by Tufo, Mark
“Sorry,” Tommy stated. “I lost my grip just as I was propelling you.”
“Might be for the best,” I told him. “Any more momentum and I would have skidded off the far side.”
“Hadn’t thought of that.” He placed a hand to his chin. We were moving quicker now; the zombies had eased up on the bombardment. It was my sincerest hope they were running low on stock; however, that seemed unlikely. There were a lot of volunteers. I wonder what zombie extremists are promised when they reach the hereafter? We watched for a few moments as some of the zombies tried to make the jump. The first couple actually made a fair go at it; they got a running start and everything. But as more zombies began to crowd down, the gap narrowed, and now they were trying to straight leap from a standstill, or were being shoved over the edge.
We’d been given a reprieve, even if it was temporary. But there were other ways down, and by nightfall, it was a good bet we would be hunted again. I looked up to gauge the time. A heavy bank of clouds was moving in; it was another good bet we were going to be seeing shitty weather again tonight. How many more soakings and eighteen-hour forced marches could we take? Twice more got the static-laced garble of my squad; these were even less intelligible than the first time. I hoped they were looking for us, and not under their own duress.
The clouds had thickened and blackened—looked like the inside of the lungs of a three-pack-a-day smoker that had been hard at that habit for thirty years, but as of yet, the clouds had not released their payload. We had to get out of the forest and somewhere with a building, preferably a fort, though right now I’d take a trailer. Ended up getting something in the middle. Tommy again was out in front. We weren’t being overly cautious; we were trying to make as much ground as we could. I felt the first splash of rain strike the top of my ear when Tommy brought us to a stop.
“Now what?” Anger had begun to set in; I couldn’t help it any more than I could stop the rain.
Tommy pointed up, I figured to the storm clouds. I looked anyway. You can imagine my surprise when I saw what looked like an entire house up in the trees.
“What the hell is that?” I asked, although the answer was right there. “You see a way up?” The thing had to be twenty feet off the ground, no rope, no ladder; I was walking around the trees looking for something, any kind of access. I didn’t like the idea of being stuck up in the canopy when the zombies came, but I liked the fact of being stuck on the ground with them even less.
“Whoa, someone spent a pretty penny on that,” BT said. “Used to watch Extreme Treehouses with Linda.”
“Think you can climb that, Tommy?” I asked.
“Fuck off!” someone from above shouted down. I moved to where I thought the voice was coming from. First thing I saw was the bore of a very large hunting rifle. The person holding it had on baggy clothes and a scarf wrapped around her face, but the voice was distinctly female.
“We need help,” I shouted up.
“Yeah, and I need a McFlurry. Doesn’t look like either of us is going to get what we need,” she said.
“Miss, there’s zombies following us. We need to rest.” BT was attempting to appeal to any altruistic tendencies she might have.
“They’re following you, so you should probably get going, then.”
She wasn’t going to budge. I didn’t blame her one bit. Still wanted to throttle her some…in a figurative way. If a couple of more drops hadn’t have landed on my face, I might have been willing to plod on.
“My name is Michael Talbot. I’m a lieutenant in the Marines Corps. These two men with me are both sergeants, Tommy, and the little leprechaun guy is BT. We just need a place to rest up, and then we’ll be gone.”
“Leprechaun? Isn’t he a little big to be a leprechaun?” the woman asked.
“Leprechaun on his father’s side. His mother was a mountain troll. I saw the wedding pictures; I’m not sure how they…you know.”
“The fuck is wrong with you?” BT asked me.
“Miss?” I entreated.
“It’s just fuck off to you. Don’t try and create a repertoire with me. I don’t give a shit about your names, who you are, or who you say you belong to.”
“Listen, I realize the world is full of assholes these days, but we’re not in that group.”
“Well, that settles it. You must be decent if you say so. We’ll lower the ladder now.”
“The sarcasm is heavy with this one,” BT said.
“You think maybe I could talk to your manager?” I asked.
