A Broken World

by Andrew Lauck

  When I had sat down across from Kat and unscrewed the bottle, she asked something that threw me off.

  “Eric, what was your life like before all of this?” Her expression was of concern and curiosity.

  “What?”

  “Well, we’ve been through a lot together, but we’ve never really gotten to know each other. Would it help if I went first?”

  “I guess.” I wasn’t exactly prepared to discuss this topic as I had done everything I could to forget my past. And even if I hadn’t, I don’t know if I was ready to face those demons. Ironic, I know, that I could face down a dozen zombies and a town full of cannibals, but I hesitated against emotional vulnerability.

  “Alright, I was in Texas when it happened. It was my second year of college, and I lived on the campus two hours away from my family in a dorm. My roommate and I saw the news and our boyfriends came to get us. We all took her boyfriend’s SUV and just drove. Once we hit the highway, though…” She trailed off for a minute, and I saw tears forming in her eyes. “The radio guy said there was a safe zone to the north, so we tried that, and by the time we got there it was all gone. Everyone was dead, the military checkpoint was on fire, and zombies were everywhere.” She stopped again, and I reached out my hand to place it gently over hers.

  “One came out of nowhere and bit my roommate…God, what was her name?” Her eyes shifted, trying to recall the name. I know what she was going through. Being out in this Hell took things away from a person, even memories, which is why humanity was the most important thing to hold on to. “Linda. It got Linda, and her boyfriend fought it off, but there were more coming, so we got back in the SUV. Linda was bleeding all over, and we tried to keep pressure on it like in the TV shows, you know? But nothing was working and after an hour she…Her boyfriend pulled over to bury her, but she came back to life and bit into his forearm. I’ll never forget that image…her teeth just sunk into his wrist like it was Jell-O. And his scream…I got back in the SUV and waited for my boyfriend before driving. I could’ve stayed and done something, but I was so scared…We hit a gas station before that, so the car got us all the way to Illinois before we had to walk.”

  “We found the fort after a long time and they let us in. I thought they were so nice, and it had been so long since we had seen anyone that we trusted them. But that night…” She was crying and my heart sank. “I don’t know how long I was there. They came in and hit me and joked and told me that once they were done with my boyfriend they’d come for me. Said I was lucky.” She let out a short, sad laugh. “Then you found me.” She smiled a little and wiped her cheeks with the sleeve of her shirt.

  I stood up and moved over to her, leaning down to hug her as she cried into my shoulder.

  “It’s okay, Kat. None of that was your fault. You’re safe, sweetie. I promise.” I rubbed her back until she stopped heaving, and I felt she was done crying.

  “I’m sorry, Eric. Your shirt is soaked now,” she said between sniffles.

  I smiled.

  “Somehow, I think I’m okay with that. Now,” I started, helping her up, “You should get some sleep. I’ll stay up tonight, so don’t worry about taking watch.” I escorted her to a bedroom upstairs and set the rifle down next to her bed so she’d feel safer, and I pulled a blanket over her.

  “Eric, you don’t have to tell me what happened if you don’t want to. I understand. Thanks for listening, though. Sometimes it helps to tell someone you trust.” She smiled at me, and I smiled back.

  “Anytime,” I said, closing the door behind me. I felt the smile on my face fade, though, as I walked back to the kitchen and picked up the note. Something felt wrong, and I hoped this had the answer to a question that nagged at me.

  “They got inside, and I couldn’t stop them. God forgive me, but I’m taking them to the cellar before they turn into one of those things. Please forgive me.” My eyes drifted to the refrigerator door, and I registered the childlike drawing. A sun in the corner of the paper overlooked a hill with three figures labeled Mommy, Daddy, and Me. I felt my chest grow tight as realization dawned upon me, and I knew I had to go to the cellar in case the father hadn’t been able to put his family to rest.

  I closed my eyes in a silent prayer that he had.

  Chapter 31

  I set the rifle down against the wall inside the door, knowing it would be close to useless in the tight quarters of a cellar, and opened the door. The screen door chopped the outside into pieces, reminding me how truly broken this new world was, but I didn’t have time to admire the symbolism. Pushing through the screen door and pulling the wooden one closed behind me, I walked slowly down the steps and looked around the exterior of the house.

