by White, Ben
"But where to? Where did they go?"
"Don't ask me, darlin'! Although now that you mention it, I was kind of expecting more, I dunno, maybe like big white tents and dudes with machine guns—"
"I'm sure they'll come soon enough."
Zed laughed. "Yeah, reckon so. Reckon so." He looked around as he drove slowly forwards. "How do you get into that there courtyard?"
"You can't. Not in a car."
"Well why the hell not?"
"There were problems with boy racers."
"Ain't that just gosh darn swell. Y'know, that really gets my goat, couple of young fellas probably just having a good ol' time and WHAM goes the gate down on every damn person—"
"They were doing more than 'just having a good time'."
"—god-DAMN but I hate local government, you get the real mean sumbitches in local government, these limp-dicked little boogers think they got something to prove—"
"Just stop up here. I can walk the rest of the way."
Still grumbling, Zed stopped the truck in a car park behind a small hill of bare earth, compacted down tight. Two large trees grew from it, five leaves between the pair of them. From here Imogen couldn't see any zombies, but now that the truck was stopped she could hear them, the purring like a rumble of thunder, low and constant.
"Da-amn," said Zed. "Hell if that ain't eerie."
Imogen was busily clicking away at her lighter. Eventually it caught, and she held the newly-lit cigarette between her lips as she opened the door—
"Hey now, hold up a moment."
Imogen glanced back at Zed. "What?"
"Mind if I take a look at that there lighter of yours?"
"Now? Why?"
"Call me nostalgic. Just kind of want to feel the weight of it, if you wanna know the truth."
Imogen's dubious expression didn't change, but she fished her lighter back out of her pocket and wordlessly handed it to Zed. He held it up to the light, grinning.
"How many of these you reckon they made? Million and a half, I'd say." He flicked it open and looked down. "Butane, right? Hang on just one second."
"Hey!" Imogen's protest came too late; Zed had already slammed the lighter against the dashboard.
"Relax, Sue darlin', just gotta give these things a whack now and then, helps 'em breathe. Now what you wanna bet I can't get this thing to light first try?"
Imogen's mouth was tight, her eyes cold. Zed chuckled.
"Million bucks? You're on. Just you watch this—I mean keep a real good eye on my technique, because I'm about to show you how it's done."
Zed blew on his fingers and thumb, rubbed them together, then held up the lighter and clicked the wheel.
He barely got a spark.
"Wow, thanks," Imogen said, snatching her lighter back. "If you just broke this—"
"Sorry, darlin'—if you try again—"
Imogen had already shoved the lighter into her pocket. "Let's just ... let's just go."
The rumble of massed zombies all purring together could still be heard, but none could be seen. Imogen held HopeKiller tight in her hands and her cigarette tight in her mouth as she walked around to the front of the truck, Zed joining her from the other side—he had his rifle slung over his shoulder, his hunting knife in its sheath on his leg, and his cowboy hat firmly on his head. For several seconds the two of them just stood there, listening to the sound of massed undeath, then Zed spoke:
"Well? What're we waiting on?"
Imogen took a deep drag of her cigarette before replying: "You're still wearing that hat. And that poncho."
"Yeah? So? Hell, you think I dressed up for that damned convention? This is 'me', Sue honey. One hundred percent Zed Killer, standing tall and proud." Zed was grinning. "Now what do you say, Sue darlin'? You ready to go kick some deadhead butt?"
"No. I'm ready to attempt to get to my apartment as safely and with as little risk as possible." There was just the ghost of a smile in Imogen's eyes. "But I'm also ready to bash in the head of anything that gets in my way."
"Yeah, now you're talking! That's my girl, Sue, that's my good god-damn girl. Let's do this thing, you got a plan?"
"Yes. Don't die."
"Sounds damn good to me."
Imogen didn't have trouble getting to the hill, and to her surprise she didn't have trouble walking up it, either—the rubber balls of her brace gripped just as well to the packed dirt as they had to the concrete of the ground beneath.
