I had a certain feeling that in about a minute or two I’d get to try firsthand if simply making their head split like a watermelon was another way to stop them for good.
I knew well enough that the guys could have offed the five shamblers already with their rifles, but as none of them had fired a single shot yet, it was obvious that they were biding their time. I kind of wished that I’d kept the rifle, even if I didn’t really like shooting it. Andrej’s words kept repeating in my head—a shotgun is a close defense weapon, like when you have to shoot someone coming right at you. Only if you lack anything else, you shoot a guy across the room with it. Anything beyond fifty feet, and you’ll likely miss.
Considering that massive brain damage was the way to go, I doubted that any of the zombies would have been impressed if a stray buckshot hit them in the knee or thigh if I fired too early.
Exhaling slowly, I forced my muscles to lock down and remain in my defensive stance, even though my mind was screaming at me to run.
Smart zombies might be—smart enough to use makeshift weapons, as Raleigh’s video had shown; or smart enough to hide until their prey ran right into their jaws, like the girl at the house—but caution was not on their menu. Seeing the four of us standing there, they didn’t slow down with suspicion, but instead they increased their speed as they drew closer—jaws snapping, growling with delight.
“Any time you’re ready now,” Nate griped, not taking his eyes off the zombies. I quickly shifted my gaze back to them—looking at him had been reflex, and one I realized I’d still have to strike from my instincts.
They were still forty feet away but closing in quickly. Holding my breath, I pulled the trigger.
The second zombie from the left jerked, blood, bone, and gore spraying from the right side of its torso and arm, but it still kept coming. Pumping the next round in, I aimed a little higher, this time hitting the left shoulder and taking part of its cheek out. Somewhere low inside of me I felt revulsion come up, but it was easy to ignore with fright and adrenaline clamoring in my mind. By then, the zombie was close enough that missing would have been harder than hitting it, and with my third shot I made what remained of its head explode.
It was quite fascinating, and I would have loved to linger at that moment. Yet with four other zombies right in our faces, it was probably a good thing that I didn’t.
Downing that zombie had clearly been a signal, and the guys finally opened fire, spraying the remaining four with bullets from up close. I just managed to get another shot off into the middle one before Nate took it down, and within seconds, there were just five piles of stinking rags lying on the ground in front of us. In the sudden silence after the racket the shots had made, my panting was loud in my ears and my arms were shaking, but my grip was still sure on the shotgun.
Looking up, I saw another group of zombies way to our left, and a few single stragglers behind us. Miraculously, the direction in which our camping ground lay was free, at least for now.
Forcing myself to jerk out of my momentary stupor, I quickly reloaded before stepping up to the zombies and eyeing them a little more critically. Before, morbid curiosity had always won over; now I was more interested to check on the damage I’d inflicted. There was definite minced meat quality to the wounds, with bits of torn flesh all around them. Dark goo started leaking out of the surrounding tissues, looking less and less like blood.
Nate stepped up to me, watching what I was looking at. When I directed my gaze at him, I didn’t get the thumbs-up I’d expected—of course, that would have been too easy.
“Next time, make it two shots at the max. You’re wasting ammo.”
With that, he turned around, giving the silent signal for us to move out. Grimacing, I gaped after him—but only once I was sure that his back was securely turned. Andrej snorted and Burns laughed again, in passing thumping my left shoulder hard.
“You did good, girl, but he’s right. Next time, make every shot count.”
Rolling my eyes, I fell into step behind Burns.
“Yeah, because I totally misfired deliberately to give you guys something to gripe about.”
“Your stance is sloppy enough that you don’t need to try for that,” Nate called over his shoulder. “And you’re way too slow. You need more practice.”
Grumbling under my breath, I did my best not to appear too hurt, although his criticism stung.
“How about you help me with that rather than complain?” I shot back.
“That’s the plan,” he replied. I wondered if I’d just doomed myself.
Chapter 14
As we continued our journey, the guys didn’t exactly go out of their way to give me practice, but unlike before, I was included in the few raids that we ventured on. Clearing houses was still not something I was trusted with, but if we were just hunting for ammo, weapons, or food along the road, I more often than not was part of the group set to get the job done. More and more, my bats remained strapped to the outside of my pack, the shotgun taking their place except for when silence was absolutely key. Each sortie still left my nerves wrecked and my calm shot for hours after, but I couldn’t help but feel a certain amount of satisfaction every time we returned from a run. I was well aware that on my own I would have been toast, and I was without a doubt still the weakest link, but I felt that for my rookie status I was doing a good job.
Like with the ill-fated tampon run, we more often than not set out without our heavy packs strapped on, just taking a few empty, smaller backpacks and bags with us instead, to reunite with the others once we’d gotten rid of any trailing zombies. Even armed and cautious, there were a few close calls, but miraculously, we didn’t lose anyone to the undead. Yet that remained the only good news for days, when food got scarcer and scarcer and our ammo stashes kept draining frighteningly fast. More often than not it took us hours of searching to find enough to feed our entire party, with not more than a can or two remaining for the next meal.
