by G. D. Lang
Not even five minutes since his death, and we were already bartering for Ricky’s belongings. I wanted to say no but I didn’t want to offend someone who could possibly be an ally. Also, I can’t really explain it but the sight of that machete almost gave me a hard-on. It was beautiful, like the weapon was made for me. The vision that kept running through my head was a weird version of the Sword and the Stone where I was somehow the only person who could pull this magnificent weapon from the petrified head of some undead statue. Clearly, I needed that weapon in my hands immediately. I agreed to the trade but hid the fact that I was as excited about it. The fact that I felt excited at all given what had just happened filled me with guilt to be sure but Ricky was dead and there was nothing I could do to change that. I had to move on and hope that the same thing doesn’t happen to me. Or that it does. I suppose I’d take either outcome at this point but the two girls waiting back in the Jeep made it so the decision to live narrowly outweighed the decision to die.
Doc led me back to his camp, only a short distance from the field. He had disabled the weapons in the field as well as killed the rattlesnakes, which he referred to as “dinner.” I felt weird about leaving Ricky’s body there but Doc insisted that the undead don’t care about people who are already dead. They like fresh meat. I wasn’t ready to tell him about Jane and Zoe yet so the fact that the field was now death-trap free put me at ease a little bit. We chatted on the way back. Small talk about things that will probably never matter again. His grown daughter is living safely with her family on a small goat farm on Lopez Island. The last time he talked to her there was no undead activity on the island but the residents had banded together to protect the shores from any unwanted visitors. Now that the phone lines were down, all he could do was hope that she would be ok. Admittedly, I was only half listening, most of my focus reserved for my sharp new toy. I transferred it from hand to hand, getting used to the weight of it, admiring it with the kind of reverence usually reserved for a boy’s first baseball glove.
The camp was nothing special. I would’ve kept walking straight through it if Doc hadn’t told me this was it. Marijuana growers – the good ones anyway – know how to blend in. It was in a small clearing surrounded by trees in kind of a circular ring. Many of the trees had ladders leaned against them I’m assuming as a means of quick escape if a zombie were to stumble into the mix. In the fire pit, embers still warm from the fire gave off their last bits of life, sputtering and hissing to a quiet end. There were plenty of backpacks and garbage bags hanging from some of the lower tree branches. I didn’t see a tent anywhere, which was strange but I wasn’t in a position to pry.
We sat down by the fire pit and I watched as he began to skin the snakes. I looked over at a pot sitting on a pedestal at the side of the fire.
“Is that coffee?”
“Help yourself” he said, laughing. “Caffeine withdrawal is a bitch, isn’t it?”
“You got that right” I said, grabbing a cup and filling it to the brim. It was steaming hot and I could tell from the smell that it was good and strong, just the way I like it. The first long drink was like heaven. My mind perked up immediately and I became much more cognizant of my surroundings. I couldn’t imagine how I’d survived up to this point without being as hyper aware as I was right now. It was exhilarating.
“You wanna Irish it up a bit?” he said, taking a flask from his inner jacket pocket.
“Don’t mind if I do” I said, “I could use the pain relief right now.”
“Yeah, you look like you’ve seen better days.”
“Yeah well, almost getting run over by a semi-truck and then getting attacked by the zombified driver of that same truck will definitely put a few bags under your eyes to say the least” I said.
I took another drink of coffee. And then another. The whiskey was cheap but strong and when it started to kick in, I began feeling guilty about not telling Doc about Jane and Zoe, especially since he had been so open about his daughter.
“Look” I said, “I haven’t been completely truthful with you…”
His eyes squinted as he looked at me, or at least I thought he was looking at me. He put his hand up as his gaze fixated on something in the distance over my right shoulder. I heard the crackling of a few small twigs and turned around to find the origin of this break in silence. I saw a figure in the shade of one of the trees.
“The ladders!” Doc shouted as he threaded his arm through the crossbow I had traded to him and rested it on his shoulder.
“Wait!” I said, thinking that Jane and Zoe had come to look for us. “I think it might be my friends.” I gripped my new machete tightly all the same.
We both stopped momentarily and stared as the figure slowly made her way into the light. It wasn’t Jane. It was a woman shuffling slowly towards us, her scalp torn off and a dagger sticking out of her right shoulder. One of her feet dragged behind, barely hanging onto the one tendon that hadn’t been severed. Her ankle bone made a pock mark in the soil with every step. At this pace, it would take her at least 5 minutes to get to us.
I looked down at the machete, thinking this would be a perfect time for a practice kill, just to get used to it without much risk. That’s when I saw two more zombies trot out of the bush. They were fully mobile and coming right for us. It almost felt like they used the gimp to lure us in and let our guard down. I didn’t think they were capable of it but the thought alone sent a chill down my spine. Doc ran for the ladder that rested furthest away from our new undead hunters while I panicked and stupidly went for the ladder that was closest to me but also closest to them. I thought for sure they’d both go for me but they split up. The one that came after me looked like he’d been a football player in the recent past, like maybe a week ago. He was on me as I got to the base of the ladder. I gripped the machete hard and swung at his head, completely lopping off his jaw and leaving a deep gash in his neck, which slowed him down enough for me to shimmy up the ladder and get onto a thick branch that had no problem supporting my weight. He smashed into the ladder and knocked it over as he moaned and growled - the first time I had heard one of them growl like this. I rolled my eyes thinking that even I would have secured the ladders to the trees somehow to avoid this very thing from happening. I’m surprised Doc hadn’t thought of that. Then I remembered Doc. Did he get up the ladder in time or did he have to fight his way through?
