Apocalypse Z (A Zombie Novel) (10 page)

He only felt relieved for a minute, then he saw another set of headlights closing in on them. He shook his head and sighed, “Son of a bitch!”

Jet asked, “What?”

He glanced into the back. “Here comes another one.”

He watched as they drew closer. The car was about half of a mile behind them when it slowed and kept an even pace. As they reached the bottom of the hill, the sun began to peak over the mountains to the east. The car continued to keep a safe distance behind them, neither coming closer nor falling back. Mark figured they saw the fireball from the first car and decided not to make the same mistake.

As he veered right onto another freeway, the other car sped up and stayed on the I-5. He looked over at them as they passed, in the front passenger seat was a woman looking back at him. Right behind her, in the back seat, he saw a little boy, about five-years-old, looking over and waving at him.

Mark continued north bound on the freeway. When he started to drift over into another lane, Lisa looked over at him. She saw his eyelids slowly closing. She reached over, grabbed the steering wheel, and asked him to pull over so she could drive. When he didn’t respond, she shook him. Mark slowly leaned forward and slumped over onto the wheel. She screamed, “Mark!”

Everyone in the back woke up. Lisa grabbed his leg and took it off the accelerator as she steered. As they slowed and finally came to a stop, she put it in park. Sheryl leaned over the seat and looked at him, his face was pale and he wasn’t responding to anyone.

Sheryl and Tami jumped out the back and went to his door. When Tami opened it, she set her hand on his left thigh and felt something wet. She lifted her hand and shrieked. Her palm was covered with his blood, that’s when she noticed there was also a small pool of it on the floorboard.

Sheryl called for Jeff to come help. Between the three of them, they pulled him out and around to the back. After he was inside, they placed him on the gurney. Everyone got out of the way and stood outside as Tami and Sheryl went to work. They cut the pants around his wound and assessed it.

Lisa was by the back doors of the van trembling. She asked them as she paced, “Is he going to be okay?”

Sheryl said as she worked, “A bullet entered and exited his thigh, but it doesn’t look like it hit the artery.” She looked up. “He’s lost a lot of blood and needs a stable place to rest.”

Lisa thought before she said, “There is a place about forty miles up the road that might be safe.”

“Then we need to get him there and make sure the van doesn’t bounce around a lot.”

Lisa nodded and went to the driver side door. She paused; there was a lot of blood on the seat and more than she cared to see on the floorboard. She began to feel very ill and asked for towel. She started shaking as she cleaned the seat. Lisa threw the towel to the ground as she got in and started the van. Amy climbed in the front passenger seat and they continued north.

She watched Lisa as she drove as carefully as she possibly could. Sheryl and Tami cleaned his leg the best they could under the circumstances. They came to a crossroads and Lisa turned right, then drove two more miles. She pulled off the road and stopped in front of a little white house with an old barn on the other side of the yard.

Lisa and Jeff went in to clear the house and barn before anyone else entered. Tami and Sheryl moved the gurney into a bedroom and carefully slid Mark over onto the bed. Lisa looked down at Mark and asked again, “Is he going to be okay?”

Tami and Sheryl looked at her and neither one said a word. Lisa put her hands on the sides of her head as she groaned. She felt dizzy and light-headed. “Somebody, please answer me! Is he going to be alright?”

Sheryl softy said, “I don’t know. His blood pressure is really low and his pulse is weak. It could go either way. We just have to wait and see.”

Lisa felt a lump in her throat and a cold tingling in her body. She quickly walked toward the front door. Once she was outside, she ran away from the house and went into the barn. She sat down on a bale of hay and bit her lip as she stared at the ground.

She didn’t want to be attached to anyone like this; she wanted to finish college first. Now with this zombie thing going on, having feelings for someone had been the last thing on her mind. Over the last two years, she hadn’t allowed herself to get close to anyone in this way and it was working out fine for her. But now, her heart had other ideas and had taken control. The thought of not having Mark around overwhelmed her.

She felt the tears start to run down her cheeks. It finally became too much and she buried her face in her hands and wept uncontrollably. In between breaths, she pleaded, “Please don’t take him from us. We need him” She looked up toward the roof and said, “And… I need him.” She looked down and covered her eyes.

