by Brown, TW
“You’ll have to forgive me,” Mike struggled to keep the impatience from his voice. Really, for cryin’ out loud, why couldn’t Kevin just tell him instead of treating this like some top-secret kernel of information that he had to parse out in bits and pieces.
“When I was seventeen, my family took one of those horrid see-the-country road trips for summer vacation,” Kevin explained.
“I remember.” Mike nodded as the two walked past the gatehouse and turned right on the road, moving into the center of it to better avoid being surprised by a zombie. “Your dad said Clinton was gonna get the country nuked and you might never have a chance to see the Heart of America again.”
“Something like that,” Kevin scowled. “Anyhow, we stopped near here, and the next day we toured this building shaped like a giant picnic basket that had just opened. Even met the owner and my mom got his autograph on a basket she’d purchased. His name was Dave Longa-something.”
“Weird,” Mike said, scanning everywhere at once. He and Kevin had one gun, less than thirty rounds, a baseball bat and a sword. Any serious zombie threat would not go well.
“You have no idea,” Kevin sighed. “But I’m positive that place is nearby. Why else would that guy say something ‘bout going to The Basket?”
“If you’re right…” Mike’s voice trailed off.
***
“What’d you say this town’s name was?” Mike leaned against the wall of the remains of an unidentifiable and mostly burned down building.
“Heath,” Kevin said as he wiped the sweat from his eyes and peered around the corner.
“Yeah, well I hate this place.”
“Me, too. Six more coming, and they know we’re here. They’re bee lining for us.”
“That gas station better damned well have maps.” Mike pushed off from the wall and shook out first his right arm, then switching the sword to it, did the same to the left.
Kevin stepped out from his useless hiding place. He never got used to caving the skulls in on women and children. The nearest zombie had been a girl no more than ten, hair still in stringy, filthy pigtails. Her mouth was an over-exaggerated oval from all the dried-on blood and goodness-knows-what-else on her face. Equally gruesome was the gore caked on her bare arms well past the elbows. With one swing of the bat, he brought it to its knees. A couple more pile-driving-type blows cracked open the skull, spilling vile fluids and dark spongy matter. He and Mike worked their way through the small group and bolted for what appeared to be the only gas station that hadn’t burned to the ground.
Along the way, they had to dodge or hurdle decomposing bodies and piles of garbage. The smell, coupled with the hordes of buzzing flies, caused both men to struggle with not vomiting. If it was this bad in a small town, what must the large cities be like by now? They reached their destination and caught a major break. The entry door had already been shattered. Glass cubes littered the floor of the small customer area.
Kevin ducked in as Mike stood watch. He saw several zombies shuffling their direction, none close enough to be any serious threat…yet. Mike heard Kevin rifling through things behind him, but he wouldn’t risk taking his eyes off the surroundings.
“Got it!” Kevin called triumphantly.
As he did, a grisly remnant of what looked like a prom queen staggered around the corner of the gas station a mere ten feet away. A once shimmering dress hung in shreds. It opened its mouth and moaned as its arms reached out, leading the body. Mike’s eyes widened. The mouth was moist with fresh blood! Taking a closer look as he raised the sword and prepared to take the pitiful creature down, he noticed both wrists were marred with what looked to be severe rubbing caused by restraints. One ankle still had a thin leather strap buckled in place.
He swung as it stepped into range. The head split down the middle and the body toppled. Kevin stepped up by Mike’s side. Both men stared horrified. When the body fell, the dress rode up far enough to reveal the absence of panties…and a thick smear of wetness inside both thighs.
“What the fuck?” Kevin gasped.
“Shaw’s men?” Mike asked.
“Why?” Kevin couldn’t peel his eyes away. Little facts were beginning to reveal themselves. Like, even the most horrific injury—a gaping rip on the neck—was cleaned. The dress was in tatters, but it had been torn recently. The dress itself was clean. Shaw and his group obviously have living women to…
“She’s wearing make-up,” Mike said.
