Mark Clodi

by Kathy

  Once Steve had the gun reloaded he pointed it carefully at the lead zombie coming towards them, it already had an arrow sticking out of it's back, but had not slowed down much, he hit it just about the left eye and it dropped quickly. Steve then rolled forward, his legs still in the car, his gun hand pointing under the car and using his other hand he supported himself and tried to get a line on the zombie that had Stewart trapped under the car. The position was awkward and he could only see the mangled thing past Stewart, it was not worth taking a shot, he might hit Stewart. Steve scrambled out of the car, paused to put another bullet into an oncoming zombie and then said, “Tom! Take the pistol! Gimme the shotgun!”

  Tom let go of the gun and Steve pressed the pistol into his hand, “You have seven shots left.” Steve fumbled in the pockets of Tom’s coat and came out with the shotgun shells he knew were there. He reloaded the shotgun with five shells and ducked around the back of the squad car, looking for a better angle on the zombie that had a hold on Stewart. Tom fired the pistol at more approaching zombies, the rest ran back towards the cars parked on the side of the road. Steve could not see anything at the back of the car and continued around to the driver’s side. He noticed Max was slumped unconscious in the back seat and saw the zombie’s leg sticking out from under the tire of the car on this side. Ducking down he spotted the thing’s torso, on arm was on this side of the body and was holding onto the undercarriage of the car, the other had Stewart, the zombie was trying to drag her lower leg to it's mouth, but between Stewart and Tom’s efforts the leg was not getting any closer. Steve angled the gun away from the Stewart and Tom and fired one round into the back of the things head. The car gave a sudden jerk too.

  “Aw shit!” he yelled, his shot, while angled away from his friends, had been angled towards the front passenger side tire, which had been shot out when he finished off the zombie.

  Stewart was up, trying to walk and reload her gun at the same time, she was limping badly and had to lean on Tom for support, he transferred her to leaning against the car and took the shotgun back from Steve after he came around the car. Taking his original gun back Steve put in the last loaded clip he had.

  “Tom you and Steve go help them out, they are just kids for christsake! Leave me the empty clips Steve I will reload them. I will stay and keep an eye on Max. Go!”

  Tom and Steve moved forward towards the group of four people fighting in the parking lot, the people with the bows were not firing into the mob, probably to keep from hitting their friends. They were also not moving around to get a better angle either, but staying in place. Tom and Steve had no reservations; they moved around behind several of the zombies and finished several off before they even knew what hit them.

  The rest of the zombies were either hacked or batted to death by the four medieval fighters or ran off around the corner of the building, leaving the parking lot empty of all undead in a few short seconds. Tom and Steve fired after the zombies and ran to the corner to make sure they were still fleeing, not regrouping. When they returned a few moments later the squad car was sitting in front of the clinic doors. The archers were helping a younger man along between them; his legs were coated in blood. Behind them came a younger boy and girl, carrying backpacks and baseball bats.

  They all formed a little group at the front of the clinic where Stewart, naturally, took charge of the situation, ordering Steve and Tom to man handle Max into the clinic and directing the kids, teenagers really, to bring their wounded friend in as well. The rest would stay in the parking lot to keep the zombies away from the broken front door, except the smaller children, who Stewart directed to stand in the entry way to bring messages back and forth if shouting would not work.

  Once Max and the wounded boy were inside Stewart turned to the youths and said, “Can any of you fire a gun?”

  The oldest looking one said, “No.” then thought about it and added, “Not yet.” and smiled at her.

  Stewart took the revolver that had been Max’s out of the back seat and showed him how it worked. She sent one of the kids in to snag the black belt off of Max for the extra ammo and showed him how to reload it once the bullets ran out.

  “So who are you and what are you dressed up in those outfits for?” Stewart asked

  “I am Michael, that’s John, Craig and Whitney, the little kids are my brother Matt and Whitney’s sister Lauren, the girl with the bow is Aggie, for Agnus. The guy is Ron and the wounded one is my friend and Ron’s older brother Jacob.”