So when one blistering hot day Bates came running back from a recon trip, a wide grin splitting his face from afar already, I couldn’t help but feel a surge of hope deep in my chest. With my stomach cramping with hunger—and I couldn’t be the only one, even if no one complained—it was easy to guess that he didn’t look that ecstatic over having found a new pair of boots. Our whole group sped up, meeting him halfway, and with just enough care to make sure that we weren’t surprised by a sneaky zombie hiding somewhere behind a car, we streamed up the slope to the highway. There were only a few cars on the road, the odd accident cluster between the single cars where people had abandoned them, or died behind the wheel.
Bates was already climbing into the back of the truck that he’d found, but the logo on the side made me pause for a moment.
“Seriously?” I asked, feeling my shoulders sag just a little. Just our luck.
“Bitches always be critical,” Burns muttered under his breath—just loud enough that I couldn’t miss it—as he shucked his own pack and crawled up next to Bates, hauling trays out so he could hand them to the others.
Martinez stopped next to me, answering my suffering look with a grin. “Food is food is food, right?”
Someone—Andrej, I thought—threw a can at me, making me catch it instinctively. Frowning, I turned it over, unable to muster much enthusiasm.
“There’s sugar in this, too,” I noted, not too unhappy about that revelation.
“You’re too critical,” Nate called out from where he was stowing can after can in his pack.
“I’m not,” I protested.
“Are, too,” he chuffed. “Besides, haven’t we agreed that this likely wasn’t a mistake but someone deliberately contaminating the glucose syrup?”
Giving an uneasy shrug, I couldn’t help but agree. “Shit like that only happens on purpose.”
“Then this should be safe,” he replied, opening a can himself and scooping a chunk out. “Besides, who’d bother with contaminating cat food?”
I watched him dig
in with revulsion, but my stomach was growling loudly enough that my protest started sounding absurd, even to me.
“Is that even safe to eat for us?” I asked, hanging on to my last shred of protest with a fingernail.
“Wouldn’t know why not,” Martinez said. “Might taste a little weird because it’s not spiced, but besides that? Likely the most accessible form of meat we’ll find in the months to come.”
I still wasted another minute, watching as all around me, cans were opened and animal chow was wolfed down, no one dropping dead or turning into a raging lunatic. Then I was just feeling stupid and popped my own can, carefully sniffing on it first. It smelled exactly as I’d expected—but unexpectedly good. Still hesitant, I reached in, wincing at the gooey consistence of the sauce between the chunks. Exhaling forcefully, I held my breath and popped some in, chewing a bit before swallowing.
But, damn, cat food was a lot less repulsive than I’d thought.
It took some getting used to—and I wasn’t the only one who didn’t eat with gusto—but the last weeks had taught us not to be too choosy about what made it onto our plates. Not that we had plates, but still. Could have been worse. It certainly tasted better than spam. Come to think of it, it was even more edible than the cafeteria food I’d often scorned at work.
It certainly beat trying to hunt down rats.
Even though the truck was out in the open right where it had crashed into the rails, we remained there for a good two hours, eating until we were all too full to shovel in more. Every nook and cranny of the packs was filled up, even our raiding packs. Although it was lacking in style, the cat food would likely keep us fed for at least two weeks, probably longer if we could scavenge a little more along the way. It certainly ensured that we didn’t have to risk busting into a small town and going for the grocery store, if they had one—which had been our Plan B for days now. While still not enthusiastic about our new dietary addition, it certainly beat having to take the risk of losing someone.
Nate and Pia debated staying with the truck a little longer, but we were too exposed, so as the sun started its descent from the zenith, we hit the road again, somewhat slower because we were all a little drowsy from food coma. The sensation had become so infrequent that it was strange rather than familiar. I couldn’t help but grin at the occasional foul-breathed burp from Burns, and I even caught Nate smiling in my direction briefly. Yet as soon as he caught my gaze, he looked away again, making my heart sink.
Guess it came with the territory that if I was too stubborn to die, I was equally stupid about other things.
We hit the Wabash River the day after the cat-food-pocalypse. Indiana looked disturbingly like Ohio, although we lingered in the middle of the road, staring at the street sign, for a good five minutes. Then we just trudged on, ever heading west. That night, we made camp a little earlier, and I spent one happy hour scrubbing my dirty clothes in the cool water of a sidearm of the not-quite-majestic stream, wearing my swimsuit, much to Burns’s amusement. After weeks out on the road in full gear, I had stark tan lines at my wrists and neck, but the rest of me hadn’t really seen much exposure. We didn’t have sunscreen—and skin cancer hadn’t really been in the top five most likely to kill us—and I figured that as long as my shoulders weren’t too sore to carry my pack tomorrow, I’d be fine. Most of the others stripped down to their boxers as they did their laundry. Under different conditions, I might have been tempted to do some ogling with so much potential eye-candy on display, but with everyone’s gear left to dry on the grass or fluttering in the wind on makeshift clothes lines, one thing became apparent—we were all losing weight, and not in the most flattering way. With several of the guys packing a lot of muscle—Burns in particular; his upper arms were easily as thick as my thighs—it wasn’t that apparent, but there were already ribs poking out and knees getting pointy, and I wasn’t the only one who was poking flabby, loose skin with disdain rather than the happy news that pounds had been shed. I was still easily packing the highest body fat amount—being a woman didn’t help there—but as I dug out another can of mackerel with green beans and carrots, I couldn’t help but wish that the rate of its disappearance would slow down a little. I certainly didn’t fill out that swimsuit as I used to, and considering that it had belonged to a teenage girl—albeit a tall, well-developed one—didn’t make me much happier.
