Zpoc Exception Series (Book 1): Re-Civilize (Chad) Read online

  I washed my hands and headed back out to the kitchen. I checked the fridge to find that there was one apple left. I put it in my pocket to eat while I was out and about. I had a couple ideas where I could easily get a car, but I would run the risk of being confronted by people who were hiding in their homes and ready to protect themselves to the death, or zombies trapped inside small spaces. I had the gun, so I wasn’t completely defenseless. I just had to be careful and not make too much noise – the less zombies I attracted the better. I didn’t know how many were in the area and I didn’t want to find out. The most ideal vehicles would be the minivan from the big family of Mormons down the street or the truck from the construction guy down the street the other way. I planned to go for the minivan first and I hoped I was able to get it. It wasn’t a kickass vehicle, but it could haul all the supplies we would need and have decent gas mileage, but it would completely suck if we had to go off-road or if we needed to push another vehicle off the road so we could get through.

  I exited the house by going through the laundry room and out into the garage. I then went through the door at the rear of the garage that led into our fenced-in backyard.

  The morning air was cool and clear; it felt insanely good to be outdoors. I hadn’t realized how much I’d missed going outside.

  I stood beside the gate to leave the backyard and listened. I didn’t hear anything other than birds chirping, a lot of them. At first I found that strange, then I remembered the flies from the giggle-sluts body, and she’d been inside. The rotting corpses outside would have drawn way more bugs, which would have drawn a large population of birds.

  I wondered if the birds would turn into zombie-birds from eating the bugs and rotting flesh of the undead… That would be freaky, but cool.

  I didn’t hear anything alarming, so I unlatched the gate and headed out the path that circled around the garage and lead back out to the driveway. I only went halfway before I left the path and headed into the stand of dense pine trees that separated our yard from the neighbors’. I paused to check out the area when I got to the other side to make sure there was no immediate danger.

  I could see a zombie. It was across the street from the neighbors’ house, wandering around the mailbox on the curb. The thing was pathetic looking. Dirty, bloody rags hung from its body, not covering much of anything. In truth, there wasn’t much to cover other than bone and scraps of muscle. I couldn’t believe it could move around at all, considering.

  I watched as it stepped too close to the edge of the curb and fell out into the street; it started screeching and flopped around, I assumed trying to get up again.

  I took that moment as a sign to get moving. Nothing would hear me over that awful noise, at least not for a couple minutes.

  I darted toward the neighbors’ house. I planned to stay close to anything that could block me from view at least on one side. I was going to use objects to watch my back since I didn’t have a human to do it. Elaine could do things like this with me, but she was still too weak, so I hadn’t asked her to come along.

  The screeching of the zombie was drawing more of them out of hiding. I saw three heading in the direction of the noise as I snuck from yard to yard to the Mormons’ house. By the time I reached the garage the screeching had stopped or I was far enough away not to hear it anymore – either way it was quieter and I felt like even my breathing was extremely loud.

  I headed around to the back of the house in a nervous rush and was happy to see they didn’t have a fence around their backyard. I kept my eye on the windows of the house as I headed for the back of their garage where I saw a window. I didn’t see any movement inside. I hoped that didn’t mean they weren’t home and had taken the van.

  I peeked into the garage and breathed a sigh of relief; the vehicle was inside.

  Now all I had to do was figure out how to get the keys… I had no idea how to hotwire anything.

  There was no way I was going to get inside the garage or the house without making noise. I’d figured this from the beginning. I knew some noise was going to have to be made to achieve my objective, after all, I couldn’t drive a vehicle back to my house in complete silence. That just wasn’t possible.

  The window of the garage looked too small for me to break and then try to climb in without hurting myself. I decided to go in through the house since the garage was attached. I figured it was set up similar to my house and would have a door leading out into the garage from somewhere inside. I would probably find the keys going that route anyhow.

  I headed to the backdoor of the house. It was situated in the middle of a small wooden deck. There were potted plants, a small table with two chairs, and a grill on the porch.

  I climbed the three stairs leading to the landing of the deck while once again watching the windows of the house. I still didn’t see any movement.

  When I reached the door, I stood looking at it for a few moments, and the objects around me, trying to decide which would be the best for bashing through the door. The door had a window in the top half that was covered by a red and white checked curtain. I couldn’t see into the house. I didn’t know what was beyond the door. I assumed it would be a mud room, or perhaps a kitchen. If everything went well, I would raid the house for food before I left with the van. If things didn’t go well, I would just get the hell out of there as fast as I could and try to get a vehicle somewhere else. There was no point in taking too big of a risk when there were probably dozens of vehicles in the neighborhood that I could get my hands on.

  Just for shits and giggles, I reached out and turned the knob on the door. To my shock, it opened easily. The door hadn’t even been locked. I didn’t know if that was a good sign or a bad sign. It could have meant anything.

  The unlocked door could have meant someone had forgotten to lock it when they’d left to go somewhere. It could have meant someone was inside and didn’t feel it needed to be locked for whatever reason. It could also mean there were people inside who were now zombies and they didn’t care if the door was unlocked.

