Zombie Lake: Still Alive Book One

by Javan Bonds

  I had hoped we could avoid contact with any Villain, and it is still my belief that we probably could have just kept to ourselves aboard the Cora. But here we were, running headlong to meet them. As we slowly passed the "Welcome to Douglas" sign at the first bridge going into town, my dad actually let out an obscenity when he saw the half-dozen bodies of locals hanging from the trees around the sign. Daddy has never been much of one for profanity because my mom would start quoting the Bible any time he let slip any four letter word. Even when she was not present his language typically remained pretty PG, so any deviation into PG-13 was a good indication that we were in a world of shit.

  "Mmm-hmm," Smokes nodded as if he had been expecting such barbarism by The Villains.

  My dad radioed Hammer to cryptically fill her in on the atmosphere to expect and she replied just as cryptically with stories of equally violent displays. Apparently this military unit was not fucking around with all that "life and liberty" stuff. They were making it clear that if you are not fully compliant, you are fully murdered in a grotesque fashion. After taking into account the dozens of bullet wounds on each hanging body, I was fairly confident that at least these people had been dead before their corpses were strung up as some sort of message.

  We passed several houses with clumps of trees or hay fields between each; more than one had been razed and was nothing but smoldering wreckage. We slowed nearly a mile before reaching the school, where we planned to stop to avoid alerting The Villains to our presence. We were greeted by a group of camouflaged men on foot, all pointing shotguns or hunting rifles in our direction. My dad came to a stop and we all instinctively raised our hands in surrender.

  A member of the group approached and gestured for my dad to slowly get out. When the two men faced one another, the gunman pointed his rifle at the ground and lowered his bandanna.

  He slurred, "’bout goddamn time," and spit a stream of tobacco juice to his side.

  This was unexpected. I lowered my hands and turned to explain to Smokes that this armed group was obviously insurgents, but the zombie prophet had already known that there was no threat and had returned his hands to his lap. I can’t decide if he had predicted that this was coming or had just immediately recognized Walt whom he had only met once. This would all be so damned much easier if he would just tell me what was going to happen.

  "So, you know what happened to my fiancé?" Walt, the rebel leader, asked my father with genuine concern for Sarah.

  "Oh, she went with me and Mrs. Collins down to where Mo is staying. I reckoned she’d told you before we left."

  I could see the younger man shake his head in the negative and this had just answered my question of whether she had alerted her future husband of her spur of the moment post-doomsday vacation. This would probably have been a deal breaker if it was a real relationship from the get-go.

  The other survivalists eased and stopped pointing their guns at us as my large friend and I approached the two men in conversation. "Completely?" My dad looked like he was about to fall over.

  "Hell yeah, there wasn’t a goddamn thing left."

  "You didn’t even bother to grab some walkie-talkies or–?" Walt could only look on stupidly at this question. Apparently, a few of the freedom fighters had been using my father’s house as their headquarters and the military swarmed it with machine gun mounted Humvees and a Bradley tank. While the only military casualties were ammo and fuel, only half of the freedom fighters escaped with their lives, and according to Walt, nothing else. My dad was changing colors and I wasn’t sure if he was just going to start shooting everyone in sight or would save his rage for the villains.

  The radio crackle to life in his hand. ”Gray Fox, I am in position to land my boat and continue swimming. Are you going to meet me halfway? Over."

  My dad stared off into nothingness and I was about to ask if he had heard that message when he lifted the radio and replied, "Roger, Red Witch. Some unexpected friends are going to tag along for the swim. Over and out.”

  I winced at the use of both nicknames and honestly had no clue when they’d had time to discuss code words, but I’m guessing Hammer’s team was leaving their truck and walking the rest of the way like we had already talked about. As my dad mentioned his "unexpected friends," he looked to the guerrillas in hunting camouflage and then to Walt who nodded his head in the affirmative.

