by Lowry, Chris
BATTLEFIELD Z
SILENT RUN
A Battlefield Z Legend
By
Chris Lowry
Copyright 2018
Grand Ozarks Media
All Rights Reserved
CHAPTER ONE
“Not fair,” Bob grumbled. “I said not it.”
“Shut up Bob,” Steve said. “Go to sleep.”
Bob rolled over, still muttering under his breath. It only took a moment for him to start snoring in a soft wheeze.
Steven envied him. He feared sleep would be long in coming.
Events from the night replayed in his mind. His mom bitten. His mom trying to kill him. Running until he couldn’t breathe.
Finding Emma.
Saving her.
And almost dying again and again as creatures from humanity’s darkest nightmares tried to kill him.
Kill them.
But they were safe now. Safe for the moment. Bob snorted and shifted as he rolled over on the floor.
Steve wished it was tht simple for him. But he knew it was going to be a long night.
He opened his eyes to a morning sky out of the window and the smell of coffee filling the air.
Steve got out of bed and slipped his faded jeans over his boxer briefs. He skipped his shoes, since that would require waking Bob and he wanted to avoid that for as long as he could.
He twisted the knob and tried to remember if the door squeaked as he pulled it open. The hinges were silent as he made his escape.
Stewart sat at the table, an old mug clinched in his gnarled hands.
“Help yourself,” Emma’s grandfather nodded to four more mugs set on the counter by the automatic coffee maker.
Steve poured a cup, added cream and joined Stewart at the table in a nook by a bay window that overlooked the back yard.
“I normally read the paper with my morning coffee,” the old man explained. “But no paper this morning.”
His sharp eyes regarded Steve as if it was his fault.
“We’ve been in this house for thirty years and in all that time, the delivery hasn’t missed. Not one day.”
Stewart took a long sip from his mug and stared at Steve over the rim. The boy shifted in the seat, hard wood digging into his flesh.
“I’ll pick one up while I’m in town,” said Stewart.
“You’re going to town?” Steve hissed. “I don’t think that’s a good idea.”
“You think zombies are going to get me?” Stewart scoffed. “There’s a better explanation for it. Probably a couple of kids hopped up on the whacky weed and getting paranoid.”
Another sip. Another look.
“They’re real,” Steve swallowed, his cup of coffee ignored as it cooled in his hand. “Sir.”
Stewart studied him for a few moments in silence.
“You don’t look like a pothead.”
“I’m not,” Steve defended.
Stewart drained his mug.
“I’ll be back before the others are up,” he said as he stood. “I’ll gas up my truck for the trip to take you three home, and get my paper.”
“You could call them,” Steve searched for a way to keep the old man at the table. “The paper. You could tell them it wasn’t delivered.”
“Tried,” Steward grunted. “No answer. It must be too early.”
Even he sounded like he didn’t believe that. Carriers were at the paper by four a.m. to get most deliveries in the driveway before dawn.
He glanced at the clock on the wall.
“I’ll be back in ten minutes.”
“Please. Sir,” Steve fumbled. “Wait here. Don’t go.”
Stewart grunted with a low noise in the back of his throat. He ignored the plea and walked through the door to the garage.
Steve stared after him, debated whether he should try to physically restrain the man. Not that he could. Stewart was a thick man, the kind of grandfather that looked like a cross between a mountain man and Yeti. If he had made up his mind, he wouldn’t be swayed.
Thinking about his size gave Steve a slight feeling of relief. Maybe the man could take care of himself.
He took a sip of coffee and grimaced. It was cold.
Steve poured a fresh cup to sit at the table and wait.
CHAPTER TWO
"Is that coffee?" Bob shuffled into the room, digging into the corner of his eyes with a knuckle. He poured a mug without asking and took a small sip.
"Hot," he plopped into a seat across from Steve and blew on the scalding liquid.
"How did you sleep? Comfortable in the bed? The floor sucked, by the way. Tonight, I get the bed. I'm calling it."
"Bob," Steve blew out a breath he didn't realize he was holding.
"What? I can call it."
"We might not be here tonight?"
"Why not? Where are we going?"
"Home," said June as she walked in from the bedroom she shared with Stewart. She cinched up her robe as she studied the two boys sitting at the table in her kitchen nook.
