The Zombie Apocalypse (Book 1): Buried Instincts

by Henson, Lynn

  “What do you want?” he said at the door.

  “Please let me in! They’re outside and coming this way!”

  “Who are you talking to?” Lisa called out.

  The woman rapped on the door again desperately. “Hurry! Please!”

  Blake opened the door as wide as the chain allowed. “Look, how can I...”

  There was a gunshot and Blake felt a stab of pain on his forehead as he reeled backward from the door. The door opened explosively only to be stopped by the couch. The woman kept pushing though and the couch started to slide backward. He shoved himself to his feet and ran forward to push the couch back into place when there was another gunshot and he heard something shatter which made him instinctively duck down. The woman shoved the couch again enough that she could shimmy inside. She took a look at and leveled a pistol at him.

  “Alright fuckstick, push the couch back in place,” she ordered.

  He got up slowly, trying to refrain from putting his hands up by his head and pushed the couch back in place as she’d requested.

  “What’s going on?” Lisa asked, coming into the room and letting out a little gasp as she saw the woman. The woman pointed the weapon at her, “That’s far enough. Anyone else here?”

  She nodded, the fear on her face apparent.

  “Call her in here,” she said.

  “T-Tiffany? Can you come here please?” Lisa managed to get out.

  Blake sized her up while they waited. As he’d previously noted from the peephole, she would’ve been attractive if she didn’t look like she’d been out in the sun for so long. She had on black leather pants made for someone about five years younger than her and a leather jacket covering a dark gray t-shirt that completed her ensemble.

  Tiffany bounded downstairs, “What’s up? Oh,” she said as she took in the situation.

  The woman gestured for Tiffany to join Lisa with her pistol. “Stand over there with her.” Tiffany reluctantly did as she was asked.

  “Any of you a doctor?” she asked them.

  “No,” Lisa answered, looking down at the floor.

  “Shit,” she cursed. She moved over to the guest bedroom and opened the door and peeked inside. “Alright. All you assholes get in here. Now.”

  They did as they were ordered and she gave them a threatening look. “Stay in here. If you fucking come out, I’ll shoot you.” She shut the door on them.

  Lisa faced Blake, “What the fuck man? How’d she get inside?”

  “I’m not sure,” he replied guiltily, “I think when I opened the door a little to talk to her, she shot the chain out.”

  “I guess that explains your new face piercing,” Tiffany said sheepishly.

  He put his hand to his forehead and felt something metallic sticking out of his cut. He examined his fingers to find his blood on them.

  Lisa sighed. “Here, let me,” she said sounding less angry. She faced him and carefully probed his injury. “This might hurt,” she warned and ripped the shrapnel from his head.

  “Ow! Fuck!” he yelped and tried to put his hand to his forehead. “Don’t touch it,” Lisa said, slapping his hands away. Tiffany came over and offered some white cloth that looked like they’d been ripped from bed sheets. Lisa took them and cleaned the cut. He winced but tried to keep still. Finally, she wrapped lengths of the cloth around his head to form a headband. Lisa took his hand and applied it to his now covered cut. “Just keep pressure on it.”

  He did as was asked. “Sorry,” he told them after a moment. “I should’ve been more careful.”

  Lisa looked at him and then offered the piece of door chain that she’d removed from his forehead. “Souvenir?” He took it and Lisa managed a small smile at him. “Now what?” he asked.

  “We should escape if we get the chance,” Tiffany told them.

  “Yeah,” he agreed, “But how?”

  “I don’t know,” she admitted. “But we should try soon. I’m not sure how our friends are going to be able to get back here with the street filled with zombies.”

  “And the zombies might be in town as well,” Lisa realized, horrified.

  “Maybe we can reason with her,” Blake suggested.

  “What?” Lisa asked in disbelief. “Reason with that bitch?”

  “She was asking for help. Maybe she wants something?” Blake reasoned.

  “She wanted to come in here and steal our houses out from under us,” Lisa replied.

