Chronicles of the Undead | Book 1 | Urban Gridlock

by Hernandez, Jaime

  Max glassed the dead with the binoculars. He couldn’t fathom what had drawn so many of them together or why they were all traveling toward the city. He watched as zombies from nearby streets slowly joined the fray. The crowd was like a beacon drawing the dead from all around. He focused on Vince’s neighborhood and saw crowds of zombies shuffling south to join the horde.

  Max zoomed in on the horde, unable to see the very front of it. The lead element had already passed through and beyond the intersection while the guys had been sleeping. As far as he could see to the east, the dead bodies were moving in concert. He looked back to the west and couldn’t see the tail end of the horde. Their view wasn’t entirely clear, but they could see a hell of a lot with the binoculars.

  “Downtown’s been on fire since day one. I wonder if that’s what’s drawing them,” Vince said.

  Handing the binoculars off to Junior, Max said, “The fires and smoke are massive. I can’t imagine what else would draw so many of them. This can only be good for us. As long as nothing distracts them and none of them break off from the rest. They’re clearing out a lot of the suburbs for us.”

  “That they are,” Frank agreed. “However, an endless number of zombies could show up again in the suburbs coming in from any given direction at any time. And countless houses and businesses hold untold numbers of the dead that are, for the moment, stuck where they are. Right now though, this is the beginning of a huge opening for us.” Frank was levelheaded and right as usual, which was one of the reasons that the other guys respected him.

  “They could be passing right through your neighborhood, Max, if they’re following Detroit,” Vince said. Max’s jaw immediately took on a hard set. “No, that’s a good thing. It means we wait until we see the tail end of this thing, then we head to your house. We’ll be in the clear or close to it.”

  “I think we should keep watch here, so we can see if any of them break off. We can watch for the tail end and know exactly when we should leave,” Junior added.

  “Why not go now?” Max started but Frank interrupted. “They’re drawing in the dead and they’re focused. We don’t want to provide a distraction and we definitely don’t want to get caught between any of the zombies moving to join the horde,” Frank said. He knew how eager Max was to get home to his family, but he wanted to make sure they didn’t take any foolish chances or make any mistakes when they were this close to the finish line.

  “Damn, this is insane,” Vince said and lit up a smoke then passed the pack around. “When we go back inside, you guys have got to watch something my DVR picked up last night. More fucked up shit.”

  “Just tell us,” Junior said. His curiosity was piqued, but he didn’t feel like going back inside yet.

  “The vice-president made a live address last night. It was informal and I have no clue where they were filming from. No bullshit, no politics. Obviously, the President is dead. Anyway, he wasn’t reading a speech; he was just talking and addressing the public. Our country as well as anyone else who was watching. He confirmed that the world was fucked, world leaders were dead, wars were over, countries no longer mattered, world militaries had been overrun and some other stuff along those lines. Then he encouraged everyone who had survived to work together to save humanity from extinction. When he walked out of the camera frame, there was a very visible stark white bandage on his hand. Hell, he probably died last night,” Vince said. “So it looks like we’re on our own. No help is going to come from anywhere, not that I had expected it to. But to have it all confirmed like that was pretty mind blowing.”

  The guys were a bit thrown and had to let the news settle for a minute. From everything they’d seen and how things had been going, they weren’t surprised. But having it all become official like that was a lot to take in.

  Junior broke the silence. “Why don’t you guys go inside? Cool off, take a shit, whatever. I’ll keep watch on the horde for a while,” he said.

  “Yeah, okay,” Max answered for them. “One of us will be back up here soon.” He followed Frank and Vince down the ladder, and they made their way back inside Vince’s house. Max and Frank downed a couple bottles of water then sat down to watch the VP’s address themselves. It was unnecessary but felt important to both of them. They were essentially watching the official fall of their nation or at least the official announcement of it. The official end of it all.

  Chapter 38

  Day 3

  It had been several hours since Michelle had directed everyone to take refuge in the garage. If the garage had felt stuffy when they first went inside, it now felt like a sauna. In the heat of the afternoon, the garage had become oppressively hot, so much so that the air felt heavy and breathing was slightly labored. She had found a shelf at the rear of the garage that held grilling and cookout supplies. She tore open a sleeve of plastic cups, opened a gallon of water from the truck and forced some on everyone. They were miserably overheated and between the five of them, they quickly burned through two gallons of water.

  Normally Michelle would be forcing food on everyone, but they’d had a large breakfast and were far too hot to even consider eating. She desperately wanted to open the side door of the garage in hopes of drawing in a slight breeze but knew it wouldn’t go unnoticed by the horde and would spell their certain doom. The boy’s faces had gone from a sweaty red to a shade of crimson purely from the heat and dehydration, and Emily’s long blonde hair was soaking wet, so she decided to open the door from the mudroom to the garage. Then she opened the door from the kitchen to the mudroom. The zombies couldn’t see her and if any of them encroached upon the house, it would be easy enough to close the doors again. If even the tiniest bit of the central air found its way to the garage, it would grant some sort of relief.

  “What the fuck are you doing?” Anna demanded viciously. They were suffering in the heat of the garage for a reason.

