Undead Ally
Issue #2
by Tom Zjaba
Chapter Two
Run For Your Life
With the bus stopped, Trish slowly climbs to her feet. She feels something warm oozing down her face and wipes her hand to feel blood. She looks around the bus and sees movement in the darkness. She does not know what to do. She stops for a moment and listens. She hears something that chills her to the bone. The sound of moaning. Not the moaning of the people in the bus, who are all in pain from the crash. But the moan of the undead in the distance. She can hear they are coming and it sends a shiver down her spine. They heard the crash of the bus and are coming to investigate. She knows she has to do something and fast. She can move, so she knows that she has not broken any bones. It takes a few seconds to get her bearings and soon she realizes the front door of the bus is facing the ground. They are trapped in the bus and the undead are on their way. She panics as she realizes she is doomed. Then it hits her. School buses all have emergency back doors. She remembers how some troublesome boy on her bus would open the door and force the driver to stop. She then heads back and finds the door. She opens it and finds it is heavy. She pushes it hard and is able to get her legs out. She then pushes until she reaches the ground and can feel her feet on the ground. She holds the door open as she slips out and ducks to not get hit with the door. She then crawls away from the bus and gets up and looks back. She can see the light from the headlights, but that is the only light she sees. Above her, she hears the sound of the undead as they shuffle their way through the forest. She can hear the breaking branches and the sound of feet dragging over the dead leaves. And she hears the moaning as it grows louder and louder. She thinks for a second about going back and freeing the rest of the people from the bus. While they were not exactly her friends, they did allow her to travel with them and they did give her food and drink. The moralistic side of her contemplates going in and helping them out, but then she hears the moaning and the shuffling feet and she can tell they are very near. To go back would be to jeopardize her own life. Her survival instinct takes over and she starts to run away. But in the darkness, she does not know where she is going. She has no idea where the undead are either. She panics as she is afraid of running into them in the darkness. She gropes through the darkness until she comes to a tree. She feels that it has some lower branches and she reaches up for one and struggles to pull herself up. She curses herself for not taking gym class more serious. She strains to pull herself up, part from weak upper body strength and part from fatigue. But the sound of the undead is very close. She looks back at the bus and sees something moving in the headlights. Fear takes over and she quickly pulls herself up. She keeps climbing until she feels safe. From there, she looks down at the bus and cries. It is not long before she hears the screams of her companions as the undead find their way into the bus. For the rest of the night, she hears the sounds of moaning and the sounds of screams. Blood curdling screams that last until the middle of the night. All she can do is try to cover her ears and cry.
The next morning Trish awakens to find herself still in the tree. Her face hurts from having it against the rough bark all night, but otherwise she is alright. She looks down and says a quick prayer of thanks that she did not fall out of the tree. She looks up at the sun and blinks at the brightness. Turning away from the sun, she looks down at the bus and sees that most of the undead have left. There are a few stragglers roaming around the bus. Most are holding a body part that they ripped off one of her traveling companions. The sight of the undead with the remains of the people she was traveling with make her feel like she is going to throw up. It takes some will, but she is able to hold it in. The last thing she wants to do is alert them to her position because she vomits. As she surveys the situation, she can see two undead still around. With her bladder full and her body aching from being in a tree, she feels that she needs to climb down and make a run for it. Slowly, she works her way down the tree. The two undead have walked off into the woods, chewing on their limbs. They are busy and if she is careful, they will not notice her. One branch at a time, she works her way down until she reaches the ground. With her feet on the ground, she breathes a sigh of relief. Looking around, she finds it is safe. Knowing there may not be another opportunity like this, she quickly relieves herself.