  Spotting the storm cellar in the pitch black of a stormy night took me a while, but I eventually found it after getting soaked again. There were two doors folded down with a bar on each to pull them open, so I grabbed one and pulled as hard I could. The wood parted slightly but remained firmly closed. I pulled out a flashlight and angled the light through the thin crack to see a chain on the inside sealing the doors together. Pulling out my Sig and taking aim, I waited patiently. I didn’t want to bring Kat out here if I could help it, so I was waiting for a thunder strike to cover the sound of the gunshot. Sure enough, after thirty seconds a flash lit the night sky along with my handgun, and I jerked the right door open. This time it opened with ease, and a smell washed over me that made my stomach nauseous.

  I was beginning to think less and less that my earlier optimism was correct. Judging by the horrid stench coming from the cellar, I was starting to hope the man had killed his family and then stayed down there with them since the doors were chained from the inside. The other option was almost too awful to think of, so I kept my mind set to the task at hand. The beam of my flashlight split the darkness below as I descended into the cellar, and I kept my gun resting on my right hand the entire way down.

  I’ve seen enough horror movies to know how this works. I walk farther into the room, shine my light in a circle, and when I turn around the zombie’s there. Instead, I opted to stand at the foot of the steps and shine my light around the room. I passed over something that caught my eye, and reflecting back on it I wish I had never gone into that cellar because of what I saw. At the far end of the room my light flashed over a sheet, and as I approached it the sheet began to move, and a dry moan emanated from that side of the room. I cautiously closed the distance and pulled the sheet off, revealing two bodies tied down by rope. The woman’s clothes were tattered in places, exposing decomposed skin peeling off onto the concrete floor. There was a telltale gash on the side of her arm crusted over with dried blood where she had been infected.

  My eyes slowly, almost fearfully, shifted to the smaller body next to her to rest on the little girl. Her face was distorted, one eye red from a blood vessel that burst, and her jaw opened hungrily at the sight of me, her teeth pointed unnaturally. The bones of her jaw were cracked all over, the flesh jutting out from the bone pressing outward beneath. She had worn a simple dress with daisies on it before. I could see the faint pattern of yellow against the white cloth in the places that remained untainted by the dark red stain of her blood. It was difficult to see where she had been infected among all the blood, and I didn’t want to get closer to examine the body.

  I brought up my handgun and leveled the sights on the little girl’s forehead, trying to distance myself from the situation. She jerked at the bonds, the bones of her jaw breaking through the skin in bloody spurts as her teeth snapped in demand for my throat. I felt tears sting my dry eyes as my finger depressed the trigger, and her head whipped back as the 9 mm bullet pierced her softened skull. My arm instinctively moved to her mother, and I pulled the trigger once more, leaving the room eerily quiet. The gun just hovered there over the bodies in the silence of the cellar.

  Behind me I heard the twinge of a tightening rope and swung around, the horror committed only moments ago briefly pushed to the recesses of my mind. The question re
maining was answered as my flashlight outlined the father hanging from the ceiling, a stool knocked out underneath him. His feet dangled lifelessly two feet off the ground, the rope tight around his throat. A few feet from him, lying on the ground, was a double-barrel shotgun. At first, I assumed he couldn’t live with the guilt of letting his family down, but I think that was just me forcing my subconscious on him. The top of his right shoulder was torn open, and teeth marks were clear in the beam of my flashlight. I guess he killed himself before the virus changed him into something worse.

  I followed the rope to the handle of a steel footlocker, and reached up to untie him, when his mouth shot open in a voiceless moan. His body swayed as his limbs jerked toward me, trying in vain to fill the undead hunger inside. I raised the Sig and sent him to his final resting place before reaching up and undoing the rope to let his body fall to the ground. While I hated using what scarce resources I had, I put one more round in his skull to make sure he wouldn’t wake up again. Before I left to bury them, I checked his pockets, and found three extra shells for the shotgun.

