Roxanne's Story (Book 1): Survival in the Zombie Apocalypse (3 page)

Roxanne was always on alert that more people would have the same idea of going to an amusement park and that her isolation could be disturbed any day. Therefore she heard the car attempting to make the upgrade to the park long before it came into sight. She could tell from the sound that the car was on its last legs by the knocking, rattling and grinding as the driver attempted to shift gears.

She ran to the bus and got down on her hands and knees to remove one of the barriers she had placed there in an attempt to deter Ze’s from crawling under the bus. After crawling on her belly she removed a small peephole in an outside barrier and watched the parking lot until the car limped into view. “Shit!” she couldn’t believe it. Ed, with a male companion. A thousand thoughts went through her mind in seconds. “I can’t do this again. I should have killed him long ago. But what about the other man? Is he an innocent passenger or another asshole? Damn!” She heard the other man caution Ed as they got out of the car and approached. She wasn’t worried about them coming through the bus because she had locked the back door and only unlocked it when she left the interior of the park.

“Ed, I think this place is already claimed” the traveler said as he stood there with his hands on his hips. “This bus was positioned to block the tunnel and did you notice all the stakes and spikes protruding through the fence? Let’s take our time on this and walk the fence line to see if there is any activity inside.” They went to their right which would take them up the mountainside where they would have the same view of the park that Roxanne had when she first arrived at the park. She knew the view would be good there and that it would be hard to stay undercover without being noticed. No, she was not going to play this cat and mouse game. On this she needed to get out there and get it over with.

She crawled back to where Mutt was waiting for her with anticipation in his eyes. She had him get under the bus so he wouldn’t be seen, told him to stay and pulled the barrier back with just enough room for him to get out if necessary. She picked up a ladder that she had placed for this possibility and leaned it against the hill that covered the tunnel. The hill extended out along the fence line and she would be able to run across it undetected. She knew that they could scale the fence but the hillside was wet with morning dew and any attempt by them to climb it would be a slow process. The ladder helped her to reach the top quickly, and then she ran along the top until she was directly above them and the sun would be in their face. She cocked the rifle and yelled, “Hold it right there!”

Both Ed and the other man started to raise their hands to shield their eyes from the sun but Roxanne ordered them to keep their hands down. “I have a rifle trained on you and will blow both of you away before you even get a bead on me so don’t move.”

“Roxie?” Ed asked. “Roxanne is that you? I thought you were dead. How’d you get here?”

“I’m with a group,” she lied. “They sent me out because I recognized you. We’re not taking in any more people, least of all a worthless piece of shit like you. Now beat it! Get out!”

Ed started to whine, “The car is shot Roxie. You can’t send us out on foot. We’ll never make it. You know what it’s like out there. You know that I’m good with cars Roxanne. I can be helpful. I can keep things running but I’m just no good out here. You gotta’ talk to them Roxie. They gotta’ let us in.”

Roxanne hesitated. Ed had a point there, he was good with machinery. He could get the Water Wheel going again to keep the pond water circulating and fresh. He was good with wood and could devise fishing poles, could make more stakes to fortify the fence, could build more barriers. He was useful as long as he was protected and not out in the ZA world.

She turned her gun on the other guy. “What’s your name and what skills do you have?”

“Name’s Lucky”, he said. “I’m good at tracking and hunting animals and I’m good with a gun.” Roxanne was startled by the softness in his voice which surprised her. She hadn’t heard that certain “calmness” in a person’s voice since the ZA started. People now spoke in tones of fear; panic, screaming, yelling and even whispers had the tone of urgency in it. Ed had been whining and she had been yelling yet here was this man, this Lucky who had not let their drama suck him into the circle. She changed the tone in her own voice and said, “Well Lucky, if you can answer three questions to our satisfaction I’ll talk to the council about letting you in.”

Roxanne sat on a rock pile watching Lucky and Ed work on the Water Wheel that had clogged pipes to the filtration system. They had been here for three days and she didn’t know how much longer she could keep up with her lies. She wasn’t worried about Ed although he would be mad once he found out that there wasn’t a “group” working in another section of the park. Ed was happy to have a bunk, food, shelter, protection and was actually taking pride in his work. She had seen him smile a few times as he stood back with his hands on his skinny hips and surveyed his accomplishment at the end of the day.

