Death Squad (Book 2): Zombie State

by Dalton, Charlie

  Jimmy moved around their home, constructed predominantly out of refuse discarded by people of some forgotten civilization. He approached the small enclosure around the back.

  It was sturdy and well-made, built to withstand the dust storms that often plagued them during the summer months. Another testimony to his father’s skill with hammer and nail.

  Billy the Kid stood, knock-kneed, head bowed to peer up from under the gate’s rungs the way he used to when he was smaller.

  Jimmy wondered if he knew how much cuter he looked this way, making it even more likely he’d get a treat. Or did he do it by accident? It made no difference to Jimmy. Billy was getting his treat, no matter what.

  Jimmy reached into his pocket and took the flimsy flap of yellow lettuce out. The goat sniffed it. Not with relish. He reached out with his tongue. The leaf stuck to his taste buds. He sucked it in his mouth and made loud slapping noises as he chewed.

  “Sorry, Billy,” Jimmy said. “It’s the best I could do today. I’ll try harder next time.”

  Billy munched quite happily. Goats even ate paper, so the lettuce leaf, no matter how limp and faded it was, had to be better than that.

  Billy’s eyes were a gray-blue hue and stared in both directions, keeping a lookout. His mother said his eyes looked sinister but Jimmy thought they made Billy look confused, in need of protection. Jimmy was only too willing to provide it.

  He patted the goat on his bony head and looked up at the sky. The stars shone brightly the way they always did when the temperature began to fall, blinking like cold distant gods. Gorgeous against the desert white and velvet blue of the cool night sky.

  The craggy mountains were a mile or so distant, unflinching against the heavy press of the stars. Some nights, they were so vivid he could make out the swell of the Milky Way.

  One of the stars flickered. Probably a satellite, Jimmy thought. Occasionally they passed overhead, useless now, empty metal shells from before the Fall. An everlasting remnant of their once illustrious past.

  Jimmy liked seeing them. A reminder of the way things could be. One day. Perhaps he might even live to see it. But he doubted it. There needed to be signs of progress, of things getting better, his father said. And they had seen blessed little of that for the past decade.

  A flash of light surrounded the satellite, glowing brighter around the undercarriage. That was strange. There was usually a blinking green light on the satellite, not an explosion of yellow-orange like this.

  It moved faster than a satellite, growing larger as Jimmy watched it. It was coming toward their little camp, fast.

  Jimmy ran and shouted, but by the time he rounded the shack, they were bathed with intense bright light. Jimmy’s cries were lost to the object’s roar as it sailed overhead.

  The world bleached white, a powerful blast of air knocking Jimmy to the ground.

  The fire swirled, rose, and then doubted immediately like a giant had blown it out. The air rippled, spraying dust outwards and curling back in on itself, forming a tunnel.

  A heavy thud in the distance.

  The animals mehed and screamed, kicking and beating at their prison. Jimmy and his father secured the gate, ensuring the animals couldn’t escape.

  A wall of dust rose, blocking the stars as if reaching up to knock them from the sky. Then it began to settle back down to earth.

  “What was that?” Mom said.

  “I don’t know,” Dad said. “Another meteorite?”

  “Probably best to stay away from it,” Mom said. “Just in case.”

  “It wasn’t glowing green,” Jimmy said. “Didn’t all the other meteorites glow green? This one just crashed. Maybe it’s not a meteorite. It could be like those flying metal things you told me about. The. . .” He struggled with the unfamiliar word. “Helicopter. Or. . . airplane.”

  Mom rocked the forgotten baby in her arms. It screamed and wailed. None of them took any notice.

  “Jimmy could be right,” Mom said. “What if it’s a plane? Someone might need help.”

  “You want me to check it out?” Dad said.

  “Just in case,” Mom said. “It might be an airdrop, something we can use. God knows we need more medicine.”

  “All right,” Dad said. “Let me put my boots on.”

  “I’ll go with you,” Jimmy said. He always liked to join his father on his adventures.

  “Fine,” Dad said. “But the goat stays here. We don’t want anything we can’t control. Besides, he’s probably still munching on the lettuce leaf you gave him.”

  Jimmy’s eyes grew wide and he flushed red. He thought he’d gotten away with it.

  * * *

  DAD HELD Smokey’s reins as they crossed the desert. The mountains rose higher with each step. An owl hooted and screeched overhead. Jimmy eyed the darkness uncertainly. He was afraid but didn’t want to look like it. He kept close to his father.

  “Don’t worry,” Dad said. “There’s nothing out here that can hurt us.”

  They both knew the falseness of that statement. There were all manner of animals that lurked deep under the sand and circled high overhead that wanted to gnaw on their bones. And that wasn’t even mentioning the man-shaped horrors in the world.

  Thick bolts of devil grass poked out of the ground, snagging Jimmy’s foot. The world was carpeted with curled silver shadows that stretched over the valley floor.

