Zombie Rules (8 page)

             
I had only met her once. I recalled she did not look much better in real life. I patted him on the shoulder. “I sincerely doubt it’s as good as it was back then, but if you need some time alone with her, I understand.” Rick reached out and goosed me in my sore ribs. “Did she smell that bad when you banged her? He tried to goose me again but I was too quick.

             
We loaded the body onto the back of the ATV, carried it to a nearby sinkhole and set it on fire.

              After much haggling, Rick convinced me to go along. I think he was more worried about running out of whiskey than he was about picking up women, but we certainly could use some more dog food. Those little bastards sure could eat. “If you knew this was coming, why didn’t you build a still?” I asked.

             
“I did.” He responded sheepishly. “It blew up. Damn near killed me. I was going to build another one, but never got around to it.” I laughed. He glared at me. “Shut up.” He quipped.

             
We worked the rest of the afternoon preparing the farm truck. We took some spare wood and made frames around the windows. We then stapled hardware cloth to the wooden frames. Much like we had done to the windows of the house weeks before. The idea was to keep anyone or anything from breaking out the windows and getting to us. It was not bulletproof of course, but we did not have anything for that issue. We cut out holes in the middle of each door window so we could stick our guns out. Murder holes.

             
“Why don’t we just go up to Fort Campbell and steal a tank?” Rick pondered while we were working.

             
“Might be a good possibility in the future. Do you know how to drive one and work on it? Did you mess with tanks when you were in the Army?”

             
Rick grunted. “No, I was infantry, an Airborne Ranger. Well, it was a thought. We’ll try to find some tank manuals for you to read up on. So, you got a route planned out?”

             
“I do. Let’s say we ride over to the Riggins’ house first. If there are any more zombies, we’ll need to kill them off.” Rick glanced up at me. “Well somebody sure bit her.” I said.

             
Rick chuckled. “No, I agree with you. It’s just, listening to you talk. It’s not the same as it was just a short month ago. You’ve changed kid. You’re all hard core now. You’ve put on some muscle in the shoulders too. Maybe when we get into town we shop for some clothes as well.”

             
I smiled tightly as I finished stapling the last of the hardware cloth. “Well, you’ve certainly helped me along.” We admired our work for a minute and complimented each other with effluent gushiness. We then took an inventory of items we were going to carry with us. We each armed ourselves with a handgun, rifle, and knife. Extra ammo, water, and a cooler full of food were stored in the cab. We had pry bars, two spare tires, a gas operated Sawzall to cut open stubborn doors, rope, and chain with hooks on each end.

             
“Why don’t we take the taillights off?” I suggested. “There’s not going to be any cops writing tickets, and if we need to run away from someone we don’t need to make it easy for them to follow us.” Rick shrugged, took a hammer and busted them out. I frowned at him. “I was thinking more like using a screwdriver and remove them carefully, but whatever.” I took the license plate off as well and removed the registration from the glove box.

             
“Why’d you do that?” Rick asked.

             
“If we have to abandon the truck, we don’t want anyone to figure out where we live by checking the registration.” Rick nodded and slapped me on the back.

             
“Nice thinking. Alright my man, we’ve got a lot done. Let’s go eat dinner and get to bed early.”

             
We got up early the next morning, fixed ourselves some breakfast, fed the dogs, and the other usual stuff before heading out. The sun was peeking out as we crossed the creek. It was promising to be a sunny day. The start of our reconnaissance mission did not go as planned. The John Deere’s battery was dead. A quick trip back for jumper cables fixed the issue. We moved it out of our way and moved it back once we crossed the bridge.

             
“You know, a functioning gate sure would be nice.” I said glibly. Rick gave me a withering stare out of the corner of his eye.

             
The Riggins house was empty. No people, no zombies. What little food remained had rotted. There was a case of dog food left, and a dog’s carcass tied up to a chain in the backyard. “It’s sad.” Rick said as he tossed the cans into the back of the truck.

             
“Yeah.” I said. “You’re talking about the dog, right?”

             
“Yeah. Did you know how I got Moe, Larry, and Curly?” He asked. I shook my head. “Somebody had dumped them on the side of the road. I found Moe first. About a week later I found Larry and Curly. They were on the brink of starvation. People can be real assholes. It makes you wonder if God finally had enough of mankind’s shit and unleashed this plague upon us.” He stared straight ahead as he drove. Sometimes Rick was very talkative. Sometimes, he lapsed into a broody silence which could last for hours, or even days. I always let him have his space. I figured his PTSD demons were awake and he just needed to work it out of his system. Today, he was talkative, so I listened.

             
He continued. “You know, I wonder how many pets have died just like that dog back there. And the zoos, how many of those animals died? Sad, man. Very sad.” He lit a cigarette, the last pack he had. “Which reminds me. We can expect a lot of stuff decomposing and rotting. Food, trash, unprocessed sewer, dead dogs, dead bodies. The smell is going to be awful. You think you can handle it kid?”

             
I chuckled. “I’ll try not to barf on you. I bet the rats are not only alive, they’re probably thriving.” Rick chuckled in agreement.

             
Rick was right. The closer we got into town, the more nauseous the smells and odors became. We reminded each other to bring gas masks next time. Today we had to settle for bandannas wrapped around our face.

             
“So what exactly are we going to do if we encounter anyone?” Rick was looking around everywhere as he slowly drove down the street. There were abandoned vehicles and corpses everywhere, but we had not encountered any impassable roadblocks just yet. Multiple tendrils of smoke could be seen in the distance. Dark black smoke, indicative of more than just wood burning.

