Knight of the Dead (Book 1): Knight of the Dead

by Smorynski, Ron

  “Lena! Get Charlotte!” odd, that he can actually hear his voice echo down the tight small stairs, only two feet across, six feet deep, to a sub-basement. It is just a crawlspace for the gas heater, under their bathroom floor.

  Lena scrambles up on all fours under the wooden door hatch. Dad slides Charlotte down. She jerks in pain, crying now, alive now. Lena takes her.

  “Dad?”

  “I'm getting mom!” he closes the hatch and has to crawl low, below the smoke. It is but a few feet off the ground. He is frantic, coughing, choking. He crawls back the way he came. She is in the kitchen, huddled, spent. He drops atop her, barely able to continue but pulls her along. She is blackened and looks as if she wants to die. She has given up. He pulls her on. She is light to him. He pulls and coughs, dragging her. She slides across the floor. A zombie rambles by in full flames. They can only see its ragged shoes clearly as it rambles through the smoke.

  He gets to the hatch. When she sees it, she realizes and pulls herself down. He squeezes himself and his steel armor through. He scrapes down the stairs and drops the heavy wood hatch behind. He is able to hear himself think now, hearing his steel pieces scraping along the concrete sides. The smoke is seeping through and the wood is burning above them.

  They are losing air quickly and the thickening of smoke is not allowing them to hide here from death. He sees the old cast iron pipes that he never got replaced. They are the old sewage pipes running not under the house, but through the dirt to the side of the house and under the concrete. He bangs the pipe open at a connector with his steel gauntlet and finally with his boots to loosen it. He pulls at it furiously, to breathe. He takes a big gulp in a dizzying state.

  “Breathe!” he yells at them. Each in turn takes a huge stale sewage breath from the pipe. It doesn't matter. They are so grateful for the air. The stench of old dry sewage pales in comparison to the stench they have experienced since this hell came to Earth. Their eyes burn. They cough black phlegm. They tear and spittle and faint but are slapped awake. They each take turns breathing. At first it is a hectic grab, to continue breathing. But after awhile, they are able to hold their breadth and abate the panic of aspiration. Charlotte is positioned up so she can breathe it. At first she was coughing up black phlegm but now is able to breathe in turn.

  As the yellow of fire shines above, the heat permeates the burning wood above them. Dad squats against the old combustion furnace. He yanks at the metal siding of the large encompassing box. Its pilot is off and the gas has gone out a long time ago. The thin metal sheets keep the heat away. He yanks off a side and affixes it above them to shield against the burning wooden beams. He is able to brace the heated metal with his own armored body. Because of the cramped area, it is easy to brace against the cinder blocks and dirt foundation.

  For hours they wait, breathing in the pipe. They are exhausted. Dad only has to stay awake to balance his armor and the metal sheets. He nods a few times and catches his slide. He yanks at other pipes. A narrow copper one comes off. He sticks that into the large sewage hole and breathes air in like drinking through a straw. They all take turns with either and with covering their faces with clothe.

  Wood beams come crashing down and explode above them. The girls groan loudly as ash and sparks flicker between the metal sheets and Dad's armor. Burning wood falls within and Dad grabs it up quickly and tosses along the ground under the foundation. Smoke suddenly fills their space. There is a panic, a coughing dread. Dad reminds them to relax and breathe through the pipe. Dad senses the world above burning and the ocean of terror burning. More wood chunks fall around them. The weight of the house seems to be crashing all around them and the howl of fire angers at being unable to reach them.

  Dad sees Lena praying. She is covering her mouth and nose with her shirt but has her hands affixed in prayer. Lisa does the same. Mom prays into Charlotte's ear. Dad grabs up the flaming serpentine wood pieces and tries to flick them under the fallen debris, the burning lattice all around them. The smoke billows above them denser and thicker. They wait a long time, coughing, hacking, in their own zombie state. Darkness takes over and time ceases.

  Then the rain comes. Perhaps the hissing sounds that permeated the fury of fire was there for some time. But the deluge suddenly envelops them. Large rain drops and rivulets pour in as if they were under a leafless tree. Dad hears the echo pitter-patter on the metal sheets and looks to see water showering from above.

