For almost all my life, my ma told me that my daddy had died a hero.

Carolyn, you were very little then. I was in the cabin with you and your father was outside chopping wood when he heard them. They were all around the cabin. They had surrounded us without us knowing it. And your dad, he took his axe and he went to work and they all went down like bowling pins, one after the other.

There must have been a hundred of them, so many that any other man would have been taken down, bitten, become one of them. But not your father. He chopped through them, until they were all dead.

And when the last one had been taken care of, your father leaned on his axe and then fell over dead. His heart had just given out on him. And he had saved us both.

She’d tell me the story when we were alone in the woods. She’d tell me in whispers when I was scared and the dead ones were all around. She’d tell me when there was no food and no game and we were in danger of starvin. My daddy was my hero.

It wasn’t until later that I found out different.

We’d been walkin through the woods, just her and me, away from everybody else. That’s how my ma liked to do things. She thought we’d be safer alone. Even when we met up with the other survivors, we still kept to ourselves. We’d pitch our tent on the outskirts of camp. People’d try and talk to us, but my ma, she’d just stare em down. They only let us stay with them cause she could scout and she could hunt and she’d share what she found.

We’d take off and leave the others behind, make sure that the way was clear and maybe find somethin worth takin back. Sometimes there’d be deads. Sometimes there’d be nothin. My ma’d handle it no matter what it was.

That day, I wished we had someone else there besides just the two of us. We was ahead, trackin a deer that had broken from the rest of its herd. We walked together through the forest. Dead wood lay everywhere. Too much ice and too much snow all winter killed trees left and right. Most of it had started to melt, the ground muddy thick and clogged up with water. There was still snow though, enough to cover the hunter’s beartrap that had lain untouched for who knows how many years.

The trap closed snap-crack on my ma’s leg and my ma she just stood there and howled and howled the pain was so bad. We worked together to get her free. I jammed a stick between the trap’s teeth and pried it open with all my strength while she grabbed ahold with her fingers, the trap’s teeth all slickery with her blood and we got her leg free of that trap.

But even I could see that she was in trouble. Ugly orange rust and wet mud and leaves were shoved deep into the wound, right down to the bone. I seen wounds like that, wide open and dirty, and they would get ugly, red and swollen.

People usually die after a wound like that, unless they get some of those special medicines. The ones they don’t make anymore, little round pills and things in plastic bottles. I dug through my pack, lookin for some, hopin that some had gotten loose in there. I found some asprin, two tiny pills. I gave them to my ma, but I don’t think they did any good.

I cleaned out the wound the best I could, taking handfuls of snow, holding it in my hands until it was slush and then scrubbing it out. She passed out a few times during. I couldn’t feel my hands after. Had to hold them over the fire to get the feelin back into them. But it looked as clean as it would get. Ugly and raw though. I tried to bandage it up with some strips torn from my shirt.

We waited. I wouldn’t leave her behind and she wasn’t going anywhere with her leg busted up like that. The rest of the group was only a few days behind us. So we waited for them to catch up. Waited to see if they’d see our fire. And hoped the dead in the woods wouldn’t smell us, that they wouldn’t be moving to us.

During the night, she seemed fine. Tossed and turned the whole night though, sayin her leg was on fire. I tried to do what I could. Tried packing the snow into the wound, makin it all numb so she wouldn’t feel it anymore, but snow rubbed raw bone and she was hurtin worse than before.

Night crawled to a close and then it was morning, a grey, wet morning where the sun does nothin to really chase away the cold. It was just a dim speck behind the clouds and I could see my ma’s breath as she lay there shivering.

As the day dragged on, the fever began to set in, digging into her head. She was sweating, tossing, kicking ’round. That’s how we started the second night; her rollin around on the ground like her whole body was alight, throwin that leg around. Once she hit it against the ground so hard I heard it crack. I had to lay across her to keep her from moving anymore and finally she got still and she slept.

Her dreams weren’t good. I heard her call out my dad’s name a few times.

When the morning come, she was worse, her leg had swole up twice the size and was purple-red, all filled up with sickness. She was red and flushed, still asleep though. I did the best I could, but I didn’t have anything left in my pack, but some venison jerky and dried fruit. She couldn’t get it down.

I pressed the snow to her forehead, hopin to keep her cool, but it melted as fast as I could pack it.

She finally woke up round midday, but I could tell she wasn’t seein me, didn’t know where she was, when she was. She kept talkin to my dad, tellin him she was sorry. Talked to me, but not to me, talkin like I was still little.

She’d talk like things weren’t like they were, before the bad stuff happened, before I could remember. Talkin to old friends and askin them about their kids and tellin them about me. Talkin about me goin to school. Talkin about goin to the store. Talkin bout things that I only get to see wrecked and broke down now.

I can remember stuff like that sometimes. The time before now, before I got scared all the time. But it gets harder as I get older. I was small then, little kid. The memories are gettin rough around the edges and I know what I remember can’t all be real stuff. That I just made it up, to fill in the holes.

She stopped talkin after a while and I realized she’d gone to sleep again. I placed my hand on her head and she was burning, burning hotter than the night before, though that didn’t seem possible.

Another night and day passed like that. We’d been out there for too long. Our supplies were dwindling and I was startin to lose hope that the others would find us.

She’d be asleep most of the time, then come awake again. She’d babble about things that weren’t there. Sayin crazy things. Or sometimes she’d sound reasonable, but talkin to people who weren’t there. I’d give her melted snow to drink, and gave her my rations. But she’d throw it back up most of the time.

I kept near the fire and tried to sleep.

It was a long night.

It was early morning when I first heard sign of one of them. My ma, she was sleepin and didn’t hear, but I did. Somethin was movin and movin slow through the weeds and branches and not givin a whole lot of care to how much noise they were makin.

I got up and crouched low, grabbin the first stick I saw that looked like it got any heft to it. If it was a dead one, the stick would be enough. If it was a raper or a thief, stick might only slow em down. I stayed low and moved toward the noise.

I hoped it wasn’t a dead one. There ain’t ever just one.

I got close and I didn’t need much light to see it was a long been dead. Most of the skin had come off at some point and the clothes long before that. Just muscles and tendons creaking and groaning in the cold, struggling to keep it upright and moving.

It had its back to me at first, but then it must have caught my scent cause it turned its head slow and I just saw holes where its nose had been. The mouth didn’t have any lips any more and it opened and closed its mouth like it was already biting me. I gripped my stick hard, so tight my fingers started to hurt. I’d killed dead ones before, but always with my ma. I couldn’t let this one go. It’d track me back, in that dead one way. It’d bring the others. Every moment I left it alive, I’d risk bringing a whole pack on us.

I charged forward. I didn’t make any noise, just ran for it.

It being a long dead and it being so cold, it didn’t move fast. It just stood there and I hit it high and hard and its head exploded. It fell to the ground and that was that.

I ran back to the camp. I had to get there fast, cause I knew, knew, that when I got back there, she’d be surrounded by dead ones.

When I got back, I saw instead that she was awake. Like that, she’d come back to her senses.

“Carolyn?”

“Ma! You’re awake! I heard a dead one and I killed it.”

She smiled, though I could tell that she wasn’t doin well. Her face was ash-white and bright red spots lit up her cheeks and forehead. She was drenched in sweat, in spite of how cold it was.

She was sittin up though and she was talkin right for the first time in days.

“I thought you’d left me,” she said.

I shook my head. “Of course not ma. I’m not leavin you here. The others will be here soon.”

She looked at me, sweatin while she lay on her damp bedroll and wet ground. “Get out of here. Rejoin with the others.”

“No ma.”

“Carolyn Scott, you need to leave right now. If there’s one, there’s many. You know that. If you stay here with me, you’ll be surrounded, out-numbered and preoccupied with what’s happening to me.”

“I’m not leavin you ma! Stop talkin about it, cause it’s not gonna happen.”

She glared at me and I glared back at her and she sighed. I thought she had given up, worn out by her fever and the pain in her leg.

But she started talkin right up again.

“You can’t do this Carolyn. You can’t BE like this. You can’t care. You can’t stop just because someone’s injured. You move and keep on moving.”

“I know ma.”

“Listen to me, because you don’t know. You haven’t had to make those decisions, not yet. But you will and you will time and time again. Do not give in to your feelings. You put someone down if they’re bitten. You leave someone behind if they’re hurt. The point of life is to survive, to outlast those things out there.”

“I know ma.”

She just sighed and lay back on the ground. “You don’t know. Your father…”

And then she got quiet again, not sayin anything, just lookin at the woods behind me. It’d been a good long time since she’d even mentioned my dad and I wanted her to tell the story again. Of how he fought off a hundred of them, until his back was up against the wall, but still he kept fightin them, killin them one after the other while my mother kept me quiet in the cabin behind him. And it was so close, they nearly broke through a few times, but he swung that axe around again and again, until there were none left. And then he just dropped, his heart burst inside of his chest.

She lay there a long time, her eyes shut tight.

“Your father was a fool,” she said. I started.

“He went out into the woods, without a gun, without any weapon. I don’t know why he did. I followed his tracks later though. Saw the same campsite that he found. Saw the same dead bodies. Saw the one that bit him. He was able to bash her skull in, but it was just one of them, not hundreds. Just one woman who got half her face gnawed off. And he got bit. Then he turned. And then I had to kill him.”

I just stared at her, not knowing what to say.

“You can’t be like your father Carolyn. He was stupid and he was slow and he tried to help people when he didn’t have the resources to do so. And then he got bitten. Don’t be your father. Get out of here.”

“Don’t talk about dad that way! He saved us!”

My ma just looked at me with her sad eyes.

“I told you a lie so you wouldn’t have to be ashamed of him. He was a nice enough man before…this happened. But he couldn’t adapt and couldn’t adjust and he died because of it. I don’t want you to be like him. I’ve done my best to make sure of that.”

I stood over her, breathing hard and tryin to keep from crying. I knew she wasn’t lying now. That my dad had been a fool. I’d met people like him. People who get too scared and stand there to get eaten by the dead ones. People who run into a group of them with nothin but a club, thinkin they’ll be heroes. People who go into buildings without other people to watch their backs.

They all got one thing in common and it’s that they’re all dead ones or dead. And my dad was like that. He had been a dead one. Only the sick and the stupid get turned.   That’s what my ma always said.

I sat next to her.

She was breathin rapid and her eyes were lookin glazed again, like she did when the fever took her over.  She’d passed out and left me with myself. I curled into a ball next to my ma and fell asleep.

I woke up to the sounds of dead ones. The fire hadn’t died down out completely and the dancin light let me see them. There was three and they weren’t in such bad condition as the one I killed earlier. They moved quicker. And while we was both sleepin, they had nearly surrounded us.

My ma was still out and my stick was on the other side of the fire. I wasted no time. I jumped up, my heart beatin hard and fast. I ran for the stick. All three deads turned toward me and came at me, their mouths openin and closing. I saw teeth shine in the firelight as I got my stick.

They ignored my mother lying on the ground. She bein so close to death herself, they must not have wanted her so bad as they wanted me. I kept the fire between me and them and circled slow. They stay in a group and kept their faces pointed at me.

One of them, a woman in a dirty red dress, nearly stepped on my ma. I held my breath. The woman dead kept comin toward me.

I cussed myself in my head. If they hadn’t woken me up, if I had been asleep a little longer…

I pushed the thoughts out of my head and began to go to work.

I circled them and went after the one furthest from the other two. He had a been a big man, but the rot had taken off a lot of his muscles and skin. He was still a head and a half taller than me.

He grabbed at me, nearly snaggin my shirt. I fell back a bit and took a swing. I missed his head and hit him on the shoulder. He took a tumble. One thing dead ones ain’t so good at is staying upright. He lay on his back, trying to get back on his feet. I took a second swing and split his head open. His limbs still twitched and tried to reach out to me. I swung down again and that put a stop to it.

But the other two had gotten round behind me. I moved back, taking care not to step in the dying fire. The dead in red made her move. She darted forward and I just had time to jab her in the face with the end of my stick. The blow jarred my arms and rattled my bones. I nearly let go of my club.

I brought it back around and tried to swing, but she was on me before I could do anything. She grabbed ahold of my hair and was trying to pull my face toward her open mouth. I had to drop my stick to keep from being pulled toward her. All I could smell was the rot. Her hair was fallin out in clumps and takin her scalp with it. Her teeth were mostly gone, but there were enough left to do damage.

The smell nearly was what did me in. I’d never been so close to a dead one before and it was all I could to keep from throwing up. My gut rollin over and over itself, I reached up and broke all the fingers on her right hand. They snapped like twigs and I was able to pull away from her.

She stood there with her torn up hand and her bashed in face and she still came at me. I bent down and dug around for anything in the muck I could use. I came up with a hefty stone just as she  had reached me. I hit her as hard as I could in the forehead and dropped her. I was about to make sure she was dead when I saw the third dead one bend down to bite down on my ma.

I screamed and ran at him with only the rock in my hand. I slammed into the back of his skull again and again until there was skull and brain and stinking, rotting meat everywhere.

I stood over my ma, with three dead ones still on the ground.

My ma opened her eyes and saw me standing over her with a rock. And she smiled at me. I dropped the rock and stepped away from her and she frowned.

She looked around and she saw the dead ones.

“There are going to be more.”

I ignored her and collected up wood to build up the fire. Then I’d figure out what to do about the dead ones. The smell of so much dead meat was overpowering.

“They’ll come and they won’t stop. They’ll kill me and then they’ll kill you if you don’t get away. You need to leave me now and find the others. They’re obviously not going to find us or they would have been here by now.”

I tried to shut her words out. The fire was starting to burn more brightly now.

“Please.”

I turned and looked at her. She was crying.

“I hurt so much. I don’t want to be like them. I don’t want you to be like them. I want you to survive. You have to survive. Please.”

I saw the woman deader was moving still. I picked up the rock and I hit her as hard as I could. She stopped moving.

“This is what you want me to do to you,” I said.

“I don’t want you to turn into that. I don’t want to die like that. Infected. I just want it to stop. Please.”

I looked around me at the three dead and the one alive and I looked at the rock in my hand. I thought about what my dad would have done. I thought about what my ma would have done. I thought about it and in the end, it wasn’t thinkin that made me do what I did. It was looking at that deader in front of me, in her dirty red dress and her missing teeth. I looked at that face, with skin rotten and fallin off the bone and I thought of it comin at me.

I went over to my ma and I kissed her on the forehead and then she smiled and I did what I did.

I found my group a few miles south. It had only taken me a day to find them. They had run into some trouble and hadn’t even noticed me and my ma weren’t there. They hadn’t even been looking for us.

They said their hellos to me and didn’t ask any questions. We set up the camp together. I made my tent nearer to the others than I ever had.

The next morning we left those woods behind.

Rachel made sure her parents did not see the change in her. She took as long in the shower as she usually did. She hesitated between two dresses before deciding on a third. She intentionally left her backpack-slash-purse up in her room so she had to run back for it. She slipped her birthday present for her brother into the backpack and then pouted down the stairs and out to the car.

“Really, darling, I don’t understand why you make such a fuss.” Her father’s seatbelt clicked with a sense of finality. “It’s only twice a year.”

Three times a year. Rachel’s mother dragged their family to the viewing home on Mother’s Day too. Christmas, Mother’s Day and Joshie’s birthday. Rachel’s three least favorite days of the year. She suspected her mother went more often, but she hadn’t figured out a way to prove it.

“She’s here. That’s the important thing.” Rachel’s mother cradled the boxed cake in her lap. “This is a day for the whole family.”

This was a day for Rachel’s mother. Rachel and her father were just in the car to keep her happy. Rachel kept her mouth shut and looked out the window. The countryside blurred into streaks of dying grass and withering trees that made Rachel feel sticky just looking at them. The weatherman predicted rain sometime this week. She knew how the sky felt. Stifled, like it could burst at any second. If only conditions were right.

The drive out to Eternal Rest Viewing Center only took an hour and a half, but it always seemed longer to Rachel. At last the family car passed the ruins that meant they were getting close. Rachel often wondered if they put the viewing center out here simply because no one wanted it in their back yard, or if there was a conscious irony. A viewing home in the middle of a ghost town.

They pulled up in front of what looked like a large hospital. Rachel supposed it had been a hospital, before the Troubles. Whatever had happened out here must have been bad. No one wanted to move back. But when the U.S. got control again, the viewing home had taken over the hospital. As the family got out of the car, Rachel resisted the temptation to slam the car door. No sense in overdoing things. She did trudge up the steps after her parents.

Her mother signed them in. Someone who looked like a nurse but wasn’t ushered them into the waiting room. Rachel and her father sat in the hard plastic chairs while her mother paced the floor. Rachel lost count of how many times she went back and forth.

She had been moving back and forth ever since Joshie got sick. Carrying Rachel and her father in her wake.

“Party seventeen, we’re ready for you in viewing room three.”

Rachel’s mother was off, making it hard for Rachel to keep up with her. Beyond the waiting room ran a corridor with marked doors. The viewing room was only slightly smaller than the waiting room. It was dimly lit. A curtain ran the length of the long side opposite the door. Rachel could never decide if the curtain was grey or blue. Rachel’s mother already had the cake out of the box and was setting up the candles. A large one and six made of red wax. The curtain slowly drew back.

The entire length of the wall was a large window. It looked onto a room decorated as a small boy’s room. Rachel knew Joshie didn’t live here. The bed and dresser and toys on the floor were just for the rest of the family.

“There’s the birthday boy. Happy birthday to you…”

Rachel joined in with the song, but the room swallowed up the sound. The glow from the candles lit up the face of a boy about ten years old. His dark hair was buzzed short. He wore jeans and a striped polo shirt. His skin had a greenish pallor, his eyes a milky film.

Joshie, Rachel’s older brother.

“Look! He’s smiling! He’s happy to see us.”

The creature that had been Joshie was opening and closing his mouth, revealing grey-black gums. No teeth, just in case. Rachel thought it more than likely that her zombie-brother realized the light from the candles meant there was food nearby. Of course he was happy to see his family. He thought he was about to get a snack. Of course Rachel didn’t say anything.

Their mother stood right up at the window rubbing her fingers against the glass where Joshie pressed his face. He gummed at the window as if he were trying to eat her fingers and couldn’t understand why he wasn’t biting down on human flesh.

“I have to go to the bathroom.”

Rachel’s mother didn’t say anything. There were times when Rachel wondered if she had gotten the cancer instead of Joshie, would her mother gone through all the trouble and expense to…preserve her. Rachel didn’t think so. She didn’t know whether she hated or loved her mother for that.

Rachel’s father rested a hand on her shoulder but he was staring at the viewing window. His face bore the same expression Rachel had seen on it when they passed a highway accident. Or when he watched the news on the last of the Troubles. Compassion mixed with disgust and horror. And curiosity. You didn’t want to look, but you still couldn’t look away.

“Do you want me to go with you, darling?”

It gave Rachel some comfort that she wasn’t the only one in her family who thought what had been done to Joshie was wrong. But her father had never said anything about it, in six years. Was that love, or cowardice?

“Dad… It’s…personal stuff…”

Rachel had hated it when she started menstruating. It was messy and gross. But she had learned a new power came with her period. Especially since her father didn’t keep track of her cycle. He blushed.

“Well, um, hurry back.”

“I’ll do my best.” She shouldered her backpack and headed out of the viewing room.

There were bathrooms near the viewing room. Rachel went in, making what she told her father not a lie. She waited a minute and walked right out. A quick look around. No one else was in the corridor. Rachel pushed open the door marked Authorized Personnel Only.

Rachel expected alarms to sound and half a dozen security officers to swarm her. Nothing happened. She stepped through the door. It swung closed behind her with a solid, final thud.

She could do this. Rachel looked around her. She shouldn’t be too far from the other side of the viewing rooms. She turned the corner and found a large door — more solid than the one she had just passed through — marked Viewing Rooms 1-4. A heavy steel door, with the hinges on the inside. A steel bar fit over the door in two heavy brackets. Next to the bar was a key card slot, its red light staring at Rachel.

Before the girl could even curse, footsteps echoed down the corridor. She heard female laughter and a male voice in reply.

“Don’t worry. That one could be there for the rest of the day. You can tell it creeps the guy and the girl out. She must really have him by the short hairs.”

More laughter. Rachel ran away from the sound as quietly as she could. Only after she started did she realize she was going further into the former hospital. She turned a corner, listening for pursuit. When she stopped, she nearly gagged. Something smelled awful.

A loud whirring sound made Rachel jump. It continued for a full minute and stopped again. The putrid smell grew stronger. Rachel put her hand over her nose and pressed onward. There had to be another way to get to Joshie.

The whirring sound started again, louder this time. Light spilled onto Rachel’s path from a half-open doorway. The stench and the whirring sound both came from inside. Rachel crouched down and stuck her head inside. The sound cut off.

