ZWD: King of an Empty City Read online

  ZWD: King of an Empty City Chapter 01

  ZWD: Dec. 1.

  The house was cold even with all the blankets we found, but it was nice sleeping in a bed again. We picked up a dog from somewhere.

  The broken window let in the cold breeze and some snow, but I think we had every blanket in the house on the bed. Despite the cold I think it was the first night of real sleep we’d had in a few weeks. We’ve been doing a lot of running over the past few months, running and fighting.

  It was a crisp, cold morning when we woke up. It was so cold in the room you could see your breath in the air. But the blankets and quilts were so warm that we just wanted to stay in bed forever. So while we had a chance, we decided to just lie in bed and relax. We kept our ears open for sounds, all kinds of sounds. The quiet sounds especially; those are the worst. You hear one faint scraping sound and the next thing you know, you have a bunch of zombies on you. We’ve already learned to stay out of confined spaces. We’ve seen too many bodies where people have been trying to barricade themselves into some place small and they don’t make it.

  We broke into this house last night. Broke in, ha! The door was off the hinges. We cleared the house, then put the door back and barricaded it. You have to do that now, clear places. I always thought it was funny on the police shows when they busted into a place and went room-to-room yelling, “Clear.” Now I understand why they did it. You don’t want any surprises. We don’t yell clear. We’re afraid that would attract attention. We haven’t got a system to signal that the room is clear. We just hope we don’t miss anything. We hardly split up now. Never really out of each other’s sight.

  This was one of the worst houses to search and clear. A two-story house, not open concept; too many hiding places, too dangerous. We’ve found that sometimes zombies get stuck in corners or closets. I think it’s some sort of faded memory for them; they step into a closet and can’t get out, at least till you show up. Then for them it’s all about the food, and you’re the food.

  So far when we clear a house, we go room to room looking to make sure there are no zombies inside. Once we’re certain, we return to the doorway we came in and tape a piece of string across it about waist high. Zombies never pay any attention to objects like that; they just want food. If the string is broken we know we missed one. We do this to every room we look into. When the place is clear we start planning the escape routes. We found it’s a good idea to create two or more exits just in case you get trapped. Sometimes they’re simple, simple as busting through a window and hitting the ground running. Sometimes they’re as complicated as going to the attack and climbing out a window, then jumping to a tree and climbing down. We pick a spot nearby to meet up again. I know this sounds a little far-fetched, but it has kept us alive this past month. Picking a spot nearby to meet up again is key. Who would have thought those home fire PSAs they used to show late at night would be useful?

  We also made a checklist of supplies to look for after we clear a house.

  Lighters, candles, matches, canned food, flashlights, and dryer lint—it’s great tinder for starting fires. Toilet paper—she makes sure we have a roll with us even though the sewer system still works. I know this doesn’t seem like a great list, but we’ve never had to survive a zombie attack before, and there’s not really a guide for this. We’re making it up as we go along. I bet right now I’m carrying seven lighters with me. That and a pumpkin-scented candle and a can of red kidney beans for emergencies.

  We’re lucky the sewer systems still work, along with the tap water and the electric and gas. There are foods still in freezers and microwaves to cook. If we’re lucky, a house will still have heat we can run, at least when we’re feeling brave. Last night we were not brave. Last night we were mainly just tired. We’d been playing keep away from zombies left and right all day yesterday. It seemed like every time we turned around there was another one. When you're running all day it kind of wears you out. Last night we just wanted to find a safe place to sleep.

  I hadn’t seen so many zombies until yesterday. It was as if they were all trying to do nothing but kill us, like we were the only food source left for them in this city. I know there are other people because at every house we’ve checked lately, someone has beaten us to the food there. Honestly, yesterday was kind of a blur, but we did learn some valuable lessons. The night before we slept in a PT Cruiser with tinted windows. We chose it because it had the tinted windows and for the most part all its windows were small, harder for a zombie to get through. We’d started it up after we found the keys hanging on a hook inside a house where something was rummaging around in the back. We didn’t want to take chances so we grabbed the keys and went to the car. It started and it had gas, so we turned it off and crawled in the back and tried to sleep. You could hear them thumping and bumping into the car all night. She wanted to move the car off the street, but I thought it would be better if we kept it where we could go either backwards or forwards. We tried to take turns keeping a watch, but somewhere in there we both fell asleep. We woke up with a zombie standing in front of the car staring at us.

