This is the End (Book 2): Not Dead Yet (12 page)

Hearing footsteps crowd into the room, I turned to see every last one of us standing in a semi-circle, doing one last inspection of food and weapons.  I was about to suggest a plan when Ty stepped forward, map in hand.  “I think we keep the best shots in the back and head up the group with the fighters.” He looked pointedly at me as he said that and to my shock, the heads around us nodded in agreement.

Jack stepped towards me, “Angie and I can take the lead, just make sure the kids stay in the middle.”  He looked down at me, “You ready?”

I looked back up at him and with a smile, “No, but let’s do it anyway.”  He returned my smile and without a word, we started through the door.

Chapter 6:

I didn’t stop to make sure the coast was clear.  Throwing open the front door with one hand, I pulled the small machete from the holster on my thigh and ran down the porch steps and down the pathway, stopping to look around while the others caught up.  The coast was still clear and the morning sun was just starting to make its way above the rooftops of the surrounding houses.  The pounding from below my feet was getting louder and I knew we were running out of time.

No one said anything as we half ran, half jogged around the back of the house into the woods we’d come from the night before.  The ground was soft and I was grateful as the noise from our feet would’ve been thunderous if there had been a lot of vegetation to break as we went.

Catching sight of Jack out of the corner of my eye, he nodded once to me and we continued forward.  The racing heartbeats of the others were drowning out my own as we moved as quickly as we could.  After what felt like eternity, we reached the edge of the woods looking out over the golf course that sat between us and the interstate.

I stopped and held up a hand to halt the group while we still had the trees for cover.  There were maybe 10 zombies wandering around the golf course.  I watched as they ambled about, obviously not having caught sight of us since they were still relatively dormant.

They reminded me of background characters in a video game; when they weren’t actively attacking someone, they just slowly walked around, like they were waiting to be activated.  I almost expected to see them pixel and start the loop of inactivity again but this was reality and they just kept moving.

There was about a quarter mile of golf course between us and our destination and while there weren’t a lot of zombies, they could easily follow us up the embankment and over the wall onto the road; they had to be killed.

“We need to kill them all so we aren’t followed,” I said in a loud whisper, steeling myself for the fight.  I turned around, meeting the eyes flanking me.  Fear was echoed back, but they all just nodded.

“I’ll go clear a path, the rest of you just focus on running, try not to shoot if you can avoid it, the noise will draw a crowd.”  Before anyone could protest, I started at a dead run towards the middle of course, not worrying about how loud I was as I wanted them all to see me and move towards me.

Luck was on my side because as soon as I cleared the trees, the nearest dead caught sight of me and headed towards me at a dead run.  Changing direction, I angled towards them, sword out.  I didn’t stop to consider the massive stupidity of running dead out towards zombies, but hoped it all worked out anyway.

The first two finally came within swinging distance as I skidded to a stop, let my wrist go limp and swung the katana I’d pulled from my back with my right hand as loosely as possible, like I was fishing and turned my head away as the blood from the neck of the woman splattered my face as her head fell from her shoulders, still sort of hanging on by the spinal cord that hadn’t quite been severed.

Angling my body to the left, I jabbed the machete into the shoulder of the other one while crossing my still bloody katana across its neck, but I didn’t get the right angle and the zombie kept at me.  He was tall and fat, which was a terrible combination.  It’s a lot harder to cut through layers of fat than the skinny ones, so I kicked up and pulled my machete from his shoulder while my foot was planted firmly on his gut, giving me just enough momentum to pull the blade free and cause him to lose his balance.  I watched my blade being released from the fatty tissue as the mountain fell, and jabbed the blade through his eye socket before his belly had even stopped wobbling from the landing.

There were still 8 more and they were all heading towards us from various sides of the course.  I started towards 5 that were blocking my path, machete in my left hand and katana in the right.  The sounds of fighting behind me made me turn my head and I almost tripped watching Ty and Bash tag teaming a zombie I’d missed.  I was pretty sure the whole group would be fine taking down one zombie so I kept right on my sprint towards the crowd.

I took a deep breath and started swinging the moment I got close enough.  The weight of my backpack was working against me and I was having trouble swinging fast enough.  I was able to take down the first one, but I wasn’t fast enough and the other 4 were very close to overtaking me.  I started to panic and swing wildly, and felt teeth graze my sleeve as the head they were attached to was suddenly pulled back at an unnatural angle and the body dropped. 

I looked up to see Earl swipe a large hunting knife with a serrated blade deep into its neck and closed my eyes to avoid the blood splatter.  I smiled in thanks and he nodded in acknowledgment as we turned together and started slashing the other 3 for all we were worth.

When the last body hit the ground, I stepped over it, jogging to where the others were finishing off the last 2.  A quick head count told me we hadn’t had any casualties but we definitely didn’t have time to stop and discuss it so I turned back around and kept jogging towards the embankment.

There weren’t any zombies left in the area, but I couldn’t be sure what was on the road so I wanted to make sure I was the first there.  I knew it was crazy to go alone, but I was the only person we’d met who’d been bit and lived to tell the tale so I was the best person to be bait.  That didn’t mean I wasn’t quietly shitting my pants in terror, but I wasn’t about to tell everyone else that.

Running up the hill, I grabbed the cement divider and launched myself over.  My left foot didn’t clear the wall as I was expecting, catching the cement and causing me to fall into a roll onto the pavement.  I hit hard on my left shoulder and my head bounced off the ground hard enough to send vibrations down my spine.

“Son of a bitch,” I groaned, catching my breath while I waited for the world to stop spinning.

