Riding The Apocalypse

by Frank Ignagni III

  That fucking smell!

  I started to panic. I imagined Charles reanimating and biting my neck, shoving his head between the back of my helmet and my leather jacket. Was he alive, or at least undead? Did he just move? Or was that the other monsters, did they get around Charles? I began to flail my legs, trying to hook something to use to lift myself away from my dead friend.

  “I’m sorry, Charles, shit, I’m sorry!” I screamed, trying to thrust him away but afraid to let go of the protection he afforded me. Suddenly, I felt weightless. The body, the clawing arms, the thick smell, and the tire iron in my grasp were all gone. Buell had jerked me back over the fence. He then pulled me to the ground and grabbed the front of my jacket with both hands.

  “Rem, it’s okay, man, it’s okay. Fuck, he was already dead!” Buell yelled. “Just sit for a sec, chill, we got this.” He got up and returned to the fight.

  I sat there in a daze, looking at Charles’s body with the tire iron protruding out from his head and torso. He was still upright, having fallen face-first against the fence. His bitten cheek tucked neatly into one of the thousands of diamonds formed by the metal mesh. What were the fucking odds? It fit so perfectly. His mortal wound was highlighted for me to see. Like I needed to be reminded. Why the fuck did that happen?

  I laid back in the dirt, flipped open my visor, and stared straight out of my helmet. The blue and white pattern of the sky and clouds was a temporary reprieve from all the hell that surrounded me. There was no blood, gore, or fighting from the view of my helmet. I lay there motionless, grateful for the lack of peripheral vision.

  Just blue and white.

  The last few monsters climbed atop of the previously fallen at the base of the fence and made a valiant attempt to reach us. However, they were quickly disposed of by Max’s and Buell’s well-placed blows.

  I was exhausted, but as far as I could see through my blood-soaked visor, we had cleaned them all for now. Not using the guns kept us from attracting too much attention from the other monsters farther away from my garage. I sat up, looked at Buell and Max. They didn’t say a word. Max put his hand out, helped me up, and with a firm slap on the back, Max set me at ease.

  Max was just that guy.

  We jumped on our bikes as Max opened the gate, and—with one last glance at Emily’s ruined Corvette—began what we hoped was a sojourn to the coast.

  Buell was running point as I watched him carefully maneuver around a few new monsters who had approached from the end of the street after hearing the ruckus. Max was also ahead of me; his bright red Ducati was shining in the morning sunlight. It truly was a gorgeous bike. I hoped it would stay that way.

  “Hey, Max, why didn’t we do the kill all the monsters through the fence and then leave plan the first time Buell and I went to Kmart?” I chirped on the intercom. “Wouldn’t that have been easier and less risky than our previous plan? Couldn’t we have just done that?”

  “Nope,” Max answered laconically.

  “Why the hell not, Max?” Buell added.

  “ ’Cause we didn’t think of it,” Max replied dryly.

  Buell’s cackling through the helmet sounded like a flock of ducks in a phone booth full of pita bread.

  “Oh, yeah, gotcha,” I replied.

  While it seems funny, Max made a darned valid point. I can remember so many times watching a movie and thinking, why didn’t the actor just do this or that instead of whatever they were actually doing in the film. Now I realize it’s because in real life, sometimes you just don’t think of it. There is no writing and rewriting in real life. It never crossed our minds to kill the monsters through the fence, not once the whole time we planned Buell’s and my original sojourn.

  Bygones.

  We leaned into Big Lazy just fast enough for my rear tire to break loose and slide a tad rounding the turn. The pace Buell set would certainly be a challenge. Looking forward, both bikes were completing the turn and braking hard for the sharp U-turn at the bike path.

  “Heading for the Par Course’s path,” Buell said through the intercom.

  We decided we were going to ride the bicycle path through the middle of the Campbell Recreational Center. This path, Par Course, runs along the city’s percolation ponds, used for water purification. It virtually bisects the small city in half. One side is the ponds, which can also be fished during the summer months, and the other side is the foothills leading west toward the mountains. If we headed west through the park, we could skip the congested roads and save time. That was the plan. This bike path would take us to the base of the foothills in Los Gatos, and from that point, we could subsequently ride on fire roads south toward Monterey and Senator Punkass.

