Z Notes | Book 1 | Z Notes
Page 1
Z Notes
Shawn L. Lilly
Copyright © 2020 Shawn L. Lilly
All rights reserved
First Edition
NEWMAN SPRINGS PUBLISHING
320 Broad Street
Red Bank, NJ 07701
First originally published by Newman Springs Publishing 2020
ISBN 978-1-64531-951-1 (Paperback)
ISBN 978-1-64531-952-8 (Digital)
Printed in the United States of America
Table of Contents
The Two Travelers
Flashback
What a Lovely Place to Be
Freaks Come Out at Night
Bacon and Eggs, Anyone
A Walk in the Woods
Back to School
Four Guys in a Motel?
Tank’s on E, Time to Fill Up
Time for Church
First, I thank Newman Springs for giving me a chance to get my story out there to others. Also I like to thank my family and friends who believed in me.
I thank all those who didn’t think I could do it as well. If it wasn’t for people like them in the world, people like me couldn’t prove them wrong. My biggest thank you goes to my grandmother, Emma Hall, my biggest fan. She truly believed in me more than anyone else. I only wish she lived long enough to read it. I truly miss her, and I know she is looking down on me and is proud of all my accomplishments. So this book is for you, Grandma.
Fire, smoke, and sirens are all I hear and see now. People are attacking each other. Some are dying from their injuries only to get back up and attack others. Others are screaming and running all over and around each other to get away. Those who trip and fall get trampled by those who are running. No one seems to know what is going on in the world we live in. Mothers are trying to fend off crazed people from attacking their children only to get overrun by a couple of them, and their lives are over that fast. The army seems to be a joke; they roll up fire at will killing the crazy and the sane. I guess it’s too hard to tell the difference anymore. There is so much blood everywhere it’s covered us all.
In the mall people are jumping from the third-floor edge to the first floor to just get away from the killing, only to die once they hit the bottom, if they were lucky. Some of the ones not lucky lie there bleeding uncontrollably to find out the downstairs is just as bad upstairs. So they just lie there and watch as the crazies run over and eat upon them, helpless to do anything about it.
Try being on the road, and you see all of this going on while you race home to your family—cars crashed into poles and ditches and people plowing into one another to try and run and stop and turn. You set there watching them leave their car and try and run only to fall under a pile of bodies like one had a football in Smear the Queer.
People scream, run, and cry for help, only to see no one is there to aid them. They are screaming, “What’s going on and why me?” And there I am, standing with a bat in my hands swinging for a home run with every head shot I come in contact with. Next to me is my best friend, Frank, and he is just as good as I am at baseball.
All you can do is set back and watch people scream and run around like crazy and wonder—wonder why people are so stupid sometimes. We have watched the movies and read the books. And still when you see people die and get back up to kill others, it tries to tell you something doesn’t click in their brains. If that’s the case, Frank and I here think to just let them die to have less in our way and more for us to kill.
My name is Matt. There’s no need for last names because I might not know you that long. And if you’re like me, you know what’s going on in this fed up world we live in. We’ve seen them on TV and in movies. They move slow and are dumb as can be. Well, they got most of it right at least. As it never happened before this, no one really knew how an undead would act. But I’m here now to let you know some are slow but other ones are fast.
Anyway read on. This will tell you about my life so far in this crazy world I live in. Read slowly and learn fast for your life could depend on it. So grab a weapon and aim high because it’s zombie killing time.
The Two Travelers
“Look there, Matt! There seems to be a black painted arrow on a house.”
Matt looked over to where his longtime friend had pointed. He was right. There upon the house was a large arrow angled downward pointing toward the front steps.
“Frank, you know the rules. No houses are one of them,” replied Matt.
“I know, but can’t we at least go have a look at what it’s trying to show us?”
Matt looked at Frank with his ignored look and waved him onward to his new fascination. Keeping close to the buildings, they both crept along the shadowy edge of each wall. Frank carried a spear he made himself and a knife that would put Rambo to shame. Matt held a machete in his hand, and tucked in his belt was a pistol his father used to own before he passed away. Slung over his shoulder was a small book bag full of a variety of foods and things needed for his trips out in the day.
Matt was older than Frank. However, he wasn’t taller than him being 5'10" to his 5'9". Matt had a good head on his shoulders, a thinker, and was also pretty good at tinkering. Even with his medium build, he wasn’t the fastest runner. Unlike his friend, Frank, who was blond, his hair was brown, making it easier for him not to be spotted while hiding. Matt kept one thing on him at all times, and that was a gun his dad once owned. Inside it was one bullet, and that bullet was for him and him alone.
Almost in sight of the porch, they came upon a street crossing that appeared empty. Matt took not one step closer to reveal his hiding spot. Lowering his bag to the ground, he unzipped it and pulled out a couple of good-sized rocks and zipped his bag up and pushed it close to the wall.
Given a nod by Matt, Frank turned around to watch behind them; and seeing no movement, he patted Matt’s back. Matt stepped out for a second and reached back and threw one rock into the street a good ways away.
