by Jimmy Bird
It happened one morning, just after I started working. I could hear shouting, shortly followed by the sound of gun fire. I stopped working and listened. I’m not sure why, but my hopes for my family trying to rescue me popped into my head.
The guard stationed outside the doorway poked his head into the room, “Keep working.”
Right afterwards, the guard’s walkie talkie began to have chatter as people screamed all over it.
The guard kept his eyes on me as he grabbed his walkie up, “What’s going on out there?”
I’m not sure what was being said, but it sounded like, “Another group is attacking us. Zombies are everywhere. Need backup at the gate.”
Hope for my rescue rose even higher. Was it my family? Were they here to rescue me? I noticed that the gunfire outside was kind of getting sparatic and followed quickly by explosions. They sounded close.
The guard looked at me and said, “Stay here and keep working. I’m going to find out what’s going on.”
The guard got about halfway up the stairs when the sound of an explosion went off next to the stairwell. The walls around where the guard had been walking, collapsed. Scared, I jumped backwards. Smoke and dust quickly covered the room. My ears began to ring while I started coughing.
Dust got in my eyes, causing them to water. I tried wiping my eyes with the back of my arm. It probably wasn’t the brightest idea since I was now covered in dust.
However, it worked, sort of. The dust was so thick in the room that I could barely see light coming from the direction of the collapsed wall. Fearing that I was going to die, I slowly made my way towards the light. The only thing that was positive about my position was that the closer I got to the light, the clearer the air became.
I shuffled my way to the stairs, careful not to trip on anything. Once I made it, I used the wall to guide me upwards. I had almost made it to the hole in the wall when I kicked something that kind of moved on the ground. I glanced downwards and could kind of make out two dust covered boots. Below the boots looked like a reddish liquid crawling along the dust covered steps.
Oh my God! Was that blood? Was that the guard? I began to feel sick to my stomach and had to look away.
I turned to my left and looked out the hole in the wall. The ringing in my ears began to subside and I quickly realized that the fighting was still going on.
Through the dust, I could see people running around in all kind of directions. I could hear gunfire and explosions going off all around the area. I could even hear people screaming.
I hesitantly stuck my head of the hole. I could see the group that was attacking Selina’s group. To my disappointment, I didn’t recognize any of them. This was not my family coming to rescue me!
I noticed that the attacking group’s attention was in front of them, giving me the opportunity to sneak out and escape. I carefully took a step out of the collapsed wall and onto the ground. I glanced around and noticed that the front gate had been blown off its hinges.
I took a step towards the gate when I heard my name called, “Makalyn!”
I glanced around and noticed the top of Serina’s head. It looked like she was looking at me. I could see her move her head in the ‘over here’ motion.
I ignored her and turned back around. Something in her voice caused me to freeze in place, “MAKALYN!”
I turned back around and noticed that she had a gun pointed at me, “MAKALYN, GET OVER HERE! NOW!”
I shook my head from left to right to indicate ‘no’.
She began to rise when the spot she was hiding behind was sprayed by bullets. She quickly ducked behind her hiding space.
I could hear her scream over the gunfire, “MAKALYN! WHEREVER YOU GO, I WILL FIND YOU! YOU HEAR ME! I WILL FIND YOU! YOU BELONG TO ME!”
I turned around and ran towards the gate as fast as I could. Before going through the gate, I heard Serina scream, “Billy, on me! Let’s show these guys who they’re messing with!”
Chapter 12: The Return Home
I managed to make it to the gate without any incident. No one shot at or tried to catch me. What was on the other side of the gate though, was a different matter.
I ran through the gate, thinking that I had just escaped my imprisonment. My feeling of freedom was quickly squashed when I ran right into a huge number of zombies making their way towards me. I’m not sure why, but I froze in place. Loud gunfire and explosions continued to go off behind me. Maybe, all the noise was attracting them.
I didn’t want to go back in. I didn’t want to belong to anyone. I refused to belong to anyone. I thought that maybe, just maybe, if I gave myself over to the zombies then I wouldn’t have to worry about anything ever again. Who knows, maybe being a zombie was not so bad. That’s it, I decided that I would give my life over to the zombies rather than be someone’s property.
So, I froze in place, waiting for the zombies to take me. I leaned against the gate entrance and closed my eyes. I pictured my family. My mom, my dad, and my siblings. I’m not sure why, but I pictured us all at Christmas time. It was the last time all of us had been together, as a family.
I heard the groans walking towards me and clinched my eyes shut. I began to hyperventilate but forced myself to calm down. I could do this. I was ready. I was wanting to get it over with. My only hope was that it wasn’t too painful.
Without even realizing it, I noticed that the moans were beginning to go past me. Keeping my left eye closed, I opened my right eye and watched as dozens of zombies walked past me. A few stopped and sniffed at me, but they turned around and followed the others inside, towards the noise.
When there were no more zombies walking past me, I opened my left eye and looked. There were, literally no more zombies. They were all inside.
Thoughts ran through my head. Why had they ignored me? Why didn’t they attack me? Why wasn’t I dead?
