Zomblog: The Final Entry (11 page)

“Trial two days ago for a pair of fellas that got a bit too rough with one of Madam Judy’s working girls. Judge found them guilty and sentenced them to hangin’.”

“You mean…?” I tried to ask, but couldn’t say the words.

“Can’t be wastin’ perfectly good meat these days, little Missy,” she croaked.

Okay. I probably come off a bit snooty with a statement like “she croaked.” So, I’ll leave it to you. Did you ever know a chain-smoker? I’m talking lighting the next one with the one still dangling from their lips.
That
kind of chain-smoker. Okay. So the chain-smoker’s voice would sound as smooth as Sinatra if compared to this waitress.

Still think I’m being a bitch?

Now, you’d think that’d been enough. You’d think that Eric would have taken my glare, raised eyebrows, and not so subtle tilt of my head towards the road out front that would take us away from this roadside circle of Dante’s
Inferno
.

Nope. The big dummy ordered the Snake Soup. Personally, I think he did it on purpose to screw with me.

Saturday, May 8

Her name is Tricia Maio (pronounced like mayo short for mayonnaise). She used to be a dancer. Judging by her body, I bet she made a fortune off of desperate, middle-aged men. Seriously, I’m very hetero, but she made my tummy tingle. Oh…and Eric? Not so much as a batted eyelash.

Anyways, we met Tricia at a ransacked old gas station sitting off the well-covered-by-sand highway. There was an intact off ramp that we decided was as good as any to search for the possibility of camping out for the night. Imagine our surprise when we peeked through the busted out front windows to discover a naked lady hanging her clothes over a small fire concealed behind the checkout counter.

She’d been in a nasty fight with a small pack of zombies earlier in the day. She’d washed the worst of the gore from her clothes in an old, yellow, plastic mop bucket that she’d found in a closet.

When I’d asked about the water, she told me that there was a small spring just out back that drains into a pond that has two large concrete pipes at the lowest end. She’s pretty certain that they lead to a nearby reservoir a few miles away.

I lent her some of my clothes so that she wouldn’t have to stand around naked in front of strangers. I’m not sure who I was trying to make feel better. Still, that led to the obvious question.

“Where the hell is the rest of your stuff?”

She said that a small herd of a couple hundred zombies caught her off guard. She was camped out in some random apartments. She had to leave her backpack and could only bring what she could carry in the pockets of her heavy field jacket. She escaped by climbing up on the roof—which couldn’t have been that easy considering that she had to use a piece of metal pipe to bust a hole through it when she climbed into the overhead crawl space. By getting most of the zombies down to one end, she was able to run to the other and jump.

She eluded most of them, but then ended up having to fend off a fair amount. Hence being such a mess and needing to clean up.

I asked her where she was heading. She said that some travelers heading south told her about a safe zone on Mount Hood. I filled her in on the details, including the situation regarding the Warm Springs Reservation. I also hinted where we were headed.

Tricia is coming from Utah and didn’t have any info about Nevada. I asked about Utah, mostly just curious to hear if it was as bad as every other place I’ve been. I never considered how a heavily religious region might react and respond to an event like this. She said that the zombies were almost less of a concern when compared to some of the zealot extremists. Oddly, the main body of the Mormons wasn’t a problem. It was the offshoots that continued to lurk in the shadows. It seems that there is a very male-centric core that view women as subjects, servants, and vessels to carry their offspring.

Some sort of Holy War erupted and a lot of people were killed by the lunatic fringe. I guess, right up to the end, the elders of the central body were condemning the extremists…all the way up to the point when an eighteen-wheeled car bomb was rolled into their main cathedral in downtown Salt Lake City.

Sunday, May 9

Tricia was gone when we woke.

My clothes were neatly folded and sitting on the counter. I think she did Eric last night when I was sleeping. He seems to be in a strangely cheerful mood.

Whatever.

