He would take her with him when he went back to his home to live. They could make the journey together. Maybe they could ride that stupid giraffe, it was high enough so any undead they ran into couldn’t get them. The only problem with that was Bert hated him for no reason. When she wasn’t hanging out with Cody or any of the rest of them, she was with the giraffe. He would aim his noxious ass in his direction, or swipe at him with his big head if he got anywhere near Harper. She would tell him to go, he was upsetting the stupid thing. She refused to leave it and come talk to him alone. We’re training was always her excuse.
He needed to make her understand that Cody was wrong, being slaves to the animals was wrong and acting more like them every day was wrong. If she left with him, they could go back to where people were civilized. He was sure his old community was safe behind their walls. They had to be. The more he thought about it, the more convinced he became. This group was acting like savages in a jungle. They called themselves a tribe, they hunted animals with spears, they swam in the frigid water with the polar bears, they cavorted with those ridiculous monkeys and they slept with the furry creatures like pack animals. They’d turned the living room into a barn stall.
If she left with him, he would bring her the finest clothes and drape expensive jewelry, just sitting there for the taking, around her neck, wrists and on her fingers. They’d leave this place with the animal noises that kept him awake at night and the never-ending lists of chores. There were other survivors back home; he knew it in his bones. His community wouldn’t have been overrun so easily. He had family there and it was gated and fenced. Million-dollar homes with separate servants’ quarters. You can bet they weren’t living in a barn with wild animals stinking up the place. It was a virtual paradise and all they had to do was get there.
Sooner or later, someone would come to Putnam and find a ghost town. They’d load up the stores of food and valuables and be gone, leaving him behind in this hellhole with no way to replenish supplies. Putnam was the only place close enough for a cart to go before the battery died and if it got cleaned out, they’d starve to death. If they wouldn’t risk traveling north to his home, they should at least be there. If they weren’t going to bring all the food to the park, they should at least be in town to defend it against bandits. No one was coming to the safari on purpose, it was too far off the main road. Nothing else was out here. Nothing worth taking anyway.
Gordon daydreamed as he filled the wheelbarrow with buffalo dung. He plotted and planned, thought of ways to get even and ways to escape. He knew he couldn’t take Cody in a fair fight, even though he was bigger and stronger. If he had a gun he could, but there was still the bear to contend with. He didn’t think a few bullets would stop the thing if it was mad and if he shot Cody in the back, it would probably be mad. If he was honest with himself, he knew he’d never convince Harper to run away with him by herself. He’d have to convince the whole group to leave. Going by himself was out of the question, there was no telling what kind of trouble he might run into on the road. If he brought a whole group, he’d arrive home like a returning hero and his dad had hunting rifles. They couldn’t use their animals to bully him anymore and he’d make rugs out of most of them. They’d do what he said or he’d kick them all out.
It all came back to the Cody problem. He knew he couldn’t do anything to him, hell if Mr. High and Mighty stubbed his toe halfway across the Park, they would find a way to blame it on him. Cody wouldn’t leave as long as it was safe and without him, none of the others would either. He would have to force their hand somehow, take away their reasons for staying. Make it so they had to find someplace new and he would be just the guy to take them there. If he could engineer some bad luck, maybe a few accidents here and there, he could kill two birds with one stone. If they didn’t have all the stupid animals to take care of, they wouldn’t be trapped here. If he could blame it on bad decisions made by Mr. High and Mighty, they wouldn’t think he was so great and do everything he said. All he had to do was start taking out the animals and he was fine with that. Nothing would make him happier than to see Swan blubbering over her dead wolves.
Gordon grunted with the weight of the wheelbarrow as he made his way over to the compost pile. There would be no more hauling crap around, either. They’d leave this dump and these stinking animals and in time everyone would realize he had been right all along. All the girls would be his and the boys would do whatever it took to stay in his good graces. He smiled at the thought of Harper sitting beside him, Vanessa and Annalise bringing his meals and seeking his attention. Swan would be on permanent cleaning duty and he’d have those wolves of hers turned into rugs. He’d make her do all the worst jobs like cleaning the bathrooms. He’d make sure he missed every time he used the toilet, too. If she didn’t do a good job, he’d make her clean it with her tongue. His smile was huge at such pleasant thoughts.
He’d banish Donny the freak. He couldn’t be trusted; you never knew what he was thinking. Tobias would be kept in check by the hold he kept on the boy’s sister. The young kids would fall in line if they knew what was good for them. Murray, that pathetic cripple, had his uses so he’d keep him around. He grinned through split lips at the thought and actually started humming as he plotted his revenge on all of them. Yes, life would be good.
He’d be patient. He’d wait, and when the time was right, he’d strike. The book hidden under his mattress held the key to changing everything.
