Cry Zombie Cry (I Zombie Book 5) (15 page)

“
That’s for thinking a lousy cry would make it all feel better. Just crack your whip and shout c
ry, zombie, cry
, like I’m your circus monkey.”

Jamal stared at me in utter shock.

“
I’m just fucking with you, J-dizz.”

Jamal put his arm around me. “You okay? You must have been having one hell of a dream.”

I melted into his embrace. “You could say that.”

We sat there for a moment, unsure of what to say next.

“
I just want my baby back,” were the only words necessary before the tears began—once again—to pour from my eyes like rain. “God, Jamal, what’s wrong with me? My emotions are all over the place, lately; it’s driving me crazy.”

Jamal pulled back and turned to face me.

“
Bethany, you’ve lost your son to the bastards who punched the human race in the gut. It’s quite understandable that your emotions would be all over the place. What’s wrong with you is that you’re human…in the best possible ways.” He engulfed me in his embrace. “I love you, Bethany.”

Silence…not the bad kind of
what did he just say?
silence. This was more about letting a moment breathe and sink into your soul.

When I finally pulled away, the look on Jamal’s face brought purpose and life back to my spirit.

“
I love you too, Jamal.”

My empty stomach decided the moment had gone on long enough. The audible growl from my gut reminded me that too many meals had been skipped. The laughter that followed was all we needed to motivate us to the first mission of the day—find food.

The kitchen was stocked with every possible piece of cookware necessary to feed an army. Unfortunately, the pantries weren’t equally equipped. In fact, Old Mother Hubbard had nothing on our current situation.

“
Paradise lost, I’d say.” Jamal sighed.

“
Looks like you and I are going on a bit of a scavenger hunt.”

*

Morning sun was never my thing—it always seemed too harsh, too demanding. But in this case I was actually pretty okay with it. This go around meant I was still alive, which was about all you could ask for at the moment.

Jamal and I stared at the litter- and rubble-strewn city streets.

“
Which way?” Jamal asked.

I pointed north and took off. There was no logic or reason behind the choice. Every street was a maze of debris, broken down cars, and broken bodies. It didn’t matter which direction we went.

Jamal pointed. “There’s a house. Should we pop in for a visit?”

“
And maybe tea?” I gestured toward the house. “Lead the way.”

Inside, the house was no better off than the streets.

“
I swear,” Jamal spoke softly, “this town must have been completely looted before it was walled up.”

“
That doesn’t make any sense. Why would someone bother walling off a city after it’s been stripped of everything that would keep it functioning? I would have thought this place stocked for Armageddon.”

“
Literally.” Jamal winked.

“
Jesus jumping Christ, is there anything of use in here?”

“
This may sound crazy, because you know I can find a use for most anything, but no. This is a do-it-yourselfer’s nightmare.”

Jamal was right. The house contained not one piece of equipment, scrap of food, or article of clothing…nothing of use. From bottom floor to top, the house was littered with the wrecked remains of a snuffed-out life.

“
B, why are there no corpses? Wouldn’t it stand to reason someone would have died inside these walls?”

“
That’s a rather presumptuous conclusion. We have nothing to prove this house was actually occupied prior to the blast. Or what if the occupants were running errands when it all hit? Or what if they fled the scene of this post-apocalyptic crime?”

Jamal turned to me, his eyes wide. “Aha! Your conclusion assumes that whatever hit took out the inhabitants of the house immediately. How do we know the virus wasn’t slow to take hold here? Should that be the case, the infected could have wandered about for any given period of time—at least until the virus overtook their systems.”

The look on my face must have projected my reaction. Jamal’s eyes nearly doubled in size and he crossed to me, his hands in the air in surrender.

“
I’m sorry, Bethany. I didn’t mean to insult you or dredge up old feelings.”

“
Jamal, you know I’ve been through this before. I know how long the virus takes; I’ve seen it, firsthand, every step of the way.”

“
I know, B, I’m sorry…”

I couldn’t allow those feelings to boil up again. One more visit to crazy-town and I might not return. So…I offered Jamal a smile. “It’s okay. Let’s just keep on moving through these houses until we find what we’re looking for.”

“
Which is?”

I turned to Jamal, hands on my hips. “Anything to make survival a bit more, well, possible.”

It wasn’t until we hit the fourth house that something actually useful came up.

“
Holy shit, Bethany,” Jamal grinned as he pointed out two equal-sized solar panels. “These babies will keep us in electricity for some time.”

Jamal was right. The four-by-six-feet panels were perfectly suited for our needs.

“
We can squeeze about two hundred and fifty watts from a full charge.”

Jamal was busy checking out his find. He found the connection wires and traced them across the floor.

“
Damn, girl, we are hitting the jackpot today. Here’s the inverter and charge controller.”

“
Are you saying these panels will work?”

“
I don’t see any damage to the silicon infrastructure. There’s no reason why they won’t deliver full wattage from a single charge. Oh…” Jamal’s voice drifted off.

“
I don’t like it when you say ‘oh’, Jamal. What’s the ‘oh’ for?”

