Dead Soil: A Zombie Series

by Alex Apostol

  IV.

  Christine Moore was home alone once again after witnessing the horror of Sally’s mangled body and Ralph, who ate her. The light of the fireplace flickered against the blackened room. It was only Liam and Zack left to gather supplies. They let her know before they left that they’d be gone most of the day and half the night and that it could stay that way if they don’t find more people soon.

  She sat down on the window seat and opened her massive book and then closed it again. With a sigh she stood up and walked over to the kitchen. It was incredible how quickly her eyes adjusted to being in the dark. Candlelight was usually more than enough. She opened the pantry door and browsed the few cans left on the shelf.

  She looked down at the walkie-talkie on her hip and checked to make sure it was still on and charged. It’d been silent all day. Jerry didn’t use it often, not since she almost got everyone killed. He barely spoke to her at all and when he was in her presence his eyes avoided her. He thought she was unfit to survive and he was right. She had no business going out beyond the complex walls and she hadn’t since.

  The little green light on the radio blinked. She unclipped it and set it down on the kitchen counter by the dust-covered coffee machine. No point in wearing it around if she wasn’t even going to use it.

  For a moment she considered going out to the patio. If she leaned over the railing and craned her neck just right, sometimes she could see Jerry’s feet propped up on his railing below her and across the stairway. He’d taken to kicking his feet up and napping with his pistol grip in his lap. No one complained. He always got the job done.

  Christine couldn’t remember the last time she saw one of those dead, rotting things wandering around the grounds. However long, it’d been even longer since she saw a real human. If there were any survivors in the other nine buildings spread out around them, they were keeping to themselves. No new people had found their way in either. Liam took down the sign out by the street for the apartments. The road that lead back through the woods was long, windy, and lined with thick woods. If anyone had passed by, they must have thought whatever was at the end of the road wasn’t worth the risk.

  Christine often sat on the patio, watching the unsuspecting animals go about their day without a care in the world, and wondered what it would be like if new people came there looking for shelter. She’d been limited to her group of survivors for months and their numbers were only getting smaller. Having more people to rely on would be nice for Liam, so most of the burden to provide for the community of four wasn’t weighing down on him. It had started to take its toll, in the heaviness of his dull eyes shadowed by circles, in his wiry, ginger beard and shaggy hair that fell below his ears, in his newly roughened voice that growled monosyllabic answers back at her.

  But then again, if a group of strangers came waltzing up to her door, she didn’t know if she’d be able to let them in. It felt bizarre to think about expanding the group and meeting new people. There was a veil of mistrust over her eyes that she couldn’t shake. It was best if no one new came in until she could figure out how to get rid of the winding sensation in her stomach that constricted her insides like a boa every time she thought about it.

  Christine collapsed onto the couch in a huff with a can of tuna. With little food for days on end, her stomach shrank and the small can she held in her hand was actually enough to almost satisfy her. Each time Liam and Zack went out for more, they had to travel further away from Chesterton and into the neighboring towns. Last week they had to take Liam’s beat-up Jeep Cherokee, even though it had less than an eighth of a tank of gas. Right before they reached the rural limits of Morgan Township, the old clunker gave out and the boys had to trek it the whole way home, leaving more than half of the food behind. Christine had wanted to drive her fist into the drywall when she heard the story from Liam, not because of her grumbling, aching stomach, but because if she’d been there with them they would have been able to bring more back.

  When she’d devoured the wet lump of tuna in four bites, she rolled her eyes and threw her head back against the billowy couch. But sitting still and relaxing wasn’t an option, not while Liam was out there. She didn’t know if he was still alive or dead or hurt or worse.

  She raised her head again and looked out the blackened window, trying to remember how long it’d been dark to figure out what time it was. Long ago, she’d given up on trying to remember to charge her phone with that solar charger Liam bought years ago. They had no working clock for her to reference. Occasionally, she’d message down to Jerry from the other end of the walkie-talkie. It gave her an excuse to talk to him when things were too quiet.

