by Jake Bible
We joined her and saw a few dozen Zs stumble about the riverbank, with even more wading in the shallows because their feet kept slipping in the river mud and they couldn’t get enough purchase to get away from the water.
“Huh,” I said. “That is a problem.”
“I’ll distract them,” Elsbeth said. “You get the canoes down and get ready to run to the water. I’ll get them away from here, and then swim out to you.”
The day had gotten away from us fast and the sun had started to set. The light came in through the dirty windows and lit up the boathouse, reflecting off the natural wood of the walls. It kinda gave everything a surreal, almost spiritual look. It was at that moment that I had a sinking feeling I wouldn’t see that woman again.
“We can’t leave you,” I said.
“You won’t be, Long Pork,” Elsbeth smiled. “You’ll just be out on the river until I can swim out to you.”
I looked to Stella for help, but her face was set in agreement with Elsbeth.
“She’s the only one that has a chance of distracting the Zs and living,” Stella said. “You know that.”
Stella hurried forward and hugged Elsbeth fiercely. Greta followed, leaving me and Charlie to stand there.
“Group hug?” Charlie smirked as he looked at me.
“Group hug,” I said and we all went in for a squeeze.
“That’s enough,” Elsbeth said, suddenly embarrassed. “Get off me, Stanfords.” She nodded to the canoes. “Get those ready.”
We threw all of our gear into the canoes as Stella and Greta handled one while Charlie and I handled another. Charlie did most of the work by maneuvering the canoe to the door. I pretty much grabbed the handle on the rear end and waited.
“Ready?” Elsbeth asked as she reached in and grabbed Charlie’s AK-47.
“Ready,” we answered.
She didn’t count off, just tore open the door and fired until the rifle clicked empty. Then she started doing what she did best: hacking and slashing at the Zs with those fine blades of hers. We let her get a good distance away, her violence leading the Zs like a bloody Pied Piper, before Stella shoved the double loading doors open and we made our break for it.
It all would have been easy to deal with if it wasn’t for the wading Zs. The ones that were mobile went for Elsbeth immediately, but the ones stuck in the mud didn’t have that options, so they turned their attention on us.
“Jace? What do we do?” Stella yelled.
“We ram them!” I shouted. “Lower your shoulders and shove them aside! It’s the only way we’ll get past!”
Stella hesitated for just a second, then her face scrunched up and that determined look she gets that I have always loved took over. She and Greta lowered their shoulders as I said and smashed into every Z that was in their way, which made things a lot easier for Charlie and me.
Greta screamed as a Z got its fingers tangled in her hair, but she elbowed it in the nose so hard that the thing’s rotted neck snapped right there. If it wasn’t for the fear and terror of the moment, I think we would have all laughed as the Z’s head wobbled on its broken neck while it stayed upright because of the mud. It was obviously truly dead, but there it stood.
We were able to get the canoes past the waiting Zs and out into the river, but we hadn’t prepared for the current that was rushing along. The Tennessee River is not a small river. It has a good pull to it when it’s high and there has been some rain. Which it looked like there had been before we hit Knoxville.
Stella and Greta barely got up into their canoe while Charlie hopped in ours and turned and held out his hand to me.
There was the problem. I only have one hand.
I tried to pull myself into the canoe, but I didn’t have the leverage. If I let go of the side even for a second to take Charlie’s hand, I would have been separated from the canoe by the current.
So I just stayed in the water and started kicking my legs.
“I’ll help get us across!” I yelled up at Charlie. “Just steer us to the shore!”
The canoe blocked my view of Stella and Greta, but I could hear my wife shouting for our daughter, “Paddle your fucking ass off,” which made me feel confident things were being handled over there.
I risked a look over my shoulder at the riverbank and almost wished I hadn’t. The current was so strong that we were already a good hundred yards downstream before we’d even reached the middle of the river. That meant Elsbeth would have to swim quite a ways to get to us when we finally made it to the other shore.
