Mark Tufo - The End ....

“Justin you stay behind me, anything happens, you head back. Got it?”

“Sure something happens to you, I go back alone and tell mom I left you behind. Got it.”

“That’s not what I meant smart ass.”

“I’ve got your genes.”

“Lucky you.” I said, not as a compliment.

After a moment’s thought, I headed towards the rear of the base and Lake Michigan. More enemy humans to scope out towards the front but that also meant more fighting. More fighting meant more bullets and more explosions, more of an opportunity to get killed. I had checked my itinerary earlier in the day. Nowhere on it did it say anything about dying. We hadn’t gone more than a block when we began to run into wounded soldiers who were being medevacked out of the hot areas. The shell shocked look of defeat shone through their eyes. Hastily made bandages were soaked through with blood. More than one unlucky soul screamed for their mother, most gripping what remained of a slightly tethered leg or arm. One poor bastard's entire lower half had been compressed to a third of its former size, how he was still alive was proof to me that God had turned a blind eye towards his children. His glassy shock-tainted stare was having an unnerving effect on Justin. To be fair, Justin’s illness had kept him largely out of all the battles we had thus far been in. Unfortunately for him, he’d be able to get some much needed experience today.

Justin was having a difficult time compartmentalizing the sights all around him. He kept stumbling into me, so intent was he on looking around at the human carnage and subsequent debris. I’d seen it before, happens all the time in combat. Some guys, no matter how much training they’ve received, can’t cope with the sensory overload. We used to call them ‘freezers’, more times than not these ‘freezers’ would get their buddies killed because the friend would go out to save them and usually take the bullet.

“Justin, you have got to stop walking up my heels.”

“Sorry Dad, I’ve just never seen so much…”

“Death."

"I was gonna say blood, but whatever."

"I know, but you’ve got to move on. We’ve got to concentrate on what we need to do. These men and women were brave. They died for us and have given us this chance to save ourselves. The best way we can remember and honor them is to succeed.”

My words seemed to have the desired effect. Justin stopped ramming into my back and his gazed stayed to the front. More likely his stomach was right now rivaling his sister’s and he didn’t need any more fodder for his stomach canon. The barrage of injured began to slough off to a trickle and then to nothing. As good as that was visually, it was that bad in terms of the direction the battle had taken. No more casualties being taken off the field of battle meant that there weren’t enough healthy soldiers to do the task. That fact was punctuated when at the very next block we began to encounter soldiers in full on retreat. As if they were dragging it behind them, came the pustulous smell of the dead. Justin volleyed forth a greenish-yellow bile that seemed nearly incandescent in its hue.

“Feeling better?” I asked him without turning around.

“Worlds.”

“That sarcasm?” I asked.

“What do you think?”

“You really are going to need to get away from me when you get your first chance. A few years more with me, you’ll be my clone,” I said swatting his shoulder, his hunched over form getting a closer look at his refuse from the impact.

He stood straight up, eyes wide with fear. “She’s here.” He whispered.

“Like here, here?” I asked pointing to our general vicinity. “Or here in the camp?” I asked. I wanted to push him away from what was looking like a good place to dispose of any undigested food and maybe some twice churned stomach soup, I might possess.

“Close but not here.”

The worst passed, it was looking more and more like I might get to finish the processing of the omelet I had eaten earlier in the day.

"Can she tell that you're here?" I asked concerned. She could have us rounded up and served on a platter in under twenty minutes if she could locate us.

Justin was concentrating hard, a thick vein stood out on his forehead. Was he fighting for control of his mind, or was he trying to break through Doc's vaccine and back into the cold embrace of his dark mistress? Both were disturbing thoughts and I was getting nervous just standing here. If an errant patrol were to come around the corner of the building and they were of the ilk to shoot first and kick our bodies second, well that would just be shitty.

"Justin we gotta go." I said shaking his shoulder, I could hear movement and it was getting closer. It wasn't the haphazard flight of the retreating either. This was the stealthy approach of the nearly victorious. Justin was coming back from whatever depths he had ventured but as a snail's pace. If he hadn't been joined to my side for the last 20 minutes I would have sworn he had just got stoned, and then I'd really be pissed because he hadn't shared. No matter how much I wanted it to be, we were not on a movie set as extras for some Alfred Hitchcock horror flick. This was proved to me when I looked up and down the side of the building and there was no super convenient place to hide. If this was a movie we could just press flat against the building and miraculously the enemy would fail to turn in our direction. Yup, good chance that wasn't going to work.

I half-dragged Justin away from our tentative last resting spot, the cries of screaming men and women masking our move. We hid behind a deuce (that's a two ton truck to all you non-military folk, although if you're still alive you must have had some sort of training and would have known that.) I started taking Justin's camo pants off, that seemed to bring him all the way to his wits.

"Dad? Wait, where are we? What the hell are you doing?"

"Good to see your back. Now get your cammies off, we're playing for the other team now."

"What?" He asked still dazed.

"The camp's overrun, I want to look more like the enemy right now. You know, the whole hiding in plain sight."

"Dad that's not really going to work so much." Justin said flatly.

"Sure it is, it's a great plan, thought it out all by myself."

"Maybe that's the problem."

I stopped in mid-motion taking my blouse off (that's a camouflage top to all you non-military types, must I keep explaining myself?) and looked him square in the eye. "It's good to have Justin back." His wit and sarcasm had been severely lacking during Eliza's hostile takeover bid.

"It's good to be mostly back." He said, stressing 'mostly.' "Look through the windows, Dad."

We were on the driver's side of the truck. I looked through and past the passenger window; the two thick panes of glass did very little to hide the nightmare that stumbled our way. "Oh fuck." I said without much emotion. What is the best way to meet your end? Angry defiance? Resignation? 'Oh fuck' seemed an appropriate blend of the two. "You ready to run?"

"Too late, speeders have already passed us."

"Well aren't you just full of good news. Wish I had a grenade, I really saw myself going out in a big movie ending explosion."

"Dad, get behind me!" Justin whispered urgently. I checked my safety off. Zombies were within feet of us. Justin pushed the barrel of my gun down. "Dad, please get behind me." He beseeched.

"Justin, this isn't how I want to go out, it's the whole machismo thing. You know the guns a'blazing and all that." It's funny the words that were coming out of my mouth had nothing to do with how I really felt. I pretty much wanted to piss myself. Who the hell would know the difference? The zombies wouldn't give a shit if I self basted.