The rock made all kinds of noise as it hit the ground and rolled to a stop near a car. Matt leaned back and waited, and after at least a good minute, nothing happened. Stepping out he launched two rocks this time, about fifty feet from the direction the first rock traveled. Stepping back he flattened to the wall again. After a few minutes, nothing still was heard. Matt reached back and patted Frank’s side who was still facing the way from which they came.
Frank feeling the touch gently lowered his homemade spear and helped Matt with the book bag. Matt gave Frank a smile and took a step out into the light of the open street. Before his foot could touch the ground, a hand reached out and grabbed his shoulder and pulled him back into the building’s wall. Matt knew this hand to be Frank’s and knew him not to be big on joking around in times like this. He did not look back at him and instead scanned the area again.
Matt scanned from left to right focusing on each rock and then looked at their destination. He looked hard and could find nothing to have made Frank jumpy. Looking back he saw Frank had lost some color in his face and was scanning the area.
“What is it you’ve seen, Frank?” Matt asked in a hushed voice only they could hear.
Frank did two more scans of the area and leaned in close to Matt. “I count three so far.”
Matt took in a deep breath and then slowly exhaled it out. Matt did another look around and for the life of him couldn’t see anything. “Where are they? I don’t see anything.”
Now it was Frank’s turn to be annoyed by his buddy’s unawareness.
Frank was a couple of years younger than his buddy, Matt. Frank lived a good life before all this happened. He worked in sales with a side job fixing computers. Frank was a slim-built young man but could run like the wind. His baby-blue eye
s were as sharp as a hawk and could see better than most people could with perfect vision. With his buddy’s brain and his keen eyesight, they made the perfect zombie killers.
“One’s by the window two houses down on the left. The way it passes quickly, I think it is a screamer.” Frank focused on number two as Matt found the first one. “Number two is in the bushes almost ahead of us to the right. I bet my money, if I have any, that it’s a jumper. As for the third, it’s by your second stone about ten feet away under the car. It looks dead, but watch close. It will move a bit here and there. It is most likely a crawler and nothing to worry about, but as you always say, ‘no unnecessary chances.’”
Matt smiled at his lifelong friend and scanned the three he saw again. The third one he had seen, but seeing it wasn’t walking around, he paid it no mind and was just ready to show Frank his arrow was crap.
But looking at it a bit more, he could see it was twitching some every so often.
“What is the plan then, Matt?” whispered Frank.
Matt was at a loss of plans right now. This trip to this mysterious arrow was not thought through as well as his other plans and trips were. As for the crawler under the car, it would be easy to escape from. It’s not very fast while dragging a body behind. And the jumper was semi-easy as well. Jumpers walked slow, but if you were in their range, they could lunge at you and get a hold of you quickly. It was the screamer that worried Matt the most. Screamers really didn’t walk around much as they didn’t need to move around to eat a meal. They voiced high-powered screams that carried great distances. With their screams came all sorts of dead to their location. Once their pray was down, the screamer was known to spoon up the rest of what was left. Besides their screams, they’re not very strong and easy to kill. But like all undead, zombies were deadly up close. And not many who had come up close with the undead had lived or lived long to tell their tale.
Matt took one more surveying of the area and looked back to Frank. Frank was claiming as ever, keeping his spear level and ready for anything. It was a good thing to be this way. Being all panicky was a sure way to be killed.
“The crawler is easiest. We wait here till the screamer makes its move to another room and will walk slowly toward the right.”
Frank gave a quick nod without looking at his friend. Matt waited for like what took forever, and then his moment came. The screamer slowly turned and moved off into another room. Matt reached back and patted Frank to let him know it was go time.
Slowly they moved around the corner of the building and along the side of the wall. The sun was now bearing down on them, so they were visible from all around. But the undead’s eyesight wasn’t too good, and slow movement would not pull the attention too well.
Frank was two steps behind Matt and kept a close watch of the surrounding and the window. Matt took lead as always and watched for anything new to appear. It took them both nearly four minutes to make it close to the car. They were close enough to see now the undead’s head was not moving but its eyes were moving all around the area. Its body was in a great stage of decay. Some of its entrails were pulled out from its stomach, and its one leg was only being held on by some rotten flesh.
Matt pointed to another car just across from it, and he and Frank made their way to it. Now only several feet away from the crawler, the smell was almost unbearable.
“You think as many of these things we have seen we’d be used to the smell by now,” said Matt gasping for air and trying to hold his breath at the same time.
Frank shook his head and waved a hand in front of his face in a poor way to clear the air in front of him. “Woo! This guy is rank and smells like someone shits vomit.”
Matt smiled and gagged. “You sure have a way with words, buddy. Let’s just see if we can hurry and kill it and then move on.”