A man stood at a long black counter like the lab tables at school. He wore a long dark apron, black gloves up to his elbows and enormous safety goggles, giving him a mad-scientist look. He was standing at an industrial-sized blender and singing off key to himself.

“Feeding the zombies, feeding the zombies…”

He reached into a grey bin to the side and pulled out a brain. A cow brain, Rachel hoped. He stuffed it into the blender and added organs and bits of intestines and other things Rachel couldn’t identify. He put the top on the blender and started it up. Rachel had to turn away. She still threw up into her mouth. She forced herself to swallow it.

As she looked away, she saw a white lab coat draped over the back of a chair. More important was the name badge clipped to the lapel. If it was a dual badge and key card, it was Rachel’s ticket further into the viewing center.

The sound of a viscous liquid poured into a container. Rachel didn’t look. As the blender whirred again, she crept forward. When it stopped, she stopped. She didn’t look at the man. If she didn’t look, he wouldn’t look. That’s what she told herself. He kept singing. Rachel inched forward with each pulse of the blender.

As she made her slow progress, Rachel found herself wondering if Joshie liked the slurry the man was making. Did cow guts taste as good as human flesh? If she got caught, would she find her way into the blender as a special treat?

She reached the badge at last and unclipped it from the lab coat. Scott Bridges looked like an ordinary guy in his photo. Not at all like the goggled ghoul in the room with her. Rachel slipped the badge into her pocket and turned to make her way back to the door.

“Where did you get to?”

Rachel froze. Had the man known she was there all along? She envisioned him cheerily pulling her intestines from her guts and adding them to his mixture. She hazarded a look in his direction.

The man was bent over his table, evidently trying to chase down a bit of organ that had escaped.

“There you are. Into the soup you go.”

When the blender started again, Rachel crawled to the door as fast as she could. She sat outside the gruesome kitchen panting. This was crazy. There was no way she could pull this off.

She saw Joshie’s face in her mind, and the glow of the candles on her mother’s face. She adjusted the strap of her backpack on her shoulder and rose. She had a birthday present to deliver.

She wondered how long she had been gone. Were her parents worrying about her? Her mother was probably still glued to the window, laughing at everything her precious not-Joshie did. Her father usually zoned out at a viewing, in his own world of loss and guilt. Rachel had plenty of time.

Would there even be a back way into the viewing area? The viewing center did everything to make its wards as non-lethal as possible, but they were still dangerous. The lock on the door leading to the viewing rooms, not to mention the bar on the outside of the door, suggested that they didn’t want to take any chances of the zombies escaping.

No. There had to be a way in. Rachel owed it to Joshie to find it. She owed it to Joshie, to her father, to herself. Even to her mother. She crept further into the viewing home.

Rachel wondered why her mother couldn’t see what she had done. Rachel couldn’t even remember Joshie’s face any more. Not his real face. The face of the brother who had pushed her on the swings and chased her around the back yard. The face of the brother who had held her hand when the Troubles began and made sure she brought Mr. Ted to the relocation camp.

The face of the brother who had held her and cried when the president went on TV and declared the war against the zombies over. The face of the brother as he got sick. The face of the brother nestled among all the tubes and monitors at the hospital.

A low sound from up ahead. Rachel slowed. The sound was constant and grew louder as she walked. She fingered the strap of her backpack and went on, looking around with each step.

Over Rachel’s every memory of her brother had spread the face of the zombie. She understood why her mother did what she did. But she just didn’t get it. Turning him hadn’t kept Joshie’s memory alive. It killed his memory, infected it. The zombie ate away at the real Joshie every time they came to see it. It would continue to eat away at the Joshie who lived in their hearts until there was nothing left.

Joshie was dead. Rachel had to believe that.

The sound grew still louder. Rachel recognized it at last. The moan of the walking dead as they roamed the earth hungering for human flesh. Even as the sound increased in volume, it still had a muffled, contained quality. Rachel frowned. Her muscles tensed, ready to flee from a lurching horde.

She turned a corner and came upon another door barred and locked like the door leading to the viewing rooms. Had she found a back way in? Unlike the other door, this one had a large window. Wire crisscrossed through the glass. Rachel crept closer and looked inside.

The room had maybe been an operating room before. Something big. Any equipment had long since been removed. Chained along the far wall were perhaps a dozen zombies. They wore iron collars and heavy shackles on their wrists. Their feet were unchained. The zombies all walked in place, the chains keeping them from going anywhere.

The zombies moaned as black gums chomped down on nothing. Perhaps they were all waiting for Scott Bridges to make his rounds. The all wore grey hospital robes, some with red-brown stains. Lunch apparently was messy.

Rachel scanned the room. Two of the creatures on the far end were children. There was a gap in the line before the adults began. Collar and shackles hung limply. Rachel just knew that was Joshie’s spot. The zombie-Joshie’s spot.

“Would Rachel Harding please report to the sign-in desk? Rachel Harding to the sign-in desk. Your family is waiting for you.”

That was it then. Her mother was done, and they were leaving the viewing home. They had started to look for her. Rachel had missed her chance.

She looked back at the zombies chained to the wall. She could still do this. If her mother was done, that meant Joshie was on his way back here.

She lifted up the heavy bar and slid Scott Bridge’s card through the lock. The light switched from red to green. She pulled the door open. The scent and sound pushed her back. She forced herself into the room.

The door swung closed. The zombies moaned louder. Could they sense her in the room? See her? Smell her? She heard the sound of chains pulled taught. She waited to hear links snap. Nothing happened. All four walls held zombies, not just the one wall she had seen from outside. But there was a clear space on either side of the door, about four feet wide. Rachel stood against the wall next to the door hinges.

She opened her backpack and pulled out her present for Joshie. The machete her father used for clearing out brush in the yard. She heard footsteps and voices in the hall. The door opened.

Two guards marched the Joshie-thing into the room. One was a man, the other a woman. They directed the zombie with a long pole with a noose on the end. The door swung closed.

Rachel let out a shout. She swung the machete. The guards were too shocked to do anything. The blade cut through the restraining noose. It stuck in the zombie’s neck.

Rachel yanked the machete out. She shouted and swung the blade again and again. She closed her eyes at the dull, wet sound of the blade. Tears streamed down her face. She didn’t care.

Hands grabbed Rachel’s arm. She swung the machete a final time. The zombie’s spine gave way with a sticky snap. The guards pulled her back. The blade clattered to the floor. Her whole body felt limp. It didn’t matter. She had done it. She looked at her big brother’s body.

“Happy birthday, Joshie.”

And she could have sworn that Joshie’s head smiled at her from the floor.

“Turning our tortures into horrid arms”

Martin cycled through the air, dropping easily over the gap between the two buildings. He started to twist as he fell, desperately trying to right himself, and after falling for long, breathless seconds, he hit the roof of the building fully side on. Pain exploded up his body as he skidded along the gravel. Finally, as he ground to a stop, blackness took him and he could taste the iron saltiness of blood in his mouth.

After a period of darkness he found himself, lying in a sodden drain, soaked in faeces and God knows what. All around there were sounds of small arms fire and puffs of dust exploding above his head. In his arms lay the broken body of Sparky, his oldest friend in the Army. They had met in basic training and joined the SAS together, supporting each other all the way and yet playing tricks and taking the piss the way all good soldiers did to their friends. Tears ran down Martins face making irregular tracks in the dust. He could taste them on his lips as he spoke gently.

“Sparky. Sparky! I’m going to get a medic. You just stay here mate. Just wait here a minute. It’ll be OK mate. It’ll be OK.”

Martin knew it wouldn’t be OK. Bubbles had long since stopped forming from the massive wound in Sparky’s chest. The pool of blood that spilled from exit hole had stopped increasing in size and Martin sat, gently cradling his friend in his arms, rocking slightly, weeping openly.

It was in that moment that Martin realised his time in the Army was done. He left as soon as he honourably could, and went to the shit holes of the world, earning lots of dirty money. Never forming real friendships again, and moved on like a drifter from one squad of mercenaries to the next. He had been alone as a child, and as an adult it was his preferred state of mind.

The blackness came again.

Slowly, he opened his eyes as the sounds of warfare carried through his dream into reality. He stared at the row of figures that stood silently on the opposite rooftop. In confusion he tried to say something but had to spit the blood out of his mouth. He realised he had fell maybe two stories, the difference in height between the two buildings.

The pain on his right side indicated the twist as he fell meant he had landed solidly on that side of his body. The distribution of weight along his whole length had probably saved his life or, at least, stopped him shattering both legs as he landed.

His vision cleared and he sat up onto his elbows, he realised he still had both pistols in his hands. He could smell acrid, burning, oily smoke. He stared at the line of Zombies as they stared at him, shuffling gently on their feet. Suddenly one over balanced and tipped head first over the edge, tumbling down to the ground like a stunt doll.

Martins eyes opened in surprise. Then his face wrinkled. Then he started to giggle. Soon he was howling with laughter, noting with a certain detachment that he had grazed the side of his face even more. He laughed until tears ran down his face, stinging the graze as they went.

“You….You…..You stupid……You stupid twats!” He howled. Then as the blood rushed back into his head he collapsed back onto the roof and slipped back into unconsciousness.

After the darkness Sparky was stood over him, shouting silently in his face. His camouflaged helmet rocked comically from side to side as he ranted. He was pulling Martin up by the arm and shoulder, desperately trying to get Martin up onto his feet. The tinnitus whine in his head, which he hadn’t noticed before, started to fade until he could hear what was being said.

“Get up! Get up! We have to get out of here! For Chrissakes man. MOVE SOLDIER!” Sparky spat at him.

Martin used his last ounce of strength to put his arm around Sparky’s shoulders and steady himself on his feet as best he could.

“Whas going on?” Martin said weakly.

“Grenade mate. We need to get you out of here.”

“Have I still got all my bits?” Martin said in a daze. Sparky smiled warmly at him.

“Yes mate, you’ve still got all your bits.”

“Thank fuck for that. Good job I got you innit Sparky.”

“Yes mate. Good job you got me. Come on lets go.”

Sparky started to walk out of the ruined Mogadishu bar, wrecked by the explosion, but on the first step Martins body exploded in pain and he faded into blackness once more.

All he could think about was Sparky stood over him shouting “Move soldier!” over and over again. It coalesced his thinking until his eyes sprang open and in a second he was on his feet. He saw the line of dark figures ahead, raised the guns and clicked them ineffectually at them in confusion. He dropped his arms and the guns on the ground, his balance wavering. Finally he rubbed his hands over his face as his vision cleared.

After a moment he came too, and after a few minutes his mind cleared. He stuck two fingers up at his line of witnesses.

“Fuck you.” He said to them quietly.

He found his guns and reloaded them, putting the empty clips back into the holsters. His moleskin overcoat had a series of rips on one side and he tutted to himself. He really liked that jacket.

He was busting for a pee and so removed his gloves and relieved himself in full view of his voyeurs in defiance. He checked his pee for blood and was relieved to find it normal which meant no internal bleeding. Then he looked around to see where he had landed. The roof was much the same as the other one with several air conditioning units dotted around. He noted that they were all still running. He crunched around the gravel roof and found the stairwell into the building.

He paused a moment before going in. The city still sounded like a war zone and he had no idea how long he had been out, but the sun was maybe  two hours from setting. He decided to get out of this building and see if he could get some transport out of the city before nightfall.

Readying himself, he opened the door and slipped into the stairwell beyond. Inside, it took his eyes a moment to adjust, and he was in short stairwells that lead to the main offices, unlike the older building  where the stairs went straight down to the ground floor.

He moved up to the door and peered through the glass. The office was empty beyond so he opened the door a touch and listened. He couldn’t hear anything inside the area. He slipped quietly in, checking corners as he went, and came across a small kitchen. He shut the door gently behind him and his stomach growled immediately reminding him he hadn’t eaten for maybe more than twenty four hours. He holstered his weapons and checked the fridge. Inside were two lunchboxes and a note. The note complained about a missing salad asking the culprit to own up or face the consequences. He opened the lunchboxes and sniffed. They were both fresh and cool. He opened the a packet to reveal a tuna mayonnaise sandwich in one and cheese and pickle in the other. He quickly ate them leaning against the counter, staring into the distance as he chewed. His mind was both blank and yet playing through the events of the last few hours in a way that reminded him of sleeping after mission. To a trained soldier this was a kind of meditation, a way of processing horror and compartmentalising it.

He polished off the crisps and distractedly made himself a cup of tea. He was halfway through drinking it before he realised hat he was doing, it was a bloody lovely cup of tea though. The small kitchen providing a familiar space. He almost shook himself out of it as he drained the mug. The food and the moments respite had made him feel a lot sharper.

If things ran true to form then the city would be teeming with those things by tomorrow morning, and the amount of targets would be reducing, making him more attractive. Speed would be of the essence.

He left the kitchen and moved through the office space. It looked as if the workers had packed and left quickly. There weren’t any jackets but a file was knocked onto the floor, papers spilled from it and were then indented with trampled foot prints. All the computers were left on, spinning patterns on the screen, waiting for users that would never return.

He decided to risk the lift, his knee still ached, as did his shoulder. He stepped in, pressed the button for the ground floor, and immediately regretted his decision. As the lift descended to the innocuous music he watched the numbers tick down his imagination saw a wall of dead burst through the inexorably opening door. It was the kind of sloppy mistake that nearly got him killed two nights ago.

He pointed the pistols at the door and breathed in as the countdown reached 3, 2, 1, G. There was an electronic ping and the door slid open to reveal an empty foyer.

Martin breathed an audible sigh of relief and lowered his guns.

The room marbled floored with a cream desk to one side, and a series of corporate awards on frames . Slumped over the desk was a security guard ringed with a pool of blood. Moving up to the front door he looked out onto the street. He had expected copses littering it and yet, barring a few suspect stains on the road it was empty.

The door was locked, explaining the lack of Zombies in the building, so he slipped the manual catch and moved out. The first thing he noticed was that the sounds of chaos had moved away. He could still hear gunfire and explosions but they were more distant now, and he judged them to be a couple of miles away. Martin imagined them moving through the city in a battlefront, like the chaotic, shifting battles of Ancient Rome or Gaul. The only explanation would be that the dead moved towards sounds in search of prey, and as the sound moved they followed it leaving only silence behind them.

He walked quickly down the street, Italian leather shoes tapping echoes, as he went. It was like an early Sunday morning after stepping out from a late club.

As he walked he passed a series of empty restaurants and shops, some normal, as if waiting for the day’s customers to arrive, some with shattered glass and the blood spattered doors that only Jackson Pollock could match. The whole city stank with the throat catching, oily thickness, of burning plastic. A pall of dust and smoke eddied round the corners followed by papers and shreds of carrier bags.

He checked behind him and could see one of the high rise office buildings on fire, flames licked up its sides, and he could hear the faint tinking sound of melting steel. Without any emergency services to stop it, it resembled a log, burning in a hearth, with gases being forced out and igniting with coloured flames as myriad substances burned within.

It occurred to him that if his theory about sound was correct he was going to need a melee weapon, and to move quietly.

He realised ahead he could hear sobbing. He walked slowly, scanning around to find its source. On the other side of an advertising hoarding he found a smartly dressed woman, holding a young man with short blonde hair and a rugby top, cradling him in her arms and crying. She heard Martin approach.

“Please. Please help me. Can you call an ambulance?” She calmed asked.

“I think they’re all busy.” Was all he could think to say.

“My husband needs an ambulance.”

“Ma’am. I think its too late.”

“No, no, he just needs an ambulance. Can you call one for me please? My mobiles not working.” She held it up to him.

Just then a series of spasms ripped through the man and he shook violently.

“John! John! its OK. This nice mans going to get an ambulance for you. Everything is going to be alright!” She tried to hold him close as he shook, spit dribbling out of his mouth like a rabid dog.

“Ma’am I think you should step away.” Martin pointed a pistol at the both. She held him closer as he shook.

“What are you doing? Don’t point that thing at him.” She said as she stared in horror at Martin. She hadn’t noticed the spasms had stopped, and for a moment he lay still in her arms.

“Ma’am please step away from him.” He looked into her pleading eyes, just as the mans bloodshot eyes flicked open and he pulled her exposed neck towards him with bestial snarl.

Then Martin saw it, the look of betrayal in her eyes as her dead husband ripped her arteries from her throat, with a wet slapping sound. For the rest of his nights Martin would never know if the look was aimed at him or her husband. The dead man continued to feast on his now dead wife as Martin looked on. He shook his head, aimed the weapon and shot them both. To Hell with the consequences. Martin left them and moved on.

He walked in a daze, and the buildings changed from offices to shops as he went. He passed abandoned cars slewed into the sides of buildings, some with dead occupants, some with evidence of a struggle showing bloodstained doors and windows.

Suddenly, it was if the ground dropped away from him. The road shook and he heard an enormous explosion from behind. He turned and saw the burning office block lurch towards him, the bottom floors bulging and exploding as it came. Martin’s eyes widened in horror, and then the glass and steel monolith seemed to stop. Martin started to run from it, as it then lurched again with a grinding tear, shaking the road as the immense weight of the floors above began to topple it over. Martin ran as a wall of noise ripped through him, he could hear glass and the thin whine of twisting steel. Martin pounded down the street, the shaking road buckling as he ran. He scanned the sides looking for an exit. Turning, he saw the immense building tower over him, blocking out the afternoon sun, as it continued its slow but relentless collapse. Inside its furniture and computers fell against the glass above, and to his right a desk and chairs fell from a broken window smashing against the road.

Finally, he spotted an entrance to the underground and sprinted towards it as the sound increased around him. He could feel his ears pop as the air pressure under the immense structure increased. He ran for the entrance, the air around him turning to escaping dust. He could smell the crushing concrete as he jumped onto the gap between the stairs and slid down the metal ramp that separated each side of the escalator. A howling wind rushed after him pushing him down as he slid faster and faster down the metal slide. The pressure as the building fell fired shards of concrete and glass past him. Then he slid off the bottom of the stairs tumbling to a stop as the whole world seemed to explode around him, forcing the air from his lungs he covered his head with his hands.

For long minutes it roared around him, and he lay there expecting to be crushed until finally, the noise calmed, and the rolling pieces of concrete stopped. He lay there in the flickering artificial light, coughing in the thick cloud of acrid dust as it settled around him.

Eventually he rolled over. He reached into his pocket, took out a Marlboro and lit it with his silver Ronson. It seemed like the right thing to do considering he had just had a skyscraper fall on him.

He finished the cigarette and flicked it away. He got up, dusting himself down. His knee and face throbbed with a dull ache. He needed to rest soon, but didn’t want to do it in a darkened underground tunnel. He checked the tube map on the wall, unfortunately although it was a fantastically informative piece of art, scale meant nothing on it. He could try and go through the underground tunnel to the next station but that seemed like a really bad idea.

So he looked around for another exit. He moved down onto the platform itself and peered down the tunnel either way. He couldn’t see anything in the darkness beyond a few feet, so he moved along the platform of the deserted station. The station itself was clean with no signs of struggle. He guessed the Zombies had hit this area early in the morning, before the rush hour.

Then he felt the breeze from the tunnel, followed by the sound of a train. He stepped away from the edge of the platform, the stale breeze increasing as it came. It didn’t slow as it entered the station rushing past in a blur of broken windows and bloody handprints, its clicking clacking rhythm never wavering as it moved at full speed.. Then it was gone into the darkness beyond. That made the decision for him. If the trains were still running he didn’t want to move into the tunnels. He would have to find another way.

He moved to the end of the platform and back into the station towards the stairs where he came from. He found a small innocuous door marked “Maintenance – Authorised Personnel Only”. Guns at the ready, he moved inside. After a sweep, he surveyed the small room. It was a grubby, dirty little space with racking on one side containing tools and equipment. He found a heavy rubber torch, and a packet of spare batteries, so he pocketed that. One wall was plastered in Page three poster girls who stared back at him with their jaunty, fun poses.

“Ladies.” He nodded to them. He then moved through the door at the back which revealed a long corridor curving away from him. The flickering orange lights gave the thin grey corridor an unearthly look, and Martin wasn’t surprised to find the odd rat keeping him company. Every few hundred metres the tunnel broke out to the right onto the track itself, this was obviously some sort of maintenance or safety conduit to move passengers down in the event of a fire. Just when he considered this may be an enormous mistake, and was considering turning back he found a set of steps that lead up and off to the left. He decided to check them out and moved up them cautiously, even though he had seen no evidence of anything suspicious.

After a few flights the stairs ended in a wooden door, with an old style brass Yale lock on it. Around the edge, worn and rotted as if it had never been replaced in the history of the Underground, he could feel a breeze, so he bent down and looked through the gap. He couldn’t see much as it was night. He opened the lock and stepped out into the cool breeze.

Looking right he could see the empty street lit by that wan orange streetlight. There was a gated park to one side with tall townhouses behind it. On the nearside, past an up-ended white van, there was a small row of shops with a fish and chip shop.

