Slow Burn: A Zombie Novel

by Mike Fosen

  “I got this one,” he offered. “He was my friend too. Let’s let him rest in peace.”

  At that, Stephen fired a single shot and promptly returned to the ambulance, not even wanting to watch Johnny fall to the ground.

  “Let’s go!” Stephen yelled, again putting the ambulance into gear before I had the chance to climb in.

  I climbed into the cab of the ambulance this time instead of the back, and I had a better view of our surroundings. I was amazed to see a few living people running into a Walgreens drug store. It appeared that they were looting as several others were also seen running out with armloads of goods. Sure enough, looking at other store fronts, I could see they were being hit as well. A large black man smashed out the window of a convenience store with a cinder block and a small crowd followed him inside. It was amazing to watch; they had obviously no fear of authority. The sound of gunfire just to the north caught my attention as well.

  “Someone is still in the fight,” Stephen remarked, slowing to avoid hitting an armed man who scurried across the street towards the shots.

  "Maybe Stephen is right," I called back to Mattie, offering her a reassuring smile. ”Not everyone is dead. We’ll make it out of here. And by the way, does your radio work? Stephen and I have both lost ours."

  "No," she replied, "I haven’t heard anything from dispatch in a while. I think we have lost the station to these...."

  "They’re zombies!" Stephen chimed in. "We’ve already seen enough dead coworkers today. We can check on the station later. I wanna get home and do some refitting, and we could all use some rest after what we’ve been through."

  As we got close to the Des Plaines River that runs through the downtown area, we were disheartened to see that the drawbridge over the river was up. The bridges were a constant cause of traffic delays as they must rise to let passing barges through. Looking up and down the river, I didn’t see any barge traffic and decided to go have a look. Working midnights, I’d had a chance to shoot the shit with the bridge tender, Frank, a few times, and maybe he was still here. Stephen slowed the ambulance to a stop, and I told Mattie to provide some cover while I investigated. Exiting the side door, I walked up to the stone structure that housed the bridge tender. It was rock solid with a steel door and contained a small apartment that should have kept Frank out of harm’s way for an extended period of time. I noticed there was a stalled-out car pushed to the side of the road and it appeared a few buildings had the front windows smashed out, but there were neither people nor any zombies in sight. I had to pound on the door several times with my asp before Frank's head appeared in the small glass window.

  "What's up with the bridge, Frank?" I asked with only a slight edge in my voice. "We really need to get across."

  "I can't do it, Mike. Got orders straight from Springfield to raise these bridges and not let anyone cross," Frank replied while shaking his head. "Sounds like some kind of quarantine. And people are acting crazy… I saw that car over there get mobbed by a group of people, and they chased the whole family right over the wall into the river! The mob just jumped in after them, and they all got swept away. Happened so fast I couldn’t do a damn thing about it. Tried calling 911 but got no answer. I think people are getting sick or something.”

  "Listen!" I responded with a raised voice. "You know me damn it! Now look at me! I’m not sick and have seen firsthand what is going on. We’re all in a world of shit, and it's only gonna get worse, and quick I might add.”

  Frank looked shaken up at my response. “W-What is going on out there, Mike?”

  A quick recap of my observations and experiences over the last couple of hours went a long way toward convincing Frank to lower the bridge. Leaving him Sherman’s Glock 17 along with his two extra magazines sealed the deal. Frank informed me that since losing his wife to cancer last year he had no reason to even go home and was going to try to ride it out in the bridge house. He had a lot of food and water, a bedroom, kitchen and bathroom, all in a secure two-story building.

  “It’s got a satellite dish too,” Frank added. “Maybe I can find something out on TV.”

  "Not a bad spot to be in," I said and gave Frank a thumbs up in the direction of the tower as the bridge began to lower. "I'll try to make it back in a few days to check on you."

  “Be sure to,” Frank said. “I’ll be here.”

