Adrift

by Trimboli, TJ

  Which fate is worse?

  Her decision was cut short at the sound of a gasp. She turned around to see Doris at the door staring at her. Bobbi’s heart sank as she struggled to come up with something to say. She put her pointer finger up to her mouth. “Shhh, Just listen to me for a second.”

  Doris grabbed the door slamming it shut. Bobbi darted to the door but Doris managed to get the lock on. She banged against it but it wouldn’t budge. She heard shuffling around on the other side of the door.

  “It’s the Sheriff.” She heard Doris mutter.

  “Bobbi?” Valentina called out.

  Bobbi said nothing.

  “Bobbi, what do you think you’re doing?” Valentina pleaded.

  “What’s right,” she shouted back.

  “What were you planning to do Bobbi?”

  Bobbi refused to reply, knowing full well the repercussions if she did.

  “I didn’t want it to come to this Bobbi. You’re sick…Maybe not sick like the rest of them down there but your mind is destroying you. You need help. I don’t know, maybe Richard will be able to help you but you can’t be trusted anymore. I wish I didn’t have to do this but…” Valentina said trailing off.

  “You’re off the council Bobbi, effective immediately,” Kendra said. “You are no longer fit to protect yourself let alone anyone on this ship.”

  “You’re wrong Val. You put your bet on the wrong horse,” Bobbi said sternly.

  “I’m sorry Bobbi but this ship has warped your mind,” Valentina replied.

  “Doris, stand guard here until we find someone to replace you. Under no circumstances is anyone to receive tonight’s rations until we find someone to properly transport Bobbi to somewhere she won’t hurt anyone or herself, understood?” Kendra asked of her.

  “Understood,” Doris replied.

  “GOD grant you the serenity you need Bobbi,” Kendra said.

  “Val! Let me out of here! You’re making a big mistake!” Bobbi shouted but it had no effect. Valentina and Kendra were long gone and Bobbi was shouting only to Doris who paid her no attention. She sat back against the wall defeated. She looked around the room for anything she could use but it was no use. There was nothing she could do to get free but wait. She thought of all the people she would fail tonight, the sick, Trent, Becky, Richard and as she thought about each one of them, she slowly drifted off to sleep.

  With a deafening crash, everything in the storage room collided into Bobbi, waking her from her sleep. Pushing the debris off of her, she checked herself for any fatal damage. Blood seeped down her forehead but she felt no gaping wound upon inspection. She slowly stood up. “Doris.

  Doris, what happened?” she shouted banging on the door.

  The door slid open, revealing Doris’ corpse resting against the counter. Half her neck had been torn off, blood staining her body.

  Bobbi slowly walked past her. Shocked, she ran for the windows. Outside, she could see land.

  We crashed. How did we get moving again?

  The sun shone bright in the sky. She guessed that the night had come and gone while Valentina and Kendra had done their dirty work, finding a way to get the ship moving again. She set off in search of them, in search of anyone who could make sense of the night.

  She found no one as she traversed the halls of the ship. Every room, bathroom, dining hall, auditorium, was empty. Not a soul was in sight, not even a corpse. She made her way down to the embargo level, figuring everyone had already made their way off the ship. She stopped at the room where she left Trent, hoping to God that no one had found him through the night. Her hopes were shattered when she entered the room to find it empty like all the others. The handcuffs still latched onto the pipe. The end that was cuffed to Trent was covered in blood. She closed her eyes, stifling her tears as best she could. She screamed punching the wall beside her. She grabbed her hand in pain feeling the broken knuckles dangling by a thread against her ligaments.

  Leaving the room, she headed towards the disembarkation room. She pulled the door open to reveal the bright sunny day before her. The breeze hit her and the smell of freshly cut grass perforated her nostrils against the pungent smell of high tide. The walkway had been cast from the ship to the harbor. Still, she saw no one in sight. If their were other survivors, surely they would have stuck close to the ship. The silence was unsettling. Though she feared the worst, she forced herself onto the walkway towards land.

  I have to know.

