Z14 (Zombie Rules) (55 page)

             
“Come in Saigon.” She said. Tommy looked at the radio, and then looked at me in confusion.

             
“They’re calling us.” I picked up the microphone. “I’m here, heading back.”

             
“I need you here in forty-five minutes. Don’t be early, and you better not be late, or else.” She said. In spite of Tommy’s pain, I couldn’t help but grin at Julie’s menacing ultimatum.

             
“10-4.” I acknowledged. “I’ve got to stop by Fred’s place first and then I’ll be there.”

             
“Fred and Joe are over here.” She said.

             
“I just have to pick something up and I’ll be right there, in forty-five minutes.” I said and signed off.

             
“Who was that?” Tommy asked. I looked at him.

             
“That’s Julie, your sister.” I said. Tommy looked at me in troubled confusion.

             
“Mom said she was dead.” He finally said.

That bitch, I thought. She probably said it to Tommy so he’d stop asking about her.
It was a cruel thing to do.

             
“No Tommy,” I said quietly. “She’s very much alive, and she’s going to be thrilled to death to see you.”

             
“You’re taking me to see her?” He asked, wide-eyed.

             
“Damn right I am. You two have been apart far too long. But first, we’re going to stop by a friend’s house and get you cleaned up.”

              Tommy took a quick, cold shower and toweled off. I gave his backside a look and handed him a tube of Neosporin.

“Alright buddy, you’ll need to use this for a couple of days. It’ll help you heal up.
” The Neosporin would, hopefully, prevent any infection, but I had nothing to prevent any possible STD exposure.

“Why did he do that to me?” Tommy asked plaintively.

“Because, he was an evil person, they both were.” I answered. “You don’t have to worry about either one of those assholes anymore, right?” I asked.

Tommy nodded. “You killed them
, and set them on fire.”

“Yep,
and they never had a chance to tell anyone what was done to you. So, we’re going to keep it between us. Nobody else knows, and nobody else needs to know.” I said. Tommy nodded gratefully, and thanked me when I handed him some of Joe’s clothes. “These should fit you. They’re some of Joe’s clothes. I’m sure he won’t mind. You’ll meet him shortly. I bet you two will turn out to be good friends.”

“Where is Joe?” Tommy asked as he started getting dressed.

“He’s at my house with everyone else.” I looked around conspiratorially. “They’re throwing me a surprise birthday party. I’m not supposed to know about it.” I grinned at Tommy and winked. He grinned back.

“I won’t tell anyone.” He promised. “Is Julie there?”

“She is, and we’re going to surprise her when she sees you. How does that sound?”

“It sounds awesome.” Tommy said.
I put an arm around his shoulders in a brotherly hug.

“There’s a lot to tell you buddy. For one thing, I’m now your brother-in-law.” I said. Tommy looked at me blankly. “I married Julie, so that makes me your brother-in-law.”

“Oh, cool!” He said.

“It gets better. You’re an uncle too.” I said with a smile.

“How’d that happen?” He asked.

I took a deep breath. “I’ll let Julie explain it.” I looked at my watch. “We better get going, or else we’ll catch hell.”

Everyone shouted the customary ‘surprise’ when we walked in the door. I dropped my jaw and acted
as if I were truly surprised. Simultaneously, everyone seemed to see Tommy at the same time and a hush came over the room.

“Oh, my God” Julie gasped, handed little Rick to Rhonda
, and rushed over to where we were standing in the doorway. Grabbing Tommy by the shoulders, she looked at him a moment, and then burst out in tears. This caused Tommy to burst out in tears as he grabbed his big sister in a tight hug. Curly ran up to him with his tail wagging in recognition. I spoke up.

“Everyone, this is Tommy, Julie’s little brother.
” There was a collective gasp as everyone murmured their surprise, gathered around, and welcomed Tommy. I slipped out of the way and stood off to the side. Andie walked over and stood beside me.

“I didn’t know Julie had a brother.” She whispered.
I glanced at her.

“Yeah, it’s a long story.” I whispered back. “So, what birthday present did you get me?”

“A blowjob.” She whispered and grinned mischievously at me. I laughed and put my arm around her shoulders. “When is Julie’s birthday?” She asked.

“March seventh.” I replied.

“Did you do anything for her?” She asked.

“Oh, yeah.”
I replied with a grin. Julie broke her embrace with her little brother long enough to looked at me with tears of joy in her eyes. I gave her a wink.

We had a large
dinner, and afterward, I sat in a chair holding my son while everyone chitchatted. Julie, understandably, devoted her attention to Tommy. She peppered him with questions about where he had been and what their mother was up to. Little Rick decided to go boom-boom at some point, so I quietly walked into the bedroom and changed him. I started to walk out when I saw Wanda standing in the doorway watching me.

“I thought you might need some help.” She said.

“I was a little clumsy at it, but managed to get it done.” I replied.

“You did better than I thought you would.” Wanda said and disappeared down the hallway. I guess it was her way of complimenting me.

When I walked back to the den, everyone was waiting on me. Julie directed me back to the chair. “Time for your presents.” She said cheerfully.

“We’re doing something a touch different.” Rowdy said. “A physical present from each of us to you was
too hard to figure out. Whenever you want something, you just go out and find it, which can be damned annoying.” Everyone chuckled in agreement.

“So, we decided to do testimonials instead.” Julie said. “I’m going first.” She looked around. “When I first met Zach, I’d gone without a bath for a few days, so I was a little self-conscious. Later, even though Tommy loved him from the very first, I thought he was an arrogant prick.” Everyone burst out in laughter.

“Ditto.” Wanda added. Everyone laughed again.