"How's your walking? Doing pretty good there?"
Imogen just nodded; her eyes were on the tree furthest from them. There was a crawler beneath it, lying still.
"Damn." Zed had followed Imogen's gaze. "You reckon—"
With a jerky movement, the crawler raised its head and howled long and low.
"Figures," Zed muttered. "God-damn but I do hate it when they howl."
He raised his rifle and squeezed off two shots in quick succession, putting a bullet in the crawler's head.
"Feel better now?"
"I do, yeah." Zed still had his rifle raised, and he fired off the rest of his clip at the nearest group of zombies—every bullet found a home, but the overall effect on the horde was negligible. He put another clip in. "Don't reckon this is gonna work."
"No," said Imogen. She was standing and looking out at the blurry hordes covering the courtyard. Many of them were moving towards her and Zed. But some of them weren't. But why not, Imogen thought, why wouldn't they move towards a howl? It's not distance, some of the nearer ones aren't moving, did they just not hear it? Or are they choosing not to respond? Are they thinking, in whatever limited way? What ARE these things? Maybe I should have listened more to what Doctor Angerness said. Hive mind—but only in the individual zombie. What was it—the 'hive community'. Working together to get the zombie moving, stimulating the nervous system and the 'brain' to make the body move—but how could that work? There has to be some kind of instinct or ... or something in there controlling it all.
Hive community.
Hive mind.
If that's the case ...
... is there a 'queen'?
Zed was still squeezing off shots as Imogen looked and calculated and thought. He's got a whole bag of ammo, how many clips? There has to be at least a hundred in there. A hundred clips, eight shots each, but each shot takes so much time to aim, to fire, and then reloading isn't free, and it takes more than one bullet to take down each zombie, and he's good, he's accurate, but he still misses, he only hit three times with that last clip, and with every shot we lose distance, you can't keep walking backwards forever, eventually you hit a wall ...
Imogen's cigarette was nearing death; she spat the butt away. How do they know to 'group'? Wouldn't that be detrimental to the individual zombie? More zombies mean more chance of killing humans—but less food for each of them. Doctor Angerness said they group before they go dormant, but why? To increase the chance of killing someone? They're more dangerous in a mob, but do they know that? Why do these things exist? What PURPOSE do they have except to kill and consume and multiply? There must be more to them ... there HAS to be. Do they talk to each other? The ones I've seen, they seemed ... sometimes ... and they do seem more organised than just 'instinct' would suggest ... they must have a way of communicating. The purring? But ... but how much can you get from 'mmmmhrr'?
"Sue honey? Got an intention of moving anytime soon?"
"Distance," Imogen murmured. "That's all that matters."
"Yeah? Well we're losin' it fast, I tell you what."
Imogen was looking back now—the truck was parked away from the hill, plenty of space around it. There were no zombies that she could see behind them, in the streets or the flat concrete parks. The zombies closing in from the apartments mostly came from the right, some from the left, not so many straight ahead ... Imogen narrowed her eyes and started walking forwards.
"Sue?"
To the left, to the right, straight ahead. Imogen could picture the courtyard so clearly, th
e zombies arranged around its edges, clustered around the buildings—spilling from the 'alleys' between, too. She could see what would happen if she and Zed walked forward, how the zombies would close in behind them, leave them in a rapidly tightening circle that would eventually, inevitably—
She kept walking forward. If we just keep this pace, she thought, if we keep moving like this we'll reach the apartment and then ... then ...
"We'll be trapped," she murmured. "One will howl, and the others will come—there's just no way."
"Now that's just a damned defeatist attitude, that's what that is! Come on, let ol' Zed here show you how it's done."
Six shots later saw five headless zombies. Zed reloaded and relieved another six of their heads.
"Are you just showing off or is there a point to this?" Imogen asked. She could feel her heart beating fast—they were on the concrete but they could still turn back, could still get to the truck. "You know shooting them in the head doesn't do much."