  I had ridden the eight miles of this bike path at least a hundred times, but always on a bicycle. The path was narrow, but because there were no crowds at the moment, it was easy to avoid the shoulder and hills along the right. Of course staying out of the ponds on my left would also be advantageous.

  Looking ahead, I saw the brake lights on both motorcycles go bright red, with Max’s Ducati leaving a black skid mark resembling a profile of a slithering boa constrictor along the path.

  “We have a slight problem here,” Buell quipped as he stopped short.

  We pulled alongside of him, three abreast, narrowly fitting on the skinny path. There was a young woman and a child hunched over right in the middle of the trail. There was another person, lying facedown on the path. The body was perpendicular to the trail, thereby completely blocking our route. At first glance it looked like a large glistening red chunk of flesh. Had it not been for the one unmolested foot, this poor human would have been virtually unrecognizable.

  As I inched closer, I saw the woman snap her head toward us, causing bloody bits of flesh to swing from her mouth like a mouthpiece ejected from a boxer after a solid punch. Showing us her bloodred teeth as a warning to stay away from her prey, she let out a bone-chilling rasp and went back to her meal. Her stomach was grossly distended, though I doubt she was with child. The smaller girl never lifted her head, just continued to bury her face in the lower back of the partially devoured carcass.

  I saw Buell’s left foot bang the shifter down two times, and with the roar of his Harley Davidson–powered twin motor, Buell was off to make room where there wasn’t any. Just before Buell reached the two kneeling creatures, he removed the crowbar from his chest zipper and swung it straight down and back up, much like a polo player. He caught the back of the head of the larger of the two beasts and severed it entirely from the body. The combination of a crowbar, Buell’s swing, and the speed of his bike provided more than enough force to destroy the monster’s vertebrae and leave the head to fend for itself. Buell shrieked into the helmet intercom as he flew by. Max, not to be outdone, merely dragged his steel toe boot down the path, and just as he approached the girl, kicked upward, catching the little monster on her bloody chin. The sound of the neck cracking was loud enough to hear through my helmet insulation. It was sickening, but the effect was positive. Or at least as positive as disabling a feral child can be. She was knocked back and rolled to her side. I then followed the two road warriors through the now cleared roadblock, my only concern not to slip on the blood.

  “Jesus, you guys are taking to this pretty well,” I shouted into my helmet mic.

  “I don’t have time to stop and chat,” Max replied. “I am ready for some trail riding, how ’bout you guys?”

  Just as I was about to reply, the brake lights came on again, but this time for another rider approaching from the other direction. He had his hand up, waving us down. Relieved to see another human who was not pale with black eyes, we slowed up immediately. I flipped up my visor as we stopped face-to-face on the trail. Taking the opportunity to breathe the fresh air.

  “Hey, where you guys headed?” the helmetless rider yelled as he shut off his motorcycle. He had a grin a mile wide and seemed cool from the start.

  “South to Monterey. We’re thinking of taking the fire road
s along the foothills and mountains to stay off the main roads,” Max said to our new acquaintance.

  The road warrior was riding a Harley Davidson Fat Bob, which boasts a seventeen hundred cubic centimeter power plant, a classic street cruiser. He looked the part, kitted out in a black leather vest, ragged jeans, and easily over two hundred and fifty pounds. His beard was a little tattered, but he looked healthy and unhurt otherwise.

  “That may work. When you get to the fire roads, watch for traffic, lots of riders and groups of civilians are up there camped out. When all this shit went down, lots of us went to the hills for refuge, and we got a pretty decent thing going at the reservoir. So take it easy up the hill, huh. Be smart,” he said, tapping his black and gray windblown hair.

  “Name is Augie, by the way,” he added, putting his fist out.