Martin heard a noise to his left, and turned slowly to see a group of about fifty Zombies dotted down the street to end at a ‘T’ Junction. None of them had seen him emerge from the door, not until the old door behind him swung shut, snapping the Yale lock with a loud click. With that noise the closest one snapped round to look at him dead on. For a second it just stared those long bloodshot stares, then others turned and followed the direction it was looking. Then, in absolute silence, they started to run at him.

Martin turned and ran along the street, looking for a way out or a mode of transport. He spotted a bike lying in the road in front of the shops, and sprinted for it, knee once again announcing its painful presence. Then, as he reached the bike, he saw another group emerge from the opposite end of the street. They were closing in on both sides. Martin grabbed the bike and pulled it up but the front wheel turned independently of the handle bars. He threw it down in disgust and readied his pistols. Arms wide, one aiming at either group.

They were evenly spread out and so closed in on him in groups of one or two. He blasted away at each group in turn, taking out the front runners on either side. Then one or two reached him, so using his pistols as clubs he alternated clubbing them and shooting the ones behind. Using a mixture of combat forms he swept their legs from under them before shooting them in the head, or used Judo to use their own weight to carry them over before dispatching them again. He grunted at the effort, with a shot every few seconds to complete the job. As he fired the street lit up with a flash of gunfire, but he knew he was fighting his last battle as the density of runners increased. With increasing fury he threw his attackers at the ones behind slowing them down as much as he could. Then, just when he thought he was about to be overrun he heard a metallic sliding noise.

“Mate! In here quick. Over here!” Said a thick Indian accent.

Martin scanned desperately around and then saw a hand waving underneath the metal shutter of the Newsagents. The shutter had been raised about a foot from the ground and a dark face peered out.

Martin emptied the clips into his attackers to create some breathing room and dove for the gap, rolling under it.

“Quick get it closed!” the voice said.

The metal shutter slammed closed behind him, as the first of his attackers reached it banging and clawing against the steel, howling its frustration to an empty street. It was soon joined by more.

Looking up Martin saw a balding Indian in his forties with a long red beard. Beside him was a small skinny teenage boy with expensive trainers and a tracksuit, and a woman in her thirties with tight jeans and a blue hooded top. They were all dirty and dishevelled.

“Come on. We better get back upstairs out of sight.” The balding Indian said, offering Martin a hand. Martin got up and followed the group through the narrow aisles selling bread and tins of beans, with the Indian shop owner following him from behind. They went through the back of the shop and up the narrow, grimy, stairs. They emerged into a living room above the shop, it appeared to have not been decorated since the early seventies. The only indication that this was the twenty first century was the large flatscreen TV mounted on one wall. In the room there was a girl in her early twenties, frantically fiddling with her phone. She had scraped back hair and large gold hoop earrings. Sat next to her on the sofa was another woman in her thirties dressed in a white blouse and pencil skirt, she had her knees pulled up to her chin and was muttering to herself wild eyed, in obvious shock. Martin sat in a chair next to a small dining table in one corner, pulling his jacket over the bulges in his coat. The young man in the tracksuit sat in a recliner opposite Martin. In his hand he held a revolver. Martin studied it as the young man gesticulated it around.

“Mate. That was some well good fightin’. You must’ve taken a shitload out.” When the boy spoke it was with that thick mock gangster accent so beloved of teenagers.

“Mind you I was the same this morning, wasn’t I babe?” He turned to the girl.

“We got out da club and I was all blat, blat, wasn’t I Kell?” He said spinning the pistol round. She muttered her acknowledgement, fingers flying furiously on her phone. He sat back, disgruntled at being ignored.

The blonde woman in the tight jeans came into the room carrying a small white First Aid box. She sat at the table with him.

“Have you been bitten?” She said to Martin flatly, in a slight northern accent, it was so slight he couldn’t tell exactly where from.

“No.” Martin said.

“Where are you hurt?” He pointed to his face, shoulder and knee.

She took out a small bottle of TCP and a ball of cotton wool. The pungent smell of the antiseptic fluid battled for dominance with the lingering curry smell in the small flat. Ultimately it was a draw.

“This is going to sting” She said. She tended to his cheek graze, firmly as she cleaned the dirt from it. It did sting and make his eye water, but he ignored it.

Just then the Newsagent came in from the kitchen, followed by a tiny indian woman dressed in traditional Sari.

“More tea?” She asked. Everyone nodded, except the smartly dressed woman on the sofa who just nodded to herself. She disappeared back into the kitchen.

“Well, I suppose I better do the introductions. I’m Mohammed. Mo, and that’s my Mum.” He said pointing into the kitchen. “Binita.”

Mo reached into his pocket and pulled out a pack of cigarettes, he took one out and lit it.

“This is Kelly.” The girl with the hoop earrings raised one hand, still staring at her phone.

“Jez.” The boy waved his pistol at Martin again.

“Don’t know what her name is” He said, pointing to the rocking woman.

“Emma.” He pointed to the woman tending Martins face. She smiled at him.

“What about you?”

“Martin.”

“That was some pretty good shooting man. You Police?”

There was no point in lying, beside a lie was best held between two truths.

“Ex Army.”

“That explains the guns then.”

“Can you take your shirt off so I can see your shoulder” Emma said, depositing the cotton wool ball on the table. Martin stood and took his jacket off revealing the holster and pistols. He unstrapped the harness and laid it on the table.

“Nice Gats mate. Can I have a look?” Said Jez, the tracksuited teenager.

“No.” Said Martin, unbuttoning his shirt and removing his tie.

“Please yourself” Said Jez, muttering “Wankah.”

Martin revealed the shoulder dressing and sat back down. Emma peeled the old dressing back to reveal the flesh wound. Her eyes narrowed and she looked at him. It was obvious she was aware that not only was this a gunshot wound, as there were powder burns around it, but it was older than the current troubles. For a moment he thought she may say something, but the look in his eyes convinced her not to, and she treated and redressed it in silence. Martin turned to Mo.

“Do you mind if I smoke?”

“Go ahead mate.” Mo said. Martin took out a Marlboro and lit it. Emma frowned at him as she tended his shoulder. He ignored her.

Binita emerged from the kitchen carrying a tray with tea and digestives, which she put on the table. She served the tea in a remarkably nimble way for a woman of her age. It was nice to see that for all his bravado Jez said please and thank you to the old woman. Then Jez reached into his pocket and pull out a long conical spliff. He put it in his mouth. It was then Mo spotted him.

“Hey! Not that shit! Don’t bloody smoke that stuff in here. What would your parents say, you little sod.” Mo shouted.

“But I haven’t got any fags mate.”

“I don’t care, you aren’t smoking that crap in here.”

Martin took pity and threw Jez a Marlboro.

“Thanks mate.”

Roused from her reverie Kelly looked up and snatched it from his hand,

“Thanks babe.” She said in a thick London accent. Jez looked crestfallen and made a praying motion to Martin. Martin shook his head smiling, and tossed him another one.

“Cheers fella.” He said cheerily.

Emma finished dressing the shoulder. He noticed her looking at the other scars on his torso.

“Knee?” She said. Martin rolled up his trouser leg to reveal the black bruise surrounding his kneecap.

“We need to strap that up. Is it painful to walk on?”

“Not too bad. Aches after today though.”

“I’ll bet.” She said, and finally smiled at him. She took a bandage and strapped it up before pinning it in position. She looked at him again in that strange way. Martin guessed she knew the injury was a few days old, before all this started.

“How’s that?”

“Good. Not too tight. You a nurse?”

“No. I’m a Doctor.”

“Sorry.”

“That’s OK. You weren’t to know. All done.” She stood and went over to the woman staring on the sofa. She lifted her cup of tea and tried to give it to the woman, talking softly, and trying to get her to respond.

“Hey Emma if you’re a doctor can you have a look at my dick? There’s something wrong with it?” Said Jez.

“Oh yeah?” Said Emma

“Yeah I got a rash innit. There’s only one cure.”

“What…Give it a wash? I can smell it from here.” She said. Mo and Martin chuckled.

“Oh yeah. Real smart entcha.” Jez said waving the gun around again.

Martin had had enough. He reached over and took one of his own automatics out of the holster and levelled it coolly at Jez.

“Listen Son. You wave that cheap Chinese copy round in my direction again. Especially with the safety off, and I’ll blow your fucking brains out over that wall.” Martin said it so charmingly and coolly that for a moment Jez mistook the meaning. Then his eyes grew wide and he stared at Martin.

“Keep the gun pointed down and put the safety on yeah?” Marting continued. Jez did as he was told. The tension in the room at fever pitch. Mo’s cigarette dropped out of his open mouth.

“Right. Now why don’t you come and sit here and let me have a look at it.” Jez got up and walked slowly over to the dining table and sat in the chair opposite. Martin put the automatic on the table, and Jez passed him the pistol. Mo reached down and retrieved his cigarette. Binita called him from the kitchen.

“Your problem is that this is a copy of a .38. Its not a bad copy, but its still a copy.” Jez stared at him.

“Your issue is going to be stopping it exploding and blowing your hand off.” Jez was interested now and watched Martin as he quickly stripped the gun down to its component parts. Martin took a small leather box, that was built into his holster, and took out the cleaning kit. Martin took Jez through the regime of cleaning the pistol and reassembling it.

“Now we need to get you a cleaning kit and you are going to have to do it every night.” Jez looked at Martin in awe.

“Leave it unloaded until the morning. How many bullets you got?” Jez reached into his pocket and pulled out a handful of shells. Martin frowned. He himself was down to seven full clips.

Just then Binita walked in.

“Would you like some dinner. I can make something” She asked.

“What! They’re not having our food. They can buy something from the shop!”

“Mohammed! Don’t be so mean.” She called back. Mo walked in, clearly angry.

“They’re not bloody guests woman. They’re customers. It was your idea to let them all in. What is this, a bloody Hotel?”

Kelly and Jez looked at each other. It was clear that they didn’t have any money between them.

For a moment Mo and Binita argued in Urdu. Martin couldn’t understand what they were saying but Allah was mentioned several times. Martin couldn’t be bothered with all this so he decided to diffuse the situation.

“Mo…..MO!” Mohammed and his mother stopped arguing.

“Mo, Binita. Thanks for saving my life earlier. I appreciate it, but I think we could all do with a hot meal. Why don’t you cook something and I’ll pay for it. He reached for his wallet and opened it, taking out two crisp fifty pound notes.

“Does that cover it?” Mo nodded. Binita looked at Mo in disgust and disappeared back into the kitchen, after a moment they could hear pots and pans being sorted.

“Right.” Said Kelly looking up from her mobile.

“Jez, you know Gary, yeah?”

“Which one?”

“The one who goes out with that slag Stacey?”

“Eh?”

“You know. The one who plays footy for the Legion.”

“No.”

“Yes you do. He got busted for pissing on that Police car on mushrooms.”

“Eh?”

“You know. He goes out wiv Stacey. That tart who was doing porn on the Internet.”

“Oh yeah I know.”

“Well he came back to me on Facebook. It seems to be working ok now. He’s back home with some soldiers holed up in his flats.”

“Right.”

“Well he reckons the soldiers are gonna head out to that Army base. The one in Dovah.” She looked at her phone.

“Connaught Barracks” She said slowly.

“And?”

“Well he’s gonna go wiv them.”

“So?”

“So it might be a good idea.”

“Nah I ain’t going anywhere without my xbox.”

“Are you fucking mad. You saw how many of those things were on the estate. What use is your xbox anyway? You’re a fucking idiot Jez. I don’t know what my sister sees in ya.”

Martin interjected.

“She’s got a point. This city has gone to hell and by this time tomorrow there are going to be a lot of those things about. There are some serious fires raging out of control as well. I nearly had a skyscraper fall on me.” Martin said it, but it didn’t sound real even to him.

“Is that what that noise was?” Said Emma.

“Yup.”

Jez sucked his teeth.

“Well It’ll be your fault I’ll lose all my saves.” Said Jez. Kelly rolled her eyes.

“Whatevs.” She said, shoving him in the shoulder.

Emma looked at Martin.

“What are you going to do?” She asked Martin

“Get out of the city. On my own.” He said, turning away.

“I need to get home. home. i need to get home. Brian’ll be there with the kids. It’ll be OK. He’ll be there. It’ll be normal back home. Normal” The smartly dressed woman muttered to herself. Emma tried to console her.

“How did all this start anyway?” Martin asked Jez.

“dunno mate. Something at the airport in the city. Kell saw it on the news last night. Didn’t ya.”

“Yeah some terrorists or something. I dunno. Then when we woke up this morning they were everywhere.” Kelly said.

“I don’t know either.” Said Emma.

“I was on shift until yesterday afternoon, and when I got home I fell asleep until this morning. What about you?” She said to Martin, suspiciously.

“I was asleep too.” Was all he would say.

They sat in silence for a while, each lost in their own recollections. They only noises were Kelly’s frantic tapping on her phone, and the woman in shock muttering to himself. Martin cleaned his own weapons and put them, and the cleaning kit, back in the holster.

After a while the smell of Indian cooking began to waft in from the kitchen. Mo came in and they all set up the dining room table. It was laid out with a selection of different meals and they all ate hungrily, all except the woman in shock. They all complimented a blushing Binita on the quality of the food, and small talk dominated the evening. After they had exhausted all conjecture on the cause and the effect of the days events, Martin and Emma offered to do the washing up. Binita agreed and passed the hundred pounds back to Martin, much to Mo’s chagrin.

Emma and Martin washed up in silence, until as the last of the plates were dried, Emma spoke.

“I saw your injuries.” Martin said nothing.

“They are a couple of days old aren’t they. You still in the military?”

“No. I’m Ex Army. I said that earlier.”

“So why have you got three day old gunshot wounds?” She asked.

Quickly, he grabbed her arm.

“None of your fucking business woman. I’ll be gone tomorrow so I suggest you just let it lie yeah?”

“OK. OK. But we could do with your help. I don’t fancy being protected by a chav with an exploding pistol.”

“Well maybe you should take it from him.”

“That your style is it? Or is it just hurting women?” She looked down at where he was holding her. He threw her arm away in disgust, and stormed out of the kitchen, throwing the tea towel on the floor.

“Martin!” She called. He turned towards her, scowling.

“If you don’t help us tomorrow we’ll all be dead……You know it as well.”

He stared at her. The worst thing was he did know it, but who were these people to him? Who was anybody to him? Targets, Marks or security. Everyone else was below his radar.

Still fuming he asked Mo were he could sleep. Mo looked at him confused and lead him to a small spare room with a single bed that smelled slightly of damp. Boxes of crisps were piled up either side of the bed. Martin lay there for a moment, angry at Emma for being so observant, for being so….vulnerable. He let out a big sigh and tried to forget it, intending to go for a pee before he went to sleep, but by the time the sigh had left his body his eyes had closed and he was out.

He woke once in the night to use the toilet. Perturbed by dreams of the mechanic, the young man in the crowd, the woman he had pulled out of the way by her hair, and the mother holding the toy bear. He killed three people today, three civilians. They weren’t security or marks, they were just three innocent people in the wrong place at the wrong time, and yet, would they still be alive if they hadn’t met him? He was too tired to contemplate it, and after all it was just survival and so, after relieving himself, he fell fast asleep again as soon as his head hit the pillow and didn’t stir until morning.

—–

Thanks to Pete Griffiths for editing this series.

My collection of short Zombie stories “All the Dead are here” is available on Lulu.com and Amazon as a paperback. It is also available on Amazon for the Kindle reader or app. The link is on the right hand side of this page.

Strip clubs around Albuquerque like The Peppermint Lioness, had been known to have a large stock of booze and for some reason he had a need to find a good stiff drink. It didn’t matter what kind just as long as it was a good hard liquor in a sealed bottle. He ran across the street at a half crouch and hid low behind a burned Ford Pick up and looked into the dark entrance way of the former strip club. He scanned around him once and then ran quickly into the dark open maw of the building. Inside was a dark clutter of destruction. Tables and chairs had been overturned and the once plush red carpet was a rotted mess from exposure from the rains and snows from seasons past from the collapsed sections of ceiling. Sheetrock walls and ceilings had been busted through and the stage at the end of the large open hall was shattered and covered with glass mirror debris. Nothing left but old ghosts from a dead era he mused. He slung the Sterling over his shoulder then stuffed in earphones and pressed the play button on the MP3 player he had in his back pocket. The sounds of a lost era began pumping through.

Disco.

Now what was the reasons why people hated Disco he mused? Damn fine shit even if he was just a five year old wet nosed kid living in a dilapidated house with no heat and his father had to work two full time jobs to make ends meet while his mother was off spending some of it on dope and shit. His mind drifted back to those days when being black and poor was common place. His brother and him listened to the radio every Saturday night listening to the new Disco sounds drifting from the speakers. The sounds of Motown were great but the beats of Disco had always enthralled him. He had Disco now but he wanted some booze to go with it. He had searched through most of Albuquerque’s industrial area liquor stores and found that they had already been picked clean to the walls or the buildings burned down. He stepped further into the ruins that had once housed some of the states best class of strippers and searched the bar first and found only broken or empty bottles.

He moved through the open hall to a doorway and began rummaging through the back room and found nothing but empty boxes filled with rotted foods of some kind.  He tossed the boxes and swept them away with the edge of his foot and saw a pack of cigarettes fall from the rotting cardboard. Holy Mother Fucker! He thought. He knelt down and picked up his new found treasure and made sure it was still sealed in it’s package. Well no booze but a smoke and some Disco sounded good enough. He placed his new found treasure within his back pack and had no sooner placed the pack strap over his shoulder, when several zombies appeared in the doorway.

He cursed, un-slung the Sterling sub gun and fired off a long burst in rapid succession. Three of zombies flew back from head shots, splashing the door jam with brains and gristle. Two fell twitching to the floor and the other one, with half it’s head blown off but amazingly, it staggered back to it’s feet. Jackson slammed the metal butt against the side of its shattered cranium forcing it to drop like a puppet with it’s strings cut. He stumbled over the trio of dead zombies and saw the room coming to life with undead beings. He made a mad dash through the small throng of zombies that had quickly materialized seemingly out of nowhere. Slamming against an overturned table, he picked it up and threw it at the large zombie blocking his escape out of the building, forcing the undead being to fall over on it’s back. He cursed his own stupidity for not following his rules which he had placed on himself: Always look around before entering a building and always clear the building before beginning any scavenging actions. The past is dead and there was no point in dwelling on it.

He burst through the broken doors and went on a mad run and saw more zombies appearing out of the nearby alleyway and began chasing after him. He looked back and saw the small throng erupt from the former strip club and saw women in various stripper garb running after him. He fired off the last two rounds from the Sterling, hitting one square in the chest but it had little effect. Having no time to reload, Jackson turned and ran.

Jackson ran cursing his luck and the heavy pack strapped to his back but he knew to shed it would be the last thing he could do. His MP3 player blared a KC and the Sunshine Band song ’Boogie Man’ through his earphones and thought of the irony of that. If he didn’t find a place to hole up or make a stand, he was looking at being dinner within the next few minutes. He held the Sterling at waist level cursing that it was empty. The small throng of zombies chased after him down the street snarling and snapping. He should’ve stayed out of the strip club to begin with. There was no luck for a black man even in the post-apocalyptic world dominated by zombies just as his luck had been threadbare before the viral outbreak.

The zombie strippers chased after him gathering a few other zombies who must’ve been patrons, employees or others who just happened to be in the area. The zombies were like that. At first you couldn’t see them then out of no where they would appear. One of the stripper zombies had sprinted ahead of the tightly packed group and was quickly gaining on him. Her long greasy blonde hair trailed out behind her and she quickly bared her teeth and clawed at the empty air between them. She was topless and her heavy breasts must have been things of beauty at one time but now they were rotted bags of dead flesh that bounced with each running step. He poured it on and managed to widen the distance from her but knew he could not keep the pace forever. He rounded another corner and ran uphill into another part of the industrial area.

He looked quickly left then right and found a stack of crates piled against a twelve foot cinder block wall. If he could climb up to the top of the wall he might be able to get away. Making a mad run, he clambered up the stack of loose crates, he had just grabbed the top ledge of the wall, then crates fell out from under him. He managed with every once of strength to pull himself up and on top of the wall, being careful not to just jump completely over into the compound on the other side of the wall. One never knew if there were more zombies waiting on the other side. The zombie stripper smashed into the clutter of crates and then the wall. She snarled and clawed at the wall with her long fingers and he then noticed the silicone bag used in breast implants, poking through the torn and rotted flesh on her breast. He thought about blowing her head off but it would be a waste of a valuable cartridge. Instead, he reached into his pocket and found a battered one dollar bill and tossed it down to her. “That’s at least for the show bitch, be happy with that.”