  I ended up having to race back to the ambulance for the second time when it appeared Stephen was again content with leaving me behind, already having the big GMC on the move. Mattie helped pull me in the back door with a chuckle.

  "Try and keep up, bitch!" she chided.

  I could barely make out from Stephen up in the driver’s seat. He honked the horn to Frank as he crossed the bridge.

  After we reached the west bank and rolled into a residential area, Stephen slowed the ambulance yet again when he saw two women with a small child waving us down.

  “Oh thank God,” the younger women pleaded. “You have to help us. My little boy got attacked by our old neighbor lady and is bleeding pretty bad. I called 911, but nobody answered. It took my mother and me everything we had to pull him away from her, and we both got cut up by her pretty bad, and need help.”

  “We’re not paramedics,” Stephen replied, making sure his door was locked and the window left mostly up.

  The boy looked to be in a comatose state, and Stephen knew there was no saving any of them.

  Mattie crawled into the cab and looked at the women carefully. She didn’t like what she saw.

  “You all got bit by the woman?” she asked with remorse.

  “Yes! But my daughter and I are fine!” the older woman screamed. “You have to help my grandson!”

  She was in full panic mode and tried to open the door. Finding it locked, she pounded the window in frustration and began screaming. “Let us in! Let us in right now!”

  Mattie tried thinking of something to say but was spared the trouble by Stephen, who simply drove away and left the trio standing on the side of the road. Mattie sank back into the rear of the ambulance, subdued.

  “It’s for the best, Mattie,” I tried to explain. “There’s nothing we could have done and it would just be a waste of time to try.”

  Stephen hit some mostly empty side streets and quickly covered the few miles to my neighborhood, only having to drive through a couple of yards to avoid traffic. He didn't even bother to use the siren, knowing it would only draw unwanted attention. The people we did see had a grim mix of determination and helplessness on their faces, heading either on foot or in vehicles to their various destinations. Some towards home for perceived safety and others just out and away, with no place to go other than away from here. We heard a few loud thuds, and felt them from the side of the ambulance.

  “What was that?” Mattie asked.

  “We are being shot at,” Stephen said. “I guess someone else wants the ambulance. It’s coming from over there.”

  He pointed to the north, and, sure enough several armed men could be seen firing our direction. Around them people were running and several got cut down by the seemingly indiscriminate rifle fire. It looked fairly obvious that they were not yet infected. Stephen hit the gas and made a quick left turn down a side street.

  “This pisses me off!” I yelled up to Stephen. “We need our rifles up and running. I don’t wanna bring a pistol to a rifle fight. It’s gonna be the law of the jungle from here on out, brother, but we don’t have the time to deal with these shitheads right now!”

  The scene playing out in front of us became even more ominous when we began to hear the sound of the tornado sirens, which had been apparently going off in the central district of town. The final piece of the morbid landscape fell into place as a flight of U.S Army Blackhawk helicopters thundered overhead. This momentarily distracted Stephen who, like a five year old, was fascinated by aircraft.

  “Keep your eyes on the road or we will be walking,” I warned him.

  “Relax, I got this,” Stephen repli
ed as we bounced abruptly off yet another curb.

  I was about to reply, but my attention was drawn to a scene playing out in a large park near my house. A very overweight man was running through the open grassy area maybe two hundred yards to our right, with every ounce of determination he had. He appeared to be rapidly running out of steam and the groups of zombies chasing him were swiftly closing the gap. Just as I was about to mention to Stephen that we should stop and help, the fat man tripped and fell. Before he could rise he was swarmed, so I didn’t bother to say anything. I looked over and was relieved to see that Mattie had not noticed the fat man’s last minute alive.

  It was just as well, she didn't need to see that either.

  Pulling up to my humble abode was disheartening. It seemed to be intact, but several of my nearby neighbors’ homes already looked abandoned or damaged in some way. Several garage doors were left open and the occasional front door, classic signs of bugging out in a panic. My neighbor across the street could be heard hammering wood planks over his windows.

  “To take off or barricade yourself in,” I pondered. ”What a choice.”

