“Are you going too, Alex?” I asked
His eyes fell. “Jed said that I was eligible for the same exemption as my wife and kids, but I couldn’t find it in myself to take the place of some other woman or kid. What kind of man would I be?” His eyes met mine. “I am going to put my name in for one of the gunners on top. If God deems it, I will go with my Marta.” He kissed his hand and made the Holy sign of the Trinity on his chest.
“How much longer?” I asked, pointing to the truck. Alex seemed happy to move on from the subject we had reluctantly broached.
“Tomorrow at the latest. I’m working on a couple of ideas for the skirt. I want to make sure it doesn’t cause the truck to hang up on anything.”
We didn’t touch that with a ten-foot stick. But as Alex’ eyes briefly met mine, the point was made. He was entrusting his wife and child to this design. I jumped when a shot rang out no more than a hundred yards from our location. Alex had turned back to his task at hand. I was going to ask him if he needed any help, but this felt more like my cue to leave. I contemplated going into the clubhouse and talking to Jed, but the likelihood that he of all people would do anything to elevate my present mood was unlikely. I loved the old man, but he was a crotchety son-of-a-bitch. Then again so was I. I mean the part about being a son of a bitch, not crotchety. Ha, I could elevate my own damn mood, I said sourly as I began a slow walk around the perimeter of Little Turtle. I received the occasional greeting from some of the sentries but for the most part I was left alone. It was when I reached the far side of the complex that I ‘felt’ a difference. I couldn’t at first tell what it was, but the change was thick in the air.
I looked around trying to figure it out. It was an absence that was causing the difference, an absence of prying eyes. There were no zombies watching my every move. No zombies debating on which part of me might be stringy, which parts succulent. My spirit nearly soared. It felt like a reprieve, a last minute call from the governor. Even the air smelled a little sweeter, marginally. On this side of the complex the wall was built on top of a small rise, maybe six feet or so. The other side of the wall had the same drop off, so that would explain a lot. There would have to be a lot more zombies killed on this side before their vision would peek over the top. But it was more than that, I hoped. The air was less heavy here, that’s the best I can explain it. But I wasn’t convinced. You don’t grow up on the East Coast and not hold on to a certain measure of cynicism. I climbed up onto the nearest guard tower, startling the guard to no end. Not realizing how close I had just succumbed to friendly fire, the view was worth the chance. There were some zombies milling about but not anything near the volumes on the other three sides. I couldn’t believe my eyes.
“How long has it been like this?” I asked the portly guard.
He was still recovering from his scare. (Must have been National Guard, I mused.)
“They started moving away around ten,” he answered.
“So about the time they started to see over the wall on the other side,” I stated more to myself than him. He half smiled and shrugged. He had no clue.
“They’ve just been leaving in streams pretty much since,” he said, kind of like he was looking for some praise, friggen idiot.
“So you’re telling me the zombies have been vacating this area for the past three hours, and you didn’t feel the need to tell anyone?!” I yelled at him. He backed away.
“I…I…I um, Fritzy said,” he stammered.
I was pissed, a potential escape route was staring us in the face and this fat fuck couldn’t get up off his ass to let anyone know. I was closing in on the guard, for what I hadn’t decided yet, but as he pulled back and covered his face with his hands I knew it was time to ease off a bit.
“What about Fritzy?” I barked.
“He… he…he...”
Great, I’m in the middle of a war and the only person with relevant information is a stuttering fool. The Gods must be crazy! I backed away some more; his speech impediment greatly improved.
He swallowed loudly. “He said he would let Jed know.”
I hadn’t gone in to talk to Jed but this wasn’t a secret Jed would have kept to himself, he sure as hell didn’t know.
“Where’s this Fritzy guy staying?”
