I appreciated her words, but couldn’t help but wonder as I crawled between the covers if she was right. Was I going to be able to take care of Ginny? I really hoped so. As I drifted into sleep, I made sure one last time that the door was open and that the light was still coming in from the living room. Ginny hadn’t said she was afraid of the dark, but it was a strange house. I didn’t want her to wake up screaming, not knowing where she was.
Maggie knew when all the humans were asleep in the house and started her patrol. Every night since the sickness began she spent the night making sure everything was as it should be in the home. She was trained to be a seizure assistance dog, but she was so much more than that. At least since the sickness had come. A new awareness filled her brain and she understood far more than the humans thought she did. She just didn’t know how to communicate with them.
Maggie knew Ginny didn’t much understand what all of the things that happened to her in the past meant but she used to have seizures too, that’s why she had Maggie. One day, when Ginny was around 5, her parents had taken her away and didn’t come home with her. Maggie was very worried and did a lot of pacing, but a few days later she came back with bandages on her head and she never had a seizure again. Maggie could sense seizures before they started and alert the big humans so she’d been sent to live with Ginny when Ginny was a much smaller human puppy and with her family, but now she was just Ginny’s friend. Padding around the house now Maggie didn’t sense any of the bad-smellies outside, but she did sense a slight indication that Madeline might be about to have a seizure.
Walking into Madeline’s room, the sense became stronger and Maggie walked over to that side of Madeline’s bed and put her head on Madeline’s dangling hand. Whining loudly she tried to wake Madeline up but couldn’t. How she wished she could make all of those noises the humans made! It would make her job so much easier!
Maggie realized she wasn’t going to get Madeline to wake up so she went into Lena’s room, instead. Maggie didn’t understand human relationships, but she thought the two big humans must be sisters, they looked similar except Madeline’s eyes were brown like Maggie’s. The other woman’s eyes reminded Maggie of the sky.
Maggie did the same procedure with Lena when she went into the woman’s room, but nothing happened, this human just pushed her head away and made some noises that sounded like “go away”. Maggie couldn’t do that, so she hopped up on the bed and barked loudly at Lena’s head one time. This woke the human up with a shout and Maggie swooped in to lick her face in one long swipe.
<><>
“What is it Maggie, do you want outside?” Brushing her hair back from her face Lena got out of bed to let the dog outside.
Maggie barked one more time, but not as loudly, twirled around in a circle a few times, than shot off to Madeline’s room, where she whined loudly again.
Lena was confused, but followed the dog. That sure looked like a potty dance to her, but what did she know?
Walking into the room, even without the light on to see by, Lena knew what was happening. She could hear the sound of the bed shaking and the noises that usually signaled Madeline was having a seizure. Going back into the kitchen she found Madeline’s purse, found the pills Madeline had taught her she needed, and went back in the room. When the seizure stopped she stuck one of the pills under Madeline’s tongue, and waited.
“Swallow that darling, you’ll be ok.” Lena could feel Madeline’s neck muscles moving as she did as she was told. “Shhhh, it’s okay lovey, I’m here and you’re ok, you’re going to be fine. Take your time, breathe, that’s it, just breathe darlin’, it’s done now.”
Lena didn’t actually know if it was or not but hoped so. Poor Madeline.
Lena hated watching Madeline have a seizure, because it hurt her that she couldn’t do anything about it. The seizures made her feel powerless and she knew they hurt Madeline. She really did wish there was a way to take them away. It looked to Lena like the seizure control medicine wasn’t working so whatever this alternative was that Maddy had mentioned earlier might have to be investigated more. The way Maddy had hedged around it made her wonder exactly what it was, but she couldn’t think of anything new she’d heard about.
“You seem to be smarter than the average bear, doggy, whatever, Maggie, do you know what Madeline was talking about earlier? No? Me either. But it looks like she’s coming down now so you can go rest if you want to. Go check on Ginny, make sure she’s alright. Okay?” Lena wasn’t sure why she was talking to Maggie as though the dog understood her, but witnessing what she just had, she thought maybe there was more to the dog than she’d originally thought. Madeline was right; this was one smart dog!
To prove it Maggie turned two circles again and ran out of the room to check on Ginny. Maggie could sense that the seizure was leaving so knew it would be okay to leave Madeline. She’d been trained to be a seizure assistance dog, and even though Ginny didn’t have seizures anymore, she was still sensitive to them and responded as she’d been trained. And she really liked the human that the sounds said were Madeline. She was nice and gave off a good vibe.
Lena turned back to Madeline, and snuggled down into the pillow on the other side of her. She knew, from past experience, that Maddy would not remember these nocturnal seizures, or that Lena and Maggie had come into the room but she’d stay anyway, just in case they came back. That and she just couldn’t leave her buddy on her own after that. She might need something. Throwing her arm over Madeline’s waist, Lena went back to sleep.
In the other room Maggie saw that Ginny was fine, with one leg sticking out of the blanket, so she grabbed the blanket with her teeth and moved it over the little girl’s foot. One more trip through the house to ensure all was well, and then Maggie curled up in a ball on the couch and kept watch over the house, snoozing a little in between rounds through the house. There were no bad-smellies around.