By the looks of the huge horde of Zs that had her surrounded, she wasn’t going to attempt a swim any time soon.
“She’s outnumbered,” Charlie said.
“I know, but she’ll make it,” I replied, spitting out river water after each word. “You just focus on getting us over to the other bank.”
Charlie gave me that look he gives when he wants to argue and say something, but has decided not to. He turned back to paddling and put his all into digging deep and moving us closer and closer to the other shore.
There were many problems with our plan that night, but the biggest was that the river took a dramatic curve just past the boathouse. Not only had we gone a hundred yards away from where Elsbeth fought, but also were only a few yards from completely losing sight of her. I kept looking and looking, desperate to keep track of what was happening, but I couldn’t do that and keep my head above water while trying to hang on and kick at the same time.
Ugh.
“El!” I shouted, nearly swallowing half the Tennessee.
The last few feet of visibility were lost to me and all I had to keep track of her were the constant moans and groans of the horde coupled with her throaty war cries.
It took us nearly twenty minutes to get from point A to point B and by the time we’d gotten ashore, the sun had nearly set. We found ourselves on a small peninsula and our first instinct was to hurry across to find out what was happening to Elsbeth.
However, by the time we got there, it was almost completely dark. The horde was obvious, but we couldn’t see or hear Elsbeth at all. There were no sounds of her chopping off heads or hacking away at limbs, and no sounds of her crushing skulls or snapping necks. As far as we could see, she wasn’t there.
“Elsbeth!” Charlie shouted.
“Stop,” Stella hissed as she looked about the peninsula. “We don’t know if there are any Zs around.”
“We can’t leave her over there,” Greta said.
“She’s probably already gotten into the river,” I said. “I’ll bet she’s swimming to find us now.”
We all scrambled down close to the riverbank and then followed it around to our canoes.
Nothing.
No Elsbeth anywhere.
And no more light, either.
“Jace, we can’t stay,” Stella said. “We have to find shelter and get safe for the night.”
“I know,” I said. Both of the kids started to protest, but I held up my hand. “We won’t abandon her, okay? We just can’t do any good by stumbling around in the dark. We get safe and we get some rest. We’ll find her in the morning.”
Except, once again, there was a flaw in that plan. We found out what it was within just a couple of minutes.
“You hear that?” Stella whispered as we grabbed our stuff from the canoes. “Zs?”
“Yeah,” I said and fished out the one flashlight. “Should I?”
“Make it fast,” Stella said. “Don’t let them zero in on the light.”
I flicked on the flashlight and was beyond grateful that there were no Zs caught in the beam.
“Phew,” Stella said, echoing my thoughts. “I think I saw buildings up over that little hill.”
She took off and I motioned for the kids to go so I could bring up the rear. We made it about twenty yards and crested the hill when all “phews” flew out the window.
“Oh...fuck,” Charlie said as we looked down at the herd of Zs below us. “Where’d they come from? How’d t
hey get across?”
“They didn’t get across,” Greta said as she pointed towards a large building and the faded words on the sign above the front entrance. “They’ve always been here.”
University of Tennessee Medical Center. Another hospital, but this one wasn’t manned by crazies, just overrun by walking corpses.
“Back to the canoes,” Stella whispered. “Go go.”
We hightailed it to the canoes and shoved them off into the water. I actually got to ride inside mine with Charlie that time, but I almost wished I was in the river as the night breeze started to blow across my wet clothing.
We let the river take us a ways until I spotted a pull out tucked into the dense trees on the far side of the river. It took all of our strength to fight the current and get us over there, but we made it after some seriously hardcore paddling.
I just used my hand since I couldn’t really grip a paddle. I made a note to myself that night to figure out a paddle attachment for Stumpageddon, if my shoulder ever healed up enough to handle the strain. And if we didn’t die in the night.
