"All I wanna do is pull your friend out of there," I reiterated. "It'll save your life. I'm the only hope you've got."
"I wouldn't go that far," he said, and cautiously depressed a lever in the back of the helicopter. A hatch near the front popped open with a pneumatic sound. The pilot motioned with his gun, and I lifted the window nearest me. With the pilot's gun trained hard on my forehead, I hefted his companion out of his seat and carefully hitched the body up over my shoulder.
"Okay then," I said to the pilot, once again closing the window hatch. "I'll see you later."
"We're gonna get you," Carson said as I turned to depart. "You know that, right? Now that we know what you are, we're totally gonna get you."
"I don't know," I told him. "I don't think you know everything about me. I mean ... I don't know everything about me, and I'm me.
This seemed to stymie the pilot (it was a bit cryptic, I suppose), and I took the opportunity, carefully and slowly, to lower myself back down to the ground.
In fits and starts, I conducted my zombie battalion out from underneath the helicopter. We headed away from the interstate, back toward the sheltering interior of Knox County. Now and then, the zombies would fail to keep pace or seem to tarry over the prospect of returning to shake the stranded helicopter some more. In these instances, I chopped off pieces of the man over my shoulder (who was indeed dead), and dropped them behind me like breadcrumbs. (The pieces were furiously fought over and devoured.) Thusly, we walked well into the night, until there was little of the soldier left. Just before dawn, we stopped briefly in a dense forest, and I ate his brain (still remarkably lukewarm), sharing a bit of it with the Turk.
As fate, I considered my newfound celebrity status. There was nothing positive about being a famous zombie. (First of all, there aren't many famous zombies. How many can you name?) Zombies succeed by being one of many, by being part of a herd they can always blend into. Being famous meant I didn't blend in any longer. I was conspicuous. A target.
Despite this danger, I wasn't ready to throw away my Kernels hat just yet.
I recalled the terror my chapeau had inspired in the helicopter pilot's eyes, and dreamed of legions of humans brought to their knees through fear of "the Kernel." For a moment, I imagined a world where the remaining human encampments knew me and shuddered in my presence. Perhaps I would make them "pay tribute" to me in the form of brains, or else attack their settlements. Or I would inspire humans to wage war against one another, and then feast upon the resulting fresh carnage.
There were possibilities in this baseball cap. Oh yes, there were possibilities ...
As I finished eating the helicopter gunner's brains, I thought about how remarkable it was that the world could change simply through the transfer of new information. I had not changed since becoming the Kernel. I wore the same clothes, carried the same things, kept the same company; but this knowledge of who I was was-I certainly felt-changing things around me.
It was a pleasant idea.
As it turned out, I was more correct than I knew.
As it turned out, the world itself was changing.
When dawn broke, I again consulted the map I'd sketched on the page from the legal pad-wishing, now, that I'd taken the time to make it more detailed.
Humans ... Humans were contemptible, reprehensible, and dangerous things, but they also meant information and food. (And information was almost as addictive as brains. Learning about the Green Zone was fascinating. Learning of my own celebrity had been riveting. I had to admit, I wanted more.) One of the humans was my girlfriend, and maybe she was still alive.
If the yellow pushpins indicated other cabins full of other humans, I owed it to myself to pay them a visit. Food and information. Yes, that's what I wanted.
Although my map was terrible and homemade, the closest yellow pin seemed to be in a town called North Liberty, to the northeast. It would be like finding a needle in a haystack. There were houses there-even a suburb-like subdivision-and lakes. If one yellow pin could represent a tiny cabin hidden in the forest by a quarry, who knew what nook or cranny of North Liberty might hold the next human settlement?
Despite the long odds, I was determined to find out.
We started off again through the farmland, the Turk and I leading the way. The temperature hovered above freezing. The land was sparse and empty. We saw horrible things. The world was changing.
The world had changed.