  “Look at the boys. We need some air before someone passes out from heatstroke,” Michelle answered firmly. “Do you see any other options?” She inwardly seethed at her best friend.

  Anna said “Fine,” but really meant “fuck you” and Michelle knew it. Michelle also knew that Anna was worried sick about Camille and with good reason, so she let it go. Anna moved to the front of the garage to watch the horde through the tinted windows.

  “Joey, Damon, go sit down in the mud room and drink some more water. We don’t need everyone standing at the garage door. These windows aren’t helping anything with this heat,” Anna said. Her tone of voice motivated both of them to move immediately and make a show of how much water they were drinking as they scooted inside the mudroom.

  “Yeah, I told you your mom was scary as shit,” Joey mouthed to Damon. He nodded back. Now was not the time to even speak in his mom’s presence. The air in the mudroom felt like a cold breeze compared to the heat of the garage.

  “Emily and Michelle, go cool off for a few minutes. I can see the doorway from here. Plenty of time for me to let you know if the zombies suddenly decide that this house looks appetizing,” Anna snapped, fully expecting them to listen to her. Emily nodded, grabbed another gallon of water and joined the boys in the mudroom. Michelle turned and walked toward Anna instead.

  “We will find her. I promise you, we will,” Michelle forced a hug on Anna. Anna resisted for a moment then relented to the comforting words and arms of her best friend and hugged her back. “I’m going to go cool off for a few minutes, then you’re going to take a turn. You’re not going to be any good to anyone if you die of heatstroke. Plus, I’ll kill you.”

  Anna didn’t have it in her to laugh but she gave Michelle a weak smile and nodded.

  “How the hell did I let this happen?” Anna spoke in a whisper to herself. “We never should have left my house.” The full blame of whatever might have befallen Camille rested solely on her shoulders. For the first hour or two, she had hoped that her daughter might have been able to circle around and come back to them. As Anna continued to stare daggers at the unsee
ing dead, she gradually began to lose hope.

  She didn’t know where her husband was or even if he was still alive. He hadn’t messaged that morning or the night before. Michelle hadn’t heard from Jesse either. The not knowing continued to be an immensely difficult thing for her to process, just as it had been from the beginning. The not knowing was going to kill her.

  Anna knew that Damon would want to search for Camille, but she would have to find a way to stop him. She couldn’t risk losing both of her children. There was nothing she wanted more in that moment than to go find her daughter herself. There was no way to know how to even begin searching. They couldn’t exactly drive around while yelling her name. Or maybe they could if they were far enough away from the horde.

  She was determined to figure out something. She refused to accept the unknown. After the horde had finally passed, she would go search for Camille. She would go house to house, street by street until she found her. She started making mental preparations as she again cursed at the horde outside. Barely able to allow herself to think of such possibilities, she knew that unless she found Camille’s ravaged body on the ground or found her among the ranks of the walking dead, she would keep searching. In her mind, there were no other options. That was her baby girl out there.

  Anna watched the horde carefully, looking for any sign that it might be near its end. She’d grown so used to staring at the zombies over the last few hours that their appearances no longer surprised her or caused her pause. Not even the little kids bothered her anymore. She’d seen every type of injury imaginable, every type of injury that was possible. Dead bodies charred down to nothing but black flakes falling like dust from a skeleton. Heads nearly severed and rolling around the shoulders of the dead. Ears torn off, eyeballs hanging by a string, faces that looked as if they’d been skinned exposing torn muscle and blackish blood, entire body cavities emptied with proud white ribs protruding, missing hands, glistening ropes of intestines trailing behind and falling to the ground, flesh hanging like tattered rags, globs of fat, missing noses and half exposed brains. She wanted to kill every single one of them.

  Emily quietly left the mudroom and walked over to Anna. “You need to cool off. I’ll take over for a while,” Emily said gently. Her hair was still soaking wet but now it looked like she’d poured water over her head to cool down.”

  “Thank you,” Anna said softly as Emily took her place at by the garage door. Anna felt an instant change in temperature as she entered the mudroom. It was still hot, but they were benefiting slightly from the central AC in the house. She downed some water then poured a small amount over her head in an effort to bring her temperature down. The boys sat quietly on the counter and Michelle sat in a corner.

  “Mom,” Joey started. “What if I go out the back door and climb the fence to Anna’s house? I can go far back to the rear of the yard to climb. You know the zombies won’t see me from there. I want to check on Lucia. She’s gotta be scared shitless.”

  “If it were that easy and safe, we all would have done it hours ago. All it takes is for one of those damned zombies to see you. If one sees you, the rest will follow,” Michelle answered.

  “Yeah, but they won’t see me that far back what with all of the trees and the fence,” Joey went on. “You know how deep the yard is.”

  “The zombies coming up the road might be able to see you going out the back door,” Michelle replied.

  “But they won’t. As long as they don’t see or hear anything, they always look straight ahead. They’re not going to be randomly turning their heads all of a sudden. It’s not like they’re looking at any of the houses, let alone trying to see behind them,” Joey insisted.

  “If the horde makes a move for some reason, we have two vehicles loaded with supplies right here. We can pull out of the garage and turn around, drive through the fence and,” Michelle started before Joey cut her off.

