Anno Zombus Year 1 (Book 2): February (10 page)

Apocalypse Girl asked if that meant we would be likely to have to deal with bandits as well, and The Son nodded.  She swore.  The Son looked questioningly at me, and I told of our previous encounters with their ilk.  Redbeard assured her that between the five of us any bandits we run into will be toast before too long, and she smiled.

Night had fallen long ago by the time we reached the eastern barricade, but the way was reasonably well lit, as The Family members chose to live primarily in huts in the road, either made from wood gathered from houses, or cars that they converted into living quarters.  This made them more easily defended both from without and within.  Everybody that lived there had a blunt object ready to hand, just in case, even with the standing decapitation order for the Dead.  The Son explained that they only cut of heads when it was safe to do so.  There had been a couple of unfortunate accidents early on.

We holed up, huddled together for warmth, in a structure not unlike The Mother's Parlour, covered with blankets.  Apocalypse Girl reported in with her phone, receiving the news that two of the newcomers and two of Firecracker's miners were heading to The Farm the next day.

February 17th Year 1 A.Z.

morning

After a quick breakfast shortly after dawn, we looked over the top of the barricade.  There were indeed many more Dead-head mines laying around than the way we had entered, and rather a lot of Dead milling about as well.  They just wandered about the road, but it made for an especially dangerous area.  Concentrate on weaving through the minefield too much and the walking Dead ones will get you, focus on the shambling Dead overly much, and you are certain to become one of them from having your toes nibbled on.

I asked The Son how we were meant to get through all of that, and he simply smiled, telling us to follow him.  We headed south along the barrier for about twenty metres, until the ground dropped away from us.  Nodding to a pair of guards watching the hole, he explained that they had dug this entrance to the storm water system in order to have a way of slipping in and out of Melbourne quickly and quietly.  We would have to travel the entire day in almost pitch blackness, unless one of us carried a torch, he said.

It was a race to see which of the four of us would produce theirs first.  Apocalypse Girl lost to Redbeard by half a second, Junior and myself tying for third.  Redbeard handed his to The Son, so that he could use both of his pistols if necessary.  I am pretty sure he only does that to show off, but what the fuck, even if he is, he still takes out a Dead with each round.

The Son assured us that there were no Dead down here, as we lowered ourselves down, and that since the rains it was all relatively clean.  This proved to be more or less true, the storm water system stank of Dead, but there was nothing around, that was plain to see.  We travelled forwards, into the dark depths.

noon(ish) maybe

Kinda hard to tell the time down here.  Apocalypse Girl's phones battery life is far more important for communications rather than the relative time of day, anyway, so just going with our stomachs.  We broke out a bit of jerky for lunch, though we chewed on it while walking.  Saw a nest of rats down here, thinking about it they're the only living animals I had seen since the sheep.  I asked The Son why it smelled so much like the Dead down here, he replied that he thinks it was because everybody started burning them straight away.  The heavy rains we had experienced were the burned Dead coming back down to earth in a great deluge, and being a storm water system, had flushed through these tunnels.

I asked The Son how his Family had managed to keep itself fed for as long as it had, to which he replied that they had found a fully stocked supermarket near the far end of this tunnel, and had raided it thoroughly.  There were several others not too far off but they hadn't had to resort to looting them yet.  The nearby houses were more than enough for now.

evening

We emerged from the darkness, coming up out of a manhole to a street blanketed in fresh grey snow.  The sun descended below the horizon behind its wool blanket of deep cloud cover, deepening the gloom.  The Son bade us follow him, and led us into a nearby house, which we quickly and quietly scouted for Dead, and barricaded for the night.  Apocalypse Girl sent a message back to The Think Tank informing them that we have reached Melbourne at last.

February 18th Year 1 A.Z.

morning

We ate our breakfast, The Son asking the address of the people we sought.  Junior was more than happy to divulge all information he had on the subject, as he had been charged with the task.  The Son informed us that we were, in fact, relatively close to the suburb in question.  We would be travelling all of today, for sure, and maybe have to travel for much of tomorrow as well, unless we were lucky and there were no Dead between here and there.  Even then, we would have to be careful in the extreme.  Attracting a horde of Dead was the simplest thing in the world to do, it seemed, apart from attracting a mob of bandits.  We needed neither of these complications, not right now.

There were Dead out in the street, so we relieved them of their need to eat human flesh, and then moved out, heading to the northeast.  Junior and I kept our melee weapons handy at all times, while Apocalypse Girl and Redbeard had pistols in hand.  The Son carried no weapon to speak of, but walked in the centre of the square formed by the rest of us.

Some cackling lunatic ran out into the street and fired once at us, or at least, vaguely in our direction, then kept on making the motion of firing his pistol, shouting out “BANG! BANG BANG! BANGBANGBANG!!!!!” over and over again, bleeding from what we all assumed to be a bite wound high on his shoulder.  We walked slowly away from him, though he followed our progress, at least until he attracted the attention of a group of Dead that had been trying to get inside a house, the front door of which was smeared black with dried blood.  The shouting of “BANG BANG!” continued right up until the words turned into garbled gibbering screams of agonising pain.  We moved away from the carnage as quick as we could manage, hoping no Dead followed us.

We made good time, until we ran into a horde of Dead of our own.  Redbeards guns went up and he nearly fired before I grabbed one of his hulking tree-trunk arms.  He looked at me, and I lifted my sword.  He frowned, then put away his guns, pulling out a cricket bat.  Apocalypse Girl followed suit, equipping a crowbar, and we set about our task of destroying the Dead.