I first noticed it outside of Fredericktown-perhaps halfway to North Liberty-when we came upon a dead girl in a field. She wore mittens and a hat and a white dress. Her body was next to an old stone well with a tiny thatched roof built over it. She had been shot several times in the stomach with a shotgun. It had almost ripped her in half.
The zombies were not interested in the girl, and neither was I. She had been dead for quite a few days, and her flesh was no longer an appetizing prospect. Her limbs were stiff and her brains were cold. They were also, however, intact. She had suffered no visible head wound. And yet she had not reanimated.
"Would you look at that," I said to the Turk. My companion moaned and stroked his chin thoughtfully.
"She's been out here more than a few days, but she's not one of us yet," I said. The Turk looked on as I picked up the girl. She really had been savaged by the shotgun. Her legs dangled from the half-waist left like hams on a cord. I opened her mouth and looked inside. It was solid. A normal mouth. No wound to the brain from in there.
"I'm genuinely puzzled," I said to the Turk. He shrugged. I leaned the body against the well, giving it a once-over, trying to solve this mystery. I considered every inch of her, searching every pore for some clue as to why she remained dead, and not undead. I ran my fingers through her hair, feeling for holes or indentations in her head, but there was nothing.
"She's dead, but she doesn't become a zombie," I said to the Turk. "What are things coming to?" It was a small thing-minute really-hut nonetheless, it left me feeling that something was up. Not all dead bodies became zombies, right? Those with destroyed heads or brain-wounds didn't. So this girl might just be one of the ones that stayed down for whatever reason. Or maybe she was just taking her time. Maybe this girl would become a zombie after a couple of months of rotting, instead of a couple of hours or days. Nonetheless, it nagged at me.
I felt like-since the zombie outbreak-pretty much everybody who had died had become a zombie pretty quickly. Those felt like the rules. I couldn't remember seeing a human who had been killed with the brain intact and hadn't reanimated. If you went down these days, you were going to come back up. That was just how it worked.
Except this girl hadn't.
I looked across my zombie battalion as we left the well and the shot-up girl behind. They still looked as strong and hale as zombies could. Whatever force had possessed them to rise from their graves showed no signs of flagging. They lumbered along as they always had. And so did I.
But something about it still made me uneasy.
Then, another thing.
Closer to North Liberty, a smell on the wind. A noxious odor that hung in the air. Fire, but something more than that. An unpleasant fire smell. Different from the smoking helicopter we'd left in Marengo, too. I could smell flesh burning, and gasoline. It smelled had. It also smelled recent. A new-fire smell. It reeked of the works of men-people in the vicinity who'd been up to something-not an accidental forest fire, and not a factory smell. I decided we should investigate, even if it meant a brief detour.
"Let's turn 'em," I said to the Turk, indicating the new direction with my outstretched finger, and we did our best to maneuver the group of zombies in the direction of the terrible odor. (I think the Turk understood what I was trying to do, but his heart was not in the task. His Spidey senses were tingling. Other things were too. The smell was sickening, even to a zombie. He knew something bad was ahead of us.)
We directed the battalion through an abandoned farm and toward a shallow hill that overlooked a field next to some
woods. The smell intensified. The Turk continued to drag his feet. Then, over the crest of the hill, we saw it: a battlefield full of "dead" zombies. The most we'd ever seen. Hundreds of them. They had been torn to pieces, probably with powerful guns. Most of the bodies had been moved into orderly piles which had then been set aflame, but some-who were more "body parts" than complete zombies-were simply strewn across the field. A couple of the piles were still smoldering. Large-impact craters made by grenades or other explosives dotted the field. Here and there, the ground itself was still steaming. Every single zombie-even the "partial" ones-had received a bullet through the skull.
It was a harrowing and baffling sight. I was used to carnage, sureboth by and against zombies-but not on such a massive scale. This had been a zombie bloodbath. (None of the casualties looked like they had been living humans. The KIA were 100 percent undead.) I scanned the horizon, but could discern no other sign of the humans who had done this. I understood, however, that the mere fact of my not being able to see or hear any humans did not mean that we were safe, or even unobserved.