  And that is if you were lucky enough to still be alive at this point. Many people were probably en route to their homes when this all went down and got stuck in traffic. Add flesh eating zombies to rush hour traffic and you could most likely guess what happened to them.

  “It’s amazing what people are capable off when they panic,” Mattie said in wonderment of the damage.

  “That’s one thing I have always worried about in a breakdown,” Stephen replied.

  In the darkening gloom, I could see furtive movements in the shadows, unknown if friendly or foe from where I stood. But I didn’t have a good feeling about it.

  “I’ll pull guard duty while you load your stuff, Mike,” Stephen offered. “Just make it quick, and get some ammunition for your M4.”

  “Sounds good.” I turned to Mattie. “Can give me a hand carrying supplies out?”

  “Gladly, Mike.”

  “Great! You smell better than Stephen anyhow.”

  Climbing down from the ambulance, I did a 360 degree scan of my surroundings, and after concluding that the coast was clear, I waved for Mattie to follow me. Opening the gate to my fenced-in yard, I walked to my front door. I didn’t see any evidence of tampering on the door, so I put the key in and unlocked the deadbolt. I heard Bruiser’s deep, roaring bark as I pushed open the door and playfully rough-housed my dog, who almost tackled me while licking my face ferociously. Once he realized I had a visitor with me he ignored me to investigate Mattie and soon was clamoring for attention and trying to lick her face as well.

  "Hey, Bruiser! Long time no see!" she said with a smile, her spirits raised by the friendly dog. "What's it been, a few hours?"

  I pried him off of her by the collar. “Alright dog, get down, go out and do your thing, boy.” And with that I shoved him outside.

  After he bounded past Mattie and out the door, I paused, turning back to the inside of my home and looked at her.

  “Say…did you close the front gate when you came in?”

  “Umm no I don’t think I did."

  I leaned to the right and looked over her shoulder, out the door and down the sidewalk at Bruiser taking a huge dump. Right next to my wide open front gate!

  “Oh shit! Bruiser!”

  Bruiser, now finished with his dump and facing the open gate, looked back at me from over his shoulder. I knew what he was thinking.

  “Don’t you dare, boy,” I ordered.

  Bruiser, his tongue lolling from his fang filled maw, gave me a laughing look and exploded into a full out sprint through the front gate. The last thing I saw of him was when he paused to piss on my neighbor’s Mercedes’ tire and then was gone. I closed my eyes and groaned, slapping my hand over my face.

  “I’m so sorry, Mike,” Mattie said with obvious regret.

  “Don’t sweat it," I said reassuringly. "He runs away every chance he gets anyway. I’m tired of looking for him, and it usually takes animal control and $150.00 ticket to get him back. Let’s get to work. You bag up all of the food in the kitchen and take it out to the ambulance."

  While she set up to work in the kitchen, I decided to change out of my zombie blood-soaked BDUs. I grabbed a pair of olive drab cargo pants, and my favorite Metallica workout shirt. I pulled on my combat boots and grabbed a large duffel bag and packed as many changes of clothes I could fit inside of it. Yanking the zipper shut, I headed out of the bedroom to the front door where I dropped the duffel bag. Next, I took an empty pillow case, went into the bathroom and tossed every piece of personal hygiene products I owned into it followed by every roll of toilet paper. I had spent way too much time in the field to forget one of the best luxuries to have. Something to wipe your ass with is worth more than gold.

  Back out at the front door again, I grabbed the duffel bag, made my way out to the ambulance and tossed them inside. I noticed Stephen was on top of the truck staring down the street with Sherman’s shotgun at the ready position.

  “What’s up, bro?” I asked. “We got trouble?”

  “Not sure yet, take a look,” he responded and motioned down the street.

  I looked down the street and observed a handful of infected bastards pounding on a front door. The owner looked to be dead in the front yard and was missing an arm and most of his left leg. I wondered who else was inside his house.

