In Days We End

Startling awake, I quickly look around at my surroundings, grabbing my rifle before calming down. It had been an unsettling nightmare, filled with normality for the majority of the dream. At the end, however, I walk into a crowded mall. I am in the food court with people milling around and eating like some forgotten age. Things are simple. But I see one of them. Sitting and eating a person that is spread across their table. It sees me and stands. Walking towards me. I have a pistol and pull it out. Suddenly there is massive panic as those around see what I have and I don’t understand why they are so afraid of me and not the zombie that is walking towards me. I fire at it, but miss and hit an old man. I fire again but a teen aged kid gets in my way. I fire a third round off and wake to my back against this cool, large rock.

Rolling onto my stomach, I crawl over to the far edge of the rock and peer around it’s gray surface. The sun is not up yet, but its light shows me enough detail to see that most everyone is asleep. There are two guards, or lookouts that wander aimlessly around the tents and structures. I watch them for a while, trying to find some method to their circling but there is none. There are several large bushes or shrubs that litter the hill side and when both seem to be looking away I quickly scramble to the nearest and crouch down. I have left most of the supplies hidden behind the rocks with, between two cracks, or a space, between the boulders. I only have my machete, (strapped to by back pack), a pistol, and the ammo that was in the bag.

Slowly, I make my way down the hill until I am at the camps edge. My heart feels as though it is in my throat as I watch for one of the men to circle past me, hopefully not aware enough to see my form through the dry shrub. I see one approaching and duck lower, crouching as low to the ground as I can without making any noise. He doesn’t even look up as he passes by where I lay concealed. I scan the tents, trying to make some sense of them, guessing where Josh and Michael may be, if they are here at all. Hopefully, most everyone is asleep.

Crouching, I move quickly into the spaces between the tents and hold my breath, waiting to see if I can hear footsteps coming near me. There are none. I scan my surroundings, trying to determine where they likely would be. There is no hint to where they might be. All of the tents are closed. Not show any signs of security. I let out a long sigh and turn to the tent at my back, searching for the zipper.

It is at the bottom of the opening flap, closed. I crouch down at an angle and tilt my head down as I unzip it no more than two inches. With my finger I pull back the small whole and gaze in. There is a naked man and woman laying, sleeping, on top of sleeping backs. supplies lay around them. Feeling I’ve invaded their privacy, and then questioning if that is something to worry about now I leave the hole open and move to the next. Before opening the door–the zipper being higher up, meeting the second sipper, I listen for movement. There is none. I open the zipper, giving the same gap, but notice the tent is empty. Inside there is ammo stores, weapons. Several knives and other objects, all piled hap-hazardously. I fight off the urge to steel from the stash and move on.

Most tents are occupied by sleeping people. Most are young–no older than 30. I move, one by one but there is no sign of them. The sun is beginning to come up and slowly I make my way back to the edge of the camp where I had descended earlier. There is a small hill to the east just past the tent and I see a man walking down its face as another passes over it’s horizon. Maybe . . .

I slowly make my way to the hill, moving north, and then walking to the east side of the hill, passing over the elevated horizon where most would see me. But nearing where there was a fire starting up, smoke billowing upwards, I saw several men looking straight at me. Behind them Josh and Michael sat behind them, tied.

“Don’t move,” one says, pointing his gun directly at me. Another points his pistol at Michael’s head. My gun is not raised, and I know that if I were to raise it he would pull the trigger. I stop and put my hands over my head.

“Shit.”

The sun is peaking above the distant and low mountains to the east. I am laying on top of one of the peaks of these low rolling hills just before the canyon entrance. I have Michael’s Barrett  .50 cal, rifle and am looking through the scope. There was movement down towards the street, but it is gone now, and after the long night of searching in the dark, I suspect I am not at my most aware state. I crouch and make my way down the side of the hill a ways before continuing on. I look for any sign of regular travel, of living, anything. But there is nothing. And I begin to doubt myself. Maybe they had snuck by me, going back towards the city. Maybe I had fallen asleep. I knew that I had not, but due to a lack of sleep, I could tell that I wasn’t thinking straight.

I decide to take a rest and get some sleep. It was doing me no good if I couldn’t focus on the search. I just hope I have time to close my eyes.

Moments after I sit and lean back darkness envelopes me.

* * *

I wake to screams. But these are not human screams. They are those of the zombies. High-pitched and piercing . . . haunting. I stand up and look around. They are silhouetted against the bright blue sky on top of one of the hills–two of them. I crouch and watch. If there are people here–a community–then surly they will take care of these two. I decide, after they pass by where I lay to follow them and hope they are killed by whoever took Josh and Micheal.

