"Hey Jack," one of the humans shouted to him, "take a look at that."
"Yeah," said one of the human females. "That zombie looks like it's trying to tell us something."
"What?" Jack said skeptically, lowering his hammer. He watched my gestures and I pointed back toward the grocery store behind him. He was completely confused.
"Now it's smiling," the human female said. "Look! It's totally smiling."
"It looks like it's ... pointing at the store," one of the human men said.
"Now why in the God-lovin' world would a zombie point at the store?" Jack growled.
But then he looked behind the group, where three zombies now milled about, clearly on the wrong side of the perimeter.
"Oh, son of a bitch!" Jack exclaimed.
"Shit!" one of the others said, and began heading for the store. And as they turned, I drew both of my revolvers.
"Hey!" I shouted in an angry rasp.
Some of the humans regarded me.
I winked.
Then I started pulling triggers, shooting with both hands at once, like something out of a Western. The recoil of the guns jarred my numb hands, but I did not let go. I shot and shot until the guns were empty-six bullets from each weapon.
One of my shots hit Jack, and he spun around and fell. The rest of the humans had started running, but I still brought down three of them, leaving just one lithe female unharmed and sprinting back toward the grocery store. (Let me say that again: I hit four out of five, and I was shooting from the hip. Given my total lack of training with firearms, I think this was absolutely remarkable.)
"Omigod!" the running woman screamed to whoever was still inside the store. "Get your guns! Get your guns! There are people out here too!"
Only one of the humans I'd shot actually looked dead. The rest, including Jack, looked wounded just temporarily down. I took my time reloading the revolvers.
"C'mon guys," I rasped to the zombies around me. "There's an entrance around back. Follow me." A few of them seemed to get the idea. We walked to the back of the perimeter behind the grocery store where more zombies had started making their way through the hole. I tried to encourage even more of them to follow me, and ducked through. I rounded the side of the store in time to see a new human-a skinny man armed with a rifleemerge from the grocery entrance. He was running fast. He dodged zombies skillfully, weaving this way and that, making his way toward the group lying prone on the ground. The moment he reached his colleagues, I shot him in the back.
Most of the zombies were still at the front of the fence-the humans so tantalizingly close, yet so far away. A zombie sidled up next to me. It was the Turk.
"I knew I could trust you to figure it out," I said to him.
Screams began to erupt. A few zombies were already upon the humans. The others, across the fence, gnashed their teeth angrily. Jack, however, was fighting them off with his pointy dowel. I'd hit him in the thigh, but he was still able to hop around a bit. Now he was back on the offensive. He used the dowel like a spear-fighting with overhand thrusts. Mostly, he just kept the zombies at hay, but now and then he struck home on an older, more-brittle zombie, and sent it down with a hole in its forehead. Worst of all, I could see there was real joy in it for him.
Some part of my memory triggered. I knew this man, it told me. Knew his kind. A survivalist.
Not all survivalists were problematic, of course. I mean, soldiers needed survivalist skills in case they became stranded in the course of a mission. The same was true for explorers or people who traveled in isolated regions. But this man, Jack, belonged to that peculiarly cynical variety characterized by a pervading feeling that the world was on its way out. According to these men and women, things were crumbling and society was doomed-and the only solution was to hide on the side of a hill with a bunch of canned food and guns.
It was, in a word, solipsism. I remembered that word from my philosophy classes, and I remembered that it was what I hated about these guys. They had given up on everyone but themselves. You say your community's not what you'd like it to be? Your government seems wasteful and impersonal? Each day, the world feels a little less like a place you can relate to? The solution isn't to stockpile food and prepare to shoot your neighbor if he tries to climb inside your fallout shelter. No. That's beyond insane. The solution is to try to improve society, not run from it. You interact with that world. You try to make it a better place. You run for city council. You mentor. You don't just give up.
