Mark Tufo - Zombie Fallout

Carl had forced Ben back into action. Ben was using zip ties to bundle up the wire on the ground. This would make it easier to put into the truck and then to install once we got back to Little Turtle. Jen had yet to come out of the truck, hell as far as I knew she hadn’t even peeked over the dashboard. Carl relieved me after he finished loading the rest of the ammo and any salvageable gun parts he could get his hands on. I was thankful for the opportunity to rest. My ungloved hand was frozen but what was worse were the multiple cuts on my hand. The pain was irksome, sure, but the frenzy it caused in the zombies, that was worse. Every time one of the fat globules of hemoglobin splashed to the frozen tundra the zombies would fall to the ground and tear up divots of sod to eat my offering. It was more than a little disturbing.

“Get your hand warmed up and then get rid of those things,” Carl said with no more compunction than if he had asked me to take out the trash.

“What about the noise?” I asked with some dread. Killing zombies to save my ass was one thing, killing them like that made my blood run cold.

“What about it? Use your little pea shooter,” he said pointing to my M-16. “It’s a lot quieter than my Colts are, and we’ve been here for over an hour and we still only have five of the original six here.”

I saw his point. It’s just that I didn’t want to.

“Besides,” he continued, “we now have way more ammunition in your caliber than we do in mine.”

Again I understood his damn point. I grabbed the keys from Ben and headed for the truck. Jen looked pissed that I was invading her space as I climbed into the cab to turn on the heater. I couldn’t have cared less. Those that didn’t pull their own weight were chattel and didn’t deserve my consideration.

“Are we leaving now?” Jen asked hopefully.

I merely revved the engine a little more hoping the heat would kick on sooner rather than later.

“Are we leaving?” she asked again. This time she leaned over, grabbed the gearshift and shoved it into gear. The truck lurched forward and stalled. I was thrown forward and almost broke my damn nose on the steering column as I was already leaning forward trying to garner some heat. Both Carl and Ben were looking up at me, puzzlement on their features. I shrugged and over-exaggerated ‘sorry’ gesture.

I hissed at Jen, “You touch that shift box again and I’ll break your fucking wrist!”

She pulled back as if I had slapped her.

“If you’re so concerned about getting out of here quicker maybe you should be helping instead of hiding.”

Defiance was on her face, but defeat was in her features. She wanted to lash out but she didn’t have the intrepidity to go through with it. She settled back into her uneasy crouch, this time however she sat with her back to me. My hands began to defreeze by small degrees. The pins and needles affect gave way to nails and tacks and then finally to spikes and stakes. The pain was more intense than I was expecting. I must have been close to frostbite. As the torture began to subside I looked around the cab; I knew I had seen a pair of work gloves. They were cheaply made and would do little to stop the bite of the razor wire but I hoped that it would at least keep some of the bitter sting of the cold away. I stayed a few minutes longer than I needed to, gathering my reserves to go deal with our unwanted transients.

“Damn it,” I said as I shut off the truck. Jen jumped a bit but didn’t turn around. My feet had no sooner hit the ground, when I heard the telltale sound of the lock being engaged. “Useless!” I said a little louder than I needed to.

I was having a difficult time empathizing with her. Here we were in the fight of our lives and she had just given up. The side of me that didn’t want to kill, not even zombies, spoke up. ‘How would you feel if Tracy had become a zombie?’

‘Don’t even think it!’ My internal dialogue continued.

‘Or one of your kids?’

‘I’m telling you! Shut up!’

‘Well?’

‘Damn you! I’d probably want to curl up into a ball and die.’ My masculine side finally iterated.

‘Hmm.’ My feminine side mocked.

‘You can still kiss my ass.’ I aimed my rifle and fired off 5 rounds, killing all of our nonhuman visitors. My feminine side had been stilled.

The ensuing quiet was only briefly interrupted by the twang of wire cutters severing through wire holders. Carl hadn’t so much as turned to look as I had mowed down the noxious audience. My breathing had quickened as if from heavy exertion. Sweat formed and quickly began to freeze on my brow. I had yet to put the rifle down, gravity finally taking over and pushed the barrel towards the ground.

Ben, noticing my distress came over. “You all right Talbot?” he asked with concern.

It took a moment for me to acknowledge his presence. I turned towards him, my pupils dilated, my face as pale as the breath I exhaled.

“I could get real philosophical with that question, Ben.” And that was my only answer to his inquiry as I went to the ladder to see if Carl needed any assistance. Ben scratched his head and began zip tying the coils again.

Not much was said as the three of us worked, I know at least for me I was thankful for the lack of speech. It was much nicer to be lost in the hard work. Carl and I switched off on climbing the ladder. My legs were burning from the strain of going up and down and I would have said something but Carl didn’t so much as utter a heavy sigh and the guy was twenty years my senior. There was no way I was going to let him know I was hurting. Between my shifts on top I would help Ben coil and then pull the coil into the truck. We had a system and it was going well. I was thinking at this point we wouldn’t have to spend the night. The remainder of the day was eerily quiet, no more zombies, no other people and not even any animals. I could understand why there were no people, either they were zombies, dead, or fled. The animals had most likely taken off too, please don’t let there be zombie rabbits! But if the animals had fled because of the zombies, where were they? And as if my questions materialized into reality, I smelled them first. At first I had thought Carl had let one rip, but unless he had eaten rotten fish tacos the previous night, it couldn’t be him. I must have turned a shade of green because Carl finally broke his vow of silence.

“What’s a matter Talbot, you look like something’s disagreeing with you? It’s not all this hard work is it?” he asked, laughing a little at his own humor. I didn’t have to answer him, I watched as his face took on the same hue as mine. “Oh sweet Jesus!” He magically produced a bandanna, as only people of his generation can, and began to tie it around his face to block at least some of the odor.

Ben had at this point just emerged from the back of the trailer. “Oh geez! What is that smell!” he yelled.

“Talbot, we’ve got fifty more yards of wire to go,” Carl began. “Do we cut and run so to speak or stay and finish? But from that stench you know we’re not dealing with some onesy and twosy lost zombies, that smells like the mother lode.”

“Cut it,” I said as I made the executive decision. “All this wire does no good if we can’t get it there. I was wondering why there were no animals around here.”

My last words fell to the grounds without an ear to pick them up. Carl had already ascended the ladder to this time cut the wire itself and not the holders.

“Look out below!” Carl yelled a moment too late.

The razor wire sliced past my face at an alarming rate, a couple inches more to the right and my facial features would have been neatly severed from their resting place. I looked up at Carl more in shock than anything.