by TW Brown
Thick woods lined both sides, but all that they bothered to put up along the sides was a simple barbed wire strand fence. We tossed some of our gear over, and then just ducked between the top and middle strands.
I held onto a little hope since the gate and front fence looked to still be intact. When we were all on the actual grounds, I heard a soft moan.
Looking around, at first I didn’t see anything. Eventually, a cluster of bushes moved, and out crawled a man. What was left of him.
“No way.” Todd started toward the zombie, drawing his machete. He was a few steps from it when he stopped and glanced over his shoulder. “He ain’t got no teeth.”
That made Alex laugh. After a moment, I joined in. When you thought about it…a toothless zombie was kind of funny.
“Should I kill it, or just let it be?” Todd asked.
“Never leave one behind you if you can help it,” I said as our laughter sobered.
The zombie was now out on the grass of the expansive yard. Judging by the response of the other two, I think we were now realizing that our laughter was coming at the expense of a man who had obviously suffered horribly.
A filthy strand of his insides were dragging behind him. They had long-since dried, but that didn’t make what we were seeing any less disturbing. His arms were covered with tiny bites. There was a near-perfect set of teeth prints on his shoulder that was visible since most of his clothes looked to have been ripped away from his body. Most likely, the crawling around on the ground had done a majority of that work.
His right leg was almost entirely intact, but his left one had been gnawed down to the bone. That struck me as a bit strange, but I didn’t have any ideas. I’d not seen zombies work at something to the point of taking it clean to the bone like a drumstick; that didn’t mean they didn’t…that just meant I’d not yet seen such a thing.
I gave a nod and Todd walked over and buried his machete into the top of the poor old man’s head. He jerked his blade free and was kneeling to wipe it off when a new sound reached our ears.
I looked around, but couldn’t find the source. When it came again, the cause of the eerie yowling noise had either moved…or there were more than just one.
“I’ve never heard a zombie make that noise,” Todd breathed.
“That’s no zombie,” I said without moving my lips. I don’t know why, but despite knowing that the source of the noise wouldn’t understand me, much less read lips, I’d adopted that manner of speaking. I think it was simple fear.
I pointed to a collection of shadows under one of the fuller bushes. Both Alex and Todd turned slightly in the direction I indicated. At least ten cats slunk out from the bush. They weren’t coming at us in an aggressive manner, but they were certainly eyeing us in a way that made me very uncomfortable.
“Are they z-z-zombies?” Todd stammered as he took a step back.
“I don’t think so,” Alex hissed as she actually took a step towards the felines.
As if a cue had been given, the entire group of cats scattered. They bounded away in the grass, most of them retreating directly towards the sprawling home that sat as the crown jewel to this piece of property. Adding to the creepy feeling I was getting, a distant rumble of thunder sounded.
“That was a bit cliché,” Alex scoffed as she started towards the home.
I fell in and then looked back when I realized that Todd wasn’t following. He was standing, frozen in place. Perhaps I’d been wrong in insisting that he join us.
I snapped my fingers, but his eyes were looking past me and over my left shoulder. I turned with no idea what to expect.
“Fuck me,” I breathed.
Alex must’ve heard despite how quiet I thought I was being. She stopped her advance and looked over her shoulder at me with an eyebrow cocked that I could see despite the ski goggles she wore for protection.
Standing in the shadow of the trees that ran down the side of the property were perhaps three dozen zombie children. They weren’t advancing, but they weren’t leaving either. They were just standing there…watching us.
To add to the creepiness of it all, many of the cats had fallen back to them. For whatever reason, the children made no attempt to attack. That oddity was amplified when I swear I saw one of the cats tug at a piece of loose flesh dangling from the leg of a little girl wearing a tattered and blood-stained dress.
I made the connection between the old man’s injuries and this band of children. That brought an entirely new level of horrible to the situation. I had to shut my brain off as it tried to create the scenario that would lead to the results we’d encountered.
“He saw them as children and couldn’t bring himself to do what needed to be done,” Alex said as if reading my thoughts. “And you need to wrap your brain around that idea the next time you consider not killing one of those things right away.”
Without another word, she started towards the rag tag pack of diminutive undead. Once again I noticed that the moment the zombie children became aware of the weapon she brandished, they reverted to regular zombies…in a manner of speaking.
The thing was, there were so many. I took off at a jog to help, but she was on her own for the first few seconds. Not that it appeared to matter as she swung her machete at one while kicking another away at the same time.
I arrived just as a trio of the creatures all lunged from Alex’s right flank. She would’ve never had a chance to take them all down. Later we would discuss being reckless, but for now, I struck fast. My own machete cleaved into the side of the head of a little boy as I swept the feet out of another young lad. The girl managed to grab Alex by the elbow with her tiny hands, but the woman shook the monster off, spun, and had a knife in her other hand that I hadn’t seen. She drove the point of it into the girl’s eye socket and let go of the blade as she side-stepped another few coming from the left.
I stepped around her and lowered my shoulder as I charged at another pair. I could only hope that Alex had the three handled as I sent my two flying. They didn’t go far, and I was able to hurry over and end them both. I spun and saw that Todd was still standing stock-still. His face was a blank mask.
