One Nation Under Zombies (Book 2): FrostBITTEN

by Raymond Lee

  “Girl, if you don’t quit snoring.”

  Raven cracked open her eyes to see Damian sitting in the bed, propped up with pillows and immediately straightened, ignoring the crick in her neck from having fallen asleep in the chair. “You’re awake.”

  “What else am I supposed to be with all that wild kingdom cacophony coming up out your nasal passages? I thought snoring was supposed to sound like a saw. You sound like some mating elephants over there.”

  Raven laughed. “Well, you’d snore too sleeping all shoved into a chair. If you’re really concerned you can give up the bed.”

  “Sugar, please. I’m the pampered princess up in this bitch and I’m going to milk it for all its worth.” Damian smoothed the coverlet over him. “I haven’t had to get up and do a damn thing today. They even brought me some Twinkies they found in the pantry.”

  “So you feel good?”

  “Hell no. I was shot.” He laughed, then grimaced. “Ooh, girl. There’s only so much Tylenol can do and that’s the strongest thing down here. I’m gonna try not to complain too much though. There were three armed people right in front of us and I walked away. That’s a blessing and I’m not about to piss on that.”

  Raven leaned forward and held his hand. “I’m so sorry, Damian.”

  “Oh hell no, don’t you start.” He shook his head adamantly. “No ma’am, no ma’am. I’ve already been told you think you’re to blame for this, and that poor child in there thinks he’s to blame for it. None of us started the shit and we damn sure didn’t look for it. You bleeding hearts got to stop that self-blame right now. Blame Russia and blame the bastards over here that took this mess as a do-whatever-evil-fuckery-you-wanna-do card. Carlos knew that bitch. You heard him. He worked with her daddy and she could have stood down and let us go. I don’t know who she was caught up with, but she was from this neighborhood and that made Carlos and Elijah her people. She went against her own people. Screw her and that bitch they told me spent forever looking for us. They got what they deserved and I don’t feel the slightest bit guilty.”

  She looked out the door into the main room to see the women sitting at the table talking while Hal leaned back against the kitchen sink discussing something with Cruz. She couldn’t see Elijah from where she sat. “How is Elijah?”

  “I haven’t spoken with him but from what I’ve overheard while coming in and out of blissful sleep, he’s not doing that great. He didn’t get to bury his mother and we just left his father on the ground out there.”

  “We had no choice.”

  “Yeah, doesn’t make it suck any less. He wanted to go out there and get him this morning. I thought somebody was going to have to knock him out to keep him down here but they finally got through to him.”

  “Did the people finally leave upstairs?”

  “I haven’t heard anything. If they’re up there, they’re not stomping around.”

  “That woman was sure we were in here. I doubt she went far if she left. They’re probably watching the house from somewhere nearby.” She listened for a long moment, hearing nothing but the voices of her group in the other room. “At least Leah’s fear didn’t come true.”

  “What was that?”

  “She thought they might try to burn us out.”

  Damian’s eyes widened. “Fuck. Think they still might?”

  “I hope not. Did Hal say how long until you’re able to head out again? I imagine we’ll have to wait a few days anyway in case they’re just up there waiting on us, maybe a week.”

  “Sweetheart, unless they burn us out, we’re going to be down here a lot longer than that.”

  Raven was instantly filled with alarm. “I thought you were stable. Your wound is that bad?”

  “No.” He laughed, grimacing again. “Damn it hurts to laugh. They decided to stay this morning. We have a warm place stocked with food to spend the winter.”

  “But we have to get to the military base. That was the plan.”

  “That was the plan when we lost our superstore. Now we have another place with a generator and I for one have no problem with staying here where my balls can be all warm and cozy instead of click-clacking together. If I never see snow again it’ll be too soon.”

  Raven stood and walked out of the room to see what was going on. Elijah sat on the couch holding the open journal Cruz had found. He ran his finger reverently down one of the pictures that had been stored inside it, his mind somewhere in the past.

  “Sleep well?’ Hal asked as she approached.

  “Apparently I slept right through the big decision making.”

  “It’s not like that,” Cruz said. “Once you hear us out you’re going to agree with us.”

  “Oh, am I? You know what’s in my head now?”

  “I know you don’t want to see anyone else die,” Cruz replied, his tone harsh.

  “There’s enough gas down here to keep the generator running through winter,” Hal said. “Those people searched all night and didn’t find the secret door. Even if they did, it doesn’t matter because they aren’t going to get through the second door. That thing is steel and we’ve discovered the wood paneling you see down here is just decorative. This panic room is a fireproof, invasion proof fortress with its own power supply. The pantry is stocked fairly well with food and we have enough water to last until the weather warms up enough for us to try the faucets without worrying about cracking a frozen pipe.”

  “So what? We stay here until we run out of food and then we find ourselves on the run with no supplies whatsoever? We’ve been extremely lucky on this journey but we have no guarantee we’ll find food when spring comes around, especially if we’re busy trying to outrun whatever infected people are left out there. They may just thaw out. We don’t know yet.”