“And her hair’s been washed recently.” Kevin pointed.
“What do you guess her age to be?”
“A little older than Erin maybe…Sixteen?” Kevin used the toe of his boot to nudge the dress back down.
“Sabrina,” a voice called. Several of the zombies in the area shifted directions.
“C’mon,” Mike hissed, nudging Kevin and took off towards the sound of the voice. While the concentration of zombies was increasing, they remained spread out enough to not be too much of a concern.
A man less than a block from them shoved away an approaching zombie dressed like it had just come from a night at the nearest country bar. His left arm was wrapped in a blood-soaked bandage. He carried no weapon that either Mike or Kevin could see and appeared completely unfazed by the handful of undead heading for him.
“Something feels wrong,” Kevin said.
The man’s head snapped over to Mike and Kevin at the sound of voices. A look crossed his face. He seemed suddenly much more frightened at the arrival of two living, breathing people than he did of the slowly growing number of undead.
“Nasty wound you got there,” Kevin said, shooting a look at Mike, and then moved away to the left, putting some distance between them.
The man took a step back, his eyes darting everywhere at once. Then, without warning, he bolted in the direction of several zombies!
“Decide quick.” Mike guessed the number of approaching undead to be in the forties.
“I gotta know.” Kevin shrugged, and took off after the man.
He wasn’t hard to follow. Kevin guessed him to be a few inches under six-feet tall, but easily over two hundred-and-fifty pounds. From the back, the man displayed a well-defined bald spot and a braided ponytail that swayed back and forth. The corpulent man barged through several converging zombies, unfazed by their outstretched hands, shoving or elbowing aside any that came close.
Mike and Kevin had more difficulty keeping up as they reached the cluster. With bat and sword they made their way, losing a little ground, but still keeping the man in sight. They followed, and were actually relieved when he ducked into a large, whitewashed, three-story building. The sign out front read Heath High School.
The two cut across the shin-high grass of the front lawn and to the wide stairs that led up to four sets of double-doors. The building itself, at least from what they could see, was set up so that the first-floor windows were a good seven or so feet off the ground. The front doors were covered from the inside with what looked like a mixture of corrugated metal and plywood. A few small windows—inches above the ground—were both too narrow and low to be much worry, but they all appeared boarded up as well.
They bounded up the stairs and gave the doors a tug. Each set was locked. Looking around, Kevin climbed onto the concrete banister and stretched over to the nearest windowsill. Of course, he scoffed as he tried to wedge open the window. It was locked.
“Watch out!” Kevin called over his shoulder as he swung the bat. Glass shattered. Clearing out as much of the remaining shards as he could, Kevin easily swung over and in the new opening. He was inside an office. He only had a couple of seconds though as the door burst open. The man they’d chased was there, a gun pointed, albeit shakily, at Kevin.
“Put the gun down!” Kevin yelled, hoping Mike would hear and take the hint.
“You can’t stay here.” The man’s voice was even shakier than the hand holding the large, black revolver.
“That’s a nasty wound you’ve got there.” Kevin pointe
d to the bandaged arm that was dripping on the gray indoor-outdoor carpet.
“You can’t stay here,” the man repeated. “You have to leave now.”
The sound of glass crashing made both men jump. Mike was obviously making his own entrance. The sudden distraction caused the man to turn away from Kevin. Seeing the opportunity, Kevin lunged, coming down hard with his bat on the arm that held the gun. The weapon fired, and the useless computer monitor on the large walnut desk toppled to the floor. Kevin felt, rather than heard, the sickening snap of the forearm. The man howled in pain, and the gun fell to the ground. Kevin brought the barrel of the bat up, catching the man under his jaw. The man fell back out of the doorway, bounced off what looked to be a long reception desk, and collapsed to the ground in an unmoving heap.
“Kevin!” Mike yelled.
“In here,” Kevin answered, stepping over the prone body and fully into what had once served as the front office for the school.
Mike burst into the office slamming open the frosted glass door. “I heard a gunshot.”
