Undead Ultra (A Zombie Novel)

by Camille Picott

  I turn my head, trying to see the owner of the voice. She’s concealed behind the bright beam of the flashlight. Based on the sounds of multiple feet crunching on gravel, I assume she’s not alone.

  “I asked you a question!” She fires the gun again.

  “My name is Kate,” I squeak, ears ringing from the gunshot. “I—I’m a waitress. This is my friend, Frederico. He’s retired.”

  “Bullshit.” The woman comes to a stop before us. “What would a waitress and a retired man be doing in Mr. Rosario’s cave?”

  “We’re from Sonoma County,” I reply, craning my neck around.

  Now that she’s closer, I can see the woman. She has long dreadlocks pulled back into a ponytail. She wears ripped jeans and a faded T-shirt that says, What are you looking at, Dicknose? Bits of light-brown armpit hair stick out from her cut-off sleeves. She looks like a bona fide Northern California granola hippie, except that hippies don’t have a predilection for waving guns around and scaring the piss out of people.

  “We’re trying to get north,” I continue, hoping to disarm her. “My son is a student at Humboldt University. My friend’s daughter lives—”

  “Why are you here in Mr. Rosario’s tunnel?” She moves a few steps closer, leveling the gun at my chest.

  Sweat breaks out along my chest and spine. My mouth goes dry. I swallow. I fixate on her hand, staring at the small rose tattoo on the inside of her wrist.

  “We—ah—we’re runners,” I say. “Ultramarathoners. We’re, um, running to Arcata. The roads were, uh, are, blocked, so we decided to follow the railroad tracks. See?” I twitch my shoulder, drawing attention to my hydration pack. “This is my running pack. We’re runners. We didn’t know this was Mr. Rosario’s tunnel, I swear.”

  “You’re ultra-what?” the woman asks.

  “Ultramarathoners.”

  “What the fuck is that?”

  “People who, uh, run races longer than marathons.”

  “Why the fuck would anyone want to do that? How far is a marathon, anyway? Twenty miles?”

  “Twenty-six point two miles,” Frederico says.

  “And what the fuck does that have to do with the price of mayonnaise?” the woman asks, pressing the tip of the gun against my sternum.

  “We, um, like to run long distances.” I talk in a rush, balling my fists to stop myself from shoving the point of the gun away. “Like, twenty, thirty miles at a time. Sometimes more. We run all the time. When the zombie outbreak clogged the highway, we decided to run to Arcata.”

  “And where did you say you’re running from?”

  “Geyserville.”

  “Uh, huh. And when did you leave Geyserville?”

  “About . . . ten o’clock this morning.”

  The woman’s eyes bulge in surprise. Then she barks a laugh. “That is the most creative crock of shit I’ve ever heard. It’s four in the morning. You’re trying to tell me you’ve run, what—seventy miles? Seventy-five miles?—in less than twenty-four hours? Without getting eaten by the zombies?” She laughs again.

  I swallow, resisting the urge to tell her Frederico and I have both completed several one-hundred-mile races in under twenty-four hours. And that we are in fact at mile seventy-three. And that we’ve become proficient—sort of—at killing zombies. Have I come all this way just to be shot to death by a granola psychopath?

  “What, don’t have anything to say to that?” The woman shoves the gun hard against my chest.

  “It’s the truth,” Frederico says quietly. “We’re ultrarunners, and we’re running north to find our kids and rescue them from zombies.”

  “Listen, dicknose.” The woman shifts her attention to Frederico. “I might look like a granola girl, but I’ve got shit going on between my ears.” To my immense relief, she pulls the gun away from my chest. She uses the weapon to gesture in the vague direction of her brain. “No way in fucking hell the two of you ran all the way from Geyserville this morning. And if your kids live farther north, they’re probably already dead.”

  Her words are like a kick in the gut. Frederico and I exchange desperate looks.

  Aleisha and Carter are safe. They have to be.

  “Squirrel, tie them up,” the woman says, glancing over her shoulder. “We’re taking these two back to base.”

  A ponytailed guy in a flannel shirt zip-ties our wrists and walks us down the tunnel at gunpoint. The woman, who I have mentally dubbed Granola Bitch, oversees two other men who load the crates onto a handcar. It’s the handcar, I realize, that made the rhythmic squeaking noise we heard earlier.