  I pulled the gun out of the waistband of my pants, took a deep breath, and opened the door slowly; it creaked slightly and I cursed under my breath.

  Nothing happened. Nothing popped out to attack me. No one was waiting inside to shoot me. I just walked in and closed the door behind me. Then I went searching for the keys to the van.

  I kept an eye out for anyone or anything that might be around while I searched. I also checked for food – there was a lot of it.

  Either no one had been here when everything had happened or they’d left without taking much with them. With such a large family to feed, there were a lot of canned food and dry goods. I also found two cases of water, a couple cases of juice boxes, and some vegetable juice singles. The place was a goldmine.

  I found the keys hanging on a nail beside the door that led out to the garage.

  This couldn’t be easier, I thought, taking them from the nail and sliding them into my pocket.

  That’s when I cursed myself.

  I heard a thump above me, on the second floor.

  “Fuck,” I whispered.

  I had to make a decision.

  I could leave – I had the keys to the van and I could easily get away before whoever or whatever was upstairs could get down here to harm me.

  Or I could stay and go find out what was up there, take care of it, and then load all the food into the van to take with me.

  Granted, there was still food at my house, but I didn’t know if Washington Center was going to be the safe place we were hoping for. For all we knew it was a cluster-fuck of zombies all huddled in one area. We could have to fend for ourselves until we found somewhere else safe. Then we would need as much food as we could possibly have.

  I decided to go upstairs and take care of whatever was up there. I was thinking long term survival. If I could make sure me, Elaine, and her dad had what we needed to live for a while, that’s what I needed to do.

  I crept up the
stairs, one by one, slowly. I slid my foot along the carpet of each one and applied pressure little by little until I knew there wasn’t going to be a squeak or any other indication that I was there. I didn’t want to be accosted on the stairs. I figured that would be a horrible scenario… Falling could break bones and I could still wind up zombie-chow.

  I breathed an almost silent sigh of relief when I arrived upstairs. It stank and there were more flies up here than there had been downstairs. At least one corpse had to be on the premises.

  All the doors along the hall were closed. I thought that was odd.

  I made my way to the first door, on the right side of the hall, sliding my feet and checking for squeaky parts of the floor again. I reached out with a shaking hand, turned the knob, threw the door open, and gripped the revolver in front of me with both hands.

  Flies swarmed around me in a plume of putrid smelling air.

  I gagged and swiped at the bugs as they hit and landed on my face.

  Through the swarming insects I saw two dead bodies lying on the twin beds in front of me.

  I covered my mouth and nose with my t-shirt, hunched down a bit, and shuffled forward to see the corpses more clearly. They each had a hole that looked like a gunshot wound in the middle of their foreheads.

  “Damn,” I muttered, and headed back toward the hall; I closed the door behind me, but some of the flies had flown out into the hall.

  I opened three more doors with the same results. The next to last one had adult corpses and the male of the two held a gun in his dead hand.

  It was obvious to me the entire family had decided death was the way to go. Either that, or that’s what the parents had decided and the children had been murdered. It was fucked up.

  I gave up on trying to be quiet and decided I should have the gun the man was clutching. His fingers were stiff and the flies were overwhelming and annoying, but I finally managed to get it from him. I wasn’t familiar with it, but it looked like a 9mm pistol with a clip. I dropped to my knees beside the bed and looked in the nightstand and around the general area for extra bullets – I didn’t find any.

  While I was down there, I heard the thump again. It seemed to be coming from the last room, the one I hadn’t checked yet.

  I got up from the floor, went back out into the hall, closed the door behind me, and advanced slowly toward the last room.

  I didn’t know what to expect, but it wasn’t what I found.

  The door was latched shut with a sliding bolt, from the outside.

  This could be really bad, I thought. Maybe I should just leave it closed, get the food, and leave.

  But curiosity got the better of me. If they’d locked a zombie in there, it couldn’t get to me, but if they’d locked a human in there, for whatever reason, they might need help.

  I took deep breaths and undid the latch; it released with a click.

  There was no noise from inside.

  I reached for the knob, turned the handle, tightened my grip on the revolver, and opened the door…or tried to. Something was up against it, preventing it from opening.

  I pressed my shoulder against the door, and with some effort, pushed it halfway open.

  Again, nothing jumped out at me even though I was ready to defend myself.

  I peeked around the door and found a small child lying on the floor, unconscious.

  My mind went wild with reasons someone would lock a child in a room by themselves. None of them were good. I frowned when I thought about what I’d found in the other bedrooms. I couldn’t help but wonder why they hadn’t offed this child as well.

  I knelt down to examine the child and found a bite mark on his ankle. He was nothing but skin and bone, but he was breathing.

  “Fucking assholes,” I growled, putting away my gun and scooping the child up. He couldn’t have been more than two or three years old.

  I carried him downstairs. He opened his eyes slightly once and then closed them again in transit.

  I wanted to get the food loaded up in the van, but I knew I had to do something for the little guy if he was going to survive.

