Zomb-Pocalypse 3 (7 page)

More and more
zombies gather beside the pit until their moans are deafening, and I’m
convinced we are going to die. My heart beats in my ears so loudly that I’m
terrified the zombies are going to hear it. I try to breathe through my mouth,
to help with the smell, but I get scared that I might accidentally get some of
the goop in my mouth, or just as bad, a maggot, so I switch back to nose
breathing, even though it makes it horrible.

I sit, expecting
death, for what feels like an eternity before I realize that the zombies aren’t
paying any attention to the pit. They are moaning and groaning and staggering
around, filling the graveyard by the hundred, but they aren’t riled up anymore;
it’s like we’re invisible.

I’m almost willing
to give Silas some credit for his genius, though disgusting idea, when one of
the zombies that is too close to the pit gets jostled by his neighbor and
suddenly pitches into the pit, practically on top of us. I have to hold my
breath to keep from jumping up in panic when he starts scrabbling around,
grabbing at the bodies for support as he tries to get some traction.

When his hand,
with its chipped, contagious fingernails, comes barreling towards me, I squeeze
my eyes shut and try to mentally prepare for death. I will die, but if I don’t
cause a scene, then my dad and Silas can still have a chance if they remain
quiet and let the zombies pass.

Chapter Six

The scratch never
comes and, after counting to ten in my head, I slowly crack my eyes open to see
what happened. Silas happened, of course. I open my eyes just in time to see
him gently pulling his knife from the zombie’s head. The zombie sags deeper
into the pit to join the rest of its fallen comrades. I shift my eyes to the rest
of the zombies up top, but none of them seem to have noticed. I’m in shock. I
feel my dad squeezing my hand so tightly he’s crushing my fingers, and I know
that I’m not the only one who was worried half to death. I gently wiggle my
fingers, trying to get a little relief, and he instantly releases me. I can
feel his guilt across the pit, and I give him a small smile to show him I’m
okay.

I catch Silas
giving me a dirty look and can only assume it’s because he thinks my eye
movements are going to be the death of us. I close my eyes instead and focus on
breathing shallowly.

I’m woken up by a
not-so-gentle shake to the shoulder. I look around and start to panic when I
can’t see anything, everything is dark. My mind races, frantic to figure out
what happened. “Settle down,” I hear Silas’s voice and I stop moving, forcing
my muscles to relax against their will.

“What’s going on?”
I whisper and hear Silas snort as he shifts around in the muck.

“You fell asleep,”
he tells me with an incredulous chuckle, and I’m incredulous as well. How in
the heck did I manage to sleep with all the zombies and the carnage? I shudder
thinking about it, and thinking about it makes me doubly aware of the gore
soaking my jeans making them stick to my legs, and the dried goop making the
back of my neck itch. I twitch my fingers and find they too are goopy and
immersed in the composting bodies.

“Is it safe?” I
ask, not seeing any more zombies in the moonlight—I also kind of assume that
Silas wouldn’t be talking if it wasn’t clear.

“As safe as can be
expected,” my dad chimes in, shoving a corpse off his back and standing up with
a loud snap from somewhere in his body. I wince just imaging how stiff he must
be. Silas pulls the corpses off my back and I stand up as well, or as much as I
can in this soupy mess. It feels like slogging through quicksand as I make my
way over to the edge of the pit, terrified the whole time that I’m going to
sink down and drown in this mess. I pull my tired, soggy body up over the edge,
and the hard ground is the best feeling in the world right now.

I look around the
cemetery, but there isn’t much to see in the dark and it gives me the creeps.
“I’m not sure this is safe,” I say, even though they must know wandering around
in the dark is dangerous.

“We can climb back
in the pit and wait until morning,” Silas offers, and at this point I’m already
so covered in crud that I actually think about it. I shake my head.

“No thanks,” I
tell him. Honestly, nothing short of the immediate threat of death would get me
back in that pit. Silas doesn’t argue for once, so I’m pretty sure we are on
the same page.

I pause to wipe my
hands on the grass before grabbing my backpack and jacket, I try to keep it as
far away from the rest of my body as possible so I won’t contaminate them.
“Ready to go?” Silas asks, sneaking up behind me, and I jump.

“As ready as I’ll
ever be,” I say, and hear my dad give a grunt of agreement. Silas doesn’t use
his flashlight this time; it would be a beacon to every zombie in the
countryside. We trudge back out through the gate and, instead of returning to
the field, to the main road, Silas turns and we begin walking down the narrow
country road where the cemetery is located. We head away from the main road
with nothing but the moonlight to lead our way.