  The rose branded on top of the crates matches the tattoo on Granola Bitch’s hand. What’s inside those crates that has these whackos drawing guns on us?

  Drugs, probably, I realize. Or maybe guns.

  Maybe drugs and guns.

  Considering the fact that we’re in the heart of Mendocino County, one of the first places in California to legalize the personal cultivation of marijuana, I decide it must be drugs.

  Holy fuck. One look at Frederico’s face tells me he’s coming to the same conclusion. We’re prisoners of wacko drug dealers.

  They march us out of the tunnel at gunpoint. The drugs, loaded onto the handcar, squeak along beside us. I half expect to see a zombie or two, drawn by all the commotion, but the woods are strangely quiet.

  A mile down the tracks are two ATVs. The drugs are loaded onto them, as are Frederico and I.

  I cast a searching glance at my friend. He gives a small shake of his head. Fear and despair tighten my chest.

  Granola Bitch hops into the driver’s seat. “Those two fucks try anything, shoot their asses,” she says to Squirrel.

  The ATVs roll off the tracks and into the underbrush, heading steadily uphill. As far as I can tell they aren’t following a road, or even a path. Granola Bitch seems to know where she’s going, though.

  The landscape is a mix of oak and pine trees. Frederico and I bounce along atop one of the drug crates. Who the hell are these crazy assholes selling drugs to? Despair multiplies inside me. How are we going to get out of this? What in my life has prepared me for escaping psychotic drug dealers in the midst of a zombie apocalypse?

  Nothing. Absolutely nothing. My life experiences consist of being a mother, a wife, a waitress, and an ultrarunner. Running shoes and electrolyte tablets won’t get us out of this.

  God. We are completely and totally fucked.

  Chapter 31

  Fun Run

  Despair swells in my belly. Heavy, thick, sickening despondency. It’s a despair born of circumstances too heavy to bear.

  I could just quit. I could jump off the ATV and make a run for it, force the Granola Bitch to shoot me and put me out of my misery. It would all be over.

  The ATV hits a dip in the land. The vehicle lurches violently, nearly throwing me over the side. The physical jolt sends a bitch slap to my brain.

  I mentally recoil, abruptly recognizing the dark spiral of my mind. It’s the same dark path I took after Kyle died.

  Don’t go there, I tell myself fiercely. Don’t be weak.

  I reach deep inside myself, searching for my inner strength, the strength I draw on to help me finish ultra races. I am a woman who once raced fifteen miles with a missing shoe. A person who can do that isn’t weak. Over and over, in ultra race after ultra race, I’ve proven I’m not weak.

  Now it’s just a matter of remembering I’m strong.

  I push away all the periphery things that stand in my way; the sadness, the helplessness, the pain. I grab onto a razor’s edge of focus, funneling my energy into one single, shining goal: to survive and get to Arcata.

  Fuck the pain and fuck the sadness. If I don’t mind them, they won’t matter.

  I feel my despair shucking away, sliding off my shoulders and puddling at my feet like a heavy blanket. I don’t know what Granola Bitch has in store for us, but I’m ready for it. Glancing at Frederico, I see the same steely determination etched in his features. He gives m
e a nod, as if to say, We got this.

  Mile seventy-nine.

  The ATVs pop out on a small dirt road. Cresting one more hill, we arrive at a chain-link fence topped with barbed wire.

  Inside the fences are at least two dozen zombies. They crowd up against the fence, drawn by the noise of the ATVs. They moan and gnash their teeth, rattling the fence.

  “What the hell?” I murmur to Frederico, staring in horror.

  He shakes his head in response, a frown on his lips.

  Granola Bitch turns toward us, a sadistic light in her eyes. “Like our security system? We used to keep guard dogs, but Mr. Rosario realized the zombies require less overhead. We rounded these up from Willits. Fed our dogs to them.” She grins, watching our expressions. “Now the undead keep our compound safe.”

  I swallow, trying not to let my unease show. Is Granola Bitch telling the truth, or just messing with us? What sort of sick fuck feeds dogs to zombies? And keeps zombies for pets?

  Squirrel hops off the ATV as Granola Bitch pulls up to the fence. He keys a code into the security pad. A second later, the gate beeps and swings inward.