I follow slowly, nearly a quarter of a mile from them. I watch them from lower down the hill, and walk as softly as I can. They do not change course, and move at the same dull speed, one limping as it moves along.

It takes most of the day before there is any change. They stop. It is sudden and both look down the hill, down the other side, away from where I am. They don’t move for some time, and I think that it is the strange phenomenon I first saw back so many days–months–ago where they just stood there, unmoving. But soon they begin to run, the one without the limp obviously faster than the other. I climb the hill, find them and begin sprinting towards them, down the hill. I have my own rifle in front of me as I near them. The second is not as fast and I near it, following it as it runs from about fifty meters out. There is little or no cover and it is easy to spot them, which means it would be easy for them, or anyone else to spot me.

I hear a shot and look towards the first while crouching low to the ground. Where did it come from? I scan the surrounding hills but see nothing in the expanse of brown and grey and green. Another shot and the second falls, but soon begins crawling downward. A final shot and it stops dead.

“Damn it,” I say under my breath. “Where are they?”

I don’t have to wait long before three men walk up to the two dead bodies. I cannot make out what they are saying and as their backs are turned towards me I move slowly closer.

“I could have sworn I saw a third a ways behind them.” One man says.

“No, it was only the two. You could see them on top of the hill.”

They start walking away, back towards where they had come from and I begin, very slowly, to follow them. They gain distance, but I have the general direction they are taking and stick to it, placing markers in my head in case I lose them. They continue to talk, but the words are lost in the distance between us.

The sun is setting. They need to get back to, wherever they are, soon or there will be no way to track them. They pass over a ridge as the sky’s light fades to darkness and some minutes after I, laying down, crawl onto the top of the hill. Below me are about a dozen fires burning. I can see shadows of people wandering around. However, I cannot see the layout and know that I must wait until morning to see what is really down there and perhaps in the early morning hours I could move down and try to find Josh and Michael.

There are several large rocks to my left and I crawl towards them, lay my stuff, hidden behind the boulders and rest against them.

Dedicated to Jacob Smith

Barricades were built up at some point along the canyon road leading back to Utah County. Barricades made of logs, cars, furniture.  They had not been there some months ago when we drove on the road and it was interesting to see that they had been erected. They are tall, and steep. Michael tried to climb the first, but due to a lot of loose debris on the outer layer of the barricade he feel nearly twenty feet. We broke his fall, but I still think he got a slight concussion.

The first of the barricades had been located on one of the switchbacks near the large lake. It connected to a high cliff on one side, and on the other, dropped into Deer Creek Reservoir  It was interesting as well how vertical the structure was. Almost no slant to give anyone, human or zombie, a nearly impossible time climbing over it.

“Do you think there is anyone on the other side?” Josh murmurs as he walks back and fourth, trying to decide the best place to climb.

“Maybe,” Michael says, rubbing his head again, “if zombies only used the road ways. No, I think it is meant to block people like us. Or, people with cars.”

“Yeah,” I say, walking around the bend to check and make sure there is nothing following us. I un-sling my rifle and and raise it slightly. There is nothing. “Still. Not very effective.”

The sun is setting and so we decide to sleep near the wall before travelling the following day around the thing. It won’t take long, but we figure we’re protected in all directions but one. I take the first watch and move over to the bend in the road and sit down on the gravel on the side of the road, leaning against a steel barrier. I lay my machete next to me and place my gun on my lap.

“I could use a book,” I mumble to myself.

There is no movement for hours. There is a fire near Josh and Michael and I can see their outlines vaguely. They are both lying near the flame, sleeping. I look back towards the road but there is still nothing. The moon is out, lighting the road, and brush that lines it. The cliff is mostly in shadow, save some parts lit by the small fire. The light of the fire does not go past the cliff and does not reach me. I realize I am invisible and wonder if that matters much to these zombies. How do they attach us? Can they smell, or just see. There really is no way to test it, I determine and try to leave it alone.

There is a vague scraping of gravel and I look towards the sound, near the fire. Both bodies are gone. I stand up, and grab the machete, sheath it in the backpack that I had left on and run over, pointing my gun towards the fire. I look through the darkness but see nothing. All of their stuff is still laying on the ground. Only they are missing. I look through the dark but there is nothing there. I trace along the barrier, but still, no sign of where they went. Where they taken? Somehow, without a sound, save a small scrapping of a boot, they were taken, or had . . . disappeared.