  Buell tapped his fist with his and introduced us by name. We were all instantly bonded. Hard to explain, it’s a motorcycle thing.

  “So we weren’t the only ones who thought of heading to the hills, huh?” Buell asked, already knowing the answer.

  “No, we are doing our best up there, but word is the virus got spread through the flu vaccinations or some shit, so every once in a while somebody turns. Can’t trust anyone. You get the shot?”

  “No, but we heard the same. Where did you hear it, I thought everything was down?” Max asked.

  “Radio stations are popping up now. People are getting dug in. I heard it from some guy broadcasting from his mom’s basement,” Augie added. “Our camp is just above Lexington Reservoir, we had a few hundred people there last count. I think if we can get the word out, and get people to band together, we got a shot to beat this. Hell, just a few days ago I was worried ’cause my big screen television was on the blink, and I didn’t want to deal with a salesman. Now I’m worried about the end of the human race.” He laughed. “Makes you wonder don’t it?” Augie said as he glanced around nervously.

  On a regular day, Augie would be seen as just another street tough. But looks are deceiving, he was a regular guy, just like us with the same worries and fears. He looked as if he could beat up a bar full of assholes, but he sounded worried and I didn’t like seeing tough guys not being tough.

  “I gotta run, heading back to my girlfriend’s apartment to see if her fucking cat showed up, oh, and her brother,” he said, again laughing. “Don’t know which one she is more worried about,” Augie said with a shake of his head.

  “You are a helluva boyfriend,” I said my faith in the natural order of things somewhat restored. “We will be on the lookout. Good to hear there are people fighting this thing, it looks pretty bad downtown. I think the best offense is gonna be a good defense for a while.”

  “Yeah,” Augie answered as he started the Harley back up. “Never did care much for city livin’ anyway.” He winked. “See ya down the road, I hope. Hey, one more thing… ride safe.” Augie tapped Max’s handlebar and sped off.

  “Well, looks like we’re not going to be all alone out here,” Buell said.

  “That can be a good or bad thing,” Max added as he started his bike and dropped it down a gear triggering the classic Ducati “clunk.” “We ready, ladies?”

  Buell and I replied by starting up our own motorcycles. Buell shot out in front, and down the trail we went. The path opened up wider as we went through Vasona Park, a county park in Los Gatos just a few miles southeast of my garage.

  I saw a few people in the park, in pickup trucks all backed against each other in a pack with people bearing weapons protecting them. It reminded me of a modern wagon circling. I looked to my right as we passed and saw a couple on a bass boat out on the lake; it looked like they were fishing. I guess fishing could serve two purposes; sustenance and therapy. Not a terrible idea, I thought as we rode by. The worst day fishing…

  “Wow, there are a lot more survivors holed up here than I thought there would be.” Buell’s voice echoed through my headset.

  “I count less than a dozen,” Max said.

  “More than zero, Mr. Drag. Stop being so negative, man, that’s Rem’s job.”

  “Easy, fellas, we got a long way to go,” I said.

  I have to admit, it was nice to see other people. The fact that we were in a dead-end business park actually isolated us from what was going on toward the hills. From the roof of the garage, we could not see this area, and hopefully these hills held more good news.

  We continued southwest on the Par Course. After we got through the park, the road narrowed again. In the distance we could see the Lexington Reservoir Dam.

  “Daaammmmmm.”

  Yeah, that was Buell, every time. Lexington was a large man-made reservoir about seven hundred feet above sea level, just outside of the Santa Cruz Mountains. This is where Augie said they were holed up. As we rode toward the reservoir, we had to climb the right side of the face of the dam from the dry bottom of the back side of the reservoir. I looked up to my left and saw dark streaks running down the lower section of the face of the dam as we ascended to the right. The streaks looked to be dark brown or crimson in color.

  “What the fuck?” I asked no one in particular.

  As we rode up the right side, the trail split off a little more than halfway up the face of the dam. There was a gate that could close off either road, left or straight. There was an option to continue straight up the right side of the face, and another to bear left, and ascend the dam from about three quarters of the way up, toward the left side of the face. I took a quick look down the left option, though the road was closed off by the gate. I stopped dead in my tracks. Were they dancing?