With her bladder empty, part of her wants to check out the bus and see if there are any survivors. It is bad idea and the smart thing would be to distance herself from the area, but part of her needs to know. She still feels the guilt for not helping them out last night. Rationally she knows that if she did try to save them, she would be dead now too. But she will not forgive herself is she does not at least make an effort. With great caution, she approaches the bus. She can see that the back door is covered in blood and makes it so she cannot see into the bus. This scares her as she does not know what is in the bus. Will she find it full of undead? As she nears the bus, she figures it would wise to knock on the back door and see if anyone hears her. Standing in front of the door, she makes the sign of the cross before she knocks. Taking a deep breath, she knocks on the window. At first she does not hear anything. But then she hears something moving inside. She knocks again and says "Hello, is anyone in there?" That creates even more noise as there is even more movement inside the bus. She tries to rub the window to see it, but finds that the stains that prevent her from seeing are on the inside. As she rubs the glass, a hand smacks up against the glass, scaring her. She falls back as she sees the hand rubbing across the blood. Then she hears the all too familiar moaning as the door starts to move. She steps back slowly as she sees a leg coming out of the door. Not a living leg, but a dead one. It is barefoot with part of the flesh missing off one side, exposing part of the bone. She screams out as she steps back further. As she turns to run away, she trips on one of the uprooted plants and falls on her face. The undead is now almost out of the bus with another coming behind him. She struggles to get up from the ground as she sees some of the other undead that had left the area are returning. She can see them slowly moving through the trees and it scares her. With great effort, she pulls herself up and runs into the woods. All around her, she can hear the moaning. She does not know where it is coming from, only that she needs to run and avoid it. Branches rip at her flesh and clothes as she blindly rushes through the forest. Lucky for her, she is headed in the right direction and within minutes, she reaches the road. Looking back, she breathes a sigh of relief. At least she is not lost in the woods.
After a few moments to catch her breath, she looks up and down the road. There is no sign of any undead on the roads. At least she can stop and think for a moment. Looking at the place where the bus went off the road, she can only imagine how fast the driver was going. The guard rail is knocked over and she can see the path the bus took through the woods. She then looks back at the direction they came from and thinks if they passed anything on the way. It was so dark that she does not remember seeing anything. The last place she can remember was the gas station, but that was miles back. Her stomach begins to growl as it has been hours since she ate anything. Knowing that the only food around is on the bus, she looks down at her stomach and says "Sorry girl, but we have nothing to eat." With that out of the way, she decides to keep walking the way they were headed. With any luck, she will come across a house or a store and find something to eat and drink.
The sun is high in the sky and is extremely hot. Trish walks along the road, feeling the heat of the sun. Sweat pours down her face as she keeps moving along. Part of her wants to walk in the shade of the trees that line the road, but she fears running into one of the undead. While they do move during the day, they are most active at night. She noticed that during the day, they would not see a lot of undead, unless they stop somewhere. But at night, they were everywhere. It was just her observations and she really didn't know if it meant anything or not. But she has been traveling for hours on this road and have not seen a single undead. Looking up ahead, she sees a farm house in the distance. She makes a sign of the cross as thanks. While she is not a religious person, she was raised Catholic and it is a habit that has stuck with her. Even in these times when one's faith is sorely tested and many have given up on God, she still prays and says thanks to God.
As she nears the house, she sees that it looks like it hasn't been touched. Most houses have broken windows or smashed in doors. But this one looks fine. And next to the house is fields of corn. Looking at the tall stalks, she wonders if the corn is ripe and can be picked. Being a city girl, she knows little about farming. Outside of a school trip to a farm in grade school, she has no exposure to farm life. At the top of the driveway, she pauses to do a safety check. She looks in all directions and sees nobody. Then she takes a few steps towards the house and looks for any signs of forced entry. The front door is closed and the windows are all intact. There is no telltale signs of blood that is usually around. Sniffing, she does not smell death. This seems too good to be true. She walks up to the front door and pauses. Should she knock or just try to go in? Her mind says to knock while her instinct tells her to just open the door. The curtains are closed, so she cannot see into the house. She looks at the large farmhouse with the white paint and blue trim. There is even a welcome mat at the front door. Deciding to be polite, she knocks on the door. The sound of the knock echoes through the house, but otherwise there is no sound. A second knock yields the same results. Swallowing hard, she grabs the doorknob and test to see if the door is locked. To her surprise, it is not. The door opens easily and soon sunlight floods into the dark house. Looking around, the only life she sees is the cobwebs that are already building. The one creatures that have not been affected by the whole plague is the insects. If anything, they are flourishing in a world where humans don't have time to spray and squash them. She looks around and then yells out "Hello! Is anyone here?" The house is as quiet as a tomb. She looks around and realizes that it is too dark in the house. Walking over to the front window, she pulls the drapes and let the rays of the sun into the house. Looking around, she sees the room is very dusty. The furniture, which looks a lot like the kind of furniture her grandmother would own, is covered in dust. Swiping her finger across the coffee table, she makes a path through the dust. This makes her feel better. It is obvious that no one has been in this house for awhile.
