The Essential Max Brooks: The Zombie Survival Guide and World War Z (43 page)

It was about five foot ten, slumped, narrow shoulders with this puffy, wagging belly. It wasn't wearing a shirt and its mottled gray flesh was all torn and pockmarked. It smelled like the beach, like rotten kelp and saltwater. Aiden jumped up and ran behind me. Tim was out of the chair, standing between us and that thing. In a split second, it was like all the lies fell away. Tim looked frantically around the room for a weapon just as it grabbed him by the shirt. They fell on the carpet, wrestling. He shouted for us to get in the bedroom, for me to get the gun. We were in the hallway when I heard Jenna scream. I ran to her room, threw open the door. Another one, big, I'd say six and a half feet with giant shoulders and bulging arms. The window was broken and it had Jenna by the hair. She was screaming “Mommy​mommy​mommy!”

What did you do?

I…I'm not totally sure. When I try to remember, everything goes by too fast. I had it by the neck. It pulled Jenna toward its open mouth. I squeezed hard…pulled…The kids say I tore the thing's head off, just ripped it right out with all the flesh and muscle and whatever else hanging in tatters. I don't think that's possible. Maybe with all your adrenaline pumping…I think the kids just have built it up in their memories over the years, making me into SheHulk or something. I know I freed Jenna. I remember that, and just a second later, Tim came in the room, with this thick, black goo all over his shirt. He had the gun in one hand and Finley's leash in the other. He threw me the car keys and told me to get the kids in the Suburban. He ran into the backyard as we headed for the garage. I heard his gun go off as I started the engine.

P
ARNELL
A
IR
N
ATIONAL
G
UARD
B
ASE
: M
EMPHIS
, T
ENNESSEE
, USA

[Gavin Blaire pilots one of the D-17 combat dirigibles that make up the core of America's Civil Air Patrol. It is a task well suited to him. In civilian life, he piloted a Fujifilm blimp.]

It stretched to the horizon: sedans, trucks, buses, RVs, anything that could drive. I saw tractors, I saw a cement mixer. Seriously, I even saw a flatbed with nothing but a giant sign on it, a billboard advertising a “Gentlemen's Club.” People were sitting on top of it. People were riding on top of everything, on roofs, in between luggage racks. It reminded me of some old picture of trains in India with people hanging on them like monkeys.

All kinds of crap lined the road—suitcases, boxes, even pieces of expensive furniture. I saw a grand piano, I'm not kidding, just smashed like it was thrown off the top of a truck. There were also a lot of abandoned cars. Some had been pushed over, some were stripped, some looked burned out. I saw a lot of people on foot, walking across the plains or alongside the road. Some were knocking on windows, holding up all kinds of stuff. A few women were exposing themselves. They must have been looking to trade, probably gas. They couldn't have been looking for rides, they were moving faster than cars. It wouldn't make sense, but…
[shrugs]
.

Back down the road, about thirty miles, traffic was moving a little better. You'd think the mood would be calmer. It wasn't. People were flashing their lights, bumping the cars in front of them, getting out and throwing down. I saw a few people lying by the side of the road, barely moving or not at all. People were running past them, carrying stuff, carrying children, or just running, all in the same direction of the traffic. A few miles later, I saw why.

Those creatures were swarming among the cars. Drivers on the outer lanes tried to veer off the road, sticking in the mud, trapping the inner lanes. People couldn't open their doors. The cars were too tightly packed. I saw those things reach in open windows, pulling people out or pulling themselves in. A lot of drivers were trapped inside. Their doors were shut and, I'm assuming, locked. Their windows were rolled up, it was safety tempered glass. The dead couldn't get in, but the living couldn't get out. I saw a few people panic, try to shoot through their windshields, destroying the only protection they had. Stupid. They might have bought themselves a few hours in there, maybe even a chance to escape. Maybe there was no escape, just a quicker end. There was a horse trailer, hitched to a pickup in the center lane. It was rocking crazily back and forth. The horses were still inside.

The swarm continued among the cars, literally eating its way up the stalled lines, all those poor bastards just trying to get away. And that's what haunts me most about it, they weren't headed anywhere. This was the I-80, a strip of highway between Lincoln and North Platte. Both places were heavily infested, as well as all those little towns in between. What did they think they were doing? Who organized this exodus? Did anyone? Did people see a line of cars and join them without asking? I tried to imagine what it must have been like, stuck bumper to bumper, crying kids, barking dog, knowing what was coming just a few miles back, and hoping, praying that someone up ahead knows where he's going.

You ever hear about that experiment an American journalist did in Moscow in the 1970s? He just lined up at some building, nothing special about it, just a random door. Sure enough, someone got in line behind him, then a couple more, and before you knew it, they were backed up around the block. No one asked what the line was for. They just assumed it was worth it. I can't say if that story was true. Maybe it's an urban legend, or a cold war myth. Who knows?

A
LANG
, I
NDIA

[I stand on the shore with Ajay Shah, looking out at the rusting wrecks of once-proud ships. Since the government does not possess the funds to remove them and because both time and the elements have made their steel next to useless, they remain silent memorials to the carnage this beach once witnessed.]

They tell me what happened here was not unusual, all around our world where the ocean meets the land, people trying desperately to board whatever floated for a chance of survival at sea.