  “We will ration our food. The clock over there has the date on it, Raven. It’s the first day of December. There’s a lot of winter left and in this part of the country that can mean a lot of snow, which would be challenging enough, but there’s a group of people out there who know we killed three of their people. The fact that they took one of ours isn’t going to even the score with them. They’re going to keep hunting for us. We’re safe and warm in here.”

  She looked at the women. “What about Pimjai’s baby?”

  “Probably due around April or May,” Hal said. “She has shelter, food, and water down here. There is no risk of injury or stress for her here. By the time it warms up that group should have given up on us. Cruz and I will go out, find vehicles, and we will come back to get everyone. We will drive to Nebraska and get Pimjai there in plenty enough time to deliver her baby in a medical facility.”

  “Can you guarantee that?”

  “I can guarantee someone will very likely die in under an hour if we try to leave now,” Cruz said. “We can go up and check outside a month from now if you want us to, but we need to take advantage of this. There’s nothing for us up there but people and weather that wants to kill us. Down here we have food, medicine, water, and heat. Is there really a decision to be made here?”

  “You’re all OK with staying here?” Raven asked the women.

  “I think this is safest,” Pimjai said, placing her hand over her belly protectively.

  “We are moving so slow in the snow,” Janjai added. “It will not hurt to wait until it is warm and we can find cars.”

  “There’s heat and food here,” Leah said. “That’s all I need.”

  Raven walked over to the couch and sat next to Elijah. “How do you feel about all this?”

  “I said my father was a coward because he didn’t save my mother. I said he was weak and afraid because he didn’t want to come back here. I went against him and because of that he came back here and he died. He died because he took a bullet meant for me.” Elijah tossed the journal onto the coffee table in front of him. “I read Jorge’s secrets. I know he made a move on my mom and that my dad knew. I understand why he didn’t want us to speak to him anymore and I understand how hard it h
ad to be for him to even suggest this place, but he did because he knew we would find this shelter. He swallowed his pride to give us a shelter after we made him lose the first one he’d provided.”

  “Elijah.”

  “Don’t, Raven. Don’t tell me it isn’t my fault or it’s going to be OK with time. I can’t hear that right now.”

  She squeezed his shoulder. “I was going to tell you that your father loved you, that he wouldn’t want you to dwell on what may have been said or done in the past. He knew you missed your mom and you were just hurting.”

  “I know. That’s what makes it all even worse.” Elijah wiped away a tear. “He loved me no matter what I did or said to him. I dishonored him while he lived and still he gave his life for me. I will not dishonor him in death by refusing his final gift. He led us here to protect us. We stay here.”

  “All right then.” Raven looked around the main room and resigned herself to the idea of spending the winter underground with seven other people, one of whom was pregnant, and a limited supply of food. “We stay here through winter.”

  IV

  The Thaw

  Raven paced the floor, waiting for Hal and Cruz to return, praying it was with vehicles and the good news that they could finally leave the underground hell hole she’d been stuck in for the past three months. As bad as suffering the biting cold and having to be on constant lookout for enemies, living and undead, had been, at least she’d been going somewhere, seeing new things, doing something different each day. Even in Wally’s Club they’d had entertainment to keep them occupied and the much larger space allowed them more movement.

  Stuck in the panic room, all they had were a small amount of science fiction books and outdated magazines. It had taken less than a month to get through every one of them and none were good enough to read a second time. Leah tried to keep them entertained by reciting books she’d written from memory, but her tales were all about zombies and zombies were the last thing Raven wanted to hear stories about.

  She’d resorted to pacing the floor night and day until the others complained that they couldn’t relax with her constant laps back and forth so she tried working in pushups, sit-ups, and jumping jacks, anything to keep her busy.

  Hal held a daily worship service, which everyone but Cruz and Elijah attended. Damian sang for them sometimes. It turned out he had a very good voice so the little concerts he would perform for them were the only moments they all could enjoy together, but a man could only sing for so long at a stretch. A lot of time was left to do absolutely nothing but stare at the clock and pray it would move faster.

  They’d found a calendar and crossing out each day that passed had become a midnight ritual. The first date they’d circled had been the first day of February, Raven’s birthday. She hadn’t told anyone but she’d thought she’d have reason to celebrate. That was the first day Hal and Cruz ventured out to check the conditions and if promising, search for vehicles.

  They hadn’t spent a lot of time outside the panic room before they came back with the disappointing news that it must have been one hell of a blizzard that winter because there was more snow than there had been before they’d entered their underground shelter, or prison as Raven had started to think of it.

  It was now the first day of March and although they figured it would probably still be cold, they hoped the snow would be gone. If not, they would wait at least another week before venturing up top again. Raven didn’t think she could handle crossing out any more circled days on the calendar without having a complete meltdown. She needed out. She needed to stretch her legs, breathe in fresh air and feel the sun on her face.

  “Girl, would you please sit down somewhere?”

  “Shut up, Damian.”

  “Ooh, testy.” He put his hands up in mock surrender for a brief moment before shaking his head. “Between you and Pimjai, you’re getting everybody else’s nerves on edge.”

  Raven glanced over to where Pimjai sat at the table with her sister, rubbing her hand over her swollen belly in a circular pattern.