And that was what really upset me about the expression on his face. It was more than pleasure at having an opportunity to use his obviously well-honed spear-fighting skills. It was the pleasure of validation. The pleasure of having been right all along when those around you said you were crazy.
I wondered how many relationships this man had severed in his life-how many friends and family members who loved him he'd alienated-all for the sake of militant preparedness. And now, of course, he felt vindicated. It seemed he'd been right all along.
The thing was, he wasn't right-not at all. The federal government was the last, best hope for people, and from every report there was at least something akin to order down in Columbus. It was people like this guy who'd chosen to "go it alone" and let the rest of the country go to hell who'd been taken to hell themselves. The fate Jack had wished on others was the one he'd received himself. I sauntered over at an unhurried pace that contrasted sharply with his war cries and manic stabbing.
"Hey," I said to him, gently pushing the other zombies out of the way. His eyes were boiling with rage and terror, and he did not seem to hear me at first. "I'm talking to you," I said. "Hey, you! Spear guy. Jack."
Then he looked at me, javelin raised. Startled. Terrified. As I watched, the terror became confusion. Then anger. Then wonderment. He took a step back.
"You're with them?" he asked, unable to understand who or what I was.
"Just so you know," I said, taking careful aim at his forehead, "you're dead wrong. You would've been much safer down in Columbus."
Cack! I put a bullet between his eyes, and the back of his head exploded. He went down-big and mean and camouflaged and dead. The other zombies were upon his corpse almost before he hit the ground.
I stood there quietly, looking at Jack's corpse and debating my next move, when I heard a gunshot and my left shoulder jumped in a puff of grime and dust. I fell to one knee and swiveled around. Behind me, three more humans-including the lithe woman and the scraggly man in the parka-had emerged from the store. They were armed-two with rifles, and the lithe woman with an Uzi, which she nervously leveled in my direction. They were perhaps fifteen yards away.
There were more than twenty zombies in the yard with me now, but these humans had seen enough of my interaction with Jack to understand (correctly) that I posed the biggest threat to them. I dropped completely flat against the ground and steadied my guns against the cold concrete. We all fired our weapons at once. The woman's Uzi went brrrrrrap! and made the concrete dance around me. It was terrifying, but only lasted four or five seconds. If she hit me, I didn't notice it. I emptied my guns again, and they jerked violently in my hands. I hit one of the men square in the chest, and he went down, dead. I hit Parka Man in the leg. He fell to one knee and started screaming. ("OhGodOhGodOhGod ...") His kneecap had exploded and yellow matter was leaking out.
Then, a new group of zombies emerged from the side of the store. One of the quicker ones shuffled toward Parka Man as hastily as it could. Parka Man was completely oblivious, and the zombie pounced before the human knew what had hit him. The other zombies followed, and made short work of him.
The lithe woman was unhurt so far-by bullets or by zombiesbut looked terrified by this new group of undead that had rounded the side of the store. She cast one final, sad glance at her friends who were being eaten, and ran back inside. She slammed the glass door shut and began stacking sacks of water-softener salt against it, until I could no longer see inside.
I carefully rose from my
prone position and reloaded my guns.
More zombies spilled inside the perimeter, and then more still. They made their way to the front of the grocery. When I felt concealed from view, I holstered my guns and took off my hat. I had no clue if it was possible for the humans to shoot from inside the store, but I didn't want to risk her taking potshots.
Finishing off this woman was going to be a challenge, but I was up to it. We all were. I ate Jack's brain and considered the best course of action.
Moments later, I was in back of the grocery store, and my ear was against the glass window. Inside, I could hear the lithe woman talking on a radio. It wasn't like a conversation with someone who was there, or someone you were talking to over the phone. It was like someone operating a ham radio, calling hopefully into the emptiness. She kept saying things like "Come in" and "Do you copy?"
