by Evans, Mike
“Oh, you look like you were deep in thought, Einstein. What was holding your thoughts?”
Colby did not want to answer but at the same time didn't dare not answer. He was trying not to laugh when he said, “Well, I'm actually here thinking that this might be the last breakfast pizza ever.”
Anna could only roll her eyes. She said, “You know I would argue that that is probably worse than having thought of that with your dick.”
“No dear, typically my wiener doesn't think about food too often, it does think about one thing though.”
“Oh good, because that thing's not happening today. My head feels like actually I don’t feel any need to explain myself. It's a hard no. If we have the time when we get home, I would love a hot shower and a bandage for my damn head.”
Colby knew before asking it wasn't going to happen, but he was still happy putting on a puppy dog face anyways. Colby said, “So, on the ride here, I was checking the ring and it looked like chaos going on in the neighborhood, especially across the street at Amber's house. I'm pretty sure I saw this black blur go across and it was probably Mike on his motorcycle, best guess.”
“Emily said he was sicker than hell, what in God's name was he doing on his motorcycle?” Anna asked.
Colby shrugged, trying to make her feel a little at ease. He said, “It’s difficult to tell with him sometimes. I do hope that doesn’t mean that everyone in his family became a zombie. I can't imagine those sweet kids and Emily being one of those purple people eaters.”
Anna just shook her head. She was good friends with Emily and the last thing she was going to consider was her friend being one of those things. Anna looked at Colby saying, “Then let's get off the roof and get out of here.”
The two went down the rungs of the ladder quickly. Colby went first and was keeping a watchful eye on her making sure that she really did have her balance. He’d had plenty of hits to the head in his life, and in doing so, had also received a healthy number of concussions. None of them had been anything he'd enjoyed, and he could remember for sure getting the spins from them. When they made it down to the floor, the pounding had not slowed down at all. Colby said, “It could be good karma for us to let her out. I'm just saying that if we get judged on it might be a good idea to let Britni go.”
“Well, she is a real bitch and…”
Colby cut her off saying, “And you're a bigger person than her. Not physically, of course, but you know what I mean.”
“Yeah nice save, Gerber. But I tell you what, if she gives me any back talk, I'm punching her directly in the face. Also, she's not coming with us. Even God will forgive me for that.”
Colby walked over to the door and put a few steel bars up against the men’s, making damn sure that she wasn’t getting out of there saying, “Get back I'm going to open the door.
Britni screamed from the other side, “The door opens out assface, just do it and quit wasting fucking time.”
Colby looked back at Anna who was already nodding saying, “Oh yeah, she's a real gem.”
Colby undid what was holding the door shut and Britni wasted no time pushing the door out freeing herself from the locker room. For some reason she mistakenly thought that Anna being screwed over would not be near the rage as herself being locked inside. She could not have been more wrong. Britni came straight for Anna, throwing a right hook.
Colby wasn't sure if this was going to end with his wife having a black eye or not, but he knew she would give just as good as she got. Britni put everything she could into that swing. A boxer would have been proud of the dedication and commitment put into it. Unfortunately for her, the million kickboxing classes Anna had taken left her trained and knowing how to block and duck a punch. Anna took one step back, letting the swing go quickly in front of her chin, missing by only a few inches.
Britni spun around, the momentum from her punch taking her in a three-sixty and landing up against the door. Anna smiled politely before throwing everything she had forward in a swing of her own leading with the knuckles. She caught Britni between the eyes, the sound of her nose underneath Anna's hand was undeniable that she just broke it. Britni screamed, trying to cover up her nose as a seemingly endless supply of blood was pouring from between her clenched hands. She screamed, “You broke my fucking nose, you bitch. What, you just wanted to let me out so you could kick my ass?”
“You tried to punch me. What the hell are you talking about? Why don't you go to hell!”
Britni took her dripping hands, clenching each into a bloody fist, and pulled back ready to take the swing of her life. Colby was cringing at this point. It wasn't a pretty sight, and this woman should have never taken the first swing, let alone try to take a second one. When she uncovered her nose, Anna wasted zero time taking four quick unanswered shots. Britni returned with no blocking just taking the blows to her cheek, eye socket, cheek, and a final one to her already broken nose. She would not be doing modeling ever again, which probably wasn't much of a worry given pictures would not be all that important after today.
Britni’s head bounced off the wall with the final blow. It sounded like a homerun from a baseball bat. Colby stepped in before she could lay on a fifth shot at her saying, “Alright, Tyson, let's go.”
Anna could not have been more pumped up and pissed off at the exact same time. She did realize dizziness might be something she’d have to deal with for a bit based on how her head felt. Anna said, “I'm going to tear her goddamn head off!”
“No dear, we are going to leave while we still can. This is not the time to run around all pumped up on adrenaline, doing dumb things because of dumb people making you upset, got it? I didn't come all this way to watch you die. You stay by my side. We're going to get through all of this and then some.”
