by Andrew Lauck
A Broken World
Andrew Lauk
Copyright 2016 byAndrew Lauk
Chapter 1
Approximately 1430 hours
Twelve miles southeast of Chicago, Illinois
Day 174. Still haven’t found any signs of fellow survivors.
My car has finally run out of gas. It had been on fumes for the past hour, and I dreaded this happening, so I pushed on. I got out and opened the back door. Everything I had of importance now lay on the seat. Funny how something can make you realize the important things in life. In a backpack I picked up from a K-Mart in downtown Chicago, I had several canned foods, extra ammunition, and a sleeping bag from the hunting section. Next to the backpack, I grabbed the .22 rifle I picked up. I already had the 9mm Sig Sauer P226R handgun strapped to my left hip.
It’s the only gun I ever bought and owned. Before retiring last year and putting twenty-one years in the Special Forces behind me, I was browsing through the PX and spotted the gun. It was a reasonable price and came with four twenty-round magazines and night-sights. I bought the gun and a holster for a combined price of $1100. That actually isn’t bad for a good weapon of that magnitude. Of course, I couldn’t foresee the added benefit that I could share ammo between my handgun and any 9mm submachine-gun or rifle if I happened to find one.
My watch stopped working a few days ago, but I’m holding onto it in the event that I find a battery to replace the dead one. Until I do, all times will have to be approximated.
It’s funny really. 174 days ago I was thinking about grabbing a beer, watching the football game, PT in the morning, and getting laid. Now, only one of those would make a difference to me. And it sure as hell isn’t PT.
I can’t help but think about how things were before…I mean, I know I shouldn’t, but my mind wanders when I’ve been driving for hours. Now that the car has run out of gas, maybe I won’t think as much. Maybe.
I ran my hand through my long hair, unused to the length after my years in the military. My wife had always said I looked better with long hair, but I liked it better short. Now, I’d give almost anything to hear her say it again even if she was my ex.
I grabbed my backpack and weapons, placing my hand on the Sig to make sure the strap wouldn’t slip, and patted the car once on the hood. Gas stations were unreliable for fuel after everyone started to panic when the shit hit the fan half a year ago.
There had been news reports that some biologists had discovered some sunken city deep in the Arctic. They thawed the people, and that’s when things got sketchy. The reports from their outpost stopped transmitting. A search team was sent; never returned. Knowing what I know now, I would have said screw it, and left the poor bastards alone. But, of course, that’s the gift of hindsight.
A larger group composed of three scientists, a military escort, and a news team flew up there and checked it out. Some died there. Unfortunately, others made it back onto the planes. Since the rescue operation was a joint effort between the United States and Great Britain, both countries suffered the results of the expedition. Curiosity killed humanity.
A virus, preserved through the freezing process and dormant for centuries, came to the surface upon thawing and had infected the hosts. People showed varying symptoms. Some broke out in a heavy fever. Others vomited their insides out. No matter how they got there, though, the result was the same: Death. Twenty-four hours after returning, the searchers with the most severe symptoms died first. The ones with fevers took longer, passing over the next two days.
There was a televised burial ceremony of the “brave” team that had ventured out into the arctic for a few dumbass scientists. I hate the fucking media. They always have to glorify everything. Of course, no one at that point knew what the scientists had been screwing around with up there. Now, we did. They were recreating a virus that had infected and subsequently exterminated an entire population. Scientists should know by now that playing God never works out in their favor.
Anyway, the dead people didn’t stay dead. The gutless ones got up within a few hours; the fevers took longer. It’s safe to say that the footage of that ceremony was actually quite hilarious. The priest got attacked right as he was saying, “May they rest in peace.” Oh, the irony. The mass hysteria that ensued all over the nation wasn’t so fun, but I made it out okay. People just need to learn to go with the flow and improvise.
People got bitten, basically signing their death-warrants, and then all Hell broke loose. Literally. People died and became…I’m honestly not sure. Technically, they’re not zombies because the virus has a name, and they don’t really moan or shuffle their feet. Well, some do. But most of them walk normally unless you break their kneecaps. Not that I would do something mean like that. Actually, it’s the ones that crawl that are the worst. They can be anywhere, and you might not know until it’s too late. Say goodbye to Bathroom Bob or Closet-Checking Cindy. The stupidity is classic, but still kind of sad.
For the purposes of writing all of this down, though, I’ll refer to the dead undead infected as zombies.
Chapter 2
Approximately 1700 Hours
Unknown Location
I continued to walk aimlessly, pressing forward for a reason I no longer knew. I was only vaguely aware of the time due to the location of the sun. Sweat had stained my clothing, and I was hot as hell, but I fought the urge to drink my water until I found another source.
Up ahead, I saw a sign along the side of the highway. It’s strange. In all of the movies and television shows, cars were always bumper to bumper on the highway. There was that random eighteen-wheeler that jack-knifed for no damn sense and everything was on fire. I laughed at that thought, because Hollywood was so wrong.