  “Keep on rubbing, girl. You gonna rub right through to that baby’s head,” Damian teased her, “and Raven’s gonna walk a ditch into the floor.”

  “I have to do something,” Raven explained. “How can you be so relaxed? Aren’t you ready to get out of here?”

  “Am I ready to get out of the safe, warm place where I don’t have to worry about being eaten or shot, you know, like I was the last time I was up top?” Damian cocked his head and pretended to be in deep thought. “That’s a hard one.”

  Raven sighed. “I can understand being scared of getting shot again, I almost got a bullet in the arm myself, but we need to be out there doing something, moving toward something. We can’t stay down here forever.”

  “Like I said, we’re safe and warm.”

  “There’s also a dead guy rotting away behind that sealed door.”

  “Yeah, that shit’s creepy,” Damian conceded. “Thank goodness for the power of duct tape, and thank goodness we can use the water now because this whole place would be smelling like skunk ass and corn chips if we didn't finally get to take baths last week.”

  They’d run out of bottled water last week, forcing them to try using the faucets. Thankfully, no pipes burst, giving them hope that the weather had warmed up enough to melt the snow and allow them to get back on their way to the base in Lincoln.

  “How long have they been gone now?” Leah asked.

  Raven checked the clock. “About an hour.”

  “That’s promising,” she said. “They weren’t up top long at all the last time.”

  “What if they got caught?” Raven asked, voicing the fear that had chilled her spine more with each passing minute. “Part of why we agreed to stay down here was because that group was hunting us. What if they never stopped and they were watching, waiting for us to poke our heads out?”

  “We would have heard gunshots or screaming,” Damian said. “If Hal and Cruz were caught up there they’d make sure to raise hell so we would know.”

  “What if they weren’t caught up there but out somewhere? Those people had at least two houses in this neighborhood and that’s just the people we saw. We have no idea how many there are up there.”

  “Girl, would you stop? You’re scaring everyone.”

  Raven looked around at the others, noting the loss of color in their faces and the way Pimjai’s shoulders trembled as her sister pulled her into a consoling hug. “I’m sorry but we should be scared. You know it, that’s why you don’t want to leave here.”

  “Look, Hal and Cruz didn’t go out there blind like the way we walked into this crap before. They know there’s people out there and they’re armed. They have to find running vehicles to bring back here and get us. I don’t know a hell of a lot about cars but I know you’re not supposed to let them sit for a long time and I know the cold can affect them. They might take a while but I’m sure it’s because they have to find vehicles, then they have to make those vehicles run. Let’s not worry unless a couple more hours pass.”

  “A couple more hours?”

  “Yes, Raven. Give them time. Worrying isn’t going to do anything but drive you crazier than you’re already going. Now, please sit down because you’re getting on my nerves and I’m about to shoot you right in the ass.”

  Raven rolled her eyes but plopped down in between Damian and Elijah on the couch and forced herself to accept the fact she would have to just sit there and wait.

  Damian held the open box of snack cakes he’d been holding toward her. “Ho-Ho?”

  “I know you are.”

  “Bitch, I can’t stand you.” He withdrew his offer and crammed one of the chocolate and cream treats into his mouth.

  Raven grinned.

  “Fuck, fuck, fuckity, fucking, motherfucking fuck-faced fuck!” Cruz yelled as he jerked the steering wheel hard to the right, narrowly avoiding the wrecked car in the middle of the street.

  “That’s a lot of fucks
,” Hal commented before leaning out the window and firing off a shot at the van chasing them.

  “Well, I have a lot of fucks to give,” Cruz replied, never taking his focus off the road before him. “That’s the same bitch. I recognize her voice. Do you think she knows we’re the ones who killed her girlfriend?”

  “No idea, and I don’t think it matters.” Hal fired off another shot. “My guess is she’s the one in charge of whatever operation they have in this area and she’ll kill us just as soon for taking this truck as she would for us killing her people.”

  “It was in the garage of an abandoned house and we had to put a battery in it! Nobody was using it!”

  “I really don’t think that matters to them.” Hal fired another shot and the van careened out of control behind them. “I got something!”

  “Or someone,” Cruz said, looking through the rearview mirror. He caught a glimpse of red spray on the van’s cracked windshield before he took the next turn in the direction of where they’d left the others. “Do you think that will give us enough of a window to get the others?”

  “It’s going to have to. They probably have a radio just like the group we were in the shootout with that day so reinforcements are probably already being instructed to find us. We have to get the others out quick.”

  “We should have brought them with us.”

  “And if a group had been watching the house, waiting for us to come out? Or if they’d caught us before we found this truck and got it running?” Hal shook his head as he reloaded his gun. “We did what we planned and so far no one has died. The streets are drivable, the weather is a bit nippy but survivable. Don’t give up now. We’re going to make it to that base.”

  “Gotta make it out of this neighborhood first,” Cruz reminded him as he took another hard right and drove the truck right into the back yard, whipping it around to face the alley. “I’m running down to get them. Engine’s still running. Slide over here and be ready to take off!”