She fired once more, then paused to reload, standing next to Max, who was down on one knee in the middle of the road.
Red decided to proceed as if nothing had happened, “Do you see them?”
“Fuck you!” Stewart yelled, pulling the shotgun up and aiming it where Red's voice came from. Max reached up and pulled the stock down, earning a glare from her.
“It wasn't him. He is telling the truth about us not being able to stay here.”
“What is going on Max, what did you see?”
“Zombies, lots and lots of zombies.”
“How many?”
“Over a hundred and fifty thousand, near as we can tell.” said Red, moving slightly to one side after talking.
“Are you bringing them here?”
“No, me and my two friends are doing everything we can to stop them.”
“Why?”
“Because I hate them Max. I hate what they did to us and I hate what they are trying to do to you and the other humans. But I need your help.”
“What?”
“Do you want what I need or some background first? If you have time and if you promise not to shoot at me I can tell you what I know and what I need.”
“Stewart?”
“I am not inviting them up to the house for coffee. We stay here and he and his friends do not get any closer to the house than they already are.”
“We won't come any closer.”
“Okay, then we can talk. So tell your story.” Stewart said belligerently.
“It started down in Florida. My brother in law called me up and asked me to help him move his old car off the street, he said the cops were going to tow it. I came over to help, and these cops met me there and they 'arrested' me. I had no idea what was going on or even why they had taken me in. They parked next to this building and dragged me inside, it looked like a normal office building on the outside and smelled terrible inside, like being downwind of a deer two weeks dead. So we go in and I meet this guy, he looked like a mad scientist and he introduced himself as Doctor Thomas Sentry. At this point I thought it might be some sort of prank my in- law was playing, but he just stood there with a dumb look on his face, more sad than anything. The cops stayed with me while the Doc when into another room, eventually he called for us and that is when I started struggling. There were three zombies along one wall, I didn't know they were zombies at the time, but I knew there was something wrong with them. The floor was coated with blood, some dried, some fresh. The smell, God the smell, was horrible! I know what 'carnal house' smells like now; rotted and decomposing flesh. The doctor came in and told me not to be afraid and while the police held me, he bit into my neck, sure that wouldn't make you afraid. I could not move, I have to emphasize this, the cop's grips were like iron. After he bit into my neck he started sucking my blood, but it got all over me, ran down my shirt, down the outside of my jeans and splattered onto the floor. I was hurt bad too, and I knew it, there was just so much blood. Then I remember him pulling back and slitting my wrist with a small sharp knife, he did it length ways down my arm, not across it. He collected my blood in a five gallon bucket not some medical thing, just a normal looking plastic pail. The bucket already had some blood in it, half coagulated on the sides and it looked like…well, like when your momma made brownies and let you lick the bowl. There were finger streaks all through the blood, as if someone or something couldn't get enough of it. My last living memory is of watching my blood pool at the bottom of that bucket.”
'Do you remember being dead at all?”
“No. I don't have any visions to tell you about heaven or hell. If any of the others remember anything they are not talking. I can tell you this though, they burned all of the churches in town, on Sentry's orders. I think some of the faithful were inside them at the time too. The first thing I remember when I came back was having my head inside the bucket, licking up someone else's blood. I remember drinking a half dozen times, I didn't get the whole bucket, I just got a portion and when Sentry decided I was smart enough he booted me out with instructions to not make any more zombies and lay low until he called me. Of course not everyone followed that rule, he must have messed up his instruction to some of the others somehow and that is when the problems started. Things got out of hand pretty quickly and all of us were called up to rein in the renegade zombies. Zombies attacking others in the street and one couple moved off to a nearby community and started a nest of zombies there, it was a mess and Sentry barely got it under control before he made his plans. We like the flesh of our enemies too, blood is good, if it is fresh enough, but nothing is better than living flesh.”
“Even now?” asked Stewart.
“Now…well now I am able to control my hunger a little better, I am not sure why. Before I couldn't, I just had to eat, there was no way I could stop, aside from having the food removed from me or being ordered to stop eating.”
“So you don't eat anymore? Not even regular food?”
“No.”
“How is that possible?”
“You know what I did Stewart? Before I became what I am?”
“No, what?”
“I was an assistant manager at the 'Bait Bucket', we sold fishing supplies and bait. Do you really think I might be able to tell you what has happened to me or why I don't need to eat anymore?”
“No, I suppose not. So how'd you end up in Colorado?”
“You two know anything about 'Og'?”
Max shook his head, “No, I thought I heard the name on the radio, WWEB. Just before it went off the air.”
“Yeah that is right, well Og was actually Neil Rosol, I never liked the guy. I was with him, not by choice I had to go with him.”
“Everyone has choices Red.” said Stewart.
“Humans have choices, Stewart, zombies have to do what their maker tells them to do. Most zombies, even the smart ones never figure this out, that they can control their own 'children' quite well and even lesser zombies to a great extent. Anyway Neil and I came up from Florida. There was this guy there, Doctor Sentry, he is the one who made us all, in theory that makes him the head zombie and he should be able to control all of his creatures. However I know for a fact that controlling zombies a couple generations removed from you is more difficult than one you made yourself. If I ran into a really smart zombie…”
“We call them 'Super Zombies'.” said Max.
“Yes that is good, if I ran into a super zombie who was my great-great-grandchild I might not be able to tell him to do anything, unless I was more powerful than he was.”
“How do you get more powerful?” asked Stewart, already suspecting the answer.
“Eat more humans, or drain their blood at least. Anyway I was talking about Neil. He was a big fan of Egyptian mythology, one day he decided we had to call him 'Og' some sort of sun God or something. I was down there with him at the radio station, a group of soldiers came and were roughing up our troops, they tended to use wounding tactics, fragmentation grenades, shots to the arms and torso when they first ran into us. They soon learned that only major trauma to the head would keep the zombies down and switched tactics pretty quick. What they didn't expect was that we, well, you would call us 'supers', had picked up several weapons from the police and other convoy's we had ambushed earlier, we even had some rocket propelled grenades, that sort of thing and a few zombies who knew how to use them. We let the convoy get in real close then hit them hard, we almost wiped them out, but they had a reserve that retreated when we got the first bunch of them. I was sent by Neil to pursue those soldiers when the bomb went off behind me. Almost everyone I was with didn't make it. I had the luck of being down by this shitty little creek and it was just low enough that the debris went flying over my head by inches instead of into my head. I tried to crawl down under the stream bed after that, I didn't know if there would be more bombs coming or if it was over. There was only the one, and it took the heart out of Neil's army, most of the supers were there with him, and the ones who had come with me were just gone once I got up. Here and there a few dumb zombies shuffled around, but I was free. See it gets back to the orders I was given by Doctor