“Doc! You alright?” I shouted towards the tree that he should be in right now. I didn’t have a completely clear view but I could see the zombie at the base of Doc’s ladder, in a full Forest Ranger uniform complete with the huge hat and everything, just milling around maybe waiting for Doc to fall out of the tree or something. I suppose that’s a good sign.
“Yeah” he said with a labored voice, “I’m good.”
I looked down at my zombie still struggling to untangle himself from the fallen ladder. I couldn’t get a clean shot with the crossbow until he got up so I focused my attention on the gimp who had managed to make it another 5 feet at the most. I lodged the machete into the tree since I hadn’t gotten around to putting on the sheath that it was supposed to be carried in. Doc was right, that thing was sharp as hell. It sliced through the bark with ease. I took the time to line up my shot, trying to drown out the moans of the growling undead linebacker that was going to be a really big problem in a minute or two. I aimed, fired, and once again, fucking missed. I really need to get some practice time in with this thing. The arrow whizzed past her left ear, brushing aside what little hair she had left on the side of her head. She looked to her left where the arrow had zoomed past, then to her right as if someone had tapped her on the shoulder from the opposite side as a trick. Another strange example of the undead still clinging onto some form of muscle memory from when they were still alive. I shook my head as I loaded another arrow, the last arrow I told myself, that I would waste on Gimp Girl. I rested the crossbow on my left forearm this time, hoping for some added stability. Amazingly the second shot was even
more off target than the first, impaling her left breast right where her nipple should be, almost as if that’s what I were aiming at. Maybe I was I have no idea.
I didn’t have time to waste another arrow on her though as the undead linebacker quickly steadied himself and prepared to go on the offensive. I knew he couldn’t hurt me from up here but I also knew there was no way in hell I was going down there if that big son of a bitch was still shuffling around. I readied another arrow thinking there’s no way I could miss him from point blank range like this but then he shuffled directly under the branch I was on and looked up at me. The huge gash I had sliced into his neck allowed him to hinge his head up in a creepily unnatural position that reminded me of an owl, only it hinged vertically instead of horizontally. And I swear I could see all the way down into his stomach. I could tell from the angle that it would be impossible to aim and fire my weapon without losing my balance and I wasn’t going to just spray and pray. I hadn’t been able to hit a target that I was actually aiming at so hitting one with nothing more than blind luck as my guide seemed a little out of the question. I looked over at Doc’s zombie again. It was still just shuffling around and groaning towards Doc’s position in the tree. I have no idea why Doc hadn’t shot it yet but I had my own problems to worry about.
After confirming that Gimp Girl wasn’t going to be a threat until at least nightfall, I secured the crossbow on my back and glanced over at the machete. Sitting in this tree reminded me of being a kid and filling up water balloons to torment my older sister with. I used to perch myself on the edge of the roof and wait for her to come outside where I’d hold the water balloon out with one hand and close one eye to get the aim just right. Once I got it situated directly over her head, I’d let it fly, wait long enough to witness the hilarity and then run for my life. It’s probably one of the reasons we rarely talk anymore. I figured it was worth a shot. I gripped the machete with my left hand and slithered out further onto the branch so I was directly above him. He began to snarl even louder, perhaps thinking his next meal was going to fall right into his lap. I had to keep peeking my head around both sides of the branch to get my aim just right and when I was confident, I held the very tip of the handle with my thumb and forefinger, said a prayer and calmly let go. My balance waivered slightly so I didn’t get to witness the money shot but I heard a squishy sound followed by a thump that hopefully meant good news. The groaning had stopped and I was able to lean over to one side and see that I had hit him dead center in the middle of the head. The razor sharp blade had gone all the way through and impaled into the ground leaving the corpse resting on its back with its head slightly propped up and the handle protruding out of its forehead.
I carefully scooted back to the base of the branch and hollered for Doc. His zombie was still unscathed, circling around the tree and sniffing the air. The remnants of its park ranger uniform clung lazily to its body and I could see what looked like a walkie-talkie attached to its belt.
“What’s the deal man?” I shouted. “You alright?”
“My shoulder’s fucked” he yelled back, painfully, “I don’t have enough strength to even pull the arrow into position.”
“You have your machete with you?” I asked.
“Yeah, why?” he asked.
“Wait until he’s directly underneath you and drop the blade into his head. It worked for me.”
“Alright” he said, “It’s worth a shot.”
After what seemed like minutes of silence, he shouted out “God Dammit!”
“What happened?”
“I missed! God Dammit! I missed. I’m sorry” he said. The desperation in his voice had me more than a little worried.