"You're up early. I let Emma sleep in. She looked exhausted. Where's Stewart?"
"He went to get gas and a paper," Steve said.
"A paper?" June prepared her own coffee, creamer first and stirred it with the tip of her finger.
"It wasn't delivered, he said," Steve explained.
"Curious," June answered. She made her way to the back of the table and sat with them. "Did you boys sleep?"
"Yes, thank you," Steve answered.
"He was comfortable," Bob sulked.
CHAPTER THREE
"What happened to your arm?"
"Daryl bit me?"
June crunched her eyebrows together and shot them up almost to her hairline.
"I shit you not, hon. The son of a bitch came out of the work bay and bit me."
June bustled into the bathroom.
"I have a first aid kit, let me get some ointment."
Steve and Bob exchanged a look before turning back to Stewart.
"Uh, Sir?" Steve stumbled through the words.
"What he wants to know is was Daryl a zombie?" Bob interrupted.
Stewart snorted.
"Of course, he wasn't a zombie."
"Then why did he bite you, Grandpa?" Emma said in a voice that trembled. Tears welled in her eyes, but had yet to spill over to her pale cheeks.
"Here," said June.
She came back with three bottles of ointment and a bandage.
"What did he look like?"
"Who?" asked Stewart.
"The zombie," Bob tried to keep the exasperation from his voice.
"There are no zombies," Stewart growled. "Ouch!"
He flinched away from June as she lathered his forearm in brown anti-bacterial liquid.
"Hush you big baby," she slapped him on the shoulder.
"What did he look like Grandpa?" Emma tried to steer him back on topic.
"He looked like Daryl."
"Was he rotting? Moaning? Did he walk with his arms out like this?"
Bob demonstrated a stiff legged Frankenstein's monster walk with arms held out in front of him like the mummy.
Or a zombie on the hunt for brains.
"Nonsense," Stewart huffed.
June felt his forehead.
"You've got a fever."
"I feel fine," he stood up from the table and wobbled, almost pitching to the floor before he caught himself on the worn wood.
"Whoa," Steve lunged to help hold him upright as Bob backed away.
"You need to lie down," said June.
"I think I need to rest," Stewart said in a halting
voice.
"He's going Z," Bob muttered under his voice.
"Shut up Knob," Emma hissed.
He shot her a hurt look that she ignored as Steve and June helped Stewart back into the master bedroom just off the kitchen.
Steve came back after a moment and closed the door behind him.
"She's tucking him in," said Steve.
He glanced between Emma and Bob.
"How long ago do you think it happened?"
"Fifteen minutes," said Bob. "That's what I was thinking about."
"Fifteen minutes before the symptoms take affect."
"Actually, it's effect."
"Seriously, Knob?" Steve collapsed in the chair.
"It's the end of the world, but that doesn't mean we forget how to speak English," Bob corrected.
"I'm speaking English," Steve sighed.
Emma sat down and put her head in her arms. Her shoulders heaved as she sobbed in silence. Steve reached over and put a hand on her forearm, just to let her know he was there. Bob grabbed a seat and put his hand on the other side.
Steve shook his head as June came out.
"He's asleep," she said, a perplexed look on her face. "He's been sick a dozen times I can remember, but never took a nap. I can't remember him ever laying down in the middle of the day."
She went to the sink and began to make a fuss over the coffee mugs as she cleaned them. She was deliberate in her movements, precise and careful, as if clean mugs were the only thing that could save the world.
Steve thought he saw a tear course down her cheek, but didn't know if he should try to comfort the woman or remain where he was with Emma.
"Do you think Daryl had an illness?" June squeaked.
"I think so, Grandma," Emma sat up and swiped the tears off her cheeks.
"I'll just go check on him," she set the coffee mugs in the rack to dry and went back into the bedroom. Steve noticed she left the door open.
"I can't kill your grandfather, Em," Bob whispered. "It would put a real damper on our relationship."
"We don't have a relationship, Bob."
He tried not to look offended and failed.
"Not yet."
"Not ever," she bit back more tears.
"I know you say that now, but we are rapidly approaching a last man on earth type situation and if we reach that point, I do not want you to think of me as the guy who shot your grandpa."
"Shut up, Knob."
