LZR-1143 (Book 4): Desolation

by Bryan James

  Instead, I pulled his head further into my body, and reaching across my chest for the large knife attached to my tactical harness at the chest. I undid the snap closure and pulled the blade free.

  But as I struggled with the creature attached to my shoulder, the other three surrounded me, their hands clambering for flesh.

  The knife flashed and found an eye as the grip on my shoulder loosened, then relaxed. The piercing pain was now throbbing, and I pushed the corpse to the ground and spun to meet the other threats. They had clustered together in their hunger, making it harder for them to take advantage of their larger numbers. One tripped and fell on my feet as it pushed past the other two.

  I didn’t have time to draw my long blade. The first was now upon me, hands on my shoulders and mouth agape.

  Time had not treated these creatures well.

  They must have been among some of the first to turn—a surprise for an area far from larger cities and remote from other possible sources of infection. Only small tufts of ragged, matted hair remained on the heads, patches of diseased skin flaking off the tops of the rotten skulls. Fingers, dulled to the white bone from grubbing for flesh or pawing at doors and windows, clawed at my clothes. Jaggedly fractured teeth grinned out of lipless mouths below withered noses.

  Pushing hard against the first creature, I sent him sprawling against the other that was still standing, both of them falling to the ground. As I bent over to end their moans, worried that they would give away my position, I groaned in frustration.

  It was too late.

  From the street, nearly two dozen creatures had keyed in on our little dance, and were fumbling their way away from the fire toward the house and the yard. Sparing only a kick for the larger creature that had arisen clumsily from where they lay, I sheathed the knife and pulled the machete free, bolting for the fence line.

  This was not going to plan.

  ***

  In one of my worst movies—and the one that my wife had never truly forgiven me for making—I played the part of a government agent, working desperately to save the world from nuclear annihilation. It had all the great stuff from spy movies—cars, secret weapons, over-the-top bad guys and, of course, girls. In what remains my favorite scene of any movie ever made, I happen upon a harem of beautiful young women in the layer of the evil mad scientist.

  They had all been programmed to kill me by infecting me with a poisonous substance that would cause my heart to explode if my pulse topped seventy beats per minute.

  How did they attempt to raise said pulse?

  Intense and gratuitous make-out sessions.

  With all of them.

  At the same time.

  Did I mention that they were all in lingerie?

  Yeah.

  So why do I mention this?

  Because I figured I was going to die in this piece of shit house on this piece of shit block in this piece of shit town. So why not go out with a great memory or two, right?

  I had made it several more yards down toward the center of town, and my only road to the dam, before the numbers were just too large. I had a group of at least a hundred behind me, and I was sure it was growing as I ran.

  Taking the steps in a single bound, I crashed into a musty-smelling home with the decor of a hunting lodge, complete with the head of a large stag presiding over the living room, bolted down a hallway, found a basement door, and slammed it shut behind me. In the darkness, I waited.

  They were all over the house in minutes. I could hear the creaking floorboards and the shuffling feet. The noises that they make as they hunt. Their smell quickly permeated the home, handily beating down the welcome smell of must and mildew that had controlled the air until I entered: rot and blood and dead thing. I scowled at the rankness of it as I sat on the top step of the stairwell, back against the door to hold it shut in case they tried the door.

  I had patched my bite wound as well as possible, but in the end I simply took a huge pad of gauze and duct taped it to my shoulder. The bleeding had slowed, and a ring of greenish ooze—likely a sea of bacteria and disease—surrounded the wound. But I needed to keep it from smelling like fresh blood. If I couldn’t mask that, I might as well walk outside naked covered in barbecue sauce.

  My options were dwindling and I was running out of time to meet Rhi and Ethan. I had thought I was being generous with my time allotments, but I had underestimated the complication of moving house to house in the daylight. I wish I had had the time to wait it out until night. They couldn’t see that well anyway, so night really …

  Wait.

  My feeble brain had just sent me a memory.

  A recent memory.

  I was laying on the floor of the ferry. The massively fat zombie laying on top of me as the hordes behind fell off the edge of the hallway like lemmings.

  I had been passed over because they didn’t know I was there.

  They couldn’t smell me. They couldn’t see well enough to find me.

  I wonder if I could replicate that … while moving?

  But to do that, I would have to …

  Jesus, I hated my life.

  Drawing a deep breath, I chanced a movement away from the doorway to search the basement quickly. I found what I needed in a large box marked “Nanna.”

  I had never met this “Nanna” but I surmised she had been a generously endowed woman. The bathrobe I located was the size of a circus tent.

  I wrapped it around me, covering my shouldered rifle, my gear and my clean clothes, and tying it with a fleece belt.

  It would work.

  I removed it and draped it over an old chair. Then I returned to the top of the stairs.

  This part would be trickier. I considered my options for a long minute before settling on the easiest one. I stood back from the door, unlocked it, and cracked it very slightly. At least ten zombies milled about in the hallway, but none were looking at the doorway. The closest one, a terrifyingly rancid creature with exposed ribs and a torn face, was simply standing outside the door. Others crashed around the house, pushing over lamps and into walls, slamming doors and dishes, and generally making a shit-ton of noise.