  “Keep your eye on them,” I decided. "If they get bored and want fresh meat, put them down fast. We want to draw as little attention to us as possible while we are vulnerable right now.”

  “Will do, boss,” Stephen replied. “Just hurry the fuck up with the rifle ammo.”

  I jogged back inside to check on Mattie’s progress and saw her munching on a peanut butter and jelly sandwich.

  “That looks good, why don’t you make a bunch?" I mentioned to her. "Take a few out to Stephen. We could all use the chow right about now.”

  Mattie nodded her head and tried to say something around a mouthful of food. I walked past her down into the basement and stopped to take a long look around my gym. Now that the world had gone to shit I was more pissed off that it appeared I would not be able to keep my workout routine than anything else I had seen so far. Kind of callous after so many people had died and been born again as flesh eating zombies, but if it kept me from snapping, I could really care less.

  I walked through my workout area and over to my small preps section and started hoofing bottled water up to the ambulance. Next, I grabbed two military duffel bags and tossed every box, can, and bag of stored food off my shelves into them. Another trip out to the ambulance completed, and I was starting to work up a sweat. I looked over to see what the status of those infected bastards was and noticed several new corpses lying in the street. I looked up at Stephen questioningly.

  “They got tired of dead meat and wanted yours truly to munch on. I disagreed with their line of thinking," he said and shrugged his shoulders as he was feeding shells into the bottom of the shotgun.

  "Funny, I didn’t even hear the shots."

  “Might be a good idea to hurry, the noise probably will draw more,” he answered back, pumping the action of the reloaded shotgun.

  Back inside, I told Mattie to lug all the bagged food to the ambulance and meet me downstairs when she was done. Heading back down, I opened my gun lockers. I reached in and removed my personal Bushmaster AR-15 with an EoTech holographic sight and loaded a full 30 round magazine. I also pulled out a small range bag which contained 10 additional loaded magazines. Setting it aside, I then retrieved out my “zombie killer”, a Mossberg 500 12 gauge with folding stock pistol grip and side saddle shell holder. I loaded the shotgun to capacity and retrieved a bandolier with twenty extra shells loaded onto it. Finally, I grabbed another bag and loaded all my remaining shotgun shells into it. Mattie finally came down the steps, and I handed the rifle and ammunition to her.

  “Here, this is for you. Now carry the
se upstairs,” I said and handed her the load before she had time to object.

  She left without saying a word, and I started loading up a large rucksack with all of my remaining rifle and handgun ammunition. I was never able to stack the ammo quite as deep as Stephen or our buddy Dan, but I always kept at least 500 rounds of each caliber on hand. I grunted as I grabbed hold of the backpack and started upstairs.

  Ammo is fucking heavy, I learned yet again as my legs burned under the weight.

  Returning from the ambulance, I directed Mattie to another pile of gear as I opened a different locker to pack up my other hobby.

  I always liked knives and blades of any kind. The beauty of a knife was that you never had to reload them. I reached in and grabbed one of my favorites. It was an Ontario Spec Plus survival machete, made of really thick steel with a square tip and a rubber non-slip grip. I was dying to try it out on one of the zombies. I also retrieved a huge Bowie knife. I had brought it home from work and over the course of several hours, cleaned it up to a mirror polish. It was close to the Spec Plus in size and weight, so I belted the Bowie knife to my left side and strapped the Spec Plus on my right thigh.

  I next grabbed my Colt Commander 1911 .45 pistol and that went into a holster on my right hip before I pocketed several spare magazines for it. I tossed my Glock and all remaining spare magazines for the pistols into my last empty range bag. Finally, I grabbed my already packed three day “bug out bag” and my much larger long term camping rucksack. They contained two .38 caliber revolvers as well. My uncle had given me a Colt Detective Special years ago for helping him roof his house, and the other was a cheap Taurus that was too good of a deal to pass up from the pawn shop that was in my old patrol zone. Again I ran - or rather, waddled - upstairs and tossed the gear into the ambulance.