  I located a shovel resting against the wall and walked slowly back outside, finding a small clearing nearby to the east of the house, and setting myself to the task of digging three graves. The heavy rain had turned most of the area to mud before letting up to the light sprinkle, so I tried to dig close to a tree where the ground was more solid. I found the tree from the picture on the refrigerator and got to work. Keeping in mind the horde Kat and I had encountered earlier wasn’t too far away, I couldn’t take the time to dig three six by six foot graves. Once I had a sufficient hole in the ground I headed back to the cellar.

  I brought the father first, then the mother, gently placing the sheet from the cellar in the grave before setting their bodies on top. I went back to the cellar for the daughter last, each step trying to work up the courage to go down the steps and see her limp body. Her small figure weighed almost nothing in my arms, but I tried to distance myself as I took her to the open grave and lay her next to her parents before folding the cloth over to cover them. I doused the cloth with an accelerant from the cellar and dropped a match down, the resulting flames licking at the edges of the grave as if trying to drag me down with them.

  My feet carried me wordlessly back to the house, and I sat down at the table in the kitchen, pulling a glass from the cupboard and filling it with the bottle of scotch I spotted hidden among the wine. I poured myself two fingers and downed the contents quickly. Rinse and repeat. By the time I heard footsteps coming down the stairs, the sun was beginning to rise, and I had tossed back a third of the bottle. Katherine rounded the corner and saw me sitting there, silently acknowledging that something had happened. Without a word she came over and sat down next to me, placing her hand on my arm. She glanced out of the kitchen window and saw the grave, looking back to me for an explanation. Her eyes flicked to the picture on the refrigerator, and her hand shot to her mouth as recognition hit her.

  “I thought they deserved to be put to rest together,” I said, watching through the window. The tree I had buried the bodies under was barren and as I watched, the last of its leaves fell off. There was some foreboding symbolism there, but I didn’t have the mental strength to be profound given the circumstances. She nodded in response, and we sat there wordlessly watching the pyre burn. I momentarily wondered if I would end up with a pyre of my own someday.

  Chapter 32

  Day 184

  Two days have passed since the incident in the cellar, and while I could dwell on the sadness, I refuse to let it get to me for Kat’s sake. That little girl being dead only further served to degrade my hopes of anything better, but it wasn’t about me anymore. It was about the girl sitting across from me at the dinner table.

  After the fire had died down, I went out and shoveled the dirt back in the grave to finish the process. I returned to the cellar to put the shovel back, but the footlocker had piqued my curiosity, so I broke the lock with the shovel and set it down against the wall. Lifting the top of the locker, I examined the contents within.

  Several jars of various fruits filled one side, but the big score was the .30 hunting rifle with a handful of boxes of ammunition along with a few odds and ends that would come in handy like a medical kit complete with a sewing needle and gauze, and a roll of duct tape. I must say, that sparked my Texan side, and I had a redneck moment. An amusing image came to mind of Jeff Foxworthy saying, “You might be a redneck if you get excited over finding a roll of duct tape in a zombie apocalypse.”

  I found a burlap sack not far from the locker and collected the boxes of .30 ammunition, stuffing the random items in on top. The rifle ended up slung over my shoulder, and I gathered a few of the jars of fruit for lunch, noting to take some with us when we left. As much as the thought of having to leave again bothered me, I considered it the best decision since the infection was evident at the farm, and I didn’t want to be here when the zombies caught up.

  I’ll admit that when I brought the sack of goods back to the house I felt like I had just pulled off a great heist of rare jewels. And the feeling was even more intensified by the look of satisfaction on Kat’s face, the huge smile making the events of that night in the cellar a distant memory. After dinner that night, I went out and packed most of the goods in the car.

  Last night, I slept in what I can only assume was the main bedroom. It was the first full night I’d slept in a bed since Chicago, and it felt amazing. Sometimes, it really was the little things that got you through the day. Unfortunately, I couldn’t shake this feeling that the farmhouse was deceptively comforting and distracted me from being prepared for something.