  As we drive through, I get a better look at the zombie perimeter guard. They’re inside a dog run that surrounds the compound. I guess technically it’s a zombie run now.

  We pass through the run—fenced off on either side of the entry gate—and head into an area of hard-packed dirt and giant, towering pine trees. Below the trees are small wooden cabins painted the color of dirt. They blend in with the landscape, which is probably the point if they’re trying to avoid aerial detection.

  I try to get a good look at everything. Three of the buildings are roughly the size of barns. They’re probably used for storage or the manufacturing of drugs—maybe both. The rest of the buildings, all small, look like bunkhouses.

  As the ATVs roll into the compound, people come out of the buildings. They look similar to Granola Bitch—dreadlocks, big beards, tie-dyed T-shirts, ripped jeans. A few of the women wear ankle-length skirts and loose, fluffy blouses. A number of the men wear dark, knitted caps. They all look to be in their twenties. If not for the guns they carry, I’d think we’re in a hippie compound.

  The people wave to Granola Bitch and the others, calling out greetings. Any of them could pass for the hobos Frederico and I encountered earlier. Perhaps this is how Mr. Rosario disperses his drugs across northern California; he takes on wayward young adults and turns them into drug mules.

  “Found the goods,” Granola Bitch calls, hopping off the ATV. “Tell Mr. Rosario we have prisoners.”

  Several people immediately descend on us. We’re grabbed by the elbows and pulled off the ATV. A handful of other people grab the crates, carting them toward one of the big buildings. Most of them gather in a loose circle around the ATVs.

  “Jeanie!” A chubby, middle-aged woman with tan skin comes out of a bunkhouse. The top of this particular bunkhouse is carved with a rose—the same symbol Granola Bitch has tattooed on her wrist, and the same symbol branded onto the drug crates.

  The plump woman wears a tie-dyed sundress. A matching scarf covers her head and holds back graying, waist-length dread locks. She gives Granola Bitch a quick hug and a kiss on the cheek. “What did you bring me, Jeanie?” she asks.

  Granola Bitch—Jeanie—waves the gun in our direction. The hippies holding us haul us forward.

  My eyes flick back to the symbol carved on the house. Now that I’ve seen it, I spot it on the other buildings, too. Why does it look so familiar? I’ve seen it somewhere before, but where?

  “I found the goods and brought them back, Mr. Rosario.”

  The fat woman beams. “I knew you would, Jeanie. Now we just need to sit tight and ride out this zombie bullshit.” She pats Jeanie on the cheek, obvious affection in the gesture. “When the dust settles, people will still want their drugs. Hell, they’ll probably want them more than ever. Mr. Rosario will be there for them.”

  Her eyes, which have been traveling over the crowd the whole time, land on us. Her smile instantly disappears. Eyes narrowing, she says, “Jeanie, who are these folks?”

  “Mr. Rosario, we found these two in the tunnel with the goods.” Jeanie shoves the gun in my face. I flinch, and she laughs. “This bitch claims they ran all the way from Geyserville yesterday morning. Says it was just coincidence they were hanging around our goods.”

  “Really?” The chubby woman, who I can only deduce is Mr. Rosario, narrows her eyes at us. “Sounds unlikely.”

  “That’s what I said, Mr. Rosario.”

  The woman moves forward. The hippies part to make room for her. She comes to stand before Frederico and me. We’re pushed to our knees. Why does this woman go by “mister?”

  “They kind of look like runners,” she says after a long, silent assessment. “Doesn’t account for them being with my goods, though. Well, you two?” My eyes jerk upward as I realize she’s directly addressing us. “What do you have to say for yourselves?”

  I open my mouth, but Frederico is quicker.

  “Mr. Rosario,” he begins, voice respectful and deferential, “I’m Frederico, and this is my friend Kate. We live just outside of Geyserville. Our kids live in Laytonville and Arcata. We’re on our way to find them. We apologize for disturbing your goods. You have my word that we were only passing by.”

  “Uh-huh.” Mr. Rosario crosses her arms under her substantial breasts, clearly not buying our story. “Jeanie says you ran all the way from Geyserville yesterday morning. That’s not possible.”

  I swallow, mouth going dry. This is not going well.

  Frederico keeps his voice level when he answers. “Kate and I are ultrarunners, Mr. Rosario. We run races longer than marathons. Both of us have run fifty- and one-hundred-mile races. We’re, ah, the sort of weirdoes who get up Sunday morning and go for the thirty-mile fun run.”