  “No, no that doesn’t make sense,” Blake told her. “Why would she have to risk taking our houses when this town was empty? She could’ve just found her own house. There’s plenty to go around here so why antagonize us?”

  “That makes sense actually,” Tiffany admitted.

  “So maybe if we help her, we can all get out of this alive,” Blake said.

  “Hey!” said the woman through the door, “You people got any meds in here?”

  “We don’t have any,” Lisa replied through the door trying to sound friendly. “We sent some of our friends into town to find some though.”

  The woman opened the door and came in to stand in front of them, pistol at ready. “That true?” she asked them.

  Blake nodded, “Yes. We needed to get some for the guy that showed up last night.”

  Her eyes widened at that, and then she scowled. “You’re trying to help him? But weren’t you the ones that beat him up?”

  “What were we supposed to do?” Blake said carefully, “He broke in in the middle of the night. What would you have done if it was you?”

  “Same thing I suppose,” she relented.

  “You know him?” Tiffany asked.

  She looked at her as if deciding something, then nodded. “Yeah, he’s my man. He can be a stupid son of a bitch sometimes, but he’s not a bad guy.”

  “Look, maybe we can help you,” Blake offered. “We have to get to our friends who have hopefully gotten antibiotics and stuff. But the whole street is filled with zombies now, so I think if we’re going to get out of this, we’ve got to work together.”

  “Ok. But I’m in charge. I’ve got the gun,” she informed them.

  “Ok, fine,” he agreed. “Can we get out of this room and figure out what to do?”

  She looked at him, eyes narrowing, then she turned and walked out of the room leaving the door open.

  Blake looked at the girls then stood up and followed the woman out the door. He went to the window and looked out through the blinds. The dried up face of an old black man stared back at him, he took a bite at Blake who recoiled despite the glass separating them. Blake realized that the door was shaking as well from zombies pushing on it.

  He turned to face the woman who still had the pistol in her hand. At least she wasn’t directly pointing it at him. That was progress at least. “They’re on our doorstep. I’m not sure how our friends are going to be able to get back here,” he told her.

  “And we don’t know how extensive this is,” Lisa further reasoned, “What if the rest of the town is just as bad?”

  She raised her gun slightly, then lowered it again, her face was filled with worry. “Is there anything we can do for him?”

  “We might be able to run over there. But that would attract their attention for sure. A better way would be to see if we can sneak out the back,” he thought out loud.

  “That sounds good,” Tiffany agreed.

  “Let’s go check the back,” Lisa said.

  The woman followed slightly behind them and Blake was very aware of her continued, threatening presence as they moved to the glass door and looked into the backyard. It seemed empty. “Seems like this could work,” he said. “But what should we do when we get there?”

  “We should stay there and do what we can for him,” the woman said immediately.

  Lisa shook her head, “It’s a little safer here. We have the keys to this place, but not for next door. Also, most of our supplies are here.”

  “That’s true,” Blake agreed. “The best thing might be to mov
e him to here.”

  “How are we going to do that?” the woman asked, looking unsure.

  “We just go over there and carry him over here?” Lisa suggested.

  Blake shook his head. “He’s a really big guy. It took three of us to get him into the bed.”

  “There’s four of us,” the woman said abruptly, sounding angry, “We should be able to manage to move him here.”

  “I guess we could try,” Blake said diplomatically, “It’s only when we’re outside that we might have problems.”

  “How do we get in?” Lisa asked. “We can’t go through the front door. And isn’t the back door locked?”

  “Well, as you saw the back door was smashed in by the guy,” Blake said, “The repairs we made were meant to keep zombies out until we could get stuff to make more permanent repairs. It might take a little while, but I’m sure if we’re quiet, we could get in.”

  “Alright, let’s go,” the woman said gesturing with the gun.

