ZOMBIE'S DOOM? "Chronicles of Jack Doom" (42 page)

"They're your friends, you lead the way!"

With Derek hesitantly leading the way, and the Sarge close behind him almost drooling in anticipation of getting his dick-skinners on Beth one more time, his five men trailing in close approximation to each other, and me bringing up the rear, we left the minimal concealment of the crater pockmarked posh neighborhood and marched into the street guns blazing.

While the Sarge was preoccupied with the horde, I found the zombie cleansing to be the perfect opportunity to do a little more than just thin the herd.

Although I was doing my fair share of harvesting the vile creatures in the neighborhood, most of which were now aware that what they were hoping would be their next meal of guts and brains was migrating toward them. My main concern at the time, however misguided it might be, was alleviating the human threat before me.

With their mouths watering at the thought of devouring the succulent yet well-armed morsels marching toward them, the ravenous man-eating beasts quickened their pace and stumbled toward us from all directions.

With our group preoccupied with the charging horde, I took the liberty to give a lethal dose of high-speed lead poisoning to two of the Sarge's men, by systematically administering them an epidural with my suppressed M-4 assault rifle.

I weighted down two more of the Caucasian's followers with lead and watched as they dropped to street level under the poundage of my bullets.

In the noise and confusion of the battle, no one but me noticed the four men fall to the asphalt, as the attacking zombies dropping all around us was the perfect distraction.

The bodies of the men quickly began to be devoured by several of the undead, which penetrated the weak point in our perimeter left by the Sarge's fallen comrades, and who I let feast upon their remains.

Zombies ripping, tearing, and biting at their flesh, would mutilate their bodies enough to hide the gunshot wounds if I was unable to secure my real prey immediately following the fight.

And their hunger for the brains of the fallen combatants left no need for me to waste a bullet, as their brains would soon be devoured as well.

The ruckus outside had alerted Beth and Jolene to our presents and they began to pick off the
revived
dead from a bedroom window.

Now with only four of us fighting the zombies in the street, and our gunfire attracting even more dead bodies to the area, I began to have second thoughts about my decision to dust off four of the Sarge's soldiers before the zombie menace was extinguished.

Besides the influx of more ravenous cannibals staggering into the melee, I was also concerned that Beth might take it upon herself to exact her own revenge on the Sarge from that window she was shooting from, and cheat me out of the pleasure of killing him myself.

However, before Beth could shoot the Sarge, or the ever-growing population of the horde of zombies could over run our position.

"We're fucked!" Derek announced loudly, as he saw the first of twelve dogs out of the corner of his eye.

I had been lucky since Armageddon had raised its ugly head, and this was only the third time since the beginning of our world's undoing that I had had to deal with the
Canine Corps
.

Derek on the other hand, had not been so fortunate. Surviving in and around the Indiana Badlands, he had been on the shit end of the fetching stick many times before, and was well versed in the dangers of a feral dog pack.

He raised his revolver and took aim at the lead dog as he called out.

"God damned dogs!"

As he sounded the alarm, the lead dog charged, which signaled four of the other curs to follow.

Three more came from beside the safe house and darted directly under Beth's position at the window, and four dashed toward us from across an adjacent street.

Although I didn't say so at the time, my thoughts were the same as Derek's as I raised my rifle.

We were now not only surrounded by a mass quantity of ravenous dead bodies walking in our direction bent on serving us up as a four course meal, we were also being attacked by a pack of vicious and ruthless mutts that would no doubt be relentless in their pursuit as well.

And if it wasn't bad enough that the undead had seemed to find their second wind, and were now at least twice as fast and agile as they had been in the past, now we had to contend with a pack of callous curs who's speed and agility far eclipsed the unfed man-eating beasts I call
Eaters
.

Just as panic was about to set in among the four of us, and as we each took aim at our respective charging canines, an odd thing happened.

With my chosen dog perfectly aligned in my gun sights, and my finger applying three pounds of pressure against my M-4's four-pound trigger, my target suddenly changed course and leaped onto one of the stampeding zombies.

Without regard for the hundreds of flies whizzing by the slobbering monstrosity, or the multitude of maggots swimming in its drool, and giving no thought whatsoever about the terminal case of ringworm that covered the bluish skin of its victim, my former target began to dismantle the slowly rotting two legged carnivore piece by piece.

Our gunfire ceased as we stood in awe of the carnage that was taking place before us.

We were no longer the chosen prey of either the mongrels or of the zombies. They had both stopped pursuing us and focused their complete attention on each other.

"Let's make a break for it!" Derek yelled, as he trotted toward the house.

The Sarge followed him toward the house and without looking back shouted to me.

"Come on Jack, move it!"

With only one man left on the Sarge's team, I think his name was Steve, the four of us ran to the safety of the house.

Well three of us did anyway.

Unfortunately for the Sarge's last remaining squad member, after I tripped Steve and pushed him on top of two zombies that were being ripped to shreds by three of the feral dogs. In the heat of battle, neither the dogs nor the zombies could discern the difference between Steve and the enemy that they were fighting.

Sadly, Steve didn't make it.

The back door of the girl's hideout opened and Beth called out to us.

"Get your dumb asses in here!"

As one might think, none of us wasted any time complying with the cute little blonde's demand.

We entered the home in single file, in the order that we had escaped the deadly fracas, except for Steve, as I said, sadly, he didn't make it.

Once inside the sanctuary, the Sarge wasted no time trying to tell Beth twice (give her two black eyes).