"Damn, wish it were that simple though, I'd just set up somewhere high and quiet and have myself a real good time. Nah, but I'm just testing something. Reckon ... yeah, reckon this'll work."
Suddenly Zed was running, heading fast across the courtyard—first straight ahead, then to the right, then he took a sharp turn left and stopped, raised his rifle and blew off two more heads with three shots, then he was running again, further to the right—
"WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU WAITING ON, SUE? GET GOING, GIRL!"
Imogen stared for just an instant longer, then she was moving, walking, one foot after the other, as fast as she dared, not a run, not nearly a run but faster than she'd moved for years—
"COME ON, YOU UGLY RED BASTARDS! COME ON!"
Zed's 'plan' was, amazingly, working. Very few of the zombies to the right seemed interested in Imogen, just a couple of outliers shambling hopefully towards her, distant and easily outpaced. Those to the left were more of a threat, and those ahead, of course—but there was a way through, there was a path, and Imogen followed it.
"TAKE IT! TAKE IT!"
The sound of Zed's rifle echoed through the empty space, repetitive and rhythmic, seven shots one after the other and then that 'ping!' with the eighth as the empty clip was ejected, a tiny pause and then again, firing and firing and firing—Imogen was halfway across now, alone in the middle of the courtyard. There was a twinge from her injured leg but she ignored that. She could see Zed, he'd just blown the leg out from under a zombie and now he was taunting it, his arms held wide as he yelled, but he was losing distance, every second meant they were getting that much closer, he was near the edge and Imogen just kept walking ...
"COME ON! MAKE SOME NOISE! MAKE! SOME! NOISE!"
Every word was punctuated by a rifle shot, and as another 'ping!' sounded out it was accompanied by a howl, guttural and loud, and though Imogen's vision was blurred she could see it, could see the ripple in the hordes of zombies as some of them started lurching in different directions, as some of them kept right on towards her, as some of them stopped moving entirely, she was nearing her apartment building now, the stairs were there—there were zombies around but not many, and most of them were moving away towards Zed—
Imogen stopped, her breathing hard but measured, HopeKiller tight in her hand, the wood of the handle wet with her sweat. She carefully wiped it on her shirt then glanced around as she raised her weapon once more, judging, waiting—
"NOT GONNA BE—"
The rest was too distant to make out, but Imogen could see Zed, he was up higher than the zombies somehow, another seven shots and then again that 'ping!' with the eighth, but they were surging towards him, he was backed into one of the alleys between the buildings—
Imogen brought HopeKiller up in a swift arc that sent the blunt side smacking against a zombie's cheek; it stumbled to the side and then fell. It reached out but she was already past it, already swinging her bat low and hard to slice open a calf; this new zombie fell towards her but she stepped back and then back again, she'd checked before she'd swung and knew she was safe to do this, and as it slammed face first into the ground she walked forward again, the stairs were there, one more zombie between her and the first step and she took up a stance and let it come to her, slicing right and then left in a swift one-two reversal that left both claws useless, and she pivoted on her good foot to let it lurch forward and fall to the ground.
The brace wasn't perfectly suited to stairs, but she managed. Every step she took seemed to be punctuated by the steady sound of Zed's rifle, one two three four five six seven ping! one two three four five six seven ping! and she was on the flat before the next stairs, and then again one two three four five—
Imogen glanced sharply back, gripping the railing tight, looking down at where Zed had been, and she thought she saw him, maybe it was him but he wasn't holding a rifle, and from the alley behind and the courtyard ahead came zombies to surround him, and suddenly she realised she could hear his shouting:
"COME ON THEN! I DON'T NEED NO DAMN GUN! COME ON YOU MOTHERLESS—"
And the zombies surged forward from both ahead and behind, and the shouts stopped, and Imogen could no longer see anything human in the blur of dead flesh, and as she made her way up the stairs to the ninth floor, mouth tight, eyes hard, she did not hear Zed's shouting again.
I was always just using him, she told herself, as she walked slowly along the narrow balcony, her left hand on the railing, her right holding HopeKiller. This was always what was going to happen. Everyone else died, or ... or was lost.
