When I spotted her again, she had fallen to her butt. Two of the undead had a grip on her and both were trying to get that first potentially fatal bite.

I shoved and struggled and ended up on hands and knees, crawling as fast as I could. As soon as I was close enough, I popped up and cranked back the club, ready to obliterate the one that seemed to be closest to getting in a bite.

I swung forward. At least that was what my muscles tried to accomplish. I almost lost my grip on the handle since I was unprepared for something to prevent my attack. Glancing back, one of the zombies had stepped in and the barrel of my club was caught under its armpit. The thing was actually looking down at it as if studying the strange object.

I pushed back and then jerked, freeing my weapon and sending the middle-aged man with a crowbar jammed through his chest stumbling back into his lethal companions. Spinning back, I was already swinging when Selina shrieked.

It was as if my eyes became telephoto lenses, because it was as my vision zoomed in on where jagged teeth tore into cloth and then the flesh of the girl’s forearm. Blood welled up and appeared to squirt between those vile teeth and wash the gray gums with a sheen of crimson.

The scream.

It is a terrible sound. It twists my stomach every single time. This time, it was worse. I was staring at the source. The second zombie was just sinking its teeth into her upper arm. A thirsty zombie was looming over her and almost seemed to collapse as it fell on her, blocking my view completely.

The last thing I’d seen were Selina’s eyes wide with pain and horror…and pleading for me to help. I threw myself forward. She wasn’t necessarily dead yet. She was injured, but there remained the chance of immunity if I could wrest her from these monsters.

I spied her feet as they began to pound the ground while her scream changed registers. Grabbing one with my free hand, I jerked.

In that second, my hopes were riding the slim chance that she might not succumb to the zombie infection. If her eyes remained free of tracers, then there was still that chance. If the injuries were not so bad that they could be patched up.

I pulled as hard as I could.

Nothing.

Her legs shot out straight for just a moment. Both of them went stiff…and then she screamed again. This time I was certain that anybody who heard it would know. Still, I had to try. I had to pull.

A hand clamped on my shoulder and I could feel it digging in, trying desperately to get through the leather of the jacket. I shrugged to no avail, but I refused to let go of that leg.

I pulled again.

This time, she inched toward me. Or maybe it was my imagination. By now, we were at the center of a clump of zombies that were all trying to feed. A body came down on my back and the weight knocked me forward. I was sprawled on my belly.

Helpless.

This would be how my story ends. But I would not let go of that booted ankle. And maybe, knowing that I was right here with her…it would help Selina. She would not die alone. And as her scream turned to liquid gasps, I knew she would die here in the next moment.

How far behind her would I be?

Another corpse fell on my back and hands clawed at me. A jagged fingertip that was mostly just bone jabbed into my cheek and I screamed. Taking over the chore that Selina had passed on to me.

Something scraped the edge of my jacket collar and gouged a furrow into the back of my head. A creepy and drawn out “Braaiiiiinssss!” echoed in my head and I felt delirium trying to whisk me away from the pain I knew was about to come.

Another body landed on the pile, and I was now certain there would be no way I could escape from under this heap of writhing dead flesh. Now, all I could do is hope that there was not enough of me to come back. Maybe Selina and I would be consumed to the point that there would be no remains left to reanimate.

Something clawed at my and despite being unable to move, my desire to survive kept me trying. And then I realized that I was no longer able to draw much of a breath. I was going to suffocate under this weight if they didn’t rip me open first. Neither seemed like a good way to die.

Something clutched my ankles and I felt my muscles clench in anticipation of teeth ripping into my calves. I was going to find out just how bad that bite hurt when Roger got it in the original Dawn of the Dead.

Another tug.

This felt like it was being done with way more power than a zombie should possess. Then I was yanked again, and this time, I could tell that the lower half of my body was free. I started kicking my legs in the hopes that maybe now I could get free.

“Evan!” a familiar voice snapped. “Stop kicking so we can get you out of there.”

A moment later, I was jerked free. I rolled over to see Marshawn and Andrew staring down at me. I scuttled away from the undead that I’d been under and turned to see that most if not all of them had either been shot in the head or jabbed with Andrew’s spiked walking stick.

I spun to where I’d last seen Selina and felt my stomach clench. She’d been ripped up. Her insides spilling out or being feasted upon by the handful of zombies that had not abandoned their meal to come after me.