  I had no clue as to why six roughnecks were camped out at the side of the highway, facing away from the location of their current enemy–maybe they were on their way to assault Town Hall or maybe this was just their weekly hunting club meeting and it was pure coincidence that we ran across them. It sounds pathetic, but I am still trying really hard to find a logical reason why things are happening like they are. I should just go ahead and give credit to our The Oracle and God or The Screenwriters. There’s no way I could deny the obvious divine intervention. The three of us with assault rifles and body armor waited as Walt instructed the band of camouflaged militia members with mostly breach-loading shotguns and bolt action rifles to back us up as we made our way to "shoot them goddamn bastards at Town Hall."

  Yeah, even I have become accustomed to referring to semiautomatic rifles and carbines with high-capacity magazines as "assault rifles" and it really pisses me off. Just because a rifle is black or looks like an M-16, nothing about it makes it any more of an assault weapon than the next rifle! In WWII, millions of people were assaulted and killed with Mauser bolt action rifles. The British Redcoats assaulted the American colonies with muskets and swords. John Hinckley assaulted Ronald Reagan with a revolver! It is stereotyping all firearms with a certain outward appearance as more malicious than others, and it is the same mindset as racism. Sorry, I just had to get that off my chest.

  Anyway, we walked through the woods to our meeting place with The Expert, and I started wondering how the hell Bradley was going to be at the spot. Images of R2-D2 strapped to Luke’s back on Endor ran through my mind, but I had difficulty believing Gene would be able to move the bodybuilding concrete slab that was my Old Friend, plus a seven pound monkey. Shit, Bradley could probably just walk on his hands faster than I can run. We approached the designated spot and saw no one before hearing the whistled "olly olly oxen-free" which froze our party in its collective tracks. Jesus Christ, could you pick a geekier password, Gene? I seriously doubt any of the older guys or hillbillies followed Halo, I sighed and dropped my head before whistling the reply. I briefly feared this would expose my inner nerd to those around me, but then realized they didn’t know what the hell this was. I’m sure they assumed it was from our days playing hide and seek in the park. The Expert and The Tech stepped into the open a few seconds later and our group entered the small field that was actually the wide backyard of a house that had been completely destroyed by fire.

  When we drew close enough I could see the look of pleasant surprise on Gene’s face that I was on the same wavelength, though he didn’t have time to say anything about it.

  Hammer answered the question that was about to come. "Our other man looped around to some old church and has the targeted building in his line of sight. He is carrying the 50 sniper."

  Well, I guess that was easier and probably more sensitive to those with mobility problems than my idea…I know, I’m an asshole sometimes. He had told me about his shooting championships, but I don’t know when he got the sniper rifle. He could probably shoot the damn 50 with one hand. My dad explained to Hammer that our backup was a group of local friendlies who would provide cover during our attack. We all became quieter the closer we got to our destination.

  As we traveled, it was easy to see that the two groups remained separate. While not hostile or even unfriendly, our group of backups did not feel like they were part of "us." I don’t think I knew any of the men personally, but trusted that if they were compatriots of Walt’s, they were the kind of guys who could be depended on to do their part and then some. Walt must’ve told them that we promised beer after completion of our goal.
With the five of us main protagonists together in the lead, the extra guns at our rear, and Walt occasionally going between the two groups to mumble an encouraging word, we continued on toward Town Hall.

  Hammer looked around to make sure we were alone and spoke quietly for our ears only. "Have any of you had grenade training?"

  I didn’t even know "grenade training" existed. How hard can it be to pull the pin and throw the damn thing? Gene has played enough Call of Duty to have some type of Xbox achievement level for number of grenades thrown, and I am positive Smokes has thrown a baseball around, so I can’t believe it will be difficult to learn. Knowing The Oracle, he could probably throw a grenade in the wrong direction and it would blow up at the feet of his enemy.

  I shrugged and she said, "Well, it’s not that hard: think of baseball," I guess I nailed that one on the head, she shot a thumb in the direction of our newfound allies. "And I’m not giving any of these guys grenades. I don’t think they would intentionally blow us up, I just don’t want one of these drunk old coots to accidentally frag me."