“Can I just punch her one more time? I swear to God it'll be the last one.”
“How about we go kill some nice zombies together? It'll be a really good exercise for the two of us to have a great bonding experience.”
“You better watch it, Gerber, I can whoop some ass.”
“Well aware, well aware. Britni, you have a lovely, blessed day. It was so nice to see you again. Good luck with evading zombies and all. I kind of think they like blood, so you might want to go back into the washroom there and clean yourself up just a little bit. On second thought, some people might mistake you for one of them and hit you with a car or shoot you in the head.”
Colby took Anna by the hand, making sure she wasn't going to go in for a third round. Colby checked outside, trying to see if there was anyone out there waiting to try and kill them. He looked at his truck, seeing that Ashley gnawed enough away at her arm that she’d been able to free herself, with the exception of her arm.
A bloody stump that looked like it had been gnawed through by wolves was still under his tire. A trail of blood disappeared down the driveway and he really hoped he didn't see that woman again. Colby said, “It looks like it is clear. I think that we should give it a shot.”
Anna said, “How sure are you that it is safe to go?”
“At the very least 50%.”
“50%,” she said, questioning.
“They are humans, Anna, dead ones but humans. It isn't like I'm looking outside saying, oh yeah there is a T-Rex and it's definitely a 100% not safe to go outside right now.”
“My savior, I do love you though.”
“You and me both, sweetheart.”
The two went out the door slowly, inching their way out until they knew the coast was clear. The dinging from the notification system did little to help them stay incognito. As soon as the chime went off a very pissed off one armed purple Ashley came flying around the corner of the building. She did nothing to try and stay quiet at the very least she might have been even louder than she had been originally before Colby had hit her with the truck. He could only assume some of that could be attributed to the fact that she had had to gnaw on dead flesh, which was not satisfying. She probably looked like a kid eatin
g sweetener chocolate thinking it was going to taste like an Oreo. One of the many fun things to mess with children.
Anna tried to pull Colby back, but he was bigger and heavier than she was. He was already too far outside of the door to come back in. Colby didn't waste any time once he saw the woman sprinting in his direction. Horrific little pieces of skin, flesh, meat, and jagged bone stuck out in what seemed like a bouquet of death. Colby already had his wrench in his hand, and not for the first time today, wished that he had something with a little more kick to it.
When she got up within a few feet of the door, Colby realized just how stupid these things potentially might be. The woman seemed to have no awareness of what she was running into. She didn't stop moving forward until she slammed face first into the glass separating Colby and her. She was definitely not creative because the first thing she started doing was slamming her face directly into the glass.
Colby wasn't going to look a gift horse in the mouth. He knew even on the off chance that they could get away from this thing without killing it a second time, that there was an extraordinarily strong probability he would be doing someone else a very large favor if he got rid of her. Colby walked around the glass when the woman was mid head bang and took her by the back of her neck. Not meaning to, but also got a decent grip on her sports bra, and pulled her so hard backwards that her head made a horrible sound as it ricocheted off of the cement. Colby almost lost his hold on the wrench. The vibration coming up the metal made it difficult to hold on to his grip. Colby knew losing his grip meant an increased chance of death. When Colby reassessed the situation, he widened his hands a little bit, like a baseball bat. He then brought it down a second time, wanting to strike it in the already dented forehead of this pissed off purple zombie. Anna screamed, “Would you kill that damn thing, please!”
“Trying dear, thanks so much.”
Colby, as fast as he could, brought it down in five quick successions, not stopping until the wrench was buried inside of Ashley’s skull. When he was done, he was thoroughly out of breath. He did not know how he was going to handle doing this repeatedly if he had to keep using Neanderthal tools instead of precision killing instruments.
When Colby pulled the wrench free from her skull, a goo that he tried not to focus on, dripped from the circular end. Colby said, “I think it would be a good idea if we got out of here.”
Chapter 19
Abigail waited impatiently for Noah to run around to the side of the truck. He wasn’t a sprinter, but right now, she knew he was absolutely not fucking around. Mabel was going nuts in the truck, completely taking on the feelings racing through Abigail. Both of their hearts felt like they were going to explode.
The hair on the rear of her back and neck came up like a mohawk all at once. Abigail was so busy watching out the windows waiting for Noah to get his ass in the truck that she hadn't been paying attention to what was happening less than two feet away from her. Mabel had begun growling a low guttural moan, sounding like a small fuse had been ignited in her belly as it grew louder and louder until it was close to explosion. Abigail took the back of the dog by her thick leather collar thinking incorrectly that she was going to try and leap out the door to go after some zombie that she had not yet had the displeasure of seeing.
Abigail yelled, not knowing that she was actually being protected, “You be good Mabel. You let Dad get in the truck so we can get the hell out of here and never come back.”
