Zomblog (32 page)

They were betting!

The third and final runner, a girl of no more than twelve, decided to take her fate into her own hands. By now, the others had joined me at the window and were involved in an argument about trying to rescue the doomed. That’s what they were. The young girl scrambled up onto the rail of the dull pink bridge and leaped. While the height was not too dreadful, her landing was. We watched and waited. Finally, we spotted her, face down, drifting away with the current of the Columbia.

Still, it is what happened next that has us stationed so that we can watch all approaches. It is what we all saw and none dispute the danger which is why we made a few trips to the vehicles to retrieve large amounts of ammo, grenades, and two of our tripod-mounted .50 cals.

The men looked seemingly right at us…then…they waved.

This is no way to spend my birthday. The big 3-0. Not exactly living up to the dreams and expectations I had when I was growing up.

Although, if I wanted, I could be part of the ruling clan of The Dalles, Oregon. It is unlikely that we would receive any resistance if we declared ourselves as such after today’s events.

It seems that the men we saw yesterday were the largest group in this town. By best guess, they numbered about fifty. I will hazard a guess and say that they saw us at some point and only saw a handful of women and girls. I guess they didn’t see the firepower.

They came at us around noon today. In pick-up trucks and flatbeds they came storming across the bridge. We let them get across before we opened up. Snoe and Brittany started things off with a quick volley of grenades that did most of our work for us. Then, from the roof, Caren and I opened with the .50 cals.

It was actually quite anti-climatic. I’m sure that these redneck buffoons felt they had easy prey waiting. Snoe actually dragged a badly wounded survivor out of the wreckage. She’s been down in the baggage claim terminal “questioning” her captive for a few hours now. Every so often the screams are loud enough that we can hear them.

Outside, things have been quiet. The zombies came in like crows after carrion to finish off anybody who may have still been technically alive after the brief engagement. Then, they wandered off. Some our way, others back across the bridge and into town.

There has been not so much as a single gunshot from outside since ours echoed in the cool fall air. Perhaps the survivors are waiting for something from us after the vulgar display of firepower we put on.

All day yesterday, Snoe would come up and give us a briefing of news she managed to extract from her prisoner. Early this morning, she determined that there was no more information to be had. She apparently dragged the man outside and drove him to the bridge and shoved him out of the Hum-Vee. I guess the guy could only crawl from what Cera told me when I woke up. He barely made it ten feet.

My hunches about these guys being the “evil overlords” of the area were correct. It also seems that they have a stronghold in some hotel in town. Most of their entertainment comes in the form of women and girls they’ve snatched up either from passers-by, or other local clusters of survivors.

All but a handful of the gang were involved in yesterday’s attempt to storm our little location. Snoe, Caren, and Cera are now on a recon mission. It seems we’ll be liberating whoever is left before we continue our journey. We are on radio silence until midnight when they will check in and decide if this is doable.

If we get the word, all of us are to pile into the Hum-Vee. Since Snoe has already driven the Bradley over and hidden it someplace, we will be directed to a pick-up site. From there…well. I’m sure Snoe will tell us what to do.

I don’t really know exactly what that guy said, but she has taken this mission a bit personal. She’s not acting reckless, but she is definitely not acting normal right now. I will keep an eye on her, but of course, at this moment, she is out there. Among the living dead and the deadly living.

Nothing went right. Snoe radioed us early yesterday morning. We did just as she’d instructed: We piled into the Hum-Vee and drove up to someplace called Kelly Viewpoint. She gave great directions. The problems started when somebody went on the offensive…against us!

Gunfire from seemingly every direction came from the darkness. Instinctively, I swerved and ended up slamming through the front of what had to be an absolutely gorgeous house before all this madness began. We had to abandon the vehicle then and there. Without night-vision goggles, it was a chilling sight to see hundreds of those damn things coming for us. You could hear their ghastly moans and the occasional baby cry (which still chills my blood) from every direction.

With zombies coming
en masse
and fearing that whoever had opened fire on us was waiting to gun us down, we had to rely on hand-to-hand weaponry so we couldn’t be tracked by our gunfire. Of course if they (whoever
they
were) had night-vision, we’d be screwed. It seems they either didn’t, or, took off after we crashed.

In the confusion, we all got separated. I ended up on the roof of a video store. One-by-one, as each of us reached relative safety, we had to get Snoe to come for us. Unfortunately, Dominique didn’t have a radio; Penelope’s broke, likely during the crash.

It took all day, seeking out places where zombies were congregating. We did find some survivors of the City of The Dalles holed up in the city jail, but we were waved off. I guess they were fine with their situation. So, late yesterday afternoon as we were on the verge of giving up, Dominique came running out of a ranch-style house.

Just before sunset, we found Penelope. Her entire left arm had been ripped away. Even worse, something had fed on the right side of her face. Most of the cheek as well as the right eye were blood-crusted, gaping holes.

We keep getting a static heavy message. All we can tell for sure is that it is a girl’s voice. She is in Hood River, Oregon. The part that doesn’t make sense is that she says she is “on the Broken Bridge”. We have a couple of AAA maps and an atlas. We can’t find any reference to Broken Bridge, or, if we are getting the message wrong, Broken Ridge.

We’ve looked for anything that rhymes and have nothing. She sounds a bit frantic at times. Other times, she sounds almost bored. Her message repeats every hour at the top, give or take a few minutes.

Hood River is about half the size of The Dalles. We will drive through slowly to see if anybody tries to get our attention. Of course we have considered the possibility that it is a trick.

That is why we won’t be taking any of the exits unless somebody actually tries to contact us.

Her name is Jenifer. She is fifteen. I believe she and Dominique are going to be good friends. In fact, it was Dominique who spotted her.