  It washes over his face like a cool breeze. Each drop conquers the serpentine smoke and stomps it under its heel. The air suddenly clears of smoke and is replaced with dancing glass beads.

  And hope, in all its impossibility, returns. If it were not for Charlotte, and the look he shares with his wife.

  30. Charlotte

  Dad pushes off the metal siding. Mud ash and burnt wood roll off. The ground is puddling with black water. Plenty of smoldering beams and piles of oily burnt flesh continue to smoke as the downpour continues. The ground is steaming with orange embers and desperate flickers of flames.

  The sun is rising in the East, yet they are still shadowed in the rain clouds. Dad grabs his daughter's gladius at her side. He raises it and looks around. What good would a gladius do against The Horde?

  But The Horde is no where to be seen. The whole house, the driveway, and the front yard are a blackened wasteland. Everything is burned, not wholly, but mostly, collapsed and smoldering. The fires are gone and pillars of steam dissipate as the rain overtakes the last of the flames.

  The zombies, perhaps thousands upon thousands, are spread like ashen spiders in webbed piles across an expanse of black and grey earth. Many are stuck in charcoal lattice works. The dark shadows of an early morning reach far across the ground.

  Holy God, Dad ponders. He climbs up, weakly, awkwardly, stiffly. He stretches and is overtaken by a wretched cough. All their helmets are off and their faces muddied with black char. They look up into the rain, mouths open. Their faces are washed of ash and illness. They are renewed with water and life. He coughs a black phlegm. He blows his nose hard, pushing out ashy snot. He looks at his family. They are coughing and rain or tears course down their faces. They look at Charlotte and her wound.

  He sees a house up the street, beyond the blackened misty rain and blackened yard. He doesn't worry about zombies. He returns to the crawlspace and picks up Charlotte.

  “Come with me,” he says softly. His wife, Lena, and Lisa slowly unfold themselves from their pains and stiffness. They climb up from the basement crawl space, up onto the muddy ashen ground.

  Dad carries his small child, through the blackened rubble to that house, a sanctuary, a still standing structure.

  He kicks a smoldered wood fence, pushes through to the back yard. It seems peaceful here, untouched by the horrific devastation just a few houses away. The rain seems to lighten now, just a trickle. He stumbles to the back door and kicks it open with renewed strength. His wife and the girls are walking in behind him. He finds the master bedroom, and in a clean untouched room, all white with sheets and flowing curtains, he sets her down.

  She coughs up black phlegm and blood, a sudden and stark contrast to the white room. He kneels at her side, blackened and muddy. Each touch leaves a black mark on the white carpets, sheets, curtains and furniture. It is some sort of deco house. He came through the backyards on the other side. He doesn’t know who owned this house. His wife comes in with a fancy bottle of water. She puts it to Charlotte's lips and pours. Their daughter sips then gulps, choking and coughing and crying with each painful convulsion. His wife comforts her, sitting on the bed, black smears now graying much of the room where they are.

  Dad prays with tears and white knuckles. Lena and Lisa sit on the floor, drinking from additional water bottles. Something they must have found, his wife must have found in the house, this art deco house untouched these many weeks or months by the hell beyond.

  Charlotte cries in and out of pain, and closes her eyes as if to sleep. All of them are exhauste
d, physically, emotionally. Their respiratory system wholly defiled. Their pains and aches dulling their senses.

  The wife sings to Charlotte and barely audible, Charlotte sings back, between bouts of convulsing pain with perhaps a faint smile on her blackened cracked bleeding lips. Oh, how he loves us, oh how he loves us, me without you, me without you, God of this city, fix my eyes on you, pushing on a pull door, dum diddy dum, and many more. And Charlotte remembers every tune, perfectly, and most of the words, perfectly, with her closed eyes and clutching of the designer water bottle, cradled in her mother's arms.

  Her leg is a gruesome sight. It is swelling and puss ridden, completely covered in ash, not healing and seeping of something unholy. Dad eventually finds that staring at it does nothing. He gets up. Lena and Lisa, tears already clearing rivulets of skin around their eyes and down their faces, lay quiet, partially asleep, partially looking up at him. He waves for them to stay. He searches the bathroom. He finds fancy things, fancy wash clothes and cleaning ointments. He carries them, in a clumsy grab, back to the bedroom. He lays them on the other side of the bed, the white pristine side, now stained by his actions.