"Fuck," I said, looking around nervously.
I tried to understand what had happened in this place. Was it a repository, where a nearby encampment of humans had been dumping (and exploding?) the zombies they'd killed over time? Or-horror of horrors!-was it what remained of a single, massive massacre of hundreds of zombies, and had a group as large as ours been killed in one fell swoop? I suspected the latter, more-terrifying option. I reasoned that a strike this powerful would almost certainly have to have cone from the military. This was beyond the means of local farmers with hunting rifles.
I waded into the steaming piles of zombies, genuinely impressed with whatever force had done it. Helicopters with missiles (like the one we'd just encountered)? A carefully aimed blast of long-range artillery from the Green Zone? But no. The zombies had clearly been arranged on the ground and moved into piles. Someone had been here on the ground, and recently.
"I'm beginning to think your Spidey senses were right," I said to the Turk. "Let's not spend any more time here." We maneuvered the battalion of zombies away, into the forest. It didn't need much urging.
We moved on, through forests and fields, looking for more people to eat. And suddenly, it was there, like a new neighbor you hadn't noticed, moving in.
Company. We had company.
Huinart company.
I suddenly understood the phrase. (I seemed to recall action movies in which people were always saying "Looks like we've got company." I also remembered that, mostly, they were not very good movies. But the sentiment was right. Company. Visitors. Unwelcome relatives. That was what it felt like. Humans were our cousins-our stupid, contemptible cousins whom we sometimes ate-hut nobody wanted them to show up like this.)
Their company first came in the form of small movements on the very distant horizon, furtive rustlings in far-off trees, and the occasional hum of invisible engines. (It was the sound of humans being intentionally furtive, and succeeding at it.) This was not how we liked to encounter humans. We preferred disoriented, weak groups. Just enough of them to go around. Groups we could overpower through our sheer numbers. (The dumber and more frightened, the better.)
These humans were aware of us. They were watching us and, apparently, traveling with us. For hours and then days, they seemed to live alongside or ahead of our zombie horde. They were there. No question about it. I'd catch the glint of binoculars at the top of a hill, or see the smoke from a far-off campfire. At night, I sometimes made out the cherry of a cigarette in a distant row of dark trees. These humans were good at what they were doing, and this damn sure wasn't the first time they'd done it. They stayed far enough away that we never smelled them. They stayed downwind. They stayed quiet.
As the only zombie in our group able to think and reason, I struggled with what to do next. The responsibility was all mine. I could turn the group if I wanted, or-with some effort-even reverse our course entirely. However, that would mean diverting us from our destination: North Liberty. And, thus far at least, the humans had posed no threat. Though we were traditionally ranged as foes-or at least, as entities that wanted ... different things from one another-these humans had done nothing to provoke us. And we, certainly, were not about to provoke them.
Only late into the third day did I chance to wonder: "Could these be the same humans who had created the field of flaming, dead zombies?" I couldn't guess what manner of weapons they might possess. Were they military soldiers, with tanks and Hummers, who had made a land incursion into Knox County? If they were, it wasn't like we could run away. (There were disadvantages-as well as advantages-to being a giant, lumbering dinosaur of an army.) I could steer my zombies into the nearest nest of trees if the humans started shooting, but beyond that, my options were pretty limited. And every hour I didn't let the humans deter us was another hour's march toward North Liberty. Another hour closer to that yellow pushpin.
Closer, maybe, to Vanessa. To information. To answers.
A road.
Then a crossroads.
Then a sign that said NORTH LIBERTY 5.
I urged the zombies onward. An hour's shamble past the sign, dawn broke, and an eerie tension descended over us. (Over me, anyway.) We were nearing a population center. A place that might-like Mount Vernon-be peopled and defended. The zombies around me continued their march forward with the resigned steps of pack animals, oblivious to any danger. (They also gave no sign of having scented human prey.) We traversed an empty cornfield that ran alongside the highway leading into town. As we drew closer to the town proper, my hesitation overtook me, and I allowed myself to drift to the back of the group.
