Surviving The Zombie Apocalypse (Book 1): Sanctuary (19 page)

Simon
was already back with Julie and Michael, and Cherie had started her truck so
there was no one else to hear.

Lizzy
looked at the bodies around us. “Kill enough of them?”

“Just
what I had to, so you’d have enough time to finish your shopping spree.”

“Wait
until I show you the tiger print bikini bottom I found.”

“I don’t
really need to see you in that sort of thing Lizzy. Lois might be angry with
me.” I was almost back to my own Jeep.

“This is
for you Jacob.”

Lizzy
began to laugh. Weird sense of humor on that one. I shook my head, somewhat
amused nonetheless.

Interlude – Simon’s Story

With
Cherie failing to provide more than the tiniest inkling of her past, and deftly
avoiding the topic with a level of skill that would impress a State Department
diplomat, I’m now going to relate Simon’s story. This is his tale, not that of
his family. Julie outright refused to speak with me, nor would she consent to
Michael participating.

Simon
Branson and his family were residents of
Omaha
,
Iowa
. As an assistant manager working the
nightshift at a distribution center servicing several grocery store chains,
Simon was awake at the time of the initial change, the only person I’d met up
to that point with direct, personal experience whom I could question.

Without
warning, several co-workers collapsed in their chairs or on the floor, shaking
violently. Some cried out in pain, others just writhed in silent agony. One of
these unfortunates was driving a forklift at the time, and the machine veered
sharply to the side, struck a wall, and spilled several pallets of laundry
detergent. No one was crushed, but the event added to the initial confusion and
delayed the survivors’ response. Several minutes passed before Simon and the
others even realized the afflicted had died. Then one of the employees said it
could be a toxin of some sort, possibly a terrorist attack. He ran from the
building further contributing to the chaos.

Simon,
unable to do much else, hurried to the office and dialed 911. Therefore, he
missed the imminent reanimation and subsequent attacks by his former friends
and colleagues. With the majority of the employees still in the warehouse,
there was no shortage of ready targets, and when the zombies began to stir,
several bent down thinking, reasonably at the time, that they had been terribly
wrong in believing these people dead. The results were horrific. Everyone save
Simon and Lewis were either bitten or fled.

The pair
quickly moved the injured inside the office while the zombies shambled about
aimlessly, sated after feeding. They used strips of cloth, torn from their
shirts, to bind the wounds. No one bled out, but several were seriously injured
and required immediate, professional medical attention.

With
Lewis keeping a watch on the zombies in the warehouse, Simon again attempted to
reach an emergency operator. Unsuccessful, he tried directory assistance, but
that didn’t work either. Growing impatient, Lewis insisted they drive the
injured to the hospital themselves. Simon reluctantly agreed – he was worried a
few might die if moved without the assistance of an ambulance or paramedics –
but by then the zombies had grown hungry once more.

The
monsters made straight for the office. Lewis slammed the door shut and locked
it, but the zombies pressed forward, hammering their fists against the wood.
The hinges suddenly broke free, and the door fell inward landing on two of the
men. They screamed in pain and terror as the dead shambled inside, their weight
pressing down, pinning them to the floor, but this put the pair out of easy
reach, saving them from what followed. John Tucker was less fortunate. Being the
nearest person, the zombies grabbed him. Simon and Lewis did their best to stop
it, but he was dragged from the room.

Once
again satisfied following their abbreviated feeding, the zombies drifted away,
ignoring everything and everyone. Lewis rushed to Tucker and managed to get a
pair of tourniquets tied off before he bled to death, but the man still lost
consciousness. In the meantime, Simon pushed the fallen door to the side. One
of those pinned beneath had a shattered leg.

“We have
to get them to the hospital,” insisted Lewis. “We can’t go through that again.”

“I know.
I’d…” Simon shook his head. There was no reason to think there wouldn’t be a
third time. “How about one of the delivery trucks?”