  The harbor looked deserted. Cranes left with their motors running, dingy engines idling humming, suitcases thrown about. She passed it all, heading up the road that led towards the city. It was uphill and she struggled to make her way to the top. She couldn’t remember the last time she ate and as she used up whatever energy she had left, she fully felt the effects the ship had taken on her. She crawled on all fours the last third of the way up. Finally, after what felt like hours, she crested the top collapsing on the blacktop. The sun rested at its pinnacle now beating down harsh rays of sunlight against her skin. The heat tore at her body instantly sun-burning her arms and legs. She sat up forcing herself to look for shade.

  Bobbi sat horrified to see a city ahead of her. It lay in ruin. Tall buildings burned, fires raging from top to bottom, cars sat on the road in front of her, abandoned, blood seeping out from the doors. Papers and garbage kicked up with the wind traveling through the wasteland truly giving off the appearance that she was all alone. Dead bodies lay everywhere, as far as her eyes could see. Flesh torn from their bodies, entrails spilled about, organs squashed under cars or half eaten on the side of the road. Her stomach lurched and if she had eaten anything in the last twenty four hours, she would have surely thrown it back up, but alas the tank was empty and so too, was her spirits.

  An object hit her from behind and she fell forward. Grabbing the back of her head, she turned to see it was a frisbee that collided with her skull. Dazed and confused, she reached over grabbing it. She heard someone whistle off in the distance. Standing up, she looked to her left, away from the city, shocked.

  Two kids were shouting at her to throw it back to them. They jumped up in the air, smiling and waving at her. Behind the kids, was a beautiful little suburban town that seemed to be thriving. The grass was green as could be, the townsfolk were all out going about their day as if the city in ruin before them was mere myth. Families BBQ’d, kids played, dad’s mowed their lawns while the woman chatted and drank lemonade. She stared at the frisbee in her hand unsure of what to do. She turned back towards the city and the raging fires.

  Slowly, the dozens of corpses strewn around the cars rose. Smelling Bobbi, they all turned their attention towards her.

  She froze in place. As each body stood up, she saw the dozens and dozens of people she lived with on the ship.

  Xao rose next to a Chrysler, eyes gouged out.

  Becky slid out from under a smart car, split in half at the waist, crawling towards her.

  Richard screamed from his spot on the hood of a Bentley. His stomach had been ripped to shreds as if he gave birth to a xenomorph. “Run Bobbi, for the love of God, get out of here!” he shouted.

  Kendra appeared beside the hood of the car, her left arm missing, blood dripping from her mouth, a ravenous growl protruding from her lips. She latched her teeth into Richard’s neck gnawing at his throat.

  Two feet in front of her, beside the stripped clean Ford Fiesta, Trent rose. His eyes were bloodshot, body intact, yet his entire body had been stripped of its flesh. Still, he slowly lurched towards her, mouth open, teeth gnashing against each other. Pieces of flesh still resided in his teeth.

  She turned to run but no matter how fast her feet fled, she made no progress. She stopped, realizing she was stuck on top of the hill.

  The denizens of suburbia paid no attention to the zombies on the road.

  “HELP!” Bobbi screamed.

  They paid her no mind. To them, there was no threat, no imminent arrival of the zombie horde. It was there, a
t the BBQ, she saw Valentina grilling up food for her two kids. They ran around her shooting at each other with water guns. The three of them howled with laughter, having the time of their lives. Next to them at the table, she sat, feeding potato salad to Trent. She looked down at the frisbee but was shocked instead to see the plate of food. She looked up to see Trent sitting next to her eating his hamburger. She stood up looking at the edge of town where she once stood. The road was clean as a whistle, cars flying by on their way to and from work, life continued on as it always had.

  What the fuck is happening to me?

  “Life, baby,” Trent replied.

  She turned to look at him, horrified to find herself back on the hill, zombified Trent standing next to her. He barred his teeth sinking them into her flesh.

  She woke with a fright kicking at the cabinets beside her while screaming.

  Doris banged on the door. “You’d be smart to keep quiet and not make any more trouble for yourself!”

