Mark Clodi - About a Woman, a Zombie Chronicles Novel

Dora jumped out of the pickup bed onto the blond woman, she could have taken her time though because the blond was just lying on the pavement twitching. The humans had seen such behavior a few times in the past, usually when a zombie had taken major spinal or neck damage. The zeds would heal up and be moving again, given some time, but Dora had no intention of letting the woman recover. Looking around she searched for a tire iron or other means of bashing in the zombie's head, her eyes then fell upon the tail gate.

Reaching down Dora grasped the blonde's ankles, her own wrist was hurting but seemed to function alright and her ribs were now just a dull ache. Spinning the blond was no problem at all and when she had enough force she smashed the zombie into the back of the truck, aiming for the bumper. Dora's aim was a little off and the zombie's head ended up impacting on the torn metal of the tail gate, removing everything above the nose. Dora spun once more and released the body in the general direction of Andi who was on top of Jake beating him into the ground. The top of the blond's head landed bloody side down in the back of the truck bed, the thing's eyes seemed to be looking right at Dora, who laughed and turned towards the muscle man.

Becka was not up yet, she seemed to be moving as if she were hurt really bad, so Dora moved to put herself between the girl and the still active zombies. As Dora stepped towards the big zombie she smiled; there, on the road, was another shotgun. It had some twine wrapped around the barrel in front of the trigger guard, which told Dora the gun had been strapped to Becka's motorcycle at some point.

With a short whistle springing to her lips she picked up the gun and approached the still recovering zombie. He lifted his head and started to speak, "Plea-" The blast hit him square in the head, killing him. Another two steps and Dora had a front row seat to the wrestling match between Jake and Andi. The zombie with one foot was nowhere to be seen, but Dora did see a crushed path through the knee high grass leading out to the other side of the highway, looking close she saw puddles of zombie blood on the road. Turning her gaze back on Jake and Andi, Dora stopped, shocked. It was Andi, the zombie didn't resemble a little girl so much anymore as a fury of nature, and she had two hands. The one that had been blown off was smaller and a deep red color, but it was there and growing more vibrant each time she swung her little arm down to pummel Jake.

"A little, aagh, help here?" asked Jake.

"I can't shoot her without hitting you!" Dora said, which was true, they were both moving very fast. It was evident that Jake could not get the upper hand on the girl, and just as clear that killing him was going to take her some time. One of Andi's hands punched through Jake's stomach and she started to focus her efforts there, moving all the while to keep Dora from getting a shot of at her.

"Shoot anyway! Shoot anyway!" yelled Jake, as the girl grabbed his innards and started tossing them by the handful into the grass, "Fucking shoot!"

Shrugging Dora spared a glance at Willy, he lay crumpled and sobbing on the grass where Andi had dropped him. He had one hand holding his lifeblood in at his neck and his other arm was still bent in an angle that it was not supposed to be at. Looking at the fury of fighting Dora thought of the cartoon Tasmanian Devil from her child hood, it was just a series of fast blows raining down, with pieces flying off as the two circled each other. Jake rolled beneath the girls again and Dora fired her gun at the same time, catching Andi in the back, punching through the girl's body and striking Jake over the heart. Jake rolled with the blast onto his back and didn't move, his stomach was an empty skin sack, torn open so deep Dora could clearly see the bottoms of his ribs and his spinal column.

"Jesus fuck, Jake, you look bad." said Dora, then Andi, still standing, spun around and leaped for her throat. Andi's little fists were out before her in a classic superman dive, fingers reaching for the living woman's throat. For Dora it was like the girl was diving through a wall of syrup, she found it easy to shift the gun's barrel and wait until that perfect moment when Andi's head was six inches away and in a perfect line with the business end. She pulled the trigger and nothing happened, so she pulled it again, then smoke and pellets issued forth from the end of the barrel.

It was going so slow Dora thought she could have counted the individual pellets had she chose to. Right after the first puff of smoke came another one. Andi brushed her arm in front of her face before the shot hit her, taking the brunt of it in her regrown arm, and losing it again in the process. The girl's mouth twisted into a scream as the second shot slammed her directly in the face. Dora watched as Andi's head was worn away by the pellets, they ate away her eyes, nose and the top of her head like waves dissolving a sand castle on the beach as the tide came in. The girl slammed into Dora, knocking her backwards onto her backside next to Willy.

"Eww." said Dora, rolling Andi's corpse off of her, but leaving behind a large amount of blood and gore, "I got Andi all over me!"

She looked at Willy, he had taken his hand off of his neck, which was not bleeding anymore and straightened his arm out, twisting it around until he appeared to be satisfied it was back the way it should be.

"Shit Willy, doesn't that hurt?"

He shrugged, "Yeah." then he looked down at his missing foot and moaned, "Oh God! I…where is my foot Dora?" then he collapsed back onto his back on the grass.

Dora got back to her feet, Becka was up and moving too, walking slowly towards them, "You alright Becka?"

"What happened?"

"We killed Andi, one of the wonder twins!"

"I know we were coming to help you, but everything happened so fast. Where's Jake?"

"Here." the man called weakly from in the grass.

Stepping over to him Dora reassessed her evaluation of him; he looked worse than shit. "Jake how long is it going to take before you heal up and can go?"

Jake moved both his hands into his stomach area and waved them around, then stared at Dora.

"It might be awhile, but minutes, hours or days? Are you still an asset or do Becka and I leave you and move on?'

"You go, I can't make it, I might be out for a while. I might never make it back. I have never been this torn up. I need to feed, that would speed up the process."

Dora stepped back from him automatically bringing up her shotgun.

"Yeah darling, you could just end the contract right here, but I like to think I've held up my end of the bargain."

Dora nodded once, curtly, then said to Becka, "We gotta take one of their vehicles, the truck. Let's get Willy loaded up."

"No." Willy's voice was strong.

"We need to catch up with the others, c'mon Becka."

"No Dora. She bit me, you know what that means. I'm dead, just go…you know what you have to do first."

Realization hit Dora then and she looked at the shotgun then to Willy, "Oh Willy, I don't think…"

"I don't want to come back as one of them. Do it and go. I'm dead. Jeff told us this might happen, where we have to choose between what's hard and easy. Just do it and go."

Dora raised the gun and sighted down the barrel at the boy's head, her finger tightened on the trigger, sweat broke out on her forehead, then she lowered the barrel and sighed, "I can't. Becka?"

The girl held her hands out in front of her, "No, no! Not Willy! I couldn't"

"Well shit. Willy what can we do?"

"Leave me the gun. Make sure it is loaded. Then get out of here."

Dora was about to complain that it was their only gun, then nodded, removing a couple shells from her pockets and reloading the weapon before sitting it down by the boy. She leaned over him and whispered, "Sorry Willy, sorry I couldn't do it. I just…"