by Coke, Justin
So that massive accumulation of zombies in Bowling Green was proof the town had been alive in the past week or two. They were still excited. They weren't convinced that the area was devoid of targets. So they stay clumped up and on the prowl.
This behavior set up the second wave of death. The cities waited like a time bomb as the zombies there massed and cleaned up the guys sealed in bank vaults, or on the roof of some building. The besieged had a choice, in the end, to try to run, or let themselves die of starvation or thirst. Either way they died. And then the cities ticked away like bombs as the zombies made their way to the exits.
Envision it like a supernova. A circle of zombies expanding outwards, sweeping any survivors away. The circle keeps expanding until the density of zombies reaches the minimum density to keep the net whole.
The New York nova was massive. It consumed most of New England. The St. Louis net was much, much smaller. But it was large enough to consume a whole lot of small towns that had been able to survive the first wave. Towns like my town. The net approached, day by day. People thought that it was odd when a few zombies shuffled out of the corn fields. Then one day the net closed around them and hundreds or thousands of zombies descended on their town. The gunshots drew more zombies from miles around until the town was overwhelmed. The towns closest to the supernova were almost always overwhelmed. It was only their warnings via CB radio or cell phone that let more distant towns know that it was time to pack up.
I didn't realize that shambling army was fifty miles away, looking for people just like me. I was more concerned with listening for footsteps and wishing for candles.
This army moved at around ten miles a day, rain or shine.
I finally passed out under a pile of musty blankets that someone had stored up in the attic. When I woke up I listened for a long, long time. Total silence. While I was up there I went through their stuff, looking for anything that might be useful. I found a manual can opener and a Star Wars sleeping bag among boxes of VHS tapes, old glassware, and boxes of bills and receipts.
As I descended the ladder there was a crashing noise downstairs. I almost had a heart attack and fell. Falling on a can opener is even worse than falling on your keys. I fumbled for my pistol. I'm embarrassed to admit that at that time I was a bit of a size queen; I favored the .45. Of course I would learn better, but then I still didn't understand the zombie. The power of the .45 appealed to me. Bowling Green was where I started to appreciate the power of finesse. I waited, hunched at the stairs, waiting for more noise. After a while I peeked around the corner. A skunk stared back at me from the base of the stairs, tail quivering and ready, face covered in dog food dust. I almost cried in relief.
My standoff with the skunk lasted for another hour before he went away. I wasn't going to waste a bullet on him and attract zombies. He wasn't going to leave until he was ready to go. After he ate his fill he waddled out of the dog door. From the way the dog food bag was almost empty it looked like I had disturbed his breakfast tradition. I wished him luck and headed downstairs. The owners had taken a lot, but they hadn't gotten everything. There were eight cans of soup, two cans of creamed corn, and a whole six cans of tuna gathering dust in the back of the kitchen cupboard. I tore into it like a ravenous skunk. Two cans of tuna and a hearty tomato soup later, I was feeling pretty good. I went to the window and peaked out of the blinds. The place was on a bit of a hill, and my truck was visible in the distance. I groaned; there were at least a couple of figures walking around the truck. Then I saw another truck nearby. Was that truck there last night? I couldn't remember. But I didn't think so. I had thought to bring Bob's binoculars, and after a second of fumbling I brought the scene into focus. There was a man and a woman, and they were trying to siphon gasoline from the truck.
I did cry then. It's difficult to express how it feels to be alone in a hostile world with no food and no power. And I don't mean no electricity. Being alone is a death sentence in our world. No one to watch your back. No one to help when you get sick, or pull a zombie off you. We are social animals, and I was beginning to understand why as I was relieved to the core to see these people try to steal my gasoline. I gathered my things and blew out of that house and clocked it down to the truck. I was almost halfway there when they noticed me. Of course they brought their rifles up. I stopped and put my hands up. I didn't think it would be a good idea to try to shout, but I made it clear that I was alive. They talked for a little too long for my taste, standing there in the open with two rifles trained on me. After a while they waved me in.