  Outstanding.

  Reaching my arm out like a striking snake, I pulled the frail form of the closest creature back, managing to open the door just wide enough to pull the body through and throwing it to the bottom of the stairs, before closing the door slowly once again. I listened carefully as footsteps approached the door, a curious grunt reaching my ears as the creature on the other side slapped the door with a curious hand.

  Locking the door slowly, I judged the operation ‘good enough’ and went to the bottom of the stairs to greet my patient. A low, guttural hiss escaped its lips as it lunged forward, catching a flap of skin from its torn torso on the wooden railing and tearing the flesh from its ragged form.

  Yes, you and I were going to get on just fine, I thought.

  ***

  The hardest part was not vomiting.

  As dust fell from the ceiling under the hammer of multiple undead feet, I grimaced as I worked.

  The robe was draped over my shoulders, tied tightly. My weapons secured underneath, fully loaded and ready to draw, but blocked from access—and from sight—by the heavy garb.

  I had found a pair of bright yellow gloves, dingy with mold, laying near a wash sink, and I had donned them with glee.

  This was not fun work.

  The creature’s insides were the consistency of jello, with shattered bones and stringy tendons and arteries adding to the joy. My hands made their way through the viscera, pulling large amounts of blood and intestines toward me, smearing the robe with their chunky putrescence. The blood glowed in the meager light cast by my shielded flashlight standing on the small table in the corner.

  Above, a hand found the door, slapping meaninglessly against the thin wood.

  I cringed despite my work.

  If they tried to push that door down, they would succeed. It was cheap wood—thin and m
ass-produced, the consistency and strength of balsa. If if were attacked, it would not hold for more than a minute.

  Faster, I applied the creature’s essence to my new robe. It was thick, like clotted oatmeal. The blood had curdled long ago, and was now a thick pudding of gore. My hands rebelled at the chore, but I kept on, knowing I was running out of time.

  Another hand found the door above, and this time it crashed against its frame, as if something had decided it wanted to see what was below.

  I looked down at the display I made of myself. The robe was caked in thick, black blood and gore. Intestines were dropped over my shoulder, a cord of desiccated bowels nestled near my neck. I had even placed several ribs and its shriveled liver in the cushy pima pocket. The smell was overpowering and nearly debilitating.

  The door shook again, and I heard the cracking of wood.

  This would have to do.

  I grabbed for my flashlight, wincing as I was forced to stick it into the pocket with the creature’s liver.

  As I did, I cursed.

  My head.

  I needed something over my head.

  Quickly, I searched around the room, not able to stomach the thought of smearing the thing’s blood on my head and face. In a box marked “Halloween” near the sink, I found what I was looking for.

  ***

  In the kitchen above, several creatures had clustered near the door, their eyes vacant and staring. They followed the lead of one particularly vapid zombie—a man dressed in only a pair of undershorts, his thin torso covered in dirt and grime, several old bullet holes marking his abdomen, where a family of maggots had taken residence. His face—formerly that of an auto mechanic from a town thirty miles away—was drawn and lined, trails of blood having long since stained the skin around his narrow lips and open mouth. He was hungry. He hadn’t eaten in weeks.

  In the faded light of the kitchen, far from a major source of natural light within the small house, he had seen the barest of flickers of movement several long moments ago. So small that his horrible eyesight could have been deceiving him. So small, that his energy was only partially devoted to the cause. But it was enough.

  He tried his hand on the door, pushing it. Pulling it. Finding it locked only irritated him. Like an angry hornet, he grew agitated. And his agitation attracted others. Herding to him, in case he had found something they had not. In case he had found food.

  Within a minute, the door had collapsed inward, the shards of wood cutting his arms as he pushed his body forward.

  As the cheap wood buckled inward, he tumbled onto the stairs, falling headfirst down the wooden flight, landing awkwardly on the cement floor below to find a leg and foot standing next to him. Eagerly, he lifted his head to find a face staring down at him.

  If he were alive, he would have been startled. Or perhaps he would have been amused, as the visage of William Jefferson Clinton, smeared with viscera, blood and dirt, glared down at the broken zombie.

  ***

  I stood stock-still, waiting.

  The door fell in, and the zombies followed, and I stood.

  Waiting.

  This was the test.

  If I could fool these, I could fool the rest. If I couldn’t … well, I was trapped in a basement with five or six zombies. No big deal. I could fight these off. But the others would hear the noise. They would come. They would block the stairs. I would be trapped.

  And then I would die.

  No. This would work.

  It had to.

  The creature before me, barely phased by its fall, was looking me in the eyes. Or rather, President Clinton’s eyes.

  He struggled to stand, his calf bone now protruding from his leg. But he didn’t even notice the compound fracture.

  I saw the nostrils widen slightly. The eyes scanned the vague features of the plastic face, seeing only human shape and smelling blood and death.

  It moaned softly, as if curious.

  I stayed silent, not trusting myself to speak.