“Crap,” I snarled, “the kid checked out.”
“Did you really think he wouldn’t?” Alex grunted as she ended another little boy with a jab of another magically appearing blade that drove into the zombie child’s temple.
I jumped back as two children lunged for me just as I chopped down into the crown of the skull of a girl that had been no older than five or six. From the looks of it, her fate had been sealed by the nasty bite that had torn out most of her tiny throat. Or maybe it was one of the bites on her right forearm.
Both of the children tumbled to the ground in a heap, and I stomped onto the back of one while ending the other. I had just enough time to glance around and get a look at how many remained. Eight more, and they were spread out in an arc around me and Alex.
Correction…eleven more. A trio of the zombie children had, for whatever reason, adjusted their course and were heading towards the still frozen-in-place Todd Burns. A quick assessment told me that there was nothing I could do. If I drew a gun and tried to shoot them, I risked hitting him.
“Todd!” I yelled as I skipped to the side of one of the approaching zombies and swung backhanded at the creature. I felt the machete bite into the skull and I jerked the blade free just in time to swing with a forehanded sweep at the next one approaching—a little girl again. Why did it seem I was drawing all the little girl zombies? I took this one’s hands off just below her tiny wrists, but did nothing to end her attempts at attacking me. I had to kick out at her and scuttle backwards a few steps.
That gave me just enough time to re-orient my blade and line up an overhead swing that would be much more effective. As I swung, I heard a yelp from behind me in the direction of Todd. Unfortunately, I didn’t have time to look as I stepped in to finish off the last of the child zombies within reach of me.
Alex and I both put down our l
ast threat almost simultaneously. I spun to see that, thankfully, the young man had snapped out of his trance. He was backing away and not attacking, but at least he hadn’t simply stood there and been pulled down.
I took off at a run, coming up behind the straggler of the group, and swung my machete with all my might. The attack was a shade low and decapitated the little boy. His head flew away, rolling a few feet in the grass before coming to a rest on one ear. At least it was no longer a mobile threat. I grabbed the next one, another little girl, by her ponytail and jerked her backwards. She fell unceremoniously, but I was able to cleave the remaining one before returning my attention to the girl.
By then, Alex arrived and was finishing her for me. As soon as she yanked her blade free, she walked up to Todd and clocked him with a vicious backhand that sent him staggering a few steps before losing his footing and landing hard on his butt.
“I’m only going to tell you this once,” Alex seethed. “You do your part. If not, you endanger my life and that of anybody around you. These things will rip you apart and chow down on your guts the first chance they get.” She shot an angry glare my direction, then returned her focus to the young man staring up at her with a mix of fear and pain etched on his young face. “I don’t know who or what put the thought in our head that these things are any different behavior-wise than any other stinking meat bag. They are zombies…flesh-eaters…whatever you want to call them. What they aren’t is living.” She turned and stomped away, intentionally bumping my shoulder as she passed me.
I watched her for a second before returning my attention back to Todd. “I don’t want to pile on, but you need to shape up. This is the way of things now. Can you handle it?”
He nodded as he got to his feet. I turned and followed after Alex. I wanted to watch over the kid, but I didn’t have time to baby him. By the time we reached the end of the driveway with a paved parking area in front of the four-car garage with enough room that it could double as a full-length basketball court, Alex had cooled down—or at least appeared to. She stopped at the wide walkway that led to the front door and waited until we caught up.
“Not sure what to think about this,” she said by way of greeting.
I looked past her and saw a very large house cat sitting on the single step that led to the front door. Several smaller kittens were scattered around. Some were snoozing and other were wrestling with each other, but making it a point to stay under the overhang and out of the rain.
“Cats.” I scratched my head in confusion. “What the hell is the deal with all the cats?”
“Maybe it has something to do with all the zombie children?” Todd finally said with enough meekness to make it sound like a question.
“Why would it…” Alex started, but then stopped. She turned to us with a puzzled expression. “Did you see how they wove in and out between the children? I swear I saw a few of them nibbling on exposed flesh. And not once did any of those kids try to attack them.”
“Whew!” Todd gasped. “I thought that I’d imagined that.”
“I saw it, too.” I looked around Alex at the mother cat and her kittens.
I gave the house a closer look. It had a front that looked like it had been constructed with stone. Judging by what this place probably cost, I doubted it was fake. This place was one of those houses so far beyond anything I could even begin to imagine. It was the kind of house you put on your list when you had a nine-figure bank account and a seven-figure annual income. As nice as that first place was that I’d stayed at with Carl, Michael, Selina, and Betty, this place made that one look almost low-rent.
The cat on the porch seemed to be studying me as much as I was studying the house. Every time my gaze passed by it again, it was staring.
“Doesn’t look like it’s been bit,” Alex said quietly.
I glanced at her and saw that she was staring just as intently at the cat. From the sound of her voice, I would say that the feline had her unsettled.
“Then let’s go inside and see what we can find,” I said as I pulled out the flashlight I’d packed.