They were Rich and Janet Franke from Illinois. I gathered that the trip through St. Louis had been a bad one for them. They were haggard and jumpy. I learned they had lost two of their three kids as they had skirted St. Louis. Wasn't even zombies. One had died of an asthma attack and the other had killed herself during a bathroom break. The third kid had been attending the University of Missouri. They hoped she was still in Columbia, which was only sixty miles west of where we stood. When they saw my truck they had decided to try to top off.
While I wouldn't say they were pleased to see me (I think they were afraid I was mad about the gasoline). They seemed like people in a state of intense grief. I told them that they could have all the gas they wanted as long as they gave me a ride until I found transportation. They asked me if I had heard anything about Columbia.
"Supposedly there's a rescue station there, at a Wal-Mart. They were broadcasting a week ago. But the radio also said it was surrounded. They said that you shouldn't even try to get near it and that they wouldn't be broadcasting anymore until it was safe to approach," I said. I didn't have the heart to tell them that every person who heard that broadcast lit up the same way they did. At least until the "we're surrounded, don't come" part. Even as naive as I was at that point, I knew what that meant. You can't be a rescue station if you need to be rescued yourself. The fact that they didn't even give you another option-- well, that told you the state of things, didn't it?
Now Columbia is, at least by Missouri standards, a decent sized place. It had a hundred thousand people or so, at least when the students were in town. So that crowd in Bowling Green, the horde that almost destroyed me? Ten times that. All trying to get into the Wal-Mart. Seventy thousand to the west, a million or two to the east. I started to feel claustrophobic as the immensity of those numbers began to dawn on me.
Now, I thought I was imparting horrible news. But hope lit up their faces. The last thing their daughter had told them, almost a month ago, was that she was headed to the rescue station at the Wal-Mart. To them, knowing it stood as of last week–well it was pretty obvious that it meant a lot to them. They smiled a bit and they upgraded me from unknown quantity to Bearer of Good News. Shortly after I stuffed myself into the back of their crew cab truck, eating an energy bar and slurping a cherry Gatorade.
If I had known I was heading into a supernova, I wouldn't have been so happy.
CHAPTER NINE
Conscript
The guards didn't come for three days. Before the Airborne hit the Cell Block, there had been a hundred inmates. After forty-eight hours, they were down to thirty-five guys. Quite a few guys had lost the fight with their cellmate. Some won and turned the next day anyway. It was so bad Demarco stopped charging for the hammer. At the end of seventy-two hours of violence, twenty living people remained. Eighty zombies, their arms sticking through the bars, aimed at the nearest living man. They moaned and screamed and snarled. The inmates all ended up curled in the farthest corners of their cells. They cowered away from the grasping hands and noise. There was nothing to be done except hope for someone to show up. James was not optimistic. The guards might figure the best thing to do was pull the breaker and lock the one ton steel door that was the only exit from the cell block. It was a one-step plan for dealing with eighty zombies and twenty hardened criminals. He knew that at least a few of the guards would think it was a long dreamt of chance for revenge. If the guards had been having as bad a time as the
prisoners they weren't going to be nice.
So when the big door buzzed and footsteps rang against the concrete, James didn't bother to get up. He could tell the newcomers were talking, but he couldn't tell what was being said. The new guys had gotten the zombies frothing again and the place was a cacophony. When a shadow appeared outside his cell door he stood up. A woman stood with a pen and notepad. She looked at his cell number and wrote it down. She pointed at Dick and made a thumb wiggling gesture. She smiled at up, frowned down.
"Oh, he's quite dead!" James bellowed, and gave two thumbs up. Her eyebrows shot up a bit but she moved on without response. James paused.
That wasn't the guards uniform, was it? Was it? Maybe it was. But he didn't think so. It was clean, whatever it was. She only had Demarco left to check on, so she crossed in front of James' cell again.