“Should
be enough room. Let’s move now, before they decide to come back.” He jerked his
head in the direction of the zombies. “What’s wrong with them?”

Not
waiting for a response, probably not expecting one, Lewis slung Tucker over one
shoulder and, completely disregarding the blood that dripped down his back, carried
the man to the parking lot. Simon helped the others outside as best he could
before opening one of the trucks. Both men gently got the injured into the
back, and once this was done Simon handed Lewis the keys.

“I’m
going to check on my family.”

“We have
to get them to the emergency room,” protested Lewis, angrily. He couldn’t
believe this. “They might die. Tucker probably will.”

Simon’s
head dropped. “I’ve two kids at home.” It was a feeble excuse, given the
circumstances as he understood them at the time, yet Simon was not going to
allow anything to prevent him from going to his wife and children.

“They’re
probably… Carl! Where are you going?”

The
small man ignored Lewis’s question. Holding an injured arm close to his chest,
he hopped out of the delivery truck and headed for his own car on the opposite
side of the building.

“We need
to go.”

Simon
wasn’t sure who said that. He took the opportunity it presented to turn and
walk away.

“Damn
it! You can’t just leave!”

He
steadfastly refused to look back and soon heard Lewis drive off.

Simon
had no idea what befell any of them, but looking back it’s likely John Tucker
died and reanimated while in the rear of the truck. Additionally, the vehicle
was similar to the standard U-Haul. There was no way to open the rear loading
door from the inside. The men it was carrying would have been trapped with the
zombie, and there’s a good chance at least one more would have perished before
they reached the hospital.

*
* *

Heading
home in his wife’s SUV – Simon’s own car was in the shop getting the
transmission fixed – he spotted a few zombies on the street. There weren’t
many, only a handful, but he was certain they were just like the men in the
warehouse. They had the same unsteady, shambling gait, the same weird behavior.
Some were clearly the homeless, but others were young people dressed as if
they’d been out at bars or clubs. Simon watched as a woman in a very short,
extremely tight fitting black dress bent down and bit the face of a drunk
sleeping on a park bench. He sped up.

Reaching
his house a few minutes later, Simon parked in the driveway and hurried inside
to wake Julie and the children. Simon wouldn’t share the words that were
exchanged, but he provided a summary of what they did. First was to turn on the
news to find out what was happening. The earliest reports were very unclear,
but the fact that a quarter of the world’s population had collapsed and gotten
up a few minutes later was never in doubt. Nor was there any disputing that
those who rose attacked the uninfected and were unresponsive, even to the pleas
of their loved ones.

Convinced
that all the worst things in Hell would break loose as people began waking up,
Simon got everyone dressed and into the SUV. They grabbed a few personal items
and some toys, but that was it. Focusing on speed, the family left behind many
of the things they’d need in the coming days. Still, they were more than thirty
miles south of
Omaha
when the sun first began to show
itself.

*
* *

The
radio reports steadily added to their understanding of what was happening,
verifying that Simon’s instincts had been correct. They listened as a
journalist reporting from a hospital talked about how the numbers of injured
arriving kept increasing. Then they heard the frantic cries as patients began
to die and reanimate.

By lunch
time several stations were off the air. Those remaining told of widespread
power outages as facilities were abandoned or failed due to other reasons. Some
went silent after the announcer said he was going home and walked away with no
one to take his place.

The
highways had grown rapidly worse, becoming a lesson in insanity. Thousands were
fleeing the city. Others were trying enter. People began to change their minds
and turn around, sometimes going the wrong way only to cause a head on
collision. And zombies were walking about adding to the panic. A few were
deliberately run down, and ordinary human beings who’d abandoned their cars
were struck as well, not always by accident.

Needing
to think, Simon pulled into a rest stop where his family watched in horror as a
group of people began to smash open the vending machines, stealing candy bars
and soft drinks. A scuffle broke out, and a man was knocked to the ground and
then stomped on, repeatedly. His rib cage was crushed and his skull cracked
open. He was left there, a bloody mess, while the looting went on around him.