  Blake unlocked the door and slid it open slowly, trying not to make any noise. He stuck his head out to look on either side to make sure it was clear and then stepped out into the yard. Tiffany and Lisa came out behind him with the woman bringing up the rear. She slid the door closed and then Blake walked over to the brick wall separating the properties. He grabbed the edge of the wall and pulled himself up to look over. The other yard was empty. “Looks clear,” he told them and he pulled himself up higher and got a leg on top of the wall. He shifted to get his other over and ended up sitting on the wall like Humpty Dumpty. Finally, he dropped down to the yard. Tiffany was next, pulling herself up and over easily. Lisa struggled but managed to pull herself up to lying prone on top of the wall. Tiffany and Blake helped her down to the other side. The woman followed, hefting herself up similar to how Blake had climbed over then dropped down in a crouch to absorb the shock. Blake nodded, moving to the damaged door and started to work at the plywood. Tiffany and Lisa came over to help dismantle the barricade as well.

  “Hurry!” the woman hissed.

  Tiffany pushed on the plywood and the whole section gave way with a loud wood cracking noise. “Oops!” she apologized.

  “Damn,” Blake whispered, “Guess it isn’t as sturdy as we thought it was.”

  “Come on, quit fucking around,” the woman said insistently.

  Blake went inside the gap made in the door and waited until the others had come in. The woman led the way to the guest room where the biker was tied up. Blake and the girls milled around the living room, momentarily forgotten. “We should ditch her,” Lisa whispered insistently.

  “Not yet,” Blake disagreed. “Let’s see how this plays out.” He checked out the window, and the street was still full of zombies, with a lot of them gathered in front of their house next door. “Shit, I guess they must’ve been attracted by the gunshots.” He looked back at the girls, “They don’t seem to be interested in this house yet.”

  The woman emerged from the guest room looking frightened. “He’s in real bad shape. We need to get him some meds. I’m not sure we should move him.”

  “Let us radio our friends,” Blake suggested, “Maybe we can figure something out.”

  She nodded, giving her permission and moved back into the room to look after him.

  Blake took up a walkie-talkie and spoke into it. “Anyone out there? Kim? Gao? Carrey?”

  Disturbingly, there were no immediate responses. After a minute, he tried again. “Someone talk to me, this is an emergency.”

  The walkie continued its silent vigil. Blake became extremely worried. He looked towards Tiffany and Lisa who sat nervously in the living room.

  “I can’t find them,” he reported, “I think the town may have been overrun.”

  Lisa closed her eyes and took deep breaths. Tiffany wrung her hands in front of her and looked at him. “Maybe they just can’t talk right now,” she suggested hopefully.

  “Yeah, I hope that’s all it is,” Blake replied, trying to sound confident.

  “So what’s the story?” the woman asked, emerging from the guest room.

  “I can’t get a hold of them. They might be in trouble,” Blake replied.

  “Fucking perfect,” she observed. “Then we’re going to have to get the meds ourselves.”

  “What?” Blake asked in shock, “The streets are filled with zombies, and all of our cars are gone. How are we supposed to go out there?”

  “Where’s Jed’s hog?” the woman asked impatiently.

  “Who? What?” Blake asked, confused.

  “The motorcycle!” she clarified, pointing the pistol at him to emphasize the point. “I saw you assholes move it!”

  Blake raised his hands up in a panic. “Ok! Ok! Yeah, the bike! We moved it into the garage!”

  “Alright. We use that,” she said.

  “I don’t know how to drive a motorcycle,” he said lamely.

  “I’m driving it,” she informed him, “You’re riding bitch. Those two will stay here and make sure nothing happens to Jed.”

  “But...” he protested.

  “Shut the fuck up,” she said. “Get your shit, we’re leaving.”

  Blake’s stomach continued to sink into the floor. He tried to think as he retrieved his backpack. “I’ll go with her. Maybe we can help the others,” he said to Lisa and Tiffany. “I doubt we’ll be able to close the garage door when we leave, so make sure to lock the inside door behind us.”

  Lisa nodded fearfully while Tiffany stared at him wide-eyed.

  “Radio if anything happens,” he continued, trying to sound brave.

  “Blake...” Tiffany complained.

  “You whores better take care of my man. If something happens to him you’re going down,” she told the girls. “Let’s go,” the woman ordered and looked at him expectantly.