We got the canoes up onto the shore and then sat there for a while and listened. Far off, we could hear the herd of Zs as the wind shifted and blew their moans our way, but that was all. No sound of a woman trying to swim to us and no sound of gunfire or human activity coming from the city.
That night, we slept in the canoes, with Stella and me taking turns as sentries so the kids could get as much rest as possible. If Zs came at us, we could just shove back into the water. Luckily, we didn’t have to.
By the time dawn hit and the morning light crested the far off mountains, I felt so spent that I thought every bush and small tree was a Z coming to eat my face.
“We get someplace safe while we have light,” Stella said to me, looking exactly how I felt. “The kids can stand watch while you and I sleep. If it’s safe enough, we’ll stay another night.”
“Then what?” I asked. “We don’t know where anyone else is.”
“But we do know where Kansas City is and where Boulder is,” Stella said. “So does everyone else. We keep going and hope we catch up to the others or they catch up to us.”
“We’re going to walk to KC?” Charlie asked.
“Until we find a better way to get there,” Stella replied.
The kids looked at me, which I could see irritated the shit out of Stella.
“Your mother is right,” I said. “We rest and then we travel. That’s our new pattern so get used to it.”
Both of them had the smarts not to argue with two exhausted and scared parents. At least they were learning.
Chapter Six
We had pulled out of the river in Sequoyah Park and were lucky enough to find that the park was bordered by some seriously swank houses with excellent views of the river. How nice for them.
We picked one at random, a modern looking, four-story semi-mansion, and didn’t have too hard a time breaking in. The doors were locked solid, but not solid enough against a rock through a window. Without any alarm systems to worry about, we broke and entered old school. Like, Neanderthal old school. Rock go smash!
The smell inside told us that somebody had been home at one time and maybe hadn’t quite left yet. We were cautious as we went room to room, making sure to stay together, and scouted for Zs. We’d covered all of the floors from the ground up, which left only the basement.
“The smell is stronger down there,” Greta said. “But it’s old.”
She was right. The smell was old. It was the faint stink of rotted meat and the putrid stench of a trapped Z. Not fresh at all, more like a memory than a current thought.
Step by step, we slowly descended into the basement. It wasn’t hard to figure out what had happened to the family that had lived there once we got down to the bottom.
“Jesus,” Charlie said, as we all stood around the ancient Z that could barely clack its jaws at us. “It ate them all.”
The scene was of a family trying to escape from a loved one. It was a scene we had witnessed a hundred times since Z-day. They thought they were safe down in the basement from the Zs above, but something went wrong and one of their own turned. The mother. I could see that the family members, a dad and three kids, fought back, since the Z’s legs had been hacked off at the knees, yet that hadn’t been enough to keep its hunger at bay.
However it managed it, it caught a couple of the other members and gave them some good, hard chomps. The kids’ heads had been split open by the dad and he had tried to kill Z-Mom with the hatchet he held, but he’d missed and only managed to bury it in her shoulder. He was probably too weak to get the hatchet out for a second whack and finish the job, so he finished himself instead.
A screwdriver stuck out from his temple.
“I think they were going for there,” Greta said as she looked at the far wall.
I turned the flashlight in that direction and saw a bookshelf that had been partly pushed away from the wall. We walked over and couldn’t believe what we saw.
“A safe room,” Charlie said. “Cool.”
“Yeah, until you run out of air,” Greta said.
Then it made sense. The family hadn’t been trying to get to the safe room, but had escaped it. When the power gave out, even whatever backup power they had, the safe room lost its ability to circulate the air. They had to get out or suffocate.
I walked into the safe room and found another piece of the puzzle: the bottom halves of the mom’s legs. She’d died in there and then came back. They tried to hobble her, but not being familiar with the tenacity of Zs, they had no clue what kind of monster they were trapped with. Old stains on the floor leading out into the basement told me that the horror had started to go down inside the safe room.