Lisa felt a hand on her shoulder and she looked up. Amy stood there looking back at her, tears building in her eyes too. Softly, she said, “You do like him. You like him a lot, don’t you?”

Lisa wiped the tears from her eyes and nodded, her voice cracked as she said, “Yeah, I guess I do.”

Amy sat next to her. “You know, I like him too.” She smiled. “But I won’t get in your way.” Amy giggled and gave Lisa a hug.

Lisa smiled and returned the hug, “Thank you, Amy.”

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Jeff stood next to the bed. “C’mon, bro, I need for you to hang on, man. I can’t remember shit and I need you to tell me about my life.”

Jet put her arm around his waist. He looked at her and put his arm around her. She looked up at him and said, “He’ll be okay, Jeff. I know he will.”

Jeff nodded. “Yeah, I know he will. He has to.”

Tami came into the room and checked Mark’s bandages. Jet and Jeff stepped back to stay out of her way and watched. When she finished with his bandages, she checked his pulse and blood pressure again. Right after she finished, Sheryl came in and looked him over too. She talked to Tami for a minute; then Tami left the room.

Sheryl stood over Mark for a few minutes, and then she turned to Jeff. “I appreciate what your brother did for Tami and I. Then what he did for the others still trapped inside the hospital by killing all those zombies. At least now, when the generators run out of fuel, the people will have a better chance of getting away.” She was quiet for a moment and then left the room.

Dedee and Todd came in and went over to the bed. She touched his arm. “Get better, Mark. We need you to keep us safe.”

Todd agreed. “Yeah, Mark. I want you to get better.”

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Lisa and Amy came from the barn and started for the house. They saw Sheryl and Tami taking some of the boxes from the van into the house. Sheryl noticed Lisa’s eyes were red and puffy as she passed. “Lisa, are you alright?”

Lisa turned as she walked. “Yeah, I’m fine.”

“Hey, I’m going to do everything I can to get him back up and around.”

Lisa stopped and turned. She glanced down as she nodded her head and then looked back up. “Thanks, Sheryl.”

Sheryl picked up the box and followed them into the house. Jeff and Lisa decided to go outside and check the surrounding area, just in case there were zombies wandering around. Sheryl and Tami went the through the boxes and organized the medical supplies Sheryl had taken before leaving the hospital.

Sheryl grabbed a small bottle and a syringe then went into Mark’s room. Jet and Dedee noticed this and looked each other in silence. They both got up and followed her in. Jet asked, “What’s that?”

Sheryl drew the liquid into the syringe. “It’s just something to help him with the pain if he wakes up. I don’t want him flinching from the pain and start bleeding again.”

“Oh,” Dedee said. “That’s a good idea.”

They watched her inject it into his leg around the wound. After that, they started to go through other rooms in the house to see what they could find as far as useful weapons. The first room they came to was a sewing room. Inside, were bolts of fabric and balls of yarn organized by color and stored in tubs. Dedee looked through a cedar chest while Jet checked the closet.

Jet stepped back and said, “Whoa! Check this out.”

Dedee glanced over and jumped up.”Whoa! Where did you find that?”

Jet held a scabbard in her hand. When she pulled the handle, an antique katana slid free. “Oh yeah, I like this!” She said as she set the scabbard down on a small folding table and looked the blade over.

“Oh my gawd, that thing looks old.” Dedee tilted her head. “Isn’t that kinda short for a sword though?”

“No, it’s a katana. That’s how long it is supposed to be,” Jet replied. “I’m petite, so it’s just right for me.”

Dedee stared at the blade and said, “I’d love to have one of those too.”

Jet held it out in front of her with both hands on the handle. “This feels nice, not heavy at all.” She handed Dedee a piece of scrap paper. “Here, hold this.” She set the blade on the edge of the paper. It cut cleanly the entire length of the sheet with only the weight of the blade pulling it through. “I’m keeping it. I bet I could dice up some major zombie ass with this.” She smiled.

“Is there another one in there?”

Jet looked, but only found an aluminum bat. Handing it to Dedee, she said, “Here, take this.”

Dedee looked at it like she had just been given a consolation prize before she said, “Let’s check the other room. Maybe there’s another one in there.”