“Sure thing, Karen. I’ll get right on that,” the woman said.
“Shit. If I weren’t married, she’d be vying for the spot,” I told BT.
“Yeah, I’m sure that would be her dream come true.”
“Come on, can’t you imagine the two of us together? We could rip on nearly the entire population. We’d be a tandem sarcasm power couple.”
“Don’t like it when I can’t hear what people are saying. Better yet, take your conversation and…”
“Yeah, we know, fuck off. Know what I’m going to do, Miss Fuck Off?”
“Can’t wait for you to tell me.” I saw her sighting down the barrel, thinking I might try something along the lines of force.
I kept one hand up while I slowly took my rifle off and placed it against a tree. “I’m exhausted. I’m going to take a nap.” I made sure to lean up against a tree so she could see me clearly.
“Not here you’re not. I’ll shoot you.”
“Go ahead. I’m sure the fresh blood and the noise will bring some guests along in a hurry.”
I pulled a cover out of my cargo pocket, placed it on my head and covered my eyes with the brim. A nap sounded great, but under these current circumstances, it was pretty close to being the furthest thing from my mind. Generally, eating ham-anything tended to dominate that last spot.
“Is your lieutenant insane?” the woman asked.
“Most likely.”
“Yup,” Tommy added at nearly the same time.
“You can’t stay here.” It was the first time I sensed some hesitation from her.
It was a safe assumption that she had to come down fairly often to replenish food stores, maybe do some hunting. If a gaggle of zombies parked under her abode, that would seriously hamper that. I stretched my arms out and gave an exaggerated yawn. She pulled back the breech on her rifle; I would imagine to let me know she had chambered a round.
Tommy came close. “You sure you don’t want to just leave?”
I looked up. “I like it here. Even have a root crawling up my ass. Helps me remember just how fucked I am.”
Nothing much happened for five, maybe ten minutes. Another few and I might have actually been able to pull off a snooze. Then the wind changed. Not only did the rain pick up, but the scent of the dead rolled in with the prevailing breeze. There was a murmured conversation going on up above. I suspected maybe it was more than just the woman, then that was confirmed.
“My lookout says the zombies are coming. You should get going.” This time, there was a lot less anger in her voice and much more anxiety.
I didn’t say anything.
“How far?” BT asked her.
“Half a mile,” she replied.
“Mike?”
“How far you think we’re going to make it, BT? Another night running full-tilt in the rain, stumbling to who the hell knows where?” I asked. “I’d just as soon end it here.”
“Hell of a gambit you’re pulling,” he muttered before walking away.
It was less than a minute later. “You give us all your weapons, we’ll let you up,” she said. “The offer ends in two minutes. In four, the zombies will be here.”
“Done,” I told her, standing up.
“Have you lost your mind? Who’s to say they don’t take our guns and still leave us out here?” BT asked.
A small hatch opened up in the bottom of the house, a large, Yogi Bear-type picnic basket was quickly lowered. The round face of a kid peere
d through. I waved; he stuck out his tongue and flipped me off. It wasn’t a great first encounter. Then it hit me; they were planning on screwing us over. Would you really flip off an adult who was going to be in your face in a minute or two? Not likely.
“Tommy, how fast can you make it up that rope?” I spoke out of the side of my mouth while smiling up at the kid.
“Ten seconds, maybe less.”
“As soon as I get the woman in my sights, you head up. And before either of you ask—no, I’m not sure about this.”
“What’s the hold-up down there?” the woman asked.
“The big guy has one of those garter guns and he’s embarrassed to show it. Be a sec!” I yelled up. I had my rifle in my hands as if I was about to place it in the basket. The kid was watching me; the woman was still on the deck that encircled the whole structure. I darted out into the open and trained my rifle on her.
“Don’t,” I told her. “I can spray that entire area in a micro second. You’ll never get a second shot off.”
Tommy was climbing that rope like a monkey on crack. Honestly, I don’t know what that would look like, and I hope I never do, but he was flying up there. He was going hand over hand, never using his legs to support or push with. I sometimes forgot just how strong he was.
