The Zombie Plagues Dead Road: The Collected books. (8 page)

“
Learn that up in the big
city, Miss?” Mike asked with a smile.

Candace smiled back, reached inside the
case, careful of the glass that had sprayed in small slivers from
the spider webs in the top, and withdrew pistol after pistol,
setting them on a wooden topped case next to the cash
register.

“
Forty five caliber, Nine
millimeter, a cheap one though. Three eighty, kind of nice, though
small. Here’s a much nicer Nine Millimeter.” She set several more
guns on the wooden top, looked up with a crooked grin and asked,
“Well, gentlemen, lady, what’ll it be?”

“
You really know about this
kind of shit,” Lydia asked in an awed voice.

“
Obviously well enough to
know what’s what,” Tom said.

“
That’s right. Obviously
well enough,” Candace agreed. She gave no further
explanation.

“
What do you think,
Candace?” Jan asked.

“
Yeah, what would be the
best?” Mike asked.

Candace shrugged. “It depends on what
you like. I like a three eighty myself. It’s small, not as heavy as
a Nine millimeter.” She pulled her own Nine Millimeter. “This was
my Dad's. A good gun, but I liked the Three Eighty I had. A Three
Eighty won’t really knock somebody down, not like you see in the
movies. But a nine millimeter won’t always do that either. It’ll
just make a bigger hole. If you want to knock somebody down, you
need this.” She held up the bigger forty five caliber pistol. She
held the mostly black pistol easily in one hand. “This will knock
somebody down and kill them. And, on the off chance that your aim
was bad and you didn’t immediately kill them, believe me, they are
not going to feel like getting back up.” She grinned. “It’s still
not like the movies. You know, where you see them flying backwards
through the air. But, it will knock them down and keep them
there.”

“
Jesus, Candy, I’m like in
awe,” Lydia said.

“
Candace,” Candace said,
“and thank you.”

“
So how do you know all
that? Like for real, how do you know all that shit?”

“
My dad was a cop, not in
Syracuse, before we moved there. He had a thing for guns. I just
caught it. When he knew I was going to be like him when it came to
guns, he sent me for training, safety stuff mostly, but I liked it
so much I started buying my own weapons. I took the test.
Eventually I would’ve had my foot in the door in Syracuse. That’s a
good department. I would’ve been in already if not for the
economy.”

“
The thing is, I love to
shoot. I’m good too,” she sighed.

“
So… what'll it be?” She
let the smile return to her face, reached over and began to jimmy
another of the locks on the sliding glass doors.

They spent the good part of two hours
in the store. Camping gear, rifles, pistols and ammunition, Mike
began to feel like they were equipping their own private army
before they were done. Even so, by the time they left, everyone was
carrying at least one pistol, and several rifles and boxes of
ammunition had found their way into the back of the pickup truck.
Candace, Mike noticed, had added a matte black forty five caliber
pistol to the Nine Millimeter. She wore them in webbed holsters on
a wide leather belt.

“
I thought you preferred a
Three Eighty,” Mike said half jokingly as he replaced the Nine
Millimeter he had decided on into the side holster he had
chosen.

“
I do,” she said, “For
shooting. But like I said, a Three Eighty can’t knock somebody
down.” Her eyes met his.

“
Yeah… There is that,” Mike
agreed quietly.

They spent a short amount of time
looking through a small convenience store in the same parking lot.
There was very little left. Most likely cleaned out, Bob voiced, by
the same folks who had tried to take the guns. This was evidenced
by smears of maroon on the counter tops. Even so, they managed to
find boxes of stuff in the storage area. They finished filling the
backs of the trucks with basic First Aid stuff and several boxes
full of candy bars and junk food too.

The sun had been standing overhead for
what seemed like hours. Bob spoke.

“
Hotter,” He said. “You can
feel the heat. And,” He motioned with his hands, “the snow is
melting faster as well.”

“
Got a theory on that?”
Mike asked.

Bob shook his head.

“
Maybe the whole process
takes time,” Candace said.

“
Maybe,” Tom agreed. “Maybe
it’s not so easy to start something spinning in the other
direction. And we don’t know if it really stopped or not. The sun’s
coming up in the north, or it was, but that seems to be changing
too. I don’t think it stopped all the way. I think it’s just got a
different spin now, and maybe a different path.”

Bob nodded, as did Mike. “I guess we’ll
leave it for the scientists... long as we don’t fall off the
Earth.” He chuckled a little.

“
Call it a day?” Mike
asked.

“
Yeah,” Tom agreed. “We
still have to unload all of this.”

There were a few halfhearted
complaints, but everyone piled into the trucks, and they made their
way slowly back towards the heart of the city and the cave that lay
behind the Public Square.

Janet ~ March 14th

We are six people who have managed to
stay alive through whatever it is that has happened to our planet.
My husband Bob and I were fortunate enough to be protected by our
spirits and brought through all of this.

I am Janet Dove; my husband is full
blooded Blackfoot and a very proud man. A very good man as well.
And not just to me. He treats all people well.

My mother was Cherokee and my father
was French. I don’t mean French transplanted to this country. My
mother met him in France. We are looking forward to whatever the
Great spirits purpose is in this.

We have many young people with us.
Michael Collins. He’s mixed race, like many of us. He probably
doesn’t realize it, but he is in fact our leader. He’s in his early
twenties. I guess the mixed race stuff doesn’t matter anymore, but
I lived with it for so long that it’s hard for me to let it
go.

Bob has suffered worse with those
prejudices. Many other people besides me. Maybe the world is at
that place where all of that stuff can be let go now? I hope
so.

