Zombie Rules (Book 3): ZFINITY

By David Achord

This book is a work of fiction. Names and characters are fictitious, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

© 2014 David Achord. All rights reserved.

Hello journal. It’s the end of another year and we’re still alive. We’ve been busy for most of the month and I’ve been a little lax in making prompt entries, but I vow to do better. Julie finally finished reading what I have written so far and she said it was good, but a bit perfunctory. I know, it’s a big four-syllable word. She’s sounding more and more like Zach every day (God help us). Anyway, I’ll try to personalize my entries more.

First: we just finished a huge job. Terry called it Operation Bell Road, and we did it on Christmas Eve. Terry had located a large horde of those nasty stinking bastards walking along Bell Road. They had massed together and were slowly making their way toward our homes. We, as in Zach, said we couldn’t ignore them. A group meeting was held and we decided that we needed to kill them off in order for us to live in this area in relative safety.

I must admit, I was a little scared that day when we drove up to them. The sight of so many of them, massed together, was unnerving. They didn’t hesitate when they spotted us and somehow seemed to pick up momentum as they headed toward us. We fired on them for hours. There were times I was certain we’d be overwhelmed and killed, but we prevailed.

Zach, in his usual manner, kept a running number in his head the entire time we were killing them, and it took over twelve hours to kill them all. The final body count was a little over two thousand. When the last zombie’s head exploded in a hail of gunfire, I think everyone’s euphoria only lasted a couple of minutes, and then fatigue set in. I had a hard time keeping my eyes open on the way home, until Terry said all of the weapons needed to be cleaned before bed. Then Zach informed us we were going to have to burn all of the corpses. Thank God, Julie convinced him to wait at least until after Christmas.

We did it though. We used bull dozers to stack them up into piles (Zach called them pyres), threw on some fuel, scraps, old tires, whatever was flammable, and lit them up. It was every bit as hard as killing them, but we did it. The only person who actually grumbled about it was Wanda, but that’s the norm for her. She’s a sour old woman.

Okay, here is where we stand so far this winter -

Food: our supplies have been good. We still have plenty of stores, and our greenhouses are producing nicely, including a really nice batch of weed (much to Zach’s chagrin). The livestock are enduring the winter with no major issues. In addition, Fred and the boys have taken a strong liking to fishing. We’ve had lots of fish fries (more than I care for).

Living conditions: Terry and I are living with Zach and Julie. Kelly has been living with us too. The rest of the women from Birmingham are living in the house at the radio tower. Tommy and Joe have been living with Fred, and of course, Rowdy has been living in his tour bus, which is parked out beside the old homestead.

New arrivals: occasionally, people will show up at the radio tower. They’ll stay for a day or two and then move on, believing in their soul that they know of some place they are sure a modern civilization still exists. Funny, none of them name the same place or city where this supposed Sanctuary is located. We listen silently to them as they weave this magical tale and try to talk us into going with them. We’ve given up trying to convince these people differently. Fred said that once they get it in their head, there’s nothing you can do to convince them differently. We give them some food, maybe some fuel if we have enough to spare, and watch them drive away as we wave halfheartedly.

Everyone is healthy and doing okay. No illnesses or major injuries to report.

The boys, Tommy and Joe, are inseparable. I bet they even take a crap at the same time. It’s amazing how much they’ve grown in so short a time.

Tomorrow, we’re going to go on another zombie hunt. This one is different though. We’re going to kill a bunch of little kids who’ve been trapped in a school. I’m not looking forward to it, but as Zach says, it has to be done. I’ll write more about it later – Andie.

In retrospect, the music was a mistake.

It was an elementary school, directly across from the radio tower. There was nothing fancy about it, a simple brick and mortar, built in the style of most public schools in the last few decades. I liked the design. The windows were smaller than those large stained glass windows at the church, and all of the entry doors were steel with heavy locks.

We’d conducted a brief recon on it a couple of months ago. I parked in front, honked the horn a couple of times, and waited. Almost immediately, little ghoulish faces pressed themselves against the windows, staring out, their rotted faces contorted in a primeval rage. Julie and I sat in the comfort and security of the truck, listening to a Marvin Gaye CD, while watching the little kids trying to claw their way through the windows.