Standing on the wall, he noted it was a good twelve feet high and surrounded a compound that had a single two story brick walled building and an outbuilding with a armored truck sticking half in and half out through the garage door. He walked along the wall top, carefully surveying if there were any zombies down inside and saw none. The large group of zombies had by now gathered at the foot of the wall and were clawing up at him. He saw no reason not to go and investigate the compound and hope for the best. He squatted, took hold of the walls edge and jumped down to the asphalt parking lot below.

An old armored car vault building. The bright business sign above it said it had belonged to the Bangor Armored Division. The building was a two story brick wall structure with no windows. Parked up against the rear wall of the compound were a half dozen red and black painted armored trucks covered in a thin layer of dust from the elements of time. He saw only a couple of heavy steel plated doorways and a single garage door and for a moment thought perhaps somebody was barricaded inside. He walked around the building, tried the plated doors and they were locked shut. Moving around back though, he saw another garage door that was partially open enough that a person could slide under it. No one would leave a place like this unguarded. He approached it with apprehension then knelt down and removed his backpack. Rummaging through it until he found the box of 9mm shells. He was down to his last twelve rounds and he hoped there was no zombies inside.

If he didn’t find another gun, preferably a shotgun, he was going to have to resort to some kind of hand held weapon like an axe or a shovel with sharpened edges. That meant also he was facing close contact fighting with zombies which he dreaded. He took his MP3 player and saw the screen flashing indicating the batteries were low. He had found an old generator a few days before and had managed to recharge it that way but who knew how long before he could listen to the disco beats again. Prior to that it had been several months. Mumbling, he wrapped up the ear phone cords and stuffed it in the back pack. It was just as well. If he had been paying attention at the strip club, he would have heard the zombies coming. He loaded the final rounds, slapped it into the Sterling then looked under the door, watching to see if there was any movement. He could see the large wheels from a couple of armored trucks parked inside then he slid under the garage door then quickly gathered his feet under him, holding the Sterling at the ready.

“Hello?” His voice echoed in the large garage and he waited for a moment waiting for any kind of human response. Nothing answered back. He slowly slid the safety switch forward on the Sterling. If there was no human response then he had to assume the worst. There would have to be zombies here but there again, with just him calling out, any zombies in the building would have come running by now. Small beads of sweat formed on his forehead which he wiped away with the shoulder part of his shirt. The buildings interior was like an oven. The heat was almost intolerable and he had second thoughts about looking around for anything. Pausing, he flipped on the mini mag light mounted to the Sterling and the light poked a bright hole into the darkness. Within the large loading garage, were two armored trucks with the rear doors open. Off to his left were several rooms with sliding doors standing open and empty. Cautiously, he went through one of the small rooms and climbed over a counter then searched the various open vaults. The main vault contained a large table and some racks where large stacks of currency and boxed coins were stored. He shrugged his shoulders. There would be no use for any of it these days.

The smell of old decay caught his attention and he lifted the barrel of the Sterling. There was an enclosed office, off to the right, sealed off with the exception of a single door. There was also a large window pane and he peered in. There inside was a corpse sitting in a chair facing away from him. He moved around to the door and tested the handle and found it already ajar. With his boot tip he nudged it open and poked the barrel of the sub gun inside.

The stench made his stomach boil and he struggled to control his gag reflex. There sitting in the chair, was the rotting remains of a corpse in a uniform. Jackson took his shirt tail and covered his mouth and stepped forward slowly to see if the corpse was actually dead. There had been more than a few times in which a corpse he had thought was dead, had leapt up from it’s slumber and attacked. In this case though it appeared the corpse was a dead old man with a large hole in the side of his head. Taking the tip of his boot he turned the corpse to face him A 9mm handgun clattered to the floor. The old guard had probably died by his own hand at the very onset of the viral outbreak. He picked up the pistol, tucked it in the waistband of his trousers then continued on with his search and found nothing living, or dead, wandering around or hiding in the darker spaces of the building. He had lucked out so far. He could hole up here for awhile until he decided on his next move.

He returned to the corpse. He chose not to take any chances and found a large bundle of plastic sheets in a janitors closet in one of the adjoining rooms and tipped the chair containing the corpse over onto it. He then dragged the plastic outside near the wall. He hated the idea of it but there was nothing else he could do for the old guard. The entire compound grounds were paved in asphalt. That left only one option. He climbed on top of one armored truck parked near the wall, dragging the corpse with him, then rolled it over the top to where it fell with a heavy thump on the other side. He promised when the epidemic was over he would see to it the old man’s body would be buried properly. He then said a prayer that the man’s soul would rest easy now that he had passed away the horrors of the new world and that God would take him in regardless of the man’s beliefs. Afterwards, he looked around the outside of the vault building and decided to investigate the mechanics shop in the corner of the lot.

In the adjoining outbuilding he found that it was an old garage that had one armored car parked inside with the hood open. A mechanics tool box sat nearby with several drawers sitting open indicating the former owner must have left in a hurry. In the old days before the epidemic, he had gone to school to learn the trade of being a diesel mechanic. He had worked at a couple of truck stop shops and applied that trade on the various types of tractor and trailers that hauled freight from one end of the country to the other. He hated the work for the most part but it had put food on the table. He would be able to get the trucks running and make some material gathering excursions beyond the realm of the industrial area. Next to the shop was a single stand alone fuel dispensing station. He found the gauge that read the amount of fuel in the in ground tank and it read nearly full. This was not unusual in that in the final days of humanity, most business’ purchased large quantities of fuel to keep their operations running. In the end though, the zombies won the main part of the war and everyone abandoned everything and left the stores of fuel. In the far corner of the room he saw a large industrial Cummins generator motor perched in a steel cradle bolted to the concrete floor. He quickly examined the generator set, saw the fuel tank was at three quarters full and his jaw dropped open. A generator! For months he had suffered from an inability to take a hot shower, eat cooked food or just to have the security of having a light on in the middle of the night. If it started then he could at least have some light and cook for a change. He found the control panel, flipped the switch over to ‘on’ and engaged the starter button. The generator turned over, slow at first because of the low charge in the battery then quickly fired over after several revolutions. His eyes widened in disbelief as the garage lights flickered to life. It was the first time in a long time he had felt this jubilant about anything.

He spent the following hours, in the fully lit, air conditioned office vault building searching out the rooms. With the generator running, he was able to flip a light switch on in each room and search more cautiously with his Sterling SMG. On the second floor was where the main office area was located and he found some food in the adjoining kitchenette. He found a case of potato chips and a vending machine that had a few packages of burritos and a coke machine but there was not enough to sustain for a prolonged siege. There was also a restroom with a small shower stall and the bonus to this was that the compound had it’s own water well. For the first time in a long time he was looking forward to taking a hot shower. It was a oasis within a dead city. In another room he found it stockpiled with uniforms, bullet proof vests and a vault that had been left ajar. Inspecting that further he found that it held a stockpile of automatic pistols and shotguns, several hundred boxes of 9mm and shotgun ammunition. He whistled through his teeth and realized life was going to get better even if there was a large pack of zombies wandering around outside the walled compound. He retrieved his backpack and fumbled through it for the cigarettes he had found earlier and opened it. Placing one of the cigarettes between his smiling lips, he lit up and inhaled deep of the smoke then thought on what needed to be done. He was going to have to venture out and get food, water and some entertainment. Having nothing to do or eat would, after some time, wear thin and he would retreat further into himself. For the night though, he would feast on the packaged burritos, sodas and potato chips. He took up his backpack and went straight for the shower room, stripped and for the first time in eighteen months, felt the luxury of a hot shower.

The next morning saw a blazing bright sun rise over the Sandia Mountains in the East. Jackson stepped outside, stretched and yawned before placing a cigarette between his lips. He lit up then sucked deep of the acrid smoke and contemplated the day ahead. After he refilled the generator tanks, he would take an armored truck and venture to outside the industrial area. If he was fortunate, he would find food, bottled water and things that would help pass the time until the zombie epidemic past. He saw the armored trucks parked inside the bay loading area and the idea came to him. He slid behind the steering wheel and found the keys dangling from the ignition. The truck started up after a few slow cranks then he backed out of the loading garage after opening the door. He then spent a few moments driving around outside to get the feel of how the armored truck would handle before opening the main gate. It had been sometime since he had driven anything and was amazed at how his driving skills had deteriorated. Mounted on the dash were a couple of switches for opening the compound gates to the outside world and also to open and close the garage doors to the main building. He opened the main gate then pulled the armored truck out onto the street then checked to make sure the gates automatically closed behind him. A small crowd of zombies appeared at the end of the street aroused to life at the sound of the International diesel motor. He mashed the accelerator pedal to the floor. The diesel engine roared and the heavy armored truck lunged forward. The group also charged forward but the armored truck’s heavy steel brush guard caught several of the undead while others in the group fell and were ground under the wheels. The wind shield exploded in a blinding mist of dark blood and chunks of brain and flesh. He remedied the problem by turning on the windshield washers and wipers.

Life had finally dealt him a fair hand and he intended to keep it that way.

He rarely had to venture out from the compound. It had taken several weeks to gather up materials due to most of the supermarkets and other stores having already been looted or burned. Although his quest had taken him from one end of town to the other and he loaded the armored truck up as much as he could with each excursion. He had everything he would ever need. When he did venture out it was for some trivial matter or chasing some thought of a thing that had entered his mind. During these moments he would venture out with an armored truck and go searching for survivors or other things that might have use for him to survive. He had used the armored trucks as a portable siege weapon and had ran over countless zombies through out the city. The armored trucks had numerous gun ports so it was easy enough to poke a gun out and blast a zombie or two.

On one excursion into the City of Rio Rancho, adjacent to Albuquerque, he was driving through a side road and spotted something that looked unnatural to the new world of the dead. He jammed on the brakes, threw the armored truck into reverse and slammed on the brakes again to looked down one of the neighbor hood streets. There were two men, walking down the street towards him but had rifles slung on their shoulders. They saw the armored truck backing up and ran for cover. Jackson could not believe that he was seeing two living human beings. He jumped out and ran around the front of the truck. “Hey!”

The two men could be seen moving away from him across a lawn with trash blowing across it. He called again but the two men kept running.

He held his hands up. “Hey! You ever seen a zombie driving an armored truck?”

One of the men looked back then hid behind a tree. “Go on!”

He shook his head. “What? We’re on the same team! We‘re the living!”

“Fuck if we are. Now get to going before the dead come on back around here. You’re yelling like a bitch will bring ’em all here fuck head!”

He still could not believe that these two men wanted nothing to do with him. He took a step forward and the men took off running further down the street. He thought about chasing them down with the truck but the street was too cluttered with downed trees and cars. What would be the point anyway? “It’s because I’m black right?” He yelled. “You got to be kidding me! You dumb mother fuckers! Go on and get eaten then bitches!” He stormed back to the armored truck, slid behind the wheel and drove off. He had hoped for a better ending. He had wanted to find someone to talk with but in this new world old prejudices seemed to die hard.

The following week he had drove to some upscale neighborhood in Albuquerque, scouting and looking for any possible survivors when he saw an American flag blowing in the breeze in front of one house. There was nothing uncommon with that. In the final days of humanity, everyone flew the American flag but here he felt something was here he might be able to use. The street was a tangled mess of barricades, dried, crusty bodies and burned houses. He surmised that the neighborhood had banded together for a last stand against a horde of zombies and had failed. He hopped over the barricades, carefully holding his Sterling at the ready in case there were zombies still in the area. He came closer to the house and stopped at the end of the driveway and saw an old German World War Two era MG-42 that had been set up in a garage on a tripod pointing downward. He knew exactly what it was as he had always watched cable in the evenings and preferred the History or Military channels. There were countless documentaries dealing with the Germans using this gun to great effect against allied forces during World War Two. A few dozen dead zombies had found out this fact first hand and were laying outside in the driveway and front lawn. Spent shell casings by the hundreds surrounded the old machine gun and told a story of the frantic outcome of the battle. Old dried blood was smeared on the concrete garage floors leading away from the residence and he knew that the guns former owner had been overwhelmed.  He looked around further and also found an old World War Two German Mauser sniper bolt action rifle that had also seen its share of the battle. This he could use to some advantage. The zombies that occasionally swarmed the outside walls of his compound were becoming a nuisance and this rifle could very well be utilized to cut the number of zombies down. Looking cautiously deeper inside the home, he found the family or at least what was left of them. Again, like so many other times before, there would be no survivors. He loaded up the MG-42 and also the few thousand rounds of 8mm Mauser ammunition still packed in ammo cans and loaded them up in the armored truck.

He had gone to some of the book stores and libraries around Albuquerque and pilfered enough reading and video material to keep him busy. He carefully steered away from the porn stores. Not only were these too close to the downtown area, some were too heavily packed with zombies. Also there was no point in watching those films anyway and having to deal with a raging hard-on and no female to help in matters. He had, before the viral outbreak, been into watching action films that were top heavy in guns and testosterone; but now he had had a belly full of that stuff since having to live daily with more guns, guts and zombie action than he cared to admit. The musicals though had caught his attention. Titles like Joseph and the Techni-colored Dream Coat, Miss Saigon or the Sound of Music took him far and away from his current troubles. There were other times though he would target practice from the roof top of the vault building and considered it much needed exercise in survival. If he let down his gun skills completely, there would come a day that he would come to regret that so he made the effort to practice on the zombies that milled around outside the walled complex.

“Aw…” He took another pull from the bottle of Crown Royal before settling back behind the scope of the sniper rifle. “…there you are.” He settled the cross hairs on his zombie victim, one which he had been searching for some time. He had found several cases of Crown Royal and some wine and had decided it had been awhile since he had tied one on. He also decided to practice a little with the Mauser sniper rifle even if he was a little drunk. A large CD stereo player he had bought up to the rooftop with him, played a disco beat from the speakers and he settled into his groove. The Hensoldt scope mounted on the Mauser bought her head into sharp focus and he studied her. Her face was thin, gaunt and he pictured what she must’ve looked like before. The crosshairs moved up and down in rhythm with his breathing. She had been the zombie stripper that had chased him here and it looked like one of her breast implants had fallen out finally. Perhaps he should be grateful and spare the bullet but then again how many people or animals had she killed and ate?

He took up the trigger slack and exhaled. Then again perhaps not. There could not be any possible way the bitch would spare him if the tables were reversed. No zombie would for that matter. The rifle bucked and the gunshot echoed within the compound. The bullet hit the stripper in the forehead, sending a geyser of dark clotted blood, brains and gristle out the back of her head. Her lifeless eyes blinked once, the milky orbs darkening as they filed with blood before she collapsed into a twitching heap. Laughing, he stood up. “Got you bitch!”

The speakers began thumping “Born to be Alive” and he felt the sudden urge to just kill a few more zombies. Life was good and the alcoholic fumes clouded his mind. He picked up the MG-42 and feed a belt of a couple hundred rounds into the chambers, stood up on the ledge and aiming from the hip, let off a long burst. The MG-42 bucked and shook, the reports echoed throughout the compound and the surrounding buildings and spent brass spilled over the ledge. He felt like Rambo kicking ass and fucking bitches. The zombies milled around even though the bullets were ripping and slamming into them. Shot after shot flew into the small horde outside the wall and an occasional burst of red mist exploded through the air indicating head shots. When the belt ran empty, he laughed, held the MG up with one arm above his head. He had eradicated quite a few within a matter of seconds. Yes indeed he was born to be alive.

The morning came as it always did. Jackson rolled over and drew the blanket closer to his face. He moaned and rolled over again and stared at the clock on the wall. Noon. He had slept in until noon. With a throbbing head, he swung his legs over the cot’s edge and sank his face into his hands. He craved a smoke and leaned over and grabbed the pack from the crate of toilet paper he used as bedside table and lit one up. So far he had stayed king of the compound for several months now and felt some twinge of anxiety in not having seen or heard from another human being. When the virus had taken hold of the majority of the population, he had been one of those who chose to stay behind and take his chances in the hopes that the government would come through at the last minute. Military and police officials urged the population to leave the city under escort to the northern city of Santa Fe then on towards Colorado Springs where an even large military presence had a hold. He had joined a small band of other men and women but slowly over the passed year and a half they had fell of to venture out on their own or had died as a result of the zombie virus or to be food for them. He eventually found himself alone finally and had not seen another human being in the last eight months so far. Exhaling sharply, he stood up, mashed the cigarette butt into an ashtray and went for a bottle of water. The MG-42 sat on the table across the room and he cursed softly. It was a waste of ammunition to just blast away so indiscriminately. He had burned through two hundred rounds of the precious ammunition and that was ammo that couldn’t be easily replaced. It was going to be bad enough to have to clean the damned gun also.

He stood up and walked outside to piss. Once outside he heard the snapping moans of the zombies outside the cinder block walls and was thankful to be here. He plugged off one nose nostril and blew a chunk of snot to the ground. He then banged on the wall and yelled out. “Hey, shut the fuck up over there. Can’t a guy piss in peace? Keep that shit down!” All this did was aggravate the zombies on the other side of the wall. The small throng clawed and hammered on the wall from the other side. While pissing into the far corner he looked up and saw the large antenna mounted to the top of the building waving in the breeze. He tilted his head and narrowed his eyes. He had seen the radio set in the office where he had found the dead guard and thought on it. He had been wanting to get on the radio set for sometime but it had always fell to the back burner of things to do. Most of the time he worked on the armored trucks or the gen-set and the fuel station area making sure everything was in top order. Today though he would lay off the booze, drink some water and maybe sit down and scan through the channels. It was possible that the military might be close by. He finished, went back inside the garage and rummaged through some boxes and found a bottle of water before going to the control room.

There were rumors some nine months ago about the military regaining cities lost to the zombie hordes when the virus first took hold. If there were any truth to the rumors he had hear then perhaps maybe the forces were close by. It was also possible he might hear from other survivors.  Walking into the control room, he reached over and turned on the radio set and listened for a few minutes working the dial as he went. The smell of decay from the old guard had dissipated somewhat and was at least tolerable. He took another pull from the water bottle and continued listening to the sound of static.

Being unfamiliar with the radio made it frustrating. There were switches for different meters and bands and it took some time to get use to where he was at frequency wise. After an hour of constant twisting, he was about to give up then the sound of distant voice’s suddenly blared from the speaker. He had to turn the dial back to the opposite direction. Voices! My god human voices! He stood up suddenly and stepped back, tilting his head before calming himself. He sat back down and placed a heavy hand across his mouth, leaning forward to fine tune the dial.

Military. It had to be a military operation of some kind.

A woman’s voice echoed through the static. “Jake? Is it clear up there?”

“It‘s clear so far. I ain’t got nothing. Got zombies lined up the ass on the north side though.”

The woman’s voice came back. “Don’t stay up there wasting ammo. Where‘s Bernie?”

“Umm, don’t see him or the team Jane.”

Another man had keyed his mike. The sound of his voice sounded desperate and out of breath. “South side’s falling apart. Zombies breaking through! The doors did not close fast enough and some have wedged the door open!” The sound of machine gun fire ripped through the airwaves before the mike keyed off.

Another woman keyed up. “We’re on our way Tac! Continue to hold!”

The words were spoken quickly and full automatic gunfire etched the back ground. “We’ve fallen back to the escalators! Tell Doc to fire up that mini gun!”

Jackson was assuming that this Doc guy was somewhere close by. The woman Jane was perhaps instructing him on what to do and after a long pause keyed her mike. “Tac! Get to the top of the escalators and head to B wing. Doc will be there but move fast! Yolanda head to B-wing and cover.”

“Already there and set. Get those damn secondary doors closed! We got like fifty of them bastards inside the perimeter!”

“Working on it!”

Another voice erupted through the airwaves. The man sounded like he was running outside and firing his weapon at the same time. “Abort break out! I say again! Abort!”

Jane came back over the airwaves. “Bernie! Where are you!”

“Headed back to the front doors! Ran into a wall of zombies like two hundred strong or better! No way through and the mother fuckers are chomping our ass‘ hard!”

Outside? It sounded like these people were attempting a break out and it was falling apart quickly. Jackson leaned back and lit a smoke. Even if he was to load up an armored truck with firepower and drive to the scene, the mini battle would be long over with. At this point there would be no point in even trying. It would be best to play it safe and stay off the roads.

“Jake! Can you lay down some suppressing fire with the M203? If we can blow a path free of those bastards we might be able to get the team back here inside!”

“I can but it’s going to be tough! Bernie! Get to running when I start popping!”

“Get to it! We’re down to just me and Mac!”

The airwaves stayed silent for a moment. The man known as Tac came back sounding breathless. “Got the doors closed and beginning clean up of the zombies.”

“Yolanda?”

No answer then Tac came back. “She and Nelson set up a perimeter but it got over ran. They’re gone.”

The man named Jake came back on the air. “Jane…Bernie didn’t make it either. A fucking wall of zombies got to ‘em just as I was lobbing in the explosives.”

“So that’s…four of us left?”

No one answered.