“He missed.” Kevin held his arms up and turned so Mike could see he was fine. “I knocked him out with the bat. I don’t think I killed him.”
“Not that it would matter,” Mike stepped through the waist-high swinging-gate to join Kevin. “That asshole’s obviously been bitten. We may as well just put him down now.”
“I’ve got a better idea,” Kevin shook his head. “He was looking for somebody named Sabrina. My guess is that it’s the girl we took down. That probably means that this dude’s doing some weird shit.”
“So?” Mike shrugged.
“He also seems to be the last living soul here in Heath. I say we tie him up, then offer him a quick death in exchange for information, like any running vehicles nearby and where we can find supplies.”
“It’s not like we have anything better to do…or… umm…a twenty-four hour time limit.” The sarcasm was creeping back into Mike’s voice.
“Well,” Kevin snatched a phone cord and stepped back into the principal’s office, “this guy seemed to be existing under Shaw’s radar without any problem. Maybe Shaw doesn’t come into this town.”
With that said, he dragged the body back into the office. Within a few minutes, using phone and power cords, they had firmly tied the man to the chair behind the principal’s desk.
“I say we go look around and see what is here that we might use. Best gather stuff in case we need to beat feet in a hurry,” Mike said.
The two crept out into the dark, shadowy hall with their weapons at the ready. A staircase was on the left past a section of lockers. Together they peered around the corner. They had two choices: up or down.
“I say let’s start at the bottom and work our way up,” Kevin said.
“Suits me fine.”
They crept down the darkened stairwell. Enough ambient light existed to see up to the point where the stairs reached a landing before turning back in an about-face and continuing down.
Once on the landing, they peered cautiously down the rest of the stairs. A hallway ran either direction. A dull glow to the left indicated some sort of light source. Kevin and Mike glanced at each other, nodded, and continued down. Mike clung to the right, Kevin against the wall on the left.
With one step to go, Kevin raised his hand, signaling Mike to stop. The other froze, raising the sword in case he needed to strike.
“You hear that?” Kevin hissed.
Mike listened. There it was. A creak, a rustle, other odd sounds. He looked at Kevin with raised eyebrows. What? He mouthed silently.
No idea, Kevin mouthed back, shrugging.
Mike leaned forward to peek down the hallway. It was empty. On the right side, about twenty or so feet away, an open doorway cast a pale glow. It was also the direction of the source of the sounds.
They waited. The sounds continued, but nothing emerged. Kevin stepped into the long hallway. Still nothing. He walked towards the open doorway. Mike followed, glancing over his shoulder nervously.
Kevin peeked in the dimly lit room and, without warning, threw himself back. He landed on his butt, scrambling to gather up the bat that had slipped from his grip and clattered nosily on the linoleum.
“Holy shit!” Mike hadn’t been able to fight the curiosity. He stood against the far wall, staring into the dimly lit room.
Several girls—none old enough to be past high school age, all zombies—were bound to various devices scattered about the room. Some were dressed in cheerleader outfits, others in school-girl uniforms, others were completely naked.
One was only a few feet inside the door. Mike guessed she’d been the reason Kevin freaked. She was in a typical student’s desk. However, she was bound in place securely with belts and duct tape. Her hands were free and she reached for Mike, struggling in absolute futility against her bonds.
“What the fuck?” Kevin joined Mike, staring into the room.
“To hell with putting that sick fuck down. I say we feed him to these…” Mike’s voice trailed off. He was torn by disgust and pity. Disgust for that lunatic they had tied to a chair upstairs. Pity for these things. Each had only the most superficial bite, if it was even visible. This had been intentional.
In one corner of the room, one of the Schoolgirl-zombies struggled more than the rest. Kevin noticed that all of them had ball-gags secured in place except the overly agitated one. She had strips of duct tape wrapped around her head.