  That was probably smart and we all agreed with headshakes.

  Without a word between the two, Hammer gave up the lead to my dad, a local who knew, exactly as I did, that we were only a few hundred yards from the end of the tree line that opened to the expansive yard of town hall. The only sound that could be heard other than the sound of nature was the low smack of streams of Walt’s tobacco spit impacting against trees and fallen leaves. I was not the only one whose heart rate was increasing with each step. My mind started racing and I asked myself questions at a rapid fire rate: Why the hell are we making our assault in broad daylight? When did we come to the conclusion that there would be no attempt at any sort of diplomatic resolution, just a gunfight? And what happened to all the zombies? There were over 100,000 people in the county; the last living infected I could recall seeing was the one Gene speared through the neck. Looking back, these would have been prudent questions to ask myself and my confidants before making rash decisions.

  Right as I was thinking this, I heard that noise that we all recognize as a dog running to the end of his chain. When I was ten years old, I can remember standing at the edge of my neighbors’ yard and harassing his large, black, mean as hell dog, Duff. Maybe the old guy was a "Simpsons" fan or something. Anyway, the dog was chained and I knew (or thought I did) exactly how close I could get when he took a running go at me and stretched that chain just enough to reach out a paw and rip my T-shirt over the left breast. He didn’t get the slack to even scratch my skin, but I was ten years old and it made my short life flash before my eyes. That was the closest I had ever come to death up to that point, and I never bothered that dog again. I heard that noise and immediately thought of Duff.

  "I was telling the fellas that after this, we oughtta go to the Walmart and get us some goddamn beer and maybe…” Walt was whispering to my father as Duff leaped into the edge of the woods from the direction of town hall.

  I was looking down at the twenty-year-old tear in the left breast of my shirt before I realized it was a zombie on a chain sinking its teeth into Walt’s forearm. If Walt had not come up at that exact moment to whisper to my Dad it would have bitten him and not Walt. Before most of us were even aware there was an undead in our midst, Gene had used his adamantium-enhanced reflexes to spring to Walt and start slashing through the chained, yellow-eyed fiend with his claws. On that note, doesn’t Wolverine have enhanced sense of smell? These zombies obviously are not bags of rotten flesh, but we ought to have picked up their putrid shit from miles away. There were at least eight guns pointing at the newly eviscerated corpse wearing a collar, and as all of us tried to huddle near our bitten comrade. A voice could be heard in front of us.

  "Look at that! Spike got something."

  The trees made us invisible from our enemies, but we could make out several men in ACUs filing out of the front door of Town Hall, steering straight for us. Walt had been too surprised to scream, Gene only grunted as he hacked away at the former human, and the zombie itself had a mouthful of redneck and was unable to make much noise before meeting its demise, so none of the villains had yet realized they had just lost a pet.

  Before I go any further: “Spike?" Yep, Spike. I almost started shooting at the guy just for being so lame at naming his pet. I mean, that’s a pathetic name for a dog, let alone a full-fledged zombie. I understood that it was beyond weird to even consider a peevie as a pet, but is our production so poorly funded that the director can’t afford a more better name?

  "I’m goddamn fine!" Hammer and Smokes each grabbed the bitten Walt who was speaking at an above-inside-volume, dragging him back and to the left as he began blindly unloading his pistol in the direction of the soldiers who immediately took cover and started returning fire as our commando unit began retreating. A few of the idiot insurgents began charging and firing through the trees ahead of them as we made our way into a field.The firing quickly died down, but we discovered that only three of our backups (including Walt) had retreated with us.

  "Hillbilly nigga got bit yo," Smokes leaned in and reported to me as if he had just preformed a detailed medical exam.

  Walt was wearing a long sleeved flannel shirt and my large friend had not taken the time to give him more than a glance, but at this point, I could find little reason to doubt anything he said. I wasn’t going to mention that his description of Walt seemed contradictory or that it was fucking summer in Alabama: I don’t understand why anyone would willingly wear flannel. Yeah, I know my armored vest is pretty thick and I understand the concept of camouflage, but hell, I’m still wearing a T-shirt.

