by Brown, TW
I understood their reason. I’d always thought that was kind of silly when it played out in a movie, but now that I was in the moment, I understood their reluctance. The haunted looks on their faces spoke volumes.
Frank seemed to want to talk some more, but the order came for us to get on our feet and move out. I shot a look at the three scientist types. They had not said much of anything the entire time and even more impressive, they had not bitched, griped or moaned.
We walked the rest of the day and I was about to ask how much further to this location when we came to a halt. I did not need to ask. The sudden quiet told me everything. We topped a small rise, and in the fading light of the late afternoon, made even dimmer by the dark clouds that had not broken for a moment, I spotted a non-descript collection of buildings. It could be any business complex with an adjoining warehouse facility in the world.
I realized why it had probably been spared by raiders and looters. It just did not look like there would be anything there except defunct computers and plenty of office supplies. There were no big signs that would even give a clue that the future of electric power might reside somewhere within. And seriously, the average person would not know how to assemble a wind power grid from the ground up even if all of the components were laid out before them. At least that was my thoughts on the subject.
“We make camp here,” one of the females announced.
Up until that point, I was not sure if there was actually a person in charge, or if this was some sort of committee-based leadership. Since everybody seemed to get right to work on setting up camp without question, comment, or discussion, I assumed that woman was the boss.
“So do we have a watch rotation?” I asked her after I found a spot and allowed my quick-release tent to pop open where I would be spending the night.
“Yep, you got first watch,” she said, not even bothering to look over her shoulder at me as she knelt down and crawled inside her own tent to unroll her sleeping bag. “Take a spot on that big brown rock on top of the hill across the road. It will allow you to see down into camp, as well as get a full view of anything that might come from any direction.”
So it was obvious that this location was the spot they camped at the previous times that they had made this run. I waited to see if she would say anything else…like who would relieve me and when, but she climbed in her tent, zipped it up, and that seemed to be the end of the discussion.
I cast a longing glance at my own tent, but in all honesty, I was glad to get the first watch. That meant that, provided nothing crazy happened, I would get an uninterrupted night’s sleep.
The climb was more difficult than it looked, but eventually I made it to the top and took a seat on the big flat rock. The lady had been right, I could see for miles in every direction. We were at the base of the foothills of a mountain range, but the ground was flat with that single exception. I looked back the way we’d come and saw a few stragglers here and there; none that looked to be making a bee line for our location.
Turning back to the complex, I brought my binoculars up and scanned the area. Nothing. Not a single thing stirred down there. Perhaps the child zombies had in fact moved on, I tried to tell myself. I did not believe that for one instant. Something in my gut told me that they were down there…waiting.
***
Morning had not yet arrived, but we broke camp, policed the area, and then moved down the hill. The day would be much like yesterday. Rain. Glad I don’t believe in omens.
“Everybody pair up,” the woman barked. I’d heard folks call her Jessie. “My team will stay with the brainiacs. Frank, you and the new guy will secure the green building entry. Gail says that a herd of a few thousand is just up the road, so only use your firearms as a last resort. And when I mean last resort, I mean the bullet you are eating after being bit. We can’t have that swarm come down on us while we are inside the complex.”
At least now I knew what my job would be. When I’d been on watch, I’d noticed that there were three buildings apart from the rest. One was blue, one was black, and one was green. I had no idea why and didn’t think I would ever find out. Still, at least it felt good to have a job.
When all the assignments had been given, we started down. Not ten seconds later, I heard a baby cry followed by a low moan. What really gave me a chill was that they came from opposite sides of us, and I would swear that it was one zombie signaling another.
I heard Frank start to mutter a prayer. I kept mine quiet, but I sent a message to whatever being was in charge that was basically just a request: please don’t let me be eaten.
As we reached the mostly vacant parking lot, the light was now enough that you could see pretty good except for the more heavily shadowed nooks and covered areas that you didn’t want to go inside anyway.
Frank and I peeled off, as did others while the team ventured into the area and everybody took their positions. I glanced at Frank and saw how wide his eyes were. This guy was freaking terrified. That meant that I would need to be extra careful. Somebody that afraid was a danger.
Another moan came from some high grass to the south of the green building. I stopped and actually had to grab Frank’s arm. If I’d let him continue walking, he might have kept going all the way until he was right in the middle of what I could only describe as a trap.
We’d had to move down a covered walkway that spanned between our target building and the blue one. There were a few side entrances; unremarkable with one exception. The lower panes of the glass door on the four that I could see had been busted out. That exposed our right side. On the left was a cluster of cargo containers like the kind that get stacked on trains or the deck of cargo ships. The doors looked shut; but a sliver of black gave away that they were not. Up ahead was the entrance to the green building. The awning that covered the entrance was about five feet from the end of the covered walkway. I counted five sets of legs standing on that ledge. I did not want to look over my shoulder, but I had to guess that we’d missed something and that there would be zombie children waiting. I could feel the hair on the back of my neck standing straight up.