“Hannah! He’s coming up!” She turned her head at the cry of the kid.
“Move and I’ll shoot you!” I told her. I’m not entirely sure if I would have, but I couldn’t have her shooting Tommy.
“Shoot him, Johnny!” She turned back to me.
That was a new wrinkle. My eyes darted to Tommy, who was three-quarters of the way up; there was a loud explosion as a bullet was fired. Tommy’s left side dipped down as he was struck.
“Johnny!” I yelled. “You do that again and I’ll blow holes in your sister!” Just a guess on my part, but it felt right.
“Hannah?” Johnny questioned.
I shook my head. “Don’t make me do it, kid, please.”
She hesitated but she didn’t change her position.
“Shoot him!” she yelled.
“Stop!” BT yelled. “Hannah, I’m aimed in on Johnny, you want me to shoot him?”
Her shoulders sagged before she stiffened. I knew what she was thinking: should she shoot me and see how the rest of this plays out? And maybe she would have, too, if not for the fact that now Johnny was in trouble. Could hear movement in the house as Tommy entered. He came out and grabbed the rifle from a shocked Hannah. Blood poured down his left arm and fell from his hand.
“Just these two. They’re both kids, Mr. T,” Tommy said.
“You all right?” I pointed to the blood.
“It hurts; scraped my shoulder blade. Not deep, though.”
“What are you going to do with us?” Hannah stood rigid.
“Besides crash at your pad for the night? Absolutely nothing,” I told her.
Tommy dropped a rope ladder down through the opening.
“I’m going first,” BT said. “And I don’t want any of that shit about you being worried that the rope won’t hold.”
“By all means,” I told him and his pointing finger. “I’m more concerned about the trees supporting your weight, anyway. That’s why elephants don’t climb.”
“Fuck you, Mike.”
“Is that any way to talk to your commanding officer?”
He flipped me off as he ascended.
“Been around four people today and three have either flipped me off or told me to fuck off. A lesser man might think it’s time to reevaluate themselves, but fuck it, I really like me,” I said.
“Still early enough, Tommy might get onboard with the rest of us.” BT was most of the way up. I was going to wait until he was in. If he ever fell, it wouldn’t end well for me.
“You better move your ass.” BT was sticking his head through the doorway. My nose was telling me all I needed to know.
I was pulling up the ladder and shutting the door just as Tommy came inside and held his finger to his mouth. The zombies were here.
A paranoid, unreasonable part of my mind that desperately wanted to let loose its virally infectious thoughts figured that, at any moment, I was going to hear the loud machinations of a chainsaw as the zombies cut our perch out from underneath us. And my heart gave a surge of adrenaline as sheets of rain cascaded off the roof; for the merest of seconds it was the sound I’d been dreading.
“Let me see your back,” I told Tommy. I grabbed a small medical kit. Tommy needed my ministrations like a rock needed a bath; it was basically for show. If I did nothing, that would raise more questions than it was worth. Kind of wished I’d gone that route. His shoulder was far worse than he’d led me to believe. I’d been expecting a scrape that I could cover with gauze, tape it up, and move on.
I wanted to swear as I looked upon the wound; I held it in. The bullet had broken through his collar bone, out the back of the scapula, hugging the bone and ripping a trench through the muscle, and skin. How he’d climbed the rope after this injury was beyond me. BT winced as he looked at it. Hannah had Johnny in her arms; they were sitting on a futon on the far side of the structure. I ripped a piece of cloth, taped it on, then just pulled his shirt down.
“Some fine doctoring there,” BT said.
