BATTLEFIELD Z SWEET HOME ZOMBIE

by Chris Lowry

  Those were just the ones I could see. The factory itself stretched across four or five acres, big giant warehouses surrounded by a half dozen smaller buildings. The warehouse doors were shut, the overheads rolled down or connected to the backs of trailers.

  I could get in there and find a thousand worker Z's just ready to chomp on my brains. Or there could be nothing. I didn't think there was nothing though.

  Just the sheer amount of Z in the space between the twelve-foot hurricane fence and the buildings had worn paths in the gravel and dirt. Circular patterns criss crossed each other, and I wondered what the Z were thinking.

  Did they see movement at the fence line and veer in that direction to investigate?

  Even as I thought it I started scanning and saw, that yes they did in fact do that. There were worn paths on this side of the fence too.

  It looked as if people had gone up to stare at the fence and ran away when the Z got packed too tight at that spot. Like hungry men looking through the glass window of a cafe at the patron's inside.

  According to the hillbilly gang, there was enough food inside to last a year, maybe more. It was a distribution center.

  I didn't see food though. I saw Z.

  And the truck depot.

  There were at least eight trucks parked with their backs to the warehouse doors, and several more empty trailers across the asphalt parking lot.

  I tried to formulate a plan.

  I could set up shop in a tree branch and just pick off the Z inside. That would work, except the noise would attract any of the walking dead outside toward this location. I could get stuck in that tree, and this time there were no tricks from Byron's boys to help me down.

  I didn't want to shoot if I could help it.

  The new world was silent for a reason. Noise attracted the zombies.

  It also attracted the attention of other people, and so far, we hadn't had much luck with running into other groups. Usually it was a Darwin's rule scenario. They wanted what we had, and wanted to take it by force.

  Those same groups had to be discouraged with a greater application of force.

  It gave me a bit of a reputation.

  I didn't mind though since that same reputation spread by Hannah had built an alliance with a group of survivor children led by a fourteen-year-old megalomaniac. I was pretty sure Byron was insane, and a genius so I was glad he was on our side.

  He was being held at the Trail head along with the others and a truckload of this food was the price for their freedom.

  I could have used his input, but since I didn't have it, I'd have to figure it out on my own. Quietly.

  Which meant no shooting.

  I could build a pike and start carving, but there were so many of them, I'd probably get exhausted and a tired fighter could either be a dead fighter or a bitten fighter, which was as much as dead.

  Building a pike was a good plan, but not yet.

  I kept studying the layout in front of me.

  There were two roads that led to the depot, the driveway that was an offshoot of the main road, and a smaller access road that ran out of the back of the warehouse. Each of the roads had a tiny guard shack off to one side.

  I noted the doors were closed, and even though I couldn't see movement in the little windows they could still hold Z.

  A plan began to formulate in my mind. I scooted back into the shadows of the tree line and went to hunt for the supplies I was going to need to make it happen.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  I didn't have a map. One of the things I hated about the z world, besides the zombies was all the stuff I was used to using. GPS was one of them. Two months ago if I wanted to find a hardware store, I'd just unlock my smart phone and say the words, “Okay Google...”

  She would find what I needed, and maybe offer alternative suggestions.

  For me, the best part was the map.

  I could pull it up on the 5.5-inch screen and zoom in to see what I was looking for, the surrounding streets, and stores on the same block.

  “Okay Google,” I muttered as I marched up the middle of the two-lane road. “Show me a hardware store.”

  I wanted a hardware store for supplies to break into the food depot. I also wanted some additional cover, a jacket and gloves. Being in just shirtsleeves made me feel very unprotected.

  Hell, being out of a car made me feel very unprotected, so I vowed that if I ran across one as I walked, I'd take it.

  Except the first two I found were gassed out and the third was growing a tree out of the engine block where some considerate driver decided to park it. Blood on the steering wheel and vinyl seats made me think they might not have had much choice in the matter.

  By the time I found the fourth car, a gray sedan gassed up and ready to roll, I could see the town a few blocks ahead.

  Or what passed for a town in the two-block collection of stores, empty storefronts and sports pub that lined the street as it passed through. There was a small brick building that served as a Sheriff's office, but no cars in the lot that I could check for shotguns. I almost considered breaking in to raid the gun cabinet, but the shattered glass in the front door convinced me I was too late to that ballgame.

  And there wasn't a hardware store.

  Damn it Google.

  There was a MART though. It could have been any sort of Mart, but the first letters of the sign were gone, and the faded stains that normally made an outline around them was washed over with a smoky residue that seemed to cover the whole town.

  The Mart had whole windows. The front door was closed.

  That was a good sign.

  I still didn't have anything to fight Z, if there were any inside. I'd been lucky on the hike in from the depot. No Z to bother with, not even the noise of their moans.

  But if one was inside the Mart, I needed a weapon.

  I looked around the street for something to use, but it was clear. No one had left a gun, or pike or bazooka just laying around waiting for me to come along and pick it up.