  “Fucking A, Mom,” Joey said in frustration. “If the dead do turn toward this place, do you really think we’ll have enough time to do all of that? And what about all the trees? This place has almost as many as Max and Anna’s does. Do you really think we can drive through all of them?”

  Before Michelle could answer, Anna spoke up. “How the hell did I not think about that? He’s right, Michelle. They won’t see us go out the back, and we’ll go to the rear of the yard before we cross over. Once we’re in my yard, there’s no chance in hell that they’ll be able to see us,” she said. “We’ll move quietly, but they won’t hear us anyway over all of the noise they’re making.” Anna felt like she was thinking much more clearly after having cooled off a bit. “Lucia’s there, and if Camille comes back on her own she’s going to go to her own house, not here. Fuck, she could already be there!” Anna latched onto Joey’s idea and had already decided that she was going to do it.

  “Okay,” Michelle finally acquiesced. She was worried about Lucia. She felt certain that Lucia was safe, but the poor girl was probably a wreck. After finally agreeing with Anna and Joey, she took charge. “Leave all of the supplies. Everyone drink some water but we’re going with weapons only. When the horde finally passes, we can come back for what we wanted and leave the vehicles stocked in case we need them later.”

  “I’ll let Emily know,” Anna said as she walked from the mudroom to the garage. Emily stood at the front watching the procession as it passed by. She looked over as Anna approached.

  “We’re going to go out the back door, to the very rear of the yard then cross the fence into my yard. The dead won’t be able to see us. Lucia is all by herself over there,” Anna said while simultaneously thinking that Camille could be there as well.

  “Anna, look,” Emily said, nodding her head at the dead in the road. In the half hour that Anna had been in the mudroom, the flow of zombies had slowed. They no longer filled the entire road and attached tree lawns. They were no longer on the edges of front yards; they were only on the road. Anna watched and saw that the width of their ranks really had shrunk. There were still undoubtedly a few hundred at the tail end of the mob, but they were finally nearing the end of it. The zombies nearly covered the road, but they didn’t fill it completely and weren’t packed nearly as tightly as they had been. Anna watched as what she referred to as crawlers were revealed as part of the tail end of the horde. Those whose dead bodies had been so severely damaged that they couldn’t walk but pulled themselves along using their arms and hands. They moved much slower than the already achingly slow zombies that walked.

  Anna craned her head to look as far as she could to the right. She could see the end of the horde. It would take a little time, but soon they would be past both the Wright’s house and her own. She decided to abandon their newly formed plan. Anna softly called Michelle and the boys to the garage. “Look,” she said and gestured toward the garage door windows.

  “Forget the plan. We’re too close to the end here. They’re not as loud and they’re going to make less and less noise. It’s no longer worth the risk to try to leave now. We’re almost in the clear,” Anna said. Joey and Damon looked on, utterly amazed. It had seemed like the horde had no end and now they were almost past. Michelle looked out and agreed with Anna.

  “Keep very quiet,” Michelle whispered. “We’re clear of the worst of it, but I don’t want any of the stragglers to find out we’re here,” she reminded everyone.

  The five of them stayed at the garage door watching as the last of the walking dead passed. There were a lot of crawlers at the end, far more than any of them had expected. They waited one more agonizing hour before the last of the crawlers passed by.

  “I still think we should go out the back and cross out of view, just in case any more stragglers come along,” Anna said. She looked at everyone’s faces as they nodded or murmured their agreements. “We don’t have to go to the rear of the property. Just behind the house so we’re far enough from the road,” she finished. Her house was set further back than the Wright’s, so they would still be crossing near the f
ront of her own house which was completely hidden from view from the road.

  One by one they walked out the back door and moved toward the fence. With staggered trees on both sides of the fence line, everyone was quickly able to climb up and over. Michelle immediately moved further into the front yard to see if Lucia was there. She spotted the tree Lucia had been in, but her daughter was nowhere within sight. Since none of the zombies had breached the wall at the front of the yard, that could only mean that Lucia was safely inside Anna’s house. She breathed a sigh of relief and quietly headed toward the house to join the others. Everyone had already slipped through the bars of the storm door on the front porch. Emily held the door for Michelle so she could climb through.

  The heavy front door of the house opened from the inside as Lucia quietly greeted them. Her face quickly filled with worry when she saw that Camille wasn’t with them. Anna saw her expression and knew without asking that her daughter hadn’t circled around and made it back to the house.

  Camille was still missing.

  Chapter 39

  Day 3

  Frank and Max sat on the roof of Vince’s house watching the horde in the distance. It had been hours, but they still couldn’t see the end of it. Their view wasn’t entirely unobstructed but with the binoculars they could see enough.

  Max worried that the horde had likely been nearly on top of his home.

  “I’m telling you Max; they’re staying on the road. For hours now, every time we look, they’re on the road. The only zombies that aren’t are the ones coming out from other places to join them and when they do, they stay on the road, too. Path of least resistance, remember?” Frank tried to reassure Max. He wasn’t placating him. He truly believed that the horde hadn’t overrun Max’s property and home.