I sling my rifle over my back, and try to grab as much of their supplies as I can easily carry, shoving Josh’s weapons in by bag, slinging Michael’s rifle over my other shoulder, and pack some food. I can feel the extra weight difference, but try to ignore it. I pull the machete out and a pistol and walk away from the barrier. There is only one place they could have gone. The other side of the wall. And the best way for me to get over, is to go around the cliff and come up where the land slopes down to the road and travel over. I walk quickly, almost a jog, hoping they are alive and not far.

Michael places the zombie in his cross-hairs. I stand behind him, watching the thing, probably two hundred meters away, wander aimlessly in the middle of the street. It is missing an arm and a large chuck of it’s left leg which gives it a heavy limp as it walks. The buildings around it are low and old–down town Heber City. Cars litter the edges of the street, but none, but one far down the street, sit in the middle of the road. It is a green mini van.

There is a loud bang as Michael pulls the trigger, causing me to jump from the sudden noise. The zombies head explodes as the large caliber bullet hits it.

“Watch,” he says to Josh and I. We look towards the dead zombie, trying to make out its body. Soon after, more began to appear, but not by us–where the gun shot sounded–but near the body of the zombie that had been killed.

“That . . .” I say, looking around us, checking for something to jump out, “doesn’t make sense. Why would they go towards the zombie, and not towards the sounds origin?”

“It almost seems like they were waiting for someone to try to attack the one we killed and then jump out.” Josh turns and looks around as well. Nothing is coming towards

“I think that is exactly what they were doing,” Michael says. “I’ve seen it a few times.”

“So have we,” I say absentmindedly, staring on. “But I still figured they would follow the sound.” I look forward and they now are all wandering aimlessly. It is almost as if they just happened to end up in a formation where one was still in the street while the rest had stumbled into buildings. They didn’t seem organized, or like they had any sort of plan. It seemed wrong that they didn’t attack us.

“Should we go around?” Josh asks? “We could maybe find a car with gas in it.” Our car had made it to the outskirts of the small city, but we were unable to get gas for it.

There is movement to our left, and out of a small house-like restaurant wanders a zombie. No . . . a man. He is stumbling around and has a bottle in one hand and a pistol in the other. It is obvious that he does not see us, but instead, walks to the street, turns towards the several zombies and starts to yell, holding the gun up, towards them.

“Oou killb’d ‘er,” he slurred his words, taking another drink. “Shees de de . . . she died. An’ hey I hadda kill-er. Stop ‘er fom bittin’ meh.” He fired a round at the ground. Obviously on accident.

“Should we help him,” Michael said, taking aim at a nearby zombie moving towards the man. neither of us respond. The man is now slurring so badly that we cannot make out what he is saying. He continues walking and as the zombie near him lunges he raises his hand, almost casually, and sends a bullet strait through its head. He stumbles out of its way as it falls to the ground. Another moves quickly towards him and his reaction is the same. One shot to the head and it is down. More and more are coming towards him and each time he kills the things with little effort.

Soon, there are only two left. He fires at one, dropping it and before we could shout. Before Michael could kill the last and before we even know what had happened he put the gun to his head and pulled the trigger, ending his life.

“No!” I shout and run towards where he had fallen. I hear a round go off from behind me and the zombie near him loses its head from the large round Michael put through its neck.

He is dead. Blood pools around him, starting at his head. I pick up the gun and take out the clip. “He used the last one on him.” I look around at the bodies, mutilated and bloody, all around him–each has a hole in its head.

“That was a bit weird,” Michael says.

“What was he even saying?” Josh says bending down to look at the man. “I couldn’t really make out anything.”

“He said that they killed his wife, I think.”

“Recently?” I wondered out loud and started walking back towards the house he had come out of. I pull out my machete as I near the still open door and walk up the stairs, peering in. There is no movement. I walk through the door and to my right, in a front living room is a woman–old like the man– lying in a pool of blood that has stained their carpet. Most of her right leg is gone, and parts of her face and torso have obviously been eaten away by the zombies that had killed her. Intestines string out across the floor and, leaning against the front window is a zombie–bloody and dead.

“Oh, shit.” I say quietly.

“Yeah.” Michael says.

The woman suddenly stirs and opens her eyes. She shuffles around for several seconds before seeing us and slowly moves to her knees. Blood pours from her mouth and out of her wounds. Josh draws his katana as she begins to stand and cuts her head off.

No one says a word, but we each exit the house and start walking down the street, towards the highway at the end.

Dedicated to Taylor

Sorry, but due to Midterms and moving work locations I am unable to post a zombie blog today.

Day 100 will be up next week.

Thank you for your patience and understanding.