Diaries of the Damned (27 page)

The field below the hill, easily twice the size of the others was home to the cows. In the near corner was what Brian assumed to be the milking shed.

There looked to be around one hundred and fifty cows in the field. Each with a distinct black and red color, with gaping holes in their flanks. The field was also crawling with zombies. It was the mixture of their hungry growls and the pain filled cry of the dying cattle that created the wail on the wind.

Offal littered the ground. Thick strands of bovine intestine spilled from the opened carcasses like the arms of Cthulhu. Brian had no concept of how long he stood watching the feast, but before he realized
it, the sun was setting behind him, and the downed cattle at the end of the field had fallen victim to the encroaching eve.

Brian hurried back to the farmhouse. A check of the house told him it was clear. He closed the doors and settled down to another bowl of hot soup, courtesy of a wood burning stove and a healthy stockpile of fuel piled beside it. There was also an assortment of crackers and biscuits. It was the best meal Brian had eaten in days.

That night he dreamed of his wife. It wasn’t a happy dream. They never were. They had argued all the time, and rarely shared even a meal together. Her visit to her mother was a journey taken all too eagerly, and a break that they both welcomed. Yet when Brian wrenched awake, upright in his bed, sweat coating his body in a chilling blanket, the tears in his eyes were real.

The silence of the countryside somehow seemed to amplify the growls of the zombies. The cows had fallen silent, but their conquerors remained. They were all trapped inside the field, unable to master the fence that held them captive. Brian lay in the soft double bed of the master
bedroom, and waited for the sun to rise. He was lost in his fantasy again: His empire built around him, a harem filled with women, grateful to him, their rescuer. 

With the rising of the sun, Brian got to work. Having worked in construction most of his life, until the recession had cost him his career and relegated him to a factory position, he was more than capable of doing what was necessary to fortify his new refuge. He knew that the women would not come to him without proof of their security, so after a hearty breakfast of semi stale bread and jam, he got to work digging a trench that ran along the field where the zombies were corralled. The cattle had been further stripped of their hides, though it appeared that their juicy centers were the main ingredient to a zombie meal. The trench did not need to be very deep, nor wide. By the time the sun had moved above his head, Brian had dug the basic trench from one corner of the field to the gate which rested at just past the central point. It was here that he came to the iron grate that stopped the cattle escaping should the gate be opened by some force or another. His work had attracted the attention of the zombies who lined the fence and grabbed at the man whose musky aroma overrode their senses.

The fence held their weight, but the wood strained and groaned in places. After lunch, Brian decided that fortification was in order. Having found rolls of barbed wire in one of the large barns behind the house, he quickly got to work attaching it to the fence post. He worked quickly, in random stages to keep himself one step ahead of the undead that followed his every move. Their frenzy grew with every passing minute. While adding the fourth section of coiled razor wire, Brian cut his hand when his footing slipped on the edge of the trench he had dug. The zombies turned in unison at the scent of blood. Brian jumped out of their way, and continued working on the opposite end of the fence. The creatures, so tantalized by the smell of fresh blood began biting down onto the barbed wire, their heads getting stuck within the twisting coil.

By the time the day was done, Brian stood shirtless. His body was caked with dirt and dripping with sweat in spite of the cold wintery air. The trench was dug, and the depth would be completed the following day, while the barbed wire held firm. One of them had torn itself free, while two others struggled against the wire, only succeeding to embed themselves further. Brian drove a screwdriver through their heads as he walked back to the house.

After boiling water on the wood stove in two large pans, Brian treated himself to a small bath, and crept into bed. He smiled as the dreams came, for with them came more visions of his future, and more ways to prove his strength. Once he got his art perfected, they would come. They would seek him out.

The days came and went in a blur. Brian cut away every second rung on the iron grate, changing it from a cattle guard to a zombie guard. The invention pleased him. It would be the first place he would bring the ladies when they arrived.

