Surviving The Zombie Apocalypse (Book 2): Conflict (6 page)

Searching
with his hands, Kenneth found the large piece of sheetrock. He slid this to the
side, allowing it to strike the floor with a dull thud.

“We have
to get out of here.”

Faint
orange light began to peep through, beneath the bedroom door.

“Are we
on fire?” she asked, her voice rising.

Kenneth
jerked it open. The far side of the hallway and the steps leading downstairs
were aflame.

“We have
to go out the window.”

“We’re
twenty feet up!”

“We have
to go out the window Barbara, right now! Get your shoes on.”

He
pulled on a pair of jeans and a lightweight sweatshirt, followed by his own
sneakers. Kenneth only managed to tie one before the house rocked a second
time. The structure was going to collapse. He frantically pulled on the window.
It wouldn’t move! Grabbing a chair, he smashed the glass, doing his best to
break off any protruding shards.

“Hurry!”

Barbara
staggered up beside him. The floor was buckling, and smoke poured into the
room. Grabbing her, Kenneth pushed his girlfriend out the window, holding her
wrists in order to lower Barbara as much as possible before letting go. She
tumbled down, landing in a snow bank. Rolling aside, Barbara was barely clear
before Kenneth came plummeting after her. He struck hard but was up and moving
a second later, trying to get away from the building. They were less than fifty
feet away when it collapsed.

*
* *

“What
happened?”

“Don’t
know Tamara.” Kenneth looked around. “It might have been the generator blowing
up.” He pointed. “That’s the worst area, and everything around it sort of falls
outwards.”

The
large generator, along with its drums of fuel, had been kept in a small shed,
almost smack dab in the middle of the house, barn, and stables. All three
buildings were now gone, collapsed and burned to cinders. The horses were dead
or run off, and the human inhabitants had fared little better. Only six
remained. Kenneth and Barbara were in fairly good shape. Tamara had a few
contusions but was otherwise okay. Julian was the worst, with severe burns over
most of his body. The remaining two, Chris and Morgan, had also been caught in
the fire, but their injuries appeared mostly superficial.

Julian
had been outside on watch at the time, and as a result, he was the only one
with proper clothing. Unfortunately, the flames had gone through his coat
before torching the flesh beneath. No one had a jacket, and only Tamara wore
decent boots. Chris was in socks. They had no shelter, and the temperature was
well below freezing. The smoldering remains of their home were all that kept
them from freezing outright, and that wouldn’t last.

“Will
any of the cars start?” asked Barbara.

Morgan
went over to check but soon returned, looking dejected. “Even the ones that
aren’t completely wrecked have blown tires. We can’t drive anywhere with them.”

“What
about calling the other houses?”

He shook
his head. “No good. The radio was inside. That’s gone. The pickups with the
CB’s burned up. They were parked closest. Can’t let anyone know what happened.”

“They
should check when they don’t hear from us,” remarked Chris. “We talk to one
another nearly every day, and trucks come and go too.”

“The
trucks came and went when the weather was better,” corrected Morgan. “We have
snow on the ground now and who knows how much more may be coming. But, we can
sit inside one of the vehicles, be out of the wind.”

“It’ll
still be freezing in them,” said Barbara. Her arms were wrapped tightly about
her torso. “Can we do anything to make them warmer?”

“Pile
some debris up maybe. Hell, I don’t know.” Morgan looked around, but there was
nothing to see. “Keeping close to each other will help.”

“Julian
can’t be moved,” said Tamara, “not again. I don’t think he’ll live long.” There
were tears in her eyes.

“Minutes
after the last of the fires are out.” Chris turned away. “He’ll freeze to death
then.”

*
* *

No help
came that day, nor the next, and, as predicted, Julian didn’t last long,
mercifully dying a few hours later. With burns that extensive, there was no way
he could survive. Even if, by some twist of fate, he did manage to hang on, the
extreme pain and suffering he’d experience the remainder of his life would be
beyond description. Odds were that the man would have been driven to suicide or
begging another to kill him. There were still doctors but no trauma or burn
centers. Proper treatment was an impossibility.

The five
were without food, sucking on snow or ice to keep hydrated, and constantly
cold. Chris and Morgan, each with burns on his hands and arms, had the worst of
it. They tried to hide the pain, but both were hurting. And hope was rapidly
diminishing.

“Think
somebody will come tomorrow?” asked Tamara.

“Should
have been here by now,” stammered Chris. He had his feet tucked up beneath him.

“If they
don’t come, what are we going to do?”

Kenneth
held Barbara close. “I don’t know. We could try to reach one of the other
houses.”

“Those
are miles away,” pointed out Morgan, “and I don’t know where. Any of you?”

“I was
at one,” replied Chris. “Dropped off some stuff a few weeks back. It was east
of us. I know that much for certain.”

“Do we
want to go and try to find it on our own?” Tamara did not appear pleased with
the prospect.

“I don’t
want to be walking that far in the snow without shoes.” Chris closed his eyes.
“I’m waiting here. I would never make it.”

“But we
might,” said Morgan. “As cold as it’ll be, we can walk several miles, say till
lunch time, and then come back if we can’t find the place. If we do, we tell
them what happened and get help. ”

Kenneth
looked at Barbara who nodded.

