Zombie Revolution

by K. Bartholomew

  Even with this evidence, it was still so hard to believe, for obvious reasons, that I had to check my phone to make sure it wasn’t April 1st. It wasn’t. But I checked again just to make sure. It was the middle of September. And even after I gave myself a crack about the cheek with an opened hand, they were still there, staggering after the cameraman and causing the picture to go all shit.

  I was so euphoric I could barely even move. This was so much better than winning the lottery and my mind began rapidly darting around over what I was supposed to do.

  The only bad thing about it all, um, apart from everybody dying, of course, was that this monumental event was transpiring all the fucking way over in London.

  I slammed both fists into my desk, upsetting the goldfish, and blew air out my nose. How far was London?

  Opening Google maps, I clicked on directions and checked the distance from Bristol to London.

  No, no. This was no good. I needed a more precise answer.

  I deleted London and entered Poplar before swapping Bristol for Redland and while I waited for my stupid internet to make a move, I felt the sweat pricking at my forehead.

  When I saw the answer, my heart sank.

  124 miles away, which meant a two hours and twenty minute drive.

  “Fuck!”

  This provided me with several problems. One; I didn’t own a fucking car. My house mate Dave did though, which brought me to problem number two, because Dave was a twat and lending me his precious vehicle so I could go slay some z would be the last thing he’d ever do. Third; even if by some miracle Dave did lend me his car or, say, I was to somehow come into possession of the keys, I had no money to purchase the fuel in which to traverse the south, just as I had no money for a hotel and neither did I have any friends in the capital to put me up.

  In any case, driving through to the east end of London would take considerably longer than what Google Maps was suggesting, it always did in this shit hole of a congested country. My heart sank further as my pent up rage threatened to explode within the confines of my dingy student box room.

  Think, Gareth, think…

  I clicked on the cycle icon and waited for Google to make the calculation. That I was even contemplating actually cycling there on my BMX was evidence of how desperate to smash some zed foe I truly was.

  Bam! Fourteen hours it would take to pedal there, or less, considering I was in shape, having spent the last six years preparing for this day. Oh, they all called me crazy but the TV don’t lie, does it? Who’s the crazy one now, right, you bastards? Cycling would cost me nothing, which was another plus. Sure, I might die on the way but this was a once in a ten-lifetime opportunity to find some actual fucking zombies skulls to cave in with my cosh.

  There was no need to even give it any more thought. I would pack my gear, cycle to London and have the time of my fucking life, and I was in the process of yanking my bag down from atop the wardrobe when the realisation struck me and all I could do was clench my fists in vexation.

  Because last week when I’d gone for an Indian takeaway, some cretin had stolen my bike. Apparently, you can’t live in a student area and leave your bike propped against the rail for ten minutes. Why wasn’t I told? Why must I be tortured so?

  In case you hadn’t guessed yet, I was a zombie maniac. When I was ten, Paul, my older brother, swiped from the DVD store the original George Romero, Dawn of the Dead.

  I was hooked.

  It was something about being allowed to bash in people’s heads and be completely immune to punishment from the authorities. It was about being the only guy around keeping a cool head while the rest of the world went to shit. They’d be running around, screaming like girls, fighting each other over who got to take the TV into the basement while I’d be out there with a sledgehammer, taking it to those zeds. It was about being able to breeze into the Ferrari showroom and taking whichever car you desired. It was about being able to go to your local Game store and stealing as many Playstation games as you could stuff in your backpack and not face any retribution. It was about being able to stride up to your old school bullies and laugh while you hacked off their limbs one by one before hurling them down a high flight of steps and watching their heads bounce off every one.

  I’d seen Dawn of the Dead over a hundred times. I had a cabinet full of zombie movies. It was how me and my bro would bond, we’d watch a zombie movie. We would sit there in the dark, eat popcorn and go on a six-movie spree, afterwards talking about our strategy should we ever be lucky enough for an outbreak to happen in our lifetime.

  But since then, I’d taken my obsession even further.

  I now possessed dozens of prosthetic limbs I’d stolen from old people’s homes all across the city. Whenever someone died and they had a fake limb, I’d be lurking around the bins waiting. I learned how to make realistic zombie skin from a makeup artist I paid to discover her secrets. I had everything; zombie contact lenses, zombie hair, gallons of pigs blood in the freezer as well as a set of false teeth I’d fashioned. I won’t tell you where I got the teeth from, but let’s say, they were one of my proudest creations. I’d also perfected the walk. When I dressed up, I was one pretty fucking convincing zombie, let me tell you.

  But none of this was helping me now.

  Why did the epicentre have to be so far away? My heart pounded and I could actually feel my blood pressure rising within me. Oh, please, please, please, Zed, eat your way through London and make it all the way 124 miles due west. My country? Who cared. I only wanted to live the dream.