  “A thirty-mile fun run?” Mr. Rosario’s eyebrows nearly climb off her forehead. “You’re either completely full of shit, or completely insane.”

  She flicks her fingers. Two hippies step forward, reaching out to rifle through our packs. They probably would have taken them off if our hands hadn’t been zip-tied behind our backs.

  A woman unzips the pockets near my breasts, pulling out precious food and tossing it to the ground. I curse myself for not eating it when I had the chance.

  I watch my other few precious possessions fall to the ground: the railroad spike, screwdriver, gloves, spare shirt, the stick of Body Glide, headlamp, and my phone. I twitch, instinctively leaning toward the phone—my last link to Carter. Granola Bitch sees the motion and laughs at me.

  “You expecting a call?” she asks.

  “My son,” I reply, voice chilly.

  Granola Bitch rocks back on her heels. “Riiiight,” she says, sarcasm thick in her voice.

  I want to claw out her eyeballs.

  Meanwhile, Frederico is undergoing the same treatment. Our blister pack is tossed aside, followed by his headlamp, food, hammer, and Luggy the lug nut wrench.

  I watch the proceedings, heart sinking into my stomach. We’re already running on bare essentials, much less than what we need for a run of this magnitude. By the time these assholes are done with us, we’ll be lucky to have our underwear. Hell, we’ll be lucky to be alive.

  The man frisking Frederico pulls out the small pocketknife he’d lifted from the zombies outside Willits. I glance away, distracted by the contents of my pack scattered on the ground.

  “Where the fuck did you get this?”

  The hostility in the young man’s voice jerks my head up.

  He stands in front of Frederico, holding the knife between them. The mother-of-pearl inlaid handle flashes, and that’s when I see it: the rose.

  The rose.

  The same rose that’s on the crates, Granola Bitch’s tattoo, and Mr. Rosario’s house.

  Oh, fuck. Fuck-fuck-fuck. How did we miss this?

  A murmur of recognition and anger ripples through the crowd.

/>   Frederico doesn’t flinch. “I lifted it off a zombie corpse just south of Willits.”

  “This is Greg’s knife.” The young man turns toward Mr. Rosario, eyes bulging with grief and rage. “These fuckers did something to Greg. He never would have parted with this knife.”

  “Let me see it.” Mr. Rosario holds out her hand.

  The man drops it into her palm before turning a steely-eyed gaze back to Frederico.

  My heart starts to pound, adrenaline pumping through me. We are so very, very fucked.

  “This is Greg’s,” Mr. Rosario confirms. “Never went anywhere without it. Care to explain?” She levels a hard look at the two of us.

  “The owner of this knife was a zombie when we came across him,” Frederico says. “He heard us coming and attacked. We defended ourselves.”

  “You killed and robbed him,” Granola Bitch says, a dangerous glint in her eye.

  She’s not completely wrong, but we can’t let her know that.

  “He was already dead,” I reply, cold sweat breaking out over my body. “We didn’t mean any disrespect. We were so hungry. After he attacked, we took the food he had on him. Just the food and the knife. That’s all.”

  “So you say.” Mr. Rosario narrows her eyes at us. “And yet Jeanie found you in the tunnel with our goods. Somehow I find it hard to believe this is all just a coincidence. I will give you one last chance to tell me the truth. Who do you work for, and who sent you?”

  Frederico and I exchange anguished looks. What can we say to appease this pack of hippie whackjobs?

  “Mr. Rosario,” Frederico says, “I know our story sounds bizarre. I wish we had some other truth to share with you. But my friend and I are nothing more than two runners trying to get to Laytonville and Arcata. It was never our intent to disrespect one of your fallen or to trespass on your tunnel. Please, let us go.”

  It’s an honest plea. It’s the only plea we have. But I can see from the hardening lines around Mr. Rosario’s mouth and eyes that it isn’t enough.

  “Runners, huh? That’s the story you’re sticking with?” Her dark eyes glitter. “Well, all right then. What’s the phrase you used a few minutes ago? Fun run?” She hands Greg’s knife to Granola Bitch. “You two are about to go on a little fun run, Rosario style. Jeanie, go get the jingle bells.”