  Above, the remaining creatures were stumbling down, feet heavy on the stairs, wood creaking beneath their weight.

  The thin zombie in front of me leaned forward, still confused.

  I must not have smelled normal. Maybe not dirty enough. Maybe the smell of the rubber mask confused him.

  It moaned again, and from the stairs, the others seem to respond, as if sounding off.

  Shit.

  This weird communication shit again. The others had answered him.

  The creature in front of me seemed to be waiting, its eyes staring.

  Then it hit me. They had sounded off.

  The zombie leaned forward, its foot flinching slightly as if it would lunge for me.

  My sudden moan was breathy and low, as I had heard thousands of creatures do before.

  The zombie stopped, eyes rolling in a rheumy glaze. A hand rose briefly before dropping again to its side. Then it turned away.

  The remaining creatures were reaching the foot of the stairs.

  They passed me without looking, following their de facto leader.

  Holy shit on a stick.

  I had just bluffed my way into the zombie fraternity.

  I didn’t pause to wonder at my luck. I got the fuck out of Dodge.

  Clumsily, I ambled up the stairs, making each footfall heavy and deliberate. More were appearing at the top of the narrow passage, and I grimaced inside my presidential mask, pushing forward and slamming my shoulder into them as I imagined they would do to one another.

  The stench of my coat and the creatures around me nearly toppled me, but as I made contact with one after another of them, moving slowly and shambling toward the front door, I marveled at the ruse.

  Thankful that the door was open already, and I wouldn’t have to risk using the knob, I staggered into the dull daylight, my eyes burning slightly in the weak sun. The ash had stopped falling, but clouds of it were thick in the atmosphere still, blocking the sun’s direct rays, and protecting me from serious pain.

  As my eyes adjusted, I stood on the porch in dismay.

  The house I was in sat adjacent to the commercial district, near the intersection of the road leading to the dam, which stretched up and away from town to the north. Several shops lined the streets on either side of the four-way intersection. A police car stood forgotten and alone in the middle of the crossing streets, doors shut, windows covered in dust and ash.

  Hundreds of the creatures milled around on the street, pouring to and from my happily burning neighborhood, past me and into the main part of town. I could still see large groups of them on the road leading to the dam. Fewer than before, but still too many.

  It didn’t look like my distraction had worked.

  ***

  I had practiced this before, you know.

  Truth be told, I was no rookie when it came to blending in. On days when we felt adventurous, Kim and I use to saunter down to the local organic grocery store for kale smoothies and vegan toffee nut bars, right out in the public.

  Dangerous, you ask?

  You bet. We had to dodge shoppers with carts full of food, irritated customers, frantic moms, and the overall press of humanity—all without the benefit of special lines, physical barriers, or anything else to keep people away from us.

  Yes, I had proved several times that I could avoid notice. Usually it was just a ball cap and some sunglasses atop a scruffy sweatshirt—the latter always ‘artfully distressed’ by some designer or another, costing hundreds or thousands of dollars.

  Usually it wasn’t entrails and gore smeared over some dead granny’s moo-moo, but the concept was the same as it was at the organic food store on a Sunday.

  Move among the zombies. Be confident but not too fast. Be aware but not too astute. But most of all, anger no one.

  I staggered along the streets, noting absently the smashed windows of the storefronts and the trash that blew through the abandoned yards and fields beyond. That was one thing about the apocalypse that I couldn’
t get used to—the trash.

  Where had it come from? Why now? Did we really have that much paper and debris floating around the world on a daily basis that when our lights went out, it was a veritable snowstorm of garbage? When the cars crashed and the planes fell and the power went out, did large bins of paper simply seize the opportunity to gleefully topple over into the waiting avenues of the empty world, eager to blanket the streets?

  Apparently the answer was yes.

  Ahead of me, a small female zombie was battling against a symptom of that plague—swatting ineffectually at a newspaper that had plastered itself across her face. She struggled with it as she walked, and I had to seriously work at not laughing when she plowed into a light pole and collapsed to the ground.

  More than two hundred creatures swarmed this small, narrow street, and I suppressed a shudder beneath my Slick Willy mask. Sweat poured from my face and neck. The smell of blood and entrails made my breath ragged and shallow, creating more moisture inside the mask. I could hear my heart pounding and my breath echo inside the cheap plastic and rubber, and had to will my legs to shamble, not run.

  If I broke, I would not get far at all.

  As I reached the middle of the stretch of commercial buildings leading north and away from town, I slanted to my right, finding the alley that led behind a large brick building. The alley was empty and I sighed softly, picking up my pace slightly as the narrow corridor met a slightly wider alley behind the buildings. I turned left, searching for the door to the building.

  The large metal door was riveted to the brick, and I slowly pivoted my head around, playing the part as I searched for other creatures. The alley was deserted but I could see crowds of them on either end, passing the narrow entrances without looking my way.

  I knew that could change if they saw my movement, but I chanced it.

  The door was the back entrance to the First Concrete Memorial Savings Bank and it was locked, of course.

  However, luckily for me, my goal wasn’t to rob the place. It was to spring the alarm.