ZWD: King of an Empty City (37 page)

             
The truck driver fired a shot in the air and my heart stopped for a moment. I spun around to face him. His right arm was above his head and he was glaring at me. And I remembered something Dylan and Stager once said to me.

              “If you ever get into a gunfight, count the shots you hear fired,” Dylan said. “I mean, if it’s an automatic and you hear a burst, forget about counting, but if it’s bang, bang, bang. Count those.”

“Why?” I asked.                       

“Because if he has a revolver you know how many shots he has left. If he has a clip pistol, then you know he has at least ten shots in the clip. Count the shots and you have an idea just how many he has left.”

“But,” interjected Stager, “if you can, look at his feet.”

“Why his feet?”

“Because, dipshit, he’s not going to pick up his casings. If he has a clip and you heard three shots, but you look at his feet and you count five casings, then even you can figure out about how many shots he has left.”

Our eyes locked in rage, then I lowered my head and my eyes and looked at his feet. He had two Browning Hi-Power pistols with capability of thirteen-round magazines and one in each chamber. I knew the gun because I’d wanted one for years and often looked at them in the gun store. I just never bought one. I looked at his feet and there on the ground were the spent casings. He was right-handed, so he probably shot everything with that hand. One pistol was fully loaded, and the other had at least seven rounds left in it. There was no way I could disarm him before he could kill me, and probably a lot of other people as well. We’d have to rely on the sniper. The red dot appeared again and I walked to the right to cover it up, raising my hands higher in a sign to wait. I hoped the sniper understood.

“Stand still, goddammit!”

“Ok, ok.” This was followed by an awkward moment of silence. I didn’t know what to say and I don’t think he did either, but I was going to wait him out and it made him nervous. He started glancing around at everyone and we all just stared at him. He finally stared back at me. I was silent for a long moment, then asked, “So, how many people you still got in the nets?”

“What’s it to you?”

“How much of your drugs you got waiting? A hundred pounds?”

“What do you care?”

“Look, you got me here,” I said, and anger crept into my voice. “You’re not killing me, so obviously you have something to say. What the hell do you want?” Then, there it was. Total confusion crossed his face. He didn’t know what to do next. He placed the gun to Ashley’s head firmly and looked around. I glanced around too. I hadn’t noticed, but more people from the community had gathered behind me. There were probably fifty people behind me. He was getting scared and I was getting tired. “What do you want?” I asked with a raised voice.

“I’m in charge here,” he started, but I cut him off.

“No, you’re not,” I informed him in a flat, even tone. “You’ve never been in charge of us. You and your little cronies are nothing more than bullies, but you were never in charge of us. You said you wanted to build an empire. We have a government. You wanted to be king, sitting on your throne in a mansion in West Little Rock. We share our meals, together. You’re standing there alone because we killed all your little playmates. You’re not in charge, you’re a pissant. And we’re going to squash you.”

“I got—” I cut him off.

“You got what? A warehouse full of drugs somewhere? You’re never going to get back to it. People hanging in a net? How many?”

“Plenty.”

“Liar. You got nobody in the nets now, do you? You got nothing.” The more accusations I made, the more I knew them to be true. It was written all over his face. The more we’d taken away from him by killing his friends, the more of his empire he’d lost. He was beaten. He might not have known it, but I did. Ashley was the only hostage he had left and he didn’t even know how he was going to use her to his advantage.

              Donny moaned again in pain and the sound brought back to me everything this guy and his buddies had done to us over the past few months, the living in fear, the taking of loved ones. Hell, I even placed the zombies on him. I’d had enough of his shit. I lowered my arms and did that sweeping motion you do when you’re at a door and you invite someone to go in first; you know, that “after you” gesture.

              I felt the bullet speed past my face. An instant later his head popped back and his grip on Ashley relaxed. He fell backwards to the ground, most of the back of his head missing. He was dead. I was very thankful I leaned back a little instead of bowing forward when I did that motion, or I’d have had my melon splattered everywhere instead of his.