  I took an urgent inventory of all the zombie fighting hardware I’d dedicated an entire wardrobe to. I possessed no illegal weapons, for I was far too much of a pansy for that, but I had a brilliant range of weaponry that could take out zed without landing me in jail. I owned a set of long gauntlets, specially made, pure leather, thick, heavy and which stretched the entire length of my arms to cover my shoulders. The material was a little thinner around the fingers, which allowed for maximum dexterity without the risk of being penetrated by teeth. Purely defensive, they would enable me to grab zed by the hair whilst I plunged my weapon of choice through the eyeball.

  This was a set of modified hedge shears. I’d unscrewed the bolt so there were two constituent parts, which I’d always planned on using for stabbing and thrusting when the apocalypse came. The handles had been shaped specifically for my fingers using a wood file, which bestowed an incredibly comfortable grip and the blades were sharpened to a wicked point. I kept them both in their own custom leather holsters that would strap around my back using a special sling. In addition to this, I had also honed my thrusting arm over many hours of practice on Dave’s old punch bag in the basement.

  I possessed a titanium framed stiletto hammer that tucked into my specially adapted belt. It wasn’t meant as a primary weapon but more as a backup in case zed managed to pin me to the floor. In the unlikely event of that happening, I could simply delve into my belt, slip out the hammer and either shove zed’s head in from the back or use the claw end to lever out its eyeball from the front.

  I owned an eagle sniper slingshot, which I’d been lucky enough to stumble across at a car boot sale about a year back. Since then I’d whiled away many a Saturday morning in the forest practicing firing stones at tree trunks from a distance. I’m a pretty good shot.

  Of course, I also kept a baseball bat. That was standard. But in all practicality it was cumbersome, unwieldy and would be a problem carrying into a fight with all your other shit weighing you down. Still, I kept it in my room because the Zombie Survival Manual had recommended I have one, and that book was my Bible.

  I had even stashed several breeze blocks beneath my bed, which I hoped to drop on zed skull from my bedroom window. Though, in all honesty, I wouldn’t be needing the breeze blocks since my zed friends were 124 miles away, which unfortunately meant I’d be unlikely to need any of my other weapons either and that angered me immensely.

  A knock at the door interrupted my thou
ght process and I snarled, “what do you want?”

  “You going to uni today?” It was Dave, my housemate with his usual mocking routine. He knew full well I’d taken a job stacking shelves at Tesco after my little zombie prank got me kicked out of university. The Dean had absolutely no sense of humour.

  “Fuck you!”

  He laughed through the door and I wondered if he was also jingling his car keys. The bastard. “Hey, Gaz, I take it you’ve seen the news? I bet you’re pissing razor blades right about now, huh?”

  He was right about that but I decided against giving him the satisfaction of allowing him to see the state I was presently in and even though it killed me, I politely told him to bugger off.

  He ignored me and this time I was sure he was shaking his keys. “Is there something you’d like to request of me, my friend?” He was bluffing, of course, and had no intention of lending me his car, not after I’d urinated in his coke, but I was so desperate that I still considered begging for them and I was just about to throw open the door prior to falling to my knees when he called, “because you can forget it. I’m thinking of taking a drive over to Karla’s, maybe spend the night there again.” She was the girl I’d had a mini obsession with before I was made to leave my course. Now, I never got to see her but Dave did. I hated him for it and now he was laughing from the other side of the door.

  “Yeah, I’m sure you’ll find it funny when they make it to Bristol, you bastard,” I muttered the last two words under my breath, but when that time came, I truly would make him beg for my protection, Karla too, though I’d be likely to acquiesce to her pleas, whereas Dave could tussle with zed on his own and Karla and I would watch from a safe distance, she slightly behind my muscled arm, on the end of which was held my hardware poised and ready to protect her, her long red hair floating with the breeze as she held on to my shoulder for dear life.

  At least, that was what I dreamed.

  Dave had never taken me seriously. Something about being a zombie obsessive. But one thing was definite … I was prepared and he wasn’t, and he’d squirm before I lifted a finger to help him.

  I stared forlornly at the TV as my dreams slipped away. How could I get to London?

  The footage was now being shot from a helicopter and it showed hundreds of zeds loitering in the street, completely unmolested. It broke my heart. Where were all the heroes? Why had nobody decided to go out and stick it to those freaks? Maybe they were expecting another zombie apocalypse after this one. The fools.

  A zed had its face buried in what had once been someone’s belly and he pulled out several lengths of intestine, ripping it apart like sausage before devouring the bounty. Yep, these were the real things, alright, and I couldn’t wait for the Youtube videos to surface.

  My laptop pinged. Someone had messaged me on Facebook.

  Who else, but it was Javvo.

  Javvo and myself were the founders and joint administrators of our Facebook Group, Zombie Maniacs Of The World Unite. Our group had over fifty thousand members, bringing zombie nutjobs together, wherever they were around the world, as the title says.

  It had been Javvo who’d created the group a few years back and, after seeing my enthusiasm for the cause, which had included a fair deal of pestering and begging, he’d made me joint admin within a few weeks. An American, we were in communication constantly, discussing grand strategy, tactics, logistics and weaponry and although we’d never actually met, he was probably my best friend.

  But trust Javvo to be on top of the situation when zed finally came knocking and there was not one person on earth I’d rather have at my side during a zombie infestation.