"Stop calling me that," Bob pouted. "You never called me that before."
"You never threatened to kill my grandpa before."
"I'll do it," Steve said in a voice almost too low to hear.
"You will?" They both glanced at him in confusion and surprise.
He shrugged.
"I don't want to do it," he said. "But it has to be done."
Emma reached over and gripped his hand in hers, squeezed it. Steve relished her soft skin next to his, and the look she gave him.
Bob glared at her reaction.
"Wait a minute! I'll shoot your grandpa!" he shouted. "I'll do it."
"The hell you will," June stepped out of the bedroom and racked a shell into a short-barreled shotgun.
"Grandma?!"
"Emma, get away from these...these hooligans. Your grandfather was afraid they were a bad influence on you."
"Grandma, wait."
"Now hold on June," Steve held up both hands.
"Don't call me June, you murderer!"
"I haven't killed anyone!" Steve screamed.
"Actually," said Bob. "There was that guy in camo-,"
"Knob!" Emma and Steve shouted at the same time.
Stewart lunged from the bedroom and sank his teeth into June's neck.
Her finger twitched.
The shotgun went off, blew out the bay window behind Steve in a shattering explosion of glass and gun smoke.
Emma screamed. Bob shrieked. Steve lunged from the chair, pounded across the linoleum floor and slammed into June and Stewart.
The shotgun clattered to the floor and their momentum carried all three backwards into the master bedroom. Steve flipped over and crawled out as fast as he could.
He rolled up and jerked the door closed behind him, clinging to the doorknob. They listened to June's cries that turned into a gurgle after just a moment, almost drowned out by Emma's sobs.
"I guess no one has to shoot him now," said Bob.
CHAPTER FOUR
"What are we going to do?" Emma said through her tears.
Her zombie grandfather scratched and moaned against the closed bedroom door.
"we're going to be quiet," Bob put a finger against the tip of his nose.
"Lock it," Steve backed away from the door.
He began opening drawers in the kitchen, searching.
"What are you doing?" Bob hissed.
"Looking for rope."
"Nobody keeps rope in their house."
"Something then," said Steve, his voice going up one octave. His wild eyes roamed over the counters, the open drawers the two people seated at the table. "Anything."
"Why do you need a rope?"
The zombie hit the door again.
Steve pointed.
"Tie the doorknob. So, it can't get out."
"Like shoelaces?" Bob asked in confusion.
"Yes!" Steve snapped his fingers and pointed at Bob. "Exactly."
The Z hit the door harder, the moans doubled as a second body joined the first.
"Grandma," Emma sobbed.
"Come on," Steve motioned for Bob to follow him to the spare bedroom where they had slept.
"I don't think it's time for a nap," Bob muttered as he followed Steve down the hall.
The room looked different in daylight. Old furniture, thin curtains. A long dresser by the wall that created a narrow space between the bed and drawers. No wonder Bob had complained. It would have been tight.
Steve jerked open the closet door.
"Eureka."
"Eureka. Who says that?" Bob said from behind him.
"I did. You just heard me say it."
He rummaged through the bottom of the closet and tossed twelve pairs of sneakers onto the bed.
"Laces," he ordered as he began to remove the shoestrings from the shoes.
"Twelve," Bob said in wonder. "Who needs twelve pairs of shoes?"
"one for each day of the week," Steve answered, distracted as he concentrated on ripping the strings from the eyelets.
"And then some."
Steve rushed to the kitchen with Bob in tow, laces strung over both of their shoulders.
The Z had grown silent in their absence and Emma put her finger to her nose to tell them to be quiet.
Steve nodded.
He bent in front of the door and began tying the end of one of the laces around the narrow neck of the knob.
His finger slipped, knuckles cracking against the solid wood door with a thunk.
The Z slammed into the other side of the panel. It rattled in the frame. Emma squeaked or it might have been Bob.
Steve fell back.
“Move,” said Bob.
His fingers wove an expert knot that created a small noose. He slipped it over the knob and sensed it tight.
He double knotted a second string to the first and repeated the noose on the door knob to the garage door in the kitchen.
“That's why you become a scout,” he crowed in triumph.
“Yeah, well, good job,” said Steve as he got up and brushed himself off.
Bob look at him in surprise, his wit failed at the unexpected compliment.