Candace Loi is a beautiful young woman.
Her father is African American, her mother Asian. She has her
father's dark skin blended with her mothers features. Striking. I
enjoy her company. She reminds me of my daughter. I don’t know how
she fared in all of this. I suppose we’re all wondering similar
things.

Tom. Thomas Evans. And, Lydia, Marcia
George fill out our party. We are planning to leave here in a few
months and head south, or west. The direction isn’t decided, only
the realization that we need to go. The thinking is that we should
head south, somewhere warmer. After all, there is no electricity
here, and we are living in a cave. It’s not a bad cave, and we’re
lucky to have it. Almost the entire city has been destroyed. The
buildings are unsafe to live in.

When we leave, we’ll leave all of that
behind us. This is who we are. We will most likely continue to the
south. We are currently looking for a Short Wave radio set to try
to get in touch with others around the world. You, whoever you may
be, may be able to reach us where ever we have gone to
now.

Bob believes in the Nation. That the
people will once again live on the earth the way they used to. Bob
believes it, and so I believe it. I’ll continue to keep this book
up while we’re here and include any useful information we can pass
on to you before we go.

Candace ~ March 14th

I guess I should start this
the right way. I hadn't thought about it when it was just me to
think about. But it's more than me or even those of us that are
here now. It's the ones who might come. Or
will
come after. So even if you
figured out almost all of what I'm about to write, I'll write it
anyway.

I read back over what I wrote and it
doesn't even seem like me, like I wrote it, like those things
happened to me

My name is Candace Loi. I was living
here when all of this happened. I'm not from Watertown. I actually
did live here for a while last year, but that’s a long story. The
point is I'm not really from here like the others are.

My man is Mike Collins and we are with
two other couples; Jan and Bob Dove, and Tom Evans And Lydia
George. I came here with them; Mike was on his own then. I was too,
even though I had people around me. I guess if you've read all of
this diary you know what I'm talking about. I had Jan as my friend,
this diary and my father's gun. I Thank God for what I had,
especially Jan.

Jan and Bob are older. They are really
good people. Tom and Lydia are younger. Well, Lydia is. Lydia’s
even younger than I am, but Tom is quite a lot older. I don’t think
anyone cares about that anymore though. At least nobody here
does.

We are going to leave here sometime in
the next few months and try to make it down to the Gulf coast. We
don’t know for sure how that will go. I’ll keep this updated though
until then. We’re going to leave these behind us. Hopefully they
will be useful to someone. But I think I'll keep my little
Notebook. It means something to me.

Things we know: You can get trucks and
cars to start as long as they are older ones that don’t have
electronic brain boxes, as Bob put it. That is how we intend to go
before winter or just after winter really lets go. Otherwise, we’d
really have to wait for summer to settle in before we could chance
travel.

There are several sporting goods stores
in the area. We’re all carrying guns now. It seems smart to do.
Maybe I should say it would be stupid not to. We think it only
makes good sense.

This cave we are in seems stable, but
many of the other structures in the city aren’t safe to live in. We
don’t know how deep these caves go.

We’re going to try to reach others with
Ham Radios. We’re also trying to find a battery powered television
set just to see if anything’s on the air. We’re hopeful. We’re also
going to pick up some hand held F.M. Radios, walkie-talkies, Bob
calls them. That way we can speak to each other when we’re
separated.

The sun is rising in the north. Really
the North West. The days were long, then short, now going back
towards long again. We don’t know what that might mean, where it
will end or even where we will be when it does end. And maybe end
is the wrong word to use. We don't know what began or ended; might
begin or end.

I re-read that, I guess it seems
melodramatic, at least to me, but it's honest.

I will write more as we go
along.

~ March 15th ~

Early morning darkness held the road
that fronted the cave. The moonlight, sparse, reflected off the
rapids of the Black river.

A shadow moved by one of the pickup
trucks. Another moved by the Suburban. The sound of sand gritting
beneath the sole of a shoe came clearly in the shadowy darkness.
The door of the pickup squealed loudly as it was carefully opened.
The shadow paused, looking towards the Suburban. The shadow there
appeared to be fighting with the door to no avail. The shadow next
to the pickup gestured quickly with both hands, and the shadow next
to the Suburban gave up on the door, crossed to the pickup and
quickly climbed inside. Once they were both inside, silence
returned to the small patch of asphalt that fronted the cave. A few
seconds later the pickup roared to life. The headlights snapped on,
the wheels turned hard left and the driver launched the truck down
what was left of the shattered roadway.

Voices were raised in alarm from inside
the cave, and within just a few moments everyone inside was
outside. Lydia, gun in hand, unloaded a full clip at the fleeing
pickup truck. Both Tom and Mike snapped off a single shot, more in
startled response to Lydia’s’ shots than with any real hope of
hitting the retreating pickup truck.

“
Jesus,” Lydia said
breathlessly. “They stole our truck!” She turned and looked at Mike
with wide, frightened eyes. “They stole our Goddamn truck,” She
repeated. “How could they steal our truck?”

Tom headed for the suburban and pulled
the keys from his pocket, preparing to unlock the door.

“
Tom,” Mike called. “Where
are you going, Man?”

“
That’s our Goddamn truck.
I’m going to get it.” His eyes were wild, the truck keys in one
hand, a pistol in the other, no shirt, sock-less shoes, laces
trailing.

“
It’s an old truck, Man,”
Mike said.

“
It’s
my
old truck,” Tom said defensively.
“And if I catch that fucker…”

“
Fuckers,” Lydia
said.

“
Huh?” Tom
asked.

“
Fuckers, as in I saw two
heads. Two of them. Not one,” Lydia said. Her voice held a
breathless, excited quality to it that Mike didn’t like. She was
dressed in jeans and a thin T-shirt. She shivered slightly, whether
from the cold or the excitement, Mike couldn’t tell.