Maybe it was because I was miles from a major city, or maybe it was because no one made it past a certain point out of Chicago, but there was not a thing out there except for me, that sign, and a shitload of dirt. At that thought, I looked around in every direction. Chicago had a lot of tall buildings crowded together for the sole effort to pollute the hell out of the city and kill the environment. Outside of the city, though, it was a lot more peaceful and barren. The good thing about that was that I could see in every direction, so none of the zombies could creep up on me without me knowing.
The bad thing was that I was in the middle of freaking nowhere, and I had no idea where to go. If the movies were wrong about the simplest subject of the zombie apocalypse, meaning the zombies, then how could they possibly be right about the more complex things, like where to go that’s safe? I was hoping that a small town with a low population would provide relative safety, but at this rate I was not counting on it.
I was close enough now to read the sign. “Oak Lawn. 42 Miles.” Only forty-two more miles, and I might find something useful. I hadn’t had a full night of sleep in probably a few months now. Every little sound woke me. Nightmares flooded my subconscious and kept me on a constant edge. The combination of paranoia, sleep deprivation, and basic fear had been causing me to zone out for long periods of time where I began to imagine things. Hallucinating isn’t a good thing to do when ninety percent of the world population is trying to kill you.
I wished I had someone with me that I could trust. That way, I could sleep in relative peace and have a conversation. I used to be very anti-social, and avoided people like the plague. Only now that there is a plague, I would give anything to have a friend. It was pretty ironic in a sad, depressing kind of way.
How long have I been walking? I lost count of feet a while back. I thought I was up to 4,300-something, but I was not sure anymore. I would just start over.
The sign was now a blur in the
distance behind me as I looked over my shoulder yet again to check if someone, or even worse, some thing followed me out of Chicago. I looked back in front of me and prayed that this was all a dream.
Maybe it was a dream. Maybe I would wake up to my annoying alarm-clock and listen to my ex-wife bitching at me that it’s my day to get the kids and how much she hates my guts. It was not my fault I preferred my job that takes me thousands of miles away from her over being around her and her hippy parents. They even had the long hair still. My marriage ended a couple years ago when I told her parents to leave me alone, and let me take care of my family since I was the father, not them. Of course, I didn’t put it that nicely, but I had never been very diplomatic.
If this was a dream, then if I walked out into the dirt and put a bullet in my brain, I would just wake up, right? The shock of dying in a dream wakes you up. I read that somewhere, or maybe I saw it in a movie. I couldn’t remember. What’s the last thing I remember? What did I have for breakfast? Supposedly, one way to tell if you’re dreaming was to see if you remember anything prior. Standard Stanislavsky questions. Who am I, where am I, how did I get here, et cetera.
I don’t remember, but I was not exactly anxious to plug that irritating hole in my head, called a mouth, with a 9mm bullet. No, I was just going to have to stick it through and pray that I wake up soon.
Further ahead, I saw a faint outline walking in my direction. I stopped and crouched down, reaching in the pack for my binoculars. Adjusting the sights and bringing them to my eyes, I zoomed in, and focused on the object.
Yeah, it was a zombie. Who didn’t expect that, right? Disappointed, I put the binocs back, and whipped the rifle off my shoulder while walking forward, taking my time because I was not looking forward to another zombie. Honestly, if I never saw another zombie for the rest of my life, it would be too fucking soon.
When I was trying to leave Chicago, I had gone to my ex-wife’s house. She was lying on her back in the kitchen, and she just looked up at me when I walked in. At that time, I wasn’t aware of everything going on. When I walked around the corner of the bar, what I saw pushed my mental capacity to “mind-fucked” status. My son, Phillip, was devouring her intestines.
You know, it’s weird. All the movies say zombies want your brains, but somehow they always end up eating other stuff besides your brains. Like intestines for instance. Why do zombies eat those? I don’t have the answer, but at that time, Phillip definitely wanted some intestines. He was pounding it down faster than a marine eats or an alcoholic drinks.
As proud as I was that my son was finally eating enough, I was both disturbed and disgusted at his choice of cuisine. The little cannibalistic motherfucker was chowing down on my ex-wife. I must admit that as much as she hated me, I didn’t want that for her. Then Phillip had the nerve to get up and frown at me. He was actually frowning. Don’t get me wrong, he was my son, and I’m obligated to love him for that reason, but at that moment, with his fat, pudgy face caked in the blood of a woman I had loved long before him and frowning, something snapped. I raised my gun and put his ass down with a bullet to the brainpan. Then I shot her in the head to end her pain. I stood for a long time like that—gun leveled, shock making its way through me, just staring at the two bodies in the kitchen.
Sooner than expected, I got over the initial shock, and got the hell out of there. My relationship with my ex-wife had been tenuous at best, so of course that meant my relationship with my son wasn’t as strong as I wished it were. As I drove through the streets of Chicago to make it to the highway, I passed the officials and politicians trying to work out some semblance of order in front of the town hall. Assholes. I can’t say I was upset to watch them get taken out.
Still, what I had seen got to me. It haunted my dreams, my thoughts, and lingered on me like a scent that I couldn’t mask. It was obvious. I was just trying to push back the depression for as long as I could and press on. Press on to what? I didn’t know. Luckily, no one was around to ask me.