All I can do is remember.
All I can care about is my family.
(To her right were the doors of the other apartments, some open, some closed, but nothing came lurching from them, and in the dim interiors she saw nothing dead and nothing alive.)
My family is all that matters now.
(From behind some of the doors there were noises, shuffling and purring and gentle, gentle scratching.)
Zack. And Grandpa.
(And here was the door to her apartment, 912, it was closed and it was locked and her hands shook as she tried to get her key to fit.)
And ... and Mum.
The door swung open.
Imogen Shroud took a breath, and then she went home.
The inside of Apartment 912 was just the same as when Imogen had left it. There was glass on the carpet and the papers on the noticeboard had been blown all around the room, and her mother's magazines covered the floor.
But still, it was just the same.
Except for the silence.
"Mum?"
Imogen walked forward, unaware that she was holding her breath, her eyes wide against the dimness—even with the door open, even with the sun shining outside it was dark inside, it was always dark—
"Mum?"
Glass crunched underfoot and glossy magazine covers threatened to slide out from under her feet and send her crashing down. Imogen noticed none of this.
"Mum?"
The lounge led to the hallway. No glass in here. The books were still in the cupboard that served as a bookcase, safe behind scuffed and stained doors.
"Mum?"
Her mother's room. The door was old, the paint peeling. Down by the floor and up by the ceiling it was covered in tiny black speckles, some kind of fungus Imogen's mother had always declared to be harmless.
"Mum?"
The door pushed open under Imogen's touch. Inside was the room she'd spent the least time in. The walls were pale pink, decorated with pages torn from magazines, shots of famous beautiful people and recipes that would never be made, and two faded pages each with a huge left eye, unnaturally blue, a decade-old advertisement for a perfume that hadn't been available for years.
The bed took up most of the room. It was big and white, the duvet fluffed up and puffy, the pillows piled high.
Imogen's mother lay in it, head to the side, eyes closed.
Unmoving.
Imogen walked forward, beside the bed, Hope
Killer tight in her hand. Her mother was still, far too still, and Imogen raised her hand to her mouth as she came close enough to hear breathing ... or the lack of it.
Too late, she thought, tears coming to her eyes. Everything I did and I was—
"Imogen?"
The voice was a croaked whisper, dry and hard in coming. Imogen drew in a single, short shiver of breath through her nose, then her bat fell against the floor as she fell forwards to embrace her mother.
"Mum," she mumbled. "Mum, I thought—"
Her mother's hands were against her, not embracing but pushing, pushing Imogen away—too weak to move her, but she moved anyway.
"Why did you come back?" Imogen's mother croaked, frowning at her daughter.
"For ... for you, of course. I couldn't—"
"You're a stupid girl." Margaret shifted in bed, wincing at the movement. "I'm dead, Imogen. They had it on TV. I'm not strong enough."
Imogen stared at her mother. "No, you are—"
"I'm not," Margaret snapped—or tried to. She shifted position again, looking up at Imogen properly now, her eyes old and tired. "Don't you know what death looks like? This is it." There was the trace of a grim smile at the corner of her mouth. "Same as my mother."
"Mum—"
"You cut your hair."
Imogen stared, then raised a hand. "Because ... b-because it was—"
"Ah. Dangerous. So a 'practical' haircut. It only took zombies to get you to change."
Imogen said nothing. She couldn't think of anything to say. Margaret didn't say anything either, not for half a minute, then she sighed, not entirely unhappily.
"They said it's not so bad. You don't feel anything. It doesn't hurt. You just get weaker and weaker until you're too weak to stay awake, and then you sleep, and then you die. And I have my pills, I took twelve this morning, I thought it might be enough." Imogen's mother made a sound that might have been a laugh in a stronger person. "Apparently not. I would have taken more but without water ... and you know my leg—"
"No. No, that's not ... maybe there's—"
"Imogen. I'm dying." Margaret's mouth twisted into a weak smirk. "End of story."