             
“First we pull our bandanna’s down so we don’t look like bandits, and then we wave. Most people with evil intentions won’t wave back. If they don’t wave, we keep going. If they do, we stop and talk to them.”

             
“But keep our distance from them.” He said.

             
“Yeah, absolutely. If we do run into anyone, I’d dare say they won’t want to get too close to us either. In fact, anyone trying to get close to us would make me suspicious.”

             
Rick nodded. “I agree. Zombies on the other hand, we kill on sight.”

             
I shook my head. “We don’t want to be making a lot of noise, do we?”

             
“You make a good point my friend. But I have to warn you, I may have to kill a few just on principal. So, where to first?”

             
I looked at the street sign and down at the map. “Hang a left at the next street. There should be a liquor store on the corner.”

             
“Now you’re talking!” Rick said gleefully. His elation was short lived. When we drove into the parking lot, it was readily apparent the liquor store had been ransacked. The plate glass windows were broken out, and the shelves had been emptied. We went inside anyway. The only thing left was a half empty bottle of pure grain alcohol.

             
“Better than nothing.” Rick mumbled as he picked up the bottle.

             
The next stop was a car dealership. It was also obvious that it had been broken into, as was most businesses, but it seemed like the only thing that interested people were the cars. We made our way back into the shop and broke into the supply room. We found several spare parts for our trucks. “I like your thinking kid. Long term, always think long term. I would not have even thought of spare parts and fan cables. Let’s get some synthetic oil while we’re here.” We stocked up and made our way to a vet clinic for dog supplies. It too had been ransacked, but it looked like whoever broke in was looking for drugs. We found an ample supply of heart worm pills, flea shampoo, and other antibiotics intended for house pets. We also found the kennel in back. We suspected what we’d find, but we looked anyway. The cages contained the carcasses of several pets. Rick swore silently and took a swig of alcohol.

             
There were dead and decaying bodies scattered around. On one street, there would be none, or just a solitary corpse. Turn the corner and there were dozens of decomposing bodies stacked like cordwood. Several houses and buildings had burned to the ground. We were getting accustomed to the chaos and carnage. One house had a fire truck parked in front of it. There were some firemen lying supine. It looked like they had been ravaged. “Stop here!” I shouted excitedly. Rick hit the brakes. “We can use the fire hose, and the truck probably has some good tools on it too.” I explained.

             
Rick looked around. “I don’t see anyone lurking about, but let’s make it quick.” I agreed. We gathered up a couple of fire hoses and the tools that firemen always carried. Rick pointed at one of the dead firemen. They had oxygen gear, but the oxygen was depleted. As he approached, one of the firemen started moving. “Holy shit, they’re zombies!” I walked up and buried my newly acquired fire axe into his head before he could stand up and bite one of us. “Bada boom!” Rick shouted gleefully. I held my finger over my lips. Rick smiled mischievously and pointed at another fireman that was struggling to stand, even though he had a missing leg. I walked over and dispatched him as well. Rick grinned.

             
We gathered up anything we thought we could use, including the empty oxygen tanks. I pointed at the dead firemen. “This turnout gear could come in handy.” Getting the protective helmets off of their heads was pretty easy, but we had to wrestle the corpses to get the jackets and pants off. Both of us dry heaved a couple of times. “I don’t know kid, if we can’t get the smell out of the gear, there’s no way in hell I’ll wear any of it.” I agreed. We threw all of it in the bed of the truck anyway and drove on.

             
Rick started as we drove into the parking lot of a Lowes. “Heads up.” He said as he stopped at the entrance. He nodded toward the front of the store. There were two men standing there looking at us. We had about one hundred feet between us. They did not look very old, maybe early twenties, and they were armed with handguns. They had them stuck in their waistbands like they were street gangsters. We pulled our bandannas down. I stepped out of the truck and waved. They did not wave back. I got back in the truck. “So what do you want to do?” Rick asked.

             
“Drive on. We don’t need any confrontations, we need to survive. We can revisit this store later.” I looked at him seriously. “After all, who is going to take care of all the pussy out there if we’re dead?” He grunted in agreement and made a U-turn out of the parking lot. I looked behind us as we left. The two men ran to a parked car. “They’re going to follow us. I guess we should head back.”

             
Rick glanced over. “Not quite Zach. We’re going back to the liquor store. The big car wreck and all those abandoned cars around it form a perfect bottleneck. A perfect kill zone. We’re going to be waiting for them on the other side. They ain’t gonna like what happens next.” Rick punched the gas.

             
You had to slow down to a near crawl to get through the mass of wrecked cars and make a sharp left into the parking lot. We left the truck parked in front of the liquor store with the doors left open. It worked exactly as Rick had planned. They were in a baby blue BMW. Not the kind of car I’d be riding around in post apocalypse, but whatever. They entered the bottleneck and slowed to a crawl. Once they made the left turn they spotted our truck and stopped suddenly. They sat there looking at our truck, wondering where we were. I could see them through the windshield talking to each other. After a minute, the passenger got out. He slowly approached our truck and peeked inside. He looked toward the liquor store, looked back at his friend, and pointed toward the store. His friend got out of the car and walked up. The tall one looked in our truck again. I heard him say, ‘no keys’ in a hushed voice. Apparently, it meant something of significance. Maybe they intended to steal it.

             
I was crouched down behind a car. Rick was in the back of a minivan on the opposite side of the wreck. If they just looked around, they would have probably seen me. They both focused their attention on the interior of the liquor store. The shorter of the two was pointing his handgun toward the entrance. The other one finally yelled out, “Hello!”