Joseph Talluto - Taking It Back

About twenty feet from the corner I stopped and shouldered my weapon. I walked out away from the wall and kept my eye on the corner. I moved until I could just see part of one of the zombies and stopped. When Charlie opened up, I wanted to be out of the way, but in position to support him if needed. Out in the parking lot, the other zombies saw me and started in my direction. They were about two hundred yards out and not yet a threat.

I waited for about five seconds, then heard Charlie’s rifle bark. He was very methodical and four shots rang out. I waited a second, then stepped forward and faced three zombies whose backs were to me. At the first shot, I dropped a teenage girl who had moved quickly to the corner. The other two, probably her parents, turned at the sound and headed for me. I shot the father first, then the mother, both of them falling beside their daughter.

The fusillade of shots stirred the Z’s in the parking lot to move faster and both Charlie and I took a moment to shoot the ones nearest to us. Mine seemed to be whiter than usual and as I ran to engage the remaining zombies I noticed that the reason he was white was because he was covered in maggots.

Charlie reached a zombie first and jumped high into the air to bring his tomahawk down on its head. I reached my second one and, ducking under its clawed hands, swept its feet out from under it, slamming it onto the pavement. Stepping up to it, I drove my pickaxe into the top of its head before it had a chance to recover.

The next two were going to present a little bit of a problem because they were close together. They were two women, dressed in tank tops and jeans, with lank, filthy hair hanging down their faces. Deep scratches covered their arms and one had a tear in her shoulder. The other had a hole bitten in her thigh, the opening torn and bloodied. Their hands and arms were blackened with dried blood and they moved in an almost coordinated fashion. They advanced with their arms outstretched, allowing very little room to maneuver. This was going to take some timing. I waited until they got close, then I swerved to the side, placing one behind the other. I shoved the head of the pickaxe into the face of the blonde one, knocking her into the brunette and tumbling them both to the ground. I moved around again and slammed the heavy blade end of my pick into the top of the blonde. She lay still as her companion crawled towards me, standing up on unsteady feet as she faced me. Her arms came up again and I kicked her back over her friend again. I moved and slammed the pick down more forcefully than I had intended and caved in half her skull. Her reaching hands immediately fell to the side and she looked like she and her friend were now sleeping.

Charlie came over after he finished his zombie. “All done with your threesome?” he asked, wiping off the ‘hawk.

“Yeah. Wasn’t as fun as I thought it would be,” I said, scrubbing my pick on the grass.

I looked around and didn’t see any threats. I knew the cougar was still out there, but that was a danger I could live with if I had to.

“Come on,” I said. “Let’s get the family moving. I want to show you something before we go.”

We went back to the Visitor Center and gathered up Mike and his family. They watched with wide eyes as Charlie and I dragged the bodies to the parking lot and set them on fire. I used the opportunity to cleanse my pick and Charlie did the same with his weapon. As the fire was burning out, I took Charlie up to the lodge, where we scouted around for a bit. Not finding any enemies, living or otherwise, we stood on the expansive patio that ran the length of the building. The Illinois River Valley stretched before us and the water of the river lazily wandered by. In the middle of the river was an island, about a mile long, with trees and long grass.

“What’s on the back side of this place?” Charlie asked.

“Farms and another state park,” I said. “A little more rustic than this one, but very nice.”

“What are you thinking?” Charlie asked.

“I’m thinking this is where I want to be. It has everything. Land for crops, land for animals, perfectly defensible positions if needed, water all year long, lookout points for the river. I would move here in a second. There’s a horse farm nearby. Might have some horses left.”

Charlie thought for a second. “What about your brother?”

“He’s alive and will stay that way. Unless I miss my guess, he and his family will want to get to some semblance of civilization soon. They would be a welcome addition to the community.”

“What about Sarah.?”

I thought about that. “She’ll resist at first, but I think she’ll come around.”

Charlie gazed out over the water and the forest. “Want some company?” he asked.

I laughed. “You been feeling the same thing?”

Charlie looked at me. “The ‘I’m not meant to run a community’ feeling? Yeah, I’ve been feeling that. I was looking to head out earlier, but didn’t know where to go. Now I do.”

“Yeah, me too. This place feels right, better than any other.”

“Exactly.”

“Still have a lot to do back at Leport.”

“Yeah, but we’ll get here.”

We headed down the stairs to where Mike and his family were waiting. We had a lot to do, but we had another success under our belts. I was eager to get back to Starved Rock and settle in, but we had to go to our old home first before we made the trip to our new one.

For the first time in a long while, I felt an odd sense of peace. I hoped it would last.

We moved my brother and his family quickly back to Leport, stopping briefly at Ottowa and Seneca to speak with the survivors there. We established communication protocols and traded information about towns we had visited to the south. I figured once we cracked the nut of the huge distribution center to the north, we would be in a great position to share what we had with towns that needed it.

Joslin proved to be no trouble on the way back, although we did hear gunfire and saw many zombies still in the area. I was again curious as to the viability of restarting the power plant, but that would only occur after the danger had been taken care of.

At Leport, there were plenty of hugs to go around and I moved my brother and his family to a house just down the road from where Sarah and I lived. Logan was delighted to see Jake again and Jake thought Annie was just the greatest thing. We spent several nights just catching up on things, sharing stories and shrugging our shoulders at the way things turned out. The one sour note was we had no idea about our parents, but even I wasn’t crazy enough to try and head in that direction.

After a few weeks of readjusting and settling back in, I finally got around to talking to Trevor about his trip to State Center Alpha. Trevor had insisted that he wouldn’t talk to anyone until he had talked to me first and I put it off for a while. I knew he had found several towns that were on the brink of extinction and had managed to bring back over a hundred people. For that alone, he was a hero in anyone’s eyes, as well as the rest of the crew that accompanied him.

I sat down in Trevor’s living room and waited for him to organize his thoughts. I was in no hurry, although I was very curious as to what he found. Outside, summer was past its high point, and every once in a while, you felt a breeze that let you know fall was on its way. Plants weren’t as green as they used to be and overall there was a dustiness to the air.

Trevor leaned back in his chair and launched into his report. “We didn’t run into anything we couldn’t handle on our way to the center. We worked our way around some roadblocks, but didn’t hit anything serious until we came to the outskirts of Alpha. We approached pretty much the same way you did, keeping an eye on the cars and building, looking for movement. The gates were closed, however, and we could see the buildings were occupied. Thanks for the map, by the way, Alpha was built just like Bravo.”