Chapter Seven
Seems we chose a bad day to set out. The rain poured all through the night and when we woke up the world was covered in a dense fog. Even though I don’t remember the night time seizures they were still affecting me; I was tired, slow to respond, and my brain was sluggish. All of that mixed with the fog meant we were in for a few surprises and slow going.
We had all piled up in my Dad’s car and left early this morning. We couldn’t see much of the world around us, but Lena saw the sign at the nursing home and almost broke down. She’d insisted on driving this morning and I wondered if it was a good idea as she slowed down. I could hear tiny little sobs in her throat and grabbed her hand.
“Keep driving, hun, don’t slow down. Just keep driving.”
She took a deep breath, turned up the Rammstein, pressed her foot down on the gas pedal, and asked if I wanted to go by my house one more time, in case I’d forgotten anything. I didn’t even think about the horde that could still be there, I just said that I would like to see it one more time because I doubted I’d ever see it again.
There were no zombies out that we could see as we drove up Main Street, but Lena noticed the smell straight away. She managed to hold the urge to gag, but when she saw the bodies littering the area around the gate she almost lost it again. They weren’t out for the count, those bodies, just unable to walk anymore because the impact from the car had broken their legs or other vital parts needed for walking. And the smell was overpowering at this point, even with the windows up the smell was blowing in from the vents.
Lena hadn’t been exposed to all of this as Ginny and I had. Yeah, she’d seen some on TV and a couple when she went to her neighbors’ but she hadn’t seen the bodies left to rot or any of the horrors that Ginny and I have encountered.
Then Ginny screamed and Maggie started barking. Lena and I didn’t notice, but a figure had been walking in the fog towards us. Just as Ginny screamed the figure threw something at us and roared. I think you can guess who it was.
His costume was torn, the ears now sagging down to his head, and he was cove
red in even more gore, but it was him. He was missing an arm and one leg was not working at all. Halfway down his thigh the leg just hung as though there were no bones in it at all. But the evil grin on his torn and grime-covered face, the glimmer of evil intelligence in his eyes still made him a terrifying figure. Fear gripped me, my heart started pounding, and a miserable whine escaped my throat. You know how you dream you want to scream in fear, but can’t? That’s what happened; I simply could not scream I was so terrified. The Zombie of the Lambs was still with us.
We all screamed as the object landed on the windshield and slid down the glass in a streaky mess of blood. It was Mr. Crown’s head, and despite being separated from its body the head was still active. The broken teeth in the thing’s mouth were clicking together, eyes staring at us with malice and hunger. How could it still be hungry? It didn’t have a stomach anymore!
“My people!” The Zombie of the Lambs screamed at us. “You’ve taken my people from me! This is what you did!”
“Run the Lamb over Lena, do it now!” I screamed, not thinking about anything, but destroying the grotesque images I knew would haunt my nightmares. I also hoped the movement would sling Mr. Crown’s head off in the process.
“GO! GO! GO!”
Ginny was still screaming in the back seat. I’m starting to wonder if this poor child will ever stop screaming now. It’s not like she’s used to having heads thrown at her, even though the things have been around for a week now. For that matter, I’m not used to it either.
Lena was still just sitting there, staring at the Zombie of the Lambs while Ginny and I made frantic gestures to encourage Lena to move. When more zombies started walking out of the fog I did something horrible. I didn’t mean to, I just panicked and Lena wasn’t responding! So I hit her in the arm. Hard.
“Move it woman! NOW!” My voice was stern, aggressive and Lena looked over at me in shock as she gasped out my name on her breath.
She turned and gawped at me. “You hit me, you meanie!”
Really. She said that. But she put her foot down finally and we started moving. She hit the Lamb, who immediately fell, one of the back tires spinning as we moved over his body. I had my hands over my eyes peeking through my fingers as Lena put the car into reverse. I might have growled louder than Maggie ever had at that point.
My reaction must have changed her mind because she looked over at me before shifting the car out of reverse. We kept going until we finally hit the exit for the interstate. There was a gas station there and we needed gas. We had to stop.
Lena turned into the station slowly, looking around. There were quite a few shops around it, but when we were planning this part we decided that it should all be clear because most people never left their homes once the sickness started. We were still learning here! Things are changing. We hadn’t quite realized how much yet.
Lena jumped out of the car, once we were certain we weren’t going to get any visitors, but left the door open in case she needed to get back in quick. She stared at the now gore-covered car for a moment before using her foot to close the door a little. With my credit card in her hand, she pulled the plug out of the gas tank, did what she had to with my card, pushed the handle in the tank, and started the gas running. She walked over to my window and tapped on it.
“I need to wee, I’m going to go behind the store.” Lena looked behind her as she spoke, old habits about what we were supposed to be embarrassed about dying hard.
“Why, Lena? It’s not like anybody’s looking, just go behind the car!” I mean seriously, we’d just had a brush with death, let my heart calm down a little!
“Nah, I’ll check out what it looks like inside the store while I do it. I should be able to see most of it through the windows. If there’s nobody in there I’ll go in and see what we can get. We can’t fit much right now but we need to get what water we can at least.” Then she just walked off. Hmph.