On the third day, as Brian arrived to start embedding the disjointed grid irons into the shallow trench he had dug, sticking them at alternating angles to one another, he noticed that none of the zombies had gotten stuck. It was the first time, and Brian felt disappointed. He tried to get down to business, but something kept gnawing at him, and it would not let up. Brian walked to the fence and stood opposite the zombies, who kept their distance from the wire. The closest was a large man, clearly a farmhand or some other manual laborer. It was a zombie that Brian had seen every day. Many of the others were new. The undead came and went like migrant workers at harvest time, through the gap in the fence.

Brian stared at the zombie, i
ts teeth were bared and thick spittle hung from his lips, as if it were under some great internal struggle to keep from charging the barbed wire and ripping itself to pieces in an attempt to claim the fresh meat that taunted it.

Br
ian pulled a Stanley knife from his back pocket and drew the blade across his palm. He smeared the blood across the wire, the whole time, staring at the big zombie. Its body shook as it resisted its natural urges. Ultimately, it lost, and descended on the barbed wire, snarling and salivating. It bit into the wire with such ferocity that it severed its tongue lapping up the blood it had been given. Brian executed it and finished planting the spikes, but it was with an uneasy feeling that he headed back to the farm house.

As he enjoyed a meal of tinned spaghetti, scrambled eggs, and baked pot
ato, Brian thought back, realizing that the whole incident had lasted only a matter of minutes. It had seemed worse at the time, but the fact that the zombie had resisted its nature had him confused. Besides, how would the women feel safe with him, if the zombies didn’t stay put? As Brian filled the pipe he found in the living room cabinet, he thought through his options, and came to the only possible conclusion: In the morning, he would set up some additional traps and run a few tests. He needed to know just what their limits were. Then he would go looking for the women.

He slept fitfully that night, waking several times to the sound of screams cutting through the night. Once they were his own.

His fifth day on the farm, Brian woke feeling tired. His joints ached and his head was heavy. He made a coffee and took it outside. He sat in the cold morning air and stuffed the pipe. He took it everywhere with him now. He smoked and drank his coffee while opposite him, the zombie crowd gathered. They glared at him with undead eyes, while Brian smiled at them. He looked them over, waiting to see if any more offered resistance. Five were trapped, impaled on the blood smeared barbed wire, but Brian needed more. Besides, his harem would need entertainment. They could not live in the throes of passion forever. Even Brian accepted that.

With his coffee gone, Brian clenched the pipe between his teeth and crossed the modified cattle grid. He picked up one of the grid sections he had not embedded in the trench. Holding it like a staff, Brian unlocked the gate and jumped back across the grid. Zombies piled through the opening and fell between the gaps of the grid. Their legs snapped as the pressure of bodies behind them increased. Several of them spilled over the pile and fell onto the spikes, sealing off all possible escape. The undead thrashed and growled in spite of their positions. Brian leaned in close, just beyond the reach of their swiping arms
. Their hunger controlled them…drove them. It was clear to him now that they held no other interest than flesh.

“We are to too dissimilar, you and me,” Brian whispered to the zombie closest to him, moments before he drove his trusted screwdriver through the thing’s forehead.

The zombie fell still. After using the iron pole to finish off the remaining trapped zombies, Brian reached under the chair and pulled out the rabbit carcass he had found in the barn. He tossed it into the field, and watched those gathered by the gate turn and descend upon it. The body was devoured in no time flat, but it gave Brian enough time to close the gate.

The trials, as Brian liked to call them, were repeated throughout the day with the same result. The creatures piled onto the spears and charged over the grid without as much as a second thought. After two further days of similar results, Brian decided that it was time to take things to the next level. He had found a journal and started keeping notes. He spent most of his days watching and taunting the zombies in the field. Each creature was carefully noted, for when the women arrived he would handpick the creatures and fight them. He would show them all how much of a man he was. He would prove it to them on the battlefield, and in the bedroom.