Dad had gotten his whole family out of there so they wouldn’t die trapped in a steel box and could feel like they were home one last time.
The man had had the chance to just fall asleep from lack of oxygen, but he fought on to honor his wife and kids. It was a fucked up thing to do, but everything has been fucked up since Z-Day. I had to applaud the noble thought behind the action.
“Dad?” Greta asked, as she walked back to the Z that was mostly bone and tendon. It shifted, knowing meat was near, but it didn’t have any muscle to grab at Greta. “Can I?”
“Please,” I said as I turned away just as Greta’s heel crushed the Z’s skull.
“It’s a backup if we need it,” Stella said as she eyed the safe room. “But we aren’t sleeping in there.”
“No shit,” Charlie said.
“Let’s clean these people up,” Stella said to the kids. “Haul the bodies upstairs while your dad and I make some space to sleep comfortably. You two will stand watch by the stairs and wake us up if you hear anything at all. If we aren’t disturbed, we’ll go upstairs and hunt for some food after we get enough sleep to think straight. Got it?”
The kids frowned and didn’t say a word as they got to work lifting the bodies and carrying them back upstairs. I will give them points for not complaining out loud. The looks on their faces, and the pissed off body language, did all the talking needed, though.
Stella and I moved a couple of couches around so we could face the stairs, then each plopped down on one and sighed heavily.
“Should we take shifts sleeping?” Stella asked.
“Nah,” I said. “The kids aren’t rookies. They can handle a little sentry duty. I doubt I’ll sleep that much anyway.”
I was out before the kids even made it back down the stairs.
***
“Dad?” Charlie whispered. “Dad? Wake up.”
I sat up with a start and had to shake my head a couple times to focus on Charlie’s shadowed face.
“Chill, it’s all good,” Charlie said. “It’s just that Greta is asleep and I have to pee bad.”
“Okay, then go pee,” I said. “Is there a bucket or something down here?”
“No, Greta and I have been going upstairs so we don�
�t stink things up down here,” Charlie said. “We’ve been using the kitchen sink since it’s close to the basement door.”
“Good idea,” I said as I stretched. I looked over at Stella and smiled. “It has to be afternoon by now, right?”
“It’s almost morning,” Charlie said, making me blink in disbelief.
“What? Morning?”
“You and Mom were out,” Charlie said. “Greta and I took turns sleeping through the afternoon and night. I wouldn’t have woken you up if I didn’t think I was going to piss myself.”
“No, no you did the right thing,” I said as I got up and tried to get the circulation going in my legs. “I’ll follow you upstairs and keep an eye out while you piss. Is there any food up there?”
“Plenty,” Charlie said. “It’s stale and expired by a few years, but the stuff that’s sealed, like crackers and shit, hasn’t gone moldy or anything. Greta gorged herself on crappy cookies and cupcakes that were hard as rocks.”
My stomach rumbled as I followed him up the stairs. I didn’t care how hard the cookies or cupcakes were, I would eat them all.
There was a pile of supplies by the basement door and I frowned at them.
“What’s that?” I asked as Charlie hurried over to the sink and sighed with relief as he let his bladder empty. “Where’d all that come from?”
“We took turns hunting for stuff we could use,” Charlie said. “We kept it there in case we had to escape quickly. I was going to look for new backpacks or duffel bags next. I think there’s a closet in the basement we hadn’t checked. I’ll bet they have the luggage in there.”
“Could be,” I said as I found the pantry. I searched the food for what I thought wouldn’t poison me and came away with a killer find. “Dude! Peanut butter!”
“Really?” Charlie asked as he finished and zipped up. There was a large bottle of hand sanitizer on the counter and he used it before coming over to me. “Where the hell was that?”
“Behind the cans of tuna and smoked sausages,” I said. “Which still have two months on their dates too.”
“Shit,” Charlie said. “I ate all those crappy crackers when there was peanut butter and tuna?”