Turning back to Ginny, who had finally quit screaming and calmed down, I asked if she was ok. She’d curled up on the backseat with her head in her arms, Maggie at her feet. Looking up at me with the most miserable eyes I’d ever seen she asked me if we had a blanket in the car. I knew there was one in the trunk and told her I’d get out and get it.
Reaching into the trunk I took out the blanket and slammed the trunk shut.
Oh no. Oh no, oh no, oh no! I knew what I’d done instantly. The noise was going to draw a crowd. But maybe we were ok? I didn’t see anything moving yet.
Sneaking back quietly to my side of the car I carefully pulled the nozzle out of the gas tank as it had clicked off, crept over towards the building, and stopped in my tracks. There were seven of them back there, and Lena was halfway up a ladder and still climbing. Trying to walk quietly I backpedaled, hoping to get to the car without them noticing me. I didn’t have a weapon, Lena was safe for now, I needed to get to safety of my own. No I was NOT abandoning my friend, shut up!
Lena saw me and apparently realized what I was doing because she started banging on the metal ladder to keep the zombies attention. I made it around to the front of the store then took off running as quietly as I could. I pressed on the passenger door until I heard it click then scurried over to the driver’s side. By this time I could see more coming from behind the fried chicken shop just across the road and it looked like a lot of them. This might get ugly.
“What’s wrong?” Ginny asked from the back seat, a note of panic in her voice. Eek, I’d forgotten how perceptive the child was!
“Well, Lena’s trapped in the back and I have no idea how to get to her. We can’t get the car back there because of those things they have in the front to keep cars from plowing through the store. We could make some noise here to draw them over here so she can get down but then we have to get them away from the car.” I told her as I fiddled with the car, adjusting the seat to my own height and moving the mirrors.
“Could we drive away and then lose them? How long would that take?” This is really one smart kid, ya know?
Putting the car into drive I started to slowly creep away. I didn’t want to get ahead of them, but I didn’t want any of the creatures getting near the car. The whole experience was made simpler by the fact that I didn’t have to stop for the traffic lights the county put up about every 150 feet. Paying attention to those would have likely got us both killed. In the end I slowly drove us down to where the new chain stores were located, and kept going for a while, wanting to truly lose these things for as long as possible. I couldn’t get too far ahead though, this fog is still thick enough to hide us and I don’t want them to turn back around to Lena.
After two hours we were far enough away I didn’t think the zombies could find their way back and sped up to a speed where the zombies could no longer see the car and then took a side road so that we could go back to the gas station a completely different way than we came. That’s one good thing about Lincoln County roads, there’s more than one way to get where you’re going. It helped that, although I’d never driven, I’d been on these roads my entire life. I knew them as well as anyone that had been driving.
“Ok, Ginny, we’re almost at the gas station now. We’ll see what it looks like when we get there.” I looked in the rearview mirror to check on her, but the little girl had her dark head buried under the blanket, hidden from view.
Pulling into the gas station I didn’t see anything out of the ordinary. I didn’t even see Lena! Where was she?
Pulling to a stop at one of the gas pumps, yes we were going to need more gas now; I quietly got out of the car and started looking around. I didn’t see her, maybe she was still on the roof? Going around to the back I could see that there were three bodies lying on the ground. They all appeared to be male and their heads had been bashed in. My fear, which had finally settled down to an “oh this is kind of scary but I’ll survive” level now shot back up to “We’re all going to die” level!
I was afraid to call out to Lena because one of those things might hear me, bu
t I didn’t know how else to get her attention if she was still hiding. Trying to calm myself down I took a deep breath and quietly told myself to think. So I did.
When I last saw Lena she was climbing the ladder to the top of the building. She might be up there, hiding or something. Taking another deep breath I walked over to the ladder and started to climb up it. I wasn’t exactly comfortable with the idea that my head was going to be the only thing visible once I got to the top of the ladder, but I had to do what I had to do. Live the dream! Find Lena!
By the time I got to the top of the ladder I’d convinced myself that a zombie was just sitting there waiting to bite my nose off and eat it before my very eyes. Just sitting there, knitting a sweater, waiting patiently for me to present my face to it so that it could munch down on my face the same as I munched on that turkey a few days ago. Okay, maybe nothing like that but I still had to stop again and calm myself down. I peeked over the edge of the flat roof to look for Lena and whispered her name loudly. Nothing happened.
Wanting to be sure, and finding that my face was still intact, I decided to climb onto the roof and see if she was hiding behind the strange objects that populate a store roof. I have no idea what most of it was so couldn’t tell you, but there were different little structures, buckets, and other paraphernalia hanging around up there. I crouched down, just in case some wandering zombie might spot me and then realized it’s foggy isn’t it Maddy, nobody could see me so I stood back up. I shuffled along the top, hoping the broom I picked up would serve as some form of protection. It was only one of those cheap plastic ones, but maybe I could use it to push a zombie over the side of the store roof? Luckily I didn’t have to find out. There was nothing up here.
Seizures: A Tale of the Zombie Apocalypse Page 6