  I don’t know if he was staring at us or if he was staring at his reflection, but we didn’t dare move from where we were in the back. I was certain he couldn’t see us. Our downfall was when we shifted our weight. Lying in one spot the same way for so long gets to the body. We tried to shift around slowly, but I guess the car rocked or something and he started banging on the hood. At that point it didn’t seem to matter that we be stealthy. I slid over the seat and turned the key. As the car came to life another zombie hit my window. I threw it into reverse and hit the gas. We slammed into another car behind us that I hadn’t noticed the night before.

  The airbags went off and I was temporarily stunned. When it deflated there were four zombies on the car. I put it into drive and stomped on the gas. The one in front, the one that had been staring at us, was thrown on the hood. You know what the funny thing was? At the end of the block while I stared at his dead face, out of the corner of my eye I saw the stop sign, and out of habit, I slammed on the brakes. Can you believe that? I slammed on the brakes. In a world where the dead walk the earth, where you’re the food and anarchy is the law of the day, I was still obeying traffic laws.

  Her body was thrown forward and into my back from the impact. The zombie was thrown off the hood of the car and onto the street. Some alarm in the car started going off and down the street to the left two zombies turned to look at us. “Staring zombie” started getting up. I hit the gas again and ran him over, yelling over my shoulder, “Are you alright?” I didn’t hear anything, but I couldn’t worry about her just then. I backed up over him again and turned the car onto Eighteenth Street and gunned it. I aimed for the two zombies that had heard the alarm and were coming for us. Over the alarm the GPS voice came on telling me I had an alarm going off. I hit one of the zombies at about forty and was told that “sensors indicated” I’d had a collision and asked me if I needed assistance. I could feel her in the back being tossed around like a rag doll. She wasn’t making a noise, but I had to get us out of there and I didn’t want to have these zombies coming back to haunt us. I spun the car around like Steve McQueen in Bullitt and ran over the second one. The GPS voice kept right on informing me that I’d been in a collision, asking me if I needed assistance. I kept my foot on the gas and ran over “Staring zombie” again as we drove east on Eighteenth towards Main. This time I ignored all the stop signs.

  Seven or eight blocks away I stopped. I jumped out of the car and opened up the back. She was unconscious. A quick examination showed no blood. The car was making all sorts of noises with the alarm and the GPS voice. That was going to bring attention we didn’t need. I grabb
ed her by the ankle and pulled her out of the back, then hoisted her over my shoulder in a fireman’s carry. I couldn’t carry her and everything else, so I left all our belongings in the back of the car and headed north on Main.

  I’m not in shape and I have a bad knee, so it was slow going. Main Street is big and wide. Too much open space for us, so I turned down Seventeenth Street till I got to Rock Street and turned north again. I carried her down a driveway back behind this big Victorian gingerbread house and stopped in the alley. There were some bushes there that lined a privacy fence. I followed that till I found the gate.

  I put her on the ground and climbed up the fence and looked at the latch, no lock. I dropped over and opened the gate, grabbing her under the arms, and dragged her into the yard. Pulling the gate shut I plopped to the ground, exhausted.

  I heard whimpering and saw a dog across the yard on one of those retractable leashes. It was wrapped around a tree and at the other end of it tied to the tree was another zombie holding the leash. The dog was looking at me and begging for help. The zombie was looking my way and it sent a chill down my spine. Now I know what a gazelle feels like when a lion looks at it. I looked around the yard to see what other surprises it held. None. It was just the dog, this thing, and us. The fence was concealing us on all sides except for a gate off the driveway that was left open. That’s probably how they got in here.

