“Someone sabotaged them,” Felix exclaimed.
“Why is the car abandoned? Why did Phillip head back to the fort?” Bill stood back a few feet from the car and peered in, while Ed hunkered down to look under it.
Jenni saw the zombie lunge for Ed out of the corner of her eye.
“Ed!”
The older man scrambled backwards quickly as the zombie reached for him. It was terribly mutilated and missing a good chunk of its torso. It's feet scrabbled at the ground, trying to find purchase to push it toward the grizzled old man. Ed got to his feet and kicked it in the face, knocking its head back. Yanking his hatchet off his belt, he motioned to the others he had it under control.
“Hurry up and kill it,” Jenni exclaimed, trying not to yell and draw more zombies to them.
Ed slammed the hatchet down on the fearsome growling face lunging toward him. The zombie shuddered. Its skinless fingers clawed at Ed's boots. …like those tiny fingers pressed under the door on the first day…those tiny little fingers…
Jenni shook her head to break the memory.
Ed slammed the hatchet down one more time. The thing's fingers finally stilled.
“And here we go,” Felix sighed as two badly decomposing zombies appeared from around a nearby building.
“I hate company,” Jenni grumbled. Her head was throbbing. She felt off kilter. Seeing the zombies' fingers straining to reach Ed had sickened her. She tried hard not to think of Benji.
“Especially the kind of company that wants you for dinner,” Felix agreed. “I hate zombies. I hate them. I really, really hate them. I wish they would just go away.”
Bill popped the hood behind them while Nerit walked slowly around the car. Ed joined her. They studied the area together.
“No one likes zombies.” Jenni frowned as more staggered into view. “But at least they're slow now.”
The shambling dead were a strangely reassuring sight. Jenni preferred them slow and relentless to fast and relentless. The zombies were a mess now, often indistinguishable as male or female. Not only were the zombies mutilated from the attack that killed them, but from wandering around looking for the living.
Four months of rot, the elements, and wear and tear had the walking dead in bad shape. Their skin was dry, cracked and shredded. Their limbs were mangled and twisted. The zombies felt no pain, so they had no concern for their bodies. They struggled through brambles, bushes, and low fences, wandered off elevated areas, tripped down inclines, and, sometimes, rammed themselves repeatedly against obstacles. On her trips outside the walls, Jenni had seen the undead do extraordinary damage to themselves trying to get the living.
“They're getting closer,” Felix called out.
“Almost done,” Bill answered.
Jenni felt uneasy despite the slow advancement of the zombies. Her rage had dissipated at some point to be replaced with a low pulse of fear. But she couldn't let it get to her now. One of the zombies, a female in a truly tacky pink tracksuit, was drawing too close.
“Ax time!” Jenni moved toward the female zombie reaching for her, moaning that terrible sound, and forced back her fear.
The zombie snapped and lunged forward. Jenni slammed the flat of the ax head hard into the sternum of the creature and knocked her flat on her back. She quickly pinned the creature down with one foot placed solidly on the dead thing's chest and heaved the ax over her head. As the zombie grabbed at her boot, Jenni brought down the ax as hard as she could and cleaved its head in two.
“One down!” Jenni yanked her ax out of the zombie's head and took a few steps back.
“I got visitors,” Felix yelled. He used almost the exact same moves to take down a zombie near him with his double-bladed spear. He miscalculated how far away the second zombie was, and it lunged at him from behind. Felix shoved the spear back hard behind him and impaled it before it could grab him. Jenni moved to help him. The zombie began to push its body down the spear to grab Felix, but the young man turned and shot it in the face.
“I got it, Jenni, I got it,” he said, and grinned.
Jenni nodded. “Good job.” She held the ax at the ready, her eyes scanning the approaching dead, trying to figure out her next moves.
“I would really like to go now,” Felix called out as more dead stepped into view around them.
Bill motioned to Ed. The two men talked in soft tones.
“C'mon, guys! Hurry up!” Jenni's voice was full of exasperation.
The limping, gruesome dead were drawing ever closer. They were too clustered together to take down individually.