Every rustle in
the grass makes me jump nervously; I’ve never felt so exposed. I was never a
fan of the dark, and that was before there were flesh eating zombies to be
scared of. We stay in the center of the road, the idea being that we will have
more room to fight if a zombie bursts out of the ditch—thankfully no zombies do
that.

“I think I see
something up ahead,” Silas says, and his words send ice cold fingers of fear
racing through my body.

“What is it?” I
yelp, imagining the horde of zombies from earlier returning to finish us off.

“A house—I think,”
he says and I allow myself to relax a little. We’ve been walking for forty-five
minutes and my gore-soaked jeans have begun to dry and have hardened to my leg
like a cast. Every time I take a step, I feel them rubbing uncomfortably.
Twenty minutes ago, the terrifying thought that this could somehow infect me
crept into my brain, and I’ve been walking gingerly ever since.

“Let’s go,” Silas
says and starts off at a run.

“Wait!” I yelp,
and he turns impatiently back towards me.

“Come on slow
poke,” he cajoles, but I shake my head.

“I can’t,” I tell
him, and I think he can tell from my voice that I’m not joking around.

“What is it?” he
asks, almost sounding like he really cares, but there is no way that I can tell
him I’m scared my chafing jeans are going to turn me into a zombie.

“Never mind,” I
tell him, motioning for him to go on ahead. “I’ll catch up.”

“I don’t think
so,” my dad interrupts. “We are all staying together,” he says firmly, and I
deflate a little. We are all tired and cranky and I feel bad for slowing us
down, but I will feel even worse if I become a zombie. I catch Silas staring at
my legs as I walk crookedly down the road like a cowboy whose ridden too long
in the saddle, and I try to walk a little straighter.

Silas doesn’t
argue as we continue at a slower pace. Even though we aren’t running like he
wanted, we still reach the house in pretty good time. It’s hard to see the
details in the dark, but I can tell by the shape that it is a one-level, small
square house. I feel some relief that the home isn’t large and won’t take us
forever to clear.

We reach the front
porch without incident, and my dad raises his fist and knocks. The sound echoes
through the silent yard and makes me feel even more on edge. We wait for a full
five minutes, but nobody comes to answer the door, so Silas tries the knob and
it opens.

As soon as the
door is open an inch, we hear it—the low growl of a zombie. Silas pulls the
door closed, reaches for his flashlight and gun, and then pushes the door open
with a bang. His light illuminates an elderly female zombie wearing a bubblegum
pink tracksuit. Her hair is short and spiky, sticking up in every direction,
and her spine is curved, making her appear hunched over. She stares unblinking
into the glare of the flashlight, but she doesn’t attack us.

“What’s going on?”
my dad whispers to Silas, and he shrugs.

“Maybe our scent
is masked thanks to all this zombie crap we’re wearing, and something is
telling her not to attack,” Silas guesses, as he steps forward to test his
theory.

“Silas, don’t,” I
say sharply, and the zombie looks around hungrily at the sound of my voice.
Silas steps closer and closer. With each step I expect the zomb to turn and
bite into his flesh, but she doesn’t. Silas walks right up to her, and she just
stands there as docile as an old cow. “Enough,” I whisper, and Silas nods,
spiking his knife through her skull.

“That’s crazy!” he
crows as he wipes the blade of his knife off on her track suit. We walk through
the house, clearing it, and only find one more zombie. An elderly man, most
likely her husband. It is the same with him—he doesn’t attack—and Silas walks
right up and puts him down. Silas and my dad each grab a zombie, take them
outside, and lay them out in the yard.

“You take first
turn in the bathroom,” Dad offers, and I look at Silas, unsure, but he nods.

“Do it,” he tells
me, and I give them both a grateful nod as I slip into the bathroom and peel
out of my clothes. They are completely ruined, so I ball them up and shove them
into the garbage can. I turn to the shower, shivering in the cold, and turn on
the water, waiting for the icy blast that is unavoidable. At this point in my
life, I’m not sure what I hate more about coming into contact with zombie
guts—the fact that it’s highly contagious and disgusting, or the cold shower
that is guaranteed to follow. I turn on the showerhead and turn back towards
the mirror, trying to peel a few strands of zombie-encrusted hair off my
shoulder.

My lantern lets
out a little bit of light and I’m grateful not to be in the dark anymore. I
glance over my shoulder and freeze at the silhouette framed in the closet door.