We had recently finished a massive operation along Bell Road in which we killed off somewhere around two thousand of the things. They covered the full spectrum of age, race, and gender, including kids. Somehow, it seemed different now. This was a group of little kids, none of them over ten. It was hard to imagine them as mindless killing machines.

Looking through the windows at the faces of all of those children was both sad and unnerving. We had been avoiding this issue, along with all of the other elementary schools in the area, but after a family discussion over lunch one day, we came to a decision. Our survival plan dictated that we could not ignore the issue any longer, so the decision was made to take care of them.

Now, we were back. The rest of the gang was with us, and our plan of action was to clear the school, which was an ambiguous way of saying we were going to kill all of the little zombie bastards trapped inside.

The plan was simple. Park the truck in front and use it as a firing platform, open the front doors, and play loud music to entice them to come outside. When the kids filtered out, looking for a tasty human morsel, we’d give each one an after school headshot special.

Rowdy’s expression was pensive. “Man, I’ve killed my share of zombies, but killing all of those little kids…” he left the sentence unfinished.

Fred gave me a look. He and I had previously discussed the issue and knew how emotionally difficult it was going to be. Shooting preteen children, even if they were now nothing more than little monsters, was going to be difficult. I took Fred’s cue.

“Listen up,” I said, “Fred and I will be the only ones who are going to be doing the shooting. We only want you to join in if we get overwhelmed with targets.”

It sounded good, calling them targets. Everyone nodded silently, gratefully. I think they had the same sentiments as Rowdy, nobody wanted to kill a child.

Terry and Andie got busy drilling open the locks to the main entry doors and made quick work. They used their weight to hold the doors closed until I gave the signal. Terry nodded and the two of them ran to the back of the truck. Julie turned the volume up on the car stereo, and the CD began playing a song about sexual healing. The children came pouring out.

As I shot target after target, I knew from then on that my dreams were going to be filled with images of little heads exploding in a spray of putrid black ooze, while Marvin Gaye’s beautiful voice sang in the background.

Yep, the music was a mistake.

Nevertheless, I did not hesitate when the first one came shambling out of the school. He was a fair haired boy dressed in khaki slacks and a dark blue polo shirt. Hell, all of the little boys were. The little girls were wearing the same type pants, but with light blue shirts. Most had colorful ribbons in their hair. I had no doubt it was the kind of school parents were proud to send their kids to. I thought of how it used to be. The soccer moms would be lined up in the parking lot waiting for school to let out for the day. The final bell drowned out by the squeals of joy and laughter.

A couple of dozen exited the school. They moved slow and awkward, the freezing temperature assured it, yet, they still moved with a purpose. Some of them even tried to flank around us.

I would claim that after shooting the first two or three of the little tykes it became easy, but I’d be lying. Each time I fired, my stomach knotted up a little more. There were several minutes of silence after the last one dropped. Fred and I reloaded quietly.

“Do you think that’s all of them?” Terry asked as he peered inside.

“Hell, I hope so,” Rowdy muttered. He looked like he needed a drink.

“We’ve got to go inside and clear out any that are left,” I commented and gave my friends a look. “I think Fred and I ought to be the ones to do it. The two of us can have group therapy with the docs later,” I said with a halfhearted chuckle. Nobody else thought it was funny. “We’ll keep in radio contact and give SITREPS every two minutes.”

“How’d it go?” Andie asked when Fred and I emerged an hour later.

“There’s about twenty more inside,” I said. “Mostly kids, a few women. I assume they were teachers,” I didn’t describe how the teachers had dozens of little bites all over their exposed skin. They’d see for themselves soon enough.

Big Mac walked up and handed us each a steaming cup of tea. “It’ll calm your nerves,” she said quietly. We nodded our thanks.

“How much cleanup do you reckon it’ll need before anyone can live in there?” she asked.

“The corpses will be the easy part,” I replied with a grimace. “There is a lot of water damage inside from busted pipes, and it looks like the sewer has backed up at some point.”