28
Vanessa
Vanessa wiped the dust from the mirror on the vanity before her and stared at her reflection. Pride swelled her bosom as she reflected on her actions of the past months. She wasn’t the studious little girl she had been. She had killed monsters. She had saved lives. She’d dashed fearlessly towards those stranded children with no thought of her own safety. Ziggy had performed flawlessly, shattering the glass so they could drag those three kids to the security behind the iron fences. Her daddy would have been so proud of her. He was selfless like that. She remembered him buying food for homeless people when they were out in the old neighborhood where he had grown up. He paid no mind to their dirty clothes and unwashed smell as he chatted with them, learning about their lives. She’d watched quietly, sitting on tree shaded benches as they ate and he talked to them, listened to them and shared a little gospel. Most people walked by society’s forgotten cast offs, ignoring their requests for change or offers to work for food. Not her dad though, he had a big heart and always told her it was her responsibility to look out for the less fortunate. To be a bright light in a world of darkness. She missed him so much sometimes. She prayed often that he had survived somehow and was safe with a group of good people.
She’d done all she could to be that light. She’d sat up late the first night as the three small kids cried for their mama. She answered the best she could when they asked her why their mother and aunt had tried to get eat them. She sugar coated it a little but not much. The kids had seen things, they weren’t dumb and they were old enough to know the truth. Telling them lies could get them killed. She’d held them until sleep took them and the skulk of foxes helped. They sensed the unhappiness, chose the child and comforted them with their presence. She had colored page after page with them in books taken from the gift shop, read them stories and made sure they did their chores. Always give more than you take, she’d encouraged them. We all have to do our part to survive. Never go outside the fences, never open the gates. It’s safe in here. The tribe and the animals will protect you.
It had been her idea to put them in charge of the petting zoo. The helpless animals were invaluable to their long-term survival. The chickens supplied them with fresh eggs, the goats would be a steady source of meat and cow gave them milk.
She’d laughed along with them when Bessie had knocked Cody from his stool into a pile of manure as he instructed them on how to milk her. He’d dusted himself off, and continued as though nothing had happened, his face red with embarrassment. Squirt, squirt, squirt and
the bucket gets full he sang a little song to get the rhythm as he worked their teats back in forth to fill the plastic pail.
They’d taken to the foxes or in actuality, the foxes had adopted them. They were the smallest of the omnivorous creatures in the zoo and it was a good fit. They were playful creatures and weren’t big enough to hurt them accidentally. The spent hours together, their worries shoved aside as they chased and wrestled with the little red balls of fur.
They’d done well at their tasks. As time marched on, they cried less frequently at night about their parents and instead asked questions about fighting the zombies and going on scavenging runs. They did their chores and tagged along with the older kids as they tended to the other animals. They moaned and groaned about the lessons that she, Harper and Murray gave them. They didn’t care about reading or learning math. It didn’t matter they argued. She’d chastised them. Of course, it did she’d reassured them. Without reading, how do you know what you are eating is safe? Without basic math, how did you know you were giving the animals the right amount of food? They’d given in and were decent students. She’d never thought much about teaching before the world ended, but found she enjoyed it. She’d also discovered parts of her heritage she’d never read about as she devoured the books on African history gathering dusts on the shelves of the vast library in Piedmont House.
She was fascinated by the changes of her group over the past few months. They’d gone from typical kids who usually couldn’t be trusted to set the garbage out without being reminded a few times to cunning and savvy survivors. They knew what had to be done and knew the consequences of not doing it. They had all gone a little wild but their situation warranted it. They weren’t living in ordinary times anymore. There weren’t any adults to tell them what they could and couldn’t do and there never would be again. There were things at the gate that were trying to kill them. They had figured out how to manage on their own and they had learned to fight back. They learned from their companions, their animal friends who showed no fear, knew no restraints and didn’t have remorse. They matched violence with violence. Death with death. Savagery with savagery. Their weapons, their animals and their wits were all that kept them from becoming one of the shuffling undead and they never forgot it.
Tobias and Annalise had always been a little different with their pale skin and nearly white hair but now they didn’t try to suppress their unusualness. They embraced it and like the Viking ancestors they claimed, they started covering themselves with strange tattoos. Intricate knot work and rune patterns gleaned from downloaded books covered their arms and legs, drawn on with permanent marker. She’d watch them painstakingly recreate them by the glow of the fireplace every evening, experimenting with different patterns before they made them permanent with the tattoo gun. They looked like relics of the Viking age with their braided hair and battle axes.
She thought about Swan and her face paint. The buckskin clothes and the decorations she wove into her hair. The girl never spoke of it or bragged of her heritage; she didn’t have to. Her native American blood was evident in her straight raven black hair and the dark complexion that was bronzed by the days spent in the sun. Even her choice of weapons, the tomahawks and the bow, were a nod to the Indians of the plains.
Donny had a lot of Chinese in him but he’d developed a range of skills that borrowed from many of the Asian countries. His armor looked vaguely like a Samurai’s. He fought with the spear and could spin it like the fighting staff of a Shaolin monk and he’d taught himself to move as stealthy as his panther.
Cody and Harper were as American as apple pie and neither knew much about their ancestors. I think we came from Germany, Cody had answered when asked about his forefathers. Harper had just shrugged and said Iowa.
