The Good, the Dead, and the Lawless: The Undoing

by Archer, Angelique

  Haven gave her a small smile, trying to conceal her sadness. “Right now, just get better, Grandma. You let us take care of the rest.”

  She kissed her cheek then turned away, letting her dark hair fall in front of her eyes like a curtain to hide her despair. She rifled through the contents of a box marked “Haven” and pulled out a fresh pair of jeans, tugging them over her thin leggings. She found a yellow tank top and a light gray sweater, quickly changing and shoving the box to her brother to push over the entrance. Her leather jacket lay beside her sleeping bag, and she threw it on hurriedly. Brett had slept in his clothing the whole night and didn’t have an extra set of clothes, so he continued stacking the boxes over the attic door.

  “Faith, what are you doing?” Haven tried hard to keep the impatience out of her tone.

  Faith just looked at the floor, still in a catatonic state.

  Brett glanced at his sisters and noticed the restraint in Haven’s posture fading. “Haven, I need your help. Come on.”

  Another powerful thud made everyone jump. The cardboard boxes shook, cans clattered and weapons clanked together as they were shuffled around from the impact.

  “This isn’t going to work. We need to get to the roof,” Brett said.

  Haven grabbed her backpack. “Gather what you can into your packs. We’re going to be on the run, and we’ll need to fight. Keep it light.”

  Over the course of the next fifteen minutes, everyone packed up what they could carry. Water and ammunition were the most valuable items that no one wanted to be without. Haven had discovered a Ruger LCP in the box of weaponry and shoved it into the back of her jeans. She was immeasurably grateful that her grandfather had been such a weapons aficionado.

  Brett suddenly stopped what he was doing and peered at the attic door. Without going into details, he said hoarsely, “Okay, I think it’s time to go.”

  Haven followed his gaze. A horrific impact on the other side of the door sent their makeshift barrier asunder. She gasped when she realized she’d just seen several pairs of clouded eyes for the briefest of seconds before the door crashed back into place.

  “Roger that,” she agreed.

  She went over to her grandmother and helped her to her feet, supporting her weight on her shoulders. Rosemary insisted on being given the machete from her Capetown honeymoon. She clutched it weakly as Haven assisted the fragile elderly woman out of the window. Brett followed with Faith and held his sister and grandmother’s hands to make sure they had a secure footing. Once the three of them were on the roof, Haven returned to the attic to retrieve their packs.

  Haven had just picked up her grandmother’s backpack when the first wave of undead burst through the wood. The remaining cardboard boxes uselessly slid off to the side. The sheer number of those making up the mountain of flesh below propelled the climbers through the doorway in record time. She grabbed the shotgun and aimed at the first one struggling to rise to its feet.

  In her hurry, she missed the ghoul’s head and hit it through the side of its belly. Massive lengths of entrails splattered wetly to the floor. Unfazed, the zombie moved towards her, closely followed by the others who had managed to squeeze through the opening.

  Her palms sweating, she pumped another shell into the chamber and fired. This time, the zombie’s head exploded like a rotting pumpkin, the remainders of its collapsed body slightly tripping the ones behind it. She ducked out the window and shut it just as the zombie reached the glass.

  The family watched as more of them poured into the attic, trampling the sleeping bags and stumbling over the contents of the cardboard boxes. Their faces and hands pressed up against the window. Frenzied eyes tracked their every move.

  Brett ushered the women to the side of the roof, out of sight of their hungry pursuers. The zombies continued to furiously pound at the window.

  “I really wish ‘out of sight, out of mind’ applied here,” he quipped nervously. “They aren’t giving up. What next?”

  Haven looked around them trying to come up with a solid plan of evasion. For whatever reason, the zombies that had once surrounded the house seemed to be heading in the opposite direction, towards some unseen object across the street. Considering the obnoxious ruckus the ones in the attic were making as they tried to reach her family, she found this surprising. It was then that she noticed something peculiar out of the corner of her eye. Shielded by the thick oak trees near the house, she squinted to get a better look.