“Umm…I think we’re surrounded,” I stated the obvious.
Frank spun around and took three involuntary steps back; effectively moving towards the end of the overhang and that empty space that would expose him to the zombie children on the awning. Now that he’d turned around, I could not help myself. I glanced over my shoulder. Sure enough, five zombie children between the ages of maybe eight and twelve stood in the walkway that we’d travelled along between the two buildings.
“I knew they’d still be here,” Frank breathed.
I think I now realized a further reason why nobody had wanted to get to know me. I was willing to bet that this was the same place they’d sent that other poor bastard. As for what they had against Frank, maybe he’d drawn a short straw or something.
I had my eyes fixed on the entry to that green building. What the hell was so important about it that we needed to secure it in the first place? I thought I saw some movement further back in what was probably some sort of lobby. I could see the feet shuffling around up on that awning. If I had to guess, I was willing to bet that the zombies up there were getting ready to drop on whatever came in to view. We could use our crossbows, but they take time to reload and the farthest zombie was less than fifty feet away. We might get a couple, but we were surrounded by a dozen or more by my guess. We needed to be someplace more defensible. I did the only thing that I could think of…
“Frank, RUN!” I yelled, bolting for the entry of the green building.
Just as with the other doors that I’d noticed—albeit too late—the lower section of glass was missing. I would only be out from under the canopy of the walkway for a second before returning to the relative safety of the awning over that main entrance. I was counting on poor coordination and reaction time. Please don’t all be former world champion video gamers, I thought in that instant of open air overhead.
; Diving forward, I slid on my belly through little cubes of broken glass. I had my KA-BAR out as I rolled once and came up to my knees. I was hoping to clear room for Frank…and then he screamed.
I only had a second to glance and see him go down under a swarm of children. Looking around, I saw that I was in fact in a large open lobby. There was a big reception desk and a wall of dead monitors behind it. A pair of windmill propellers hung from cables in the center of the big reception area and stairs went up to the second level on either side. Two dark hallways suddenly vomited zombie children like the doors to a school on that last day when the bell rings and summer vacation is about to begin.
There were at least five floors to this building, but I imagine that the elevator was used back when there was power. A fire escape existed someplace, but I didn’t have time to search for it.
I suddenly remembered the Call of Duty: Black Ops video game and that first room you start in with the stairs that go up each side in the zombie mode. One of the best defenses is to lure them to a single stairwell and take out a few of the leaders. Then, you take off and run around to and down the other stairs, cross the room and now you are at the trail end of the zombies on the stairs. You take out a few, and then zip back, up and across to the top of the original staircase with the stupid zombies stumbling over each other as they try to turn around again. You take out a few…repeat as necessary.
Frank’s screaming grew in volume and intensity, but it was the begging that hurt my heart. He was pleading for them to stop…trying to reason with them to no avail. A loud shriek followed by a gagging gargle ended it.
I decided that I had nothing to lose. However, unlike the others, I would not die with a belt pouch full of unused magazines for my weapons. I would worry about this supposed herd later. I slung the M4 from my shoulder and brought it up. I was mildly surprised when a few of the zombie children stopped advancing. Still, more came than didn’t and I squeezed the trigger sending a short burst. My aim sucked and I saw holes appear across the chests of a few of the leaders. I adjusted and fired again. This time I took down the first two I aimed at and blew out the throat of a third.
It was time to see if I could pull off my video game defense. I sprinted for the stairs. I was halfway up when my heart felt like it exploded in my chest. I almost fell on my face from stopping so suddenly. They must have played the same game. At the top of the stairs, at least twenty faces appeared from the shadows.
I was screwed.
Spring
(Book 9 of the DEAD series)
TW Brown
Portland, Oregon, USA
A moment with the author…
What’s in a word?
Authors love to talk word count. How many they got each day, that sort of thing. One of the issues that I had with A LOT of the zombie fiction out there was that the word count was maybe 60-70,000. That might seem like a lot, and it is respectable, but there are others who do not even hit the 50,000 word benchmark that classifies a piece of work as novel length.
The norm in the DEAD series is 100,000. Decent by most standards; maybe not as lengthy as some, but still respectable. This baby is something that I am very proud of. And not just the words count (over 173,000!), I am happy where the stories took me (and you as you dive in). The bottom line is that I feel good about this book.
So what can YOU do? Honestly? Your reviews make all the difference. It moves my book into the “Amazon Consciousness” so that those little “If you read this, you might like…” emails that Amazon sends out go to more people. Tell your friends. Start a book club. Heck, I am always willing to do something special for a book club. You get seven or so people together and make a run through the DEAD series, you can bet that I will be happy to host a Q & A, or just about anything.
