Zombie Extinction Event Novel #2 (Zombie Extinction Novel) Read online

  HUSH

  Zombie Extinction Event Novel #2

  By

  C.S Anderson

  CHAPTER ONE

  We buried Big Al today.

  Well, we buried what was left of him anyway.

  I stood next to his daughter, while they lowered him into the ground and her hand blindly sought and found mine, as each member of The Narwhals tossed a shovel full of dirt into the grave.

  All the surviving members that is.

  There are less of us now.

  Nine armed guards ring the sad little cemetery bell, behind the fortified building we call home, making sure none of the undead interrupt the service. They are there by my orders.

  Yeah, I am in charge now.

  Lucky me.

  The child we found miraculously alive turned and slaughtered the doctor taking care of her and the guards Big Al had left in place. The guards stayed dead, but the doctor turned. The child had been named Tina and she charged us, I managed to get a lucky head shot in and dropped her before she could reach us.

  While I was doing that, the doctor attacked Big Al and tore him apart in front of me and Joyce, his daughter. We barely managed to blow his head off before he tore into us.

  It had been a very near thing.

  The zombie plague had started out just affecting children below the age of puberty, but thanks to the sick experiments of Dr. Magel, the pathogen has mutated and now a zombie bite means that you turn, no matter how old you are.

  It is a game changer for us survivors.

  It might just be a game ender.

  I take what comfort I can in the fact that I took the twisted fucks head off with a hatchet.

  Since then, two supply runs have failed to return and we can only assume that all six people who went on them are dead. Dead and likely turned.

  For the time being, I have canceled supply runs, but this is a very temporary solution. There are indeed less of us now, but we still have a lot of mouths to feed. We have also lost all of the weapons and ammo the supply run crews were carrying and they will need to be replaced.

  I walk up and take my turn with the shovel and so does Joyce, we do so as quietly as possible because of how the new grown up zombies seem to hunt.

  The undead children will attack any living thing that moves, anything that they see, hear or smell.

  The grown up zombies seem to hunt entirely by sound.

  We watched from the roof top with binoculars as another group of survivors walked right by a few adult zombies and they didn’t react, until one of the soon to be not survivors, fired a shot at one.

  The sound of the gunshot seemed to set them off and they tore the group to kibble and bits. They fed and then they went back to just standing there with their heads cocked to one side, like they were listening intently.

  So it is with whispers and hand gestures that I tell everyone to move back within the relative safety of the walls.

  Hush….

  Everyone moves quickly but quietly and in just moments we are all back inside. The crowd disperses and goes about its business. Everyone has a job to do and one and all go off to do them.

  “You were like a son to him Jake.” Joyce tells me quietly.

  She is trying to make me feel better, it isn’t working.

  “As long as that doesn’t make me your brother.” I make the lame, in bad taste joke, hoping to win a thin smile from her.

  It doesn’t work.

  Our crazy German sniper Katrin ignores Joyce and walks up to me with her usual scowl firmly in place.

  “Come with me Jake, need to show you something.” She tells me tersely and turns on her heel and walks away.

  She doesn’t look back to see if I am following her or not.

  “Go lie down for a while, it has been a shit day and it isn’t over yet.” I tell Joyce touching her arm softly.

  Nodding she walks away without saying anything.

  Guess there really isn’t much to say.

  I follow my grumpy sniper up the main stairwell heading up to the roof, she moves like she simply assumes people will get out of her way and the bitch of it is, that she is right.

  People get out of her way.

  She spends more time than just about anyone up on the roof with her best friend a fifty cal scoped suppressed rifle. I have never once seen her miss anything that she pointed the damn thing at, no matter how far away or tricky the shot.

  “We have a problem.” She says handing me a pair of beat up binoculars and pointing off to her left.

  “What the hell else is new?” I say taking the damn things and looking where she is pointing.

  I pan the binoculars on a slow 180 degree sweep and see what has her panties in a bunch, there is a large semi-circle of evenly spaced adult zombies facing our building.

  That can’t be good.

  “It gets worse. Watch.” She tells shouldering her rifle. Sighting on the center point zombie she blows its brains through the back of its head, with a single suppressed shot. It crumbles to the ground and after a few seconds, I watch as a zombie lurches out of a nearby alley and moves to stand exactly where the one before it stood.

  Facing our building.

  Crap.

  Chapter Two

  I order observers on the roof in shifts, so there are eyes on the situation constantly. This is a new and disturbing wrinkle and I have no idea what to make of it. Things are evolving very quickly and I am dancing just about as fast as I can. Two of the adult zombies facing our building turned out to be missing members of the latest supply run.

  Without waiting for my order, Katrin puts them both down.

  Which is what I want someone to do for me if I turn, so I don’t say a word to her about it. I do tell her to hold her fire for the time being, because even her suppressed shots are more noise than I want made right now.

  She gives me a look like who died and made me boss, but then she shuts up and does what she is told.