  Bobbi realized it was only a dream but boy—what a dream it was. She sat ruminating over what just occurred and what it could possibly mean to her. She couldn’t quite explain it but it made her even more certain that there was still life to be lived back on land and maybe what they left behind wasn’t as doomed as they thought it was. Whatever it was, they would soon find out, just as soon as she got out of here. With a renewed vigor, she got up. The pantry next to her toppled over and she turned amazed to see a little girl raiding the pantry for one of the last cans of beans.

  “Hey!” Bobbi said.

  The little girl turned around and she found herself not so surprised to see the young child she had crossed paths with the other day.

  Crafty little girl she is.

  The little girl jumped back like a scared cat climbing up the pantry.

  Bobbi grabbed her pulling her off.

  The kid kicked and tugged trying to free herself.

  “It’s okay. Relax. Relax! Remember me? From the other day. Look at me.” Bobbi set the kid down.

  The little girl looked her in the eyes and began to calm down.

  Bobbi took that as a sign that the child did in fact remember her. She let the kid go. “How did you get in here?”

  The kid looked to the ceiling and it was now that Bobbi noticed the vent at the top of the storage room.

  The kid must have unscrewed it from the inside to drop down and collect food for herself.

  I wonder how long she’s been doing this.

  The kid took the beans out of her bag handing them back to Bobbi. She looked down at the floor afraid to make eye contact with Bobbi.

  “Don’t worry kid. I’m not going to turn you in,” she said.

  The kid lit up at that, pulling her face up to meet her gaze. She smiled taking back the beans.

  Bobbi stopped her grabbing them. “I will let you keep this on one condition.” The kid said nothing, simply waiting for Bobbi to name her condition.

  It became clear to Bobbi now that it must have been weeks since this kid last spoke. She’d probably been on her own for a long time now.

  “Can you get me to the first floor and the infirmary through these vents?” Bobbi asked.

  The kid didn’t answer. She grabbed the beans from Bobbi putting them in her bag.

  To Bobbi, that was answer enough.

  The kid climbed up the pantry disappearing into the vent.

  Bobbi followed behind her, pausing briefly before entering the vent. It was going to be a tight fit and she was dangerously afraid of tight spaces but she gathered her courage and forced herself in, not for herself but for her husband, and for the sick, all of whom would die tonight if she could not conquer her fears.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

  VALENTINA

  Glancing from behind the curtain, she watched the auditorium fill. What was left of their meager clan sat spread out as far from one another as one could be. Valentina knew their numbers had dwindled but it wasn’t until everyone found a spot that she saw how thinned out they’d managed to become. There were two floors of seats and they barely filled out a third of the bottom floor.

  She tapped her hand against her knee, beads of sweat dripping from her brow. The sun had gone down well over an hour ago, yet from where she stood, she could have sworn it was midday. The heat seemed unbearable. She tried to imagine cool thoughts but nothing would stick. She’d picture two scoops of vanilla ice cream in a cone with rainbow sprinkles and as she’d lick her lips, the heat would melt the ice cream in her hand. She’d picture a tray of ice grazing along her neck, frigid at first but ecstasy the next, until the heat turned it to boiling water burning at her back. It made her light headed.

  I’m prone to faint if we don’t get this show on the road.

  A hand reached out tugging at her shoulder. Jumping out of her skin, she turned to see Kendra standing before her. “Christ. You startled me.”

  “My apologies Mother. It’s almost time,” Kendra replied. “Are you nervous?”

  “Shameful to say that I am.”

  “They are just people, same as you and me, hopeless and afraid. You should have no problems addressing them,” Kendra said.

  “It’s not talking to them that worries me so. It’s the confessing of my sins that’s troubling me. Earlier, I figured they would come flooding out but now, before all these people. I can’t think of one,” Valentina lamented.

  “It’s simple Mother. Just think of anything you’ve ever done in your life that you were terrified to tell anyone else for fear of judgement. We all fear the judge, even judges themselves.