  Her eyes fell on the radio on the kitchen counter and she let her head fall back again, deciding it was too far away for her to get up and grab it. Time was illusory. Whatever it felt like, that was what it was. There probably wasn’t a single clock in the world that had it right.

  Christine heard the familiar sounds of two sets of feet, one heavy while the other was quick and light, pounding up the stairs. Her heart raced with joy. She jumped off the couch with a colossal grin and unlocked the multiple deadbolts for Liam. The desire to throw her arms around his neck and kiss him hard flooded her senses as she bounced on the balls of her feet.

  With the last chain on the door unhooked, she couldn’t contain her excitement and let out a smalls squeal, but the chain remained pinched between her fingers. The last thing she wanted was another earful from Liam about not being safe to kill the moment. She hooked it back just as the handle on the doorknob turned. Her smile spread from ear to ear as she clasped her hands at her chest. The door opened hard and snapped the chain tight. There was only a small crack to see through. The eyes looking in at Christine weren’t familiar. They weren’t Liam’s.

  Christine Moore pushed with all her weight against the door. One of the men on the other side gave a hardened yell. She released a warrior cry as she dug her slippered feet into the faux-wood linoleum flooring as she pushed, but her efforts were insufficient once again.

  A hearty slam and the door flew open. The chain broke. Little links of metal sprayed out and landed on the soft carpet. Christine was knocked back. A short, blonde man with a stocky build and pistol raised entered the apartment and stood over her, looking down with a leering gaze.

  “Well, hello, there.”

  Another man stood in the hallway, hidden by the black of the night. All Christine could see was a shadow that rocked back and forth with a long gun in its hands. She locked her wide eyes back onto the man in the apartment. She backed away on her hands and feet until she was pressed up against the couch. He sauntered forward until the gap between them was closed. Christine squeezed her eyes shut and raised her arms to shield her face.

  “Shut the door,” he called out to the shadowed man.

  Christine’s heart raced as the young man walked in and shut the door quietly behind him. It would be that much harder to wake Jerry up with her screams. How long would it be before anyone realized she was dead? Would anyone besides Liam even care?

  “I don’t know, Lonnie,” the kid who entered said. “We should get out of here.”

  “Would you stop being Mitch the little bitch,” the man named Lonnie said with a sigh and turned to look at the guy he deemed Mitch the bitch.

  “We don’t have much left, but you can take whatever you want,” Christine said with a shaky, unrecognizable voice. She tried to steady herself, but her muscles were weak with fear.

  “Oh, we’ll take what we want. We’re going to take the whole world back.” The sturdy man said as he smiled maniacally upward, his face turned to the unmoving ceiling fan.

  Now was her chance.

  Christine sprang up from the floor and threw herself at the kitchen counter. She frantically patted for the knife she’d placed next to the radio. Her hands pawed for something, anything to grab. Lonnie was on her before her shaky fingers could wrap around anything useful and grabbed her hard enough to deeply bruise her por
celain skin. She grunted and kicked as he forced her back with his thick hands wrapped around her upper arms.

  “Watch out!” he yelled at Mitch as Christine kicked her legs wildly through the air. “This one’s a fighter!” He threw her down hard like a sack of spoiled potatoes.

  Christine gasped for the air that had been knocked out of her lungs. She continued in her attempts to kick Lonnie, but he rolled her onto her back and pinned them down with both hands. His muscular, burnt arms gripped her calves tightly, the fingers pressing all the way down to the bone. She felt like the weight was going to snap them in two.

  Tears rolled down her face as she pleaded. “Please, don’t do this! Please, don’t. Please, don’t.” The urgency of her pleas faded away as Lonnie tightened his grip. She continued in pained whispers.

  “Get her arms,” he ordered to the shadowed man cowering in the corner of the room.