Jackson took another swallow of water. Should he even say anything? All his life he had played it straight and stayed low to avoid trouble but these were different times. These days even the most solitude of people had to rely on total strangers. He keyed the mike. “…Umm hello?” He winced. Just what the hell was he doing? Why should he bother? There was nothing he could do and to leave the safety of the armored vault was almost unthinkable. He tossed the mike on the table like it had scalded him.

The radio cackled and the woman’s voice came over the speakers. Jackson paused mid-step unsure he was doing the right thing. “Hello? Anyone else out there on this frequency…come back?”

He leaned over to the radio set and slowly picked up the mike. Should he even answer the call? If he was smart, he would just shut the thing off right now. He had a standing rule to help no one, not even if they were in trouble. To risk his neck was unthinkable but the time alone had taken a toll on his mental health.

He keyed the microphone. “Hello?” He answered back through gritted teeth.

The woman’s voice came back to him sounding as surprised as he was. “Hello? My God a voice..!”

He didn’t respond then after several minutes her voice came back over the speakers and he wondered what she would look like. “Hello? My name is Jane Masters…” He wondered just what in hell was he going to do. “…we are trapped in the down town area of Albuquerque and we need help.”

Oh hell no! Downtown? He knew the downtown area was packed with zombies. In the opening days on the viral outbreak the military had tried to regain control of the downtown area and had come up on the losing end of that engagement. He had done his best to avoid the area. There were hundreds, if not thousands of zombies wandering the streets and open buildings. “Where at? I got my own problems here.” He was careful not to mention his exact location. If somehow the people on the other end were to actually do a break out and succeed, they would come to where he was at and possibly kick him out of the vault.

“At the Lovelace hospital in the downtown area.”

He knew where they were at. The hospital was a fairly large complex some eight stories tall with smaller winged buildings attached. As long as they had taken precautions they might survive but they would have to do a breakout and then their chances of survival out in the open downtown area were slim at best. “How many of you there? I heard the military was coming in. You guys military?”

“No, we’re not but have several guys…“ another long pause. “…well…had. We got a couple left who were. We got nothing here but zombies. We tried a break out but…” The words fell off into silence and for a moment Jackson thought Jane had un-keyed her mike. “…lost six guys in the process and got pushed back here again. We’ve been here for several weeks now. Water and food from the cafeteria being rationed out. Can you help?”

He remained silent for a long moment. He lit a cigarette to help calm his nerves. To help would be suicide and there was the possibility this was a trap of some kind. “No, I’m stuck where I’m at.” Best to play it safe.

“You don’t sound to convincing. We are in need of help and need to get out of here. We can hold out for several more days and then that’s it. We are barely holding them off from breaking through the first floor.”

He took another long drag on the cigarette and leaned over the table. “Sorry to hear that but like I said, I got my own set of problems here.”

“Your problems? We got thousands of problems.”

“Look, let me think on it. What the fuck you doing down there anyway?”

“We were looking for weapons. We heard the military had tried to retake this area and left behind tons of equipment.” Another pause then she continued this time with a sense of urgency in her voice. “While you’re thinking, remember there are four people…four living human beings who need your help.”

“Tomorrow. I’ll have an answer tomorrow. Same time here on the radio dial.” Thinking on it would do no good for them, he thought. Who in their right mind go downtown? What the fuck were they thinking? That this zombie epidemic was some chance for a vacation sight seeing tour?

“Tomorrow is not good enough. We need the answer now. This is just as hard for us to trust you as it is for you to trust us. You don’t know us from Adam but we are people in need of help like right now. Tomorrow we could all be dead.”

He was breaking his own rule but she did have a valid point. What if this was the last time he would ever hear from another human being? What if he never spoke to another woman ever again? What if the tables were turned? What if he was the one trapped and needed help? Too many questions and never enough answers. The final thought was it was just the right thing to do or at least that’s what he kept telling himself.  “Okay…I can try and punch through somehow.”

“How do you plan on accomplishing that?”

“I got an armored truck I’ll be in with some firepower.”

“Armored? Like a military vehicle?”

“No armored truck as in ‘delivering the money’ kind of truck.”

The airwaves were silent for a long moment and Jackson was beginning to doubt he should even try. “It will work but that’s a top heavy vehicle.”

“Short and low though. I can make it in and out. I’ve been in tighter situations.” But nothing like being downtown. He told himself.

“Doc says you’re right but you need to come around to the west side of the complex to the loading docks. We can get you in and shut the doors quickly. We will give fire support from there while you get inside.”

He thought on that. It was bad enough to have to drive directly to the hospital and into the dock area but what other options were there? If he parked at a safe distance and had the five people run to meet him then that was a suicide run for them and also unthinkable. Even if he was laying down suppressing fire that plan would just cost five people’s lives. No it would be better to go to the loading dock, go in and load up the people then shag ass back to the main road. It was the only plan that came to mind. “All right…it sounds like a reasonable plan. Can’t have you crackers running out of the hospital in broad daylight with a horde of zombies on your ass’. I’ll go to the west end and you guys better be ready. Once this game starts we ain’t playing Forrest Gump with this shit.”

“We’ll be ready just you be there. I’m thinking noon as most of the zombies seem to retreat further into downtown for some reason but once the commotion starts it’ll be like a tsunami wave of zombies hitting us.”

That was reassuring. The very idea that he might not make it began to cloud over in his mind. “Okay…noon…high noon then.”

“Another thing Jackson…” her voice dropped off again. “…you’re a saint and I mean that.”

He just hoped and prayed that this was not going to end with him losing everything including his life. He would take the larger armored truck in and take along the MG-42 and the Sterling as a just in case. “I’ll contact you around noon…be ready.” He leaned over, switched the radio set off then lit another cigarette lost in his thoughts wondering what he had gotten himself into and what the next day would bring.

*                                 *                                 *

Jackson stood on the freeway overpass, looking through his binoculars at the scene surrounding the old hospital. There were hundreds of zombies milling around the vast parking lot and a thicker crowd had gathered at the base of the building. Going in was going to be rough but there was another entrance Jane had pointed out on the west end of the complex which he couldn’t see from this angle. He took the walkie talkie from his belt and called out for Jane several times.

After a few minutes her voice drifted across the airways. “Jane here.”

“About damn time, I was contemplating leaving.”

“Making preparations and getting the stuff lined up to take with us. Also we’re in position but I warn you once the fireworks start it’ll be a bloody mess.”

“Yeah no shit. You ready then?”

“As much as we’ll ever be.”

“I’m on my way.” He hooked the mike back on the duty belt, readjusted the bullet proof vest to feel some what more comfortable then slid behind the wheel of the armored truck. He saw his MP3 player sitting in the cup holder and grabbed it then tucked it in one of the vest pockets. There was no point in leaving it behind if he had to bail out.

Jackson placed the truck in gear and rolled forward down the off ramp. The bottom of the ramp was a clutter of cars, long abandoned from since the first outbreak. He placed the truck in low gear and pushed through the mass of a dozen cars before making a right turn onto the main street that was void of cars but plentiful with an ocean of zombies.

Jackson inhaled sharply when the horde of zombies saw him. He quickly floored the accelerator pedal and rammed into the throng of zombies. Soft bodies flew back or were caught under the wheels. The snarling zombies clawed the truck on the drivers door and he jammed the barrel of the Sterling through the gun port and let loose a long burst. Heads exploded in a mist and bullets ripped into their rotted torsos. He kept his foot on the pedal and saw the truck was having trouble trying to push its way through the massive horde of zombies that had gathered in front of him.

He slammed it into reverse and drove backwards for several hundred yards then slammed back into first gear and floored the peddle. He had gained enough speed and momentum to blast through the zombies. He looked in his rear view mirror just as the rear of the truck lifted up and saw the rear tandems roll over the head of a zombie. It’s head exploded outward like a mini volcano and the rear bounced back to the asphalt. Up ahead to his right was the driveway to the west end of the complex and he grabbed a gear and shot down it with zombies running after him. Up ahead a chain link gate appeared around the short bend.

The gate opened and several men appeared. One large over muscular black man knelt down and let loose a long volley from an M249 while an Oriental man tossed a grenade off to the far right. The explosion ripped through the horde sending a geyser of limbs, heads and headless torsos flying through the air. The white man in the group rolled up a contraption on a platform with a multi-barreled weapon mounted on it and cut loose. Jackson rolled forward and opened the door and leaned out to yell out to the black man. “Where the hell’s the dock?”

“About fucking time! Get on down the ramp and inside! We’ll cover you!”

He slammed the door shut and moved off towards the dock. In his mirrors he could see that the men were having trouble trying to close the gate. Zombies by the hundreds pressed against each other and the gate. He saw the black man yell and start to run with the white dude following close behind. The Oriental guy was running in reverse, firing his M4 as he went. The gates opened and the flood poured in just as he tripped and fell then was up and limping. He had made it inside the parking garage just as the white dude and the soul brother had ran inside behind him. The Oriental was hobbled and saw his life being torn away from him.

“Oh shit!” He had not made it this far to lose any one if it could be avoided.

The white dude pointed out to the man known as Jake. “Jake, get down with some covering fire. We can’t lose Tac!”

Jackson jumped out of the armored truck. “Hold that fucking door!” Then dashed outside holding his Sterling at the ready. Tac was running as best as he could, limping and hopping but the zombie horde was quickly catching up to him. High up to his right on top of a small grassy knoll with sparse shrubs, hundreds more zombies slammed against a chain link fence. It was only a matter of time before the whole fence line was trampled down and they invaded the loading dock.

Tac tripped and fell then rolled over just as a zombie reached for him. Jackson ran forward with the Sterling blazing blowing the zombie backward to land flat on it‘s back. The gun emptied the magazine and he quickly changed it out for a fresh one. Tac sprang up, rolling to his feet and ran past him. Jackson leveled the Sterling and downed several more just as the gun ran empty again. He paused to reload just as a burly zombie in a tattered business suit rushed through a gap in the chain link fence above and jumped down to the pavement.

The zombie had the looks of having been a successful business man or some political leader. He ran across the driveway and caught Jackson by surprise when it swiped out at him. He felt a deep burn across his shoulder and arm. “You mother fucker!” He unloaded the Sterling into the zombie allowing the weapon to start low catching the undead being first in the groin then upwards across the torso. The hollow point bullets blew chunks of raw and rotten meat out into the air and the final rounds blew apart it’s head in a mist of pulpy gore.

Tac grabbed hold of Jackson’s shirt sleeve and pulled hard. The zombies had broken through the fence on the embankment above and were cascading down across the thin patch of grass and shrubs to fall the ten feet or so to the concrete dock work. It reminded Jackson of a waterfall that had been turned on but in this case it was zombies flowing like water through a broken dike. The other horde at the end of the driveway pushed the gates wide open and were rushing in.

Jake and Doc were just inside the doorway and let loose another volley from their rifles. A woman with long blonde hair, whom Jackson assumed was Jane, appeared and held out an A12 shotgun and cut loose with a burst of buckshot. The horde rippled under the effects, faltered then came surging forward just as Tac and Jackson ran under the closing door.

The sound of the zombies slamming into the metal door echoed throughout the loading dock area and Jackson knelt over and grabbed his knees, breathing hard. Again he had managed to evade certain death. He looked over at Tac who sat down on a wooden crate. He nodded. “Hey thanks. I thought I was going to be the main course there for a moment.”

“Main course? More like an hors-d’oevres. You ain’t got that much meat to you.”

Jane walked up and placed a hand on his shoulder  “You’re…” She let her voice trail off.

“Black? Used to get that a lot in the old days.”

She pointed to his arm. “No, your arm, you’re bleeding.”

He looked at the cut. After all the precautions he had taken to not get cut or hurt, all the survival skills he had honed to a fine edge and now he had finally succumbed to his worst fears. He stood dumbfounded and the others backed away slowly.

Doc pushed his glass’ up the bridge of his nose, grabbed Jackson’s arm and looked. “Infected!” he whispered then stepped back.

“Bullshit!…after all that shit…” Jackson wobbled on his feet then fell to his knees. He knew he had been cut by the zombie but thought it was superficial but with the adrenaline flowing at the time, he had no real idea on how bad it actually was. “How…?”

“How long before the conversion?” Doc finished the question then pulled the Beretta 9mm from his holster. “It depends. I’ve seen as little as two hours to as long as forty-eight hours. From the infection field surrounding the cut area, I would venture a guess of eight hours.”

Eight hours! The thought slammed into him. The idea that he would become one of the living dead was beyond belief. He felt fine other than the itchy feeling from where the zombie had clawed him but inside the infection was growing rapidly and in its beginning stages of destroying the immunity system then the white blood cells. He shook his head. I should’ve played it better, done it different and not even been here to begin with.

“Is there anything we can do?” Jane yelled at Doc.

Doc sighed. “If the cut was on his forearm, I’d say amputate but this is higher up in the shoulder region. I’m afraid there is nothing we can do.”

Jackson pulled his canteen and drank deep of the water thinking this was going to be some of the last things he would have a chance to enjoy. He laughed to himself then pulled a cigarette between trembling fingers, lit it and allowed the smoke bit deep inside his lungs. Yes he should have said no to all of this. The others in the group had clustered together, discussing their options and what needed to be done.

“What we gonna do about him?” Jake pointed a thick finger at Jackson.

Jackson looked up. All eyes were upon him. “What the fuck about me?”

“We sure as hell ain’t takin him along.”

Jane looked at Jake. “We can’t just leave him here either. He risked his life to get here.”

“How ’bout we just bust a cap in his ass and be done with sentiments?”

Jackson lifted up the Sterling and flipped the safety off. “Hey fuck you asshole. If you want a piece of this you just come right the fuck on.” The barrel wavered at the small group like a third eye. “I’ll blow the shit outa all you and we all go down Hell‘s Highway together.”

“Now hold on there…” Doc held up his hand.

“No you hold on! I risked my ass getting here to help you guys out and look what the hell it got me! Now you want to kill me like it’s a mercy thing?”

“You know what will happen then if you come along. We take you then you turn into one of those zombies out there then you turn on us.” Jake turned to the others. “You see that right?”

Jane looked down. “I’m sure we all do but this is insane. We can’t just leave him here or shoot him. What would that make us? Better people?”

“I’ll make it easy then, I’ll stay. I’m infected anyway but I‘m doing this my way.” Jackson could feel something was wrong within him and he was coming to terms with his final demise. He didn’t know if it was the thought of the virus coursing through his veins that was making him sick or the fact he had left his sanctuary to help these people and he would never be able to return to it.

“What’s the point of that? We can end it for you now?”

“None of your god damn business. It’s my way or you’re not getting the location of the vault or the codes to get in.”

Doc pushed his glass’ further up his nose with a long finger. “Well I think he is right. I say let him have it his way. There is no point in taking him with us and having to deal with this later.”

Jake waved a hand in front of him. “What the hell you going to do?”

Jackson exhaled a cloud of cigarette smoke. “Take as many to hell as I can before checking out myself.”

Tac shrugged his shoulders. “I say let him have his way. I’d want it that way.” He looked over at Jake and nodded. “I know as sure as hell you would too.”

Jackson and Jake locked eyes. “What you say man?”

Jake snorted. “I guess, if that’s the way you want it. It ain‘t no sweat off my balls.”

Doc stepped forward. “I wish circumstances were different. All I can say is thank you.” He nodded to the others. “Let’s get loaded up.” The men began stacking crates of weapons and ammunition by the rear doors.

Jane stepped forward and removing a necklace, she reached up behind his head and clipped it in place. “It’s something for you. I know it’s no consolation but you have given up so much to help us.” She leaned over and hugged him and Jackson closed his eyes breathing deep of her faint aroma of perfume.

“When you get back to the vault, down off Industrial Avenue, just hit the switch mounted on the dash. It’ll open the gate. Hit the other blue button and it’ll open the garage door.” Then as an after thought. “Inside is a case of some high dollar perfume I took from one of my excursions. Hell if I know what use I had for it but I think you can use it more than I can. The rest of the things you guys can figure out.”

Tac opened the rear doors to the armored truck and saw the MG-42 and whistled. “That’s an old gun there!”

Jackson leaned over. “Leave that here.  I’m going to need that and the ammo belts too.”

Jane looked at Tac and nodded. Tac then took hold of the MG-42, admired it for a second then handed it up to Jackson. Jackson took the long gun, opened the top and feed in a fresh belt of ammo, then slapped the top down and pulled back on the charging handle. “You best get going.” He stood up on the loading dock edge. A slight fever was coming over him, the effects of the virus as it began to take over his body. He had no plans to become a zombie but in the meantime he had his plan worked out in his mind. He would have a war with the zombies. Running back deeper into the hospital killing as he retreated. Then with his final bullet…he shook off the thought but knew what he was going to do. Jane and the others loaded up what weapons they had and then themselves. She gave a thin smile as the rear doors closed. The gun ports opened and barrels of M4’s and M249s poked through readying for the onslaught.

Jackson smiled as the armored truck backed up and he waved a final farewell. The garage door clicked open and began it’s trek upwards and he could see the feet of zombies packed against it. He checked the Sterling, making sure it was loaded and ready then slung it over his shoulder. He stuffed the ear phones into his ears and held up his MP3 player and cycled through the menu and found a song he liked. Michael Jackson’s voice streamed out ’Don’t Stop till You Get Enough’. He smiled wondering just where that Disco era went. At least Michael held on to the disco beat throughout most of his career and the dude could dance too even if he was a bit odd there later in life. The armored truck sped through the bunched mass of zombies, some clawed at the side panels, others fell to be crushed under it’s wheels and with a quick turn had disappeared from view up the curved driveway. He wished them well. The zombie horde saw the lone figure standing on the loading dock and the wave of undead flesh surged forward. He exhaled sharply, lifted the MG-42 up to waist height and pulled back on the trigger.

fin

—–

John L. Thompson currently lives in New Mexico. When he is not working the daily grind, he is found writing short stories, poetry and reworking novel scripts. His work can be found in publications such as Shotgun Honey, Yellow Mama and Rune Wright’s Best Served Cold Anthology to name a few.

I was going to shut off the phone, mute the TV, crank up some metal and punk and watch vintage roller derby footage.  I had plenty of beer in the fridge, but I need some lime cilantro taco flavored chips.  I pulled into the Snag-n-Dash to pick some up.  The door pinged when I came in, and just as I walked past the ATM I saw a zombie in aisle 3.

“Great”, I said, “just what I need, a shambler.”

The guy behind the counter looked scared.  He was just staring as it was slowly making its way up towards the register.  I sighed, he must be new in town.

I said, “Don’t worry, it isn’t fresh and can’t move around very fast anymore.  Where are you from?”

“Uh, Plowdonk.”

I thought so:  A hick from up north.

“Is that a…”

“A zombie? Yeah. They’re okay; just a hassle, mostly.  They just do the stinky shuffle and slow down traffic, clear out public parks, that sort of thing.  The National Guard and is supposed to be cleaning them up, but they don’t seem to be working as hard as they could.  You know how it is with government workers.  Just make sure to lock your back door and close your garage.  You would be surprised how many people forget.  The zombies are slow, so if you keep your eyes open and stay away from them, you’ll be fine.  Oh, and whatever you do, don’t hit them with your car.  They will dent the fenders and the mess they leave is nasty.  The car wash guys won’t touch it, so you’re on your own with a bucket and a hose.”

“So, where do you live?”  I asked.  I was wondering if he had a chance of surviving until his next shift, or if he was smarter than average and would actually last through the weekend.  I heard shuffling steps, and cans falling to the floor when it bumped into a shelf.  I found the chips in aisle 4 and quickly took two bags.

“I live about two blocks from here, in the Sharlatan Apartments.  I got it for really cheap.   It’s a basement apartment, but it’s really nice.  There are windows on the top half of the wall, and they just repainted and carpeted.”  He was glancing over my shoulder.

“Oh, okay.”  I said, reaching the register.

“Yeah, you’re dog food,” I thought.  “Nobody does home improvement around here.  It must have been a major cleanup.”  I looked at him, thinking, “I’ll bet my chips and beer you’ll be doing the wiggly man dance by morning.  Too bad, he seemed like a nice kid.”

I tried to change the subject.  “Well, you better ring me up, he’s getting closer.”

The zombie wheezed as it approached the sunglasses display.  It sounded like it was being squeezed under a car after the jacks buckled.

The cashier’s eyes were wide as he watched the zombie over my shoulder.  He tried to ring me up three times before I just dropped a couple of dollars on the counter and grabbed my chips.  It was time to go.

“See ya later”, I said.

“Hey!” He shouted,  “What am I supposed to do?”

The zombie was shuffling behind the counter.

“Just hit him in the head, it works every time.”

I turned to go.  It was getting late and my chips were getting impatient.  Then I stopped.  The poor hick didn’t know anything.  He looked kind of pathetic, allowing himself to be cornered and now he was throwing packs of cigarettes and breath mints.  The zombie was closing on him, and he was getting desperate.