  We all know who died and made me boss.

  Haven’t been in charge for more than a few days and the weight of it is already wearing me down. Don’t know how Big Al bore it twenty four seven for as long as he did.

  Of course it is always amazing what the hell you can do when you don’t have any damn choice.

  I am heading back down the stairs, when I hear a low buzzing drone off in the distance, but getting louder by the moment. As tired as I am, it takes me a few seconds to place the noise.

  Whiskey Dave is coming.

  Fuck.

  I race back up the stairs and see that all of the guards have guns out pointing at the small ultralight plane, making a bee line for our rooftop.

  “Hold your fire! Clear the roof!” I bark out the orders and with a little grumbling and more than a little hesitation, they all obey. They would have obeyed Big Al instantly and without question.

  I ain’t him.

  Their respect and loyalty is something I will have to earn, I can only hope that we all live long enough for me to do so.

  The ultralight lands and I am grateful when the engine cuts out, it wasn’t that loud, but it’s still more noise than we can afford to be making just now. An old man in dirty military fatigues, with a ratty beard and a cue ball bald head, clambers out clutching a mostly full bottle of Jack Daniels.

  Before he can bellow a greeting, I jerk my finger to my lips and shake my head violently and by some damn miracle, he instantly takes the hint and moves quietly towards me.

  “Come inside, things aren’t great right now, so just be very quiet and follow me.” I hiss into his ear.

  I lead him past
the guards and as I pass them, I order them back up to the roof. I tell them not to shoot at the flood of zombies, no doubt attracted by the ultralight, unless they threatened to storm our fortified front door.

  Katrin sniffs at me and my guest as we move past her, as she takes her post up on the roof again. She and her girlfriend Cassandra aren’t really in the Whiskey Dave fan club.

  Can’t say that I am really a charter member my own damn self.

  He comes from another survivor enclave miles off to the east of us and story goes that he and Big Al knew each other from before the Zombies and shared a taste for American whiskeys. For about a year now, through the magic of ham radio, they have been arranging to have Whiskey Dave fly in every few months to get wasted and tell stories about the old days. It always seemed to lift Big Al’s spirits, for a while.

  At least after he got over the legendary hangovers any way.

  Problem is, Whiskey Dave is an asshole.

  A racist, sexist, homophobic, misogynistic asshole, to be more exact. He pretty much offended everyone he came across without, well hell, almost without damn exception.

  Big Al seemed to love the guy.

  Maybe I can understand it a little, Big Al was a leader and had to treat everyone the same, no matter his own personal views. He had to watch every word that he said, and police his every response to any given situation. I think in a way he envied his friend’s ability to run his mouth. He listened to every grievance and did what he could to soften his friends tone, but in the end I think he was entertained by Whiskey Dave. Maybe the guy even helped him stay more or less sane under the pressures of leading us Narwhals.

  So when they sat together semi regular times and when such could be scavenged, they smoked stale cigars and drank whatever booze was to be had and told stupid jokes and laughed at tall tales. They also traded intelligence from their respective territories and made various deals and treaties between our two groups. One of the early tests that Big Al put me through, was putting me in charge for the day or two he needed to recover from these visits.

  Damn, I miss the bastard, so fucking much.

  I knuckle tears from my eyes, as we pause on a landing a couple of flights of stairs down and I bring Whiskey Dave up to speed on current events.

  He bows his bald head for a moment and his breath seems to catch his throat in what might have been a swallowed sob. Wordlessly he hands me the bottle and without even thinking about it, I take a healthy swing and hand it back to him. With a deep sigh he takes a swig himself and then hands the bottle back to me.

  “Sorry son, if it is any consolation, you were like a son to him.” He tells me gravely, briefly squeezing my shoulder.

  Once again, if this particular line is designed to make me feel better, it really just isn’t working. But, I am surprised that he made the effort and I feel bad for a hot second that I might have misjudged him.

  “Tell the Ruskie dyke bitch to strap my bird down and have the rest of these fags guard it. Me and you need to talk us some white man stuff.”

  And the asshole we all know and tolerate is back.

  I consider telling him that the dyke bitch he is referring to is actually German, but I know from experience that he won’t really give a flying fuck.

  So with the taste of whiskey in my mouth, I follow his ragged ass down the staircase and lead him to my quarters. We will meet and exchange info and if it helps getting that information, I may have another drink or two to keep him happy, but I will not be getting drunk with him tonight. I covered Big Al on such occasions and thought the weight of the responsibility had been heavy back then.

  I used to be stupid.

  Not a luxury I have any more.

  Chapter Three

  Joyce sits at the table with us, because I told the son of bitch that if he said one fucking word about it as we sat down, I would pistol whip his bony old ass.

  He gave me a startled look.

  Yeah, I am in a mood just now.

  “Talk to us.” Joyce tells the old man gently, giving his hand a soft squeeze as she spoke.

