POW! (Book 1): The Zombie Days (6 page)

I walked over to a tree, careful not to step in anything that may be on the ground on my way. I unzipped my pants, and as soon as I unleashed my downstairs neighbor, I heard a roar that most certainly did not come from me.

Fuck.

My.

Life.

"What's that!?" shrieked Evelyn.

"That's a cougar," I said, barely loud enough for her to hear. "Remain as quiet as possible. Maybe it won’t notice us."

"Won't the sound of your peeing cause it to come get us?" she asked, making a very solid point.

"I can't stop!"

Footsteps and falling urine were the only sounds in my entire world. The steps were getting closer while the urine continued at a constant, seemingly thunderous volume.

"Get down," she said softly.

"No, don't move," I said in a regular voice, as calm as possible in such a situation. I could see the large cat, now. It was looking at me; ears back. It looked like it was about ready to pounce on me. I reached for the knife in my belt, but it was already too late for me, the cat was charging.

The beast sprung in my direction.

Surprisingly, it was Evelyn who took the shot.

The round hit my leg and I dropped like a worthless sack of potatoes. The big cat missed me by a mile. Evidently, he had a different target in mind. As it descended from its great leap, its front paws came in contact with the chest of a zombie that I had absolutely no knowledge about. The terror of knowing what was coming from one direction had blinded me from the rest of the world. I must have lost some of my touch.

Evelyn was frozen for a moment. When she saw that the animal had already found a meal, she ran over to me.

"Holy shit, I've never shot anyone before! Are you okay?"

"Are you sure you've never shot anyone before? Because you absolutely nailed that cougar," I laughed uncomfortably.

Being that my pants were already half down, I dropped them a little further to inspect my thigh. It was my lucky day. The round that Evelyn sent flying at me had just barely scraped off a little bit of the mean. The fact that it was an incendiary round meant that the wound mostly cauterized itself. I could smell burning flesh and hair as I examined the scratch. Some blood seeped out, but it really looked worse than it felt.

Carolina and Kyle ran up. Kyle had my pack on his back and MRE spaghetti sauce and a bewildered look on his face.

"Can you pass me the f-"

"
HOLY SHIT
! IT’S A FUCKING LION RIGHT THERE!" shouted Kyle raising his rifle towards the big cat. 

"Chill out, bro. He's already got a meal.  I think they're as sick of these dead guys roaming around as we are."

"Are you sure about that, man?" he asked as his voice cracked.

"I'll go pet him right on his head if it'll make you feel better."

"Nah, it's okay, homie. But why the fuck did she shoot you instead of the lion? Were you tryi-"

"Please, just shut up, bro. Now, would you be so kind as to pass me the first aid kit from inside my bag?" I asked Kyle. "It's really not anywhere near as bad as it looks."

"That’s a relief, because that shit looks fucked up, man. Do you need any help?" he asked as he handed me the kit.

"Nah, just a little iodine . . . And a tightly wrapped bandage . . . And I'm all set. I think I might need someone to hold my rifle while I take it easy with a pistol, though." I inspected the weapon to make sure it was safe and passed my rifle to Carolina. Evelyn had dropped it and left the safety switch on fire when ran over to me.

After surveying the area, I found a stick that would make do as a crutch for at least a short while. I grabbed it and got to my feet without assistance from anyone other than my new crutch.

"So, is lunch ready?" I asked, heading back to our picnic area like nothing had ever happened. My leg was sore, but I did my best to maintain a straight face to keep anyone from fussing over me.

As I ate my Chili Mac MRE entrée, I got a couple of strange looks from Carolina. Then, "Are you sure you're okay to go on, sugar? If you're not, it’s fine if you take Evelyn home. I'll be just fine with Kyle."

The thought of being all alone with Evelyn in that white house again did excite me.
Oh, man the things that I would like to do to her in there . . .

"And let Evelyn miss out on any potential family reunion? I think not." Damn, it really sucked to have to be a responsible, good guy.

"You've been blown up and shot and nearly attacked by a wild animal. I'd feel awful if anything else happened to you on my account," she said with sincerity in her voice.

"And if any of this had happened to anyone else, I'd feel worse than I do now, so, if you don't mind, I'll carry on and see how this all plays out. Maybe we’ll get lucky and I’ll be the only one with any scars to show off after this is all over." I stuffed my mouth with a spoonful of what looked like chewed up, spat out dog food.

Chapter Nine

By the time everyone had finished eating, my leg was feeling a little bit better, despite the injury having happened so recently.

"And I believe that just about concludes our lunch portion of the tour," I announced as I stood with my all natural crutch. "If you could please follow me, we must be on our way." I was enjoying playing my own little game of tour guide.

After a couple of miles I decided that I would do just fine without the crutch, so I let it go. After dropping the crutch, which went back to its boring old life of just being a regular stick again, I tried my weight on my leg. It seemed like it would be good enough to go on without the aforementioned severed tree limb. 

"Hey, Carolina? Mind if I get my piece back?"

"If you think you're okay, then here you go."

We traded weapons. I had a feeling we were getting closer to the bottom of the hill and that there would be more of them to keep us busy soon.

I issued a gesture asking them all to hold still so I could listen to see if we could hear any of them in or near our area.

There was nothing but silence.

We continued onward.

***

Unfortunately, our luck of silence would not continue much longer. We could hear the shambling walk of the undead as we neared the base of the hill. With less incline they’re able to walk around more freely. Back in town it had been some time since we've encountered an actual “horde” of zombies greater than five, but that streak was about to be broken.