I stood for a moment, torn.  One survival rule I have is to never get involved.  I have seen too many  “Good Samaritans” get eaten to death and then stand up when they should be nicely dead. The kid ran out of things to throw, and started swatting the shambler’s head with Slim Jims. The zombie let out another slow wheeze as its mouth opened in anticipation, it’s black tongue lolling out.

“Frikkin’ zombies.”  I really didn’t have time for this, but I couldn’t just walk out.  It would be like ignoring a child or a puppy.  Like I said, pathetic.  My bat was in the car, but I didn’t have time, so I looked around.

“Hey, flesh bag!” I yelled, and threw a gallon of expired milk at the side of his head.  Then I came in close, smacking its rotten face with a closed umbrella, but staying just out of reach.  The zombie didn’t react; it was too focused.  He got the kid pinned against the window that faced the gas pumps.  They looked like kissing teenagers as the zombie held him in a tight hug and started snapping, then biting.  I winced a little when it bit off the kid’s nose and the blood spattered against the glass.

The kid was screaming like he was the defending champion in a noise contest.

“I tried to tell you,” I said to him.

You can’t save someone who doesn’t listen.  I thought maybe I should call the undead hotline, but it was always busy and they probably wouldn’t come out anyway.

“God, that guy’s loud.  I can’t hear myself think.”  I thought.

I knew it was too late, but I figured what the hell.  I picked up the hot dog roller and smashed it over it’s sloughing head.

“Oh, that’s just f’ing perfect,” I cursed under my breath.   I really liked that shirt, now it looked like a zombie goo Rorschach.  “I was done with this day, had my chips in may hand, but no.  I ignored my rule and hung out to save the cute lost puppy.  Now he’s gonna be a fresh runner and my Misfits shirt is is covered in zombie parfait.   Forget the chips.  I’m hitting the beer.”

I was about to leave when if finally hit me; maybe things weren’t so bad after all.  I whistled to myself as I emptied the cash register, grabbed a basket, and started shopping.

Cord inched up onto his elbows, raised his head like a sleepy dragon, and peered out from beneath a messy clump of thick brown hair. He felt like puking. His head dropped back onto the counter, and he braced himself with his hands. Swallowed hard, then wiped his forehead with the back of his hand and wished he’d gone somewhere else tonight. Or nowhere. He sat up slowly, determined to take the shots from here, seated. He needed the money. And besides, he’d already dragged his ass here.

“Shit” he mumbled to himself when he saw Laney, his stupid ex girlfriend show up with her new girlfriend, Quincy. Hasn’t even been a week. Not in the mood for that. Sigh. He was hurt when she dumped him for a girl, and a little turned on. The though of slapping her across the face popped into his mind. So did the thought of them kissing. More. He noticed he wasn’t too hungover for everything and shifted a little on his stool. Grinder was crowded as hell tonight, anyway. Maybe they wouldn’t notice him.

“Get the pics and get out” he said aloud.

“Need something else?” the bartender asked.

“No,” he tried to smile. “No. I’m good.” Cord sipped his club soda and breathed deep.

Fourth song of the set and the gatekeepers were picking up momentum. Grinder packed in 500 at most.  Tonight looked like more than that. The second story was jammed and the floor was standing room only. The stage was maybe four feet higher than the floor and crammed with hot goth chicks whose expression wavered between a carefully honed presentation of disinterest and honest lust as they watched the band. Dark, draped clothes, bodices. The androgynous girlboys, grrls, boyz. Every version of genders quite unique in the making: derbies and caps, suspenders, spats, boots and miniskirts, skirts over pants, and anything pinstriped that ever existed. And good looking gang of misfits, at that. No matter what you were looking for, you’d find it. Cord wondered if maybe he’d find someone new tonight too, and straightened up with his camera in hand. Tried to look cool and professional. The crowd swayed a little as the band revved into high gear.

The lead singer went by the letter “G.” G’s voice was ragged, low, and full of smoke. He snarled and raised his right arm up over his head; as his sleeve fell back it exposed a long, tribal looking tattoo that traced the muscles of his forearm, maybe all the way to his shoulder. A roar welled up from the crowd as G jumped onto the amp and howled.

Nice work if you can get it, Cord figured. Click. Cord got the shot. “Perfect” huffed to himself and inched off the stool into the crowd. G was in excellent form tonight. Cord shot a few more pics of the stage, capturing just the top of the fans at the base, their mussed hair and pounding fists.

The bassist wore a dark hooded sweatshirt, with the hood tied tight around his face, only his gloomy hazel eyes peering out like a pair of tarnished nickels. He leaned into the mike and started saying something. Not the lyrics. Cord couldn’t make it out. G held his mike in both hands and started talking, too, but with the screeching guitars bringing the song to a close, he couldn’t understand the lyrics. It didn’t matter. Gatekeepers were the new thing. Their tune “Corpse Walk” went viral two months ago. Every gig since went wild, and every one of them had been packed. Just like tonight.

Cord smiled. “Timing.” One perfect picture of the night and maybe he’d edge out another local photographer for a better spot of his own. He looked around. Grinder was a total dive. Busted tables, dinged up bar. Whatever. Most of the freaks that turned out tonight probably originally bought tickets to see the next band, Creepy Jesus. Since the gig was announced two months ago, Gatekeepers blew them away. This was the band to shoot tonight. He had no good reason to stick around after they finished. At least not for long. And two very good reasons to leave: Laney and Quincy.

About six people shoved their way to the front wearing homemade t-shirts with lyrics painted on the back and The Gatekeeper’s emblem, a large “G” with a small “k” and a row of lines like a little iron gate between them on the front. Got to love a band that either sells or inspires homemade shirts. No cross marketing for Gk. They didn’t look bad. The lyrics were from that viral YouTube hit, their minor popularity amidst the margins of goth scene made them a minor big deal. That kind of popularity is as hidden as veins, and just as forceful. No gleeful little babysitting brats or tweens would show up here popping bubble gum at these shows. This show, and pretty much every show at Grinder was for the other people. The ones who were lonely kids and grew up knowing better than to care or hope for anything. In high school they would’ve been alone at the lunch table. Now in or out of college they were just always alone. Except here. That’s why Grinder was always packed. Every night. No matter what band they dug up to play from some bumfuck town. They needed to be here. Together.

Cord thought about his last conversation with Laney. He’d told her his heart was a cavern where the devil lived. He was trying to sound poetic, eccentric. No wonder she dumped him.     Cord glanced toward Laney. She was offbeat, random, spontaneous and adorable. Long sandy brown hair always pulled back in a loose pony tail. She was adorable. He still loved her a little he thought, but not enough to whine about it. Just enough to be pissed knowing she was screwing someone other than him. He looked around but didn’t see them.

G cut into their best tune. They hadn’t even written it. Genius. It was a bunch of lines from a book. Cord couldn’t remember the lyrics. Something Nietzsche wrote about the last man and having chaos in yourself. It was dark, cruel, and ugly. He noticed his head bobbing to the driving bass line, and liked the song as much as he had the first time he heard it, maybe more. He popped out his camera and started shooting. Lighting was a perfect clean stream onto G’s face and the smoke in the room was just opaque enough to infuse an odd mood. Cord smiled thinking he may not have to adjust the images too much digitally when he got home. “One good shot” he mumbled to himself as he clicked.

“You still have chaos in yourselves” G growled, the lyrics pounding around them, everyone chanting and bellowing the underdog’s anthem. Cord started snapping pictures as fast as he could, tried to capture the energy in the room, in G’s voice.

“We have invented happiness, says the last men, and they blink” G crooned. Crowd surged wild, really let go. Cord looked around and noticed something else. Strange. Changes happening to them, within them. To their expressions. Too intense. This he hadn’t expected. The general enthusiasm of the audience seemed too focused, too wild. Weird. Loud murmuring swells of agitated voices buckled up under the bass line, like the crowd took over the song. Cranking, snapping sounds crashed around him as he saw the crowd knocking over chairs and tables, anything in the way of being a few feet closer to G.

“Shit!” he mumbled. The show in Dover two nights ago went berserk and got busted up after Gatekeepers played, and most figured it was drug induced. From the looks of things, Cord started to wonder. All the underground reporters kept using the term “cult following” to refer to G, but this gave it a whole new meaning.

The whole crowd looked dim-eyed, dull as the song tripped into an improv jam. The hoard of voices swelled in the sweaty crowd, still chanting, “the time is coming, the time is coming.” They started to move almost in unison, continuing their grunting chant. It freaked Cord out more than a little as he looked around and saw the movements become bumpy and disjointed. People jostled into each other numbly, mindlessly, and everyone focused on G like he was more savior than rocker. As he motioned his arms, the crowd followed, clanging and slapping into each other like they couldn’t help it, couldn’t even control themselves.

Mesmerism, hypnotism, incantation? Cord couldn’t figure it out, but he’d been spared. He never made any eye contact with G or anyone on stage, or anyone else in the room for that matter. Too busy fumbling with his camera.

Cord kept clicking, but he now looked at the crowd instead of through the lens. He caught his breath when he saw more than chairs breaking. Some dumb kid got shoved down to the floor, arm bent back as he slid slowly beneath a pair of chunky combat boots. Cord watched it snap. The kid didn’t even wince, he just pushed himself up against the wall and kept bobbing his head to the beat. His arm swung around him like an unattached branch snagged on his shirt.

The raw brutality of the injury made Cord wince. Worse than that, everywhere he looked there was a mobbed mass of people throbbing and pushing like a fleshy frenzy. They responded to G instantly with his every gesture and utterance, yet they hurled themselves around with a disjointed insanity unlike anything Cord had seen. They moved too fast, backwards, arms jutting out and grabbing each other in a fury. Like a backwoods religious revival. Cord imagined it must be like speaking in tongues or something as he watched the crowd gyrating and twitching. A few of them landed into each other and looked to be having some pretty intense enjoyment with it all.

“I may have a bit of a pervert streak, but I can’t watch that . . . “ Cord muttered to himself, glancing away to find another group shoving and punching each other wildly. “It’s like the whole room gave way to some primal instinctive . . . “ he stopped. Suddenly thought of Laney. And her damn girlfriend. “Shit.”

Cord looked through the thick mass of mounded bodies pumping with the rhythm into whatever version of fantasy they manifested. Everywhere he looked he saw ugly, sexy, violent bodies thrusting. A few bits of wall had blood splattered on them from God knows what. Cord felt a little queasy again and became acutely aware of a stenches permeating the room. Something tinny, something sour. He didn’t want to look at the floor as he felt something squish and snap as he stepped carefully around the bar. Whatever energy permeated the room, Cord seemed well insulated from its infectious spark, for whatever reason.

Cord snapped a few pictures as he nudged his way back toward the bathrooms, but he decided this was a night he didn’t want to document. Whatever he had, he’d delete this shit and stick to the concert footage. No one needed to know what was going on here. He imagined a flurry of concerned parent groups flickering in internet chatrooms if his photos went public. The hot glare of their judging contempt would spill onto him. Get him 15 minutes of fame maybe. Well, he’d have to figure out later if it was worth it. Right now he had to find Laney.

“What if she’s in there?” Cord asked himself, looking into the thick crowd of orgiastic overindulgence. His eyes landed on a single face: her open mouth a bloody smiling smear, eyes glazed, thick black eyeliner smeared, nose looked a little busted, but still that awful crazy smile. The face turned back into the crowd and he watched her biting into the people around her as they pushed around her in a swirling rhythmic motion. No way this was drug induced. There wasn’t a drug he could name that did this to a person. Cord couldn’t figure anything that would make a person let go of themselves this way, of their inhibitions and taboos. They all just went crazy.

“Laney!” Cord yelled out. “Laney!” he pleaded to no one. He stood outside the bathroom, then decided maybe he should see what was going on for himself. So what if it was the women’s room? Not like any rules mattered right now. He shoved open the door and flung himself in. “Laney, you in here?” he looked around nervously and saw only a few closed stall doors and two people in the corner. Sandy brown hair. That pony tail. She lifted her chin up as Quincy lowered her head onto her throat. Shit. Laney was even hot zombified.

“Laney!” Cord yelled again.

“Shit, Cord. What the fuck are you doing in the women’s room?”

Laney answered. Normal. Thank God. He felt relieved, but didn’t want to look like a stalker. Too late for that probably. Besides, bigger problems waited for them out there.

“You’re fucking in the women’s room . . . ”

“We’re not fucking, asshole.” Quincy was so charming. Lucky and charming. Lucky Charms sounded good. Maybe I’m, feeling better, Cord thought. Focus . . .

“Look, this is going to sound crazy . . .”

“Already passed crazy, Cord. You’re in the women’s room watching me,” Laney said.

“No, seriously. I’m not. Something’s wrong out there. Remember what they said about Gatekeeper’s show in Dover? How everyone went nuts? It’s worse than that . . . worse than you could imagine. Everyone’s” Cord paused, not knowing how to explain the frenzy he’d witnessed out there. “everyone’s real fucked up. Bat shit crazy. I’m not kidding. I don’t think it’s safe. We have to get out of here. Look for yourselves,” he motioned to the door.

Laney and Quincy straightened out their shirts and headed toward the door, pushed it slightly ajar just enough to see the foggy air filled with arms and legs. The sound of groaning pleasure and pain filled the bathroom. They let the door slam shut.

“H-holy shit!” Quincy stammered.

“No shit,” Laney stepped back from the door.

“Right. Now what are we gonna’ do? Is there a way out from in here?” Cord asked.

“No. Window’s too narrow. We’ve got to go through them” Quincy pointed to the door and looked down at her boots. “Think we can get out the front?”

“I don’t know. I haven’t seen any of the staff for like five minutes. It just, everyone just freaked out when they started the jam session. We have to stick together, OK? If we link arms, tight, maybe we can avoid being pulled into their mob.” Cord shrugged. It wasn’t much of a plan, but what else could they do?

“Right, right. We should keep our backs to it if we can, maybe. Avoid looking in at . . . at whatever the hell is going on in there.” Laney looked at Quincy, who nodded back at her.

“Good idea, Laney” Quincy said. “Do we have any room at the bar? It looked like they were all grouped toward the stage.”

“Maybe a little. And they’re pretty much in their own world, man. I mean, they’re not interested in much outside themselves, at least from what I could tell. It’s just all moving pretty fast, pretty wild. So we have to move quickly,” Cord’s voice shook, but he tried to keep it together.

They grouped together in a row, Laney in the center, clasped both their forearms. Cord stood in front and gave the door a nudge with his shoe. It opened slowly, silently. He reached back with his free hand and gave Laney’s hand a little squeeze.

“Im really glad you’re OK. Both of you. Hold on to the bar with your free hand when we get there,” Cord said back to Quincy. She nodded.

They pushed out into the smoky room. Stage lights still blinked up at the Gatekeepers. G bounced around the stage like an insane conductor, pulling the crowd together in their frenzied festival of flesh. Maybe he’d seen them, maybe he hadn’t. Not one of them felt capable of looking directly up at G. they shimmied close against the bar, working toward the front entrance. Twenty feet, fifteen. Feet shuffling. A stray hand grabbed at Quincy’s hip, clenched it tightly. She felt her leg give way beneath her and the clutch tightened. The fingers pressed through the fabric of her jeans, into the flesh. Little welts moistened with blood as it puckered up beneath the pressing hand. Quincy didn’t dare look at the face connected to that hand as she tried to pry herself free from the grip. She knew it’d be a wild-eyed monster or worse.

“What’s wrong with them?” Quincy quivered.

“Just keep moving,” Laney said.

Quincy’s jeans tore off at the knee as the hand slipped way, maybe moved to more welcoming flesh. Her stomach turned.

“Almost there. Through this door,” Cord pulled them through the sheer plastic inner door that marked the ticket entrance. It was a small room, but seemed safe enough for now. No one had leaked through here. They looked out the glass doors. Normal. No one out there either. At least not yet. The Gatekeepers earned their name.

“Just think, they used to say ‘backmasking’ inspired demonic possession. What would they say about live shows?” Cord smiled.

Quincy and Laney looked at him flatly. “Too soon to joke?” he asked.

“I’d say. Hey, we’re parked right there” Laney pointed to the second car in the lot. Her beat up hatchback never looked better. Can we drop you somewhere?”

“That’d be great. I walked from the transit. You mind taking me all the way home? I don’t feel like . . . like dealing with any more public. Or crowds.” Cord blinked at them, hopeful. He lived in the opposite direction of Laney’s place.

“Sure” Quincy chimed instantly. “You saved our asses in there, man. You’re like . . . like the best stalker ever” she nudged his waist and smiled.

“Oh sure. That you can joke about . . .” Cord smiled.

Thudding at the plastic door startled them.

“Shit. Let’s go!” Laney bolted for the door, dragging Quincy and Cord by their arms. They dashed toward the car and piled in before the crowd muscled out of the front, but they were coming. They all knew it. Laney swerved backing out, tires screeched. They hit the road, safely distant from the mob. They drove in silence, mostly. Catching their breath as Laney sped through the town, still remembering the way to his apartment. She pulled into the parking lot and reached her hand to the backseat to squeeze his shoulder.

“Thank you,” Laney said as Quincy stepped out to pop up the seat so Cord could get out. He smiled. “No problem. I’m just glad we all made it.

Quincy grabbed Cord around the waist and gave him more of a bear hug than he would’ve expected in any other situation. “You’re All right, man. I mean it. You’re really a great guy,” she said.

Laney smiled, glad. Thinking maybe they’d all find a way to be friends now that they’d survived something like this together. “Secret’s out, Cord. You’re a nice guy!” she yelled out the window to him.

“Yah, yah. Settle down. You guys drive safely.” Cord smiled, closed the door after Quincy got back in the car. He watched them drive off. “Nice guy” he kicked a pebble in the parking lot. “Rather be a fucking zombie.”

Making my way out the alley is the only way I can accomplish my task but my nerves haven’t let me move in an hour. Sitting here is only going to make things worse. I stand up, steeling myself for the journey ahead. A journey that would only be a fifteen minute walk had the Darkness not come. This I feel will take a life time. Peeking around the corner from the alleyway once again put my senses on high. It’s one of Them. About a block away, standing at the cross walk and waiting for the light. I dodge back into the corridor and vomit. The mornings ration of cat food coming up in an instant. “If you make too much damn noise…..they will hear you. And you will die.” Speaking again in a hushed whisper to the only living ears around. I take my time, making sure my gag reflex is in check. Time to put up or shut up. I have no weapon, no skill in combat. I’ve survived this time by staying low and in my apartment. Only stepping out when absolutely necessary, confining my ventures to the surrounding buildings. Now, low on food, I know that the only way I can stay alive is to scavenge outside of my comfort zone. It’s called being stuck between a rock and a hard place. If I stay, I will die of starvation. If I leave, they may kill me. Starving to death almost looks better.

I stand again, ready myself and take two steps from my cover. The corpse at the end of the street has crossed, now on my side but across from me. I find it remarkable that even after reanimation, they have tried to keep on with their lives. I remember a woman that I had seen from my third story apartment window. She was pushing a stroller. I had hoped that there wasn’t anything in it but what scared me the most, was the fact that she was humming. From so high it was hard to hear and it had sounded more like a gurgle than a hum. Either way, the experience had been horrific.

I turn right and make my way quietly to Saint Park St. Another right and I’m facing the sun and Bridge St. The litter along the pavement reminds me of the aftermath of a parade. Oh how long it has been since man kind could celebrate. How long will it be until we can again? If ever? My friends had always said I was too optimistic at times. I’m sure of what they would say had they been alive now.

Using the cover from stoops and cars on the street I get to the corner of Park and Bridge. My destination is across the river and two blocks west. My stomach lurches as I look down the street and see one of them. I can’t believe my eyes. It is, was, the control master for the bridge, he is in the booth. I step back beyond his sight. The only other way across is five miles east. Back the way I came and then some. I set about looking around for something, anything I could use. I spot it, inside the toy store I’m standing near. I remember the owners, they were an older couple. Very pleasant people and would always say Hi if you happened to walk by them. I feel bad as I step through the once solid window to the building. I grab my prize and step out quickly, it feels so wrong to steal. “I’ll pay them back.” I whisper.

Cranking up the wind I hold the toy as to not let it start prematurely. I peek around the corner. The control master is at the controls and is moving a lever back and forth. No movement coming from the bridge. I have no idea how it works but I am glad that it isn’t now. I look at my chosen path and release the toy in the opposite direction. It goes off like a racecar down the street, its little plastic wheels screaming furiously. I pull myself back into the toy store when I hear feet on asphalt. Boots actually, distinct by their  heavy thudding sound. I peer out around the window frame as the control master comes running down the sidewalk. He won’t step into the street, knowing that at least at one time it would have been dangerous. Taking the deepest breath I can I make good my escape and work my way around the corner and up to the bridge. Looking back I see that my plan has not gone exactly as I had imagined. The control master has stopped just feet from the toy. Staring at it like it’s some new wonder, unsure what to make of it. I turn my head and set my sights on the other end of the bridge. “Just make it across.” I whisper, running straight on and not looking back.