  The dark figure name Mitch shook his head. “No,” he said with an air of defiance.

  “How ‘bout this? You hold her arms down or I shoot you in the face?” Lonnie clicked back the hammer of the pistol and pointed it at his partner’s face.

  Mitchell Barnes stared at the two figures on the ground. The young woman’s face was turned away. All he could see of her was a river of golden-blonde hair. His eyes darted back and forth as he bit his lip. What were the chances that Lonnie would actually shoot him if he ran? He’d seen Lonnie attempt to take down a large buck before with his rifle. A buck was much larger than Mitchell and not a single bullet had hit it. Lonnie had blamed the sun in his eyes. That was bullshit. The ex-jarhead simply couldn’t shoot.

  Mitchell eyed the distance between Lonnie and the door. He came to the conclusion that even a terrible shot with a nine-millimeter like Lonnie had could hit him square in the back from such a close range. “Fine,” he said softly.

  He swung his shotgun over his shoulder and knelt down on his knees beside the sobbing woman’s head. He placed his hands on her wrists and held them over her head. His eyes stung and the corners twitched as tears welled up. He had to look away.

  “What a li’l bitch,” Lonnie laughed.

  He wasn’t sure if Lonnie was talking about him or the poor woman they were holding down against her will. He didn’t care if it was him. He let the tears fall as he tried to wipe them on the shoulder of his hoodie.

  The woman finally turned her head to look up into his blotchy face. She blinked rapidly when one of his tears fell close to her red rimmed eyes. He didn’t want to look at her, but he was compelled to. Slowly, he moved his head down until his chin was against his chest and his soft brown eyes met her wet blue ones.

  “Mitchell? Mitchell Barnes?” Christine said, her face screwed up to stare at the curly-haired teenage boy in utter disbelief.

  The muscles in her body released ever so slightly at the sight of his familiar face, which stared down at her wide-eyed and jaw clenched. She wanted to reach out and wipe the tears from his well-defined face, but his long, thin fingers were still secured around her wrists.

  “Mitchell? Do you remember me? Christine. Liam’s fiancé,” she said, hopeful, as her eyes cleared enough for her to see him clearly.

  There was a sharp twist on her ankle that shot a searing pain up through her leg. “You two know each other?” the blonde man holding her down below the waist growled, his eyes locked on Mitchell.

  Christine flinched. How could she be so stupid? She should have kept her mouth shut.

  “How do you two know each other?” he demanded through his small, yellowed teeth.

  Mitchell sat petrified with his face frozen in panic. He opened his mouth, but no sound came out. He involuntarily loosened his grip around Christine’s arms.

  Things were escalating quickly. Christine lifted her head off the carpet to look at the man by her feet. “Not well at all, we barely know each other, I swear,” she lied. “He worked at GameStop and I saw him there a couple times. That’s it. If it wasn’t for his tag I wouldn’t even know his name.”

  The man’s face tightened together. His eyes flickered over to Mitchell and back to her.

  Christine’s pupils dilated and her heart sped up like a racehorse at the track. She’d seen Mitchell so many times in the last two years since she met him, it was sad for a woman who didn’t even play video games. They engaged in small chit-chat at his work while she browsed new games for Liam, they laughed over stories of college life while everyone else played Dungeons and Dragons at Zack’s game night in the comic books store, they even shared Mitchell’s first beer together there. The last time she’d seen him was awkward, but it would never top the discomfort she felt around him now.

  V.

  Christine walked into GameStop with a smile on her face, Allison Murphy at her heels. “Hey, Mitchell,” she said to the young man working the counter. “You still have any left?”

  Mitchell Barnes looked up from the magazine he thumbed through and into Christine’s grand sapphire eyes. He dropped the last issue of Game Pro from his lap. When he bent down to pick it up his head banged on the underneath of the counter.

  Christine tightened her lips and tried not to laugh.

  “Yeah I have one more left. I put it in the back in case you came in,” he said. “I figured Liam would want this one.”

