DEAD AMERICA
LOWCOUNTRY
PART 4
BY DEREK SLATON
© 2021
CHAPTER ONE
Day Zero +3
The sun barely peeked over the horizon when the noise began. Dante opened his eye, waiting a moment for it to adjust to the dim light. He couldn’t quite make out the sound… it was almost as if someone was moving in another part of the house.
He looked around, doing a quick head count of his companions. Cam and Phillip slept by the TV. Bailey was on the couch, and Lily sprawled across the floor beside Katie, who was clustered up against the stove to avoid the splayed limbs.
Dante listened hard, straining his ears, but didn’t hear Abigail or her girls moving. And while he had only known Ace for a couple of days, he couldn’t imagine the redneck had ever been this quiet in his life.
The noise persisted, a shuffling combined with light tapping. He jumped at a loud BANG and sat up straight. The others stirred in the living room, but he hopped up, rushing past them to the window. He peered through the gaps in the wood that Cam and Phillip had put up the day before. The sun was up just enough that he could see movement by Ace’s window.
Two zombies stood there, smacking on the wood blocking Ace’s bedroom. Dante sighed with relief. It was only two, and the boys had done a good job of securing the outside of the house.
Movement tickled his periphery and his relief quickly flew from him as three more ghouls raced out from behind the trees at the edge of the yard. They ran straight for their brethren, joining in on the banging on the side of the house.
The impact roused everyone that had still been sleeping in the living room. Dante’s brow furrowed at another zombie, moving much slower than the others instead of at a dead sprint.
“What’s going on?” Cam asked groggily.
Dante turned away from the window. “Unwanted visitors.”
“Just tell them to come back later,” Cam moaned, throwing an arm over his face, and then sat up straight, fear in his eyes as it clicked that they were in the middle of a zombie apocalypse, and the people outside weren’t salesmen. He shook Phillip. “Get up man, get up!” he urged.
His companion rolled towards him, propping his arm up on his elbows. “Dude, are you kidding me right now?” he whined.
The pounding on the side of the house intensified, and Cam shook his head.
“Dante, what is it?” Lily asked, rubbing sleep from her eyes as she emerged from the kitchen.
“Ace’s room,” Dante replied.
She looked around, grabbing a big butcher knife from the counter and heading down the hall with him to her cousin’s room. As they moved down the hallway, Abigail opened the spare room’s door.
“Is everything okay?” she asked.
Dante nodded. “Everything’s fine,” he replied gently, “just some early morning visitors. Just stay in your room for a bit while we handle it.”
Abigail nodded and Bailey approached, slipping inside and kneeling next to her sisters’ cot.
“Don’t worry,” she said firmly to the terrified girls, “Dante’s going to protect us.”
The kids looked up at him and he gave them a nod, and then Abigail shut the door.
Dante paused at Ace’s door and side-glanced his companion. “Do we knock, or what?” he asked.
“Depends,” Lily replied with a smirk, “does Ace strike you as the type of person you want to just walk in on unannounced?”
Dante immediately shook his head. “I’ve seen enough horror for the last few days,” he declared. “Let’s give him a few minutes to cover up.”
Lily laughed and banged her fist on the door. “Get your ass up boy, we got a situation!” she barked. There was no sound from the room other than the consistent smacking of the zombies. She furrowed her brow and pounded again. “Ace, open up, cuz!” she yelled.
There was still no answer, and they shared a concerned glance, and Dante slowly turned the doorknob. He pushed it open, the door creaking as he carefully revealed whatever sight awaited them inside.
The duo recoiled at the sight of Ace sprawled on the bed, stretching over the entirety of the queen-sized mattress, wearing only a tattered pair of tighty whities. He wore a large set of headphones, a long cord connecting them to a CD player on the side table.
The banging on the window was loud, but they could hear the music blaring from the headphones over it.
“It’s a wonder he’s not deaf,” Dante muttered, looking away from the scantily clad redneck.
Lily rolled her eyes. “You check our guests,” she said, “I’ll awaken sleeping beauty.”
“Good luck,” he said wryly, and headed for the window. He peered through the slats, seeing the five zombies right outside. Four of them were right up against the window, banging away, while the fifth slow one was just reaching the group.
Lily grabbed Ace’s leg with both hands, and gave it a good shake, acting like it was a zombie clutching him just before biting.
The sensation startled Ace awake, who began flailing about in a panic. He screamed and tore the headphones from his head, scrabbling to the head of the bed, eyes wide.
“What in the holy motherfucking shitballs are you doing, woman?!” he cried when he realized it was just his cousin. “I thought I was getting eaten!”
She wrinkled her nose. “With the way your tighty-whities are stained, they’d really have to be slumming it,” she said, clucking her tongue.
He looked down, realizing how exposed he was, and hopped away from the bed to find a pair of jeans on the floor. He threw them on, zipping up as he looked around, confused. “What the hell is that noise?” he asked.
“Zombies,” Dante replied.
Ace blinked, just realizing that the bigger man was in the room too, but headed over to the window to survey the situation. He peeked through the slats, scanning the ghouls.
“Holy shit, that’s the Robinsons,” he muttered, looking over the older couple with three teenagers. Everyone but the woman had visible
