Mark Tufo - The End ....

The small bits of flesh that clung to the remains of the unlucky individual inside the hummer made any sort of identification impossible. The skeletal size suggested a small woman or a kid. I opted for small woman. Neither was a great choice, one just happened to be less crappy than the other.

"I'm so sorry," I said as I dragged the exceptionally light carcass out of the front seat. I laid her down as gently as time would allow, did a short 'Our Father.' Then I sat down in a medley of hair, blood, bone bits, possibly some jewelry and whatever other disgusting remnants come off someone that has just been eaten.

"You alright Dad?" Justin asked as he climbed into the passenger seat.

My frozen features displayed pure disgust. This above everything else was going to cause me many sleepless nights going forward. Blood and gore were seeping through my clothes. If Travis weren't running for his life I might have just completely seized up. I was making inroads into my germaphobe psychoses but I hadn't gone this far.

"Help me" may or may not have weakly made it out of my lips. Luckily, it was masked by Tracy, Nicole and Tommy's entry into the rear.

"Mike, is something wrong with this truck? Won't it start?" Tracy asked leaning forward through the gap in the front bucket seats.

"Uh sorry, waiting for the glow plugs to heat," I told her as I clicked the ignition.

Tracy could see the human goulash dripping from my seat and the perspiration dripping from my head, but with her baby outside she would not suffer my neuroses.

"Let's go Talbot, next Wal-Mart we see I'll get you some Clorox wipes and a new set of jeans, but right now you have to get our son."

"Yup." It was all I could muster without taking the chance of adding my own vomit to the mix.

"You know your son is out there right?" Tracy added.

I thought I might be stuttering at this point but I'm pretty sure it was only in my head.

"And my mom and our friend BT. They are all out there waiting for us Mike," she threw in for good measure.

"Um...the... what now?" I may have muttered. Higher functioning had completely seized up. I was being steeped in human goo and I couldn't move. Ever since this whole Armageddon thing started, I had shot hundreds of zombies, K-Barred a few humans and had been covered in gore. None of it had affected me like this. There was just something about having my genitalia simmering in the blood of another human being that was shutting me down.

"Justin, we've got to get him out of the seat. You're going to have to drive," Tracy said as she moved to the door.

Justin blanched. You may or may not recall, but in my first journal I spoke of how Justin had not deemed driving a priority in his life and had thus far found ways to escape that mundane task. "I'd…I'd rather not," he said, looking down at the cauldron of caustic bile I was in.

"Talbot!" Tracy screamed smacking me upside the head. "Get over it!"

Like shoving a sticky transmission into gear, I moved. It might have been the yelling but more than likely it was the physical force she had put behind that blow. Three older brothers and the Marine Corps had trained me to move into action by physical contact, and not of the tender variety.

In hindsight, my immobility may have saved my son's life. His original plan, unbeknownst to any of us, was to lead the zombies away and then circle back to the original place where the hummer sat. I was going to try and track him down which would have proved disastrous when he came around only to discover that his ride was gone. The speeders hadn't gained any ground on him, but they had the advantage of being tireless. When Travis hopped into the back he was bathed in sweat much like I was, and was dragging in huge gasps of breath.

The hummer jerked forward as I released the hand brake. Speeders smacked into the hood as I moved away.

Tracy turned the ire I had stirred towards her son. "What the hell were you thinking? What kind of plan was that?"

"I got the idea from Brendon," Travis said with a ghost of a smile on his face.

"I thought I recognized that," Justin said, smiling as well.

"This is your fault Talbot!" Tracy said swiveling her beacon of ire back my way.

I may or may not have released a wan smile. I was entirely too busy trying not to vomit, hit zombies or freeze up again. My internal operating system was running at 98% and was threatening to have a fatal error.

Within a minute or so we came upon BT and Carol who were on full alert but seemed no worse for wear as we pulled up. In fact, Carol actually had some color to her and BT looked like he was finally managing the extreme pain he was in.

"Couldn't get anything bigger?" BT joked as he hopped over.

"You might want to hurry," Tommy said from the back seat, his first words in over an hour.

BT's expression changed quickly and dramatically when he heard Tommy's words and saw the lack of expression and color on my face. It doesn't take a zombie apocalypse to realize when something is wrong, but it sure helps. Travis, Tommy and Henry moved into the plastic shell covered trunk to make room as BT and Carol got in. The relief in Tracy's face as she smacked me upside the head again was clearly evident.

"What's that all about?" Carol asked Tracy.

"It's the only way I can get him moving," she answered.

Carol had a look of consternation on her face but did not bother to ask for a clearer explanation.

"Kind of like a slap stick," BT exclaimed, alluding to a popular brand of transmissions during the muscle car years of the early 1970's.

"Hilarious," I mumbled. But I had to admit it was effective.

We were all caught up in our own silent reflections as we left the base behind. Except for Travis and Henry who slept, deeply I hoped.

Tracy thought about the safety of our family and how close to the edge of peril we were again. The base had been a chance to recharge the batteries, a place where normalcy had reinstituted itself. It wasn't home, but maybe it could have been.

Justin was thinking about what was going to happen to him when his two month supply of shots ran out; would he once again fall under the spell of Eliza? That was something he could not go through again.

Carol regretted leaving her life-long home. She had spent a lot of sweat and tears working that land and it seemed only right that she should have shed her life's blood there as well.

Tommy was fearful of what this revelation meant to his new family. Would they abandon him? He didn't really think they would, but that thought above all others scared him.

Nicole still grieved heavily for Brendon and could not fathom raising a child in this monstrosity of a world.

BT hoped that he would have the strength when the time came to defend his friends. He could not shake the feeling that he was somehow responsible for Jen's and Brendon's deaths. The emotional pains of those two losses far outweighed his broken leg.

My thoughts, well they were something along the lines of…disgusting, repulsive, filled with loathing, nauseating, skuzzy. Do you want me to keep going on? Remember I'm a germaphobe so I have an extended thesaurus when it comes to words revolving around 'repugnant'.

I had never before felt so alone, as if on an island than I did that night. The shielded headlights barely pierced the obsidian of the night as we drove eastward. No weapons, no food, no hope, no sani-wipes. It seemed like a good time to stop and make a permanent snow angel. I've learned a lot in these 'end of days' times. Mostly, that when it gets to the darkest point there's always something that manages to drag you just a little farther into the gloom.

CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX - JOURNAL ENTRY 20 -