by Chris Lowry
From the drag marks, it looked like whoever it was came back to life and became one of the legless zombies, the kind that pulled along on the tips of shattered fingers.
He glanced around, but didn’t see it.
The bike was almost impossible to lift. Even when he managed to get it upright, there was a moment when the world turned gray and started spinning.
Maybe it was the effort, maybe it was the lack of food, water or the injury, but he was sure he was going down.
And when it passed, no one was more surprised than he was at still standing.
He took another breath and studied the bike.
It was a newer model, no brakelights, no headlights, basically a motor, a seat and a tank on a frame.
Mickey twisted off the gas cap and jostled the tank. The pungent scent of unleaded sloshed out, almost full. He stared at the kick starter and wondered if trying to bounce on it would send him to the ground.
His thumb ran along the throttle and handle and felt a small starter button connected to the rail. He pressed it, listened to the chirring whir of the battery as it snapped and caught.
The roar of the engine bounced off the brick walls and covered the street, and Mickey couldn’t help but whoop in victory. It took two tries to toss his leg over the saddle and perch on it, and another three to pop the metal shifter into first gear.
He had to take it slow, which was fine with him and he coasted toward the gas station.
The windows were gone, the metal caps over the underground tanks folded back. If there was any gas left inside them, it would be tainted with water or dirt and Mickey knew working with it would be too much trouble.
But a full tank on a dirt bike should get him a hundred miles, maybe more if he nursed it along slow. He was going to nurse it because the road ahead was too unknown.
He eased away from the gas station and settled into a steady bumping rhythm of pain that jolted as he cruised along. He ignored it, cataloged it to deal with later.
Because he was moving along the road headed north, and that’s the way the men who did this to him had gone.
The bike would get him that much closer.
Mickey spied what he thought was roadkill ten miles later. He eased the cycle to the side of the highway out of habit and used the toe of his boot to notch the kickstand down.
By the time he was able to swing off the bike, the roadkill reversed direction and began crawling toward him.
The sun had done a lot of damage. It didn’t even look human anymore. He could still make out the tatters of a shirt, long bony arms dragging the thing toward him.
It was the lump on the thing’s back, he decided. A faded canvas backpack that bulged up like an armadillo shell, covered in dust, and dirt.
Mickey let it get closer, then used the bike for balance as he stomped a boot into the base of the skull.
He bit back a laugh. The damn thing had crawled for who knows how long and it was all over in an instant.
He reached down to strip the backpack and the world went gray underneath him.
The sun was high when he woke up, and for a moment, he wondered if he was still back at the roadside campsite where he started.
Maybe the trek to town had been a dream, the motorbike nothing more than a wish, a fantasy.
He did a quick inventory and added a scraped forehead and headache to his list of aches and pains. He stretched out his foot, hit something fleshy and solid.
“Shit,” he grinned as he spied the backpack.
He yanked it closer and used it to help him sit up. His fingers fumbled at the straps. One was frayed beyond future use, disintegrating in his hand as he worked it through the metal loop. The other had an impossible knot he couldn’t get his addled mind to unravel.
He forced it open with a quick rip, folded the flap back and sobbed.
Eight plastic water bottles. Two dozen granola bars. A couple of bags of chips and peanuts.
He leaned over the pack and cried dry tears, the hitch of his breath puffing out little clouds of dust from the canvas.
After a moment, he fumbled off a cap and slowly sucked a plastic bottle dry. Then another.
He wanted them all. Wanted to drain each of them and gorge on the food.
Patience, he urged himself.
He rolled over to his knees and rocked up to his feet in seven slow painful stages, carrying the back pack up with him.
Then he trudged to the bike and got his leg over the saddle again.
Only then did he allow himself another bottle of water and a granola bar.
He made sure to put the empties back inside the pack so he could refill them when he was able.
His stomach threatened to rebel, but he bit it down, bit it back and waited for the cramping agony to pass.
When it did, he could feel his fuel starved muscles more. His headache receded, leaving behind a varying tide of pain that ebbed and flowed from one side of his body to the other.
He could manage, he thought as he pressed the starter. This time, the engine didn’t hesitate. It caught on the first whir and he kicked it through first into second and cruised north at fifteen miles per hour, his eyes locked on the horizon.
DAD
“We can’t walk the whole way,” said Brian.
He might have been right. We were too many now, slowed by the weakest link in our chain and walking would take us another three days.
Maybe longer to hunt for a boat we could use.
