Zomblog Saga Box Set (Books 1-6) (32 page)

I don’t think we can risk staying here much longer.  While the undead remain oblivious to our presence, I’ve noticed small “squads” of survivors poking around.  They are usually in groups of three, and are obviously looking for something…more likely someone…err…ones.

I don’t think Dominique or Jenifer have noticed. These squads are good at staying in the shadows and out of sight.  Also, I’ve noticed they move shortly after I hear gunfire from farther away.  To me, that indicates coordinated movement.  That would likely mean radio communication.  That leads me to wonder if they were listening in on us.

Oh well.  Can’t be helped now.

I want to take this time to make one thing clear.  I don’t regret leaving Irony.  That place was an illusion of living.  We were just as much prisoners as Sam was back in that old compound he came from. We just replaced fences with cliffs.

Sure, things went bad, but we at least tried.  We went out to see what is left.  I will continue to fight until the end.  And I will do it out in the world where I am truly free.  Just in the little time we were out here, I have some amazing memories.  And, you simply can’t put into words how peaceful and beautiful the sunrise is when you witness it and realize you may be the only human being for tens or even hundreds of miles in any direction doing so.

We found Snoe!

We found Snoe yesterday and have been trying our best to keep her alive.  I don’t know how she avoided being bitten in her state.  She’s been shot up pretty bad.  It doesn’t help that she’s been crawling on her belly for the past week.  Her arms and legs are scraped raw.

We have washed her down, but to do that, we’ve had to sneak out a few times to nearby houses and rummage for alcohol, hydrogen peroxide, and iodine…as well as rags that weren’t moldy.  That has been quite a task since the only weapon we’ve been able to scrounge up is a pitching wedge.

Naturally, Snoe still had a Beretta 9mm and a magazine with three rounds.  Of course we don’t dare use it for fear of bringing attention.

She is upstairs now.  Sleeping.  I don’t know if she’ll make it.  She has no idea where she is and who we are.

If it weren’t for Dominique, it is likely we would have never seen Snoe. Yesterday morning, Dominique and Jenifer were going window-to-window, looking for a house that would be the easiest to raid. Since the ones on either side of us have been gutted, doors kicked in, windows broken, we decided not to even bother.

All of a sudden Dominique starts hissing to get our attention. In the side yard of the house across the street we could see somebody dragging themselves under some bushes. Apparently Dominique had seen the then stranger plunge a big knife into the temple of a zombie that had wandered over and lunged down for what it probably figured—if zombies figure—was an easy meal.

I was skeptical. My guess was that whoever it was, they’d likely been bitten. So, we waited to see if a zombie emerged from the bushes. After the afternoon passed, we saw whoever it was—we couldn’t tell it was Snoe yet—move out to allow the rain to come down into their open mouth.

Of course now we were sure it was a living person who was hurt and in need of help. When we snuck over just after dark, I was stunned to find Snoe, bloody, bruised, and unconscious. We were able to tweeze out most of the pellets from a shotgun blast that shredded her left leg. Another wound was clean through right under the collarbone. Then there was the bullet hole without an exit wound just under the rib cage. I poked around and found the bullet was relatively close to the surface. When I dug it out, she sat bolt upright for a second.  Good thing we had her gagged because I’m sure that scream would’ve been loud.

I don’t know enough to tell if there is serious infection.  I am comforted in the fact that there was a piece of cloth coating the bullet.  I know enough from Discovery Channel to know that a fragment of cloth like that could have been bad if it was still in the wound.

All we can do now is wait.  Wait.  Hope.  Pray.

Snoe isn’t seeming to improve.  We have made sure to get her awake enough to drink some water.  Jenifer found some instant oatmeal and we’ve managed to get some of that in her also.  Still, she’s just not doing well at all.

To make matters worse, something has the undead stirred up.  We’re seeing more activity than normal, and in larger clusters.  I watched a pack of them claw their way into a house that is kitty-corner to us.  The place is unoccupied, but for some reason, the walking meat-sacks decided to fixate on the place.  If that happens here, we are screwed.