  He walked to the door that led to the garage and opened it. The motorcycle sat in the garage looking menacing. He jumped a little as she pushed past him. “Suck it up,” she suggested, straddling the bike. She maneuvered it into a position where she could drive it out of the garage then started the engine which roared to life. She nodded at him and he looked back at the door to the house. Lisa had it half open and she was looking at him like he wasn’t coming back.

  “After we go, push this garage door button so it closes. But once you do that, you get back inside and lock that door,” he said loudly over the engine noise.

  She nodded at him. He pushed the garage door button and there was a snapping noise as the automatic garage door opener activated and it started to rise outward. He ran over to the bike as the woman was revving the engine and hopped on behind her, gripping the bar behind him tightly. He looked at the garage door as it rose and saw that several pairs of legs had congregated in front of it. It pushed into the zombies and after a moment the door stopped, reversing direction, but not before it had knocked a few of the zombies off balance causing them to flail backward into the others. The door snapped to life again, and Blake glanced back to see that Lisa had activated it again. Because the zombies were still trying to get back up, the garage managed to open without further obstruction and the woman ducked down as the engine roared and the bike moved rapidly forward. Blake barely managed to duck his head down, missing the still opening garage door by centimeters as he hugged his arms around the woman’s waist in a desperate attempt to regain his balance. She swerved a little and pointed the bike at a small gap between the zombies. The handles of the bike smacked into the infected and the woman grunted with effort, trying to keep the bike going forward. Blake felt dead hands grab at his clothes as the woman continued to accelerate wildly into the mob. He held on and tried to look under the woman’s armpit to see what was ahead. He flinched as the bike slammed right into a decrepit looking zombie who must’ve been on the brink of death even before turning. The zombie’s chest detached from the rest of it landing onto the woman’s back and on Blake’s head. The bike veered crazily from side to side as the woman shifted her body arou
nd, trying to get the zombie off of her. He took his right arm from around her waist and pushed straight up against the zombie. It wasn’t too heavy and fell to one side, the intestines dragged across his face and arm, leaving disgusting trails of slimy filth on him. He looked again and the crowd had thinned out making it easier for the woman to navigate the bike. He risked a glance back at the house, which now had a small horde gathered in the front yard. The garage door was open, probably unable to close because of its safety features. The bike turned the corner and the house disappeared from sight. The bike was making so much noise that they were attracting zombies to them. The woman had to maneuver from the left to the right side of the street to keep away from them. They drove free of the residential areas, moving towards the larger streets where the stores were and Blake could see that zombies had indeed overrun the entire town. He got the feeling that the zombies were heading north, at least until the noise from their bike distracted them. As they drove, he tried to locate some sign of his friends giving special attention to the stores they passed. Zombies weren’t congregating in any particular area, so either his friends weren’t nearby, or they were doing a good job of hiding.

  As they approached the next intersection, he realized it looked familiar. Why wasn’t I paying more attention when we drove through here yesterday?! I think if we turn left there’s a pharmacy or something. He tapped the woman’s shoulder and pointed towards where he wanted to go. She looked at him briefly in her mirror and with some difficulty, managed to guide the bike through the zombies. After another three minutes, he found what he was looking for. There was a dense group of zombies congregating at a pharmacy. They had mobbed the area in front of it, definitely focused on something inside. He pointed frantically at it and the woman turned into the parking lot. The parking lot was devoid of cars and the zombies prevented them from being able to see inside the pharmacy. “Go around back!” he yelled, and the woman skirted around the zombies being sure to give them a wide berth as she headed around to the back of the building. Some of the zombies seemed to be indecisive about whether or not to follow the bike or to continue trying to push their way into the pharmacy. If they’re acting like that, there’s got to be someone inside, no question about it. This thought was proven correct when they got around to the back and he saw Bree’s car parked near the back door. Unfortunately, zombies had also congregated around the back door effectively trapping his friends in the pharmacy. He pointed excitedly towards the car and the woman headed towards a relatively clear spot and slowed to a stop.