  I trekked back to the car, checked the front and back seat and still had no luck. I popped the trunk and found an old-fashioned jack next to the full-sized spare. New jacks are tiny diamonds that expand from four or six inches all the way up to sixteen, enough to lift a flat tire off the ground when you need to change it. Old jacks were thick metal contraptions that you had to crank up a three-foot metal square rod, using the end of the tire iron as a lever.

  I pulled the metal rod out of the trunk, removed the jack and stuck the tire iron through my belt for back up.

  Now I had a solid steel pole that could do some real damage to a Z. It was still a lot closer than I liked to be for fighting, but there was a saying about begging and choosing.

  I chose to go into the Mart and find a better more useful weapon.

  The front door was unlocked. I hit the bells above the door with the steel pole for a couple of extra jangles to attract the attention of anything inside. The place was abandoned.

  The food shelves were swept bare. Someone had been in here and cleaned out the six small aisles of goods. But like a lot of small town Marts and Markets, this store was set up to be more than just a grocer.

  It had winter coats for workers in a corner, and I used the light coming through the front window to select a large and shrug it on. The shell was canvas, lined with a red and black flannel liner, and warm. The sleeves were thick and heavy, the jacket on the verge of being cumbersome.

  There was a shelf on the wall with hats and gloves and belts. I buckled another belt around my waist, in case I needed it later, and skipped the hats. I stuffed a pair of brown jersey gloves in one pocket and a thick pair of heavy leather gloves in the other.

  I skipped the women and children's section and went into a small hardware section. The tools were cleaned out, but I grabbed a couple of packages of plastic zip ties and slipped them into a pocket.

  On the bottom shelf was a set of small bolt cutters and I hooked those to the new belt and ke
pt searching.

  There may have been more in the back I could have used, but I couldn't make sense of what was left or how to make it work for what I thought I needed.

  I heard the bell over the door tinkle.

  “Hello in here?” a scared sounding voice called out.

  I shifted the pole in my hand and peeked around an end cap.

  A young black man stood trembling in the doorway, the fingers in his hands twitching as he stared into the shadowy darkness.

  I almost kept quiet. Maybe he would go away. But he didn't. He stood there with the door open, one foot still outside so he could watch both directions and waited.

  He must have known I was in here, had watched me come in.

  I cursed myself just a little because I should have paid more attention to my surroundings. If someone was watching me, I wanted to feel it, then remembered even though I thought I was a predator, there was always something bigger out there.

  I was worried about Z and didn't think about other survivors.

  Still, the kid didn't look armed.

  He looked terrified, like it had taken everything in him, and maybe some chemical courage to help him open up the door and call out.

  I stepped out quickly and strode for the door like I'd been waiting on him. He jumped.

  “Hello yourself,” I said back and watched his face.

  He might have been handsome once upon a time, but whatever was making him twitch had robbed him of his good looks and a couple of teeth. His hair was matted and pieces of leaves and dirt dotted his head. He'd been sleeping on the ground somewhere.

  He was almost as tall as me, but thin to the point of emaciation, like a skeleton wrapped in skin. I could tell this even through a heavy parka and jeans. He just had the look of a scarecrow, all bean poles and flapping clothes.

  “You scared me,” he said.

  I nodded.

  “They ain't no food left in there,” he continued and looked past me toward the empty shelves. His tongue darted in and out of his mouth, licking his thick lips in a nervous gesture.

  “Did you take it?”

  “Nah, man, it was gone when I got here.”

  Got here.

  “How long ago was that?”

  “Couple of days,” he lied. I could tell because he cut his eyes sideways and wouldn't meet mine.

  Or maybe he was tweaking on something and that was just the way his eyes were working, because even after he said it, they kept darting around the room, landing on my face and skittering away like a scared animal through underbrush.

  “Been into the houses yet?”

  He studied me still.

  “Man, I don't break into houses.”

  Was he serious?

  “How long since you ate?”

  The eyes flicked down and back, settled on a point on my forehead.

  “Couple of days.”

  Hungry and he looked it. Hopped up on something. But too honest to break into houses even after the apocalypse. Or too scared.

  “Let's see what we can find,” I took a step toward him.

  He backed away quickly, tripped over his own feet and plopped on his bottom on the sidewalk. He jumped up just as quick and I got a glimpse of former athlete in his movements. He dusted off the bottom of his pants and kept distance between us.

  Alright, that's how he wanted to play it. I took off for the nearest house, careful to study the road ahead, the buildings around us.

  I didn't get the sense anyone was watching, but that didn't mean it wasn't happening.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  “What you looking for?” he asked from fifteen feet back.

  I stopped at the first house, a small little traditional set back from the road. There was a garage to one side, a big picture window next to the red front door and wilted flowers in flowerbeds that stretched along a stone path.

  “Equipment,” I said and tried the garage door.

  It folded up and out.

  The dark interior didn't have a car, but I didn't need that. I had one up the road waiting on a just in case basis.

  But the garage held something I could use. A riding lawnmower. It rested in the corner, covered in dust, but only a light layer, like it had been well maintained and used sometime before the last two months.