I almost tapped Tommy on his busted shoulder to let him know I was done; instead, I grunted at him. I looked around; the place was immaculate. If these two had been here a while, they’d sure kept it clean. It was a neat trick I wished I’d been able to teach my kids. There was a small kitchen area off to the right—mostly cabinets, no sink, a small electric range, and a dorm fridge. Two Yeti coolers were stacked on top of each other next to the small appliances. Two tapestries were hanging on the opposite wall, one of a deer scene, the other a bear. Behind the futon the kids were on, were three windows that looked out onto a mountain vista. Behind us was the door that led out to the deck. This was a quality construction. The walls looked to be cedar planking and the floor was oak. All of it had a shine of varnish. This was no kids’ playhouse.
“Where are your parents?” I asked quietly. Hannah flinched at my words.
Johnny was no longer the little shit who had stuck his tongue and finger out at me. He was now a kid no older than eight, crying into his sister’s lap. She’d since removed the scarf from around her face. I don’t think she could have been more than fifteen. Yeah, she was scared, but her eyes blazed with hate and mistrust. I instinctively wanted to seek revenge on those that had caused her this much pain.
“Dead,” was all she offered. Johnny cried harder. She shushed him tenderly. I stood and headed for the window to see what the zombies were doing.
She pointed to a small, glass-topped table near the deer tapestry. I wasn’t sure why, but as I got closer, I saw that the glass was an LCD display cut into four quadrants, each offering a camera angle, giving me a 360-degree view of the entire area.
“Are you shitting me? How do you have power?” I asked.
“There are a couple of solar panels above us,” she replied. “Enough to run the cameras, a few light bulbs, and the fridge…when we have some food.”
All four camera angles showed the same thing: a fat horde of zombies. I went over and grabbed Tommy’s backpack. Tossed a handful of Pop-Tarts toward the kids.
“Hey,” Tommy weakly protested.
BT had grabbed an MRE and was about to tear into it.
“Ahem.” I cleared my throat. We were high enough up and the rain was beating down hard, plus the herd below was making enough noise that anything conversational-toned was not going to be heard. I think we could have had a raging rave and we would have been all right.
“Mike, I’m hungry.”
I motioned my head to the kids.
“I’m a big man. I need to eat.”
“Don’t make me order you.”
“Give them yours,” BT said.
“I gave you mine,” I told him.
He grumbled as he reluctantly tossed it onto
the couch next to them.
“Eat. You’re as safe as you can be,” I told a mistrusting Hannah. Johnny had finally unfolded himself from his sister’s arms as he looked upon the tinfoil treasures.
“Be careful,” I told him with a smile. “Tommy has a way of finding the most, umm…unique flavored Pop-Tarts any of us has ever seen. I think he had a cod liver oil and turkey gizzard frosting one once.”
“Oooh, gross!” Johnny seemed reluctant to grab hold of any now.
“Not those ones,” Tommy said with resignation. “Those are grape jelly filled with a chocolate and peanut butter frosting, which they made sure covers almost all of the top.”
“No way.” Johnny ripped one open; his eyes grew wide at the chocolate peanut butter swirl. He stuffed nearly half the thing in his mouth. His eyes rolled in delight as he chewed.
“Fro frood,” he tried to say as he ate.
Hannah watched her brother eat with abandon; I thought she wanted to join him, but was afraid to let her guard down, as if the moment she did, we would reveal our true, evil intentions.
“Hannah, we want nothing more than to stay dry and wait for the zees to pass. Then we can meet up with the rest of our squad and get back to base. A place which you would be welcome to come to, if you want.”
She gripped the sides of her pants in fists. “No,” was all she said. “We’re not going anywhere with you.”
“Your call. Just giving you the option,” I told her.
“Our parents died at a base,” Johnny said, getting ready to polish off his second foil pack.
“Johnny!” Hannah admonished him.
“It’s the truth,” he told her.
“They don’t need to know that.”
“We were there for three days before the zombies broke through. Everyone was shooting and running. Except for my mom.”
He didn’t elaborate.
Hannah sighed. Her eyes looked away as she spoke. “She’d fallen off a step stool a few weeks before it started. Broke her ankle.”
“She was getting one of my Nerf darts off the top of a cabinet.” Johnny’s eyes fell and tears began to water them. “It was my fault she couldn’t run.”