We have to abandon this place for a more fortified location.  Tonight, I will slip out and try to find a vehicle.  That will be the easiest part of this whole thing.  If I do find one, can get it started, then get back here…we’ll have to load Snoe into it.  Likely we’ll have no shortage of zombies trying to take a bite out of us.  Then, there are the survivors in the area.

And me with only two grenades left.

We are now hiding out in one of those multiplex movie houses.  One really good thing about this place is that, except for the several glass doors at the entrance, this place is impenetrable.  At least by the dead.

I managed to find a school bus about three blocks away.  It makes me feel just a bit of satisfaction to know it belonged to the survivors holed up in that hospital.  When I found it, there were two guys inside.  I guess they were keeping guard.  One of them had a radio.

Anyways, when I spotted the bus, I didn’t figure I could do anything since all I have is a pitching wedge and a pair of grenades.  But, as luck would have it, the one with the radio came out while I was watching from behind a nearby car.  I heard him tell the guy inside that he was gonna clear the handful of zombies that had just begun to cluster around them.  That was when I noticed over twenty bodies littering the ground around the bus.  It was easy to figure that they’d been parked at that spot for a while.

Taking time to be as quiet as possible, I crept up on the guy as he was jabbing a long, slender iron spike into the temple of the last zombie.  Knowing I’d only get this one chance, I brought the wedge down on the back of this guy’s head as hard as I could.

In the movies, folks usually drop when such a shot is delivered.  I had to swing twice more and then dive for cover as the other guy in the bus came to a nearby window and began shooting at me.  I rolled under the bus figuring that I’d totally blown my chance.  That was when I saw the butt of a pistol jutting from the belt of the guy I’d brained.  Good thing he landed on his side or I’d have missed it.

I snatched the gun as the engine to the bus turned over.  As fast as I could, I rolled out the side opposite the driver and scurried up to the door.  The guy was looking away from me and never saw the bullet that blasted through the glass and caught him in the throat.

I forced the accordion-like doors open and stepped up as the guy fell almost right at me.  His foot came off the clutch and the bus lurched forward and stalled.  Unfortunately, I was only half in and got thrown across the concrete.

By now, I can hear the radio on the one guy squawking.  That actually helped my cause as the few zombies that had arrived went for him.  Lucky for him he never woke up as they began tearing into his body with their filthy hands.  I staggered to my feet and limped to where the bus had rolled to a stop.

The guy inside was still gasping, his hands trying desperately to hold the blood in that poured from the hole in his throat.  I couldn’t just toss him out the door to be eaten alive, so I dragged him out, then shot him in the head.

I got back to the house.  Sure enough, I now had a bunch of those things following.  Credit Jenifer with really being on the ball.  When she heard the bus rumble up to the house, she and Dominique were already carrying Snoe down the stairs when I burst in the door.

I had stacked what little food there was by the door.  It only took one trip and we were loaded.  When I saw the theater, I knew it was our best chance.  I pulled us up so that the bus was almost touching the bank of entry doors.  Then, I shattered the pane of the ticket booth window on the side that the nose of the bus was up against.

It wasn’t easy getting Snoe across the hood and eventually in, but we managed.  Of course the dead are about forty deep now, but we’ve been able to retreat to a spot where they can’t see us. We can watch in case the occasional zombie manages to stumble in.  It was unfortunate that I had to kick the door in that led to the lobby from the ticket area, but it couldn’t be helped.

So far none have managed to gain the hood of the bus, but we have to be sure.  Hopefully the crowd will disperse over the next few days.  We did find a good amount of bottled water.

Oh yeah.  And a sickening amount of stale candy.

The crowd has grown.  This is not boding well.  We’ve stayed out of sight, only taking peeks from the shadows.  Yet, they remain out there in alarmingly large numbers. We can gain access to the bus if we bail out of here by breaking the glass doors out front.  Unfortunately, Snoe has shown little improvement.