Vanessa picked up the battery powered clippers that once belonged to Derek. She’d found them in the back of one of the golf carts amidst empty Dr. Pepper bottles, empty feed sacks and foul-smelling buckets that had been used to lug raw meat around. She stared into the mirror at her dark, nearly ebony skin. Her full lips and high cheekbones. Her father had called her his Nubian Princess. She didn’t know much about her history beyond her grandparents. They were simply Americans. She didn’t know where her ancient fathers had called home but she knew it was somewhere in Africa. They may have been slaves or they may have been free men but she knew they had once been warriors. They had once lived or died by their skills, their cunning and their wit, and now she did too. Like Donny, the twins and Swan, she embraced her people’s history and drew from it to give her courage and strength.
She touched her hair, ran her fingers through it one last time. It was long and unruly, the tight, kinky curls refused to be tamed without creams and conditioners. Her kind of hair couldn’t be put in a ponytail and forgot about. She had to be careful not to get it soaking wet or it could start to mold. When she tried to wear a hat, she had to have it so tight it hurt her head or it would fall off. Braiding it was too much trouble. Dreadlocks could easily be snagged by reaching, undead hands and besides they stank. No wonder the African women kept it short, she thought, they didn’t have time to mess with it every day.
She turned on the clippers and pressed them to the skin above her ears, shearing backwards carefully. Within minutes she was running her hand over the smooth sides of her head and staring at her new mohawk in the mirror. She smiled. She liked what she saw.
She unscrewed the cap on the white makeup and dipped three of her fingers into it, dragging horizontal lines down each side of her newly exposed scalp. It made her look fierce, she thought.
That was the easy part, she said to herself then picked up the razor blade sitting next to the small can of ashes taken from the bonfire. She’d read everything she could find about ritual scarification, a practice by warrior tribes to attest to their prowess in battle. The scars of the warrior reflected at a glance their skills in battle.
She had saved three, had risked her life for theirs and it was fitting that the first marks on her flawless skin would be for them. A reminder to her and the world that even if she never did anything else worthy of honor, this she would have forever.
She made an incision beneath each eye, wincing at the pain and the reflected image of blood pouring down her cheeks. She cut slow and deep, felt the sharp burn and ignored it. This was nothing, this was but a scratch and she would not flinch. She dabbed her fingers in the ash then worked it into the cuts to promote swelling. When it healed, it would leave a prominent scar. She wondered how many more self-inflicted cuts she would bear before the world resumed some form of normalcy.
She sat and watched until the blood finally stopped running and the ash sealed the wound. She wiped the remnants of blood from her face and stood. She looked different and she felt different. She was leaving her life before the fall behind. Her clothes were different, her attitude was different and now her face was different. She let her machetes find their place on her hips, grabbed her spear, slipped the laser pointer into her pocket and went to find her ostrich.
29
Swan
The children all giggled incessantly at Murray as he sucked in another mouthful of helium from the tank and his high-pitched voice rang out. The animal sanctuary had always been a popular place for kids’ birthday and other events so rounding up some party items had been an easy task. Balloons floated against the high ceilings while others were tied off to chair backs. The youngest children chased each other in a high-speed game of tag through the hallways. Otis lay in front of the fireplace, soaking up its heat and snoring heavily. Yewan was curled in a window sill absorbing the last rays of warmth as the sun made its slow descent into the western sky.
The monkeys chattered excitedly, bouncing from cabinet to chair to shoulders and swinging from the light fixture above the massive oak table in the formal dining room. They leaped for the balloons floating lazily against the high vaulted ceiling. Sage, one of the feistier capuchins, tried to mimic Murray and breathe in the helium. Her own voic
e scared her and the rest of monkeys and they all darted for the safety of Murrays’ jacket. An assortment of gifts lay sloppily wrapped on the table. This was supposed to be Swans surprise birthday party, she was a teenager now, but she was late. Harper had been secretly planning it for weeks and made sure Cody’s job roster had her on fence detail. It only took a few hours to make the rounds, she should have been back before dark. Maybe she was getting a few more rabbits for Lucy who was still nursing the cubs.
Donny kept watch at the window, looking for any sign of her and the wolves. He caught a glimpse of her in the lengthening shadows and motioned for everyone to take their places and get ready. The house fell as silent as a tomb as children tried to stop giggling and ducked behind doors or into empty cabinets ready to leap out and yell surprise.
Swan entered the front door, followed by Zero padding softly behind her. Candlelight lit the big house, casting long shadows. She saw no sign of her friends, just the snoring bear in front of the fireplace and the black panther dozing in the window.
She sighed and hung her jacket on the coat rack, surprised no one was hogging the fire. Well, if you didn’t count Otis but he was always hogging it. Hunting for survival was hard. She was a little miffed at herself for missing a sprinting rabbit not once but twice. Both tomahawks had fell short and stuck harmlessly in the ground. The experience was real, it was tough, nothing like she’d imagined. Trying to outsmart one of Mother Earth’s creations wasn’t as easy as she thought it would be. Every creature had a will to live and even the most adorable animals had the instincts to fight back when cornered. The concept seemed ok to her, a small mistake and they didn’t have fresh meat that day, success and her pack feasted. It was fair, she didn’t have guns and an unfair advantage. She didn’t shoot an animal from a half mile away where it had no chance. She hunted with her pack and they killed for need, not sport.
Animals Page 17