  We’re all afraid of opinions. Find the ones you never told anyone, and do so now.” Kendra advised smiling. She brushed her hand against Val’s cheeks before walking away.

  Valentina took a deep breath closing her eyes to psyche herself up.

  You are strong, you are wise, but most importantly, you are not your father. You will lead where he followed, and once you are fully reborn of him, you will give these people hope, and you will find them a new place to live their lives. Take a deep breath, count to five and when you open your eyes, you do what needs to be done.

  She took one more deep breath and opened her eyes. The tapping of her hand ceased. She watched Kendra stride to the middle of the stage.

  What few conversations were going on in the crowd silenced. All eyes were on this woman.

  Kendra took the time to stare each section of people in the eyes before uttering even one syllable. “We have suffered much on this ship, haven’t we? One need only look around at all the empty seats to know it is true. Husbands, Wives, Children, Siblings. You name it, we’ve lost it. In the beginning, it was a blessing, wasn’t it? To find out the world died around you, yet you were safe to its fatal touch…but now it seems more like a curse than anything. A sick TV show we once would watch. Tune in as the last humans left on the planet, bicker, backstab, starve, and murder until there are none of them left. Well…we won’t allow it.” Turning to Valentina, she beckoned her to join by her side.

  Valentina flattened her newly acquired robe picking dust from its clutches. She strode out to join Kendra making it a point to look each one in the face just as Kendra had.

  These people need to see us as equals. Two sides of a coin working in tandem with each other.

  She couldn’t help but look at the floor of the stage where the large pale of water resided. In all the craziness and worry of sin, she forgot that soon enough she would be forcibly drowned. Knowing she would be coming back a few seconds later didn’t make the anticipation of the act any easier. She stood at Kendra’s side now, surveying the crowd. She simply nodded at Kendra to continue.

  They had both decided earlier that it would be better to see Kendra speak to the crowd. After all, they listened to Val for near a month and look at what it’d got them. She needed to show the crowd that she was open to adapting and allying herself with a new cause. “Valentina and I met this morning with her council and after hours of deliberation, we hav
e found common ground and will be working together from now on. There has been too much hostility on each of our parts and just like I’ve told you all since day one, we need to all come together if we are to escape this purgatory. For too long have we looked out only for our own interests and I don’t just mean since we got on this ship. We lost our way and God punished us for it, but he left us few behind to be tested. To prove to him that mankind deserves another chance. All throughout history, we have been given these tests. From the nomads, to the black plague, from the Nazi’s, to Isis, and now zombies. He is testing us and the enemy is not the zombies waiting for us on land, but the ones here on this ship. Ourselves. We must overcome our pettiness, our aloneness, our politicking, we must become one for the good of mankind. For the good of ourselves.” She said it all with such a rigorous passion, it brought tears to Valentina’s eyes.

  The people were firmly behind her every word. They sat unflinching, hanging on every syllable.

  Kendra whistled and four of her disciple’s appeared on stage.

  They branded straight razors and scissors.

  Here we go.

  They stood before her waiting for her to de-robe. It took her a minute to catch on but eventually she did, and slowly removed the robe over her head. She resisted the urge to cover up her voluptuous breasts fearing the people would think she wasn’t receptive to this method. She stood strong, barring herself for them all to see. No one snickered, no one uttered a word. Though a few of the men cast menacingly lustful leers, she didn’t fear for her life. No one could harm her worse than the loss of her children. She stood unfazed by their cursory glances.

  “To give you all a show of good faith and to prove how committed we are to seeing this new journey through together, our leader Valentina, has agreed to undergo our ritual and be born anew in hopes that you will all follow suit and let her lead you to a better life.” Kendra said.

  The people cheered rapturously. Behind her, the men with scissors began cutting her hair.

  “And if at any point, I should fall. Look to Kendra to guide you to safety, to keep you moving forward, as she has helped me move forward,” Valentina said suddenly. She didn’t know what made the words came out but she felt glad she said it. Kendra had given her a new lease on life. She’d done more for this ship in one afternoon than Bobbi, Xao or Richard ever did combined and she deserved to be rewarded for it.