  “Hey, Max, Bu—”

  “I see it,” Max interrupted. “What the fuck? What am I looking at?”

  “Look over there, ha, that is hilarious!” Buell shouted and pointed down the road that veered left across the face of the dam. If I could believe what I was looking at, it was a huge canopy at the end of the road. Under the canopy were at least two dozen people dancing, socializing, and eating. I swear I smelled a barbecue. After taking off my helmet, I could clearly hear some sort of music.

  As I looked down the dam face, following the crimson streaks, I realized there were hundreds of monsters at the bottom of the dam. Most were dead, and in multiple pieces. There were also many more monsters trying to crawl up the face of the dam from some four hundred feet below. They were still trying to get to the people above, but their arms were some three hundred and ninety-five feet too short. It looked like a zombie roach motel.

  “Do you see what they are doing?” Buell said, laughing.

  “Yeah, that is pretty damn creative,” I said.

  “Not you too, Rem? Really?” Max said, shaking his head.

  “Nice one, Rem!” Buell said, slapping his gas tank.

  “Wait, what?” I was confused. Oh, pretty damn creative. That was an unintentional pun, but I stayed silent and took the credit for it. I will take it where I can get it.

  Regardless, we all realized what the survivors were doing. As the monsters came up the hill and went left, following the music and partying, they were unceremoniously pushed right off the dam by three guys with long poles of some sort who were stationed above the path. The road that splits to the left was for the monsters to follow. The people dancing at the edge of the road were obviously decoys, baiting the trap. Willing participants in a system to deposit the dead on the floor of the dam. The streaks I had seen on the dam face were blood streaks from the undead scraping it on the long way down. Genius. If a monster came up the path toward the camp, they were drawn toward the party area, and nudged off the side. This was a shrewd tactic and saved ammo as well.

  “Pretty ingenious if you ask me,” Max said. “They have a natural funnel there, and they are leading them to it.” He pointed to the handful of people under a canopy dancing to the drums.

  After getting our fill of zombies being punted over a four hundred foot dam face (surprisingly mesmerizing), we stayed to the right and rode up to the top of
the dam. As we crested the hill I saw Lexington Reservoir unfold in front of me. The lake was quite serene as long as I resisted the urge to turn around one hundred and eighty degrees to the carnage behind me.

  In the reservoir created by the rivers that fed into the valley, I saw a mini scene out of Woodstock. I noticed at least half a dozen women without tops sunbathing or swimming. I smelled smoke that I was almost sure was not cigarettes, and the overall feel was less than rigid. There were hundreds of people surrounding the lake; real estate was packed with tents, RV’s, and any other sort of portable shelter. There were fires burning, kids playing and boating in the lake, just a normal California fall afternoon, but with a tad less inhibition. I don’t think anyone could find fault with how these good folks were handling the end of the world as we knew it. As long as they were not raping and pillaging, I dug it.

  The area had a natural barrier on three sides, and the man-made dam on the fourth. Two of the barriers were steep hills, and one was the actual body of water itself. The only direct road to the compound was the road that led up to the dam that we just traversed. As we crossed the top of the dam itself, we could see armed men with rifles guarding all possible areas of entry from the hills. Within days these people had adapted and formed a somewhat peaceful existence without any help from politicians, lawmakers, bureaucrats, or anything created by Steve Jobs.

  Go figure.

  The breeze shifted, and it hit me like a ton of bricks. I gagged and spit the saliva from my teeth, immediately trying to breathe through my mouth.

  That fucking smell.

  “Yeah, the only downside so far, the smell,” exclaimed a uniformed man with a gruff voice. He approached us as we were taking off our heavy gear and taking in the sights. He looked like a San Jose city police officer at first glance. San Jose is a large city that is adjacent to both Cupertino and Campbell. “Aaron Shieky,” he said as he put his hand out toward Buell. “California Highway Patrol.”

  I was close.