Mac nodded thoughtfully. “If you men want to take a rest break, I’m going to pile these up and get a fire going.”

Without waiting for an answer, she put some work gloves on and began dragging a couple of the small corpses to the side of the parking lot. We all glanced at each other. It was contrary to our nature to sit, doing nothing, while someone else was working. All of us grabbed a corpse and followed Mac. It didn’t take long to get them all piled up and Mac got the fires going in no time.

“I don’t think I’ll ever get used to this part,” she said, as the bodies became engulfed in flames. I understood. After killing all of the zombies along Bell Road, we had spent two very long days piling up the corpses into pyres and burning them. It was miserable, dirty, disgusting work.

The pyres were hot, but nobody was inclined to stand near the little corpses and warm themselves. We watched silently, but our thoughts were interrupted by the sound of two quick gunshots coming from the nearby ballpark. We took off at a run.

“We got one!” Tommy exclaimed excitedly as we ran up. He pointed to the body lying on the ground. It was an adult male. Definitely infected, but there were slight differences in his appearance. A lot of the decomposition was either gone or replaced with badly scarred tissue.

Julie ran over to her brother and inspected him closely for any injuries. “Did it attack you?” she asked. Tommy shook his head while Julie continued looking him over. He finally shrugged her off with a scoff.

“Give us a report, young soldier,” Terry ordered. I hid a smile. Lately, Terry had taken it upon himself to train Tommy and Joe in soldiering skills. The two of them loved it, but Terry’s current order seemed to confuse Tommy somewhat. Joe jumped in.

“Tommy and I were scouting the area,” he explained, “and we spotted this one crouched down beside the dumpster. He was spying on y’all.”

Terry fixed him with a stare. “Alright you two, be very specific and don’t exaggerate. Explain what you mean by
spying
on us.”

“He was hiding from y’all behind the dumpster and peeking out from time to time,” Joe said. “He was definitely watching what y’all were doing.”

“Are you two positive?” Terry asked. Both Tommy and Joe nodded.

“Affirmative,” Tommy said as an afterthought. Terry glanced over at Fred and me.

“How long did you two watch him?” I asked.

“About ten minutes,” Joe replied. “We kept waiting for him to do something, but he didn’t, he just crouched there, watching y’all.”

“So, what happened then?” Terry pressed.

“Well, we kind of got tired of watching him, so Tommy called him a turd face,” Joe said. “He turned around then and came at us. We capped his ass.”

Everyone chuckled. Well, everyone except Fred.

“I believe we have another indicator that Z14 is in effect,” he said somberly. I nodded in agreement.

Z14. It was my last zombie rule – They Are Evolving.

When the plague went viral, a little over two years ago now, it sickened and killed millions of people, perhaps even billions, but not everyone who became infected died. A sizeable number of them became – something else. They went crazy and turned violent, attacking and eating anything living. I was convinced they would all die off eventually. After all, a decomposing body isn’t going to live very long, right?

I was somewhat correct. A lot of them did in fact die, but not all. The ones that didn’t die started changing, evolving. At least a portion of their brain functions were starting to work again and their cells were beginning to regenerate. Oh, they still couldn’t add two and two, but they were beginning to display at least a small amount of awareness and a cognitive thought process. This one lying at our feet was a good example.

It was a man, he could have been twenty, or he could have been fifty, Short in stature but large framed, perhaps muscular at one time, and wearing working man’s clothes. I noted the brown calf, high, lace up boots. They were heavily scuffed, but otherwise still in good shape. There was a lot of missing tissue from around his face and exposed hands, but otherwise, he did not look like he was going to fall down dead anytime soon, at least not until somebody put a bullet into his brain pan.

“So, somehow he knew he was outnumbered and made the decision to sit here and hide. He was probably waiting on a target of opportunity,” I opined.

“If that’s true, we’re going to have to change some of our military doctrines.” Terry said.

He made a good point. I looked at Fred and Mac, who nodded in agreement. I rubbed my face.

“It’ll be a good topic of discussion over supper.”