Occasionally, she also described the attack that had just decimated her group and left her the only survivor. (That was good to know.) She described me in some detail. (I was properly flattered.) My race, sex, and physical characteristics. My clothes. My guns. She theorized that I was a human who had learned to live among the zombies, or who could possibly command zombies. She stressed that for some reason, zombies did not attack me. Perhaps I had mastered some sort of repellent. (Never did she theorize that I was just a zombie who could shoot and think and talk.)
My stomach was full of brains, but I suddenly wanted this one more than I could say. She knew me. She'd shot at me. She had even told her friends about me. This was practically a relationship. We were a star-crossed pair, destined to meet.
I idly wandered back around to the front of the building. After a little looking, I found a zombie who looked about my height and weight. I unloaded one of my revolvers and tied it to one of his hands with an old shirt. Then I managed to get my jacket on him. (Should have done that first. Hard to get it on over the gun.) I put my Kernels hat on his head as a finishing touch.
"You look good," I told him. "Now let's do this." I conducted my newly dressed zombie to the front door, and stood off to the side, in a position I hoped was out of sight.
"Hey, lady," I called, a little like a gravel-throated Jerry Lewis. "Hey, lady, it's me!"
There was no response. I knocked hard, then stepped away. "Hey, lady," I tried again. "It's ... the guy you were just shooting at. Remember me? I'll bet you do." Again, there was no response. The zombies milled about listlessly. (If she were near the door, they would likely smell her and become excited.) The Turk wandered over and looked at me curiously, cocking his neck like a confused dog.
"I heard you talking about me on the radio," I shouted. "I'm flattered. Completely flattered." Finally, a noise from inside. I looked up. So did the other zombies. They began to gather around the front of the store. I had her attention.
"Hey, can we talk?" I asked.
Silence followed. Then a voice, shaky and broken.
"What do you want?" she screamed.
It was a good question. (What to say? What to say? This woman desired life. I desired her death. And there, the impasse.)
I could not simply begin with the fact that I wanted to eat her brain. Instead, I knew I must begin by establishing the commonalities that create a rapport. After all, it was not as though we had nothing in common. We were both residents of Knox County, Ohio. We were both fumbling our way through a zombie apocalypse. And, most specifically, we were both hanging around the grocery store in Pipesville.
"A little like spring today, isn't it?" I said.
A. Very. Long. Pause.
Then: "What?!"
"The weather," I clarified. "I mean to say that it's a little like spring outside. A little warmer than it has been, no?"
"What?" she said again, as if she had misheard me.
"Not that it's going to last," I continued. "But that doesn't mean we can't go ahead and enjoy it, right?"
"Are ... Are you trying to talk to me about the weather?" the lithe woman asked, beginning to get the picture.
"I mean, unless you have something better in mind," I said. "We don't really know each other, but folks can always talk about the weather. Are you from Ohio? I am ... apparently."
"Why aren't the zombies attacking you?" she shouted. "Can you command them?"
Command was such a formal, official-sounding term. I kind of liked it. "Yes," I rasped after a moment. "I command them. They are my army of the night. Except ... umm ... They don't always do exactly what I want them to. I can get them interested in a direction usually, but they veer off whenever they smell something interesting. Sometimes they obey me and sometimes they don'tbut hey, even a stopped clock, right?"
"How do you get them to do that?" she asked.
"Uh, it's complicated," I said hoarsely, wishing there were something around for my parched throat. No pool or puddle presented itself.
"Excuse me," I tried again, "but have you got some water in there? Like some bottled water? That you could throw me?"
"What?" she said, harshly.
Back to this again.
"Could you please throw me a bottled water-maybe crack a window and throw it out?" I asked. "It's hard for me to talk."
Another. Very. Long. Pause.
"Am I crazy, or did you just shoot all of my friends?" she said.
I smiled. She had me there.
"Umm, as I recall, you were getting ready to stab my zombies in the forehead with your little homemade spears," I countered.
"But they're zombies," she said.
"They're my zombies," I corrected her. "And you were just going to kill them."
"They're zombies," she said. "I can't ... I can't even believe we're talking about this. I can't believe I'm talking to you. You killed all of my friends, you stupid fuck! Go fuck yourself!"
