Zombie Fallout 5: Alive in a Dead World (27 page)

I hadn’t seen him this mad in a long time, if
ever.

“He’s inside me!” he said thumping his fist
against his chest.

“
It’s done,”
Tomas intoned.
“Do not
contact me again.”

We’ll see
, I answered him, but he was
already gone.

“You don’t get it, BT, I had to ask for his
help. I couldn’t hold them off indefinitely. While I’m thinking
about it or while I’m conscious, it’s easy enough to keep telling
the parasites to stay put. But I have no idea what happens if I
sleep. And I love you, my friend, but I don’t always want to be
within shouting distance, do you?” I asked throwing it back at
him.

“Well, not really,” he answered, a small
measure of anger dropping off.

“I guess I’d never have to worry about
running out of toilet paper,” I told him.

“What are you talking about?” Gary asked.

“Because BT will always be around and if Mike
runs out, BT will be able to hear him. Have you not been listening
to the conversation?” Josh asked.

“So am I supposed to shoot him, Mike?” Gary
asked me.

“I think he’s fine now.”

“How would you know that?” BT asked me
suspiciously.

“Tomas is gone,” I told him.

“So how would you know if I’m good or not?”
BT asked once again, threatening me with his finger.

I didn’t answer. I was hoping against all
odds he would just drop it.

“Are you saying you can get in me too?!” His
temper was beginning to flare again. “So what? I’m like a 7-Eleven?
Always open?” BT was pacing around Mary’s small kitchen. He was
running his hand across his head. “I don’t like this shit, Mike.
Sorry, kid,” BT said to Josh. “I think I’d rather have Eliza
rooting around in there. At least, I’d know what she was up to. You
scare the shit out of me, man.”

“So you can like mind control him?” Josh
asked, making his arms move like a robot.

“Really?” Gary asked, “Because there’s a few
things I’d really love to see him do.”

“Nobody is making me do anything I don’t want
to do, right?” BT asked, threatening to come over and smash my
skull if I didn’t give him an immediate answer that completely
meshed with his.

“I can’t control him,” I told Josh.

“Damn right, I’m uncontrollable,” BT said,
crossing his arms.

“Okay, rebel, calm down, so I can finish
cleaning you up,” Mary said. “We’re out of immediate danger, yes?”
Mary asked, looking over towards me.

I nodded my answer, hoping that BT hadn’t
picked it up. No such luck.

“What am I thinking now?” BT asked me.

“You’re thinking about how you’d like to pop
my head off my bony body,” I told him.

He bounced up like a spring-loaded toy. “He
can read my damn thoughts!” he yelled.

“Relax,” Mary laughed. “Even I could have
read your thoughts about that.”

BT seemed to settle down as he finally sat.
“How would you feel if you had a crazy Talbot running around in
your head?” he asked her.

“Just so we’re clear,” Gary said, “he’s
talking about Mike and not me.”

BT looked defeated or maybe just tired. I
couldn’t really blame him either way. I couldn’t even begin to
think about what he’d been through the last few hours.

“Mary, when he’s all cleaned up, could you
find him a place to get some rest? If you don’t mind, I’d like for
us to spend another night.”

She nodded, gratefully. I think she really
liked having some company, someone who could take the pressure off
her constant vigilance.

“What about the others?” Gary asked.

“They’re on their own for the moment.”

Chapter Fifteen – Mrs. Deneaux

Night was rapidly approaching. Mrs. Deneaux had removed Brian’s
jacket, justifying her actions by saying that he was burning up and
that she was chilled.

“He would have offered it to me himself, if
he were awake,” she wrongfully assumed as she peeled the coat from
his fever-racked body. The lines from his gut wound had grown a
deeper crimson, almost violet red, and were now mere inches away
from his heart.

“I knew he wouldn’t make it,” Mrs. Deneaux
laughed as she realized she had just summed up the fate of both of
the travelers she was with. Her plan was to wait out the night on
the off chance that the twit, Paul, had found some medicine and had
not become a casualty himself. When he didn’t show by morning,
which she just knew would be the case, she would walk out and
either find Michael or her own mode of transportation.

Mrs. Deneaux had no illusions. She had only
survived this long because of the charity of others or at the very
least, the indifference of them. She knew Brian was a lost cause,
as was Paul, even if he showed up in the nick of time with
medicine. Brian was in no shape to protect anyone, and to her, it
seemed that Paul had survived along similar lines as her own, by
the grace of others.

The night almost passed by uneventfully. She
heard something going on maybe two or three streets over, but who
and what it was were not discernible. She felt as if she had slept,
but she couldn’t remember. Mostly she had stared at Brian and
smoked cigarettes. With the moon still high in the sky, she found
herself in the same spot and in the same position she had been when
she had initially fallen asleep.

She had a small mountain of butts by her
side, her exhaled smoke nearly obscuring her vision as she scanned
the woods around her.

“Zombie,” she said, standing up and crushing
her latest butt into the ground. She exhaled the blue-gray smoke.
The zombie hadn’t quite locked onto their position.

“Must have smelled the smoke. My husband
always said these would be the death of me. I can’t imagine he
thought in this fashion though.” Mrs. Deneaux looked quickly down
at Brian. He was on his own. She would not be able to move him and
where to, anyway?