  There was a door from the garage to the house along one wall, neat shelves of small gardening tools and fertilizer on the other. The back was covered with toys, badminton rackets, balls, hoops. Two gas cans set on the floor beside the lawn mower.

  “Stand back,” I said to the boy but it was wasted.

  He hadn't even stepped in the garage yet.

  I reached up and twisted the knob to the house and pulled the door open. A Z lurched out and started across the concrete toward the boy.

  He squealed, hopped and twisted, getting tangled up in his own feet and fell onto the pea gravel driveway. His feet made a scratching sound on the ground as he struggled to get up.

  The Z moaned, reached out two hands and dropped when the steel pipe snapped its head almost off.

  I followed through with the swing and stared down at the boy. He stared at the zombie, mouth working open and closed like a fish out of water, a moaning not quite Z sound issued from his lips.

  I held out my hand.

  “What's your name?”

  He looked at me, looked at the hand like it was something foreign and looked at me again.

  Maybe he was slow. Maybe it wasn't something in his system causing him to twitch and shake, maybe he had a traumatic brain injury or some congenital defect. Or maybe he was just so high, so hopped up that he couldn't process things in a normal fashion.

  “What's. Your. Name?” I asked again, slower.

  “Malik.”

  “Come on Malik, let's eat.”

  He reached up then and grasped my hand. His grip was strong when he wasn't twitching, and I helped him up.

  The house smelled. They all smelled now, either like they had been kept as a Z kennel when well-meaning idiots locked loved ones up inside until a cure could be found, or they smelled empty and abandoned. This one smelled like zombie. Rotten meat. Decay. I was used to it.

  We stepped from the garage into a small galley kitchen.

  "Don't open the fridge," I pointed Malik toward the cabinets. "Clean them out. Stack it on the table."

  I left him to gather food and explored the rest of the house.

  "We gonna get in trouble for breaking in," he called after me.

  I shook my head. World full of Zombies, Marauders and Bandits and I stumble across a kid with a guilt complex.

  "They won't mind."

  The kitchen door led to a dining room with a narrow table and into a living room. The carpet was stained with Z gore on the floor in a rough circular pattern. It must have paced back in forth in the room until it heard us in the garage. There were three deer heads mounted on the wall, and a couple of antler mounts. I pulled the blinds to let light into the room, and a dusty cabinet in the corner revealed what I wanted.

  A gun cabinet.

  It was locked. I felt along the top of the cabinet and my fingers touched a cold metal key. I fumbled it up, sneezed at the dust and slipped it into the keyhole.

  The cabinet had three guns, a Marlin 336 lever rifle, a single shot .22 rifle and a 410 double barrel shotgun. I scooped up the box of ammunition for the Marlin and loaded it, then emptied the rest of the bullets in the jacket pocket. I checked the cabinet and shelves underneath for ammo for the other weapons, but there wasn't any. I did find a folding six-inch buck knife in a pouch and attached it to the extra belt, and a sling for the rifle so I could carry it easier.

  The bedrooms were full of clothes, memories and stuff I couldn't carry or use, but I did grab a couple of rags out of the bathroom and stuffed them in my pockets too.

  Malik stood over the table in the kitchen and presented his haul like a treasure when I stepped back in. He eyed the rifle with suspicion, tongue snaking across his lips in a con
stant motion.

  There were three cans of soup, some vegetables, boxes of pasta mixes, along with condiments, syrup and a package of chocolate chip cookies.

  I rifled the drawers to find a can opener and tossed it to him.

  "Soup."

  He fumbled with the opener, got it set and twisted the tops off the soup cans. I passed him one and told him to drink it, slurped down the other cold, and drank half of the next. Cold chicken noodle tastes greasy, and salty and he guzzled down the can and a half like it had been more than two days since he ate.

  I ripped open the package of cookies and split them down the middle, twelve each. They were old, stale and still tasted delicious. I double checked the empty cabinets then went back into the house for a bag. All I could find was a giant woman's purse satchel in glittering gold pleather.

  It did not match my hiking boots, but I'd have to chance a ticket from the fashion police because it held the rest of the food pretty well.

  Malik followed me out into the garage as he munched on the cookies, taking his time with four bites each. I appreciated him savoring them, and wished I hadn't scarfed mine down so fast.

  In the garage, I hunted up rope and fashioned a harness to the front of the riding lawn mower, then clicked it in neutral and set the cans of gas on it. Malik shuffled to one side to keep out of my way, and I noticed a silver boom box radio. I checked to make sure the volume was low and turned it on. The radio stations blared static, but there was an 80's metal band in the cassette player and even though it was three quarter speed when I clicked play, it still worked.

  Malik fished through drawers and pulled out a package of D batteries that fit the boombox and I added them both to the lawnmower seat.

  Then I picked up the harness and started dragging the lawnmower toward the road.

  Malik stepped up to the back and started pushing, occasionally reaching up to straighten the steering wheel and we didn't share a word as we dragged it back to the food depot.

  CHAPTER NINE

  "You can't get in there," Malik stuttered. "I was with some others and we came over there and looked. They's too many of them."