Haven From Hell (Book 3): A Young Man's Game

by Won, Mark

  Turns out the night could have been better, though.

  The first warning I had was Tracer licking my face. I was feeling so good I didn’t really get the message. I wasn’t watching his tail and just thought that he wanted to play. Everyone else was, I don’t want to say irritated (because of my condition), but perhaps ‘distracted’, by the noise we were making while they were trying to sleep. I don’t know how long that went on. Then we all heard the sound of all those bell ornaments I’d strung up on my first day in camp. A little gentle tinkling was to be expected, depending on the wind, but what disturbed me was the volume. It was almost as if a bunch of would-be interlopers were straining against our fence. That’s when I finally came to my senses and realized that Rob’s sports car had been sounding its horn the whole way back to camp. I know that we’d been moving fast, but making that kind of noise was exactly the kind of thing one does to draw zombies to where one wants them to be. Rob and I had inadvertently drawn every zombie between camp and Paxton to out location. No doubt they’d been moaning up a storm ever since they’d first sensed us and were now at our very gates (gate actually, we only had the one).

  I bolted upright and strove to dispel the fuzziness that threatened to overwhelm me. I managed to shout the alarm, but Melissa and all the rest were more worried about my mental state than they were worried about the reality of our situation. Don’t get me wrong, I was okay with it for once, because I knew they were worried about an actual head wound and not some silly psychological nonsense. Still, I had to waste precious time explaining.

  “Listen to the alarm bells! Just listen!” By the time everyone in the motor home was on board others had already picked up on the situation. I yelled at Mr. Moon to get into the front of the RV and to get ready to drive, then I grabbed my walkie talkie. The sheriff and deputy had the remaining two, but neither had turned theirs on yet. By the time everyone in camp finally began to move it was nearly too late.

  The only way to drive out of our cul-de-sac was along the same dirt track we’d come in by, and that way was choked by the thickest part of the throng (which, if you know anything about zombies, is to be expected). Mr. Moon had no choice but to try and plow through them.

  Everyone else had been spending their first night outside of their various vehicles and inside their brand new tents. They were all getting tangled up and flailing about, desperate to get to their cars. Our situation was bad, but even with a head wound I knew exactly what I had to do.

  I jumped out of the moving vehicle (the side door had yet to be replaced) and ran directly for Blue. Realizing the need to engage the enemy, a couple of others followed me. I could hear the sheriff shouting and his deputies firing pistols and shotguns. The zombies had closed to nearly melee distance by the time I got Mary Ann out of her holster, and I finally began getting some work of my own done.

  The zombies had only managed to break through our fence at the dirt road, so at least I didn’t have them coming from every direction. Everything was nip and tuck for a few heartbeats before I managed to get ahead of the incoming numbers (that’s what Mary Ann specializes in). I can easily manage one head shot a second (at very short range) with my lever action beauty, the only time consuming part being the sliding in of a new magazine. My role model for this (aside from Uncle) was a character in an old western TV show who could work the lever and fire, all in one action. He could even work the lever one handed, if he had to.

  Once the horde began to thin out some I was better able to pay attention to specifics. Such as how Rob was trying to fight a rear guard action with a baseball bat while Mr. Reese was shoving his wife and kids into their car. And how Neil, Connor, and Melissa had dropped their shotguns and drawn their pistols, back to back to back, right in the thick of things. Connor’s wife, Jenny, and son, Jason, were busy using a couple of hunting rifles we’d got from town. They were both on top of the same four door car firing at any zombie that got too close (there were no shortage of those). As I watched, Jason put a bullet through the head of a zombie that had broken into Mr. Reese’s car and was busy grabbing Keisha by the neck. Steven, Hunter, and Norm were all up the same tree. Steven was out of ammunition while Norm kept trying for head shots with his bow (which is not as easy as it sounds if you’re balancing on a bending tree limb). Hunter kept jabbing down with his spear, every now and again getting lucky. As I watched, a zombie managed to grab the spear shaft and tear it away from him. Mr. Moon had tried to move through the crowd but was immediately bogged down by the mass of bodies. His motor home was heavy enough, but all the corpses proved more than his nearly bald tires could handle. Gina, her younger sister, Andrea, and Samantha were all firing their newly acquired pistols directly through the open doorway of the RV to prevent a gore covered zombie incursion. Dan and Jack were both unarmed and running through the camp like chickens with their heads cut off, leading all the loose zombies on a merry chase (I started to laugh at that but my head still hurt). I saw someone shoot down one of their pursuers just as a couple more joined the chase.

  But my favorite was when a couple of zombies charged the Seltzer family. Mr. Seltzer grabbed his wife by the back of her neck with one meaty hand and cast her, head first, into the mud, directly in the path of the approaching horde. Little Lin fell to her knees at her momma’s side while her big brave daddy turned and ran into the woods. I heard him hit the fence from where I was standing.

  Naturally, I helped out the best I could as circumstances dictated. My shots came fast and furious, magazine after magazine. Clearing off the threat to Jan and her daughter came first, followed by giving Dan and Jack some breathing space (and my liberated cop gun). Then I helped out the treed trio and finished off the few left trying to get into the RV. By that time everyone else had taken care of whatever was left of the rest of the horde in our immediate vicinity. The whole process must have taken me over a minute.