I got the information I was looking for with a little more yammering and headed off. I was fearful if I stayed any longer I might do something that guard would regret. Why I went looking for ‘Fritzy’ I couldn’t say. I would have been better off minding my own damn business. As it was I was thoroughly pissed off and I was looking for a punching bag to vent on. I went to his front door and rang the bell. Well to be honest, I pushed the button and I didn’t hear the familiar dingdong accompaniment. I banged my fist against the door hard enough to make the frame rattle. No luck, this stupid puke was probably passed out in front of his defunct TV with half a bottle of Jack in his lap. I tried the lock, no luck, most people in this neighborhood had always kept their doors locked and nothing that was happening now had made the place any safer. His two front windows had the shades drawn. LEAVE! My senses screamed. I paid them no heed. I walked around the back of his building. His gate was unhitched. LEAVE! That pesky voice said again. I’m not psychic in any capacity so I most likely had these feelings of foreboding after the fact, when I could sit down and write about it. But it would be nice to think I had a higher consciousness that was looking out for me, much more comforting that way. I walked into his small, unadorned backyard, minimalism at its best. He had one bleached out patio chair and an umbrella that hadn’t stopped anything much smaller than a basketball in a couple of years, laid out on his concrete slab of a backyard. In the far corner stood a small bundle of bricks and two bags of cement from a project that didn’t look like it would ever get completed. The cement in the bags had gotten wet and was set, he basically now had two 100-pound paperweights. My back ached just with the thought of moving those things. I was stalling. There was something wrong here and still I plodded on. His back sliding doors were also covered with long brown vertical shades. I pressed my face to the glass but was not rewarded for my effort. The murk from within was not yielding any secrets.
I knocked, but not nearly as loudly as I had at the front. I convinced myself that I was afraid of breaking the glass, but it was more than that. I felt like an intruder, I was now on his property uninvited, but why should that matter? I tried the door. It was locked. ‘Whew, good thing,’ I thought. My mind was saying ‘Get the fuck out!’ while my hands were popping the sliding door out of its tracks. I had pulled my gloves off and with the friction from my hands, I pushed up on the glass and as it came out of the bottom groove I then wrapped one of my hands around the side and pulled it towards me. The waft of warm, stink filled air that hit my face nearly made me drop the door. It smelled like he was cooking a zombie, or maybe it was just broccoli, I couldn’t tell. Both of those smells skeeve me out. I pushed past the greasy shades and was greeted with the low deep growl of a large animal. I froze. Out from the gloom of the hallway approached a mid-sized bear. Its throat rumbled a warning, or maybe that was its stomach. What’s worse: getting eaten by a zombie or a bear? Not much of a choice, pretty much like deciding if getting stabbed or shot is better, they both suck.
I was halfway in and out of the shades and was afraid the movement to reach and grab my rifle would cause the big animal to attack. I eased my hand back to my belt. I had the foresight to strap on my 9-millimeter but I wasn’t feeling all that lucky. It would take three or four well-aimed rounds with that caliber to take down a bear and I had maybe one or two max before this thing would be on me. Well, at least I knew what the stink was. This bear must have eaten Fritzy. The next question, however, was a little unsettling. What the hell was a bear doing in here in the first place? My hand had finally reached upon the pistol and the bear must have realized I was up to no good, at least for him. He charged full tilt. Two shots my ass, I had barely got the pistol out of the holster when the creature slammed into my legs. I fell over, my hand slamming into a foot mat. I was tangled up in the shades and rolled around, finally pulling them free from their moorings. The rail gave me a glancing blow across the top of my head. That was the least of my worries. I was kicking my legs like a marathoner in the hopes that Smoky the Bear wouldn’t be able to find purchase. Sometime during the fray I had lost the pistol. The rifle might have been in a safe for all the good it was going to do me. The bear would be digesting me by then. I was moving like an epileptic on crack, shitloads of movement with no purpose, but still no bone crunching rending. I paused for a moment, my trip- hammer heart making that a difficult process. I sat up expecting to be face-to-face with the beast. Nothing. Did I imagine it? I looked around my immediate vicinity. No, the thing had hit my legs hard enough to bruise them. A bruise was infinitely better than what I had been expecting. I sat up fully now, curiosity now beginning to overtake the ebbing fear. It wasn’t a bear. It was Bear. Over by the gate was the biggest Rottweiler I had ever seen. Bear had been a resident of Little Turtle for at least as long as I had lived here. I had seen him around the complex on