Junior splatted one skull as I sliced through another, Redbeard and Apocalypse Girl likewise killing a Dead one each.  Four more down, and the rest still hadn't noticed we were there yet.  Comprehension was beginning to dawn in the next four brains that we dashed from their skulls, and that was enough.  More than twenty Dead all turned as one, knowing there was food aplenty right there before them.

The next thing I can recall after that is sitting back to back with Apocalypse Girl, both of us heaving great breaths of relief at the death of so many Dead.  More of them had poured out from other streets, easily seventy of them.  Amazingly none of our group had been harmed in the slightest, except of course by exhaustion.

evening

After we had caught our collective breath, we moved onwards.  Copper's family home seemed a long way from here, though The Son assured us that we would be there around lunchtime tomorrow.  We walked, finding no more than a few pockets of Dead, one here, two or three there.  No more than about five in any one group, therefore easily dispatched.  I felt it was a crime to leave a Dead one unkilled, if you could safely get away with doing it.

We found a likely house before sundown, and secured it as thoroughly as we were able before eating a quick dinner and huddling up together for the night.  Lunchtime tomorrow, The Son had said, we would be at Copper's family home.

February 19th Year 1 A.Z.

morning

I awoke this morning to the smell of coffee being brought to the boil.  Apocalypse Girl had found a packet of freshly ground beans, vacuum sealed, that the previous occupants of this house had left behind in their hurry to get out.

“I hope you don't mind it black, milks a little hard to come by at the moment,”  She said, handing me a cup with a smile.  I thanked her, taking a careful sip of the bitter black liquid.  Nearly strong enough to wake an elephant that had been dead a century.  Perfect.

After breakfast, The Son brought out a street directory that he had fossicked out of a car on our journey yesterday, showing us the local area.  We were currently only about two streets away from the one we needed, and we had a choice of back yards or the long way.  As we were all armed well, The Son having found a cricket bat shortly after we found this house, we opted for the back yard route.

We gathered up all of our supplies, finishing off our cups of coffee and gathered out weapons.  I was just about to ask everyone if they were ready to move out when we heard a scratching sound emanating from outside the front door.  We all froze solid, and the next sound was a tapping on a window in the lounge room.  Carefully, I poked my head around a doorframe to see the hands of several Dead scraping across the window.  Another, louder scratching came from the door, followed by a thud, then another.  A third thud, and I silently motioned for everyone to follow me out the back.

As we reached the back door we heard glass breaking, and the thudding renewed on the front door with eager enthusiasm.  They knew where we were.

noon

We fled from the first house as silently as we were able, surprising a Dead on the way out with my katana through its head, then we were off, running into the back yard.  The Son told us that we needed to be on the other side of the street, so we went sideways, jumping first one fence, running across that back yard and jumping another before returning once more to the street.

The Dead had gathered round our coffee house, and as we watched the front door was battered in under the sheer weight of the fifty or so of them that had crowded the front porch.  More Dead from further up the street spotted the commotion and shuffled over to join in, hoping for some hot tasty meat, or some intestines to chew on.  We kept low, heading across the street straight into the back yard of the next house.

The Dead knew we were on the move, as one of them moving to join the horde from the opposite direction, close to us and behind us as we watched the main group, followed us into the back yard.  The festering carcass of a dog, dead from starvation, lay across our path, and Junior tripped over it, creating a loud enough ruckus that the Dead in China could probably have heard it.  Apocalypse Girl clobbered our tail with her crowbar, taking a look out into the street as Redbeard helped Junior up.

“They're coming, guys,”  She said, and we moved to the back fence.  We needed something to get up high enough to reach the top of this fence, it towered above us.  Redbeard went to the side of the house, where we had made our entry into the back yard, saying that he would hold them off while we do something about it.  A moment later he squeezed off a couple of rounds.  Junior ran shoulder first at back door of the house, and screamed in pain.  Apocalypse Girl swore, loudly, and ran to his aid.  I followed, and turned the handle.  The door swung inwards, and Junior looked instantly incredibly embarrassed.  More gunshots rang out as The Son and I scoured the interior of the house.  There was a large, sticky pool of blood that had to have been drying for at least a month covering the kitchen floor, and a large dining table nearby, seats flung about in abandon.

We went for the table, both of us putting our weapons down momentarily while we attempted to get it the fuck outside.  The Son screamed as a Dead hand latched onto his ankle.  I quickly glanced under the table, and saw that he was in no immediate danger of being eaten, but he was panicking and not likely to listen to me.  I grabbed my sword and stabbed it through the Dead one's forehead, then slapped The Son in the face, telling him that he is alright now.  He nodded, then we grabbed the table, dragging it outside.

I ordered Junior to help out moving the table, and Apocalypse Girl I told to run back into the house and grab our weapons.  Redbeard was walking slowly backwards, firing once with each step, glancing back briefly to check that we had dealt with the fence before he bolted for the table.

Just using it as a table would not work, that much was clear, but we were able to overturn it, such that it became rather a handy ramp, including legs that we were able to hang onto and climb up the fence with.  Apocalypse Girl, tossing the weapons over, and The Son went first followed by Junior and myself.

The next yard was almost worse.  Apocalypse Girl had managed to roll out of the way as soon as she had landed, making room for me, but Junior landed on top of The Son, and a moment later, Redbeard's entire bulk crushed them from above.  To top it off, this family had clearly been celebrating the new year at home, as they were all still there, staring at us.  Mother, father, three kids of various flavours, aunts and uncles, probably a grandparent or two.  Maybe three.  It was hard to tell who had been whom when the entire family was now Dead and stumbling towards us.
I snatched up my sword and began to slice into Dead skulls, cleaving apart most of the family before they could get to us, by which time Redbeard had recovered enough to put a pair of bullets into the heads of the final two standing.