I climbed up a tree—using mostly upper body strength, thanks to my injured leg—to get a visual on what exactly it was that we were hearing. It looked like there were about 25 of them headed on a path that would intersect ours. Not only that, but I could see rooftops. I could see roads. I could see the town. We should be able to make it there before it gets much darker. But we would have to deal with the mini-horde before we could make it there.

I slid down from the tree and informed the others of my new intel. I had to keep them focused. I gave them the plan. "Kyle and Carolina, you go behind that cluster of boulders over there." It was about twenty yards farther from the zombies than our current position. "Evelyn and I will go up this tree, it's stable and we'll be secure up there. Don't fire until I do. I'll take out the one about five deep in an effort to take most of them out while knocking the rest down. After that, we can start picking off the rest of them. Hopefully, the initial explosion will leave them disoriented."

Everyone knew their roles in the battle that was soon to take place, and so retreated to their places.

Nestled high up in a tree, I could see Evelyn had fallen into a false sense of security. Her body looked relaxed even though her face looked thrilled to see the monsters up close like this.

"I hope you understand that our plan is to re-kill all of them," I said, remembering our first encounter with one another.

"I'm not an idiot, Peter," she said. "Our conversation earlier really helped me out a lot, actually. Almost like if you weren't such an asshole you could have been a therapist in another life." She let out a cute giggle.

"This isn't something I say often, so don't take it lightly: this is no time for joking. We are about to battle a large group of the undead, and each of them has the potential to kill all of us and, even though they are dead already, we are killing them in a way."

"I'm trying to make light of the situation so I don't have to  feel-"

"I know exactly what you're doing, trust me, I’ve done the same thing most of my life. But I have to keep focused, and I have to keep all of you focused, too. Our lives are on the line at this moment."
I'm sorry,
I thought.
I know my words were a little harsh. I don't want you to be scared or sad, or anything other than happy. But, more than anything else right now, I don't want you to be dead or physically injured in any way.

I looked down at Kyle’s place behind the rocks. He was looking up at me, just waiting for me to get the party started. The zombies were in place for me to take the first shot and begin our miniature war. I gave a nod to Kyle and he sighted in. I did the same thing and slowly squeezed my trigger after I had my aim dialed in.

***POW***

Body parts. Blood. Bones. There was gore flying in every direction. Entire (or as complete as most of them are) zombies went flying to the ground in the back of the group. The stupid creatures looked oblivious as to what exactly had happened. I wondered exactly how a zombie would process such information as this. Kyle and I started picking them off one by one with headshots. It looked like we had successfully taken them all out. Kyle was looking up at me once more. I signaled for him to keep a lookout while Evelyn and I climbed down out of the tree to meet at their position behind the large rock cluster.

Evelyn tucked her pistol back into her waistband and was the first to climb down while I kept an eye out. I made sure my rifle was on safe before passing it down to her to speed up my painful descent. I didn’t feel like getting shot by her again today. Carefully finding each branch, I made my way down and immediately recovered my weapon when I got to Evelyn. Together, we hurried over to the others while I continued to scan the area for any threats.

"See any movement out there?" I asked Kyle.

"Everything looks clear from here. Do you see anything, Carolina?"

"I don't think so," she answered.

A mystery voice in the distance shouted, "Are there any livers out there?"

I hesitated to answer. How the hell was I supposed to respond to a question like that? Are there any
livers
?

"Livers, hearts, lungs, stomachs . . . you name it. Are you some sort of sick fucking cannibal or something?" I shouted back.

The steps were getting much closer now.

"Now, there's only one man I know that would ever respond with that kind of bullshit. Where the hell you at, POW?"

"BLACK!" I shouted.

"MORGAN!" shouted Kyle.

"OH SHIT! Both you motherfuckers are down here? To what do I owe the pleasure? And what the actual FUCK was that explosion

all about?!"

Morgan was another of our Marines from back in the day. He was a 6'7" black dude. I called him "Black" because one day, when we were in Estonia doing some training, there was a dude that had skin that was far darker than either of us had ever imagined who walked passed us. Morgan turned to me and said, "Damn, that nigga BLACK!" to which I replied, with my filter-free mouth, "Nigga,
you
black!" Being that we were best friends and he knew I wasn't some sort of racist asshole, he took one glance at me and just began laughing. Since then, it kind of became a greeting between us—despite the odd looks we’d get from others.

"Well, we’re down here searching for someone from our neck of the woods. Evelyn, what did you say your dad's name was?" I asked her.

"Dr. Korpiklaani," she replied.

"Fuck that dude, who is
this
lovely lady?"

"This is—uh—this is Evelyn." Awesome introduction.

"Well, Evelyn, that makes the explosion the second most amazing thing I've seen tonight. My name is Mac Morgan, and it is VERY nice to meet you," he said, grabbing her hand and giving it a kiss.

"It's good to meet you, too, Mac. Are all of Peter's friends as animated as you and Kyle?"

"Pete, over here, happens to attract a rare breed to his

side. And I would absolutely say that you fit that description. That being said, Pete doesn’t have many people he would call
friends.
Lots of people like the guy just fine, only the feeling isn’t always mutual. I take it I'm too late, and you two are already some sort of an item?"

"I think that just might be safe to say," she said, glancing over at me.

"Fuck yeah!" I accidentally whispered out loud.

Chuckles came out from all around.
I don't care. I win.

"Well, that's unfortunate," said Mac. "So, let’s get back to the explosion, if you don’t mind. What the fuck kinda heat are you boys packin'?"

"Man, Kyle and I were lucky enough to come up on some incendiary rounds and these M16s before this trip began."

"Sick, man! We can talk more when we get inside. Y'all can stay at my place for now. It's gettin' pretty dark out here. We should get a move on."

He led us down a hitherto unseen path parallel to the one we’d been following.

We had made it to town, courtesy of our new guide.