I had one in mind, something particular. A houseboat or barge, shallow draft to stay in the smoother waters next to the Gulf shore. It would need to be fifty two feet, I calculated.
Smaller than that and we would be sitting and sleeping on top of each other. That would be great for me and Anna.
If I saw Tyler doing it, or the Boy, they might have to go for a swim.
We would have to find fuel for the motor too, something to store it in, and food enough to last for a week or ten days at sea.
I called it at sea, but we would never leave sight of land, and we could pull in, if needed to scavenge. I knew the gulf coast of Florida was riddled with small villages and towns.
What I didn’t know was the kind of shape they were in. Nor how to find fuel. Nor how long it would take to find a boat we could use.
Or how many more days it would take us to straggle there.
“Next place,” I told him in the same voice I used to tell the kids on long road trips when they said they had to go pee.
Find a place to hole up in for a couple of hours while I went to find suitable transport.
The next place came fast. A small farmhouse set back from the road, the driveway made from crushed shell and dirt.
“Looks good,” Raymer said as he led us up the path.
I didn’t have to warn anyone to keep sharp.
The house was abandoned, doors cracked open from previous searchers who either found nothing or scoured it clean.
“Looks creepy,” said Peg.
“We’ve seen worse,” Brian said.
We had. Hell, I’d stayed in a fish shack trailer on the run from some bad guys next to the Mississippi River on my cross country trek that made this homestead look like a palace by comparison.
“If it’s clear, it should do,” I said.
I made motions with my hand to spread part of the group out and indicate for others to follow me.
They mostly understood.
The Boy and Tyler fanned to one side, almost empty rifles aimed at the house.
I took the four wooden steps to the porch two at a time and stared into the dim interior through the opened door.
Shadows fought and shifted as the wind moved diaphanous curtains like ghosts against the windows.
I stepped up and knocked against the door, then stood to one side and waited.
After a moment, nothing came to investigate.
“Clear,” I called out and stepped inside.
Everything was gone. No furniture. No food, no indicati
on of previous human life. Dust tracked across the floor, several windows were cracked and busted, letting the breeze flow through in a cross wind from the door.
It was a good place for them to stay. A safe enough place.
“I’ll go with you,” the Boy objected. I knew he would. Tyler offered, as did the new kid named Steve from the sextet we picked up when the buses stopped.
I marked them for later conversation when someone screamed and I did a headcount to see who was missing.
The scream came again, gargled with panic and answered by a woman’s thin wail of terror.
I sprinted around the house and was not the least bit angry that the younger guys moved faster than I could.
The skinny guy was named Todd. I had hoped to put some food into him, his woman and the girl before we got their story. I knew it would be a sad one.
Sad ones are all we’ve almost got left.
There was a pole barn behind the house, four metal walls under a long metal roof, designed to keep adult toys out of the weather. The front and back were closed off with wood.
Todd stood under an open wooden door, Z climbing across him and feasting.
The Boy raised his rifle and took aim.
“Wait!” Steve screamed at him.
It bought enough time for me to pass them with the pike and start lopping off zombie heads. I took down three, then poked three more and that was the end of it, unless there were more hiding in the dim interior of the storage barn.
Todd was crying. His legs and stomach were a bloody mess, one arm chomped to the bone.
His wife crawled to his side and cradled his head as he lay dying, their daughter watching in numb teary silence.
“He was a good man,” she keened. “A good man.”
It was a mantra she repeated two dozen times, maybe more.
Todd waved me over with his good arm, and pointed into the barn. There was a four seater ATV under a layer of grime and dust just inside the door.
“Checked the gas tank,” the man said. “It’s full. Got so excited, didn’t see the dead fucker til he bit my leg.”
His voice was raspy and weak.
“Trailer,” he pointed again, and this time his arm fell to the dirt with a meaty plop.
Todd wasn’t strong enough to hold it. But I could see what he meant. A full ATV could make good time, and the trailer hooked to it would haul the lot of us.
“You saved our lives,” I took a knee beside the dying man.
He grinned up at me, a rigor mortis grimace of pain and regret.
“Let me say goodbye,” he huffed.
He pulled his wife close and kissed her on the cheek, and beckoned the little girl to his side. I couldn’t hear what he whispered, but she accepted it in stoic silence before he pushed them both away.
I thought one of them would resist, but they stood back and cried in silence.
“Now,” he said to me and closed his eyes.
I glanced at Brian who moved in front of us to shield what I had to do from them, then used the pike to save our hero from suffering.