I’m at full stride, the eerie feeling that someone is just behind me all the way. Taking a quick left off the ramp and down the side brings me to another alley. This one behind an old hardware store, surprisingly it isn’t as beaten as the other buildings around it. I stop. Listening and waiting for those pounding, heart stopping steps. Nothing. Silence. I have won the battle of the bridge. Smiling excitedly, I tip toe down the alley to Rushmore Ave. I peek out and look up and down the lonesome road. The only thing that moves is a flag off to my left, still held high even after the darkness. It reminds me that we as Americans have made it this far. It gives me hope. Maybe someday I will be able to enjoy a parade again, see friends and family again. My focus on the flag has taken me from my task at hand and I physically shake myself out of the momentary coma. Right and due west, I step out from the alleyway stopping a couple of feet the intersection of Bridge and Rushmore. I strain my eyes and try to see where the control master may have gone to. In only moments I spot him in the same spot he was before but now there is a small boy with him. The boy has gone into the street and picked up the toy. The sight makes me shiver. How could they have cognitive thought? They are….dead, aren’t they? I decide to waste no more time on them and set out to cross Bridge St, hoping they will be gone on my return.

The afternoon sun is lower now, giving me no warmth in this cold world. Walking is seeming to help though. Being cramped in apartment 223 since the Darkness came has taken its toll on my body as I had always been athletic and had regular exercise. I take some time to stretch and collect my thoughts behind a dumpster. The smell coming from the bakery next to it is horrid and almost turns my stomach again. I remember the fresh croissants I bought there before and my mouth begins to water. Never again will I be able to enjoy fresh baked breads, cold milk or even ice cream from the parlor across the water way. Leaving the cover and back on the street I march on breathing the fresh air in and exhaling the fumes from the bakery. The Pharmacy comes into my view just a few hundred yards from the dumpster. It has been a shorter walk than I really expected and I almost can’t believe my luck when something catches my eye. Is it really?! Yes, yes it is. A car, no. A Smart Car?! “What the hell?” I say a little too loudly. I dodge behind a fence to my right and peer on. My eyes have not deceived me at all. Someone is driving a Smart Car on the other side of the river. It can’t be. Are all of my nightmares over? Is there really someone else alive, here? The vehicle fades from view as I stare on. Emotions going wild, I can not believe what I saw. If there really is someone here then how is it that I have not known before. Then it hits me. Them. The man at the crosswalk. The lady with the stroller. Control Master and the little boy. It has to be. One of them must still be living out their life. But driving? The excitement of the last few minutes is more than my stomach can take and again I hurl. The pain in my stomach and the smell of my own life blood is more than enough to clear my head. “I can’t sit here hoping for the best. I need to stop the bleeding.” I say firmly, smacking my legs with the palms of my hands. I stand up. Resolute to finish this and get back to 223 before nightfall. “I will have plenty of time to think when I get home.” I whisper.

The Pharmacy door is open and the wall length windows to the front of the building stand as open as they were at the toy store. I enter. My palms have become sweaty and my entire body begins to shake. I stop at the once bright and busy register, scanning the isles for my five finger purchase. “Food First.” I say, agreeing with the pain in my stomach. I grab a couple of bags and a working flashlight from behind the counter. Isle five is stocked with a myriad of dried foods. I begin to loading the bags with soups, boxes of mashed potatoes and even some canned pineapple. My mouth begins to water with the thought of real food but turns sour and dry in an instant. A sound comes from the street and my body freezes in fear. I listen on, hoping it was just my imagination. Again I hear the sound and my heart leaps into my throat. Panic converges over my body and I drop the bags on the floor and run. The sound is coming closer as I dodge between the isles of the Pharmacy. Isle six, Isle seven, Isle eight. Up and down I run, finding anything to help make good my escape. I stop. The fear boils to a new degree and my eyes fill with salty moisture. Rolling towards me down the isle is a toy. The one from the store I had used to get by the Control Master. Looking up brings the most horrid face into my view. The Boy. He looks to be about six or seven and has the most grotesque look on his face. Congealed blood from ear to arm, yellow eyes and rotting teeth. I turn around to run the opposite direction. No good. There’s another person in front of me now. The Control Master? It’s too dark to tell. I hardly notice as the toy hits my ankle and stops. The windings energy spent, I suddenly feel as if I have been a toy as well. A toy to two mindless beings. “They must have smelled my blood and followed me.” I think to myself. I look up at the sign hanging above the Control Masters head. Irony begins to laugh in my face as I feel something hit my head. I fall backward. I feel something jab my thigh as I land. Grunts, moans and sounds of rage fill my ears. Loud crying converges in the mad cacophony of noise but I take no notice. Still looking up at the sign I can barely make the words out now as my eyes begin to close. Isle Fourteen – Feminine Hygiene. “Gotta stop the bleeding.” I mutter. The darkness takes me and all goes black.

Chapter Six

Horst was the first to open fire into the oncoming crowd of Ornel’s former inhabitants. The round from his K98 Mauser slammed into the throat of an limping, groaning man and whipped his head back like it had been hit with a board, spinning him partially around. But within seconds he had turned towards the makeshift barrier blocking the road and continued his advance. Burkhardt glared at him. “Dumpfkoff! Scharfuhrer Dietl told you to aim for the head! We’ve only got a few rounds between us!” 

Horst spat back at him. “You try and see how easy it is making a head shot! None of us are snipers, you know!” Before either of them could continue their tirade, the woman from the village pushed both of them aside and looked down the barrel of the Luger she’d retrieved during the bloodbath in Ornel. With a steady hand, she squeezed the trigger on the pistol and watched as the approaching horror fell to the ground with a crimson flower bursting into bloom from his brow. “The two of you can argue like an old married couple later. Concentrate, dammit!’

Reuter cast a smirking glance for a brief second back towards Sergeant Knight, who returned it with a grin. “She’s a keeper, mate. Don’t ye think ye should learn her name?” Reuter shrugged. “Time enough for that if we get through this.” He looked to his left. “And she’s right, Horst. Stay calm. Choose your shots and squeeze the trigger lightly, just like you were taught in basic. Don’t jerk it or the shot will ride high.”

“Jawhol, Herr Scharfuhrer.” Horst took a deep breath and this time his shot hit its target, puncturing through the face on its right cheek and exiting out the back of the ear. The creature kept coming, the bullet deflected from piercing the brain by skimming the circumference of the skull. Better wasn’t good enough yet. They were still too far away for every shot to be effective.

Martin leveled the remaining .50 cal at the crowd and cocked the bolt back. “Dammit, they’re still too far away for single shots to be effective. We’re going to have to let them get closer. I’ve got an idea though.” He fired off a quick burst from the heavy machine gun into the crowd. The big gun was difficult, nearly impossible to fire accurately. It wasn’t designed for pinpoint accuracy, but for laying down a heavy blanket of suppression fire. Still, aiming with deliberate delicacy and concentration, he stitched a diagonal pattern across the phalanx of the crowd, which was still some fifty yards away. Starting at the ground and clearing head height, he chopped the knees off of two of them, forcing them to collapse to the ground and attempt to crawl. Those following behind them immediately tripped over their fallen forms and writhed about awkwardly as they sought purchase to regain their footing. Three more suffered grotesque but ineffectual punctures across their abdomen and chests. They stumbled at the impacts, but continued on walking. Knight got lucky with four of them, the shots either partially decapitated or completely obliterated their craniums. As he hoped, those following behind them tripped over their fallen bodies and caused a partial pileup impeding the crowd’s progress.

“That’s how we’re going to have to do it! We take out the ones in front, which causes ‘em to slow down even more. Then we pick ‘em off while they try to get over the ones on the ground!” Joe Kirk and Private Allen fired next. Allen was as off-target as Horst, but Kirk’s short controlled bursts from his Thompson hit a woman dead on in the face as she clambered over the bodies in the road on her hands and knees. A follow-up shot from Burkhardt hit the person behind her. In this small pocket, the barrier of bodies slowly began to grow.

“Let’s start another roadblock!” Reuter yelled. He fired a short bust from the MG42 into the crowd to the left of Knight’s targets. Two more went down, but even with this impediment, the surge of dead had inexorably advanced another five yards. Horst finally bagged one and it tumbled over the two downed by Reuter’s burst. “This isn’t going to work, Herr Scharfuhrer! There’s too many of them! They’ll reach us before we can down all of them!”

Hans pulled the tab on a potato-masher grenade and tossed it with a grunt. The long-handled explosive tumbled end over end and landed a yard in front of the approaching crowd. As the smoke cleared, it was clear that it hadn’t taken down a single person, though it had shredded flesh and sent shrapnel violently flying into the horde. Were this crowd alive, it would have been a horrendous deterrent. As it was, it simply made their appearance all the more horrific. They surged on, oblivious. “Mein Gott…Horst is right, Reuter. We’ll not stop them all before they get here. We’ve got to run.”

Reuter stumbled at that point. What were they to do? This tactic was a good one, but it wasn’t working fast enough. Even at this slow snail’s pace, the crowd would be upon them in another minute or so. All the expertly placed shots in the world wouldn’t take them all out. Better a bullet in the head than getting devoured, he thought. It was only a last ditch option, but in his mind’s eye, he began seriously considering it. His reverie abruptly halted as a small airplane with American markings shot by over their heads.

Even Martin seemed stunned for a second by the roar of its low-flying engine. “I’ll be damned! That must be the observation plane the Yanks said they were gonna send out! A bit of a mixed bag this is. On the one hand, at least their now gettin’ off their arses. But fer us lot, this isn’t a good sign.”

Kirk looked at him quizzically as he shot off another burst. “Wot d’ye mean, Martin? They’ll know we need help now, right?”

“Ye wee idjit. They’ll see two opposing sides working together mowing down an unarmed crowd is what they’re gonna see. And that’s wot they’ll report back. Even if we get out of this with our skins intact, we’re still fooked.”

“Then wot d’we do?”

“We keep firin’, mate.  We aren’t important now. If we don’t hold this line, they’ll go on to the next village, and after that we’ll have the whole problem start up again.”

“Jaysis preserve us…” Kirk muttered under his breath as he fired again.

“Vas…Rudi, what are you doing? Come back here!” Burkhardt’s grasping hands clawed empty air as the Sani bolted past him. Unexpectedly, Rudi leapt out of the kubelwagen with a five-liter petrol can and rushed towards the crowd of the dead. Stopping some ten yards in front of them, he upended the can and spread a line of gasoline across the road. A moan of anticipation leapt out of their lips like a jumbled chorus and their pace noticeably quickened a step. Once he’d covered the length of the road, he tossed the can into the crowd, a trickle of fuel trailing out behind as it slammed into the chest of a farmer with half his face and one arm missing. Rudi fumbled with a book of matches, cursing them as the first two failed to light. With the crowd a mere three yards away from him, he finally got one to ignite. He tossed it to the ground and the gasoline immediately burst into flames, a wall of fire running the width of the road.

Even as Rudi leapt back in surprise at the sudden conflagration, a figure stepped through the flames, his lower torso already beginning to burn. It was Leutnant Johannes, his face pale and gray, lips withered and coated with gore. Rudi froze at the startling sight of his commander and raised an arm to ward him off, which Johannes quickly latched onto. The Leutnant lunged towards Rudi’s forearm with deliberate intent and sank his teeth into the heavy wool of the Sani’s overcoat. Frustrated, his moans continued in intensity to growls as he attempted to bite his way through the fabric. He shook his head back and forth like a dog with a length of rope. Rudi screamed, kicking with all his strength at Johannes’ body, slamming his jackboot into the Leutnant’s kneecap. With a satisfying crunch, the hobnails shattered Johannes’ knee and the Leutnant tumbled to the ground, the flames now spreading across his body greedily.

Behind the wall of flames, the dead denizens of Ornel seemed to hesitate for a moment, staring at the flames in puzzlement. Those closest to the fire erupted into flame themselves and began to flail about, their bodies consumed. Three dropped where they stood as the fire licked its way up to their heads and ignited them. Two fell back into the crowd like jerking marionettes and set even more ablaze.

Rudi’ saw a shadow fall across him an instant before the rifle butt collided with Johannes’ head. He felt the iron clamp of his former commander’s jaw’s go slack upon his forearm as the Englishman standing above him pounded the butt of his Enfield over and over into Johannes’ head until the now fully-burning former Kriegsmarine officer lay still for good.

“Come on, ye tosser! Get to yer feet!” As Rudi clambered to his knees, Private Allen fired another shot into the crowd behind the wall of fire and connected solidly with another head shot. As his target fell to the ground, the retort of the rifle seemed to snap the limited attention of the crowd back towards them. Ten of them turned as one, their heads swiveling towards the young Englishman. They stepped forward into the flames, going straight towards the two soldiers, advancing even as their bodies began to immolate.

Determined hands latched onto Allen, even as he fired another round, this one blowing the lower jaw off a young woman. Four of them bit into him as one, even as they all went up in flames together. They fell to the ground, incinerating even as they fed. Allen screamed, hurling obscenities and futile blows at them until another shot rang out, mercifully ending his cries.

Rudi turned to see Burkhardt and Sergeant Knight rush forth from their barrier and continue to fire into the crowd with controlled, tightly coordinated shots. From up close, they connected each time. Four more fell. Slowly, the ranks of their undead opponents whittled downwards.

Burkhardt grabbed Rudi roughly by the collar and thrust him back towards the barrier. “Move your arse, you beautiful idioten! I can’t believe you just did that! We’ve actually got a chance now.” Rudi shivered, ignoring the compliment as he shoved back the sleeve of his overcoat. “Ach…danke, grosse Gott.” He whispered. Johannes’ bites hadn’t penetrated the thick fabric of his garments. Although a bruise was beginning to form on his wrist from the vice-like intensity of the attack, his wretched, infected teeth hadn’t made contact with his skin.

Burkhardt shoved him again. “Raus, schissekopf! You’ve done your part!”

Rudi stumbled back towards the barrier, watching as the other Englishman, Kirk leapt over the side of the British jeep, followed by Horst. The two soldiers fired single shots and controlled bursts into the crowd, an increasing number of them walking obliviously into the flames, ignoring the searing of their flesh as they did so.

Kirk yelled over the flames and moans. “Alright then! We’ve retrieved our man! Now move yer arses back to the vehicles. Fire as we go!” The four soldiers walked backwards, pumping shots into the surging crowd. The flames grew higher as each victim fell, catching alight the ones behind them. It soon got to the point where smoke had arisen sufficiently enough to obscure their line of sight. The British and German troops lost little time retreating back to the relative safety of their barrier, all of them panting heavily as the adrenaline coursed through them.

Martin swiveled the .50 cal to the east edge of the road while Reuter did the same with his MG42 to the west. “Hold tight. Watch the flanks. They’ll probably start coming around the edges of the road.”

Sure enough, a thin line across either side began to trickle through. Two of them at first, then four. Expertly placed shots felled all of them. To the west, another three stumbled through, two of them burning. Reuter dropped both of them. Sweat dribbling down into his eyes, Martin Knight waited patiently for the next wave to plod through. But nothing came. After a minute of waiting, the road now thoroughly engulfed in flames and with the stench of burning bodies filling the air, no new shambling horror came forth to confront them.

Reuter and Martin exchanged nervous glances. “If there were more of them, they’d have kept coming, aye?”

“Jah. I don’t want to count my chickens too soon, but I think we might have gotten them.”

“Let’s not take chances. Joe, you take one of the Jerries and check out the perimeter. See if any of them are moving. We’ll cover ye.”

“Aye, Martin.” Kirk pointed at Burkhardt. “Ye’re wi’ me, mate.” The two scrambled cautiously out of the barrier of vehicles and approached the mound of burning bodies before them. As they rounded the edges of the flames along each side of the road, each man heard moans from the edges and rear of the fallen crowd. Here and there, some of the bodies still moved, their legs and limbs cut down beneath them, their jaws continuing to work, their torsos undulating in spastic, flailing attempts to get to the two soldiers. With movements almost approaching pity, Kirk and Burkhardt shot all of them in the head until nothing moved but the dancing of the flames and curl of smoke.

“I don’t believe it, but I think we’ve got them all. Bloody Christ, I think we’ve actually done it.” Though Burkhardt couldn’t understand the Englishman, he certainly recognized the tone. “Jah…I think we’ve actually survived this.”

With their eyes peeled for movement, the two began to make their way back around the perimeter of the flames. Their eyes darted to the rear of their barrier as the sound of an engine again cut across the sky. Behind them, the Ami observation plane touched down on the road some several yards behind them, coming to a landing on a long straight patch. As the prop gradually came to a halt, Martin noticed that the pilot stayed behind the stick while the occupant behind him came crawling out of the plane and approached them cautiously.

Martin turned towards his German counterpart. “Reuter. Ye might want yer men to put down their weapons for now. I don’t think this Yank here will understand the whole story.” Reuter nodded and gave the command. Reluctantly, Horst and Burkhardt lowered their rifles and set them aside. Kirk continued to watch their backs, training his Thompson back up the road in case any more surprises showed up.

“Who is in charge here?” the American yelled. He was obviously nervous, his hand wavering over the grip of his .45 sitting in his holster.

“That’d be me, “ Martin replied. “Calm yourself, soldier. The fightin’s done for now.”

“Look, I don’t know what the hell is going on here, but I need you to get on the radio right this fucking minute and explain to my commanding officer what it is you’re doing. You’ve got six different shades of shit about to come down on your head if you don’t have a damn good explanation.”

Martin glowered at him. “I’d mind my tone if I were you, Yank. But aye, I’ll talk to yer commander. If me own officers won’t listen, I’ll take help from just about anybody at this point.”

Martin approached the plane as the American handed him the receiver from its radio transmitter. “This is Sergeant Martin Knight, 9th Battalion, 2nd Devonshire Regiment. To whom am I speaking?”

“This is Lieutenant Colonel David Kaplan of the 413th Regiment, 104th infantry Division. What is your situation, Sergeant?”

Martin hesitated. “That…might be a little difficult to explain, sir. My men had taken prisoner a group of Germans who had surrendered to us…and soon after that we…well, we were attacked by…”

Colonel Kaplan interrupted him abruptly. “You were attacked by a mob that had seemed to go insane, correct? They soaked up bullets and seemed utterly oblivious to anything but a bullet through the head. I know all that already, young man. I figured all that out on my own. I need to know if you’ve contained the situation on the road.”

Martin seemed baffled. “How did….Aye, sir. That we have. We had to re-arm the Germans to stop ‘em, but we did halt the advance. They’re all dead and they aren’t getting back up again this time. How d’ye know all this?”

There was a pause on the other end of the radio. “Well, thank God of that. Like you, Sergeant. This might be a little difficult to explain. I’ve been in this man’s Army a long time and I’ve been in Europe before. Back during the Great War I was a young infantryman with the AEF under Pershing. There was…an ‘incident’ shall we say during our time in Chateau Thierry that’s been with me for the last twenty-seven years. I hoped to God that I’d never have to see something like this again, but…well, there’s time for stories like that later. I’ll tell you everything I know soon. And I hate to be the bearer of further bad news, Sergeant Martin. But I’m afraid your job isn’t done yet. There’s still a nest of those things back in the village that didn’t follow you. Sergeant Kramden here observed several dozen of them still back there milling around. You understand that we have to contain them before they spread out into the countryside, yes?”

Martin sighed dejectedly. “Aye sir. That I do. But we’ll need more than I’ve got here to do a house to house sweep of that village and clear it out.”

“Let me handle that. You and your group sit tight and keep your eyes peeled. I wouldn’t count on your armored column getting off their asses and joining you anytime soon. I hate to say it, but ever since 30th Corps took that pounding in Holland back in September, you Brit boys haven’t been all that keen to build a fire under your butts and move with a purpose.”

Martin gritted his teeth, but said nothing. Truth was truth after all.

“Well, never mind that,” Kaplan continued. “You’ve done an outstanding job, Sergeant Martin and rest assured, I will cover your actions with your commanding officers. Your orders for now are to maintain your position and wait for my arrival. We’ll commence containment operations within that village within the hour, ya got me?”

“Aye sir. Understood.” Martin handed the headset back to the pilot and walked to his men manning the barricade, more baffled than he’d been before. That Yank Colonel promised him answers. God knows he needed some.

Chapter 7

The second American plane set down a short distance from its predecessor. This one was different, bigger than the smaller observation plane that had arrived at the impromptu British and German roadblock nearly an hour earlier. This one was a D-64 Norseman, a sturdy craft more than capable of traversing great distances. Sergeant Martin Knight wondered why the thought popped into his head, but he seemed to remember that the yank bandleader, Glenn Miller had disappeared somewhere over the Channel while flying in one of those birds. Before today, he would have found the musing morbid.