Ed got down on the ground and slid under the sedan.
“Guys, seriously! Seriously, this is not good!” Felix wailed.
“I'll thin them out,” Nerit assured Felix. She raised her rifle and began to fire at the less mutilated, more dangerous zombies.
Jenni watched with fascination as the zombies went down one by one. A plume of blood, brains and bone would erupt out the back of their skulls, then they would crumple to the ground.
Felix also began to fire at the growing crowd of zombies. The reality of the new world was that a small group of zombies was manageable, but too many swarming together was hard to survive.
Jenni pulled out her handgun from its holster and aimed at the remains of a mechanic shambling toward her. It didn't have much of a face left, but its tongue flicked out between its stained, broken teeth.
Mikey's torn face flashed across her vision…
Jenni shook her head, trying to shake the memory away.
“Kill it Jenni!”
She forced herself to focus and looked back at the zombie. It was Lloyd, her dead abusive husband, lurching toward her. His mouth was open to utter that terrible zombie moan and his shirt was covered in the blood of her children.
Join us, Jenni, Lloyd's voice whispered.
“Jenni!”
“Fuck you, Lloyd,” Jenni growled. She fired. The bullet sheared off the top of his head.
Lloyd swayed on his feet for a second, then collapsed at her feet.
Jenni lifted her foot and slammed it down on the zombie's head for good measure a few times.
“Who the hell is Lloyd? Did you know that zombie?” Felix yelled.
Jenni ignored him and looked down at the zombie that was no longer her husband, but some pathetic mechanic. She raised her gaze and lifted her gun to fire into the group of zombies nearing her.
“Let's go! Done here!” Bill called out.
Jenni and Felix began to draw back toward the mini-bus. Nerit disappeared into it, only to reappear at a window. She slid it down so she could provide cover.
Bill jogged around the back of the mini-bus and headed toward the open door. More zombies were appearing now. They were being drawn by the gunfire. Jenni reloaded her weapon as Felix backed toward her. Ed fired up the engine.
“You first,” Jenni told Felix.
“I'd say ladies first, but-” Felix ducked into the bus.
Jenni slowly backed up toward the open door. She was almost to safety.
A little boy around Benji's age walked into view. He trailed behind the other zombies, then spotted Jenni. With a small cry, he lifted his hands. His small fingers reached for her.
Let him bite you. Die and join us.
An uncomfortable tightness gripped her throat. She wanted to scream. She stumbled backwards and gasped. The little boy wasn't just Benji's age, he was Benji! He had found her. He was coming for her. His fingers were reaching for her so he could claim her.
His tiny fingers reached for her…strained for her…
Bill grabbed Jenni around the waist and dragged her up into the bus.
Jenni didn't fight him as she stared transfixed at Benji. The doors snapped shut.
“It's Benji,” Jenni gasped.
“No, it's not,” Nerit said sharply. “It's not him.”
“Who's Benji?” Felix was completely bewildered.
Bill set Jenni down firmly in a seat. “Jenni, it's not him. It's not Benji.”
“But…” She couldn't look away from Benji's tiny zombified form and his searching fingers. He was reaching toward her, wanting her to go to him. “He's coming for me.”
Yes, he is. Get off the bus. Embrace him. Join us, Lloyd's voice urged.
Nerit grabbed Jenni's chin and forced her to look away. “It's not him, Jenni. It's not him. Look away. Close your eyes. Don't look, because it's not him.”
She finally tore her gaze away from the small dead boy and squeezed her eyes shut. She felt the terrible fear that had gripped her slowly begin to release. She took in a shuddering breath. Finally, she looked back out the window.
The zombie wasn't Benji. It wasn't even a little boy. It was a tween girl in a torn nightgown.
Lloyd had tricked her. Anger flashed through her and she felt it burn away the last vestiges of her paralysis.
“Sorry,” she murmured.
Ed shifted gears and the min-bus lurched forward.
“It's okay,” Nerit assured her. She gently rubbed Jenni's back. “It's okay. It was just a bad moment.”
“What just happened? 'cause I'm very confused.”