My eyes burned as tears welled up and threatened to spill over. I spied my club a few feet away and scooped it up as I walked over to her still form. She was covered in blood and that only made the expression of pain etched on her face appear that much worse.

I reached for one of my handguns and discovered that I’d lost it somewhere along the line. I felt something pressed into my hand and glanced up at Marshawn. No words needed to be said. We simply gave each other a look and a nod. Then I walked over and ended any chances of the young girl ever sitting back up.

There was so much going on in my head that I couldn’t sort it out. Anger. Sadness. Failure.

“This is Greene, we found Evan and are returning to the staging area,” Andrew said solemnly. “Any word on the target?”

“We’ve got him pinned down in a small section of offices,” a voice crackled over Andrew’s radio.

The voice was young sounding and unfamiliar. I had to assume it was one of the soldiers from the depot. There was a hiss and then the crackle of static.

A percussive ‘WHUMP’ sounded from well off to my left. Seconds later, there were a series of explosions. I spun in the direction of the sound to see a cloud rising back toward where I was almost certain the highway was located.

Another series of deep sounds came, and then another set of explosions. With one final glance back at Selina, I took off at a jog with Marshawn and Andrew towards the rising cloud of smoke.

The chatter on the radio was a mix of jargon and excited shouts of how the target had been destroyed. I would need to see for myself.

When we finally reached the road, I saw a pile of rubble that was dotted with several fires burning in its midst. A huge plume of smoke swirled up from the debris. A few forms were sprawled on the outskirts.

I stalked across the four lanes, pausing at the median to utilize my club like I was teeing off with my driver in my best grip-it-and-rip-it swing when I almost tripped over a legless zombie that was trying to drag itself from the bushes.

I tried to approach the rubble, but the heat from the flames burning in various hot spots kept me back. I spun around as more people approached. Many I did not recognize, but a few of the people dressed in military camos I did recall.

“Who actually saw Don Evans go inside this building?” I asked.

After a brief pause, a young man stepped forward. “I did, sir,” he sputtered. “He and a few others came out from those trees.” He pointed back towards the direction I’d come from.

It added up to being very possible, but not seeing a body was a problem. Not having absolute proof would be something that I felt would probably haunt me forever.

For the next few hours, we tried to wait out the fires. But even once we were able to get closer, the chunks of rubble proved too much for us to do anything when it came to clearing them.

There was a long meeting, and in the end, many of the soldiers that opted to stay behind and man their post for whatever reason agreed that they would post sentries for the next several days around the decimated building. They vowed to shoot to kill anything that might emerge.

I very reluctantly agreed to return with my people back to our compound that would now benefit from a few dozen military personnel that no longer felt the need to man the guard depot. We also came away with a variety of weapons ranging from assault rifles to a few mortars and grenade launchers.

We returned home in one of the school buses with about ten thousand rounds of ammunition for the .50 cal mounted on top. The trip was almost boring. Still, I could not relax. Maybe I was simply disappointed that I had not been able to put a bullet in the man’s head.

For the next several days, I had a nightmare that was similar to the ending of Carrie. I was standing at that pile of rubble when a gnarled and charred hand would shoot out and grab me. I always woke to Alex telling me that everything was okay.

Three weeks later, our tower sentry called out that a jeep was approaching. I came out with a few people to greet them. It was a woman from the depot.

“The sentries were found dead this morning…”

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TW Brown is the author of the Zomblog series, his horror comedy romp, That Ghoul Ava, and, of course, the DEAD series and the New DEAD series. Safely tucked away in the beautiful Pacific Northwest, he moves away from his desk only at the urging of his Frisbee catching Border Collie Tyrion, or one of his Newfoundlands, Freyja or her younger sister Loki.

He plays a little guitar on the side...just for fun...and makes up any excuse to either go check on his beehives or strolling along his favorite place...Cannon Beach. His hobbies include training his Newfoundlands to be show dogs working on their championships, water rescue working on their WD titles and draft carts working on their DD titles. And we should never forget to add his African Greys named Sheldon, Lisa, and Paul. He answers all his emails sent to twbrown.maydecpub@gmail.com and tries to thank everybody personally when they take the time to leave a review of one of his works.

He can be found at www.authortwbrown.com. The best way to find everything he has out is to start at his Author Page. You can follow him on twitter @authortwbrown and on Facebook under Author TW Brown, and also under May December Publications.