Zombie Fallout 3: THE END .... (17 page)

When the throbbing in my shoulder had subsided into something less than a thundering rhino charge, I figured I might be able to give elusive sleep another chance. My ass was just about to make contact with the bed when I heard a small thud followed immediately by a muffled yelp coming through the wall, which just so happened to be the wall that we shared with my daughter. I still almost went through with the whole bed thing. The noise was that slight and unmenacing sounding. I hesitated, the burn in my thighs making itself known as I hung in that unnatural in between pose of standing or sitting.

“
Effen paranoia.” I lamented. I quietly padded across the room and out the door, I didn’t even bother completely shutting the door. I didn’t want the latching mechanism to wake my wife when it closed. The four-foot walk to my daughter’s door did nothing to instill any sort of fear into me. I felt foolish. I almost turned around. “In for a penny, in for a dementia.” Wasn’t that how the saying went? I was at her door, what was I going to do? Knock at 4 in the morning and see how she was doing? Hell, she was probably just having a bad dream, weren’t we all? And that decided it. Maybe I’d be doing her a favor if I woke her up.

I knocked lightly, and waited. Nothing happened. I knocked maybe just a little bit louder. I waited, still nothing. Dammit, she’s probably sleeping pretty good. ‘Talbot get your ass in bed and leave everyone alone,’ my inner psyche spewed. I’m sure you’ve noticed by now, I rarely listen to my higher consciousness. I turned her knob. The door was unlocked. Now I was pissed, hadn’t I taught that girl anything! This was going to suck for her. I was about to wake her from a nightmare only to scold the hell out of her. I opened the door. I was immediately struck with the oddity of the scene that was laid out in front of me. The light was on in her bathroom, which shed enough light to let me see that Nicole was nearly naked on her bed. ‘Oh fuck! A dad’s worst nightmare. That’s what I get for not minding my own business.’

“
I’m so sorry.” I said aloud.

Things at this point happened rapidly. Her head whipped up, I couldn't help but notice the gag in her mouth. I moved forward. “What the hell?” Then I smelled burning flesh (my own) as my body collapsed to the floor. I twitched like a bass out of water. The stun gun had sent upwards of 50,000 volts of charged electricity through my body. The arc and contraction of my muscles nearly made me bite my tongue off. My teeth chattered under the assault. I had 100 charley horses happening concurrently across my body and there wasn’t a thing I could do to ease the pain.

“
Bet that fucking hurts!” A tobacco teeth stained mullet wearing cracker said in my face. Redneck Number One was back. “After you kilt my friends, I swore I’d get me revenge on you all. It was just a stroke of pure luck that brought me here. Old Vern froze out in that field that night when you took our trucks. I stumbled back to the road and the next morning these military trucks picked me up. They says I was a referee.”

Through my muscle clenched teeth I was able to muscle out “Refugee, douchebag.”

That got me another charge of electricity into my rib cage. It felt like muscle was tearing away from tendon, the pain was that intense.

“
So’s, I was already here by the time you’s got here but ‘course I didn’t know that. I just happened to come across your little flower of a daughter just this morning.”

I strained against the paralysis.

“
Don’t waste yer time, you piece of shit. I shot you with ‘nough ‘lectricity to keep you from moving for the next fifteen minutes. Oh, I couldn’t have planned this any better iffen I had tried. You’re going to get a front row seat, well so to speak, front row floor maybe. As I do all sorts of things to your daughter. Then I’m going to slit her throat and I’m going to make sure you’ll be in position to have her blood flow over your face. This is going to be so much fun!”

Nicole’s face was strained with terror. My body was immobile,. I was impotent. A ten-ton elephant sitting on me couldn’t have had the same effect the stun gun did. Redneck number one stood up and began to walk over towards the bed. He produced a foot long bowie knife from under his jacket. Nicole looked over to me, pleading for her life with her eyes. I did not even have the coward’s option of closing my eyes. They were frozen in the open position. Tears formed. The room before me got blurry but it would not be enough to spare me from the horrors that were mere moments away.

I could feel a small pressure on my foot, I didn’t know it then but it was the apartment door being forced open. Henry came up beside me, he licked my forehead. I wanted to tell him to leave. There was no sense in two of us witnessing this atrocity.

Redneck Number One turned to look at the new intruder who had entered into his sick fantasy. "What the fuck is that ugly thing? Looks like he was runnen' too close to a truck that stopped short." He snorted at his own joke. Redneck Number One came back towards me. "Whassa matter ugly?" Redneck asked Henry. You gonna be sad to see your master dead? That's okay, I'll kill you too just to make it an even three." Then Redneck did something that I think saved mine, Nicole's and Henry's lives that night. He walked back towards me, I strained against my invisible bonds and was rewarded with a kick square in the ribs.

Henry then did the unthinkable, at least as far as anyone who knew that dog was concerned. He attacked. This was no play attack. His deep grumble alerted the Redneck that something had changed. Redneck had no sooner turned than Henry had latched onto the dirty bastard’s shin. I don't know what clicked in the dog's head. Lord knows he'd seen Tracy whack the crap out of the back of my head enough to not be too distraught when I was under attack. Henry must have known this was different but it still did not completely explain his behavior.