  “Nothing like what you are talking about is going where we are, nothing but the usual biting little bastards. That’s good, means it hasn’t spread yet, and maybe we can contain this.” He rasped at us, knocking back a shot.

  “We would appreciate any help.” I told him.

  He snorted derisively and poured himself another shot, into one of the pair of old time Disney World shot glasses he and Big Al used to use.

  “Don’t thank me yet kid, by help I just might mean surrounding your territory and killing anything that tries to cross the line, including you and your maybe infected people.” He growls scratching his beard absently.

  Jerk will probably give us fleas.

  He isn’t wrong though, Big Al would have had ordered the same response if it proved to be necessary. If we have a shot at containing this mess, we are going to have to move quickly.

  “You should put together a supply run, enough people to grab enough stuff to be ok for a while. Do you have any fuel?” Whiskey Dave asks abruptly.

  “Fuel we have, is the ultralight low on gas?” Joyce asks after looking at the master supply list, she thought to bring with her.

  “Got more than enough to get back, but if you top me off, I can buzz the big zombies and maybe the noise will make them follow me for long enough for you to get a team out and back.” He offers gruffly.

  It isn’t a bad plan, if the zombies will take the bait and shuffled off. Even if they won’t, that will be worth knowing too.

  “When?” I ask him.

  “Well if you two sweeties don’t have a hot date, my social calendar is clear right about, now. I need to get back and share this intelligence with my people. I can buzz real low like and fire off a few rounds to get their attention, try to herd their undead asses away from you, until I have to veer off and go home.” He sneers at us, while he does another shot.

  I exchange glances with Joyce and she gives me a weak smile that all but breaks my heart. I know what we have to do now, all that is left is to say it out loud.

  “Ok, let’s scramble a team, we are going out.” I tell her. She nods and leaves to go make it happen.

  Twenty minutes later we are in the staging area by the main doors, there are eight of us including Joyce and I. I told her to stay behind.

  Yeah. Lost that argument pretty much before it started.

  Cassandra is carrying a baseball bat and has a couple of small handguns, one holstered on her hip and the other in a shoulder holster. She also has a couple of flashbangs, from our last box of those and a small hatchet on her belt. As usual she was one of the first to volunteer for this party. Joyce stands next to her, with a large heavy duty machete and one of her dad’s big revolvers in a shoulder holster. They are talking together quietly and Cassandra looks over and gives me a wry smile.

  Don’t even want to know what they are saying.

  The other six are a mixed bag of men and women, just whoever happened to be on the duty roster today. Some of them I have been on missions with before and some are new to me. Each of them have various blades and bludgeons and all of them have at least one gun on them.

  The guns will be last resort, way too loud to use, if we can avoid it. We all are wearing empty backpacks that we hope to fill with whatever supplies we can scrounge. It is basically a bash and dash sort of deal, we sneak when we can kill when we have to, grab what we can and haul ass back home. I look at the people waiting for my order to move out and say a quick prayer that I can bring them all back alive.

  I hear Whiskey Dave start up the ultralight and the crazy old bastard has rigged an air horn to it somehow. Through the spyhole in the door, I watch him swoop down dangerously low over the adult zombies in their scary perfect circle and then veer away to the south.

  For a terrible moment nothing happens.

  Then one by one the zombies begin to shuffle off in the direction that the plane is heading, following the noise. He
keeps dive bombing them to keep them interested and pretty soon they are all lurching after him, at the best speed they can manage.

  Good news is that no zombies come out to replace the ones that moved away from our building.

  “Ok people, quickly and quietly out the door and then we are heading west, just as fucking silently as possible.” I whisper to my team.

  And then we go through the doors.

  Chapter Four

  I take point and Cassandra and Joyce fan out behind me. The rest of our happy group take up standard positions and follow us. There is a damp chill in the air and the sky looks like it could rain. Rain would be good, it would help cover any little noises we make as we move and throw any hunting zombies off of our scent.

  So it probably won’t rain, until we are back in the building, Murphy’s Law and all that.

  We double time it away from the building, knowing that Katrin is watching us leave through the scope of her rifle. I left her in charge of the roof detail, knowing that she will do whatever needs to be done, when she sees us coming back.

  Whether that means supporting us with cover fire or dropping us where we stand if we come back infected, I know I can count on her to do whatever is required.

  We make it a few blocks without encountering any zombies large or small, it takes a bit for the strangeness of that to sink in. One by one we come to a stop, as it hit us.

  There are no small zombies anywhere.

  Two blocks later we find out why.

  Between two burned out apartment buildings we come across a vacant lot piled high with the bodies of small zombies, all of their skulls have been crushed or in some cases the heads have been torn off completely. All of the bodies show signs of extreme frenzied violence. They are stacked up like fucking cord wood.

  “Jesus.” A guy I haven’t been on runs with yet, says in a low hissing whisper his face going a little pale.

  “Neanderthals.” A rail thin younger guy with a mop of curly black hair whispers, mostly to himself, I think.