Mrs. Deneaux moved away from the small
clearing and her smoldering pile of ash, to hide behind a fairly
thick bush. The zombie was coming up on her left. If it kept its
present course, it would run into her before getting to the
clearing.

Mrs. Deneaux picked up a small stone. “No
sense in both of us dying,” she said as she threw the rock at
Brian. It landed a few inches from his face. He took no notice as
he slept.

“Dammit,” she said, taking a peek from behind
her cover. She picked up the only other thing within arm’s reach, a
thick branch, it was about a foot long and six or seven inches
around. She hurt her shoulder throwing it as hard as she could.
Whether divine intervention or the luck of the devil, the branch
struck Brian in the right cheek. His moans of surprise and pain
changed the zombie’s angle of pursuit.

Brian stirred slightly, a red mark blooming
on his face as he opened his eyes. Pain, confusion and recognition
registered on his face as he looked straight across the clearing
and could only see the eyes of a hiding Mrs. Deneaux. He tried to
pull himself up, but completely lacked the energy.

“What is going on?” he scratched out of his
fire-seared throat. Mrs. Deneaux held up her index finger to her
lips. Brian could hear someone approaching. His initial hope was
that it was Paul, but it made no sense that Deneaux would be hiding
from him.
Maybe she wanted to play a prank
, he thought, but
nobody in their right mind played those kinds of pranks anymore.
You were more likely to end up with a bullet wound than a
laugh.

Zombie or other people, not very likely to
be a wild animal, at least not here.
Brian’s vision focused on
a stick that was no more than a few inches from his face. He felt
and then realized the source of his initial pain, which caused him
to awaken.

“Bitch,” he said just as the zombie plowed
through the opening and lunged straight for his head.

Brian fought for his life harder than Mrs.
Deneaux could have imagined. More than once, she thought that
Wamsley had gained the advantage and that she would have to shoot
him, lest he came after her when he was done. The zombie had
finally landed a knock-out punch when it bit the same cheek she had
prophetically hit with the stick.

She left her hiding spot amidst the screams
of Brian and the moans of the zombie as it ate its meal. “That was
close,” she said, staying in a half crouch until she was far enough
away that she felt comfortable rising up.

Mrs. Deneaux looked around; there were no
other zombies in the vicinity. She felt no regret when she realized
she could have just shot the one that ate Brian. In hindsight she
could have, but the prudent path had been the one she had taken. By
not firing a shot, she had preserved her own life while also not
alerting any other zombies in the area to her whereabouts. And just
because she could not see any, did not necessarily mean that there
weren’t any around.

“I should have never killed that two-timing
bastard of a husband,” Mrs. Deneaux said as she hefted Brian’s
rifle onto her shoulder. “That wasn’t the first time he had cheated
on me and it wouldn’t have been the last. If I had just ignored it
like I had all the others, I could be on the Riviera. They would
never have allowed the undead in there, much too exclusive.” She
laughed at her own joke.

Mrs. Deneaux found herself walking down the
center of the roadway. She knew this might not be the best
approach, but she was above skulking around on other people’s
lawns.

Chapter Sixteen

Paul took one more painkiller that night, not because he was in any
abundance of pain, but primarily because if he were to awaken as a
zombie, he would be pissed with himself for not having done so.
Moonlight streamed through the kitchen window as Paul picked his
drool-laced face off the table. The candles were close to burning
out. Paul’s legs ached as he shook the plastic bottle, which he was
still clutching.

“One lone pill to rule them all,” he coughed
out as he popped the top and took the remaining tablet elixir.
“Breakfast of champions,” he said as he downed his warm diet
Sprite. “Yuck! That doesn’t taste nearly as good as it had earlier.
So now what?” he said to the empty bottle. “I’ve got to get back to
Brian and the other one.” Just thinking about her gave him a
headache. The approaching light of day was not bringing with it the
promise that all those motivational posters talked about. He was
effectively hobbled, one of his friends was dying from infection
and three others were missing. He had no means of transportation,
and in reality, didn’t really know how to get to Ron’s. Sure, he’d
been there before, but he wasn’t driving and they were always
smoking or drinking while they were heading up there. It wasn’t
like he could pick up a phone and call anyone. The more he thought
about it, the more he couldn’t remember having ever been so
alone.

He got up to look for some more pills or at
least an accelerant, maybe some Jack or SoCo. He sat back down
quickly. “Maybe I’ll just wait until this kicks in a little,” he
said as his ankle seemed to be high on the pain priority list
today. He was deeply immersed in his pity party when he heard
shots. “Damn, that sounds like it’s right out front,” he said,
shuffling away from the table to the window next to the front
door.

“Deneaux?” Paul was having a tough time
putting all the images in front of him into a cognitive state.
There was Mrs. Deneaux, looking like a skinny, old, female Rambo,
rifle slung over her shoulder, giant, oversized pistol in her
hands, zombies running at her from up the street. Paul craned his
neck, but the wood from the window pane prevented him from getting
a better look. It took him much longer than it should have to
realize that he should open the door to get a better look…and to
help. His head was as fuzzy as a schoolgirl on her second beer.