"You take it from here," I said to the Turk. "Copilot's big day." The Turk seemed to understand, and kept his place at the front of the pack.
We passed a lonely church with a single white steeple, and all at once the zombies seemed to quicken their pace toward North Liberty. It was harder to see things from the back of the group-a little like having shitty lawn seats at an outdoor rock show-but an object up ahead seemed to have captured their attention. It was a small wooden structure past the church just four wooden walls and one large window. It looked like a tollbooth or a free-standing closet. (I later learned that they're for farm kids who have to wait for the school bus in the dead of winter.) The zombies at the front of the pack seemed unduly preoccupied with this little structure.
As we closed within fifty feet of it, I saw the barrel of a machine gun emerge from a crack in its window. Suddenly, there was movement from all sides. Armed humans in improvised camouflage were emerging from the fields on every side and closing in on us. They held guns and flainethrowers and who knew what else.
It was a nightmare happening for real.
I wheeled around, looking for a way out of the trap, but the emerging humans closed all escape routes. Even the little church now had two humans with rifles sitting on the roof.
"Fuck," I said aloud.
I fell flat on my face and covered my head (which, really, was my only vulnerable part). Sure enough, moments later they started shooting.
Machine-gun fire erupted all around us. Homemade grenades and incendiary devices were tossed, blowing the zombies ahead of me high into the air. Flame was then thrown, and zombies caught fire and stumbled around until their heads disintegrated. In a matter of only moments, I was covered in bodies that had fallen on top of me.
Then I heard humans barking orders at one another. The zombies groaned like confused animals, unsure of exactly what was happening, but dead sure that something was wrong. Some attacked, and others simply shuffled about. I peeked out from my prone position. Between dead zombies, I saw the heavily armed humans keeping their distance and firing. This was not to be close combat, at which zombies excel, but long-distance butchery.
Several zombies almost reached the wind shelter-cum-pillbox before the machine gunner inside tore them apart. An improvised grenade exploded near me, and I bucked in terror. The z
ombies nearest me moaned in confusion. Soon, there were more zombies on the ground than standing. Then there were very few standing at all. The humans grew confident, and began to close in for the final kills.
I could not believe it would end like this, and I hated themthese humans-for ending my dream so ingloriously. I hated their anonymous faces behind their camouflage masks. I hated the lack of sportsmanship to their violence. (This was not hunting-as we did-for food. This was butchery. It was artless, crude, and uncreative.)
More than anything, I hated them for their lack of curiosity. As I squirmed there, on that cold road outside of North Liberty, Ohio, covered in the stinking bodies of dead zombies who had, moments before, been my companions, I hated the humans for all the questions they were content to leave unanswered. I functioned in a world of intrigue and mystery, but these over-armed bumpkins were soulless trolls, without spark or imagination, content to merely kill from a distance. "See a zombie? Shoot it." There was nothing more to it for these types. They had no curiosity about the walking dead. The only question was how to kill them.
Speaking of killing, it also looked as though I had eaten my last brain. I would never again taste the fleshy miracle inside of people's heads. This, too, was a greatly distressing thought. I cried out at the injustice of it.
Ah, calamity! Ali, woe! Brains! Braaaaaains!!
Now the guns had stopped, and I huddled still against the cool ground in my pile of bullet-drenched, flame-scarred undead. Now the humans crept closer, and I could hear their footfalls in the spring grass. How I simultaneously loathed and wanted to eat them.
Blam!
Not far from me.
This was it then. They were finishing off anything that still twitched. And at close range.
Mani! And again, Nam!
The blasts grew closer and closer. The footfalls too.
It was a desperate moment, and it called for a desperate act.
Of cowardice.
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