He stepped tentatively into the room, carefully avoiding coming into grasping range of any of the pathetic creatures scattered about. Weaving his way through the hellish obstacle- course he made his way to the long-haired brunette. The room was almost gaggingly sweet smelling, as if bottles of perfume had been dumped over each of the inhabitants.
“Shit!” Kevin suddenly bolted to the thrashing figure in the corner. He knelt beside the girl. Patting his pockets, he produced a pocketknife. “There is no way this won’t hurt,” he said, cutting through the tape vertically. “I’ll be as quick as I can,” he said, peeling corners back on each side of the slit.
“No way.” Mike stood over Kevin’s shoulder, staring in disbelief.
Kevin yanked both directions. It took four tries, but he removed the tape…and a considerable amount of hair. To his surprise, the girl didn’t cry. She whimpered slightly a couple of times, but that was the extent.
Neither man could ignore the partially healed bite just above the knee-high stocking on the right leg. It had to be several days old.
“Please save me.” The young girl looked up at the two with pleading eyes.
Mike and Kevin looked at each other with the same basic thought painted clearly on their faces. This flew in the face of everything they thought they knew. Could it be possible that being bitten wasn’t a one hundred-percent certainty that the recipient would turn? Cary’s face flashed in Kevin’s mind.
“Impossible,” Kevin breathed. It was as much a wish as a denial.
16
Tough Choices
“Are you going to invite me in, or simply stand there with your mouth hanging open?” Doctor Zahn asked.
“Well…umm…” I couldn’t think of what to say. I stepped aside and gestured for her to enter.
“Wimmer told me you are equipped to pull out of here on a moment’s notice.”
“So what leads you to believe I’m leaving now?” I asked, trying not to sound offensive.
“I was watching you and your little clique when the vote passed barring any attempt at a search-and-rescue mission,” she said simply. “None of you should ever sit down at a poker table.”
“So why would you leave with us?” My curiosity was more than piqued.
“Sergeant Wimmer is actually going to send out a few groups.” Doctor Zahn sat at my kitchen table and folded her hands in front of her, indicating that she might be staying for a while. “He has asked certain individuals that he deems crucial to join some of those groups. We will have a radio and instructions to ma
ke contact if a suitable relocation site is discovered.”
I had to give it to Paul Wimmer. He was nothing if not thorough. Instead of sending teams on a mission and depleting his finite supply of trained soldiers, he would let civilians do his dirty work. Only—
“Why would he risk sending crucial people out with a bunch of us untrained yahoos?” I asked.
“And what would compel you to make contact with him if you found someplace safe?” Doctor Zahn countered.
Good point, I thought.
“Also, you’ve all shown the ability to survive this nightmare without help. He believes your survival is due to your not being bound to a command structure that would have you waiting to be told to act. Your independence and free thinking is an asset.”
“But this seems a bit obvious.” I sat at the table across from Doctor Zahn. “Why tip your hand? I mean, some folks might be a bit paranoid. They may shy away from bringing a government tag-a-long.”
“He’s not simply letting everybody make a run for it, Steve,” Doctor Zahn laughed. “He isn’t stupid. Some groups are being encouraged to go in order to thin out the population in the event that one of those migrating herds comes and traps us here. That lessens the draw on supplies. Others, people he’s come to trust somewhat, are being asked to accommodate a rider,” Doctor Zahn paused, then smiled. “What was your word? Oh yes, tag-a-long.”
“So how did I get so lucky to draw the most senior medical person?” I figured tonight was not going to be that chance to rest up. It was also probably going to be the last time I’d be living in such relative luxury for a while. I got back up and walked to my little kitchen.
“The sergeant is a fairly good judge of character. He feels that your group is the most likely to survive,” Doctor Zahn said matter-of-factly.
There was something else in Doctor Zahn’s voice, and I decided to press the issue, “And?” I walked back to the table and plunked down a cold beer—the matching twin to the one in my hand which represented the last of my supply—in front of the doctor. She looked up at me, and for the first time, I saw real emotion on her face. The stoic Doctor Zahn was blushing!