  The sheriff was yelling at everyone to get into a car and go. Mr. Moon’s big RV was blocking the way, so Neil and Connor both used their police cruisers to give him a little push. I got on Blue and decided to bring up the rear. Tracer was already waiting for me in the basket. With everybody running for a ride, and all the cars taking off as fast as they were able, somehow Norm ended up in my rickshaw. We all made off.

  Up ahead I could see Mr. Moon finally had enough speed up to plow through a number of newly approaching zombies. Whatever he missed got picked off by one of the following cars, truck, or minivan. It was lucky we didn’t encounter any ghouls or ogres (that I knew of). I wasn’t sure we could have handled any more trouble than we did.

  In all the excitement we seemed to have forgotten all about poor Mr. Seltzer, but he hadn’t forgotten about us. While I was pedaling my fastest, Mr. Seltzer came running up behind Blue, intent on hitching a ride. Although the way ahead was relatively clear, it seemed that at least a few zombies had finally managed to break through our fence in some other place, and they were following along behind the bloated jerk at their best pace (which was very slow). Mr. Seltzer was screaming at the top of his lungs for us to help him.

  Now I had a few problems with that. Firstly, as far as that fat man blob knew, the only motive power for Blue was me, and I was having a heck of a time as it was, with only Norm for a passenger. Just making my way over and around all the dead (and not dead) bodies was trouble enough, without adding to it. Secondly, we’d left all the keys to all of our extra cars in their visors, so that’s where the fat fool should have been running for. Thirdly, even if he knew about Blue’s little engine, the only way for two guys to sit in one seat would be for one to sit on the others lap. Not cool. Not even close to cool. Not on my bike, not ever. Period.

  And finally, of course, I really didn’t like Mr. Seltzer all that much. If I hadn’t had Norm as a witness I probably would have stopped just to shoot the man in the head. As it was, Mr. Seltzer got real close to us as we were leaving camp, passing by our little parking lot of extra vehicles. That’s when one of the half smashed up zomb
ies, one that had been run over a couple of times, reached out and grabbed Mr. Seltzer by the pants leg. He screamed, so I stopped. I figured that, in order to maintain a solid reputation with all my new friends, I’d have to save that sorry, low born, no account, sad excuse for a man’s life and get him into a car. That’s when Norm, clearly reading my intention, turned all the way around in his seat and launched an arrow straight into Jimmy Seltzer’s brain. Then he patted me on the shoulder twice and said, “Go!”

  So I thumbed the switch to Blue’s engine, and away we went.

  Chapter 15

  “What a mess.” That from Sheriff Slim. We’d been driving around for a few hours looking for a nice place to settle. At first we had to wind through the woods before wending our way more or less north, then veered to the northwest to avoid the large village of Elmsville. Also, that let us travel through the corner of a beautiful state park, which was nice. After leaving the park behind us for a few miles we began weaving in and out of wrecks littering the road, all empty. Our pace had slowed to a crawl, but we had been hoping that the congestion would end and the highway would clear up. Now we were stuck behind wall to wall traffic with literally no end in sight, but least there weren’t any zombies around. All the cars were jammed together and had broken windows and torn seat belts, so I was pretty sure we were looking at someplace where a whole lot of zombies used to be. After the Change they must have decided to get out and wander around. Hopefully, they were still wandering far, far away.

  I thought about recommending that we all go into the forest and set up a new camp, but there were problems with that idea. One difficulty would be getting potable water. I know we could find something, but I didn’t know any sure source. Another problem with that idea was a potential zombie invasion of the woodlands. I realize that’s completely counter-intuitive, but the last time I’d talked to Mark he told me all about how a group up north had been practically driven before a persistent and massive horde of zombies. The zombies (and ghouls and ogres) had to travel half way across the state just to haunt a nature reserve. According to my friend, Mark, the zombies had swept that state looking for prey, whether intentionally or not, he couldn’t say. All of that thinking made me reluctant to try for another woodland camp, since the zombies had already chased us from the one we were in, and we didn’t know how many more of the Changed might be lurking about.

  “Yup, that’s a mess,” was my contribution to the conversation. It was pretty obvious that we’d have to back up and try another way. That kind of thing happens all the time when traveling the roads, especially the highways.

  Blue was stashed in the RV with my folded up rickshaw. I was wondering if maybe I should volunteer to use her to scout out a better way. That was when Tracer started snuffling at my side and began giving me the signal for a large zombie approach. He pointed to the road ahead.

  “We got trouble,” I said. “There’s a big bunch coming from the road ahead.” Suddenly Tracer began sticking his nose in the air and pointing all about. The way he was wagging his tail was real bad news. The zombies were closing in on the road from the woods on either side, back the way we’d come. They were about to block off the road. But we still had time.

  I told Connor all about the new trouble Tracer had sensed. To the sheriff’s credit he didn’t question me once, but acted immediately. Realizing we were trapped, he quietly passed the word for everyone to hide and keep quiet.