On the morning of the eighth day, after two days of rain, Brian drew up to his arena in the grounds behind the house. It was a square arena, the size of two boxing rings. He dug a trench and filled it with wooden spikes which he had fashioned himself from the walls of a crumbling shed that stood to the west of the house. He angled the poles so that they all faced the arena, decreasing the surface area and ensuring that things swayed in his favor. He would keep the women inside, and coat the wood with blood. He would strike fast and kill without mercy. Smiling, he dropped the pole and grabbed the notepad from his pocket to scribble down another detail of his master plan. He then buried three knives under the ground, marking each with a series of stones. With his battle lines drawn, Brian knew he needed one final test before he opened his doors to the women. He was sure that the news of his fortified farm house had started to spread. Sanctuaries such as the one he had created always generated gossip. Someone would have seen it, he just knew.

Br
ian stood in the dark, outside of the house, listening to the growl of the zombies in the field. He prodded the pipe that fit his mouth so perfectly, and shifted his weight from one foot to the other. Above his head, the sky was clear and the stars shone down upon him. He focused on Orion; the mighty hunter that dominated the sky. Brian stood tall, and beat his chest in the moonlight. He let the robe he wore fall from his shoulders and strode into the field. The air refused to touch his naked body as he strode over grass, and across the iron grid that lay before the gate to the zombie paddock. A scrawny zombie in a torn football shirt snapped its teeth and lunged at the gate. Brian opened the latch and watched as the creature spilled forward, falling through the grid. Brian slammed the gate closed and grabbed the trapped zombie by the arm. Holding it in a straight arm bar and using the creature’s own lunges to move forward, he led it to the ring he had created. Releasing it, he waited. The zombie was one that had been in the field since the beginning, and Brian had watched it watching him.

“You think you can win?” Brian screamed at it as the zombie lunged for him. Brian side-stepped the attack and the zombie impaled itself one of the spikes. It pierced the thing´s chest and drove through its back. The creature groaned. Brian, lost in the euphoria of his victory, decided to leave it where it was, skewered like a rat in a trap, until the morning. He would keep it as a pet, until the women arrived. He would honor their arrival with its slaughter.

The next day, when Brian woke, he found the zombie standing free, in the center of the ring. It paced back and forth, stopping before the spikes each time. For a while Brian stood and watched, noting everything down in the dog-eared notebook. He was still naked, his body covered with zombie blood. He wrote furiously, and felt his anger rise accordingly. He finished his coffee and his breakfast, and then strode out to the ring. The zombie turned on him the moment he entered the ring. Brian side stepped again, anticipating the same result, but the zombie stopped its advance short of the spike. It spun, locking Brian in the stare of its cold, heartless, dead eyes. Again, the zombie made the first move. Brian sidestepped it, and once again, it stopped before impaling itself on the spike.

Annoyed, Bria
n charged. He ran at the creature, throwing it onto the spikes. He lifted his shoulder and deposited the creature in such a fashion that the wood pierced its abdomen and emerged through the navel. He thrust the football player further and further onto the spike, laughing as he did. Spittle flew from his mouth as he forced the zombie further and further onto the skewer.

“You will fall for my traps! You will not make a fool of me! They are coming, and I will be their god! We will repopulate the earth, me and my women!” Brian unleashed a volley of kicks and punches which rained down on the adolescent zombie, who never once stopped snapping at the appendages thrown its way.

Finally, once his torture was complete, Brian grabbed one of the knives from under the ground and crouched besides the zombie. The stench that came from it was repugnant, but as Brian had given up bathing, and sleeping, he too smelled like something that had been evicted through the puckered anus of a demon and left to float through the sewers before being deposited in the fresh air that escalated quickly. Brian held the knife and drew the blade across the zombie’s throat. It was impaled in such a way that its head was titled backward and once the skins barrier was broken, gravity did the rest and ripped a large secondary smile onto the creatures face. Thick coagulated blood, as black as crude oil fell from the wound with the consistency of milk left out in the sun for too long. Brian watched in amazement as the creature continued to snarl, even when its head was as good as severed from its shoulders. In a final act, he drove the knife through the zombies head, missing the forehead, but instead entering through the eye socket. The result was the same: the zombie was finished.