While they were in the back bedroom, they heard Jeff and Lisa outside yelling. It went on for almost five minutes before they heard a single gunshot. Nervously, everyone gathered in the living room peeking out from around the drapes, but they couldn’t see them anywhere.

They waited. Several minutes passed and no one heard anything else. Dedee picked up her bat and said, “Jet, get that old sword you found and lets go outside and see if they need help.” Jet ran to the back and returned with it.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Jeff and Lisa did a visual sweep along the front of the house, then went out and around the barn. Behind it, they found about a dozen chickens inside a coop. They went out about two hundred yards from the house and checked an alfalfa field. From there, they swung around and checked the back, then the other side of the house. The land was mostly fields with some pastures and they could see for almost a mile.

They went and double-checked the inside of the barn. Once finished there, they started looking over its contents more closely. There was an array of old farm tools that had been retired long ago. In the back corner, under a tarp, was an old tractor that appeared to be in the process of being repaired. Hanging on a wall over a workbench were some wrenches, hay hooks, and a small hatchet.

Jeff picked up the hatchet. “Hey, Lisa.”

She looked up from the box she was digging in. “Yeah?”

Holding it up, he said, “Check it out.” He nodded toward the back of the barn.”

She didn’t know what he was insinuating so she asked, “What?”

“You know how to clean a chicken?”

“Kinda. When all this crap started I watched a ton of ‘How To’ videos on the internet. It was something to do and I figured it wouldn’t hurt to know some of the stuff, just in case.”

He smiled. “Okay, looks like fresh fried chicken tonight.”

They went around and into the chicken coop. It only took Jeff a few minutes to corner, catch, and kill the first chicken. Lisa knew one wouldn’t be enough for nine people so she went in to get a second. It turned out to be much harder than Jeff made it look. Just when she thought she had it, it would dart around her.

Jeff stepped back into the coop to help. They yelled back and forth, trying to coordinate their strategy. After a few minutes, they were both winded and had to stop. She was leaning forward with her hands on her knees as she tried catching her breath.

Jeff said, “C’mon, let’s try it again.”

Puffing hard, she got it cornered and when she reached for it, it went around her again. She shook her head. Jeff started laughing and asked, “Are you going to catch it? Or wait till it drops from exhaustion?”

Gasping for air, she looked at Jeff, then the chicken. She said, “Screw this!” She drew her pistol, aimed, and pulled the trigger. The chicken spun around and dropped as feathers flew all around it. She walked over, picked it up by the neck, and victoriously said as she held it out, “Dinner!”

They had to sit down for a few minutes to catch their breath before heading to the house. When they walked in, Jet asked, “What’s that?”

Lisa held up her chicken. “It’s dinner.”

Dedee said, “We heard a commotion outside and though you ran into zombies. We were just about ready to come out and help you.”

“There weren’t any zombies outside.” Jeff said, “We found the chickens and had to catch a couple.”

“Then what was with the gunshot I heard?”

Jeff said, “Lisa couldn’t catch hers.” He started laughing. “So she shot it!”

Dedee and Jet looked at each other, and they too started to laugh. Jet held up the katana. “Look what I found.” And she pulled it from the scabbard.

Jeff looked at it closely. “I know what this is.” He stared at it and started to shake his head. “Damn! I know, but it’s like… right on the edge of my mind and it won’t come out. I can almost see it. It’s on the tip of my tongue, but won’t come out. It starts with a ‘K’.” He groaned and shook his head in frustration.

Jet ran her hand over his shoulders. “I know you do… it’s alright. Don’t worry about it right now.”

He sat down on the couch and pulled her next to him. Putting his arm around her he smiled and said, “Hot chick with a sword.”

Jet blushed and asked with a smile, “Really? You think I’m hot?”

Jeff pulled her in closer and gave her a little kiss. “Yep, scorchin hot.”

Lisa sighed. “Okay, you two. Jet, come in here and help me with this.” She pointed. “Dedee and Amy, you too. I want you all in the kitchen now. You’re going to learn how to butcher and cook a chicken.”

Lisa went over what she knew with them and it finally made it into the oven. She thought about her feelings as she walked into Mark’s room and sat on the edge of the bed. These were feelings she wasn’t even aware of until this morning, or maybe she was and had convinced herself otherwise.