I didn't know what Alang was, even though I'd lived my entire life in nearby Bhavnagar. I was an office manager, a “zippy,” white-collar professional from the day I left university. The only time I'd ever worked with my hands was to punch a keyboard, and not even that since all our software went voice recognition. I knew Alang was a shipyard, that's why I tried to make for it in the first place. I'd expected to find a construction site cranking out hull after hull to carry us all to safety. I had no idea that it was just the opposite. Alang didn't build ships, it killed them. Before the war, it was the largest breakers yard in the world. Vessels from all nations were bought by Indian scrap-iron companies, run up on this beach, stripped, cut, and disassembled until not the smallest bolt remained. The several dozen vessels I saw were not fully loaded, fully functional ships, but naked hulks lining up to die.

There were no dry docks, no slipways. Alang was not so much a yard as a long stretch of sand. Standard procedure was to ram the ships up onto the shore, stranding them like beached whales. I thought my only hope was the half dozen new arrivals that still remained anchored offshore, the ones with skeleton crews and, I hoped, a little bit of fuel left in their bunkers. One of these ships, the
Veronique Delmas,
was trying to pull one of her beached sisters out to sea. Ropes and chains were haphazardly lashed to the stern of the APL
Tulip,
a Singapore container ship that had already been partially gutted. I arrived just as the
Delmas
fired up her engines. I could see the white water churning as she strained against the lines. I could hear some of the weaker ropes snap like gunshots.

The stronger chains though…they held out longer than the hull. Beaching the
Tulip
must have badly fractured her keel. When the
Delmas
began to pull, I heard this horrible groan, this creaking screech of metal. The
Tulip
literally split in two, the bow remaining on shore while the stern was pulled out to sea.

There was nothing anyone could do, the
Delmas
was already at flank speed, dragging the
Tulip
's stern out into deep water where it rolled over and sank within seconds. There must have been at least a thousand people aboard, packing every cabin and passageway and square inch of open deck space. Their cries were muffled by the thunder of escaping air.

Why didn't the refugees just wait aboard the beached ships, pull up the ladders, make them inaccessible?

You speak with rational hindsight. You weren't there that night. The yard was crammed right up to the shoreline, this mad dash of humanity backlit by inland fires. Hundreds were trying to swim out to the ships. The surf was choked with those who didn't make it.

Dozens of little boats were going back and forth, shuttling people from shore to ships. “Give me your money,” some of them would say, “everything you have, then I'll take you.”

Money was still worth something?

Money, or food, or anything they considered valuable. I saw one ship's crew that only wanted women, young women. I saw another that would only take light-skinned refugees. The bastards were shining their torches in people's faces, trying to root out darkies like me. I even saw one captain, standing on the deck of his ship's launch, waving a gun and shouting “No scheduled castes, we won't take untouchables!” Untouchables? Castes? Who the hell still thinks like that? And this is the crazy part, some older people actually got out of the queue! Can you believe that?

I'm just highlighting the most extreme negative examples, you understand. For every one profiteer, or repulsive psychopath, there were ten good and decent people whose karma was still untainted. A lot of fishermen and small boat owners who could have simply escaped with their families chose to put themselves in danger by continuing to return to shore. When you think about what they were risking: being murdered for their boats, or just marooned on the beach, or else attacked from beneath by so many underwater ghouls…

There were quite a few. Many infected refugees had tried to swim for the ships and then reanimated after they drowned. It was low tide, just deep enough for a man to drown, but shallow enough for a standing ghoul to reach up for prey. You saw many swimmers suddenly vanish below the surface, or boats capsize with their passengers dragged under. And still rescuers continued to return to shore, or even jumped from ships to save people in the water.

That was how I was saved. I was one of those who tried to swim. The ships looked much closer than they actually were. I was a strong swimmer, but after walking from Bhavnagar, after fighting for my life for most of that day, I barely had enough strength to float on my back. By the time I reached my intended salvation, there wasn't enough air in my lungs to call for help. There was no gangway. The smooth side towered over me. I banged on the steel, shouting up with the last bit of breath I had.

Just as I slipped below the surface, I felt a powerful arm wrap around my chest.
This is it,
I thought; any second, I thought I would feel teeth dig into my flesh. Instead of pulling me down, the arm hauled me back up to the surface. I ended up aboard the
Sir Wilfred Grenfell,
an ex-Canadian Coast Guard cutter. I tried to talk, to apologize for not having any money, to explain that I could work for my passage, do anything they needed. The crewman just smiled. “Hold on,” he said to me, “we're about to get under way.” I could feel the deck vibrate then lurch as we moved.

That was the worst part, watching the other ships we passed. Some of the onboard infected refugees had begun to reanimate. Some vessels were floating slaughterhouses, others just burned at anchor. People were leaping into the sea. Many who sank beneath the surface never reappeared.

T
OPEKA
, K
ANSAS
, USA

[Sharon could be considered beautiful by almost any standard—with long red hair, sparkling green eyes, and the body of a dancer or a prewar supermodel. She also has the mind of a four-year-old girl.

We are at the Rothman Rehabilitation Home for Feral Children. Doctor Roberta Kelner, Sharon's caseworker, describes her condition as “lucky.” “At least she has language skills, a cohesive thought process,” she explains. “It's rudimentary, but at least it's fully functional.” Doctor Kelner is eager for the interview, but Doctor Sommers, Rothman's program director, is not. Funding has always been spotty for this program, and the present administration is threatening to close it down altogether.