  I opened his message and, feeling the excitement brim, I dared to hope that maybe Javvo would have a suggestion. He wrote that as soon as he’d seen a group of zeds massacring the occupants of an entire London bus, his eyes had been permanently glued to the screen, which had caused him to be fired from his job at the 7/11 after not turning in for work. This meant he was free and unrestricted to fly to the UK.

  I messaged him straight back. “Mate, I know how tempting it is to fly straight to London, but don’t do this to me! I can’t get there – Money issues!”

  The gentleman returned, “You fuckin yanking me, dude? The apocalypse begins and you, of all people, are pussying out on me? If I can make it to London from Texas, I’m sure you can make it from somewhere else in England!”

  “Mate, you don’t understand. If there was any way I could physically haul my arse to that shithole, I’d be there. You know this!”

  “Looks like you’re forgetting our pledge, dude!” I glared at his message while my fists clenched of their own accord and my entire body seized up and began shaking.

  “Ok! I’ll be there! I don’t know how, but I’ll walk if I have to. I’ve got your back, mate. Don’t worry about customs and shit. I’ve got spare hardware for the fight. Let me know when you’re in the air.”

  As I pressed send I felt a strange sensation coursing through my body. I’d committed myself to getting to London - Somehow!

  I was on my way to slay some zed.

  Two

  My specially modified backpack lay on the bed. I’d sewn in special compartments for all my weapons and tools and I liked to keep it in a permanent state of semi-readiness. Nevertheless, I double and triple checked everything was where it was supposed to be. There was no way of knowing if Dave habitually sneaked into my room while I was going about my business and would pillage through my things but in these situations, it never hurt to be paranoid about your possessions.

  The dry food was there; pasta, rice and oats. Spare mobile phone in case of emergency. Street map of the UK since the network was expected to go down at some point during the apocalypse. Two walkie-talkies. Batteries. Spare socks and underwear. A skeleton key. Condoms for any grateful girls I should happen across. Printed instructions on hotwiring vehicles. Crowbar, binoculars and flint. All standard stuff but of course, I’d taken it to the next level, because I also possessed tranquillisers, tourniquet, bone saw, needle, thread, bandages and some special chemical cube I dropped in water to make it boil. If one of my entourage was stupid enough to get bitten then I’d be able to perform an emergency amputation in order to save his life before the infection spread to the rest of his body.

  I was all set to walk out the door, never to look back.

  Almost.

  Dave had since left for university, the complete fucking nerd, and so I used the skeleton key to enter his room and headed for the bookshelf at the far wall. He kept a huge range of porn magazines, which I really didn’t feel like touching, his particular fetish being big tittied Amazons. I removed the book on Engineering Terminology, thrust my hand into the space and pulled out the money.

  At least £800 in cold, hard cash.

  Well, it looked like I no longer had to walk but could instead travel in style, or more realistically, take the train.

  My phone rang.

  Was it Javvo calling from the sky?

  I pulled it from my pocket and checked the screen.

  Damn.

  It was my brother, Paul.

  “Hi, Paul. You ok?”

  “Thank God I got you! You’re still in Bristol?”

  “Yes, but not for long!”

  “Look, I know what you’re about to do but I’m begging you … please don’t go!”

  “Paul, you know this has been my…”

  “Look, Gareth, you’re all I’ve got. If anything happens to you, I’m all alone.” He sobbed down the line, which could have broken my heart.

  I exhaled, “ok, Paul, I hear you.” My heart sank further.

  But he was right. We really only had each other.

  “I know how you must be feeling, but if you need me to come over, I can probably get one of the staff to bring me.”

  “No, Paul. That’s ok. I know how much it hurts when they move you around the place.”

  Did I forget to mention that when we were kids, Paul had pus
hed me out of the path of a joyrider, driving along the pavement. The car had crushed him against the wall, shattering his spine.

  He’d saved my life and as a result spent his in a wheelchair, pumped full of medication, in pain if he did so much as move his jaw to utter a word or squeeze his sphincters to take a shit.

  Our parents had done their best to cope and did all they could for several years. They took care of us both at home, giving up their jobs to be full time carers for Paul. But after the charitable donations dried out, they could no longer afford to carry on caring for him and so they drove their car off an embankment and into the river. I understood why they did it.

  I ended up in foster care and Paul got taken in by a specialist centre for spinal injuries, all paid for by the insurance policy my parents had taken out. I saw him every couple of weeks. Often his medication would give him all kinds of hallucinations and he wouldn’t know who I was but very occasionally, like now, we could have a conversation.

  I heard him audibly exhale deeply down the phone. “Gareth, I knew you’d see sense. You’re my little brother and I love you.”

  “I know. I love you too.”

  “Remember, you’re living for the two of us.”

  “No, Paul, I’m living for the four of us.”

  Well that was that.

  I would not be travelling to London.

  Javvo would have to do this on his own.

  But if the zeds ever made it to Bristol, then that would be a different matter entirely.

  And I’d be ready for them.