  Christine smiled at him warmly. “Thanks. You’re the best.”

  Mitchell exhaled a breath of laughter through his nostrils before he went to the back to retrieve the Xbox game for Christine.

  Allison Murphy’s eyes followed him until he disappeared behind a set of double doors. “He’s not bad for a nerd,” she said, still looking for when he came back out. “How come I’ve never seen him before?”

  “Ew, he’s nineteen,” Christine said with a scrunched face. “And you’re married.”

  Allison turned back to her friend and rolled her eyes. “I’m just looking,” she said, exasperated. “Besides, his curly, brown hair and sharp features remind me of my husband when he was a teenager…so long ago.”

  “It wasn’t that long,” Christine said absently as she browsed the shelves.

  “Twelve years is a long time, Christine. Just wait till you’ve been married for over a decade. You’ll be looking at all the cute young boys, too.” Allison craned her neck again to see if the young man reminiscent of her husband in better days was headed back yet.

  Mitchell Barnes came through the doors and handed Christine the brand new game still wrapped in cellophane. Their fingers touched and his cheeks flushed a bright red. Eyes burned on the back of his neck.

  He turned to see Christine’s older friend staring at him with what he deemed hungry eyes. He’d never gotten that look from a woman before, but he’d seen it often enough in the horny teenagers throughout high school and his first year at DeVry.

  His smooth cheeks burned even brighter and he turned away. Why couldn’t Christine ever look at him that way? He glanced at her friend from the corner of his eye and decided she wasn’t bad looking for someone twice his age. Her dark hair was meticulously styled in a short, highlighted bob that made her look older, but sophisticated. Her blunt bangs sat on her arched brows and cut them off at the top.

  Allison caught Mitchell eyeing her and she gave him a flirty smile. He immediately turned away and walked back behind the counter, stumbling over his own feet. Christine couldn’t help laughing softly to herself. Mitchell had a crush. It was cute.

  “A bit odd, though, isn’t he?” Allison whispered to Christine as they stood close together, as women did when they gossiped.

  “Yeah, but he’s a good kid,” Christine whispered back. “And I think he likes you!”

  Allison’s brown eyes lit up. She looked over her shoulder at the wiry kid standing behind the counter and gave him her best smoldering, sexy eyes.

  “Bye, Mitchell!” Christine called as they left the store. She looked back with her expansive blue eyes and saw Mitchell take a sharp breath of air when they met his.

  “Bye, Christi
ne,” he said just above a whisper.

  VI.

  “Mitchell, please don’t do this, please,” Christine begged softly. Her voice was steady now, but desperate.

  Mitchell looked down at her. His vision blurred as more tears collected and then spilled over the brim. He, too, remembered perfectly the last time he saw Christine. She’d looked so pretty that day in her suit, nothing like the tear-streaked woman on the floor. His grip loosened on her wrists again, but he didn’t let go. If they did, Lonnie would shoot him. There was no doubt in his mind.

  His stomach tightened as a wave of sickness washed over him. Why had he gone with Lonnie? Why didn’t he just stay behind with the others, like Gretchen told him to? His grip involuntarily loosened more. Why would he ever go anywhere with a psychopath like him? He should have known it would only lead to something horrible. He never imagined anything like this.

  “Please, Mitchell. You don’t want to do this. You can walk away still. You can.”

  Mitchell’s hands sprang open. His breathing was ragged as he sat up straight, away from Christine.

  “What the fuck are you doing?” Lonnie barked. His gun was tucked away into the back of his pants so his hands were free to hold Christine’s legs down.

  “I can’t,” Mitchell whispered as he raised his hands further away from her. “I can’t do this. It’s not right.”

  An arrow flew from the darkness of the doorway and pierced Mitchell between the eyes. Christine screamed. She lay still on the floor in shock. Tears spilled from the sides of her eyes and ran down onto the carpet.