Here is the reality…I am not Stephen King. And while I do make a very good living as a writer, it is not as glamorous as you might believe. I am a stay-at-home kinda guy with OCD (I say it is minor…but my wife laughs when I say it, so…). My wife goes to work and I do the cooking, the cleaning, and the writing. She says it is a little like being married to Adrian Monk because I am a very scheduled kind of person and a “clean freak.”
So let’s talk just a little about this book. I wanted to really reward the reader for hanging this long. Nine books is a BUNCH, We are closing in on a million words! I really left you hanging in the last book…so this is your “prize” for being such a good sport.
I catch a lot of flak for having main characters die. I think that is one of the things that keeps this “real.” Besides, isn’t it a bit more fun when bad things start to happen and you DON’T know that somebody is safe? Me personally, I always hated that when I read. When my heroes go into a situation, I want to feel the danger.
One other thing that I will address: in real life, you don’t always get a clear answer. You sometimes get an answer that you need to interpret and decide which aspect of it you want to use. Then, based on what you know of a situation or person, you come to a conclusion. I think it gives the reader something to chew on if they have a series of facts and a few suppositions and then they get to decide why they think something happened or a person acted a certain way. I know not everybody will agree, but that is what makes the world a great place…differing views.
One more thing; the DEAD: Snapshot series will be coming very soon. I have received a lot of requests from people that want to see what happened to their town in a DEAD universe. I will say that the first (after the 12th book in the DEAD series…so we have a little while still) will be DEAD: Snapshot—Portland, Oregon. So you might get a guest appearance by a few familiar names. But keep those requests coming. Who knows…you may see your hometown on an upcoming cover. And in this one…size DOES NOT matter. I would be just as likely to write about Mudhole, Wyoming as I would Tokyo, Japan.
I do have a few people to thank, so indulge me just a few more seconds. To Sophie, Tammy, Tim and Debra, my Beta readers for this one, as well as David Redding who comes in after and sweeps up all the messy details, you have my gratitude. And, as always, my family; despite my insistence of being left alone to work…I still need you to be that very important part of my life.
TW Brown
June 2014 2014
For my friends
You know who you are
Contents
Geek Pain and Nightmarish Discoveries
New Friends, New Enemies
Vignettes XLIX
No Geek, Just Girls
Battle
Vignettes L
Geek Girls Gone Wild
Muddy Waters
Vignettes LI
Geek on the Run
No Mercy
Vignettes LII
Geeks Making Tracks
Soul Scarring
Vignettes LIII
The Geek’s Last Leg
Welcome Home
Vignettes LIV
1
Geek Pain and Nightmarish Discoveries
“They don’t look like Guardians,” a woman said as she stepped forward from the group that had Kevin and the others hemmed in with weapons pointed.
Kevin scanned the group and counted fifteen; each was carrying a rifle or pistol which was currently pointed in his general direction. As soon as he heard the word “Guardian”, he had a feeling that he knew what he was dealing with.
“You’re right,” Kevin spoke. He took a step forward, making sure to raise his hands just a bit higher as he did so in hopes that he would not simply be shot out of principle.
“But we did run into some of them as well as a few of their hostages.” Kevin watched faces for any signs that he was about to be shot. He would have no problem shutting his mouth if it came to it.
“Is that right?” a man sneered, stepping forward and raising his gun to his shoulder, the barrel aimed at Kevin’s head. “And where would those hostages be?”
“I believe the area was called Eggers Grove,” Aleah spoke up and stepped beside Kevin, taking his
hand in hers. “But they were in no condition to travel. We were simply passing through and sort of got caught in the middle of whatever is going on here. We did invite them to join us, but they refused.”
As Aleah gave these people a rundown of what had happened, Kevin scanned the group. They all looked pretty healthy. He had to assume that they were members of that compound just to the west. Of the fifteen, six were females. One of them had a disfiguring scar on her face. Better yet, what remained of her face was mostly twisted tissue that looked puckered but obviously from a wound that had long since healed. She had an eye patch over her left eye and, judging by what he saw, there was not likely to be an eye remaining in that socket.
“Hey!” the woman who had spoken first said, snapping her fingers in Kevin’s direction. “Let’s see it.”
Kevin blinked and looked around. Everybody was staring at him…including the woman with the disfigured face that he had been eyeballing. If she was self-conscious about his obvious visual examination of her facial scarring, she gave no indication.
“Show them your arm,” Rose whispered with an elbow to his ribs.
Suddenly understanding the situation and reason for the request, Kevin displayed the recent wound from the bite he’d sustained just a couple of days ago. Their captors—Kevin could not think of a better word for them at the moment since they all had weapons drawn and pointed at him and the rest of what remained of his group—moved in and examined the bite.
“Yep…that’s legit,” the woman who Kevin now saw as the leader said out loud before taking a step back. “So at least two of you are immune…and the others?”
“Nobody really wants to test the waters,” Aleah said with a forced laugh.