But Lucky? She hadn’t fooled Lucky from day one and wondered why he hadn’t said something by now. It was his answer to her second question that kept her tense and suspicious of him. Her first question had been how many zombies had he killed because she didn’t want another Ed who would not do battle against the biters. Then she had asked how many humans he had killed and his reply had been “five.” That had startled and frightened her. She herself had to kill one human to save herself while traveling with Mutt. Lawlessness had become the norm in the ZA and most women were not safe from predators with evil intent. She asked why, and he answered that it was because they were trying to kill him. Still, she was not comfortable with that answer.

From the moment she had handcuffed them to one another and let them out of their bunk, his eyes never stopped taking in the place. He said he was a good tracker but she suspected that he had been a cop, detective or a bounty hunter. Maybe military, because he saw all the indications that the place was deserted.

“Boss, may I approach for water?” Lucky called out taunting her. She had to hide her face so he didn’t see her smile.

“Take it slow so Mutt doesn’t tear into you.” She watched him as he approached the water bucket which was 8’ away from her. He kept his eyes on Mutt as Roxanne kept her eyes on Lucky. His face was glistening with sweat and a few brown hairs had escaped from his ponytail so she didn’t think that he was faking the need for water. Mutt stood up and began to growl. She calmed the dog but didn’t tell him to sit, wanting Mutt to be ready if Lucky should make a movement toward her.

Lucky used the ladle to get a drink then took his eyes off the dog and put them on her. “When do you plan on telling us that the place is empty, Roxanne?” he asked in that soft voice. “Or do you want me to tell Ed for you after you’ve locked us up tonight? He’ll be plenty mad that a woman made a fool out of him but he’ll have all night to get over it.”

“And you Lucky?” she asked. “Would you feel like a fool?”

He took another drink of water and shook his head, “Nah. I figure you had to be careful. I know you can take care of yourself because I saw in your eyes that you were ready to take Ed’s head off right then and there. You just didn’t plan it out well, that’s all. No one can go it alone anymore Roxanne.”

Roxanne smiled, “Oh, I’m not the complete fool Lucky.”

Lucky and Roxanne sat on the porch of her cabin, both tired after another productive day. It had grown dark and the only sounds were the crickets. Ed had decided he was going to bunk in the garage and was moving a cot from the First Aid Lounge into the facility. He felt safer within the bay’s steel doors especially since the building only had one window. Lucky had convinced Roxanne that they did not have the manpower to fortify the whole park and that they needed to centralize. “Start with a smaller space and build your wall. Localize everything you need within it and if our group grows then you can expand by building another wall outside the central wall, and so forth.”

They saw a flashlight approaching from the pathway and Mutt started to growl. Ed came into view carrying a gas can and said that he had seen several sheds throughout the park which he thought contained generators. “You know, in case they lost electricity and people were stuck on the rides. They’d have generators near to get the people down. I’m not an electrician but I thought I would check out a few and see if they still run.” Lucky and Roxanne looked at each other. Ed was going out alone at night?

“That’s mighty big of you Ed,” Lucky said. “If you want to fiddle with it go right ahead.” After Ed left Roxanne told Mutt to keep an eye on him. Mutt’s head snapped around to look at her as if Roxanne was crazy. “You don’t need to like him Mutt, just make sure he doesn’t get into any trouble. Stay your distance.” Mutt got up, hesitated, and then slowly walked off as if he were going to see the Vet.

“We need to block off all the various paths leading out into the park and centralize here. We have all these amusement rides and can use the metal instead of wood. In fact we can take the cars off the rides and stack them to build a barrier,” Lucky expanded.

They exchanged ideas for another twenty minutes when suddenly Roxanne grabbed his arm. “Wait! Did Ed intend to start the equipment now? At night?” They immediately received the answer when the sky suddenly lit up when Ed turned on the Ferris wheel. The lights flashed several times followed by a grinding sound and then the wheel slowly started to turn. Both of them made a mad dash into the night, yelling “Turn it off Ed. Turn it off!”

Cami, Gene and Morgan had taken the first night shift and were in a circle surrounding the camp when Cami noticed the glow in the far distance. She walked over to where Gene and Morgan had already gathered and asked “What the Hell? Those lights are moving. Do you see that?” she turned to look at Gene.