              Ashley fell to her knees on the ground crying. Her hands were tied together with plastic zip ties secured to the truck’s bed and they cut into her wrists as she sobbed in relief. I pulled out a knife from my belt and set her free.

“We need you to see about Donny now.” It took her a moment to compose herself, then she pushed through the crowd of people that had gathered around the two wounded boys and started doing what she could for them.

              Later, I found out that the guy had her zip-tied to the bed of the truck for those missing days. No blanket, no food, no water, and no bathroom. The only comfort she had was that they were parked in a warehouse that had heaters going all the time. The warehouse was on South Cumberland Street. We eventually went there and it looked like he and the rest of the black truck guys had been living there, but there were no treadmills, no zombies, and no drugs. Wherever they were making them, we’d never find the place without going from building to building. That could have taken a while in Little Rock, so we decided not to try.

              I went over to the black truck while everyone was tending to Donny and the other kid. I looked around in it for some kind of clue as to where their zombie-powered warehouse might be hidden or anything that could tell me more about this guy. With the exception of some cigarettes in the ashtray and a few CDs, the inside of the truck was pristine. I moved to the body of the dead leader. Despite most of his head missing, I was still amazed he had so much hair gel in his hair and light blond highlights. I searched his body and found nothing on him to identify him. I picked up his body and dumped it into the back of the truck, then got in the truck and turned it around, pointing at the burning church. I grabbed a brick from the church’s front sign and wedged it against the gas pedal, then slipped the truck into drive. It rolled in through the glass doors of the church vestibule and stopped just short of the chapel doors. Flames surrounded it and dripped from the ceiling. It wasn’t long till the truck was added to the fire. And although it was a church that was burning, I admit that I felt like his body was burning in hell. I was happy.

ZWD: King of an Empty City Chapter 33

ZWD: Dec. 27.

Late to the party.

Two hours later, Eddie and Uncle Andrew arrived with the fire truck. The church had burned down to a few embers by then, so they parked the truck at the Paris Towers parking lot since it was in the middle of the kingdom. The kid who was shot in the leg would need crutches for a while, but at least he’d live. Donny was bedridden for a few weeks. High fever and vomiting kept him there. That and he kept trying to get up and move around, busting his stitches. I’ll give it to the kid, he had willpower and guts.

              Although I saw my girl briefly back at Trinity Church, we didn’t get a chance to talk, there was so much to do and everyone seemed to want my attention. I was pulled from one meeting to another and when we were both in the same meeting, people were arguing about what to do next. With the killing of the black truck leader, we all felt that a weight had been lifted off our shoulders and now everyone wanted to move forward and get things done. Ideas were coming out of the woodworks.

              That night Jr. and I walked back to the base house. Jamie was there and had dinner ready for us. Apple preserves and oatmeal cooked in butter and water. We had plenty of that, so I had two helpings. My girl hadn’t made it back yet, so I sat in the den and read a book by Charles Portis I’d found on the shelves.

              It was probably close to ten when she came in. After taking off her things and getting comfortable, she sank onto the couch next to me and buried her head into the crook of my shoulder. I draped my arm around her and kept reading, or tried to read. With her there my mind raced over the events of the day, of the past few days, and I wanted to talk. I was about to say something when I realized she was sobbing.

              I put the book down on the little table next to me and pulled her onto my lap. She curled up there like a little girl frightened of storms and cried. I didn’t say anything. I had nothing to say, so I just let her cry. At some point she muttered something about feeling like “it was finally over.” I rubbed circles into the small of her back and kissed her head. When she turned her face to me, I looked down and smiled at her.

“I’m sorry,” she said.

“For what?”

“For breaking down like that.”

“I think you needed it. Feel better?” She shook her head and nuzzled into my chest. My girl, the Commander, the tough-as-nails warrior had had her hard exterior crack. She was my girl again. We went upstairs and undressed each other, then crawled into bed.

              Later that night, I sat at the kitchen table writing this down. Jr. came down and sat at the table after grabbing a glass of water. “What are you doing up?” I asked him.

Sarcastically he said, “Somebody woke me up.”