The dog didn't slow down growling for anything. It seemed like it was only getting more worked up and angry by the millisecond. Noah finally found the pistol and scooped it up and pulled open the truck door jumping in and slamming it shut. The dog was still freaking out, and he immediately noticed. He pulled the dog over, trying to give it a quick kiss on the head for saving his life, but Mabel jerked her head away pulling free from his and Abigail's grip. The two of them forgot sometimes they were basically dealing with a small bull when it came to having a baby AKA furry dog of this breed.
She said, “I don't know what the hell is wrong with her? She's been acting like this for a while now, and I don't understand what in god's name is going on.”
Noah not even meaning to make a sarcastic joke said, “Wait, you asked her what's going on and she didn't answer? What a bad dog, you are such a bad dog.”
“Oh, I'm sorry, did you want to live on the couch or god knows where we're going to sleep tonight? And every night after that for all the nights to come?”
“No ma'am, I was just making a joke...thank you very much for making sure that I was aware of just how funny I am not. It was definitely not by design, I assure you.”
“Well, it's a good thing that you are able to learn. Now why don't we get out of dodge and get home now. We have other pups to get and a ton of shit to pack up if we are not going to stay home. Have you actually thought about that much yet?”
“Nope, I was pretty busy trying to make sure Mr. Spielman didn't kill me, followed by a bunch of other people I don't know, also trying to kill me.”
“Noah, that's probably the smartest thing that you have said all day. I take it that we're not going to take the interstate home, right?”
“I mean we could, but that's probably only going to work if we don't want to get home alive. Which, you know, if that's the case then we probably should have just stayed at the office. I could have broken open the good bottle and we could have gotten nice and shit-faced for the end of the world.”
“Well, I think we're going to have to pass on that for now. Although it probably would have been nice for you to bring that with, since there's probably a pretty strong chance that we are not going to come back anytime soon. Unless some miracle happens.”
Noah took the last look in the rear view at their office thinking he was going to miss this place. He wasn't the type who needed to hype himself up to go to work. He was still a common man who would happily have time off but going into the office wasn't a chore. It presented him with a unique ability that most didn't have the opportunity to pursue by being able to take care of everyone from the young all the way up to the elderly. Mabel had still not relaxed at all. Neither of them could really blame the dog. It was hard enough for the two of them as humans to try and understand what in God's name was happening. This was completely different in so many ways. Not that they truly had the greatest idea of what was happening either.
The two made it to the end of the driveway before they realized exactly what the dog's issue was. The growling that they had tried to ignore, chalking it up to Mabel just being pissed off about everything going on, got a second piece to her singing solo now duo. Noah was going to say something about how the dog definitely was weird but stopped dead in his tracks, excuse the pun, when he realized Rebecca had stopped moaning. The quiet they realized didn’t last long. Mabel started an extremely low deep warning growl. Noah and Abigail seemed almost in unison to realize what the shift that was happening inside of the pickup was. They also realized it might not be Mabel that was growling.
Abigail said, “That is not Mabel. Do you have any more bullets in that pistol?”
“I know I have at least one but after that it's a crapshoot. I'm assuming Miss Larsen got bit.
“Well, unless you noticed the blood coming from somewhere else then yes she did. I mean when you tossed her like a ragdoll into the rear of the truck did you think someone at her age had begun her cycle for the month?”
“That is a horrible thought, just so you know. Nightmares, it's going to give me nightmares and lots of them.”
“Could you be serious for just a goddamn minute? Seriously, if this is contagious from bites then we might need to up our A game,” Abigail tried to explain.
Noah looked over his shoulder knowing he didn't have a choice but to look, and instantly regretted everything having to do with that decision. Rebecca was sitting up straight in her seat looking around coming off like a sleepy child trying to figure out what was going on, where they were, and most definitely
in this case where they were going to get their next meal from. When she locked eyes on the three in the front seat, if she could have had emotions of happiness still then she would have been going insane with joy at the moment. Abigail still had hold of Mabel’s collar, but it wasn’t going to do any good. She could have been sitting on Mabel’s back and still wouldn’t have the power needed to be able to keep her obedient.
Chapter 20
Ames, Iowa
A scream came from behind them and unless someone had been keeping up, there was very little chance that it was anyone but Steven. He was up against the tunnel wall holding his last lifeline in both hands, pushing with all of his might. Trying his damnedest to keep those purple bastards from tearing into his flesh.
Steven’s arms were starting to buckle. Steven used his right arm, pushing as hard as he could, to bring the stick around, whacking the guy in the side of the head. He went down to the ground, because pain was no longer a definition these purple zombies knew. Steven turned his focus over to the zombie that was staring eye to eye with him. Something people forget is when things are out of sight and out of mind, sometimes they should only be out of sight. Steven looked down but it was already too late; his thin workout pants were no match against the zombie’s intense hunger.