"You fucking bitch, I'll teach you to run out on me!" he screamed, as he raised his left hand across his body to apply a backhanded pimp slap.

Just as he had wasted no time beginning Beth's public flogging that he
thought
she deserved, and obviously felt that I would not have an issue with. I too wasted no time in preparing him to accept the punishment that I
knew
he deserved.

As the Sarge's arm began to move forward towards Beth's face, I laid the barrel of my M-4 against the left side of his skull with the proper amount of force to render him unconscious.

"Thank you Jack," Beth said softly.

"No, thank you Beth," I replied.

"Thank me for what?" she inquired.

"Thank you for not shooting this son-of-a-bitch when you had the chance."

"Believe me, it did cross my mind, but I knew you wanted to take the first whack at him," Beth confessed. "I even took out one of the dead that was about to pounce on him."

"When you two are done flirting, you might want to tie your buddy up before he comes to," Derek suggested, with his usual smile. "When he wakes up he's going to be really pissed!"

During all of my planning and all of the tracking that had to be done to find the Sarge, all I could think about during that time, was killing the son-of-a-bitch.

However, after thinking about all of the people, zombies, and canines that had to die for me to successfully complete my self-ordained mission. I had come to have a change of heart concerning my former Marine Corps buddy.

In light of all the death and destruction, and all of the carnage that preceded the capture of my old friend, I decide not to kill him after all.

My thought process went something like this.

With all of the heartache and anguish he had cause me, and all of the agony and suffering that I had caused people during my search for him. All of the pain and torture that would have never happened if the Sarge hadn't of drove that school bus away from the armory that day, leaving me and my family to stand alone and almost defenseless against an unseen sniper, and in the middle of an attacking zombie horde.

I wouldn't have had to commandeer Jason's truck, and he would still be alive. I wouldn't have been anywhere near the Wolf River and Cassandra's "Bull Lesbian" sister Carla would still be alive.

I had no reason to be traveling through Arkansas, so Eric and Matt might still be alive, and Tim would still have his hair. Not to mention the leather bag hanging from my belt is a constant reminder that if it weren't for the Sarge's cowardice, Cassandra wouldn't be walking around right now one tit lighter.

So with all of that said, I reiterate, I decided not to kill the Sarge at this time.

Because... Killing is to damn good for that motherfucker!

I could have killed him before he regained consciousness, but then it would have been over.

I could have waited until he woke up, and then put a bullet into his pea-brain, but then he would never have learned his lesson.

No, killing him would serve no purpose, his punishment would need to be far greater than mere dying, after all, dying is part of life nowadays.

People die, zombies die, feral dogs die, even my family died. Dying is too much of a natural thing to do in the unnatural world we live in.

"Turn the dining room table over, and tie this bastard spread eagle to its legs," I demanded. "But stripe him buck naked first."

"That will be a job for you two girls," Derek insisted. "Touching naked men isn't my thing."

"I don't mind," Jolene announced. "I've had some experience doing that kind of thing."

"I'll help you strip this punk," Beth said. "Remember Jack, you said you'd leave something for me."

Derek smashed a couple of lamps and ripped their cords out, while I tore the telephone off the wall and cut its cord off.

The heavy oak table made an excellent rack to stretch out a human body.

As I tied the final electric cord around the Sarge's ankle, he began to wake up.

"What in the fucking hell is this Jack?" he asked. "Untie me right now, this isn't funny."

"Fuck you Ron!" Beth shouted, as she kicked the sprawled out naked man in the ribs.

"You fucking whore, I'll kill you for that!" the Sarge shouted back.

Standing over the bound up man, I stared at him for a moment before informing him of his fate.

"Calm down, you're not going to kill anybody, at least not for awhile," I told him.

"What's this all about Jack?" he asked, with a confused look on his face. "I thought we were friends?"

"You thought wrong, our friendship ended about the same time I was sucking exhaust fumes out of the tailpipe of the school bus you drove off in," I answered, gritting my teeth. "And inhaling poison gas happened to be the least of my worries that day, considering that at the time my family and I were surrounded by about ten thousand angry and very hungry eaters."

"I didn't have a choice Jack," Sarge insisted. "We were surrounded too, we had to leave right then or we would have never made it out of there, tell him Beth, we couldn't wait any longer."

"Funny, we waited, because we didn't have any other choice, and we made it out of there alive," I maintained, feeling a tsunami of rage surging through my body.

"We'll never know now, will we?" Beth stated. "You were so busy whining like a little baby, and bitch slapping me at the same time that it's a miracle that we did get away."

Beth leaned into another kick to the Sarge's ribs.

"Ouch! You little bitch, I dare you to do that again," the Sarge said, immediately regretting his challenge, as Beth again drop kicked the man in the ribs.

"Easy Beth, remember, I'm supposed to save some for you, not the other way around," I reminded.

"Okay then, you better get started before I lose my temper and waste this dick-head," Beth warned.

"All right honey, just one more thing," I said. "I want to ask this punk something."

"Well, please make it quick, I've waited a long time to get even with this motherfucker," Beth professed in a none to lady-like manner.

"Sarge do you remember what I used to say when we were stationed in Afghanistan," I asked solemnly.

"No," the sergeant answered gruffly, still grimacing from Beth's last kick.

"I told you on more than one occasion, that pain is the Great Teacher. Today I'm going to be assisting the Great Teacher with your lesson.