Monday, May 10

We should be reaching Burns, Oregon soon. Eric says that we might be able to replenish supplies there. The population was scarce and spread out. There really wasn’t that much to Burns before. At least that’s what Eric says.

Eric explains that we need to be on guard. Burns being so rural, there is a high probability that some of the yokels may have survived. Towns like Burns had a heavy gun-to-person ratio. I remember the carnage on the streets of some of the small towns we’ve been through.

We haven’t seen a zombie all day. And in some respects, that actually seems kinda creepy. A lack of undead can mean a lot of things. Not all of them are good.

Tuesday, May 11

At the best of times, children were something I was always thankful for NOT having to deal with. I mean, it was always nice to visit friends or family with rugrats of their own…and leave when they got tiresome. (My personal best being about two hours.) If they cried and wouldn’t stop…hand them to mommy. Dirty diaper?…point, hold my nose, and leave the room. See? Simple.

And yeah, I’m aware I’ve given birth to a child. However, I knew myself well enough to know it was a bad match. I am not a good candidate for parenthood. I am saying all this so that I can also clarify that I’ve never wished harm on children. (Also, in case you are wondering, yes, I do still think about my daughter. I still feel like I made the right choice of parents. I gave her to a good couple, and The Warehouse is probably the safest place I know.)

So why am I blathering on about all this? Well, it has been a rough day. We were moving along, Sam trotting ahead marking every shrub, clump of grass, or abandoned vehicle we passed. Then we heard
the
scream. It was coming from beyond a ridge off to our right.

Needless to say, we ran to find out what the hell was going on. We had to keep Sam back. Eric held him by the scruff of his neck while I moved ahead to check out the situation. You might criticize us for taking too long to respond to an obvious emergency, but rushing blindly into anything these days will just get everybody killed.

I was in no way prepared for what I saw.

Five girls—ages fifteen to (maybe) twenty—were up on an abandoned RV. It was that kind that isn’t much bigger than a pick-up truck. Dangling from the rear was a man. Naked. About a dozen creepers were flailing and squirming, trying their best to get ahold of the man. I could see that one of his arms was dripping blood. It was obvious that he’d been snacked on already.

As for the girls, the taunts and jeers coming from their mouths were…heinous comes to mind. They were actually laughing while they jerked on the ropes that they had tied to each of the man’s ankles. The curious and bizarre thing about the scene was that the girls were each wearing nothing more than their bra and panties.

I slipped back down the hill and relayed things to Eric. He seemed to puzzle over it for a minute, and then said, “Not our problem.”

I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. As I argued my point, I heard another scream. This one was much longer and louder than the first. It ended in a sudden and liquid-sounding yelp. Then…there was the distinct cacophony of rabid cheering.

Eric seemed to be much more concerned about leaving. Since I really had no idea what was happening, it was very difficult for me to agree to leave. However, I was still self-conscious about the trouble I’d gotten us into a few days ago by nosing around. Therefore…against my character, I agreed without an argument.

We were almost to the road when we heard a voice. A girl was calling for us to wait up. When I turned around, I was only mildly surprised to see a girl in her bra and panties running after us. She looked even more surprised at
me
when I turned to face her. I guess with all the gear on—leathers, boots, gloves, and a baseball cap pulled low over my eyes—I could be mistaken for a guy.

The story—as they told it—is that these girls are escapees from some compound in the area. They’ve been at ‘war’ with the men of this compound for about five weeks. They use one of their own as bait. Apparently the men are stupid enough to keep falling for it. She didn’t even hide her glare at Eric as she talked.

I didn’t feel like spending my day talking to this girl, but I needed to ask: What’s the situation in Burns? She looked at me like I’d just fallen off the moon.

“Walled up, locked down and they don’t allow in strangers.”

She elaborated by saying that if you weren’t born in, or a resident of, Burns for a year or more
before
the dead started walking, you received the same mercy that they showed the zombies…none. They keep mounted patrols,
most
of which give you a warning that you aren’t welcome before they open fire.