  Stewart passed along the names of the people traveling with her and prompted, “Where are you parents? And you still haven’t said where you got those swords and other weapons?”

  “Oh, sorry, no, the weapons are from our houses, we are really into the SCAA, fantasy stuff, like Lord of the Rings and the medieval period, you know. Our parents never came home from work, the zombies, you know, they were breaking into the houses dragging people out into the street. I figured we had better band together and last night I got almost everyone to come over to my house. Today we went and got Whitney and Lauren. No parents, they were all at work, they called at first, then nobody called and nobody answered when we called them. We decided to get out of here. We were thinking of holing up in the mall or maybe a ‘club’ store somewhere.”

  “So you didn’t even really know how to use the swords or anything? You just busted out with em and started hacking?” Shaking her head Stewart saw some measure of almost anger in the youth’s eyes before she continued, “That takes guts man, look at all of the ones you killed, that was amazing. How far have you come from home?”

  “Well we live over on south Kilmore, about four miles east of here.”

  “Four miles! That is freaking insane! Four miles with seven of you, plus two little kids? Good job Michael. We came from the Mac Co. building in the Denver Tech Center, not too much further than you have walked. What happened to your friend?”

  “Jacob? He got caught and pulled under a car like you, only the zombie bit him all up. We tried to pull him out, but it was too late. Ron is sick with worry, I mean we all are, you know?”

  “Yeah kid, I know, sorry!” Stewart saw Michael’s eyes flash with anger at the word, ‘kid’ and she hastily back tracked, “I mean I am old enough to be your…aunt at least, I didn’t mean anything bad by it.”

  Michael’s face softened into a slight scowl, “Yeah I know, but lady if you had seen or been through half the stuff we have, well even Matt and Lauren have had to adapt and we tried to shield them. You know, we can’t though, if we do they won’t stay alive, they gotta see and hear and…smell, all this stuff! There are no little kids anymore, just alive people and dead people. And undead people.”

  A woman in a a typical nurse’s uniform came to the front of the office and asked, “Is there anyone else who needs to be looked at? The doctor wants me to do the triage and get you in there in worst case order first.”

  Stewart looked around and said, “No I think we are all okay, other than a few bruises and scraps.”

  The nurse gave Stewart a look like she was humoring a little kid, Stewart thought, 'Now I know how Michael felt just a few seconds ago.' then the nurse said, “And I suppose you normally bleed from your leg? C’mon officer don’t play the tough dike routine with me, you know wounds can get infected and at the very least that will need to be cleaned up,” Pulling up Stewart’s pants leg she revealed an ugly mass of bruised and torn flesh where the zombie had Stewart pinned beneath the car. “Probably this is going to need a stitch or two as well, it looks ugly lady. You'll have a scar, but not like your friend in there.”

  Stewart looked at her leg, amazed that it had not hurt before the nurse pointed it out. 'Adrenaline, it will keep you going until someone rubs your face in the fact that you should not keep going.'

  “Fuck.” said Stewart, “I didn’t even realize I was wounded. Okay put me on the list and don’t let Tom in there off easy either he strained his shoulder and I know our little stunt in the parking lot probab
ly hurt him more than he would like to admit, he feels bad because he thinks he got Max shot. Any word on our friends condition yet?”

  “Darling” the nurse replied, “You ain’t been here but five minutes and you want a diagnoses? My best hip shot is that everyone is going to make it, usually if they get here breathing, they leave breathing too. Things have changed though, so don’t hold me to that.” While she said the last bit she was looking at Michael intently. He got the message and just nodded.

  The nurse proceeded to examine everyone else, made sure the younger children were going to be inside the doors, not in the parking lot with the ‘adults’ and then started back inside the clinic. She took about two steps before turning and saying, “And thanks. Thank you for not letting them get us, it was just a matter of time, you know?”