There is a bridge across the Columbia River to a town called White Salmon. The center span of the bridge rises to allow river traffic. Jenifer was stuck on the raised span. We don’t have all of her story yet. Here is what we do know…

A few months ago, Jenifer gave up hiding in her home. She had raided every neighbor’s house to stay fed. (We asked about her family but she immediately stops talking when we try). Deciding to try and find the person who’s blog she had been reading until power failed (Sam would have been proud) she went first to the Albertson’s that he used in his initial foray. Sure enough, the groceries he left stacked were there.

She stayed a few days and came up with her plan. From the roof, she scanned for a pick-up truck. She saw one parked in a nearby apartment complex. There were plenty of zombies wandering, but, again remembering the blog, she came up with an idea. One street over was an abandoned police car. Hoping for the best, she tried the handle, it was open! She found the switch that activated the lights and siren. Still plenty of battery because the darkness and silence were shattered. Running along a fence, Jenifer stayed out of sight as she made her way to the truck. The parking lot was painted with apartment numbers. Going on blind faith, she went to the corresponding building and found the door with the matching number. With nothing more than a sharpened axe handle, she stormed into the residence which was occupied with an entire zombified family. She lured them out into the stair- well. They fell over each other trying to get at her, and of course a few stragglers came to investigate. Somehow, she got back upstairs and into the now empty apartment.

It took a few hours, but eventually, she found the keys. From one of the bedroom windows, she could see—and hear—the police car. By now, there were hundreds of those things surrounding her decoy. Even the few who had joined the evicted zombie family in pursuit of her seemed to have wandered off. She snuck out, jumped in the truck, adjusted the seat and started it up. The engine was relatively quiet and she slipped out and circled around back to the store. Climbing up and in, she managed to supply up. It took her the whole night and the next. By then, of course, the squad car had died. Deciding she could do with what she’d acquired, she headed out, following signs that led to I-84. Having never driven before, she drove very slow and still wrecked a few times.

Only driving at night, and staying on the main roads, she leapfrogged from place to place. Her main goal was to head east. She won’t say what—or more likely who—she was looking for.

At some point, she joined up with a small band of survivors headed the same way. It was while they were camping near Multnomah Falls—a journey that takes about an hour took six weeks or so—that a band of raiders arrived. Fortunately for Jenifer, she had been down by the water cleaning her clothes. She won’t say what she saw, only that the living people had done worse than what she had seen the zombies do.

From that point on, she’s been alone and on foot. About a week ago, she was out searching for food and saw a Pepsi truck up on the raised span of the Hood River Bridge. The climb up had been easy.

She picked up our radios in The Dalles and heard a lot of what happened. Hearing only female voices, she risked using her radio to call for help.

I have to say that for fifteen—today is actually her birthday—she is very pragmatic. I don’t know what she’s seen, but, like Dominique, for such a young girl to have braved this, seemingly alone for the most part, is amazing.

Of course she and Dominique are now fused, mouth-to-ear. They whisper and giggle. It is a strange sound in these extreme times. Pretty soon we’ll be wearing jammies, doing each other’s nails, and listening to Justin Timberlake...or whoever.

I wonder...

Today, Jenifer led us to her last hideout. I find it remarkable that somebody so young showed such an aptitude for survivalist skills. Today, we are at the Bonneville Dam. One of this place’s tourist draws are windows that you could look into the river and see the oft times gigantic steelhead swim past. In effect, this is a concrete bunker, easily defendable, with enough room for us all to stretch out.

Looking at the fish was therapeutic. That is until a few of those damned corpses wandered up. Well, wandered isn’t accurate. Drifted would be better. One of them actually wedged into a space between some big rocks and is now pawing at the thick glass panel.

Is it possible to look more dead?

Tomorrow we hope to make Multnomah Falls. That should be the last break we get before hitting the Portland Metro area. From there, I guess we’ll see if this was such a good idea.

Another garbled radio message today. This time it was Snoe and Tara that heard it. Snoe was a few miles ahead scouting a good place to hole up for the day when she heard it. Tara was up top in the front gun-turret of the RV.

Again, the words “Las Vegas” were very distinctly heard. Jenifer says that before her group completely abandoned the Portland area, they heard similar broadcasts. Nobody wanted to undertake such a journey. Even using back roads, which pose the problem of road conditions, it seemed like a pointless journey. After all, what could there be in Las Vegas worth a trip so dangerous?

This afternoon, we are atop the cliffs of Larch Mountain, camped beside where the river falls 620 feet to the plunge pool below. Even now, the beauty is breathtaking. The burned out husk of the Multnomah Falls Visitor Center is the only remaining scar of humanity. There used to be a bridge that folks could cross in front of the falls and take pictures. I have no idea where it is, but it is very much gone. The most likely thing seems to be that somebody, or a group, blew this place up. Perhaps they climbed to the top and destroyed everything behind them. There is a lot of forest to vanish into. That is a tempting option for some. Maybe the day will come when I’ll wish I’d done the same...or...never left Irony.

It may take days or even weeks to get into Portland proper. Here, on the outskirts, in Gresham, it is a nightmare of chaos. There are definitely survivors, and it is clearly every man or woman for themselves. We are no longer able to use I-84 as it is a jumble of wrecked, burned-out, and abandoned vehicles.

We are in a rundown area and have managed to secure what used to be a huge warehouse. There are dilapidated houses around, most are missing doors and/or windows. We hear gunfire from every direction, and in the distance almost constantly. There are also the periodic screams. Jenifer usually stops whatever she’s doing at the time and seemingly ritualistically states “they got another one.” She then returns to her interrupted task like nothing out of the ordinary has happened.