The “wall” that they’ve built encloses about three times the area that was formerly known as Burns, Oregon. They are most protective of the river just south of town, and have towers that allow their watches to see for a few miles in every direction. They mostly worry about zombies and don’t seem to mind folks filling water containers as long as they are downstream.

We’re about two days or so from Burns. There will be a small airfield when we come out of the pass that opens up on the farmland community surrounding this city-fortress. We are supposed to keep heading south along SR-205…a highway that will take us to a big lake. From there, we can head east again until we hook up with OR-78/Steens Highway. Eventually, that will dump us onto US-95, which will take us to Nevada.

I realize that we had to wait to cross the Mount Hood section of our journey because, as it was, the weather made for a tough trip. I think that crossing Nevada during the summer may actually be worse. Finding a car wouldn’t be tough. Finding one that would work—one that the gasoline hasn’t gone bad—would be practically impossible. What we need are bicycles. Good ones.

Even if we have to push the bikes for parts of the trip when we hit hills, we would move so much quicker when we rode over long stretches of the flat desert terrain ahead. If we don’t find bikes, we may not survive the summer. It’s almost funny; the walking dead are less of a concern than Mother Nature.

Eric was a good boy and didn’t let it slip as to where we are headed. However, I think that the girl had inkling. After all, she not only told us how to get around Burns, she also told us when and where to get back on the highway headed south to Vegas.

Once our little chat ended, she turned on her heel and strutted off. For somebody so young, she was awfully comfortable with her body. At that age, I didn’t let my boyfriend slip his hand under my shirt if the light was on. I guess we are reverting to our more raw natures…the way we were before society had its way with our moral compass.

I think it is different in many ways this time, though. Women who have survived this long are probably a strong bunch. We won’t be second-class citizens this time. And, judging by those girls we left behind today, men had better watch themselves.

It’s definitely a New World Order.

Wednesday, May 12

Rain.

No…wait…scratch that. The skies have opened up in a waterfall-like torrent. There is not one single part of me that is dry. We are sitting in this abandoned car to avoid the worst of it. Well, at least as best we can. I say that because one of the windows on the passenger side of the car is gone and most of the rubber seals on the rest have froze and melted so many times, to the point that there is no watertight integrity here. Water pours in from every seam, crease, and crack. Still, this is better than being outside.

I’m sitting in the middle of the front seat, Eric is in the back. Sam is curled up beside me. He was shivering in that way doggies do when they are cold and wet. I have him wrapped up in one of my sweatshirts. Now he only shivers in little fits every few minutes.

We have all our empty containers outside collecting water. That is one true blessing from all this. I’ve watched three lone shamblers and one mini-herd of twenty or so go past. I got a little worried about the herd, but they were in the other lane and never even made a move our direction. All of them were headed
away
from Burns.

During the brief conversation I managed to coax from Eric today, I laid out my plan for a bicycle. He nodded and asked me why I waited so long to make that call. I gave it some thought…then told him to shut up.

Okay, Meredith…why
did
you wait so long?

Thursday, May 13

The road is probably not going to be here much longer. We’ve passed entire sections that are buried or washed away. It keeps getting worse.

We came out into this large opening, a valley that cuts between the hills on either side of the highway. The remnants of large, circular farm plots can still be seen.

Then there is this charred husk of a fighter jet that is jutting from deep in the fields on the south. I wanted to go check it out, but once again Eric was against it. Sam sorta backed Eric in a way. He kept sniffing towards the chest-high growth that has laid claim to the area and growling with real purpose. It could’ve been the wind…or not…but there was a lot of rustling in the grass or whatever it is that makes up that mini-jungle along the southern border of the highway.

Tonight we are camped on a rocky outcropping that looks down into the valley. As the sun sets, the bowl fills with shadows which quickly become an inky blackness. Sure enough, every once in a while Sam’s ears will perk up. Sometimes, I think I can hear them, too. Just as the citizens of Burns have staked their claim, so too have the undead…in this valley.