  I laid him down on the couch, in the living room, and went to get him a bottle of water and something soft he could eat.

  When I returned, I shook him until he opened his eyes again.

  “You gotta eat and drink something,” I said gently, smiling while I dumped a little bit of water into his mouth.

  That perked him up a little.

  His little skeleton hands reached up and wrapped around mine where I was holding the bottle and he tried to tip it up more. I resisted.

  “Easy, little guy,” I said. “You’ll choke.”

  I poured sip by sip into his mouth until he seemed somewhat content, then I unwrapped the soft cereal bar I’d found in a cabinet. I broke it into tiny pieces and fed them to him one by one until he couldn’t keep his eyes open any longer.

  I looked at what I had left. He’d drank an eighth of a bottle of water and what equaled out to maybe two adult bites of the cereal bar.

  “I guess that’s better than nothing,” I said, and sighed.

  I knew he’d sleep for a while and there was really nothing more I could do for him at that exact moment, so I covered him with a blanket and got busy loading supplies into the van.

  <+>

  I headed back in to check on the little boy once I was done loading everything I wanted to take with me in the van. He was still sleeping. I thought about going back upstairs to see if I could find clothes for him, but then I thought about the stench and the flies.

  I figured we could find clothes for him somewhere along our travels, even if we had to break into a store. Or I figured they’d have clothes for him at Washington Center if it was in good standing.

  I’d spent more time out than I’d planned on and knew I had to get moving if we still planned to make it to Washington Center today, so I shook the little boy awake and tried to get him to eat and drink some more. He consumed a little bit more before I wrapped him in the blanket and carried him out to the van. I sat him in the front passenger’s seat and strapped him in. I shut the door, went over and opened the driver’s door and started the van. Once it was running, I ran over and opened the garage’s bay door, ran back to the van, hopped in, and took off in reverse. I’d wanted to get out of the garage as quickly as possible so zombies wouldn’t have a chance to gather and give me a hard time; I’d come up with the plan of how to do it while I’d loaded up the food.

  We were out on the street and heading toward my house in mere seconds. In the rearview mirror I could see zombies coming out of all the yards to follow after me. I was glad I didn’t have to go far.

  I pulled into my driveway, climbed out, opened the garage door, climbed back in, drove into the garage, killed the engine, hopped out again, and shut the garage door before any of the zombies were even at the end of my driveway.

  “Success!” I yelled, and pumped my fist in the air.

  The door leading into the house opened and Elaine stood there smiling.

  “Proud of yourself, huh?” she teased.

  “Yes,” I said, grinning and nodding, before I thought of the little boy and frowned. “I found something I need your help with.”

  “That doesn’t sound good,” she said, stepping out into the garage.

  I couldn’t help but notice how good Mom’s clothes fit her. Of course she’d picked the more formfitting stuff that was a little loose on her, but she still looked good. You wouldn’t know they weren’t her clothes.

  I led the way to the passenger’s side of the van and opened the front door. I reached in and unbuckled the little guy and pulled him out, blanket and all.

  Elaine leaned forward and pulled a flap of the blanket back.

  “Oh, my gawd,” she gasped. “Where did you find…?” She glanced up at me.

  “Him,” I said. “I found him locked in a room in a house where everyone else had apparently committed suicide. I don’t know why he was locked in the room
or why they hadn’t offed him. He was bitten…on the ankle.”

  Elaine growled and took the bundle from my arms.

  “Poor little guy,” she said, carrying him toward the entrance to the house.

  “He’ll need a bath,” I called, shut the van door, and rushed after her. “I don’t have any clothes for him though.”

  “We’ll see if anything of your sister’s will fit him,” she said.

  “Girl clothes?” I asked, and frowned.

  Elaine laughed. “Does it really matter as long as he has something to wear?”

  “I suppose not,” I said, and chuckled. It wasn’t a situation to worry about trivialities. Besides, he was small enough he wouldn’t care if he was wearing pink.

  Clay was waiting in the kitchen with piles of things he was supposed to have ready; it looked like he’d upheld his part of the plan.

  “See if you can get him to eat and drink something after his bath,” I called after Elaine as she headed upstairs with the boy. “I got him to eat a bit earlier, but not nearly enough.”

  “What’s going on?” Clay asked. “Who needs to eat?”

  “I found a toddler locked in a room in a house where everyone had killed themselves,” I said. “He was bitten, but he’s about starved to death.”

  “What the fuck is wrong with people?” Clay asked, and frowned.

  “Damned if I know,” I said. “Let’s get this stuff loaded so we can take off as soon as Elaine’s done getting him cleaned up and dressed.”

  Clay nodded and we got to work adding what food and supplies we had to what I’d already put in the van.

  Elaine showed up with the boy, who was now fully awake but very weak, held on her hip. He was wearing a pink shirt with a sparkling unicorn and white and purple stripped shorts.

  I raised my eyebrows as I looked him over.

  “Don’t say a thing,” Elaine said, grinning. “Tob picked them out himself.”

  “Tom?” I asked, stepping closer.