Kirk Allmond - What Zombies Fear - A Father's Quest

I explained about my run from the office, and the gang of zombies in the parking garage, all about Chuck, and how his intestines were looped all the way down to the ground. I described the gore, and how he was still walking. I described them shaking the truck, and bending the brush guard.

Candi was always a realist. I was always the one thinking about zombies, or aliens or natural disaster. I don't think she would have ever believed me if she hadn't seen one with her own eyes.

We made good time. The closer we got to the city, the more often we saw other cars. I passed several heading north, but saw no one else heading south. Just above Frederick, Maryland, we'd been on the road for about an hour, I slowed the truck down. There was a wreck ahead, cars were across the road, but something didn't look right. The whole scene set off my instinct to run.

As I got closer, I realized they'd been parked there, not wrecked. None of them were dented. I reached down beside me and pulled my rifle up on my lap, flicking the safety off. "Max, this is going to get loud, buddy. Keep your headphones on, okay?"

"Yes, Daddy," he said, "But Daddy, don't shoot the ones in the front, shoot the lady with red hair in the back, she has the most bugs."

With my rifle ready, I cranked the wheel to the left and gassed the truck quickly towards the median to get around the cars blocking the road. I knew the median would be muddy, but my truck was pretty tough, and it seemed better to risk the mud than try to push the cars off the road with my already damaged brush guard. I reached up and hit the sunroof button, and it slid open quickly as my tires hit the grassy median. As I passed the first row of cars, I heard the crack of a rifle, and a bullet hit the front of my truck. I floored the truck, as a spray of bullets riddles down the passenger side. The passenger side rear tire went flat, and I realized I did exactly what they wanted me to; I had driven into their trap. All four tires spun in the mud, slinging it everywhere, but we were slogging forward at a snail’s pace. Random thoughts ran through my head. I was calm, ticking off a situation assessment. My truck won't last through this. Max and Candi are on the side of the truck facing oncoming fire. Anger flares inside me as I saw the steering wheel back to the right, heading out of the median, back on the road facing directly into the incoming fire. "Get down, Candi!" I yelled over the gunfire.

"Hold on!" I yell, as the front of the truck smashes into the corner of one of the cars. My headlight blinks out, and the truck stalled, still taking fire. The passenger side window blew out, and Candi slumped forward. I felt a warm spray hit my face, and knew that she'd been hit.

"Mommy!" Max screamed, barely audible as the blood pumped through my ears. Time seemed to slow down, I ripped my seatbelt off, and stood up out of the sunroof, oblivious to the oncoming fire, and lined up the scope of my rifle. Center mass on the first target. Remembering the police officer pumping round after round into that man this morning, I adjusted my aim upwards and watched his head explode through the scope of my rifle. In the time between squeezing the trigger and the bullet hitting the target, I noticed he was unarmed. I raised my rifle, scanning behind the line of now approaching people, and spotted her.

She was tall, thin, with long red hair. She was holding an assault type rifle, long banana clip sticking out of the receiver, one of those thirty round types. I was vastly outgunned, if I was going to save my family, this had to end quickly. I lined up the scope on her head, exhaled, this was a long shot, and I haven't shot in a while. Squeezed the trigger, I heard the rifle report, although it seemed muffled and distant. Through the scope, I watched her head move to the side, just as I squeezed, like she knew. Or saw the bullet coming, but how could anyone move that fast?

I levered the bolt forward and back, and squeezed off another shot, bolt forward, ejected the spent round, back, squeeze. I aimed at both sides of her head. She dodged back the other way, avoiding the second bullet, and my third round was low. Low, but it connected with her shoulder. She spun around with the bullets impact, and I levered back and forward again.

My last shot hit her center mass, right in the middle of her upper back. It shattered her spine, and I lept out of the truck through the sunroof. Three steps away from the truck I took aim at one of the closer zombies, and watched it crumple to the ground in my scope. I hadn't fired a shot.

Three more zombies fell in succession without me firing a shot. I ran through the line of zombies, up the embankment on the far side of the road, towards the red head. I remembered Max telling me to kill her first, and at this point, that was the only information I had. Scrambling up the hill, I saw her lying on her back, a very large hole in her chest. Except that the hole was getting smaller. She was healing in front of my eyes. I let out a guttural scream, and fired one more shot at very close range, decimating her head.

I turned to see that the remaining four zombies were heading my way. I slid the bolt forward, and back, lined up on the closest one, and once again it crumpled to the ground. Looking away from the scope, I saw that all four had fallen mid-step. Their heads appeared intact, there was no obvious reason, but I wasn't going to go inspect too closely. I grabbed the redhead’s rifle, and one more magazine from her back pocket. An automatic would come in handy. I hadn't seen any other armed zombies, and it dawned on me that I hadn't checked on Max and Candi. I leaped off the embankment, falling nearly fifteen feet to the road surface, and took off running for the truck.

05. Purpose

When I got to the truck, I looked in the back seat to see Max crying but otherwise ok, and yanked open the passenger door. Candi’s lifeless body rolled out of the truck onto the ground. I fell to my knees; she had been hit by two bullets, one to the abdomen and one to the right temple.

I sobbed, I screamed, I raged, I yelled at God or the trees or whatever was listening. I wept for what seemed like hours, tears streaming down my cheeks, wondering what I was going to do without her. Imagining trying to survive in this life without my partner, without my team mate. Ultimately, it was Max’s small voice that brought me back to reality.

“Daddy,” he said calmly, “We have to go.” Gathering myself, I kissed her on the forehead, stood and walked around to the front of my wrecked truck. There were bullet holes right through the passenger front fender, front passenger door, and rear quarter panel, but not a single bullet in the rear passenger door. The window was even still intact.

I looked down at the rifle in my hands, an American version of an AK47, 7.62mm bullets; the same size as my rifle, but not quite as powerful. They wouldn’t pass through the engine block, but they’d do a number on all the stuff around it. I jumped inside the truck, turned the key, and miraculously the truck roared to life. From the sound, it had taken a shot to the exhaust manifold. I wouldn’t be sneaking up on anyone, but it would run. I checked on Max, his fever seemed down, but not out, and the bite mark on his leg was closed up. It didn’t look all that bad actually, maybe he didn’t get infected. I handed him the whole box of cereal bars, and he unwrapped one and started eating.

The tire was easy enough, I knew there was a benefit to keeping the spare in the roof basket, even if all my off-roading buddies complained about raising the center of gravity, and called me silly for liking the look.

‘Who’s the mall crawler now?’ I thought to myself, thinking back to the derogatory term real “Rock Crawlers” used to describe guys like me. I left the old wheel on the side of the road, a bullet had passed through the tire and out the wheel, and it was useless now. In the back of the truck I pulled a blanket out of one of the plastic storage tubs, and wrapped Candi’s body up in it. I would bury her in the garden at Mom’s, there is a beautiful spot in the formal garden we’ve often talked of having our ashes spread there. Right now, I didn’t have time to think about all that; I had to get us across the bridge fifteen miles south.