  Who knows how long the dog had been there. He looked thin and hungry. Probably had been there for a few days. Talk about hell, tethered to a hungry dead thing wrapped around a tree. I would worry about the dog later. What are a few more minutes in hell?

  I don’t have a medical background. I couldn’t tell you how to treat much more than a headache. I felt her head again for blood. There was a big knot. I simply hoped she didn’t have a concussion. I had no idea how to treat that. She had bruises on her face and arms. I guess I’d knocked her around pretty hard driving away from the zombies. Not knowing what else to do, I slapped her face kind of hard to wake her up. If I’d had any water I would have splashed her. In a moment she started stirring.

  I sat there with her, holding her as she came around. I encouraged her to keep quiet as she regained her senses. I helped her to her feet and we walked around the backyard. We stopped at a garden bench that sat in front of an empty koi pond. When she seemed herself again, I turned to the dog.

  When I walked over to the dog he stopped whining and started growling. I think the zombie was growling too. I kneeled down, trying to make myself look as harmless as possible. He quieted down. Talking softly, I reached out and he snapped at me. I looked up at the zombie and she snapped at me too. I thought it would be a waiting game. Just take my time and win his trust, then undo him and have a friend for life like you see in the movies. I sat down and kept talking quietly to him. On the other side of the tree the zombie seemed to be more soothed by my words than the dog was. The dog was growling at me in low tones. I held out a hand for him to smell and he did, then barked once.

  Fear shot through my body as he barked. I didn’t want to bring any more attention to us today. I got up and walked back to the koi pond. She thought the poor dog needed to be free; I was thinking along the lines of how we could use him as a distraction if we needed to. Nothing came to mind. She was able to go over to him and pet him. Hell, he fell into her arms like they’d been friends forever. She undid the leash and he ran around the yard. He even ran over to me, jumped up licking my face, then ran around the yard again. Why couldn’t I have set him free?

  With the dog free, the zombie seemed to get upset. I guess all of this movement around the yard got to her. She started struggling against the leash that had her tied to the tree. I looked around the yard for a weapon. The only thing I saw was a birdbath. It was this big concrete thing that was in three pieces. It had been knocked over. I tried to pick up the water basin, but it was too heavy. The pedestal leg was too. So I picked up the base that was the size of a large dinner plate and weighed about thirty pounds.

  I walked up behind her. She struggled to turn around in her binding against the tree. I raised the pedestal over my head and brought it back down to my side. I sat it on the ground again and pulled out a bandana from my pocket and covered my face with it. I didn’t want to get zombie blood in my eyes or mouth. I don’t know how one turns into a zombie, and I don’t want to find out the hard way. With my face covered, I closed my eyes tight and brought the basin down on her head. That defiant crack of bone came to my ears. I opened my eyes. She had gone limp against the tree. I brought it down again for good measure, then backed up and looked down at myself. I was covered in brains and blood. The dog, the ungrateful dog, was nowhere to be seen. Everyone for themselves, I guess.

  I had no choice now. I had to get out of these clothes. I didn’t want zombie blood soaking into my skin. We turned our attention to the house.

  The back door was open so we crept up the steps to the small deck that had two little metal garden chairs at a circular table with statues of frogs gardening in the middle as a centerpiece. Just inside the door there was a little laundry room with a washer and dryer stacked on top of each other. Across from that was a set of shelves that held a lot of canned goods. Through another door we went into the kitchen. Sitting there at a table looking thoughtful was a zombie in bib overalls. I don’t know why, but I still held the base of the birdbath. As he stood up looking at us with his dead eyes, I said, “Hey, big man, catch!” and I threw the basin at him.