“Oh?”

“You two are loud.”

“Get used to it, kid, if you want to stay here.”

He finished his glass of water as he got up from the table amd muttered, “I may have to rethink this.”

I felt like with the death of the black truck leader, we’d hit a turning point. I don’t know what lies ahead, but I also feel like the worst of everything is over. I know there are still zombies out there. But now, I think they’re going to be just a nuisance to get rid of because now we have a squad of people actively hunting them down. I know we still have some big challenges ahead of us. Like Stager said in my last dream, we need to go beyond our destination. I don’t know how we’re going to get there, but I’m glad I’m with these people and that we didn’t go south.

We have a meeting tomorrow at Trinity to figure a lot of this out.

Goodnight.

ZWD: King of an Empty City Epilogue

Epilogue  

Wow, I haven’t seen this book in a year and a half. Sarah brought me this book a few days ago and said I should read it. I haven’t read it since I stopped writing in it way back then. She says that our library wants to use it as a part of a display marking the events of the zombie outbreak. It’s going to be displayed under a glass case next to a photograph of the two of us. I’m kind of speechless about the whole honor thing. But after reading this again, I guess I was kind of a hero in some sense. I also realized after I read the book, I never said what my girl’s name was. If you’re wondering, it’s Sarah.

             
You’re probably a bit curious as to what has happened in the year and a half since I stopped writing in this diary. I became a full interim president for six months. It was just until we were able to set up a congress and presidency that everyone could live with. We used the Founding Fathers’ plan to build our little government. Then we set a date for it all to take effect. Till then, I was president and leader “at the will of the people.” It wasn’t all that glamorous. Governing “at the will of the people” meant I got to hear a lot of people complain and bitch at me for things someone else did, then I had to fix it. I think the best decision I made in that time was to require everyone to take fighter training and a military conscription, one year in service of the community.

It paid off, too. Within a few months, we were able to go door to door and clear every house in my original kingdom. We even branched out to a few other places and cleared them out. But, not wanting to seem like we were expansionists, we just got rid of the zombies and left the buildings to others who needed a place to stay.

             
We were able to block off all the surrounding streets and make gates in and out of our little neighborhood. We established trade with other neighborhoods and had to fight off one or two attempts by armed mobs trying to take what we’d built.

             
We quickly became the enclave everyone wanted to live in and we let them in as long as they agreed to live by our congressional rules and the constitution, which dictated that everyone did some form of community work and shared a small portion of their efforts with the community, like a tax. Other neighborhoods started recognizing us as the capital within the city. Trade routes were established with other parts of Little Rock, although some of the neighborhoods were overtaken by warlords and little dictators. I visited a few of these and it wasn’t pretty. I was glad we had our militia and our gates.

             
Eddie became president after my six months were up and the new government was formed. When I stepped down as president, we did a big ceremony on the steps of Philander Smith College’s library to mark the occasion. We would have used the old governor’s mansion, but we had to burn it down; after what we saw there we decided to just get rid of it. Eddie has three and a half more years to go, but I think he’s going to do fine. There was some opposition to a kid becoming president, but between Sarah, Shaun, Uncle Andrew, who was a government teacher at the college, Ashley, and myself, we prepared him well enough that he quickly quieted those opposition opinions.

             
He still has opposition, but he’s a good leader. I think the smartest thing he did was to take all the problems people were bringing him and set up a new branch of government, the one I forgot about, the judicial branch, and let them make those decisions. Bobby and Eddie are planning on getting married. They want me to perform the ceremony since I was first president. I can’t wait to do this. Bobby is a reservist in our defense force and when she isn’t doing that, she runs the community clothing store and arranges housing for refugees who make it into New Quapaw. That’s what we’re calling our little town within the city, New Quapaw. She puts the refugees up in the old Philander Smith dorms and acquaints them with our community rules. The first one being “follow the rules or hit the road.” It keeps this place a peaceful community. She’s had to kick out more than one family. Those who stay are found a home to live in.