That was not the guards’ uniform. That was an army uniform or something. She hadn't gotten that rifle at Bass Pro either. Or the grenades, for that matter. Only James' natural fatalism kept him from cheering. This was a new angle. New angles were bad most of the time.
He went into deep thought trying to puzzle out his next move when the doors buzzed and his cell flew open. He hid under his blanket until he realized the zombies’ doors were still closed. Only the living's doors opened. He was still safe. Demarco popped out of his cell. His hammer had been lost when Decker had lost his fight with his cellmate, so all he had was a sharpened letter opener. When James saw Demarco moving, he got up himself and walked to the center of the hallway, far away from the grasping hands of the undead. The big door at the end of the hall was closed. The woman stood behind the door, peering through the glass. A pile of weapons sat in front of the door; sledgehammers, axes, knives, two pickaxes, and a few spears. Several rolls of the largest trash bags he'd ever seen sat next to the pile of weapons. A walkie-talkie was on top of the trash bags.
The intercom crackled above their heads. "I am Sergeant Andrews of the US Army. My orders are to pacify this jail. Which means your orders are to pacify this jail. This is your cell block, gentleman, and if you want to leave it, it will need to be secured first. If you need any of the cells open just use the walkie-talkie."
Demarco grabbed the walkie. "We ain't had a meal in three days! We want food before we do a damn thing."
"Give me twenty dead zombies and I can maybe arrange a meal."
The inmates had seen the abandonment coming and stashed what they could. While they wanted a hot meal, and James had eaten enough granola for a lifetime, they weren't in as bad a shape as it seemed. They got to work. It wasn't as bad as it sounded. The zombies were dumb, and they kept their faces pressed against the bars, trying to bite. Demarco manned the pick axe and gave them one thunderous brain destroying strike. Getting the pickaxe out of the skull was harder than killing the zombie. James put the bodies in the bag and dragged the bag out to the entrance. The inmates forgot about the food and cleaned the whole place out. After days of the screaming of the undead, the silence was a relief. Many of the inmates just sat down and listened to nothing for a while. James had never been so relieved to be bored before. He cried from joy. The big door swung open. The big door had always reminded James of an airlock. There was the cell door entrance, the chamber, and another door to the outside world.
Inside the airlock was a cart from the cafeteria and a bucket of hot water and a stack of towels. They descended on it like zombies and washed their hands and faces, then devoured the first warm meal they'd had in days. The outside door remained closed. Anderson came over the walkie.
"Back inside boys. Great job on rekilling the fuckers, but you aren't done yet. Put the weapons back in the lock and get back in your cells."
"I'll cut that bitch when I can," Demarco muttered. James caught his eye and shook his head and put a finger over his mouth. He mouthed 'later.'
They put the tools back in the lock, which clanged shut behind them. It was the first time in days they didn't have to endure the endless noise of the zombies. The joy of silence outweighed the blood and gore. They trudged back to their cells and collapsed on their beds. They barely noticed the cell doors closing behind them.
They woke the next morning to the sound of the airlock opening. Six men came in, pulling steel carts behind them. James recognized them as guards. They were in hillbilly hazmat suits now. Laundry gloves duct taped to raincoats, towels wrapped around their mouths. Together they lifted two bags into each cart and then left. It took them the whole day to cart off all the corpses. After they left the cell doors opened, and all the inmates jumped out, hoping for another hot meal. They were not disappointed. But with the commissary cart were stacks of cleaning supplies. Paper towels. Six packs of Comet. Mops in buckets of steaming water.
"Eat fast," Anderson said over the intercom. "That mop water won't last long. Get this place spic and span and then we'll let you out. For a while at least."
They wolfed the food again. Some did it because they were hungry. James did it because he wanted to get mopping. He wanted out of this place more than anything now. Prison had found its way to reassert its true nature, and it was by putting him at the mercy of people who may or may not be people in the morning. They scrubbed the hell out of the place. They piled all the linen near the door and went over everything. They slept on bare mattresses. James was pretty sure they could pass the white glove test. The desire to clean went beyond following orders, something these men hated. Nor was it because of their normal hygienic standards, which were poor. They were channeling their own sense of disgust through that Comet, they were purging their souls with hot water and soap. They were cleaning themselves more than they were scrubbing the blood stains off the wall.
