one hand grenade could have taken us all out. My drill sergeant would have kicked my ass if he could see me now. I wondered what happened to him. He was entirely too mean to die, probably scared the shit out of the Reaper when he came to collect him.
I dry fired my rifle, quickly feeling around for a replacement magazine that wasn’t there.
“This sucks!” I shouted to the wind.
Gary looked over. He was placing well aimed shots center mass in the foreheads of our opponents. “What?” he yelled over the din.
“I’m pretty much out of ammo.” I uttered the two words in battle I swore I would avoid at all costs. “Fix bayonets!” “What the hell are you talking about?” BT asked, raising his cheek off of his stock.
I grabbed the Bowie knife I had strapped to my side. I didn’t actually attach it to my rifle; it was just a play on words. Our position was tenuous to say the least. Our backs were against the wall (no, literally, they were). Zombies had completely taken over the roof. Some of the speeders were actually so close that my weapon could be of use. I’d never stabbed anyone in the head, until now that is. I figured a direct thrust into the forehead most likely wasn’t the best idea. I was afraid that if my blade did penetrate, that it would get stuck and then I’d be down to hand-to-mouth combat. Or possibly, if I didn’t get a straight enough push, the blade would glance harmlessly off the thing’s skull. Sure, it would open up a wicked wound and rip the flesh clean off exposing the white bone beneath, but the zombie sure wouldn’t care. I came in sideways striking home through the temple. I’d had a harder time cutting off pats of butter back in the day than I did driving that knife home. If anything, I went too deep scrambling that thing ’s blackened brain matter. It couldn’t drop fast enough as I pulled my knife free.
“That’s pretty gross,” BT said, kicking one of the zombies away before placing a pistol shot in its skull.
We were so tightly packed together at the end, it was tough to tell where I ended and the next body began.
Tracy whispered in my ear, “I’ve always loved you, Mike, even after all these years.” “Even after all my idiosyncrasies?”
“Maybe even more so because of them; they make you who you are.”
“So you pretty much thinking this is the end then?” I asked her as I pulled my blade free from its errant placement in a zombie’s shoulder. Its teeth snapped dangerously close to my hand. Gary blew the side of its face off. Its exposed chattering teeth made it seem that much more dangerous. If it got a hold of my fingers now, I could watch it eat them and swallow. I know that would have been too much.
“You should be more careful Dad,” Travis said, finishing the beast off.
I nodded my head in thanks.
“Just know that I love you,” Tracy said behind me.
“The fat lady isn’t singing just yet,” BT said, eavesdropping on our conversation.
“This is an intimate moment right now, do you mind?” I asked.
“Not at all, take a moment, maybe go find a quiet area,” he said, breathing heavily. He was also out of bullets and was using his rifle as a club.
Thank the stars he was so tall that when he swung, no one needed to duck.
“The fat lady might not be singing yet, but she sure is stuffing her face at the buffet table,” Justin said between rounds.
“Is anyone
My arms hurt from swinging and I only heard a few shots going off. The roof was covered in the detritus from zombie bodies, so much so I thought the roof might be in danger of collapsing under their combined weight. I knew it was only a matter of time. Nobody ever survives a zombie apocalypse, it just isn’t in the cards. A speeder came up on me so fast I was only able to raise my knife in defense. I watched as his mouth closed down on the blade. His teeth splintered on the cold metal and his lips ripped where they made contact with the sharply honed blade. He shook his head from side to side. I guess he thought that he had struck a particularly tough piece of human gristle and if he shook hard enough and long enough he would be rewarded with the sweet, savory satisfaction of meat.
What the ass did succeed in doing was to pull my knife from my blood soaked hand. Not sure who finished the blade stealer off, but he let go of my knife at the same moment a bullet pierced his skull. The backward push on his brain bucket sent my knife into the air, not far mind you, but I was in a little bit of a sticky wicket. You know, being in the middle of a battle with nothing more than my wits was not a great place to be, considering my wife would probably tell you I’d be wholly unprepared for such a confrontation.
As I reached out to grab the knife and came back up to defend myself, I felt the press of teeth on my shoulder. ‘What a way to go,’ I thought to myself as I came completely up. “What the…!” is what I yelled.
Staring back at me, tongue lolling all over the place, was Red Neck Number One. Of course if you remember correctly, he was missing his jaw due to some heavy facial reconstruction from Henry. So Redneck Number One, for the third time, almost got the best of me. “Third time’s the charm,” I told him as I shoved the knife up through his soft palate. There would be no fourth encounter.
“Sorry man,” BT said, “I missed him completely!” he shouted, blowing a few more zombies to their version of Kingdom Come.
“It’s alright, this one was personal,” I grimaced as I pulled my knife free. RN#1’s cowboy-boot-wearing feet twitched a couple of times and then I lay to rest at least one of my nightmare s . And then I prepared for more. The zombies stopped their approach at precisely the same time I heard my name spoken.
“Michael,” Eliza’s voice came silently but with force.
“That Eliza?” Paul asked.
“You heard that?” Justin asked him.
“I thought that was in my head,” I said.
“Conversing with the enemy?” Alex asked.
If I thought we were tightly packed beforehand, I was now able to tell who had Chapstick in their pockets and who was just happy to see me.
“That’s her?” Perla asked, the whites of her eyes more abundantly exposed as fear pulled her features taut.
“She doesn’t sound so bad,” Cindy said, trying to bolster her flagging spirits.
Just the sound of Eliza’s voice was enough to suck the soul from a preacher and not many of us looked pious just now.
“Why are you keeping her waiting?” April asked anxiously.
“If you’re in such a rush, why don’t you go say ‘Hi,’” BT told her heatedly.
Like a little kid April hid behind the petticoats of Mad Jack. That is, assuming that he had petticoats on, but you get the picture.
“See, I told you she only wanted him. El Diablo!” Marta screamed.
“El Diablo,” Mrs. Deneaux mirrored. “That’s rich!” as she took a puff off her cigarette.
“When the hell did you have enough time to light that?” I asked her.
“If I was to die I thought it only dignified that I do so with a Chesterfield in my mouth,” Mrs. Deneaux said smoothly.
Not a bad ad campaign I thought. Pretty sure Chesterfield wouldn’t have agreed.
Travis stood up precariously on the lip of the wall so that he could get a better angle over the tops of the zombies’ heads. He blasted two rounds through the open door. We all hoped he got lucky.
Eliza’s echoing laugh in the stairwell soon answered that question. A lone cataract-eyed zombie fell face first through the portal, his tongue hanging out inches below his open mouth. I was instantly transported back to Day One and Sir Licks A Lot. That was back when a zombie invasion was what it should be, all slow shufflers with no one to lead them. Ah, the Good Old Days.
“If your spawn deigns to live through the day I would suggest that he does not fire his rifle again,” Eliza said, her voice traveling elusively in the acoustic laden stairwell, making it difficult to get a fix on her. But what do I know? It could be some Vampire trickery.
“Still though, it is a damn shame he missed,” I told her.
I think she hissed, either that or a cat got its tail stepped on.
“I’ve got a surprise for you Michael,” she lilted.