With a sense of relief, she goes about opening all the curtains and the windows. The house is stuffy and hot from being closed up. Looking in the kitchen, she decides to see what is in the fridge. As she opens it up, the stench of decaying food pours out and stings her nostrils. Covering her nose, she quickly closes the door. She then turns to the cupboards and looks in there. The first one is full of plates. The next one has glasses. The search continues until she finds one full of canned goods. She looks through the cans with eyes wide open. There are stacks of vegetables, fruits and canned soups. Looking up to the heavens, she says thanks and makes the sign of the cross. If nothing else, she will be eating good. Going through the smaller drawers, she finds an old fashioned can opener. She laughs as she has not seen one of these in a long time. Her parents always had an electric can opener. Everyone she knew had an electric one. Never has she been so happy to see backwards technology. Grabbing it, she quickly opens a can of pears. She takes a long sip of the juice to help quench her thirst as she devours the entire can of pears. Nothing has ever tasted so sweet. With something in her belly, she looks for something to drink. Knowing it is futile, she goes and turns on the faucet. Nothing comes outs. All the power has been off for the past month. As she looks out the kitchen window, she sees an old fashioned well. Hoping it has water, she prepares to head outside. But before she does, she grabs a large kitchen knife for protection. While everything seems safe, she does not want to take a chance. Armed with a knife, she ventures out to the well.
As she steps outside, she looks around for any danger. Things are too quiet around here. Holding the knife in front of her like a sword, she slowly steps out and makes her way towards the well. Cautiously, she makes her way to the well and looks down. It is too dark for her to see anything. Looking around, she finds a small rock and drops it into the well. Listening, she hears it splash as it reaches the bottom. Smiling, she lowers the bucket down into the water. After hearing it splash into the water, she pulls the bucket back up. As it reaches the top, she sees that it is indeed full of water. She pulls the water up and cups her hand and fills it with water. Taking a long drink, she smiles as it tastes good and is cool. She doesn't even mind that her hand is dirty. A few more drinks and she feels better. Realizing she has nothing to take the water back with, she runs to the house to get a bowl or bucket.
Later that evening, Trish decides to bring up enough water to take a bath. While it is a little crazy, she has turned the sink into a fire pit with a bag of charcoal she found in a shed. Making the fire was easy with a little lighter fluid that was also there and some matches she found. At first she worried about burning down the house, but she kept a fire extinguisher she found nearby. As the flames died down and the coals became good and hot, she put a pot of water on top of them. Once the water hit boiling, she would pour it in the tub and then fill up another pot. It took a good hour to get the tub halfway filled but it is well worth it. She strips off her filthy clothes and grabs a bar of soap and some shampoo. Easing into the hot water never felt so good. It has been ages since she has enjoyed this luxury. Taking a wash cloth, she soaks up some of the hot water and rubs it slowly over her body. Not so much to clean as to relax. She looks down and can see the water is already tainted from the dirt on her body. It has literally been weeks since she washed her entire body. Before that, the best she could do was wipe down parts of her body in a gas station wash room. But this was good, real good.