I’d kind of expected a few catcalls, but the guys ignored me, only teasing me about my change of clothes, not my general state of undress. Pia was much less circumspect about that, but considering that she didn’t seem to own a bra, let alone need one, might have been part of it. I doubted anyone would have dared whistle after her even if she’d sported a rack like Pamela Anderson.
Leaving the ladies alone didn’t mean that they didn’t rag on each other, though, and within the first fifteen minutes, no less than two wrestling matches had started, with no one in any mood to break them up. On the contrary—for every one getting too close, one more jumped right in, until it was just the sentries, Nate, Pia, Martinez, and I who weren’t rolling around in the increasingly trampled grass. That Nate—moving a little gingerly in a fresh set of bandages—wasn’t up to it made sense; no one invited the Ice Queen, and Martinez hollered back that he’d much rather enjoy the show than participate. But I was surprised that Skip and Steve joined in, too, although they quickly disappeared out of sight under the mountain of muscle. Watching them, I couldn’t help but wonder if I should ask anyone to teach me a few self-defense moves. Not that I was eager to get a tooth knocked out, but my wrestling match with the zombie girl had proven aplenty that I wasn’t exactly well off if someone pinned me down on my back.
As if she’d read my mind, Pia poked my shoulder, making me look up at her sharply.
“Get dressed. It’s about time you learned a thing or two.”
I swallowed the remark that since we’d hit the roads I did nothing but learn, and instead followed her order. What followed was a rather humiliating—and kind of humbling—half hour of me ending up either on my knees with my arms wrenched uncomfortably, or on my back, staring into the leafy canopy above us. That she didn’t believe in coddling anyone was obvious, but at least she wasn’t cruel. My jacket and pants cushioned my falls somewhat and kept me from scraping various body parts too much. I still ended up aching all over, and in dire need of another bath. When she finally let me drag my sorry carcass off, Pia declared that, starting tomorrow, I would start sparring with Martinez—not because she was tired of whipping me over her shoulder, but because we were more evenly matched in height. What our medic had to say about that I didn’t get to hear, mostly because that declaration was drowned out with catcalls.
Typical.
As if our recreational activities had changed something, we started stopping a little earlier each night, Pia shooing everyone up to do some exercise who wasn’t busy guarding the perimeter. There was the expected amount of protest, but most still joined in the sprinting, jumping, doing workouts, or just plain fooling around, depending on how tired everyone was. I was hesitant at first—and not just because my legs hurt enough that I even considered not getting up to pee but waiting until I absolutely had to—but when even Steve let himself get dragged along, I couldn’t very well play prissy princess on the sidelines. As a woman of my time—even a somewhat lazy one who loved to use the excuse of too much work to skimp on her workouts—I was no stranger to body weight exercises, but it was no surprise that pretty much everyone put my measly forty-second plank to good shame. I didn’t get much beyond one pushup because Pia was on me at the second, poking and prodding me all over for where to use more tension, eventually making me crash face-first into the dirt when I couldn’t hold myself up anymore. Burns ribbed me for that over the next two days, until I managed my first set of fifteen without almost dying. To prove just what a jackass he was, he told Martinez to sit down across his shoulders while he did his three sets of thirty. Proving that I was always game for a comeback, I accepted Martinez’s g
rinning invitation and jumped onto his lap, letting him hold me bridal-style. Sadly, that only got a rather pained groan out of Burns but he still managed to complete that set—even with our combined weight on his torso—but at least that put an end to his joking.
It was easy to forget what was happening around us in those thirty minutes or so. Never having had brothers—and the extent of physical exercise that Sam had been up to was yoga—it was strange to get caught up in that at first, but I realized that I actually liked it. Being on my feet the entire time—with the odd weapons drill or raid to break up the monotony—I felt like I was already becoming more attuned to my body, and exercise helped. It was also a hell of a fun way to burn what little energy the long days left in us, and it helped decrease the latent level of frustration and hunger-borne aggression. So far, everyone seemed to have agreed to try to get along as much as possible but of course there had been the odd altercation over stupid shit; now, that was increasingly more often settled in a set of sprints or some honest-to-God punching, at least until Bates sprained his wrist and he and Cho got a ten-minute tongue lashing from Nate that had me snickering quite openly. Of course that led to Pia ordering me to do another set of sprints because I clearly had too much energy left to burn if I could still laugh my ass off, but that was so worth it.
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