  He tries to put stuff on her leg. But with her wracking cry of pain each time he dabs, he flops back to helplessness. His wife with one hand sifts through the cleaning clothes and agents, and gently with small cotton pads applies gentle cleansing to her wound. With the clearing of ash, the skin can be seen as just as grey, as green, as wretched and foretelling as can be told. Dad does cry. He does cry in front of them and does not alleviate their pain, their sorrow.

  They all cry as Charlotte, she in a drugged state of exhaustion and pain, eyes partly open, seems to be in shock, or so exhausted with pain, she can not react. Could she be turning now?

  “I, I need to tie her up. We'll wait, till the very end. But I need to tie her up.”

  His wife puts Charlotte's greying face gently down. Black veins course and unveil themselves. Her lips blacken not from ash but from within. Her eyes cloud. Her mom kisses her forehead, over and over.

  “We love you Charlotte. We love you. Remember us. We love you Charlotte. We're here for you. You can go to heaven and see Jesus for us. We love you.”

  Barely, she says, “Charlotte is so cold.”

  Dad remembers bathrobes, white, in the bathroom. The house is not rocking from an earthquake, but he stumbles along nonetheless. His weight carries him from wall to wall, to the bathroom, to the hanging white plush bathrobes. He yanks them and pulls the cords out. He yanks a hook off the wall in his drunken sorrow. He returns.

  His wife kneels beside the bed with Lena and Lisa, praying to God for Charlotte. Crying out to God. Crying to Jesus.

  Dad reaches her small hand, to pull it out. Charlotte's eyes open. But for Dad, he knows those eyes, however clouded or discolored they are, they are still Charlotte's, though fading. “Dad, I saw Jesus.”

  “That's good Charlotte. That's so very good.”

  “He said not to be afraid.”

  “Yes, Charlotte, I know. I know, not to be afraid.”

  “He did, really. He said not to be afraid.”

  “I know Charlotte. I know.”

  “So Dad?” Charlotte's eyes were fading, her eye lids closing.

  “Yes, my love?” Dad says as he easily pulls her arms out.

  “I'm not afraid,” Charlotte says, closing her eyes and sputtering into a rabid sleep.

  He ties her hands quickly, one to each bedpost. He sees a belt nearby. He straps her legs together, buckling the thin designer belt. He has no more strength in him, no more strength to tie her down more, to ready her for this. She lays comatose except for heavy rapid breathing, and though the sun shines through the soft white curtains, her skin seems to be getting darker.

  His wife stands but still holds on to the edge of the bed, unable to look at her daughter being taken away from her, right before her eyes. She falters, in such crying exhaustion. She is unable to close her mouth or wipe her ashen bubbling nose. She steps, blindly through the room.

  “Lena, take mom out. Please, Lisa, Lena, take her out.”

  “Dad, what's going to happen?”

  Dad holds his gladius, unsure if Lena is asking or wanting to stop him. He holds it tight. She glances at it then cries. She bends down, not toward the gladius, but kneeling down by her sister.

  “Charlotte, I love you. I have always loved you. I'm sorry whenever I was mean to you, my sister. I love you so much. I wanted to grow up with you. I will miss you, my Charlotte, my sister Charlotte. Charlotte, I, I, miss you, and know Jesus will take you.” Lisa kneels next to her. She cries into Lisa's shoulder. They go to their mother, holding her, steadying her. They walk outside.

  Dad waits but he doesn't know how long. Her breathing and her heartbeat are pounding into his psyche. It is too loud, breaking his temple, his heart. He looks at her, the black veins webbing along her grey skin.

  He can't take it. Just a moment, just a moment, he raises his blade above her. He suddenly chokes up with crying and phelgm and coughing and must stumble away. He goes out to his wife. He closes the door. He nods no, not yet, not yet.

  “Not until the very end, I will wait till the very end.”

  “Dad, pray, please,” Lena cries.