  Everyone mumbled embarrassed, “Sure, no problem” or “You are welcome” and the nurse turned and proceeded inside.

  Chapter 36

  A night had passed for Jimbo, Fred and Bobby and most of the next day as well, pickings were plentiful in this part of suburbia and Fred felt no need to rush or move on any faster than they were.

  “Fred, how’re ya feeling?” Asked Jimbo, “You all full for today and ready for some mental lessons?”

  Fred and the boy gathered around Jimbo in the garage, a nice empty three car garage, well empty now because they had pulled two cars out onto the driveway. Bobby pulled up a lawn chair and sat with the two men, who were likewise seated next to a small ‘dormitory’ style refrigerator. The fridge was full of beer and while Jimbo had not yet checked to see if he could still drink beer or become intoxicated, he was going to find out very soon.

  “Well guys I think we need to explore the whole mind control thing a little more. It seems like magic of some sort, being able to control others with just a thought and I have to say I don’t much like the idea myself. I don’t want to be Nancy’s puppet or, begging your pardon, even yours Fred and you seem like a pretty decent guy. So I think we owe it to ourselves to see what we can do to each other and what we can block from each other.” That said Jimbo proceeded to give them a pretty frank assessment of what he had done to both of them when he first realized he had these newfound abilities. At some point in his life Jimbo had read a story dealing with mental powers, he recalled the word psionic and liked it, so he introduced the word to Bobby and Fred, calling their new powers psionic powers of the mind. It was as good a name as any. Jimbo had decided to come clean with Fred fully and to an extent with Bobby. After their second house break in, Fred had started to grow much more intelligent and made a few attempts to get through to Jimbo. He seemed to have figured out that he was a direct predecessor of Jimbo’s and realized the implications of what that meant.

  After the third house, their current house, Jimbo thought Fred could break through to his mind if he gave it enough effort, so honesty was probably the best policy if he hoped to have an ally and not a master. Bobby was pretty oblivious to everything. You could make a ten year old a zombie, but not make him smarter than a ten year old. Not that Bobby was a stump or anything, he just lacked the experience his more devious partners had when it came to dealing with other people and problems. Bobby also lacked the world view, the context of the way things worked in the past, to him the past was going to school and playing video games. Jimbo know that Bobby held high hopes of playing more video games in the near future too.

  They played round robin for a bit with each person trying to get through the other’s mind fog. After Jimbo explained how he imagined his mind obscured by clouds they both tried it and while that made it harder for Jimbo he was still pretty easily able to brush aside Bobby’s defenses and could work his way into Fred’s mind too, but only just. Jimbo was satisfied too, Fred was not going to get any stronger, he was sated and at his peak. That meant that Jimbo might actually outweigh Nancy in the psionics power department if push came to shove. With Fred at his side and guarding his back, he knew he could beat Nancy hands down. Unless she still had those other little young bitches around her. They all continued the mental play until dusk, when they had worked up a bit of an appetite again. Jimbo discovered that his taste for beer was still there, though it seemed to give him gas, 'So nothing new there.' he thought wryly then belched loudly. 'No real buzz either though', he had drank four beers and was not feeling any sort of effect, 'Perhaps I just need more beer?'

  He was interrupted by Bobby, who said, “So who do we eat next, I am getting hungry again. Could we try what we practiced on other zombie-people and see what happens? What are we going to do?” Both his companions turned to look at him and Jimbo smiled, this was working out great, he always knew he had leadership potential.

  “Well Bobby I am glad you asked. Here is what I was thinking, we try our mind stuff out on other zombies first, we feed second, and find you someone your size to hang with us, then maybe we head over to the mall or a Best Buy and do a little shopping, I know you were wanting video games, can’t we get you a game boy or something like that?”

  “A DS! Can I have PSP too? My cousin had one, it could get on the internet and play songs with swear words in them. I want one of those.”