“It’s ok man, just stay cool” I said, knowing full well that staying cool under the circumstances was pretty much impossible. “We’ll figure something out.” I looked around for a while, first at the gimp, then at Ranger Zed, and just as I was about to make the dumb decision to attempt to scale down the tree somehow, at least to a point where I could jump and land on the ground without breaking every bone in my body, Ranger Zed bumped into the ladder that had allowed Doc to scurry up to safety. He was looking at the ladder and I swear there was a glimmer of recognition there, like all of the sudden he knew what the ladder was for. He put a hand on one of the rungs. Then the other hand followed.
“Oh come on”, I mumbled to myself. A moment later I could hear Doc spouting off a slew of expletives as he realized what was happening.
The Ranger kept his hands in the same position on the ladder while whatever was left of the hamster wheel in his brain began to slowly pick up speed. He began to lift one of his feet and I could almost hear the theme song from 2001: A Space Odyssey resonate through the forest as I was witnessing what I was sure was some sort of Darwinian horror show. Zombies can’t climb, those are the rules I thought. But apparently the rules of pop culture sci-fi don’t apply in the event of an actual undead uprising. One of his hands reached for a higher rung as his other foot lifted off the ground, bringing with it a complete reappraisal of everything I thought I knew about zombies. Luckily though, before the song could reach its belabored crescendo in my head, the record scratched as Ranger Zed’s foot squished down on the rung and slipped out from under him, leaving him flailing backwards as he still gripped firmly to the ladder. The top end of the ladder began to fall down to the point where it was now parallel to the ground with Zed’s head sticking out between the rungs as his momentum carried him backwards. The end of the ladder came to an abrupt and violent stop at the base of a tree. The force was strong enough to make Zed’s head rattle around the rungs like a pinball. There was a final hollow metallic thud combined with just a hint of squishiness that left his head looking like a cartoon character that just ran into a fence post at full speed. He was no longer going to be a problem.
I didn’t know whether to laugh or be absolutely terrified at what I had just witnessed. With Doc’s injury though I knew I had to be the one to get out of this tree so I could get a ladder up to him. And I knew I should do it soon while I still have some breathing room between Gimp Girl and myself. After more than a few deep breaths, I slowly lowered myself from the branch so I was hanging off of it. Only then did I realize how bad of an idea it was. But my grip was slipping so that didn’t really matter anymore. I just braced myself for the inevitable fall. Luckily the linebacker’s lifeless body provided a bit of cushioning but I still twisted my ankle pretty good. I could feel it swelling up already. I slowly pulled the machete out of his head and chuckled at the realization that I had finally had my Sword and the Stone moment. I walked towards the gimp readying my machete before I finally decided this undead bitch was going to die by an arrow, one way or another. I didn’t care if that meant more work for me when I had to remove and clean the arrows. It had to be this way. If for no other reason than to restore a little bit of pride in my own abilities. I’d work on my aim later. Right now, point blank was the way to go.
She went down somewhat anti-climactically but I suppose I wasn’t sure what I really expected. Although there did seem to be a sliver of fear in her eyes as I raised the crossbow and aimed it (I hoped) at her face. But as soon as it had appeared, it was gone again and she reverted back to shuffling towards me, a meal she would never have the pleasure of enjoying, if the dead could even enjoy such a thing. I tend to think the drive to consume human flesh is the only thing that keeps them going. They don’t get any pleasure out of it. They just do it because it’s the only programming they have left.
Before I went to help Doc down, I checked my surroundings to make sure that there were no more of those things lurking about. A task I admittedly should’ve completed while still in the lofty confines of the tree but becoming a stone cold undead killer doesn’t seem to happen overnight. And in my case it’ll probably never happen. A survivalist maybe, but a zombie hit man? Doubtful. But if I wanted to survive for any measurable amount of time, I should probably make a mental note of making sure I’m in a (relat
ively) safe area before I just jump into the Eating Zone and start shooting from the hip. Luckily, there didn’t seem to be any more of them for now. At first, the overwhelming quiet that had blanketed the region was eerie and discomforting but now I’m beginning to adjust to it. I see it for what it is. An equilibrium. Solace, even. If it’s quiet it’s safe. If the silence is broken, expect the worse. One gunshot had brought three of them. What would prolonged conversation bring? Or a running car or a generator? All of the things that can help us survive can also give away our position. I feel like it will take me some time to fully come to grips with that fact.
“Did you get ‘em all?” Doc’s voice was strained and he was breathing heavily.
“Yeah, you ok?” I asked, grabbing the ladder and bringing it over to his tree.
“Shit, I think so. I might have dislocated my shoulder” he said. “Ah well, wouldn’t be the first time.”
“Can you make it down?”
“I’m afraid to say I might need a little help” he said.
“No problem. I’ll come up and try to guide you onto the ladder.” I made sure the ladder was firmly planted on the ground and made my way up, having no idea how I was actually going to guide him onto anything given how much pain I was currently in. My shoulder was still killing me and I kept getting shooting pain and numbing sensations all down my arm but I had to give it my best shot.