  “Woah,” Dad said.

  They stood on the lip of a crater, peering down into the huge newly-formed indent of the earth as if Thor had slammed his hammer into it.

  In the middle, pressed up against the mountain and having taken a chunk out of its base, was a lump of rock. The flowers of half a dozen spindly trees were alight, flames flickering and burning out.

  “Well, I’ll be,” Dad said, pushing up the brim of his hat with his thumb. “Would you look at that.”

  Despite the incredible show of natural power, Dad’s attention was taken with something else. He caught Jimmy looking and spun him around so he faced the opposite direction.

  “You, uh, look over that way,” he said.

  Jimmy was just as mesmerized, even if he couldn’t quite understand why. He glanced over his shoulder at the figure standing ten feet from the asteroid.

  She was naked, wearing not a stitch on her gorgeous body. She was tall with dark raven hair, toned and strong. Her head moved left to right, taking in her surroundings.

  Dad wet his thumb and forefinger and pressed his eyebrows down. He clucked out the corner of his mouth and led Smokey forward. Jimmy had to run to catch up.

  The woman couldn’t have missed them approaching but seemed more interested in the crater. There was something odd with the way she moved, Jimmy thought. Her face was devoid of emotion, flat and lifeless. She didn’t move her eyes, only her head, to peer where she wanted to see.

  Jimmy tugged on his father’s hand.

  “Dad, let’s go,” he said.

  “That’s a woman in need, son,” Dad said. “I’m sure I taught you better manners than that.”

  Jimmy checked the woman again. She wasn’t so big, he supposed. His father was a good four inches taller than her, his arms thick and muscular. He could easily take her.

  Smokey stopped twenty yards from the asteroid and stepped side to side, skittish. Dad handed the reins to Jimmy.

  “Hello there, Miss,” he said, taking a step closer. “There’s no need to be afraid. We don’t mean you any harm. You’re mighty lucky to have been missed by the asteroid. Although it seems to have left you a little, uh, exposed.”

  He shrugged off his jacket and offered it to the woman. For the first time, the woman acknowledged his existence. She considered the jacket with the same lifeless expression.

  “Or I can put it on you if that’s all right?” Dad said.

  He stepped slowly—deliberately—toward her, and draped his jacket over her shoulders. She didn’t zip it up or try to conceal her nakedness.

  “You must have been close for
it to have blown your clothes off,” Dad said. “Perhaps you’re in shock. Sit down. You need to rest.”

  “Give me your clothes,” the woman said.

  “Sure, I can give you my shirt,” Dad said, unbuttoning it.

  “Give me your clothes,” the woman said again.

  No inflection, no wavering of the voice. Pronounced exactly the same way as she had the first time. Dad turned to Jimmy.

  “Give her your pants,” Dad said.

  “Why?” Jimmy said.

  “Share the load, son,” Dad said.

  Now he was closer, Jimmy could see it wasn’t an asteroid at all. There was a square hole in the side like a door. The moonlight shifted ever so slightly, revealing a large egg-shaped capsule.

  Jimmy wondered if it was one of those airplanes or helicopters his parents told him about. It looked a whole lot different from the descriptions his father had told him.

  “Give me your clothes,” the woman said again.

  “We’re going to,” Dad said, a little agitated this time. He could have a fierce temper when he got riled up.

  Jimmy began unbuttoning his pants when the woman stepped forward. She wrapped her hand around his father’s neck, her movements smooth and fast. She raised him off his feet.

  “Dad!” Jimmy said.

  His father barely managed to squeeze out a croak before the woman twisted her hand sharply to one side, making a loud crack noise.

  Dad’s body went limp. With her free hand, the woman pulled his pants off and tossed his body aside. The woman put the pants on.

  “Dad!” Jimmy said, rushing to his father’s side. “Dad!”

  His father stared at the night sky, unblinking.

  Jimmy didn’t know what to do. He touched his father’s face and shook him gently to wake him up. He didn’t stir even when the woman bent down to pick up his father’s fallen hat.

  “Where is the girl?” the woman said.

  Jimmy focused on his father, tears streaming down his face.

  “Where is the girl?” the woman said again, taking a sinister step forward.

  Recognizing his immediate danger, Jimmy focused.

  “The girl?” he said. “What girl?”

  “Where is the girl?” the woman repeated.

  “That way,” Jimmy said, pointing. Guessing randomly. “That way.”

  He pointed east. The woman took Smokey by the reins and led him away.

  “Wait,” Jimmy said. “How am I going to get my father home?”

  The woman didn’t answer. Didn’t even so much as hint she’d heard him.

  Jimmy put his fingers to his father’s neck and felt for a pulse. He had none.

  Jimmy held on to his father’s lifeless body and cried as the woman scaled the crater and headed east.

  * * *

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