  The couple of uninjured insurgents walked into the woods and retrieved the few weapons of their fallen comrades that were still behind cover. They reported that their friends had dropped one enemy and "one of the other sumbitches is limpin’"

  As Hammer began examining Walt's wounds, Smokes detailed his true role. Though it is not necessarily required, The Sacrifice will usually come from the group of major characters. At some point there will be a battle-with either The Villain or the monsters in which a person will give their life to save one or many other characters. The Sacrifice may be assaulted by and distract or destroy as many of the aggressors as possible while giving others the time they need to escape. If the battle is with human antagonists, this character may literally throw themselves in front of others and will be mortally wounded in an attempt to save some or all of the protagonists. Hypothetically, if The Tech sacrifices himself he will soon be replaced by another tech who may spontaneously appear, rising up from the minor or insignificant roles, or will come from a similar. Simply put, the plot can not continue without The Tech or The Expert, so they are an unlikely Sacrifice.

  Mo Journal Entry 23

  My dad and The Expert were crouched on either side of the recently infected Walt, offering words of encouragement. Hammer’s radio buzzed with the low but anxious question, "Did they really just kill all of you?"

  "No, we got surprised by a guard dog peevie and a few of the freedom fighters that joined us were taken, but the strike team survived. One of the surviving insurgents was bitten but has not turned. We will exit to your location. Over." Hammer obviously didn’t know Walt or realize that Bradley would know him. I wondered if it would have really mattered to her. Her assessment of our wounded was somewhat cold. I privately speculated how she would deal with him.

  "Understood. Didn’t realize what those dog house-looking things were–that’s pretty fucked up. One enemy down, one walking wounded. Over and out.”

  Doghouse things? How the hell do they keep guard peevies? I’m not even going to go over the moral implications, I am asking how it would be possible to house and transport rabid lunatics. We made sure to give the property a wide berth as we made a semicircle across the highway to my Old Friend’s sniper nest. I was surprised to see that the surviving backups continued to follow and did not simply turn tail when the getting was good; that showed some coura
ge. Hammer clicked the radio to alert Bradley of our approach and he welcomed us inside a House of God.

  I am a Christian and don’t think I can ever be anything else. Yeah, I’m far from even being a decent one, but I’ve never understood why people in post-apocalyptic stories often deny God. Shit happens, and if the peevies haven’t eaten you yet, why do you think that God isn’t giving you something? My life was pretty shitty even before the end of the world, but I’m actually doing fairly well with all things considered–so I’m not going to bitch. Okay, I’m done preaching religion now, just had to mention that.

  "Bradley! Shit, son! How the hell are ya?" Walt began to ask. He noticed Bradley looking at his arm and pointing. "Yeah, the goddamn little bastard took a chunk out of my arm."

  He held his arm up and gestured at the blood soaked field bandage over the injury as if it weren’t visible beforehand. I don’t think Walt suddenly became an atheist after Armageddon; I’m pretty sure he would’ve been just as disrespectful before the world went to shit. He was still walking and just as coherent as his drunk ass could ever be. According to most of the experts who were interviewed by the talking heads, there was no immunity or even treatment, but I would not have been surprised if his constant and unbelievably high blood alcohol level would keep Walt human, at least for a good long while. Walt, just as everyone else around him, knew that he was a dead man walking and it would only be a matter of time before he lost his humanity or Hammer shot him in the head. If it was me, I probably would have been depressed and I half expected him to go in search of beer and drink himself to death before the virus took him, but he showed his gumption during his final hours by spending the majority of his time discussing with the two elder tacticians how he could make his death mean something. We found some crackers and grape juice in the church kitchen to munch on as we waited for darkness. Oh God…I am so sorry! I just realized we ate the communion crackers! Is it a sin to eat those when you aren’t in church? You know, this probably would have been something to think about before now. Well, that might have been our last supper anyway, so maybe He’ll cut us some slack.