  Haven lay down on her belly and stretched out across the roof. “Hold my feet.” Brett grabbed her ankles, and she scooted forward to the edge so that she could discern what exactly was drawing them away.

  “Another one?” she muttered to herself. “What is wrong with him?”

  She returned to a sitting position and nudged her brother. “Look,” she said softly, pointing.

  A silver F150 had pulled up where Cade’s truck had been the day before. Even with the incessant moans, she could hear the engine sputter as the driver repeatedly tried to turn it over.

  “Who is that?” Faith whispered, holding her grandmother close.

  “I have no idea. He looks stuck,” Brett answered. He glanced at Haven who chewed on her bottom lip as she always did when she was deep in thought, her eyes focused as she scanned their surroundings.

  She hated to admit it, but this stranger had provided them with the perfect opportunity to escape. Realistically, they wouldn’t have been able to help him without being killed. That kind of risk for a stranger simply wasn’t an option to her anyways. Plus, she wasn’t sure that she even wanted to come to his aid if he was part of Cade’s crowd.

  The breaking of glass brought her back to reality as the barrage of zombies in the attic finally managed to get through the window.

  “Faith, get back and hold on to Grandma!” Brett exclaimed tersely. He and Haven walked purposefully to the creatures, weapons ready.

  “Don’t fire unless you absolutely have to. The ones around the house are leaving. Let’s not bring them back with the sound of gunfire,” Haven said to him.

  Brett chuckled and moved beside her. “What, you’re not going to miss them?”

  She glared icily at the undead filling the window. “Hardly.”

  The fact that the zombies had almost no coordination was in the siblings’ favor. The first one out the window tumbled forward head first, and unable to get to its feet, rolled clumsily to the ground, its skull impacting the concrete with a sickening thud.

  The next one poked its head out, its white eyes following the descent of the one before it. It turned towards them when it heard their footsteps and smelled their live human scent. Reaching out with a grimy arm when it caught sight of them, it pulled itself over the sill and managed to climb to its feet.

  Haven was closest to it. Her foot jolted out and caught the zombie at its ankle, causing the beastly thing to trip and slide down the roof to the ground.

  The next few minutes passed simply. Brett and Haven continued tripping the zombies as they attempted to reach them on the roof. Brett relished the opportunity to practice martial arts on the festering creatures while Haven found herself deriving a rather unhealthy enjoyment from the nauseating pops and cracks as the zombies fell to the concrete below. Neither was forced to use their weapons once.

  “Like shooting fish in a barrel. So easy,” Brett mumbled, knocking over another zombie.

  Haven briefly caught sight of a young man running away from the idle silver truck as she dispatched the zombies, but it looked like whomever had taken off had accumulated a very long tail of ravenous reanimated monsters behind him.

  She noticed with amusement that the attic was also considerably less crowded. The mountain of undead that had once served as a ramp to allow others to reach the attic no longer existed, and the few creatures left in the small room were now trying to follow their decaying brethren. They had apparently forgotten that several tasty morsels were on the roof. After the last zombie on the roof was disposed of, Haven a
nd Brett watched from the broken window as the remaining zombies turned back towards the open attic entrance and disappeared from sight, their limbs snapping as they crumbled to the carpeted floor of the garage below.

  The siblings leaned against the window and caught their breaths. From where she stood, Haven didn’t see too many of the zombies cluttering the yard.

  “I have an idea.” She gestured to the backyard. “You know Grandpa’s yellow canoe?”

  Brett nodded, and in spite of the cold weather, wiped the sweat from his brow. “Why?”

  Haven brushed a stray strand from her eyes. “There’s no way we can get to the car without garnering unwanted attention, and as much as it bothers me to give up that mode of transportation, we need to be creative if we’re going to live through this mess.” She gestured behind them. “Let’s say we could get through the backyard in one piece. If we got the canoe, made it across the lake safely, what would we find over there? I’ve only been twice, and the last time, we didn’t stay for long.”

  Brett looked at her questioningly.