  We were in for a long wait, but no one complained. No one wondered if I’d just been making up stories or was suffering from an ‘antisocial imaginative trend’ or just needed attention (I really hate that last one, as if I needed normal people’s attention). I could tell I was with a real smart bunch.

  The zombies took their time, but when they finally appeared it was in stunning numbers. It looked like half a major town’s worth of undead had decided to converge on our one little piece of road, all dripping with gore and with half their organs flopping all over the place. One of them was tripping over a bunch of its own spilled intestines, which it was trailing with the excrement smearing the highway, while another, a ghoul, had its legs severed and was running around on its hands, dragging its gooey innards along behind it. Gross.

  We did what we could, hiding deep in the motor home and under cars and such, but one just can’t expect little kids to have the discipline necessary for that kind of prolonged and dedicated hiding. Or maybe that legless ghoul was short enough to see under the car they were hiding under. Either way, after a few tense minutes of various zombie groups converging and blundering into each other, little Lin (our youngest) and Mr. Reese’s eldest, Keisha, both let out a scream and broke cover. I could see it all happening because I’d been looking out one of the windows in the RV by using a bicycle mirror soldiered to a telescoping pointer (which I keep for just such an emergency).

  Naturally, I rushed outside. I had no solid hope of being able to save either of them, but that was okay. The important thing was that the only way those two kids were going to get killed was over my dead body. Don’t get me wrong, I figured that was exactly what was going to happen, but it’s important to have one’s priorities straight at a time like that. Uncle always told me it was essential for me to do my best, and the hardest thing to do was probably the right thing to do. So I charged.

  I was feeling a little desperate but at least Polly and Abby were having fun. It was shaping up to be our last dance, and they really wanted to make it special for me. I began with the immediate ghoul threats and then focused on any ogres that came within reach. The girls composed a brand new number, combining two of my favorites, The William Tell Overture and Amazing Grace, just for the occasion. It was lovely. Both the kids ran off into the woods, one to either side, while I drew the horde deeper into the traffic jam.

  I can’t say for how long that went on, you know how time takes on a crystalline quality during those moments of apparently certain death. I remember how beautiful it was the way the ghouls would jump from car top to car top to close with me, and how the ogres would shove a straight pathway through traffic to reach me, arms outstretched to rend me limb form limb and eyes overflowing with hate.

  What impressed me most was how everyone else remained still. No stupid heroics, no pointless and doomed last stands, they all kept it together. It’s not at all what I expected. In situations like that I generally expect parents to jump out after their kids at the least provocation, only to leave orphans.

  After a while I lost all my reservations and let my muscles remember how to really dance. It was time for new music so Abby chose the ‘Ride of the Valkyries’ and Polly went with ‘A Mighty Fortress is our God’ in a simultaneous loop. Sometimes, during the pauses in the dance, the red would clear and I’d wonder how I’d gotten so far away from everybody else. The girls and I were heading deeper and deeper into the massive carnage of the car wreak and farther and farther from my friends. That was okay, too. Where I was going I didn’t really want any of them to follow (at least not just then).

  Strangely, it seemed to me that the pauses in the dance were getting longer and more common. I noticed that there were no more ghouls and all the ogres had fallen. The dance was slowing down bit by bit until I slipped into an adagio, and then into a larghetto. All I had left to kill were several thousand zombies. My only problem, if one wishes to see it that way, was that I was totally, completely, and utterly surrounded (although, there were only a hundred or so back the way I’d come). I wondered fleetingly if the ghouls had intentionally kept my attention, so that the ogres could keep me hemmed in, so that the final massive group could finally close in on me. But no, they’re not that smart.

  During the battle I had made my way through the wreckage until reaching the other side, a journey of two miles, pursued the whole way by the slavering minions of Hell. The woods to either side of the highway had thinned out and fallen back from the road, revealing an area choked with zombies, and the highway itself was packed shoulder to shoulder with the undead. The
advancing horde had managed to push me through the sea of crashed cars into my current flanked position. There was no way through.

  My uncle’s voice rang in my ears, “Don’t just stand there like an idiot, boy, get moving. If you’re going to die, then the least you can do is die well.” But what my real ears heard was, “Don’t move!” and then the fire rained down.

  A pair of large gasoline filled bottles broke and spilled to either side of me, spraying and spilling their fiery contents everywhere. In an instant I was flanked by two spreading pools of flame, with the zombies caught in the midst of the fire reduced to the final death immediately. Zombies are a surprisingly flammable bunch. Clearly my friends had been paying attention when I showed them how to launch a Molotov cocktail. Many times I had seen what fire does to zombies, so I was not surprised by how rapidly the hell-spawn collapsed, or by how the remaining Changed strove to fall back from the fire.

  I cast my gaze about, and to my wonder saw Steven and Hunter standing on the top of a busted up semi trailer. They were some yards distant, hurling Molotov cocktails with a pair of staff slings, like something out of an obscure Renaissance fair reenactment, except with far more practical and interesting results.

  The zombies closest to them turned and began moving in their direction. There couldn’t have been more than a hundred zombies on that side of me, like I said. That’s the direction my final charge would have taken if my friends hadn’t shown up, since the zombies were thinnest there.