  “God, God, though I walk through the valley of death. God, I don't know. I need you please. I am not strong enough for this. Please don't put me through this anymore. Please take me, not her. I know she'll be with you. She'll be with you. Then take her, take her God, your will. I have no will. I have nothing, no sword, no armor. I want to go too. Take us all. Oh God, Jesus please take us now. Please know we love you and accept your son as our savior. I have always believed it true, your death and resurrection. Why have you forgotten us? Have you forgotten us? Have you condemned us? Please no, please God, don't condemn us? I failed. I know I have failed you in my former life. I obsessed more over my fighting prowess, my money, selfish and wanting things I didn't need, everything more than my love for you. I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry God. Please forgive me. Please don't condemn my family. Condemn only me, and not them. Please send me to hell but don't send Charlotte, not Lena, not my wife, not Lisa. Please, oh God, I accept Jesus as my savior, Jesus as my savior, Jesus as my savior, Jesus as my savior, Jesus as my savior.”

  One by one they fall asleep.

  The sleep is long and riddled with black places, empty places, Godless places, not just zombies, but people happy without God, people powerful without God, people in vast castles and spires of adoration without God, and huge waves of blood and horns being blown and lamps and hooves from under robes and horned gods lording over men. Dad awakes to the cool breeze of the late evening. He awakens fully. His wife and Lena and Lisa are still there sleeping on the floor of the hallway. Before they came, it was a plush white carpet. It is now mottled and stained in black and grey.

  He stands, holding his gladius. He looks at the closed door to the bedroom. Black hand prints are spotted across its surface. There is complete silence, from here, there, everywhere. Lena, Lisa and his wife are asleep. He knows this is the right time. He can sense the change from within, and a peace overtakes him. He knows it is over and Charlotte is free. And that his love for her is eternal and she knows it. He knows that she is with God and Jesus and at peace and will suffer no more. He raises his blade and silently on plush carpet walks to the door.

  “God, thank you for my daughter, for the time you have given me with her, my love, my joy, your will.”

  He opens the door.

  “Hi Daddy.”

  31. EPILOGUE

  I've decided to start a diary. I think. It's weird. We're at the school. It's peaceful here. Funny to think I'm writing on school paper with a number two pencil. There's a lot of it around. The girls are asleep. It's at night and it's peaceful. This will be our castle. We will build this up. The perimeter fence is strong. The poles are metal and ten feet high. Only The Horde can break it. But I plan on using fire somehow to destroy them, mala
tovs or more propane tanks. Even if the rest of the neighborhood burned, I think we'd be safe in here. It's surrounded with asphalt and no trees. We'll see. I got to figure that out. What's great is that zombies can't wander close to the buildings. So there's this relief factor up here on the second floor in a classroom, that no zombie will walk by the window or hear our laughter and our talking.

  Charlotte is so beautiful. She is sleeping peacefully. She has some odd scars, black veins still under her skin, but she is the Charlotte I know. She is still the little girl that God gave to us. Jesus saved her? I told her the rule about zombies, once bitten by a zombie you always turn. She asked like a child, what rule? Who made that rule? I laughed. See it's like a zombie genre rule made up by men, and I believed it, like an idiot.

  Benjamin came up with the idea that it could be adrenaline based. If a person is full of fear when bitten, he or she is pumping adrenaline and perhaps the virus spreads or feeds off that. The creatures perhaps feed off the release of adrenaline. Charlotte said softly it was Jesus who saved her. Benjamin is the old Jew I encountered by the pet store. He and his wife were shacked up nibbling on the dog food I got them. At first, I thought they turned when I went to get them. But they moaned and groaned and then complained when I pulled back the curtains to see them clearly.

  I got them as a trial run to save others and to get some of that delicious fortified dog food. I was hoping to find Rondo too, but sadly no. It was hard on Charlotte and Lena. The burned zombies were everywhere. No telling if a portion were a burnt up dog. I don't know. They're praying for his return. There's nothing I can do about it. We don't have a picture of him... or of my children any longer. That's rough. But all things considered.... .

  Finding Benjamin and Ruth was nice. I just wanted someone. I wanted some company. And an old Jewish guy seemed the best thing, harmless and of the same God. I keep the salvation of Jesus to a minimum for now. Let them and us acclimate.