“Stay back,” I said and led with the pike to clear out the barn.
There were no more Z, but there were two cans of gas. I couldn’t see the key for the starter and wondered if we were going to have to tear the house up to search for it.
“Slip it in neutral,” Steve suggested. I did and got help wheeling it out.
He recruited Tyler and the Boy to push him as he popped the clutch to jump start it. The engine caught on the second try and he wheeled it in front of me with a satisfied grin on his face.
“Don’t get cocky,” I snarled and shoved him over so I could back the ATV up to the trailer.
“Don’t listen to him,” Brian called out. “He hates you kids on his lawn and your damn rock and roll music.”
Some of us laughed, me included, but it was a somber laugh next to the dead man who found our transport.
Raymer helped hook up the trailer and secured the ball hitch with a chain. Brian rounded everyone into the back, and when Steve offered to drive, I made him sit shotgun with Anna in the middle.
He seemed just as happy with my rifle with one bullet as he did with the steering wheel.
I drove down the dusty shell driveway and turned west. Two cans of gas and a full tank would take us all the way to the Gulf and we could be there by sunset.
More Battlefield Z Series
Battlefield Z
Children's Brigade
Sweet Home Zombie
Zombie Blues Highway
Mardi Gras Zombie
Bluegrass Zombie
Outcast Zombie
Renegade Zombie
Everglades Zombie
Flyover Zombie - the Battlefield Z series
Headshots - the Battlefield Z series
Overland Zombie
Lone Star Zombie
The Pass Zombie
Dust Devil Zombie
Terminal Zombie
Ronin Zombie
GONE DARK
SILENT RUN
NO ENTRY
RESTRICTED
Thriller
ASSET – a Brill Winger Thriller
OPERATIVE – a Brill Winger Thriller
SIDEWAYS – a Brill Winger Thriller
November 2018
CHOKEPOINT – a Brill Winger Thriller
December 2018
DECREED - a Brill Winger Thriller
December 2018
IN THE WIND - a Brill Winger Thriller
January 2019
IN THE BLACK - a Brill Winger Thriller
February 2019
Tin Trooper – a Shadowboxer story
Nazi Nukes - a Shadowboxer story
Sci-Fi Comedy
Lunar Hustle- Prequel to The Dipole Shield
The Dipole Shield - The Dipole Series
Planet 9 - The Dipole Series
Planet 10 – The Dipole Series
Half Cocked – The Dipole Series
Disco Orbit – The Dipole Series
Apogee – The Dipole Series
Apex – The Dipole Series
Sci Fi Western
Backwoods Station – Keeping House
Backwoods Station – Bootleg
Backwoods Station – Martian Roulette
Backwoods Station – Turf War
Sci Fi Dystopian- Alien Invasion
Phalanx - Invasion Earth
Pyrrhic - Invasion Earth
Beachhead - Invasion Earth
Bridgehead - Invasion Earth
Lodgement – Invasion Earth
Ultima Thule – Invasion Earth
Infiltrate – Invasion Earth
Dustoff – Invasion Earth
Riki Tik- Invasion Earth
Snakebit – Invasion Earth
Defilade – Invasion Earth
Science Fiction Adventure
Moon Men
Epoch - The Future Templar
Eon- The Future Templar
Era - The Future Templar
Super Secret Space Mission
The Herd Shot Round the World
High Steaks
Urban Fantasy
Witchmas - a Marshal of Magic story
Witchmas Eve - a Marshal of Magic story
Witchmas Day- a Marshal of Magic story
The Marshal of Magic – Hail Fellow
The Marshal of Magic – The Devil You Know
The Marshal of Magic - Small Medium at Large
The Marshal of Magic - Low Elf Esteem
The Marshal of Magic - Big Trouble
Historical Fantasy
The Holy War – Blood Bound
The Holy War – Oath Bound
The Holy War – Honor Bound
Western
Fort Smith – Judged by Twelve
Fort Smith - Carried by Six
Evasion - Destruction Earth
Omnibus Collections
Battlefield Z Collected Adventures Volume I
Battlefi
eld Z Collected Adventures Volume II
Battlefield Z Collected Adventures Volume III
Battlefield Z THE COMPLETE ADVENTURES Volume 1
Invasion Earth Collected Adventures Volume I
Invasion Earth Collected Adventures Volume II
Sanctioned – Shadowboxer Files
Unsanctioned – Shadowboxer Files
Incursion