“
It’s a good ‘oh’, trust me. I have an idea. All of these cars have batteries. We can use the solar panels to charge the batteries and use them to power what we need. Enough batteries and we can keep a steady rotation of juice flowing into whatever electrical device we need. All I have to do is find—or build—the right inverter to go from twelve volts to one hundred twenty volts.”

I laughed out loud.

“
What’s so funny?”

“
You could build an inverter in your sleep. We’re as good as golden.”

“
There is one problem…”

My heart briefly stopped. “One problem” in the apocalypse could mean the crumbling of our very infrastructure.

“
How are we going to get all of this back to the headquarters?”

“
We’ll just have to carry it.”

I shouldn’t have opened my mouth. Either that or I should have enlisted some of the others to come along for the ride.

“
The solar panels and enough car batteries to…do you know how heavy a car battery is?”

I shook my head.

A metaphorical light blinked on over Jamal’s head. He always had the same look when a flicker of brilliance and he crossed paths. That flicker was fairly constant with the man.

“
We find a truck that has enough fuel to run, load up the bed with car batteries, the solar panels, and whatever else we need, and drive it back to the headquarters. Simple.”

The apocalypse forgot to send Jamal the memo that
nothing
was simple any more.

The moans came at us like a freight train.

“
Shit,” was all Jamal said.

“
What is it?”

“
Bethany, we’re surrounded.”

I didn’t want to hear those words. In no way, shape, or form was I prepared to take on a horde.

“
How many?” I asked.

The moans sounded off again, as if to answer my question.

“
Five, maybe.” Jamal confirmed my fear.

“
Okay, Jamal; we have to stand our ground and fight. We run…there’s no way of knowing if these bastards will find us when we’re not expecting an attack. It’s now or never.”

“
Come hold me tight,” Jamal whispered.

I got the reference. Now was not the time for Elvis, especially not Las Vegas Elvis.

The moans drew in closer. My eyes scanned the area for something, anything to get us out of the situation. Thankfully, necessity was the mother of invention. I pointed to a line of wire running along a trench.

“
Jamal, what is that?”

“
It looks like piano wire; but that makes no sense.”

“
Whatever it is, help me.”

I instructed Jamal to tie one end of the wire off on a pole to the side of the road, at just above waist height, and then take the other end and tie it—after wrapping it around the handle of an errant tennis racket—to a clump of bushes and hide.

The plan was simple. I would lure the zombies to follow me. Once they walked into the wire, Jamal would rush out, wrap the undead bastards up and pull with all of his might and hope the wire sliced through the rotted flesh until the Moaners split in half. If it worked, I’d be amazed. If not, we’d run like hell.

We had to do something. At that moment, even this was better than nothing.

Just as Jamal tucked himself into the bushes, the zombie gang made themselves known.

“
Over here, ya walking bags of pus.” I waved my hands above my head as I shouted.

The zombies heard me and shambled my way.

“
That’s right, come and get some seriously fresh brain. You’ll not find a single dead cell in this piece of gray matter chowder.”

It was probably my imagination, but I swear one of the bastards licked his lips.

The group finally reached the wire, and I shouted, “Now!”

Jamal rushed out and raced around the zombies to complete the loop. With a heaving groan, he pulled with all of his nerd-body might.

“
More power, Jamal.”

“
I’m givin’ her all that I’ve got.”

Had the situation been a bit less grave, I would have laughed at the Star Trek reference. As it was…no laugh. Instead I joined Jamal, put my hands on the racket, and pulled until I felt my legs and arms would snap.

“
I felt something,” Jamal shouted.

The line seemed to pop and then we were able to pull a bit further with surprising ease. I quickly realized why—the wire had managed to break the flesh barrier and find its way into the meat within. The clothing covering the zombies grew wet with a black sludge.

“
Keep pulling,” I screamed.

The first zombie awkwardly bent at the waist and then snapped in half.

“
Holy shit, B, it’s working.”

With that, we went at the apocalyptic game of tug-of-war with renewed gusto. Our efforts were quickly rewarded as the next victim found its upper half removed from its legs.

When the final zombie was split asunder, Jamal and I fell backward, into the bushes. There was no laughter, no celebratory chest bumping. We simply stood up, brushed off, and continued about our task.

Just another day’s work in the apocalypse.

“
I hate that this all comes so easily, Jamal.”

Jamal nodded. “It’s a tragic treatise on the evolution of man, my dear.”

We searched the entire neighborhood for a truck that would start. We must have been in a more affluent neighborhood since the driveways were lined with Jaguars, BMWs, Audis, and the occasional Lexus. We did finally manage to get a BMW SUV fired up. Jamal drove it to a centralized location. He insisted; it was the first time he’d driven a “bimmer.” I wanted to punch the goofy grin off his face as he steered the vehicle into position.

To accommodate enough supplies, we tossed out the back seats. After that, Jamal scrounged up the necessary tools to start dismantling various and sundry electrical systems. As he continued to strip the vehicles of their wiring, I hefted battery after battery from driveways to our new ride.