Jenifer and Dominique have been uncharacteristically quiet.  Of course the rippling wave of moans, cries, and groans are non-stop and more than a little unnerving.  I’ve never seen such a huge concentration of those things before.  I went back in Sam’s journal; I guess this was what he was talking about when he described the multitudes that had surrounded the compound.

I wonder how those folks are fairing.

Awoke to find Snoe sitting up, propped against a wall!  She’s not quite ready to bust out of here, but it was nice to hear her complain about everything we lost.  As an added bonus, she wants to make a run back there!  She thinks that if we come late at night and have something to hook to the Bradley, we could pull it free provided it is still where we left it.

The girls were totally elated to see Snoe awake.  Dominique really looks up to her and I think Jenifer was just glad that another person she knows didn’t die yet.

Snoe gave them a work-out program and now they’re both in one of the theatres exercising. Anything to get them to burn off some of that chocolate they’ve been gorging on.

Even though she says she is feeling much better, I am concerned.  She’s lost a lot of blood. And we had no blood to give her, so it is up to her body to re-strengthen itself.  Even taking that into account…she looks awful.  I am trying not to stare too long, but Snoe is no dummy. She probably knows everything I am thinking and feeling by reading my face.  I’ve never been a good poker player.

All I can to do is watch.  And wait.

WHY WON’T THEY LEAVE?!?  The dead seem to be growing in number, not shrinking.  The crowd fills the parking lot and flows out into the four-lane road that passes out front.

I am not convinced that, even if we can get into the bus safely (they are smashed in so close that there are several under the bus now and pressed against the glass doors) we can get out of here.  We’d have to be able to plow through what now looks like thousands of those things.

At best we have a few days to figure this out because we only have a few bottles of water left.  We checked the bathrooms and for some reason the toilets are dry.  Whatever we’re going to do we’ll need to decide.  I won’t just sit here and die slowly.  I’ll either escape and move on…or I’ll die trying.

I woke up and Jenifer and Dominique are gone!  Snoe and I didn’t hear a thing.  The bus hasn’t budged.  There is no broken glass.  They’re just simply gone.

At first we just assumed that they were in one of the theaters exercising or goofing off.  More and more those two have reverted back to teenage girls.  By that I mean independent, giggly, moody, and so obscenely certain that they know it all that you spend nine out of every ten minutes around them resisting the urge to, as Snoe puts it so eloquently, “put a boot in their ass.”

We can’t imagine either how or why they left.  Much less that they said nothing.  I mean, did they hear Snoe and me last night discussing the direness of our situation and how strapped for necessities we are?  And if so, why would they just take off?

For the first time, I am questioning my decision to leave.  Not because of the danger I or Snoe find ourselves in.  Not even because of the losses we’ve suffered in losing Caren, Tara, and the others.  No, it is the sadness I feel when I consider the futures—or lack thereof—for the likes of Jenifer and Dominique.  Back in Irony, you could at least pretend that things are somewhat normal.

The girls are back!  I feel like an idiot!  It never occurred to us that they would sneak out a back door.  Apparently they were doing a lot more than exercising in those theaters.  They checked each exit and found one that empties out to the rear of this multiplex to a far off corner of the parking lot.  A part not swarming with zombies.

They said they would’ve been back yesterday but a handful of survivors were poking in and out of some nearby buildings taking advantage of the fact that most of the mob seem focused on the front of the multiplex.  They hid out in the garage of a nearby car dealership.

Of course they had two full backpacks—not the school type, but the outdoor variety—full of canned food and water.  Snoe was impressed since those packs had to weigh at least fifty pounds.  Jenifer said that they brought one pack to the door late last night, left it and then fetched the second.  Still, a very impressive piece of work.

As for the door, when Snoe began to get angry about how they left us vulnerable, Jenifer actually laughed at her.  It seems that the doors are flat and flush on the outside.  They used a piece of cloth to keep the latch from locking, then, used a stick to slide under the slight gap at the bottom and as one pulled the door slowly, the other waited for enough of an opening to grab the door and pull it open.

This afternoon we feasted on canned beef stew and room temperature water.  It was fantastic!