“Angie! Angie! Are you ok?!” Ty was out of breath as he leaped gracefully over the divider that had just taken me out and knelt down beside me. 

Pulling myself up, I sat up and prepared to stand.  “Yeah, I’m fine,” I grumbled, pushing his hand off my face.

“You’re bleeding,” He said, holding his hand up as proof.

I looked at the blood and put my own hand up to my forehead and groaned inwardly as I pulled my fingers back to see the fresh blood mixed with dirt coating them.  I wiped my hand on my pants and stood up, pushing Ty’s helping hands off me on the way up.

Everyone else had made it over the divider by that point and had pretty much figured out that I’d completely wiped out as the giggling and snickers surrounded me.

Without a word, I wiped the blood off my forehead and onto a nearby car and started north.  A host of laughter followed behind me.

“For as good of a fighter she is, she sure is clumsy,” Earl grumbled to someone.  I didn’t turn to see who he was talking to out of sheer embarrassment.

“You should’ve seen her before she became a mutant, this is an improvement.”

I turned wide-eyed to face Jack, who just stood there smirking.

“Did you seriously just call me a mutant?” I asked indignantly.

He tipped his hat to me and smiled. I looked at him another minute, and he winked.  I flipped him the bird and turned back around.  I wasn’t about to let him get me riled up when there was work to do.

Earl caught up with me and walked quietly beside me for a while.  “So where did you learn to swing a blade like that?” He asked in his slow drawl while spitting a wad of tobacco onto the pavement.

Still keeping my eyes alert for trouble, “I had nerdy friends awhile back.  We used to sword fight for fun.  I guess I got good at it or something.”

Earl’s big hand clapped my back, nearly causing me to stumble. “Good for you, young lady, glad to have you and your fighting skills around.” He chuckled deep in the back of his throat and I couldn’t be sure if he was being serious or making fun of me.

I wanted to ask, but thought it best to leave it alone.  We’d been walking for a couple of hours and the sun was making its way higher in the sky.  The air was murky and the pressure was dropping.  It was hot, but a group of angry looking clouds were off to the east and looked like they might cause trouble. 

I could still feel footsteps pounding through the ground as we walked and while I still couldn’t see anything, it felt louder which just made me nervous.  Earl still walked beside me and I could hear the quiet conversations behind me.  Ty and Bash ran up ahead of me with Roscoe, the 3 of them seemingly having a swell time climbing over abandoned cars and trucks.

I tried not to look into too many of the windows after seeing the first few decomposing corpses and made sure Johnny wasn’t looking every time Earl or I jammed a blade into a half-dead corpse inside one of the cars.  I turned around to study the kid periodically just to be sure he wasn’t about to start crying or something.

Brian had set him down and he was marching stoically next to his father, hand in hand.  His little face was twisted in a frown and the weight of the world stared out from his dark eyes.  I’d never seen a 6 year old look so serious but I guess we all looked a little more serious than usual these days.

He caught me looking at him and met my stare.  There was no fear in his eyes, no confusion.  It was like he understood exactly what was going on and was prepared to face it.  Fuck, I could only wish I was as calm and accepting of all of this as he obviously was.  I smiled at him and turned back around and kept walking.

Every so often, a stray zombie would cross our path as the road angled towards more populated areas, but there were a lot of us and they weren’t hard to take out.  I gnawed on a piece of beef jerky and kept an eye on the clouds rolling in, not sure if the rumbling in the distance was the horde still headed this way or thunder.

The kids had grown tired of running around and now we all walked silently.  It didn’t help our nerves that just glancing over the side and we could see enough dead ambling around to illicit concern.  We kept to the middle and out of sight, but it would only take one to see us to bring the rest.

Residential areas had given way to industry which I would’ve thought would thin out the crowds, but as we got closer to the airport, there only seemed to be more and more people.

I could see the airport at this point, but it was still about a mile off and I started to wonder how we would get through it to a plane.

Slowing until I was matching stride with Brian and Penny, “Hey so do you know anything about where they would keep the kind of plane we need?” I asked.

Brian looked thoughtful for a moment.  “I’ve never flown into this airport, but there should be a hanger off the runways with the smaller planes.”

My brows furrowed in question.  “Smaller?  Like a Cessna?  We all wouldn’t fit in that, would we?” I asked again, looking around the group.

He chuckled and rubbed the stubble on his cheek.  “Ah no, we wouldn’t all fit.  But there’s bound to be a private plane somewhere.”

“Like a jet?”

“Yeah, but the smaller ones, not the jumbo commercial kind you’re thinking of.”

Hmm. “Oh. Ok.”  I thought about that for a moment.  “Is that the kind you fly?”

He looked down at me, “I flew commercially for 10 years and fly the smaller stuff on the side.  Whatever we find that’s still serviceable, I’ll be able to handle just fine.” Brian smiled reassuringly down at me.  “You a nervous flyer?”

I nodded up at him, concern all over my face.  Penny moved around Brian and put her arms around my shoulders.  “Brian’s been flying since he was younger than Bash, we’re going to be fine.” She squeezed my shoulders as we kept walking.

I didn’t doubt their reassurance, and I was sure Brian was probably a great pilot, but being in the air wasn’t what I was afraid of; it was getting to a plane that had me worried.  Airports were crowded places under normal circumstances and while air travel had been restricted a week into the worst part of the outbreak, there was likely still a lot of people there and a lot of people meant a lot of dead people.  That and I’d never flown before but I didn’t see any point in bringing that up.  I had gotten so used to being in a constant state of terror since I’d left home that it was really just one more thing to freak out about.