  Trying not to blush, she continued, “The reason I ask is because I know you and Danny used to explore back there as kids. You know the territory.”

  He thought for a moment. “It’s nice. Woodsy setting. There aren’t any houses for miles, really desolate. Just an old boathouse at the other end of the lake. We could hole up there until we think of a better plan.”

  “It’s perfect. Now the trick is to quietly sneak to the other side of the roof so that we don’t bring any back. I think that the noise they make attracts others, so all it takes is for one to spot us. After we’re facing the backyard, we can climb down Grandma’s trellises and run to the lake.” Haven went over to the rest of her family to explain the plan.

  After much convincing from Brett, it was agreed that Faith would help Rosemary get to the canoe while Haven and Brett flanked them on either side. Haven was extremely hesitant to leave Faith alone to protect her grandmother, but if it came down to either Faith or Brett shooting a gun with her, she preferred it to be Brett.

  Before they left, there was something Haven had to do. She ducked back into the attic and walked over to the stack of towels, selecting a white one. Pulling out the turquoise permanent marker, she hastily scrawled a message across the dingy fabric, a clue that only Houston would be able to understand.

  “What’s that?” Brett glanced over her shoulder. “‘We’re having a picnic?’ Are you serious?”

  “It’s for Houston. I didn’t want to leave a message saying exactly where we were going, especially with Cade roaming about,” she told him.

  Haven ran her fingers over the words she had written, briefly recalling the story behind the clue.

  Houston had visited Green Acres one year to spend spring break with her. Haven had tried to plan all sorts of outdoor adventures for them, thrilled at the possibility of having Houston as a camping and hiking partner. One of the excursions included a morning of fishing on the lake followed by a picnic lunch on the undeveloped side of Clear Lake. Haven had roamed it once as a child with her brother, but it had been at least a solid decade since she’d been back. She had worn a bikini top and cut-offs, thoroughly taking advantage of the gorgeous weather and hot sun. Much to Haven’s delight, Houston had taken off his shirt while in the boat and remained in a pair of hiking boots and khaki shorts. They tied the canoe off and trudged through the forest until they found the perfect clearing to lay down the picnic blanket.

  After lunch, Houston had raised an eyebrow at her mischievously before planting a slow, intense kiss on her lips. He gently leaned her back onto the blanket until she was under him, closing her eyes as he kissed her neck and stroked her body. Minutes later, she was clad in only her bikini bottoms and Houston in his boxers, and those bits of clothing were beginning to come off, too.

  Unfortunately, the lack of clothing had been a mistake. A light rain had just started when they were attacked by a swarm of mosquitoes. Eager to enjoy the privacy they lacked in Rosemary’s home, they attempted to ignore the savage insects as best they could. Eventually, the irritating buzzing and biting became too distracting, and they reluctantly returned to her house.

  That night, she happened to be changing in front of her grandmother when Rosemary noticed dozens of tiny bites all over Haven’s breasts. When she deduced how the mosquitoes had managed to bite her there, Rosemary had been miffed to say the least.

  “You really think he’s coming here, don’t you?” Brett’s voice interrupted her thoughts.

  She nodded. “I know it doesn’t make sense, but I can feel it. He’ll find a way. And when he does, I don’t want him to think we didn’t make it.”

  “You’re sure we will?” He was skeptical.

  Haven smiled and tied her hair into a high ponytail, the silky waves streaming down her back. “A girl can hope, can’t she?”

  She headed to the window. Holding the towel in one hand, she secured the fabric over the two hooks that her grandmother usually used to hang Christmas lights. A few seconds later, she joined her family at the edge of the roof.

  Her optimism about their chances dwindled when she saw the backyard. Some stragglers were still meandering around. More were coming out of the yards of the other houses. They seemed to be following the moans of the masses as they made their way to the silver truck across the street.