After a half hour of soaking, she feels fatigue coming over her and decides that she better wash up. While this has been one of the better days, it still has been stressful. And carrying up buckets of water to have her bath contributes to her fatigue. The water was starting to cool off and she did not have anymore to boil. Grabbing the washcloth, she washed off the layers of dirt, uncovering the person she was before all this. Then she poured water over her head and grabbed the shampoo and washed her hair. It has been a long time since she used real shampoo. The best she could do before was take a handful of soap from a dispenser in the gas station bathroom and try to clean her hair. While it was cleaner, it was not manageable and it was impossible the get all the soap out of her hair using a bottle of water. But this was different. This was nice. And the candles she put around the room for light added to the atmosphere. All she needed was a bottle of wine and a good romance novel and it would be complete. That and Guy. How she wished Guy was here to wash her hair. It was one of those things she read about in a romance novel but never thought it would be sexy. That was until Guy washed her hair one day. The time he took massaging her scalp and running his fingers through her hair was an experience she will never forget. And sadly, she will probably never experience it again. All the men she has encountered since the world has changed, care nothing for romance. All they care about is their own needs and doing whatever they want to fill those needs. That is one good thing that has come from the bus crash, she does not have to be subjected to that. She was lucky that they had so far ignored her, but with the selection of women thinning on the bus, it was only a matter of time.
With the bath done, she wraps up in a comfy bath robe and decides to make sure all the doors and windows are locked. She did it before her bath, but in this world you need to check and recheck if you want to live to the morning. One by one, she checks to make sure they are locked and secure. She is carrying a lantern with her that was in the barn. It illuminates the dark house and sends a glow out into the darkness. Once each window is checked, she pulls the shades to block out the outside world. In case anyone goes past in the night, she wants the house to look like it is empty. With the house secured, she heads to the upstairs bedroom. While there is a bedroom on the ground floor, she feels better having a set of stairs between her and the undead. As she reaches her room, she puts down the lantern and pushes a small chest in front of the door. The wooden chest is not very heavy as it is made of cheap wood and only has three drawers, but it is enough to alert her to anyone trying to break into her room. She then pulls her curtains and blows out the lantern. Feeling secure, she lays down in the bed and pulls the blankets over her. To feel a real bed with pillows again is so wonderful. She smiles as she feels relaxed for the first time in ages. Within minutes, she drifts off to a deep sleep.
Across the street, three men watch as the last light in the house goes out. The men dirty and grubby with untrimmed facial hair, dirty ball caps with greasy, unwashed hair sticking out the back. The leader looks at the house and says "Someone is living in there. And where there is people there is food." His name is Tobias and he is a former prison guard who is nasty to the core. He is chewing on an old straw as he looks at the house. The second man, Johnnie chimes in "Are we gonna kill them while they sleep?" Tobias looks at him with a dirty look and says "We have no idea how many are in there or how well armed they are. We wait for morning to get a better idea of what we are dealing with." Johnnie laughs as he says "I hope there are some women in there. I'm sick of jerking off." The third man, Syn as he calls himself is a very tall and ugly man. He stands about six foot six, a good half a foot taller than the other two men. He wears all black which now has various stains on it. He has long black hair that goes past his shoulder. He used to be a guitarist in the old world. He played in a death metal band that used to sing about the end of the world and the dead rising from their graves. Unlike most people, he is not scared by the undead. Instead, he likes to come up with ingenious ways to torture them. He is also the smartest of the group, which is nothing to brag about. "I agree with Tobias, we need to know what we are dealing with." Johnnie, who used to work as a bouncer, does not agree with them but knows he is outvoted two to one. He is the strongest of the group, being shorter than the rest but thick as an oak tree. In the old world, he was big into weight lifting and is quite strong. His biggest weakness is his sex drive, which got him into allot of trouble. With numerous kids by different women, he was always getting himself into trouble. While he was always able to attract women, he had a hard time keeping them. He was dominating and has a bad temper. More than once, he was charged with assault and spent time in jail. But he always behaved in jail and his stay was usually short. Now he can do what he wants with no fear of going to jail. He grabs the binoculars from Tobias and looks at the upstairs window. "We are coming for you tomorrow, so get your beauty sleep." he says as he looks at the window.
Undead Ally ©
Tom Zjaba 2008