  I guess it was some kind of vague memory in his brain, but he lifted up his arms to catch it. As he did so I kicked him in the chest, knocking him to the floor. I grabbed a chair and set it down over his chest, pinning his head to the floor under one of the chair rungs. “Find something to kill him with,” I said and she handed me a cast iron skillet off the stove. With my weight all on one knee placed in the seat of the chair, I swung the skillet like a croquet mallet down on his head. He never made a sound. His skill just split and this dark ooze came out of it. I hit him several more times just for good measure.

  When I stopped I looked around she had a couple of butcher knives in her hands. One was long and pointed, and the other looked like an old meat cleaver that weighed about thirty pounds. My little warrior. We dragged the old man out into the yard. She found a mop and some bleach, then started cleaning up the floor. I looked around; I didn’t want any more surprises. Fortunately the house was empty, and it also looked like scavengers hadn’t hit it, till now.

  The house looked like it had belonged to a nice old couple who were enjoying their retirement. He was, I’m guessing, a gardener. There were a lot of books on landscaping and roses and things like that. Upstairs I found some clothes. He was about my size or a little bigger, so I grabbed some of his stuff and went to the bathroom to wash up. They still had hot water so I took a shower instead. It was the best shower ever. The first one I’d had in a month. The steam in the room was wonderful. I dressed in his slacks, a tee shirt, a button-down checkered dress shirt, and a sweatshirt. Looking at myself in the mirror of their bedroom all I could think was “Will I ever be able to look this dorky in my old age?” That little voice inside my head answered, “What makes you think you’re going to get to old age?”

  While I was in the shower she came and got my clothing. When I got out, she started a load of laundry. I know for her it was more a matter of feeling somewhat normal again, but I was grateful she was doing it. It really felt weird wearing someone else’s underwear. While our clothes dried, she showered and I rummaged around the cabinets. Things in the fridge were spoiled. The bread was molded, so that left canned goods. We found some creamed corn and a package of tuna fish still unopened. There was an unopened jar of pickle relish and some powdered eggs, so we made the worst tuna fish sandwich I’d ever had in my life, but it was food. That was the main thing.

  As soon as the dryer went off, I got into my old clothes again and felt like a brand new man. That was a good feeling. It did her some good too. She didn’t
look so lost. I think we’d both looked kind of lost for a while. But I guess that happens when you wake up one morning and the world is insane.

  We spent most of the afternoon sealing up the house, putting tables and couches in front of doors. The house was high on a foundation so the windows were kind of high. Standing outside, I would have to stand on my toes just to peer into the lowest of them. After that we relaxed and looked around to see what we could use. She found an old rucksack backpack and emptied it on the floor. It was filled with camera equipment. The newest camera was a digital one and still had good batteries. She looked at the photos they’d taken. There were only three, one of him, one of her, and one of both of them sitting at the table in the kitchen. Later on she found in a closet a bag full of wedding things, frames for pictures, guest books, congratulations cards. They looked like future gifts; at least, none of them were used. She took the guest book and signed our names to it, then took our pictures with the camera timer sitting at the same table in the kitchen. On a card she wrote, “Please sign in and take your picture.”

  We spent the rest of the day upstairs resting. Getting ready to move out in the morning. We knew as peaceful as it was here, this would not last. We’d seen it too many times. Before long, zombies would show up and we’d be on the move again. With black plastic bags over the windows to block the light, we played checkers and “Sorry” and the “Game of Life” by candlelight.

  The house had only one bedroom and the window to it had a busted-out pane. A big V-shape of glass was missing, so even with the plastic bag over it the room was still cold. We got into their big four-poster bed under every blanket and quilt we could find. It was the most comfortable bed I’d ever been in and we slept deep and hard that night. During the night the wind picked up and blew so hard through the broken window that it pushed the plastic covering off. The sun was out and it was probably about seven o’clock when I got out of bed to pee. I pulled the plastic off the window and got back in bed. We were still fully dressed and ready to move, to run at a moment’s notice. But it felt so good to be that warm. We hadn’t been that warm for months. We really didn’t want to leave the comfort of this cozy house, but we knew we had to eventually.