I’m not sure what you may or may not know about English Bulldogs, so I’ll give you the 101 version. There is no more passive breed of dog on the planet, unless of course you’re trying to hide food from them. Most Bullies have what you might consider scraggly teeth. They don’t so much bite as they do crush. Their jaws are massively powerful and extraordinarily large. I can attest to that fact from the numerous times Henry and I have played and he will put my entire forearm in his mouth. He’d break my bones long before he’d be able to break my skin. That being said Henry would much rather sleep than play. They know true affection and they love to be the center of attention. I once did a test with Henry to prove to my wife how loving of a dog he was. This is no lie or exaggeration. One night I was cooking steaks on the grill and I might have had a few too many beers as I was cooking. Well lo and behold one of the steaks I cooked fell off the plate when I hit the tray with the screen door. There was no chance on God’s green earth I was going to eat this thing now, so I dusted it off, cut it up and placed it on a platter for Henry. ‘Watch this.’ I told my wife. She asked me what the hell I was doing as I got down on my haunches next to my furry friend. She placed one hand on the phone a heartbeat away from dialing 911. I literally got down on all fours, head to head with Henry, and made like I was going to eat his food. Now this is steak mind you, not kibbles and bits. You know what that dog did? He moved over so I could get a better angle on the dish. That’s Henry, not a mean bone in his body.

So when Henry’s giant maw literally wrapped around Redneck's lower leg, I was just as surprised as Redneck was. The pain must have been intense, I watched as Redneck’s eyes began to bulge out. Dirt bag or not, he still had a knife and now realized he was going to need it for defense instead of fun. Henry snapped that man’s tibia and fibula, the cracking of bones was as loud as a percussion grenade in the small room. Redneck's knife came down, his aim blinded by the pain. I watched in helplessness as the knife arced down, Henry’s yelp of pain was all the proof I needed that Redneck had struck home.

“
Gotcha fucker!” Redneck yelled as he fell over, the pain in his broken leg making standing a losing venture. Henry was bleeding profusely from a wound to his side. The redneck was slumped against the wall, knife still in hand. His outstretched arm would still be plenty close enough to finish the job. “Fucking ugly motherfucker! I’m gonna kill you now!”

‘
Oh no, Henry’. I could accept a lot of things that a hard life had to offer. This was not going to be one of them.

Those were the last words Redneck Number One ever uttered. Not because he died, but because Henry ripped his jaw off. If that SOUNDS gross you should have been there to witness it. The splintering of bone and muscle as Henry tore into the soft flesh of the redneck’s face was gruesome. Teeth popped out of the redneck's jaw as Henry applied more pressure. When Henry shook his head, the bottom half of the redneck's jaw just came unhinged. Gristle, blood, teeth, and jawbone fragments flew around the room. A smear of blood landed on my right eye. Half the room became bathed in red as I desperately tried to blink, to no avail.

Two MP’s and my wife simultaneously made it to the doorway. To my wife’s credit she only retched half as hard as one of the guards.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN - JOURNAL ENTRY 10 -

A half hour later we were all in Doc Baker’s house.

“
How is he Doc?” I asked nervously.

“
Mike you know that’s the fifth time you’ve asked me that question right?” The Doc answered.

I looked longingly at him.

He sighed loudly. “He’s fine Mike, and he’d be a lot finer if you’d stop bugging me and let me finish sewing these stitches.”

Henry hadn’t even required any sort of numbing agent so intent was he with the frozen hot dogs he was sharing with Tommy, I’m not even sure he knew somebody was working on his side. Nicole in between sobs couldn’t contain herself from wrapping her arms around the lovable mutt.

“
See I told you it was worth saving him back at the house in Little Turtle.” I said to Tracy smugly. (Note to all men, wrong fucking time to prove a point!)

“
Talbot, are you kidding me?” My wife shot back. “You and your daughter almost died tonight and you want to throw an ‘I told you so’ in my face?”

“
Well I uh… had thought so. Not really so much anymore.”

Tracy glared at me.

“
So are those hot dogs really frozen?” I asked Tommy in a vain attempt to thwart the hostility. Tommy ignored me like only someone who valued their own existence could. “Could use a little help here Tommy?” I begged

“
Wanff a hoff doff?” He answered.

Henry took that as his queue and wolfed down the proffered frozen meat snack.

I turned my attention back towards Henry. The laceration looked nasty. Fourteen stitches later he was as good as new.

“
Alright.” Doc said as he snipped the excess thread away. “I recommend as little movement for Henry for the next three days as possible.”

“
I don’t think that’s going to be a problem Doc.” I said. Henry had fallen asleep on the operating table with half of a frozen hot dog sticking out of his mouth.

We went back to the barracks. I had rounded up an old musty cot to sleep on, while Nicole got into the bed with her mother. Henry had never woke back up as Tommy had carried him back up to our room. I waited until I was sure everyone was asleep and then I sobbed silently. There were just so much pent up emotions looking for an escape. A big chunk was relief, relief that my daughter was physically ok. Emotionally, that might take a while. Relief that Henry was ok. I was going to buy that dog a cow tomorrow. Out of us all he seemed the least affected. If I’m being honest, I think a big part of my tears were of frustration. I had walked into a trap. I had almost gotten my daughter and my best furry friend killed. That was a tough thing for me to reconcile. The cot swayed under the assault of my cries. I was being as quiet as was possible under the circumstances. It wasn’t enough.

From the shadows came my wife’s voice. “It wasn’t your fault Talbot.”

I wanted to answer her. It’s just that my throat was closed off.

“
Get some sleep Marine, we’ve all lived to fight another day.”

She was right, of course she was right, she’s always right. Now if I could just heed her words I’d be all set. Three minutes later I stumbled into slumber.

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN - JOURNAL ENTRY 11 -