“Holy crap balls!”
I yelp as I lunge for my backpack at the same moment the zombie stumbles out of
the closet and lurches towards me with an awful phlegm-filled rattle in the
back of her throat. She isn’t the speediest, but she doesn’t have to be. I’m
trapped in this tiny bathroom with a zombie, and worse yet, I’m completely
naked. I promptly make a promise to myself that if I survive this, I’m never
going to shower again—no love of personal hygiene is worth this! My backpack is
sitting on the sink within easy reach. I dive for it and spill half of my junk
out on the floor as I pull my gun out too quickly and fumble it. The gun slides
past the zombie’s feet, and she trips on my deodorant and stumbles. I’m forced
to back up next to the toilet with nowhere left to go. I throw my bag at her,
but it doesn’t faze her in the least. I watch as the light of my lantern
glistens off her teeth, and I’m pretty sure I’m about to die and become a naked
zombie for all of eternity. Silas and my dad will probably be horrified.

My eye lands on
the top of the toilet, and I duck her arms and make a grab for the heavy
porcelain lid. Her one arm thumps me on the back, but I don’t feel the drag of
fingernails and I don’t have time to worry about that right now anyway. The
toilet tank lid is heavier than I imagined, but I swing for the fences,
catching the zombie underneath the chin, and it sends her backwards on her ass.
It’s harder to hit her than I imagined, like literally hard, especially since
I’m swinging upwards. The vibration of the impact reverberates up my arm, and
it isn’t pleasant. My arm throbs as I bring the lid down on the very top of her
head, and it’s easier this time because I have momentum on my side. The
zombie’s eyes roll around in her head, but she doesn’t actually die. Even
worse, my makeshift weapon cracks from the impact and half of it falls to the floor
with a clatter. I stare at the jagged piece of porcelain left in my hands, and
my mind races a mile a minute. The zombie starts to scrabble to her feet but I
kick her square in the chest, for lack of a better idea, and she falls back
against the tile floor. I really wish I was wearing my boots as I rip the
shower curtain off its rungs with one hard tug and toss it over the zombie’s
struggling body. I need to try and reduce the risk of getting scratched, but I
also need to finish this and it’s too dark to find my gun—she might even be
laying on it. I jump on top of the zombie, using the shower curtain as a
buffer, and stab the broken point of the lid into her face. She is still
struggling underneath me, nearly bucking me off, so I lean into the porcelain
and push with all my might, forcing it through her skull and into her rotten
brain. She finally stills, and that’s when I become aware of the pounding at
the door.

“Jane?” Dad calls
sharply through the door. “What’s going on in there?” he demands.

“Are you okay?”
Silas asks, sounding about ready to break the door down.

I shakily climb to
my feet, my entire body vibrating from adrenaline, and wrap a towel around
myself before opening the door. I see my dad’s worried face first and he gives
me a once over, his eyes widening at the fresh zombie blood on my hands and
collar bone before he looks past me. The horror makes his face age ten years.

“You missed one,”
I say as I step out into the hallway, and Silas catches me in his arms. I
collapse against him, feeling boneless, and he wraps his arms around me,
supporting me and my towel.

“Why didn’t you
call us?” Silas asks, and I shake my head.

“I don’t know,” I
admit. “There just wasn’t time. She was in the closet and when I looked up, she
was already coming at me.” My dad comes over and gently pulls me out of Silas’s
arms and leads me over to a chair.

“Were you hurt?”
he asks, his eyes bright with worry, and I shake my head.

“I don’t think so.
Maybe my back…” I say, trailing off at the look of terror on my dad’s face.

“I’ll look,” Silas
offers, but my dad slaps his hand away.

“No, I’ll do it,”
he snaps, even in this moment of fear, he doesn’t want Silas touching me when
I’m only wearing a towel.

I feel the gentle
tickle of my dad running his hands along my back, and then he lets out an
enormous sigh of relief. “All clear,” he says, his voice going high at the end
as he bites back a sniffle. He hugs me again, and I almost sob in relief.

“You stay here,
and we’ll clean everything up for you,” Silas says as he gets to his feet and
starts off for the bathroom. He stops and looks back at me. “I’m so sorry,
Jane. I should’ve looked more carefully.”

“We both
should’ve,” my dad says, and I give them both a shaky smile that I don’t really
feel.

“It’s not your fault.
We all checked that bathroom. I guess we’ll just have to be more careful about
checking closets from now on,” I say, and both Silas and my dad nod.