Go fuck yourself.
That sentiment was cold-cold like my flaccid zombie penis. (I had not achieved tumescence once since being reanimated. She didn't know what she was saying, of course, but it still felt like a hit below the belt.) This was quickly devolving into a standoff. I decided to change my approach.
"Can I apologize?" I asked. "I feel bad about this now."
"I'll fucking kill you," she shrieked.
"You can kill me if you want to, but I still want to say I'm sorry," I told her. "I really do feel terrible about all of it. How about this: You just open the door a tiny crack so I can apologize in person. If you want to shoot me, you can."
"I can already shoot you," she said.
I decided she was bluffing. There were no openings that I could see anywhere in the sandbagged front of the store. If she were truly looking out, she'd see that the zombie wearing my clothes and "holding" my gun was facing the wrong way. His lips weren't even moving.
Suddenly, like automatons brought to life with a restored flow of electricity, the zombies nearest to the store took an interest in the front windows. Even the zombie I'd dressed as me turned and began pawing at the front door. They could smell her. She had moved very close.
"Come on," I said, calling as loudly as I could from the side of the store. "Just open up a tiny crack."
"I'll open it up and I'll shoot you!" she screamed.
I was close. So close.
"Go ahead, if that's what you really want," I told her. "Do what you gotta do."
I drew my gun and crept near. From out of nowhere, there was a shattering of glass and the sound of blistering gunfire. The zombie dressed as me began to shake as if a seizure had taken him. The lithe woman had spread apart the sandbags and was firing through the glass door with her Uzi.
As the fake-me disintegrated before my eyes, I watched the woman's weapon spit its fiery fury. Seconds later, the Uzi ceased, its clip emptied. The fake-me was bent double, virtually cut in half. "Die, you stupid the woman screamed. "Die!" Her voice was telltale, betraying her exact position.
I leapt forward, stuck my revolver through the hole at an angle, and started pulling the trigger. There was no way for me to miss. At such close
range, she more or less exploded in a shower of hair and blood. The other zombies looked on in genial assent, like pedestrians pausing to watch city workers using impressivelooking tools. I heard the lithe woman's body-what was left of it-slip down the line of sandbags and fall hard against the floor of the grocery store. I used my gun-butt to break the rest of the glass, and gently pushed my way inside.
After I had eaten the lithe woman's brain, I returned to the parking lot and retrieved my hat and other revolver from the destroyed zombie. Then I opened the door to the store and let the zombies wander inside to finish any leftovers. The sun was setting, and I let out a long belch.
It had been a full day's work.
The interior of the store had been rearranged, obviously, but the place still looked discernibly like a grocery. Something about its geography was familiar to Ine. Fruit and vegetables to your right as you walk inside. Meat and seafood in the back. I was unable to recall where I'd shopped for food as a resident of Gant, but I decided it must have been a place like this. Even without power, the smell of freezers and produce was strong and recognizable.
At the back of the store, I found the area where the humans had made camp. There were cots, clothing, flashlights, ropes, ladders, and the battery-powered radio that the lithe woman had been using. There was also a considerable cache of weapons, and I was able to rearm and upgrade once again. (I kept my revolvers-I liked them, and the holsters were nice-but added a semiautomatic M16, a sawed-off shotgun, and a green camouflage backpack full of ammunition.)
Most of the shopping carts had been piled in a corner. For a while, I considered filling one of them with ammunition and other supplies, but quickly gave up on this idea. It would be almost impossible to push such a cart if we went off of the main roads, which we almost certainly would. (Not to mention that I'd look like a zombified homeless guy.)
At one point, the Turk walked past and I got his attention.
"Hey, Turk, look at me," I said, pushing -'a cart down an aisle. "I'm a human in a supermarket, and I'm shopping for food. Look, I'm opening this glass freezer because there's human food in here that I want to purchase and consume. Look at me."
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