Sgt. Andrews finally deigned to visit their Cell Block in person after two ex-guards carted off the linen. Two hulking men stood at her shoulders. They didn't carry guns; just some mean looking nightsticks. Skull cracking sticks. Sgt. Andrews went over the entire block, inspecting each cell. As she went James started to think she was getting annoyed. Annoyed because she couldn't find anything to complain about. He was hiding a smile when she, a little red faced, turned to face the inmates.
"You are some industrious little shits, aren't you?" she said. Only James guffawed. "One last step before we let you out of quarantine. All of you strip naked." She started to pull on latex gloves. One by one each cell door opened. They were probed and prodded. They never said what they were looking for, but James thought it was obvious. Bites. They were looking for bites. They didn't find any. The ones who had been bitten had either turned in the night, or hung themselves in despair, then turned. One zombie's neck was almost two feet long by the time they had gotten in his cell to finish him off. His feet were finally touching the floor. How he had made such a secure knot out of sheets James would never know. The dead man had been an Eagle Scout. He had talked about that all the time; it seemed like he felt that fact was enough to redeem him from molesting kids. The man did know how to tie a knot, James gave him that.
Once the search was done they went back in their cell, door closed, to wait. James was second to last. While he was getting searched he caught Demarco's eye. Demarco had gotten his hammer back last night. He looked like he was getting ready to use it. James shook his head and shrugged his shoulders to the airlock. Inside he was worried. Demarco was about a hair short of criminally insane. He gave the rest of the criminals a bad name because he truly didn't give a shit. Most of the guys in here were just fuckups and losers. They sold drugs or held up gas stations because they couldn't keep a job delivering pizzas. They weren't particularly violent and had little talent for it. They were more dangerous to themselves than anyone else. Demarco was what people thought of when they thought of criminals. He'd have been right at home as a character on Oz. He had no concern for the consequences of his actions. The idea that if he attacked them, he'd just get his ass beat and then locked in that cell until he died of starvation just didn't register. He wanted revenge for being forced to do manual l
abor, and he was going to take it the first chance he got, and fuck the consequences. If James had known the consequences would only fall on Demarco, he wouldn't have cared. But it seemed probable that Andrews' revenge would fall on all of them. It would be even worse if Demarco pulled it off, which was a distinct possibility. Demarco had a genuine talent for violence. These soldiers probably didn't. But somewhere these guys’ friends were polishing their automatic rifles. All the talent in the world wasn't going to overcome that with a claw hammer.
Demarco's eyes squinted his refusal. He was going for it. If James warned them, Demarco would take his revenge. While he had no foresight, he held a grudge like a fucking elephant. Paralyzed by indecision, James missed the more embarrassing portions of the probing. He was back in his cell before he realized it. He turned, trying to figure out some way to warn them without pissing Demarco off. He couldn't think of anything. Demarco was paranoid; he'd notice if any of those three even looked at him too long.
The last cage door didn't open.
"Demarco?" Andrews said.
"Yeah."
"The guards warned me about you."
"Those pussies are scared of their own shadow."
"They said they sold you a hammer."
"Bullshit they did."
"They said you were crazy."
"Fucking A."
"They said you'd try to hurt us."
"Try? Will."
"See, this is a problem Demarco. You're used to the rest of civilization playing nice with you. Acting like your life has value regardless of what you do with it. You don't think we'll play with your life the way you want to play with ours."
"Like I said, pussies."
"What I'm getting at, Demarco, is that times have changed. I'd like to have you. The guards say you are remarkably dangerous. I like that when it comes to killing zombies. But I can't have you plotting on putting a shiv in real people all the time. You can't play these games anymore. You keep being a liability to your fellow man you're going to end up getting cremated with the rest of the useless bodies."