I looked down at myself and noticed that I was still covered in dust. Could that be why they ignored me? Was the dust a kind of camouflage?
Before I could ask myself another question, screaming came from inside the Reserve. The shooting became sporadic and the explosions seemed to have stopped. I knew that if I was going to escape, if would have to be then.
I ran up the street as fast as my legs would carry me. Every time I saw a zombie, I would slow to a snail’s pace until I was past them and then would start running again. I had no doubt that Serina or Billy would survive and knew that they would come after me. If I wanted to make it home, then I would have to get there before them. It meant that I was going to need to find a ride.
I wasn’t exactly sure how long I had been a prisoner, but I knew that most car batteries and fuel had a shelve life. When I began driving, my dad made sure that I knew that type of stuff. He always wanted me to know a little automotive mechanics so that I wouldn’t be stuck on the side of the road and be easy pickings for predators. I didn’t understand why at the time, but now that I think back on it and the way live is now, it was some of the best advice he had ever given me. Dad! I just hoped that you and everyone else were okay! Please, be okay!
I ran until I couldn’t run any further. It was the first time I had really exercised since the last game I had played. I didn’t realize it, but I was out of shape. My feet hurt. My sides hurt. Everything hurt. I could barely breathe.
I stopped and put my hand on my hips. Before long, I had to bend over to try to catch my breath. I used my knees to keep myself propped up. I began to feel lightheaded, but I refused to sit down. I wanted to be able to run quickly if I needed to. I…. I guess that I no longer wanted to die.
I heard a banging noise that sounded metallic to my right. Forgetting all about being out of breath, I stood up and glanced over. To my surprise, six zombies were walking towards me. They all seemed to be sniffing at the air like dogs do.
Worried that either, Serina or Billy had found me, I began to look around. I didn’t see anyone, but I did notice that a couple of more zombies were coming towards me f
rom the left. They were also sniffing the air.
I thought that the dust had camouflaged me. I looked down at my arms and noticed that most of the dust was gone. I could see water lines where it had washed away most of the dust. It must have been from sweat. Oh crap! I guess that me sweating from all the running had caused the dust to come off me.
I knew that I needed to get out of there fast. But, where could I go? I couldn’t go to my left or right and I damn sure, wasn’t going to go back towards the Reserve. My only option was to continue going forward. I just had to be quicker than the zombies.
Forgetting about my side hurting, I began running straight ahead. I tried to keep my eyes open for zombies, hiding places, or an abandoned ride.
I passed many cars and trucks that were abandoned on the sides of the roads. They were everywhere. It seemed that all of them had a door opened or their hoods were popped opened, something was wrong with them. As I ran up to the closest car with its door opened, I immediately noticed a reason it was abandoned. I wasn’t sure if it was the same reason that all of them were abandoned, but the one in front of me was missing its car battery.
My pace slowed until I stopped to look at the car. Sure enough, it was missing the battery. In fact, most of the electronical parts were missing from the motor. It looked like someone had decided to take whatever useful items they could from this car.
I walked over to the next vehicle with its hood up. The same thing had happened to the truck. Someone had scavenged whatever they could from it. I looked around at all the vehicles around me, as far as the eye could see, all the vehicles had their hoods up.
While looking around, I could see movement coming towards me. It looked like a few zombies had followed me up the street. I needed to get out of here. I took a deep breath and continued my run up the street.
I’m not sure how far I had run, but it was far enough that I made it to a Walmart parking lot. I saw a couple of abandoned cars in the parking lot. At least, I hoped they were abandoned.
I jogged up to the closest one and stopped. Even though the car had dirty, dark tinted windows, I could see movement inside. Thinking that someone was inside the car, I decided to make my way to the next one. I kept an eye on the car, hoping that whoever was inside wouldn’t attack me.
When I walked past the back of the car, I noticed that the rear window had been busted out. A dark reddish dry color surrounded the broken glass parts of the window. I briefly wondered what could have happened until I noticed a person’s head sporadically moving inside and knew that it wasn’t alive. It looked trapped, but I wasn’t about to take that chance.
I figured that it would be better if I just ignored this car and go on to the next one. It seemed strange but the closer I got to the next car, the better feeling I had about it. I mean, one huge bonus was that I didn’t see any kind of movement through the windows.
Not taking any chances, I slowly walked up to the driver’s side. My eyes scanned over the rustic looking car, looking for any sign of danger. I slowly walked around the car.
You know, for sitting out here in the weather, it was in decent shape. The tires were still inflated. The windows looked undamaged, well, all except for the small broken window next to the rear passenger door.
It was broken, with the glass lying on the ground. It looked as though something tried to escape, not break in. It was too small of a hole for anyone bigger than a toddler though. It was weird.
I continued walking around the car until I had completely circled it. It looked safe enough, as far as I could tell. I leaned down to the window and wiped some of the dirt off the driver’s window so I could look in.
The interior looked in flawless condition. Well, as flawless as one could expect. Sure, there were clothes and trash strung out everywhere, but the upholstery looked to be in great shape. Come to think about it, it looked too good. It looked like someone had been recently staying in the car. My eyes got wide. Was this a trap?