  Katherine and I sat across from each other at the dinner table, several jars of fruit opened and displayed as a sort of feast with a few lit candles burning on the windowsills. While I felt bad about the family that had been here prior to our stay, we had to use the resources left if we hoped to survive. After she joined me in a short prayer, we dug in, accompanied by the sounds of the downpour outside. I ransacked the peaches, since those are my favorite fruit, and Kat seemed to hover over the apricots.

  “Geez, you’re like Gollum with those peaches.” She laughed, and in her best impersonation added, “The precious!” I couldn’t help but laugh with her, shielding my peach-filled mouth with my hand. The lighthearted moment brought an air of relief with it.

  It was then that the attack came.

  Chapter 33

  The storm had drowned out the sounds of the infected and covered their footsteps up the creaky porch. Most of them didn’t moan, which explained how they had gotten so close without us noticing. But despite the reason or excuse I came up with, the arm still came through the window in the kitchen that I had stared out of hours before. Glass crashed inside, followed by a torso, and the door was being banged on by a clutter of fists so tightly grouped I couldn’t tell how many exactly Kat and I were up against.

  “Get the rifle,” I shouted over the sudden cacophony, pointing in a hand signal and moving to intercept the zombie coming through the window in a heap of bloody glass shards and torn flesh. I leveled the Sig and fired, sending a splatter of dead brain matter and blood across the kitchen and redecorating the cupboard in a fresh coat of gore-drenched paint.

  “Eric, they’re coming through the door!” I heard Katherine scream from behind and spun to find the wooden door splintering. I walked across the room and reflexively shot a zombie in the head as it threatened to enter the room as I passed. I took the rifle from Kat and sent her up the stairs to get her shotgun while I held the door.

  The door was falling apart, and through the gaping hole in the wood I saw that we were facing a horde of the bastards, a force that would largely overwhelm us if we didn’t hurry. Each lightning strike illuminated more zombies, and I felt an overwhelming sense of dread tighten in my stomach.

  “Kat, any time you’re ready!” I yelled over my shoulder as my Sig bucked again and sent another zombie to the ground with a hole
through his skull. Katherine came down the stairs, her shotgun in hand, as she moved toward the back door. I focused my attention back on the front door, but heard a cry of fear from behind.

  I turned to find Kat on the ground, writhing under a zombie and defensively holding its head back with her forearm as her other hand reached desperately for the shotgun that slid across the floor. I brought up my Sig to fire, but the slide was locked back letting me know the magazine was empty, so I ejected it and pulled another from my jean pocket with a curse. From the door I heard more pouring in like a dam had burst, so I slapped in the fresh clip, and put a round in the zombie attacking Kat while moving toward her.

  Reaching out one hand to help her up, I swung back around and fired at two infected while walking backward down the hallway to the back door. Kat jumped up and almost instantly fired her shotgun past my ear, dropping a zombie that had snuck around the house. With a ringing in my ears, I pushed Kat through the exit and made a blind jog for the car. When we came around the corner of the house and saw the dirt drive where the car was parked my heart skipped a beat. Almost a dozen infected swarmed around the area like a beehive had been smashed open on the hood of our car, only these bees were more likely to bash your head open and eat the gooey prize inside than sting you.

  “Stay on my ass, Kat.” Mentally, I added, “This is gonna be messy.” We jogged toward the car, making a slight half-circle as we formed a makeshift firing line. Kat’s shotgun boomed, and the zombie closest to us disappeared from the neck up in a splash of gore. The storm played hell with visibility, and the heavy rain slashed at my eyes, but I knew I had to make every shot count as we got closer to the car.

  I ran to the car, dipping my hand in my jeans to grab the keys as I approached the passenger side door. There was no fumbling with the keys like in the movies, but rather a deep focus on precision as my fingers found the key ring. I remember my Sergeant drilling into our brains back in training that the hardest part of an operation was always the end when you were most likely to let your guard down. As soon as Kat’s door was open, I slid across the hood Bo Duke-style and popped open my door. I threw the rifle in the back and was almost in when I caught motion in my peripheral vision and had just enough time to bring up my arm before an infected came out of nowhere and lunged for my throat. My hand caught its neck, and I barely managed to hold it inches from my face as Kat was frantic in the passenger seat trying to get an angle while she quickly reloaded.