“In fact, he and Rick
summarily kicked us out of their house with the threat of bodily harm.” She said smiling. “So, I hatched an evil plan to make him find me on the streets and fall in love with me. And it worked!” She smiled sweetly while everyone laughed.

“I’m next.” Andie said. “When I first met Zach, I called him an idiot and a dumb
shit.” More laughter. “Now, I’m convinced he’s the smartest person I’ve ever met, and I’m eternally grateful to him for everything he’s done for me.”

“When I first met Zach, he’d recently been in an unpleasant disagreement with some folks who meant to do him harm.” Fred said. “I was very impressed with him and how protective he was toward Julie. I grew to love them
both as my own family. Now, I consider all of you my family.” Everyone agreed and clapped. Rowdy spoke next.

“When I first met Zach, he chopped off the head of a zombie and then spent several minutes inspecting it.” Everyone laughed again, except Wanda. Rowdy
pretended not to notice, and continued. “Julie’s first words to me was I was full of shit.” There was much more laughter. “I had gone through a rough time before meeting up with the two of them. We’ve all had a rough time I suspect, but Zach has helped me out tremendously. He’s been a good friend.”

“I first met Zach and company
when I was surrounded by zombies.” Big Mac said. “They came to my rescue. It was obvious Zach took a liking to me immediately. I’ve lived a lifetime with people looking at me strangely, or saying things behind my back. Zach didn’t do any such thing.”

“I haven’t gotten to know Zach as well as I’d like,” Bo said. “But,
in the short time I have known him, I’ve found him to be a unique and resourceful young man.”

“I think he’s handsome.” Rhonda said sweetly.

“And a tough mother fucker.” Kelly added. Everyone laughed again.

“When I first met Zach, he was beat all to hell.
” Terry said. “When I heard the whole story, I thought, wow, he’s a pretty tough kid. When I was told the story of how he got shot in the head and lived through it, I knew one thing for certain. He
is
a tough you-know-what.”

I smiled or chuckled at the appropriate moments, but to be honest, they were making me out to be a lot bigger than my britches. I looked over at Fred. He seemed to sense my discomfort and gave me a fatherly nod.

It was after eight when everyone left, which was far later than normal. Julie fixed Tommy a bed on the couch and he promptly fell asleep while we were talking.

“Where are we going to put him?” Julie asked.

“I can fix up a bedroom for him in the basement. The wood stove down there will keep him warm. Or, he can be bunk buddies with Joe.”

Kelly smiled
in relief. “Oh, good, I thought I was going to be booted from my new bedroom.”

“W
here on Earth did you find him?” Julie asked. Andie, Terry, Rowdy, and Kelly looked at me attentively. I was hoping to avoid the story until a later time, but saw no way out of it. I only omitted Tommy’s assault, and did not feel the least bit guilty about it.

“Damn, Zach.” Terry said. “If you take a disliking to someone, they sure don’t live very long.” Andie punched
him in the arm. Rowdy chuckled, and then poured everyone a glass of violet colored liquid.

“It’
s a fine cabaret wine.” He said. “Now you need to give a speech.” Everybody voiced their agreement and soon joined in a chorus of ‘speech, speech, speech.’ I held up my hand and they became quiet.

“There are a lot of things I can think of, but I’ll only say this. My Grandmo
ther bought me a truck on my fifteenth birthday. As you can imagine, I was ecstatic. When I thanked her, she said, when you encounter a happy moment in your life, you should savor the moment for all it is worth, that way you’ll never forget it. This is indeed a moment to savor. I’m glad y’all are here.” I held up my glass and we toasted.

              Even with an occasional missed shot, and people shooting at the same zombie, our kill efficiency was very high. We’d shoot them until they got to within fifty meters, then we’d hop back in our vehicles, drive another quarter of a mile away from them, and do it all over again. We’d done it four times now.

Our strategy was working, but I hoped we killed them all before we ran out of ammo. The horde
had grown somewhat when we first encountered them. Stragglers seemed to be everywhere and joined in with the equivalent of zombiefied glee.

             
“Everyone sing out with your ammo count.” I shouted. When everyone had given their number, I did a quick mental calculation.

             
“Alright, we have about two thousand rounds left. Try to stay within your sectors of fire.” I ducked inside my truck and retrieved some binoculars.

             
“How many, do you think?” Terry asked as I handed the binoculars to Julie.

             
“I’m estimating a couple of hundred.” I said to all of them. “Hopefully, this will be all.” Until next time, I thought. We waited patiently for them to walk within range. Suddenly, Terry shouted.

“Hey everyone, get
your kits out and do a quick field cleaning. Otherwise, we’ll start getting jams. I’ll keep watch.” I glanced at him with pride. Terry had a military mindset, which was a valuable asset for our group.

We cleaned our weapons quickly, while we waited for the slowly moving horde.
I looked over at everyone’s progress and notice Kelly kept fumbling with her weapon. I reassembled mine quickly and helped with hers. I motioned for her to pull an ear plug out and asked her how she was doing. She glanced at me before focusing on her weapon.

“Alright.”
She answered, but then shook her head. “Nervous as hell, I need a Xanax.”

I chuckled. “It’s a hell of a way to introduce you to zombie killing, but you’re doing
good, hang in there.” I patted her shoulder. She smiled at me tentatively and put her earplug back in.

Once they were in range, i
t took another forty-five minutes until the last one fell. Afterward, we reloaded, gathered around, and exchanged high-fives.

             
“The cold slowed them down, but we still had some close calls.” Bo said.

             
“Yeah, this may not be a good strategy during the heat of the summer when they’re more agile.” I added. “Since we now know more about them, we may have to mount some offensive operations while it’s still cold.” I looked at Terry. “That’ll be your project, Corporal.” He grinned and gave me a mock salute.