Of course, I currently had no idea where I was going. Seems like I just pressed on to the middle of nowhere, trudging through miles of endless road, and dozens of wandering zombies to get to a place I was beginning to believe didn’t exist.
Chapter 3
Approximately 1730 Hours
Middle of Nowhere
I was close enough now to see the zombie without the binoculars, so I crouched and brought up the rifle. Wherever it had come from, it died comfortably in a white t-shirt and jeans that were both tattered and covered in dust. I watched the zombie for a minute, trying to slow my breathing and lower the pulse in my shoulder against the stock, and waiting until the barrel stopped drifting. The trigger depressed, and a bullet flew true, lodging inside the skull of the zombie. Blood and other substances blew out the opposite side and splattered onto the road.
I got up, and cautiously approached the zombie, chambering another round in the rifle. I leaned in, expecting it to get up and do something, but the zombie was dead. Again. You could say I’ve become an advocate of checking to make sure. My head was starting to feel a little dizzy from the heat, but I didn’t want to risk using my water too early.
I estimated that nightfall wasn’t too far off since the sun was beginning to wane in the sky. It was sinking low on the horizon, and I didn’t want to be caught outdoors in the middle of nowhere alone again. I had already been on that ride, and it was not very fun.
The pace became a jog as panic started to cloud my mind. In the distance, I saw the outline of the city start to form. Of course, I couldn’t possibly know how far away it was from my position, but I kept running anyway. Earlier on in the outbreak, I had made the mistake of sleeping in an insecure location once.
The sun had been down for two hours, and it had gotten to the point that I couldn’t see ahead of me, so I felt it was safe to put up the pup-tent I still had from my overseas actions. During that night, I woke up and saw several shadows moving outside of my tent. One of the zombies stumbled onto my tent and collapsed it on top of me. I freaked out, started moving around, and the zombies tried to eat me through the fabric of the tent. They would have gotten through, too, but I opened fire and cut my way out with the Kabar knife I carried at all times. Basically, I lucked out.
I must say that my luck had helped me through multiple occasions so far, and I couldn’t help but feel that it was running out. It hadn’t been long since the last zombie sighting that I saw a small group of three or four. I was tempted at that point to abort the idea of Oak Lawn if more zombies were venturing outward, but as much as I hated zombies, I really needed a friend. The truth is that soon I’ll probably lose it from lack of sleep, and then where will I be?
Shit out of luck. That’s where.
Before too long, the sun had lowered out of sight, and I was jogging through the night, using the ambient light of the moon to guide me. There was a full moon out, and it gave off just enough light to help me keep going rather than cause me to run into a tree or something stupid like that.
Unfortunately, the night was cloudy, and visibility was still bad. Ahead, I could make out the outlines of walking people. I slowed to a crawl and waited, praying they hadn’t noticed my loud footsteps on the concrete. I stepped off the road and walked east for around a mile before I turned south and picked up the faster pace again. I know it sounds like I was being a little girl, but the truth is that I was scared. Still am. I did my best to avoid those things, because after seeing what I had, I didn’t want them to even have a chance of getting me. Being bitten would be a fate worse than death.
After several hours, the clouds had finally covered the moon, and the Earth was once again pitch-black. I debated whether to continue on and try to make it to Oak Lawn before resting, but I decided against it as I had no advantage against the zombies at night. I strained my eyes to see ahead as best I could, but I couldn’t see beyond my hands. I reached in my pack and pulled out the bedroll I grabbed back at K-Mart. It’s a relatively nice sleeping b
ag, weatherproofed on the outside, and warm on the inside. Of course, a zombie would tear right through it to get to me, but I try not to think about that.
After tucking my gear under the headrest, I zipped myself up and lay down to sleep with my rifle tucked under my arms. I thought back to the better days and tried to picture something peaceful to ease my mind, but the image of the zombie with its head blown off hovered over my thoughts like a dark cloud.
I hope I get some good news tomorrow, because otherwise, I might just give up.
Chapter 4
1320 Hours (Day 176)
Outskirts of Oak Lawn, Illinois
The day has proven to be very eventful, and it’s not even close to being finished. I woke up just before dawn, scaring myself out of slumber. I thought I had heard something, but it was just my mind playing tricks on me. After packing up the bedroll and getting my things together, I started off on my journey once more. I didn’t write anything yesterday because nothing important took place that I felt needed attention. Filling the space on this journal’s pages keeps me sane, and I hate to imagine what will happen to my mind when I run out of paper. Time has lost all meaning to me, though I still keep track in case something miraculous happens. I don’t know what example to give here, because I’ve given up on the idea of finding anything normal in this Godforsaken world. Back to the current day.
I had walked all of yesterday, stopping only twice the entire trek. Today, I think I have some renewed hope. It had been a few hours of walking before I was close enough to see the mirage-like blur of Oak Lawn waver in the distance. I suddenly felt a wave of fear and looked down to make sure my rifle was still in my hands. Did I chamber another round? I did so just then, and a bullet flew out the side. Damn. I walked over and plucked it out of the sand, brushing it off on my jeans. I couldn’t afford to waste a single round with doomsday happening.