The undead lay there unmoving only to twitch every so often. But its eyes, red and bloodshot, were scanning the area in front of it. Its eyes slowed to a stop and focused on a car in front of him. It had seen something there. Just there sticking out of the back end of the car was something brown, something that wasn’t there at first look, something that finally caught its eye this time. This was all it took for the crawler to start its progress toward it. The crawler lifted its rotten maggot-covered hand and slapped the ground for a reach in front. Then its other hand reached up and did the same even further, but this hand was missing some fingers with its skin looking to be torn at the joints, almost as if bitten off.
It pulled itself slowly out from under the car, its head breaking the shadow of its structure. Its hair was patchy, and its spinal cord was sticking out from the base of the neck. As it reached out for another pull, its head turned to the left and looked up at the sun with its bloodred undead eyes. Something glimmered in the light, and then a long homemade spear struck it in the eye passing into its brain and out the other end of its skull spilling the smell of a spoiled brain into the street.
Matt watched as his plan took action. Matt took off Frank’s pack and set it out just past the car behind which they were hiding, blocking its view. Then they both took off slowly toward the car across the street and hid close by. They watched as the undead focused on the bag, made the turn, and started pulling itself toward it. Its body being dragged across the asphalt road was a stomach-turning thing to watch. It dragged its lower useless half along for the ride. Its one leg was ready to rip off anytime now for only skin was holding it. And the other looked to be stripped to the bone from the knee to its upper thigh area. Once it was out far enough to see, its head popped out. Frank took action and sneaked up to it and sent his spear home in its undead head. Matt watched as Frank gave the spear a slight twist left and right to make sure the brain was completely destroyed and then pulled his spear back out. After he was done, Frank made his way to his pack and then back to where Matt waited.
Matt raised a fist up to Frank on his way back, and they bumped fist together for a job well done.
“Now we need to get by the jumper if it even is a jumper,” said Matt quietly.
Frank placed his pack on his back and used a rag he kept with him to clean the blood off his spear tip and some of the shaft.
Matt had many items he had gathered and made on this journey since the undead began to walk again. He could easily walk up close and shoot the jumper and end it, but it would be a waste of a bullet and the noise would bring others to their location, some worse than some people could imagine. He had a small net also in his bag he made one day in the Boy Scouts for keepsake. He could toss the net over the bush and then stab and hack at it till it moves no longer. But that could take a while, and the screamer might make it back to the window and alert their presence out for all to hear.
Matt continued to think and heard a noise to his right. It was the sound of grass being smashed under a foot. Matt was leaning up against a small wall that rose up a bit and led to a yard and a home.
Pulling his machete out, he flatted up against the wall and waited. Looking back to Frank, he saw he was no longer there. Panic arose within him. He had never been alone, and without Frank he didn’t know if he could make it longer than a couple of days. Just then the footsteps stopped just above Matt and remained still. Matt took a deep breath and stepped out and raised his weapon and prepared for his death blow or to receive his own death blow.
Weapon raised he looked up and saw Frank squatting on the grass smiling at him.
“Scare you any?” asked Frank with a smile.
Matt released his breath and felt close to tears of fear. Then rage built up from fear, and he almost yelled his reply till he caught himself at the end.
“No, being scared gets you killed in this world. You just almost found yourself without a head, idiot.”
Frank rolled his eyes and hopped down next to his friend.
“Where did you run off to?” asked Matt.
“I got tired of waiting for you to figure things out about the jumper. So I went and took care of it before the scream
er came back to the window facing our position.”
Matt could do nothing but give a slight smile at his buddy and a quick pat on the shoulder for a job well done.
“Not to worry though,” said Frank. “It wasn’t a jumper, just a dead body that fell in and looked to have gotten stuck. But I went ahead and stabbed it to be sure.”
Matt gave a nod and signaled for them to move around the wall’s edge and creep up the stairs. Frank being the one closer took lead and made it up to the flight of stairs before ducking back down and pushing Matt back.
“What is it?” Matt whispered.
“The screamer is back and looking this way.”
“You think it has seen us?” asked Matt.
Frank shook his head now and released a breath. “If it had, I think we hear about it by now.” Matt gave him an “I guess you’re right” kind of look and looked around to make sure nothing had changed around them.
Frank tapped Matt on the shoulder and gave a hand gesture, facing his hand toward his own face and then turning it back around so the back of his hand showed and then back to front again. Matt knew what he wanted and unshouldered his pack and reached in and pulled out a handmade mirror. Matt had taken a radio antenna off a radio base and grabbed a piece of a broken mirror, which he added to the antenna. With the mirror taped to the end of its rod, he could angle it up or down depending on how high the ledge he needed to look over.
Frank took the mirror and raised it up and looked for the screamer. The house window was empty, and Frank lowered down his looking mirror. With a quick nod, they hurried and stored it in Matt’s bag and zipped it up.
Staying low they made it up the eye level of the yard and took a quick look around and ran to the house’s edge. It felt as if time itself stopped and slowed down for them to make it. At any moment the screamer could see them and make their life come to a stop. But all seemed to go their way. The wind blew the smell of death toward them rather than their scent toward death. Even as they closed in the house, it seemed the air stopped blowing and came to a still nothingness. It felt like the calm before the storm.