As the prop gradually slowed to a stop, a tall lanky man easing into his late forties to early fifties hauled himself out of the plane and stretched. Three more men came with him along with the pilot, who remained behind in the cockpit. The first man was another officer, a Captain wearing a trenchcoat with a 9th Air Force patch on his left shoulder. The man who had to be Colonel Kaplan gave him a nod and the man turned back to the plane, consulting a map as he spoke into a radio transmitter.  Although Martin and Reuter couldn’t hear his words exactly, it sounded as if he were relaying a series of coordinates. The latter two men in their company were armed with a Thompson and an M-1 carbine. The man carrying the carbine additionally hauled a flamethrower from out of the plane and began strapping it on. When completed, the two took a glance from Kaplan as their cue and headed towards the perimeter of the barricade, joining Joe Kirk in his vigil.

Colonel Kaplan looked at the still burning flames of the barricade of human bodies halted in their tracks by the combined efforts of Martin and Reuter Dietel’s men, his nose crinkling at the stench. He spat a long trail of tobacco juice out onto the road. “Well, I see you boys have been busy. Sergeant Martin Knight, I assume.”

“Aye, Colonel” Knight nodded with a crisp salute which the American officer returned perfunctorily. He then shook the officer’s hand. “And thanks for the offer of covering for us, sir. I’m not sure how I could explain this. May I present my counterpart, Sergeant Reuter Dietel.” Reuter snapped to attention and saluted, but was only met by a wary glance from the older American officer.

“I ain’t gonna shake your hand. I’ll give you credit for wanting to keep your boys alive, and if Sergeant Knight here says you’re his prisoner, then that’s good enough for now. But you ain’t picking those rifles up again. You’ve fought your last fight, comprende?”

Reuter had no idea what ‘comprende’ meant, but he didn’t really want to pick up another weapon anyway, provided the American’s assurances that their part in this little tableau actually was over with. Surrendering was the original intent of this little band of ragtag survivors in the first place after all. He merely remained at attention. “Jawhol, herr Oberst. I have already formally surrendered my charges to Sergeant Knight prior to your arrival. We merely await transport to a Prisoner of War camp.” He couldn’t help but add, “I hear California is nice.”

Colonel Kaplan leveled his gaze for a moment. The Kraut had brass to spare, and he was willing to let a little bit of lip slide considering what these boys had just gone through. He also noted that none of these Kraut boys were sporting SS runes on their collar tabs, so that was another point in their favor. He didn’t owe fanatics two shits for explanations or protection as far as he was concerned. For Krauts, these boys may be okay to a certain extent. “I hear the place their sending captured Krauts to is Kansas and Oklahoma, lots of farmland needing tended to out there. Be warned though, it’s damn hot in the summer.”

Undeterred, Reuter nodded. “Not to worry, herr Oberst. Meine bruder and I grew up around farmland. Your agricultural needs won’t be disappointed.”

Kaplan actually chuckled at that one. “You’re alright for a Heinie. But I still ain’t shaking your hand. Alright, enough chitchat. Gather around, fellas. Here’s where you get some answers.”

Reuter signaled Hans to join him, since his brother grasped English far better than he did. “Herr Oberst, not to sound ungrateful but aren’t you bringing more men up here to deal with the threat remaining in Ornel?”

“That’s being dealt with. Captain Ballard over there is my liaison spotter with the 9th Air Force and he’s on the job. I’ve got a couple of deuce-and-a-halves with some MPs coming up the road from my command that’ll be here in a bit to take you and your boys into custody. Till then, I’ll entertain you with a bedtime story. Now pipe down. What I’ve got to tell you all should give you a little perspective, if not understanding.”

Kaplan’s Tale.

“I don’t know how this horror originated, but your encounter ain’t the first time something of this sort has happened. There are some of us who fought in France during the last war who have looked at what you’ve seen today. We were just kids back then, some of us a lot younger than you are now if the truth be told. We’d hoped at the time that it had been some aberration, a hallucination brought on by shell shock, or some gas attack that had caused our minds to play tricks. But hell, that notion didn’t last long. We knew what we’d seen and fought against, even if we couldn’t understand how in the hell it ever came to be.

“And we followed up on things after it was all over with. We listened for news from Europe after the guns went silent, we kept in contact over the years with friends we’d made over here in the French Poilus and the BEF. And every now and again, there would be some story of a lunatic who seemed to defy pain and reeked of the grave. None of it ever got very far and we felt mostly satisfied that our comrades over here could keep it under control and above all, quiet. A lot of us had been lucky enough to have gone career with the Army after just about everything else got decommissioned when we beat the Kaiser. We’d made a promise to stay in contact and make plans in case anything like that, God forbid ever happened in the States.

“Thank God nothing ever did that ever came to our attention, but after this latest war started up and we knew we’d be coming back over here, those of us that were still serving wondered and worried. And now it looks like those worries were justified.

“It all goes back to May of 1918. Back in those days, there were maybe eight US divisions over in France. We didn’t know our asses from a hole in the ground. The most experienced guys we had were with that bunch that chased Pancho Villa around Mexico back in ’16. Pershing didn’t want to see his command dissipated by detachments to bail out the limeys and the frogs, but they’d taken such a wailing under Ludendorff’s offensive in March that they were pretty much on the ropes without our help.

The second wave of that offensive came shortly before our arrival in the trenches. The British Army lost close to 240,000 casualties in 40 days of fighting. The Krauts also hit the French in Champagne with at least 17 divisions. Then we came along and got dropped into that meatgrinder like a bunch of damned sheep to the slaughterhouse. I was 23 years old then, a first Lieutenant with the 2nd Infantry Division when we ran into Ludendorff’s advance at Chateau Thierry.

“We’d been dispatched to take over a length of trenchline that had been evacuated by the French. It had been bracketed by artillery fire so many times that entire sections of trench had collapsed inwards and needed to be rebuilt. Entire positions and fortifications had been buried, with God alone knows how many men suffocated alive and blown to bits. I commanded 2nd Squad, Baker Company. I had a bunch of snot-nosed, over-eager children under my command, heads full of ‘over there’ bullshit, all ready to fight the godless Hun and not a clue of how to do it. They had no idea what they were in for and for that matter neither did I.

“We withheld our first attack by the Heinies pretty well, all things considered. They hit us with artillery first, which for the most part fell short. Then they tried gas, which worked for them a little bit better. I remember losing six men to the damned mustard gas during that initial push. Then they tried going over the top and rushing our lines. It was our baptism of fire and I’m proud to say we knocked ‘em back. It was only after they retreated that things turned to hell.

“Shortly after the Germans fell back, we began tending to our wounded. A field hospital from the 30th Hospital Unit wasn’t far from us and a group of female nurses were among the medical personnel evacuating our wounded. They knew even less about life over in that hellhole than we did. It was a goddamned crime they let women in during that mess. Y’see, that damned gas settled into men’s uniforms. It was heavier than air. It caused blisters to rise on the skin. If you breathed it, it was one of the worst ways to die you can imagine. It seeped into the soil, into our water. I saw at least four nurses succumb to gas just trying to do their jobs, long after the attack was supposedly over with.

Anyway, one of the Kraut artillery rounds fell smack dab on our position, or rather it hit one of the sections of trench previously buried. A command bunker from when the French had occupied the line became partially exposed. Amidst all the debris and loose earth knocked free from the blast, I saw movement. It was little at first, just some dirt kicked loose. I thought it had been a rat at first glance. God knows, the damn things were everywhere in the trenches. They were almost as thick as the lice. But then, I saw that it was a hand, then a forearm. It flailed feebly, clutching at the air. I also noticed that the sleeve was the distinct blue of a French uniform. I couldn’t believe that someone could still be alive in there from the previous bombardments. I didn’t think it could be possible that somebody might have taken shelter in that bunker and somehow remained alive after that entire branch had been obliterated.

I ordered a man forward, a scrawny kid. I couldn’t even tell you where the hell he’d been from, or even what his name had been at this point. He was just another face, another dumb kid who’d had the bad luck to fall under my command. He rushed forward, latching onto the Frenchman’s hand and heaved to free him from his earthen imprisonment. I remember the look on his face the second he gripped that hand. He knew right away that something was wrong, that something in that grasp was unholy, cold and dead. Plus, it was strong as all get out. I remember watching him in his attempts to wrench his own hand free from that grip. It was no use, and when the Frenchman broke the surface, I can remember my own cries of surprise mixing with that of the unfortunate sonofabitch I’d sent to rescue him.

He’d been down there at least a couple of weeks. His skin, where there was any left was as green as slime on a pond. Parts of it fell away as he moved, exposing filthy bone beneath. He was slow, but he moved with a purpose and his grip was a tight one.

I remember that poor kid screaming, yanking his arm back and forth in a panic as the Frenchman slowly got to his feet. The stench that came off that thing was damned horrible, though surprisingly that wasn’t the worst part. We’d only been up in that trenchline for a relatively short amount of time, but even we’d been up there long enough to start getting used to that horrible smell of unburied bodies. The worst part was that this was a concentrated smell, a stench that clung to this body like a halo of flies.

He bit into that young man’s arm. I remember seeing blood erupt out of it like a fountain, that poor boy screaming. I think it was the sheer pitch of those screams that broke me out of my shock. I rushed forward and pushed the Frenchman away with all my might. He broke loose from the private and plopped down onto the mud, munching methodically on a chunk of meat from the young man’s wrist. As he dined, he seemed to go oblivious to our presence.

A couple of medics had already rushed forward and grabbed our boy from harm’s way, and I was left facing the horror sitting before me. I knew a little bit of French and I started screaming at this aberration in his own tongue, demanding to know why he was committing such insanity. He ignored me completely, only mewling with satisfaction as he chewed up the hunk of meat in his mouth. Behind him, more loose earth began to shift. More limbs began to trash about in the recesses of the exposed bunker.

I saw yet another form come pushing up from the ground, this one a French officer, equally as rotten and vile as the one sitting before me. Behind him came something that had once been a German trooper. All of them moaned with a guttural quality, fingers grasping at the air before them, clutching in supplication. That stench in the trenchline began to grow in intensity as each one of them broke free.

Well, it didn’t take long for me to come to my senses. I pulled out my Colt and pumped three shots square into the chest of the frog officer. All of them went through him like water through a sieve and he kept coming. A hail of gunfire erupted all around me as the men under my command started firing their springfields into those monster’s midst. Bits and pieces chipped away from all of them, but none of them went down. I screamed, “Retreat” and we began falling back into another section that we occupied.

It was a bit of a logjam. Those trench passages weren’t very wide to begin with and the section we ran through was partially collapsed anyway due to incessant rain and the artillery bombardment we’d suffered. Men were tripping over each other, some in a headlong flight away from these nasty beasts, some pushing forward wondering what the hell was going on. Others just slipped and fell in the mud. That was the worst part. The mud was so thick, you sunk down into it all the way past your ankles. There was no good way to get around in it. The creatures caught one of those poor bastards as we attempted to run. All three of those damned smelly things fell on him and began feeding. It was by far the worst thing I’d ever seen in my life. They tore him apart in seconds, shoveling handfuls of the man’s being into their mouths like candy. I screamed in protest and fired another round. It was through sheer luck that I hit one of them in the head, and when it flopped back into the mud and lay still, I don’t think I fully comprehended what I’d done at that moment.

“I started to fire again, when behind me another high pitched shriek hit my ears. I turned, and over the thrashing of panicked men I beheld the bitten soldier we’d rescued suddenly throw himself about on the stretcher he’d been placed upon. He stiffened, then fell back with what seemed the finality of death. A scant two seconds passed before he sat up again and grabbed the nurse who’d been administering to his wounds. He grabbed hold of her forcefully and bit down on her throat. Her screams seemed to absorb everyone’s attention before someone leapt forward to pull her free.

“In the span of just a few seconds, it all began to unravel into chaos. The Nurse collapsed, blood pouring freely from her wound. I could tell by even that distance that she was a goner. Then within seconds of expiring, she sat back up and began to attack the men trying to defend her. They in turn fell to her frantic bites, pulled away by concerned comrades who attempted to restrain her wild movements. I saw another man get bitten, then another. A third soldier shot her in the knee, collapsing her to the mud floor of the trench. She continued to crawl forward, arms clasping at everything in reach, mouth snapping.

Behind me, the two rotten things got up from their feast, joined now by the remains of the man they’d killed. All of them surged toward me and the remaining men with me in that section. I fired my pistol again, hitting another one in the head. It too fell, but behind him I saw more of the horrid creatures begin to pour out of the once-buried bunker that had been exposed. There were perhaps a dozen of them. In the few seconds of clarity I had at my command, I began to think that it might have been part of a tunnel. God alone knew how many squirming, decomposing things might be lurking around down there.

Behind me, another of the soldiers who had been bitten succumbed and came back, leaping upon his buddies, biting and clawing. I believe we would have all died in that trench right then and there if not for what happened next. Another barrage of artillery could suddenly be heard coming in overhead. The whistles of the shells descending from the German lines coming towards us fueled the panic initially, but we soon saw that it wasn’t explosives the Heinies were throwing at us, but another gas attack.

We reacted on instinct at this point, throwing on our gas masks as the yellowish mist began to seep into the trench. It soon became obvious that the only ones not putting on masks were the ones who had been bitten. We also noticed that they weren’t succumbing to the gas either. It didn’t affect them one bit. I looked at the Sergeant next to me and said, “They’re dead. They have to be. Nobody living could look like this, act like this.” He nodded at me just as another of the men cried out through his gas mask as the Nurse attempted to bite him in the calf. He’d seen me take out those two bodies moments earlier and with deliberate aim, he fired his Springfield into the Nurse’s head. From that range her head virtually exploded, but it had done its grisly work. I fired at another of our men who had begun to act insane. He too fell. The Sergeant started screaming orders to shoot our attackers in the head and it didn’t take long for a volley to erupt.

Unfortunately, it was too narrow a strip for us to be all that effective. Three unaffected men got hit in the crossfire and I beheld more of those things pouring out of the exposed bunker. The sheer volume of them confirmed my idea that a tunnel system had to exist down there. There were at least two dozen of them at this point, French, Germans, even a couple of rotting civilians. Some of them were so badly decomposed, it was almost impossible to even tell if they’d been men or women. It became obvious to me that there was no way we were going to be able to contain all of them in this mud-choked series of holes and trenches. We had to get the hell out of there.

I yelled at the Sergeant to start hauling the men up the ladders and out onto the parapets. He yelled back that we’d be exposed to German machine gun fire if we did that, but I told him that we were dead either way if we stayed here. I grabbed our field telephone operator and kept him near me. A plan had started to form in my mind and I would need him near me to make it work. It took a few minutes for us to totally evacuate our section. Hauling up the couple of Nurses and noncombatant medical personnel was the worst part. As dedicated as they were to their work, they didn’t want to leave anybody behind. There were screams of protest from them as I pushed and kicked them out of the trench. I was faced with a horrible conundrum at that point. Some of the men who had been bitten had not succumbed yet. They lay there on their stretchers, moaning and in obvious pain. My conscience couldn’t leave them behind and I debated with the idea of hauling them to their feet and aiding them in getting up the ladders. Sergeant Mitchell took the argument out of my hands and shot all three of them in rapid succession. I was in utter shock, unable to say a word at his actions. I could intellectually grasp the logic of his act, but the brutal precision of its immediacy shook me to my core. He turned me around and shoved me towards the ladders without ceremony. We were the last two out of the trench.

“As we clambered out onto the surface, I ordered the ladders hauled up behind us. I had no idea if these things knew how to climb or not, but I had no intention of finding out. We also had a few moments of grace in our favor, for the gas still lingered in great clouds and obscured our movements from the Germans for the time being. To our east lay a section of British trench. If we were lucky, we could move under cover of the gas in their direction and escape. But first, I had to deal with what we’d left behind us in our own abandoned section. I peered down into the trench and it was rapidly filling with those horrors, some of them clutching uselessly upwards towards me, or milling about with no direction. A few of them fell upon the fresh corpses that lay here and there in the trench. They appeared to have no interest in carrion. It was the first truly unobstructed view I had of them and it didn’t take me long to realize that they indeed were dead. There was no question about what I was looking at.

I ordered the telephone operator to my side, and as he made contact with our battalion command I thanked God the lines hadn’t been cut. I then called in the coordinates of our position to our own artillery. I told them that the Germans had overrun our section and they were now in occupation of the trench. I deliberately exaggerated their numbers and called for an immediate sustained shelling of our position. After confirmation, I ordered our little band of survivors towards the British lines. We almost made it, but the winds changed direction and the gas began to blow away. The Germans spotted us and opened up with their machine guns. Most of the survivors were cut down immediately, but Sergeant Mitchell and I, along with a Nurse and two other men were able to take cover in a shell hole. We lay there for over an hour, unable to move between the machine gun fire from the German lines and our own artillery, which had begun to rain down on the trench system behind us. It was full dark by the time we were able to crawl forth from the hole and make contact with a British raiding party that had ventured forth into no-man’s land on a harassment raid of the German’s positions.

Two days later, I, Sergeant Mitchell and a contingent of British and French officers made our way back to the section of trenchline we’d previously held. Aerial observation of the position told us that it had been completely obliterated. Little of the trench system remained, and the Germans were now focusing their attention on the British lines to the East. I had to see that area. I had to know we’d destroyed those things. When we arrived, it was a scene of utter devastation, but not as complete as I’d hoped. A British Captain and I climbed down into the trench and saw one of those creatures was still moving. It was one of the rotted Frenchmen. It had lost all four limbs in the barrage and yet it still flopped about, snapping its filthy jaws at us in an attempt to eat. I’d previously hesitated to tell him the truth about what had happened here, but this was evidence enough to convince him. We found a few others in different states of decomposition, all equally crippled by the ferocity of the artillery attack. We brought in one of the French officers and we jointly agreed that we had to keep a lid on this. We personally went throughout what little was left of the trench and shot any of them we encountered in the head. We never found the bunker entrance again, and I could only hope that it had been utterly destroyed. After we climbed back out, we ordered every body in there burned without exception. We made our pact to keep each other abreast of any more incidents like this, then went on back to the war.”

Colonel Kaplan concluded his tale by pulling a fresh chew of tobacco from a pouch inside the breast pocket of this field jacket and inserting a plug into his mouth nonchalantly. “And here we are. Any questions?”

Martin wiped at his pale face. He felt cold. “Gor blimey…that’s one helluva white-knuckler there, Colonel. Christ, I could use a drink after a tale like that.”

Kaplan chuckled and pulled out a flask from inside his jacket. He tossed it to the British Sergeant. “Way ahead of you. What the hell…let the Kraut have some too. I figure you boys have earned it today.”

Reuter took a small drag from the flask. “Danke, herr Oberst. Did you ever learn if the German side ever had any encounters of this nature?”

Kaplan shook his head. “No. If they did, they kept a lid on it themselves. Whatever was lurking down in that trench never popped up again during my time in France to the best of my knowledge. And now we’re going to do to Ornel what we did in the trenches 27 years ago. Hear that?” He glanced upwards. The steady drone of approaching engines cut through the sky. There were several of them and they were approaching from the east very quickly.

“Vas ist? Airplanes? Bombers?”

Kaplan nodded. “Yup. I had my liaison, Captain Ballard over there divert a flight of B-17’s to drop their payloads on Ornel. Their target was a munitions plant in the Ruhr, but it was too obscured by cloud cover to make an effective run. They needed a secondary target to make this flight worth it, otherwise they’d have to drop all their eggs in the Channel on the way home. This way, we kill two birds with one stone. Wish to hell I’d had a resource like this in the last war…”

“So that’s it, then?” Hans asked. “Your bombers level Ornel and hopefully destroy them all?”

“That’s the idea,” Kaplan replied.

Reuter spoke. “You might want to have them hit the castle ruins a few kilometers from the village along the river too, herr Oberst. That’s where our Leutnant took ill and changed into one of those things.”

Kaplan grunted. “Better safe than sorry, I think. Give me a map and I’ll have Ballard relay the coordinates. We’ll have a few planes divert from the main group and hit it next.”

“So what do we do now, if ye don’t mind my askin’, sir.” Sergeant Knight asked.

“I think you boys would like to be in on the tail end of this for your own piece of mind and I respect that. Once my MP’s get up here to take custody of Sergeant Dietel and his men, we’ll all drive into what’s left of Ornel and mop up anything that might be left. Then, we’ll talk.”

Kaplan then got up and sauntered back to his plane. Martin looked over at Reuter and Hans, a worried look upon his face. “I dunno about you lads, but this seems a bit off, don’t you think?”

“Jah,” replied Reuter. “It seems too easy, too cut and dried.” Then he shrugged. “Maybe we’re just being paranoid, nicht wahr? The Oberst seems to have a pretty good head on his shoulders and he obviously knows what he’s doing. Maybe we’re just jumping at shadows here. Gott knows we’ve a right to be after today.”

“I hope ye’re right, mate.”

Behind them, beyond the cover of the forest canopy, brilliant lights and thumping explosions of thunder shot violently upwards as the first bombs dropped on Ornel.