             
Donny is the acting Commander while Sarah is on temporary leave from our defensive forces. That’s right, Sarah is pregnant. I’m going to be a daddy! But back to Donny. He is, like I said, in charge or our defensive forces. Basically he’s head of the army, the police, and the fire departments, and in charge of hunting for game food like squirrels, deer, turkey, and things like that. People still have their own homes and they can cook in them if they want, but we’ve fostered a community meal at least once a day that most of us work at preparing and participating in. We know this won’t last once the population grows to a certain point, but till then we all know our neighbors. While Sarah is on leave, he’s taking over the training of our troops. They make a great team, she and Donny. They’ve gotten our forces, which is most of the community, to the point where they can muster at any given spot in our city in force within five minutes.

             
Donny met a girl, one of the refugees. They’ve been dating for a few months. He’s grown into a handsome young man. In the past year and a half, he led several of the clearings of the various apartment buildings and converted houses that fill the neighborhood. Under his command, he only lost six people in those clearings. He took it pretty hard. He tattooed their names on his arm in honor of them. We’re hoping he gets married to this girl and mellows out a little.

             
Ashley became our head of medicine for a while. As a nurse, she didn’t feel comfortable “doctoring” on people and the longer we stayed and built up New Quapaw, the more we started drawing people from other parts of old Little Rock. Two of them were doctors, so she’s now the head of their clinic. She turned one of the buildings at Philander Smith into our hospital and has kept herself busy with that. We found her missing daughter; she’d turned. Donny was the one who killed her. After that he became very sullen, almost grim. I hope this new girlfriend brings him out of that.

             
Joseph married that girl he had with him at the dance. Not long after that, they had a baby, Baby Batlynn. But February was a harder month than any of us could have imagined and they lost little Batlynn to influenza. They’re trying again for another baby now.

             
We lost a lot of people to influenza. In February when it hit, we had a population of I would guess three hundred. Ashley just didn’t have the vaccine or the medicines to really help fight it. We lost fifty people to influenza starting in February and on through April.

             
Starvation was another population decimator. Shaun lost his new baby to starvation, along with his girlfriend. It didn’t matter how far we went out into other parts of the city and scavenged for food, there just wasn’t enough edible food left for a population that size. We tried starting gardens, but they didn’t grow fast enough. Seeing those people die was the hardest. Starvation is a hard, slow death.

             
I remember Uncle Andrew and I sitting in Shaun’s bedroom while he watched his girlfriend pass away. Then we had to give him a few minutes to grieve before we ushered him out and killed her again in case she turned and came back as a zombie. It was different with the influenza victims; they never turned. We don’t know why. People feared starving so much that a few asked to be placed near someone who was infected with the flu in the hope that they would also get infected and die normally. I’m glad those days are over.

             
Uncle Andrew had the responsibility of dealing with the governor’s mansion. He learned how to operate a bulldozer and big construction equipment, and after he and a team went through the gates, they set fire to all the buildings and let them just burn. Then he knocked everything down with the dozer and used a dump truck to haul everything out. He had a crew of a dozen men with him who wore protective clothing and went through basically a HAZMAT scrub every evening before they left the site. It took them a few months, but they destroyed it all, thank God. Don’t EVER ask me what was behind the gates of the governor’s mansion. I and all those who saw it never want to talk about it again. EVER!

             
Grandpa, who had stayed holed up in his house with the rest of Shaun and Uncle Andrew’s family, grudgingly left the house and came to a meeting at Trinity one evening just before the flu started taking people. He ended up actually not being all that cantankerous. He helped us plan our gardens for the spring and helped us organize ourselves for planting. I think he enjoyed being an authority on farming. He used to own a farm in his younger days. He helped us with planning the crop rotation and the early planting and late planting of plants and how to do a lot of other things. He and I became pretty good friends. I was sorry to see him pass. He passed that April of old age and starvation, I suspect. Over the months I got to know him, he wasted away to nothing but bones before he passed.