Simon
drove past the melee and onto the access road, taking the first back road he
saw, not knowing where it led. Then he took another and a third. Soon he was
completely lost, but there were almost no other cars about. A few passed by
moving quickly, but none stopped. It seemed they were safe for the moment.

“Where
are we?” demanded Julie.

“I don’t
know.”

“I’m
scared,” sobbed Juliette. She’d been crying almost continuously.

“You
don’t need to be scared,” said Michael reassuringly, though he sounded
terrified himself.

It was
almost more than Simon could bear, and he was nearly out of gas. They needed to
find something, anything.

“A
mailbox,” said Julie, “up there.”

Simon
saw it – it was partially hidden by some vines – and uttered a silent prayer of
thanks as he pulled into the driveway. It was long and winding, and they went
nearly a quarter mile before rounding a copse of trees and finding a farm house
with some fields of corn behind it. As they pulled up in front, an older man
stepped onto the porch with a shotgun in his hands.

“Don’t
shoot!” cried Simon. He opened the car door and stood up. “I have my family
with me.”

The man
seemed to relax as he looked them over. “You all are normal?”

“Yes!”
shouted Simon. “All of us.”

“Then
come on inside.”

So
grateful that he was nearly blubbering, Simon guided Julie and the children
into the two story house. A woman greeted them, took a good look of her own,
and directed them to the kitchen. She pointed out the bathroom on the way, and
Michael darted inside.

“We’ve
been on the road since before dawn,” explained Julie, as Juliette grabbed a
cookie from a jar on the counter without asking. “We haven’t eaten anything.”
She looked at her daughter. “Juliette, what do we say before taking something?”

“It’s
all right,” countered the woman. “I’m Gloria. The big lout is my husband Kyle.
And you folk do look hungry. I’ll have something right up for you.”

“You
still have power,” observed Simon. “On the radio they said it was going out
everywhere.”

She
nodded. “We likely won’t lose it either. We have a generator and a wind turbine
and some big batteries that are charged up. A few years ago we lost power for
over a month when the lines went down. That hurt us bad, right at harvest time,
so we invested in making sure there were no repeats. We actually pump more into
the grid that we use.” She laughed. “Electric company pays us each month. Can’t
run everything all at once, but otherwise we should be okay.”

“You saw
the reports?” asked Simon.

“Sure
did,” replied Kyle. He’d come back inside after checking the area around the
house. “Nasty business.”

“I was
at work when it started,” said Simon, his eyes glazing over. “Lost some workers
at the center.”

“That’s
unfortunate.” Kyle gave him an understanding nod. “You’re safe enough now.
We’re in the middle of nowhere, for the most part. There aren’t even any other
houses within six miles of us. Some fields that people plant on are closer, but
no residences. Not many roads either.”

“Can we
try your television?” asked Julie.

Gloria
put a plate of cheese, crackers, and cookies in front of the kids who dug in
while she began preparing a proper meal on the stove.

Kyle
shrugged. “We don’t have cable. That went out right away. We can get a few
local stations, but not many are still talking.” He flipped the television set
in the living room on and handed her the remote. “You won’t get anything past
Channel 11.”

Julie,
with Simon watching, scanned through them. There were only two still
broadcasting at that point, and they didn’t say anything new. It was turned off
during dinner, and when they tried again afterwards, both were gone.

*
* *

Simon
and his family spent the next few days with the Robersons, and he unequivocally
believed it was their generosity in allowing them to remain that saved his
family’s life. With the chaos and violence that spiraled out of the city, they
likely would have been bitten by zombies or robbed and killed by desperate breathers
– I rather like calling the living breathers, but enough of my idiosyncrasies
for now. They had a place to stay, good food, and a chance to figure things
out.