  Jimbo had no idea what the boy was talking about, so he said, “Well, lets just see what they have, okay?”

  Chapter 37

  It was a day later that Nancy and the girls left from the house in suburbia and it had been two days since Nancy had gone from head of marketing to her new profession, queen of the dead. In that time the area south of Denver known as the Tech Center had gone from an area packed with office buildings housing accountants, stock brokers, engineers, and health care companies, to a city in chaos. Abandoned cars packed the streets like fallen dominoes. Smoke filled the air and trash freely tumbled along, pushed by the wind.

  In just a few short days the number of dead walking the streets had increased exponentially. At first Nancy had her gang of girls destroy each and every zombie that came across their path. It soon became evident that they were fighting a losing battle. It not only drained the girls of their energy, but for every zombie that fell another five stepped up to take it's place. Their appetites were still being sated however they had cut back on killing everyone they came across. As they fed more it felt like they needed to eat less and could go longer between eating, as if they were getting permanently 'full'.

  Nancy’s original plan had been to march right back to MAC Co, find Fred and that fucker Jimbo and let the girls chop them into little pieces. However, Nancy was worried about Jimbo, he had taken off on his own and he was probably out there eating as many as he could to get stronger too. The question was what would happen when they met? A fight was probably a good bet, however finding the fucker was going to take some time and effort. In the end she decided to put finding Fred and Jimbo, on her ‘B’ list of priorities, she would probably never find them. Now her plan was to take the girls out and establish an empire, if she still could; finding prey was becoming harder and harder. Nancy gave the girls orders to not to permanently kill the next three girls they each took, thereby increasing her gang size to twelve, plus her, for thirteen. After that she might let each girl make two more zombies, when she had fifty or so she was going to wield some real power. As for the lessening food supply, well there were still many parts of suburbia that were unexplored.

  The hot July days caused everything to radiate heat, the pavement, the abandoned vehicles, the office buildings, everything was a blur of red, orange, and yellow. The burning sun also expedited the aging of their dead skin. For these reasons Nancy had opted to rest, not that the dead needed rest, during the day and hunt under the cool blanket of night.

  Earlier that day they had been resting at what used to be a night club called 'Cool Water'. It's lack of windows and overall dark and cool motif made it a perfect place to lay low and wait for nightfall. During the day Nancy had heard sporadic gun shots from the north. As soon as the sun set behind the Rocky Mountains she sent Veronica and Julie to scout it ou
t. It was not long before the two returned with good and bad news. Half a mile from the night club three men were occupying a Conoco gas station. The bad news being they were armed with rifles and hand guns. These were weapons Nancy would really like to have, adding firearms to her super human strength was a very good plan, so the gang set out towards the gunfire.

  Even before they reached the gas station they could see bright flood lights and hear gun fire. The Conoco was located at a corner of a small strip mall. The gas station was comprised of one small building in the middle flanked on either side by fours sets of gas pumps. The red and white Conoco signs lit up the evening sky. The windows and doors of the gas station were boarded up and the only movement that could be seen was on it's flat roof. A parking lot filled with rambling zombies separated the gas station from the rest of the buildings.

  ‘Such a waste.’ thought Nancy, ‘Someone needs to make zombies stop making zombies or we are going to run into a serious food shortage.’

  Nancy and her gang hid in the shadows and watched for a little while as the people, men, Nancy thought, shot the zombies milling about in the parking lot and empty streets. Veronica’s report had been accurate. There were three men atop the gas station laughing and drinking beer as if they were on a camping trip in the mountains. She watched as a zombie stumbled into the parking lot attracted to the energy the men gave off like a moth to a flame.

  Nancy gave the girls orders to back her up if she looked like she needed help, emphasizing her commands with a mental nudge as well, then she crept into hearing range. Surprisingly this was farther out than Nancy would have thought, so her hearing was improving too? Or the men were just loud braggarts…

  “Hey Jake, who’s turn is it?”