This house had a lot of windows, but as overcast as it was, I knew it would be shadowy inside. I took two steps toward the front door and was greeted by the mama cat standing, arching its back, and hissing. It made a low mewling growl in its throat and I paused.
“So, you can take on swarms of the undead, but a little cat has you scared?” Todd scoffed.
Before I could say anything, he stepped past me. He’d drawn this odd-looking blade that he had been carrying on his back. It had a hooked blade attached to a three-foot handle like you would see on a sledge hammer or splitting maul. In one swing, he cleaved the animal in two.
“What the fuck!” I yelped as I grabbed him by the shoulder and spun him around.
“It’s a cat, dude.” He shrugged away from me with an ugly scowl on his face and an expression that made goose bumps rise on my arms.
“Exactly,” I snapped. “It was just a cat. It wasn’t doing anything except protecting its young. We could’ve gone around it. There was no need for that.”
“Jeez, make up your mind,” he said in an over-exaggerated tone that reminded me of every smartass teen I’d ever encountered. “Do you have a list of what I should and shouldn’t kill?”
“I thought you had some shred of common sense.” I shoved past him and approached the front door. “Just…just keep your eyes open for zombies. And don’t pull another stunt like that again.”
He muttered something under his breath, but I chose to ignore it. I stepped over the gory scene and tried not to hear the mewling of the kittens that were now probably doomed.
No surprise, the front door was locked. It was also extremely sturdy. It would take a huge effort and make an incredible racket to break down. I moved over to one of the gigantic windows and peered inside. Just as expected, it was shrouded in shadow, but I could tell that it was extremely opulent. Hell, just the furniture in this massive room probably cost more than mine and Steph’s house.
I stepped back and looked around, quickly finding what I wanted in the shape of a stone a little larger than a softball. It stuck out because it was almost black and sitting just a little distance away from the meticulously placed ones in the flowerbed that ran down the entire front of the house.
When I picked it up, I paused and then started to chuckle. I tossed the stone up and down in my palm as I stepped out of the flowerbed.
“What’s so funny?” Alex asked, looking at me like maybe I’d finally cracked under the pressure.
I fiddled with the stone for a moment and then flipped open the hidden hatch where a key sat. I tossed the fake rock and returned to the front door. When I turned the key and heard the tumbler, I realized how quiet the world had really become. That also made me think about just how loud shattering a fifteen foot or so tall window would’ve been. Since I knew for certain that sound brought the undead, I gave a nod to the powers-that-be for this stroke of fortune.
The door opened and the familiar stench of death and undeath rolled out to greet us. So much for that stroke of good luck.
I stepped into the gigantic entry foyer and looked around. There were stairs going up, an archway to our left and another directly ahead. Just this entry area was so massive that I found myself holding my breath as I took it all in. The vaulted ceiling was a good thirty feet up here. The railing on the second floor had been busted. When I stepped around a series of trunks that looked to have been packed and hauled to this spot—but never taken by the former occupant—I saw a black splatter stain on the stone floor where it looked as if somebody had landed.
My eyes tracked the large and small droplets that the person—or zombie—had left in its wake as it exited through the archway directly across from the front door. Now that I was closer, I could look through the arch and see that it opened to a large living room. I could also see a dining room with a gigantic table that seated twelve off to the right. There was another archway on the other side o
f the dining room.
“Did these people have something against doors?” Alex whispered as she came up beside me.
“Why don’t we just grab everybody and move here?” Todd called out.
I turned to see him looking through the archway that had been on the left when we entered. He had his weapon in his hands and suddenly brought it up in a protective posture.
I rushed over just as I heard the moan. I reached his side a step sooner because whatever he’d seen had caused him to take a staggering step backwards. It took my eyes a second to adjust to the shadows and gloom enough to pick out details, and as I did, I remembered the flashlight I held in my hand. Swallowing hard, I clicked the button. A shaft of light cut through the darkness, and my hand wavered slightly when it came to rest on the horrific scene.
This was a case of not having any idea how this came to pass. It made me think of how every single zombie that I’d killed or even seen had its own sad story.
“Did a serial killer live here?” Alex hissed as she peered over my shoulder and took in the scene.
This huge room would’ve been the one we entered had I busted one of those windows. I hadn’t been able to see much since the huge vertical blinds only showed the tiniest glimpse inside. Plus, this whole disturbing scene was in the corner against the wall that had the windows.
In that corner…a child sat. To be more specific, what remained of the child sat there. His arms and legs had been chopped off, and the collection of bones near the body told me that it had been done right here. The torso had also been split open—probably by the knife that was stuck in the wall just a foot or so from the child’s head.
The child’s head craned over to us, and in the harsh glow of my flashlight, it opened its mouth and moaned. Not for the first time, it unsettled me hearing such a deep and guttural noise coming from such a small creature.
The chopped up and eviscerated zombie child had a collar around his neck, and the chain attached to that collar ran to an eyebolt that was mounted on the wall. All of this made for a surreal scene that had me wondering about the residents of this place. The line “This is probably some sort of hunting lodge for rich weirdos” came to mind. But the sadness of the scene brushed that snippet away in the blink of an eye, and I took in the rest of what made this even more bizarre.