             
Keith, the handsome kid who was the new trainer of our troops? We lost him after the battle for Philander Smith. We decided to clear the campus after Paris Towers. We lost Keith clearing one of the dorms. One of the adults who he’d been training freaked out or got clumsy going into one of the rooms and a zombie got past him and bit Keith. The kid kept fighting till he turned and one of the other kids killed him.

             
The funny thing about that battle?  We lost more adults in it than we did kids. Besides Keith, we lost one other kid who was just too weak to fight off the zombie that surprised him. We lost seven adults that day.

             
Roland died at the battle of Broadway Plaza. That’s where Broadway meets Roosevelt Road. There’s a shopping center that used to hold a grocery store and a few other businesses. We knew it was a weak spot on our walls and were slowly trying to build it up, but we were suffering from the flu outbreak and malnutrition. Those who were healthy were stretched thin. A group from south of Roosevelt tried to attack us, and it was happening more and more as people across Little Rock got desperate for food.

             
Roland was on the wall defending that gate when one of the attackers got him in the shoulder with a hatchet. It broke his left clavicle bone and the attack almost took off his arm. He survived the fight and the battle, but even after we took off the rest of his arm and cauterized the wound, he had internal bleeding we didn’t know about. This was before we got the doctors; Ashley just didn’t have the skills to deal with it. A few weeks later he died.

             
Also that February, we lost power. The electricity finally went out for the entire city. It was after a very hard snowstorm. Luckily, we didn’t lose the use of the gas lines until the spring, or I think we’d have burned everything in sight just to keep warm. We had city water till the hottest part of the summer, when it quit. We got lucky there too. We’d started digging wells after trying dowsing. We came up with a few empty holes, but we did find a few wells, so we have water. Sewage became a big problem when we lost the water. A few families refused to change over to the new sanitation rules, so they were evicted. The squalor they were living in was unnecessary and just waiting to breed a batch of diseases we didn’t need. Now, as much as nobody likes it, we all take a turn in the sanitation rotation. To set a good example, I took the first rotation. I’m coming up on another very soon and I don’t look forward to doing that again.              

             
It wasn’t all bad news. Mrs. Greenbaum established a school and it’s doing well. We take in more kids than we do adults and Bobby does a great job with them. They come from all parts of the city, as one kid put it, “for the safety and the education.” Kids just want to learn. Although none of them like the sanitation classes, either. Our population has grown again and is up to about five hundred. Like I said, we’ve been trading with other parts of the city. Our government is strong and we have a lot of order. Uncle Andrew, who was a government policy teacher, now teaches a little government and a lot of gardening. He’s carried on his father’s farming skills.

             
Jamie became a part of our family. She’s my daughter now. At least we all recognize her to be ours, along with Jr. He’s recognized as our son. He’s doing his sanitation rotation now. He lost an eye in a library run. He and a group of kids went to the library to gather books and bring them back to Philander Smith to add to our library there. Topics that we didn’t have books on. They didn’t see any zombies, but got into a fight with a band of marauders. He won’t say much about it or anything else. He’s as tight-lipped and matter-of-fact as he always has been, but from interviewing others, I found out that they were attacked by a group of adults. Two kids were killed and one got his leg broken. They managed to kill all but one of the marauders, who apparently came from the group we stayed with early on at the Big Dam Bridge. Jr. laughs a lot, but he just doesn’t talk much.

             
Jamie has fallen into pediatric nursing. She helped Ashley with the setup of the hospital and she started taking care of the babies. Compared to then, we now have a lot of babies. It’s amazing what a year will do. It might seem strange to some that we approve of kids having families so young. Babies having babies, is what they say. But I look at it this way: most of the world’s population has been wiped out through the zombie outbreak, starvation, greed, and disease. These kids who have survived all that, if you can call them kids, are stronger men and women than we had on the planet before. In two years, they’ve seen more death and destruction than anyone should have to see ever. These are good kids. If they want to fool around, they deserve it. If they have kids doing it, I think we’re all a lot better off for this new generation we can shape than we were with the generation we left behind. Jamie will make a fantastic mother one day. I just don’t want her to date anyone, ever. Am I a father or what?