With that thought, I looked up to see if someone was indeed sneaking towards me. When I didn’t see anyone, I turned to my right to see if the trap was coming up from behind me. Nothing. The only thing I saw was the other car with the zombie’s head moving around.
I quickly turned back around, looking for any sign of danger. Still nothing. Either someone was trying to set me up or they had abandoned the car.
I reached out to the door handle and pulled. It easily opened. Why was it unlocked?
I couldn’t help but think that it was a trap. I began to look around when I heard a car coming from up the street. Fearing that it might be Serina, I quickly jumped into the driver’s seat and ducked down. I gently pulled the door close behind me and held my breath. I can’t explain it but, it was as if I was afraid that someone would hear me.
Within seconds, I heard the vehicle rush past me with people screaming at each other. I can’t explain the feeling of relief that rushed through me as they went past. I thought that maybe I had lucked out and escaped.
That elated feeling quickly vanished and turned to dread when I heard the car tires screech. Oh no! Did they find me?
I froze in place and listened. I wanted to know if they were coming towards me. Maybe, it would give me a chance to run.
So, I stayed as quiet as I possibly could and listened. The first thing that I noticed was that the people screaming sounded like they were quit a distant away from me.
After a few minutes of hiding and not seeing anyone, my curiosity got the best of me. I slowly sat up, just far enough to see over the dash. Close to a block away was a heavily modified pickup truck.
I watched as two men got out of the bed of the truck. The truck looked heavily armored like something out of one of those old ‘Mad Max’ movies my dad loved to watch. The windows had metal on them. The tires had rusted metal spikes sticking out of the rims. The tires were surrounded by metal. It looked like they were trying to protect the tires from getting cut. The body and bed of the truck had thin metal sticking out of it. From where I was, it looked like sword blades. Maybe, it was to cut zombies or enemies down as they drove by. I couldn’t see the front of the truck, but it looked like the tailgate had spikes sticking out of it. I noticed the guys moved in a type of pattern to keep themselves from getting stuck on the spikes.
The two guys began walking towards the front of the truck with spiky bats in their hands. Coming towards them were two limping zombies. I could hear the two guys talking loudly at each other and someone else, who was sitting in the truck. The two guys stopped talking and rushed towards the zombies.
The closest guy swung his bat low and took out the right leg of a male looking zombie, around the knee area. The guy hit the zombie’s leg with enough force that its knee bent backwards and sideways in an unnatural angle. The zombie seemed unfazed as it tried to take another step towards the guy. It didn’t go well got the zombie.
Its leg collapsed sideways as it tried to walk. It tried to grab at the guy as it fell on its side. The guy easily stepped out of reach and swung his bat downward. He hit the zombie’s left shoulder, making it difficult to crawl.
The second guy did the exact same thing to the next zombie. This one looked like a younger teenage girl or had been. It was hard to tell except for the girlish clothes it was wearing.
When the two guys stood over the downed zombies, who were desperately trying to reach them, the person inside the truck yelled something. The two guys turned around and ran towards the back of the truck and carefully climbed back into the bed of the truck.
Once they were safely inside the bed, one of them hit the metal with his bat. The truck immediately backed up a few feet before going forward. The driver angled the truck so that it would run over the bodies of both zombies. With a crunching sound, it ran over the upper torsos of the zombies.
Once the truck was cleared, the driver stopped the truck and began to back up. Again, the driver ran over the bodies, only this time he made sure to run over their lower limbs. Once the truck was clear
again, the driver shifted it into drive and went forward. This time, he made sure that he ran over their heads. With a final crunching sound, the driver continued to drive away. I could hear the guys screaming their approval.
Once they were gone and truly out of sight, I fully sat up. The people in this town were getting crazy. I needed to get out of here. Now!
Without thinking about it, I reach out to the ignition and touched a key. A key! Maybe, my luck had finally changed for the better.
I silently prayed to God, a simple prayer that he would make the car start for me. I grabbed the key between my thumb and first finger. I slowly turned the key. It turned over, a little slowly but it turned over.
I looked up to the roof of the car and spoke out loud, “Please God, please allow this car to start. I will do anything you ask of me. Just, please allow me this one thing so I can go home to my family.”
The car continued to turn over, but it wasn’t starting. I could hear the battery begin to drain as it slowed down. I pushed down on the gas pedal, trying to give it fuel. No! No! Please God! Please, Start the car!
My prayers were answered as it fired right up. It was a rough idle, but it was running. Perhaps the air filter was filthy or maybe, it had old gas, which wouldn’t be good. Who knows, the fuel filter could also be clogged. I wondered if that was the reason the car had been abandoned.
Regardless, all I could hope for was that it would run well enough to get me to at least Arcadia. I had family there. Sorry, we had family there.
I looked down at the fuel gauge. It had over half a tank of gas in it or at least that’s what the gauge said. Good, it meant that I should have enough fuel to get to Arcadia. I shifted it into drive and pushed down on the gas.
My trip to Arcadia was uneventful. I took the highway back and really didn’t see anyone. No people, no zombies, no nothing. I did see a ton of abandoned cars along the highway, but nothing else out of the ordinary.