  Haven silently gestured that she was going to descend the closest trellis. Armed with the Remington shotgun and Ruger, she landed on the ground quietly, her booted feet barely crunching the autumn leaves. She stayed in a defensive crouch, the shotgun held firmly in her hands as she listened to the sounds around her. Through the broken windows of the house, Haven could see some of them wandering to the front door, their hideous faces shrouded in the dim lighting. They hadn’t seen her yet, so she signaled for her family to follow her.

  She rose to her feet as her grandmother, brother, and sister climbed down, Brett holding their grandmother in one arm while the other clutched the trellis.

  Sweat was pouring down Rosemary’s face, and her pallor was gray and sallow, her once vivid blue eyes now hazy and unfocused. She hadn’t lost much blood from the bite on her arm, thus prolonging her death and reanimation, but many hours had passed since the attack, and they all knew it was only a matter of time before the infection killed her. Haven could tell that she was in pain, but she didn’t complain once. That was the kind of woman she was, tough as nails and not wanting to burden her grandchildren with worry.

  When they reached the ground, Brett shifted Rosemary so she was on her feet, but leaning against him. She tried to muffle a cough, but was unsuccessful. Haven’s face snapped towards the zombies milling about the living room near the front door.

  Their soulless gazes shifted towards the source of the noise, bodies turning slowly in the family’s direction.

  They had spotted them. Each one started emitting a raspy moan, signaling to the others that food was nearby. Haven could see through the living room window and noticed with dismay that the zombies headed to the pickup truck were now coming back around the sides of the house. Seeing the family sped up their movements, and they stumbled towards them at a jerky, desperate pace.

  “Get to the lake.” Haven stayed at the back of the group as they ran, trying to avoid firing her weapons while ensuring that everyone kept well ahead of the creatures.

  By the time they crossed the yard to the lake, the surrounding area was jammed with undead once more as they navigated through the trees and bushes to get to them.

  The shoreline in front of Rosemary’s yard was overgrown with cattail reeds which extended beyond the dock into the water. In her old age, clearing out the beach of these reeds had proven extremely difficult, and they now formed a thick barrier several yards wide. They scooted the canoe into the shallow water, scrambling for the paddles which were always kept on two hooks on the side of the dock. Brett placed Rosemary into the boat and helped Faith climb aboard.

  Haven
looked up as she grabbed the edge of the canoe with her grandmother and sister, ready to push them through the dense brown reeds. The frenzied ghouls were so close. She let go of the boat after thrusting them forward. Her face lined with grim determination, she stepped over to the dock where she had set the shotgun and walked towards the first wave of zombies.

  Brett was already in the bow of the canoe facing the middle of the lake, Rosemary was slumped over in the stern, and Faith sat in the middle. “Haven, come on! We’ve got to go now!”

  Haven ignored him and aimed the shotgun as the closest zombies reached out for her. She fired repeatedly into the throng of withered faces. When she was out of ammo, she pulled out the Ruger. She started to back away from them as their numbers increased, trying to suppress her fear and remembering to breathe so that each precious shot counted. The yard was so full of the stinking masses that Haven could no longer see any green, any flowers, any part of the beautiful garden her grandmother had spent years tending to... nothing but an ocean of dull grays, muted crimsons, and stagnant browns.

  She leaned forward, her boots digging into the soft, mushy ground, but her tired arms could barely push the combined weight of her brother, sister, and grandmother through the tall reeds.

  Haven heard the screeches and wails of the infected behind her. She could feel the earth vibrating from their uneven steps. She could smell the foul odor of their decaying flesh as they closed in around her.

  Panic in his eyes, Brett jumped out into the murky water to help her. The two of them grabbed the sides of the canoe, shoving it through the reeds until it glided into deeper water.

  The dock was entirely surrounded. Many of the zombies from the first group in the front were knocked into the water as those behind them impacted their fetid corpses.

  They had just climbed back into the canoe, heaving their exhausted bodies over the side with considerable effort, when Haven caught sight of a huge zombie as it lumbered towards the stern where her grandmother rested. It moved at a shockingly fast pace, its pounding feet splashing through the water noisily, creating small waves that rolled against the boat.