“We’ll
come along,” he said.

“Me
too,” added Tamara, after a long pause. She patted Chris on the shoulder. “Will
you be okay by yourself for a few hours?”

“I’ll be
fine. Just hurry back.”

*
* *

They set
out first thing the following morning. The sun was shining, and they could see
a long way in the distance. Hopefully, they wouldn’t have to go far before
spotting someone. Then, a few hours later, the weather began to turn. It grew
colder, and clouds began to appear behind them. It was obvious that a
significant storm front was moving in.

“We have
to keep going,” said Morgan.

“Are you
nuts?” demanded Tamara. “It’s already snowing, and it’s going to get worse.”

“I know
this!” Regaining control, the man took a deep breath. “Okay, we have two
choices. We go back to Chris. I’m pretty sure we can find him again, but once
we’re there we’ll be stuck in that car. As bad as it looks to be getting, I
can’t see anyone coming to look for us, not right away. The other option is to
keep going and find someone.”

“We
might be dead before we find the other house,” said Barbara.

Kenneth
nodded his agreement. It was bitterly cold, and nightfall was still hours away.

“I think
the odds of dying are greater if we go back.”

“Then,
if we don’t go back, Chris is going to die.” Tamara was clearly upset. “He’ll
be all alone.”

“If we
find someone, we can send help and get him before that happens,” explained
Morgan.

“So bad
choice one or bad choice two, that’s it?” asked Barbara.

“That’s
right.”

She
turned to her boyfriend. “What do you think?”

Kenneth
hesitated. He thought pressing on was a mistake. They didn’t know where the
other house was located, and if they moved any further away the odds of finding
Chris again would be close to nil. Then again, no one had come for them. It
seemed odd, but maybe something had happened, some disaster or crisis that
diverted their attention. There was no way to know. Even if it was an oversight
of some sort, this storm might be one of those nasty blizzard type gales that
lasted days and dumped several feet of snow. If that was the case, they really
might die, even if they returned to the car they’d been sheltering in.

“I don’t
know Barbara. It’s a bad call both ways.”

“That it
is,” agreed Morgan.

“Really
bad,” added Tamara. “I think we should go back.”

“I say
forward.”

“Me
too,” said Barbara, agreeing with Morgan.

Tamara
turned to Kenneth. “What about you?”

He
gripped Barbara’s hand tightly in his own. “We’ll keep going.”

*
* *

Kenneth’s
tale grew more distressful at this point. They did not find the house they
sought, nor did they come across any people. A single zombie was spied in the
distance, but the thing didn’t notice them and was soon lost from view as the
wind and snow increased. Faced with a virtual white out, they marched forward,
shivering violently and holding hands in order to not be separated. Morgan was
in the lead, with Tamara gripping his belt to accommodate the pain he felt from
his burned arms.

They
clambered up a slight incline, and Morgan stopped.

“What is
it!” yelled Tamara, barely able to make herself heard over the storm, barely
able to speak from exhaustion.

He
didn’t answer, instead pulling them forward. Then a spot of black appeared in
front, and they gratefully piled into the back of the delivery truck.

“Are
you… Are you okay Barbara?” Kenneth, who was in the rear, closed the door
behind them. The howling wind thankfully vanished.

She was
shivering every bit as much as he. “Cold.”

“Huddle
close,” ordered Morgan.

The man
ignored his own advice and scooted forward to check the front of the vehicle.

“Anything?”
asked Tamara.

“A body.
Shot in the head. He’s pretty much frozen.”

“Does he
have a coat?”

“Kenneth!”

Barbara
found the mere thought of robbing the dead disgusting.

“Just
jeans and a long sleeve button up shirt,” confirmed Morgan. “I think he died at
the start, back in the summer.”

He tried
to undo the buttons but winced as the skin on his fingers tore.

“Kenneth,
you’ll have to undress him. I can’t do it.”

“You
can’t take his clothes,” protested Barbara.

“We need
whatever we can get. I don’t like it either, but we do.” Kenneth shoved his
hands under his shirt, pressing them into his armpits. “Give me a minute
Morgan, and I’ll try.”

“There’s
some bottled water too,” said Tamara, “frozen solid. Nothing to eat back here.
A blanket!”

“Really?”
asked Barbara.

The older
woman pulled it from a corner. “Looks like a packing one to keep stuff from
getting scratched. It’s pretty thick.”

“Big
enough for all of us?” inquired Morgan.

She
nodded slowly. “Should be.”

“Okay,
everyone strip down to undies and socks.”

“You
want us to do what?” The words came out in chunks. Barbara’s shivering had not
diminished.

“We
won’t make it to morning if we don’t warm up. Got to use body heat.”

Kenneth
pulled off his shoes and set them aside.

“You
agree?”

“Just
like huddling in the car back at the house,” he replied, “only a little more
embarrassing.”

“More
than a little.”

“Better
than dying.”

He
helped her undress.

*
* *

They
spent two days in the truck waiting for the storm to break. Then, weak and
hungry, the four dug their way out and began hiking east. There was a brief
debate concerning Chris, but with no ready landmarks and all traces of their
prior passage erased, it was anything but certain that they could find the way.
Also, the odds of him surviving those plunging temperatures alone were slight.

It was
difficult to follow the road, as it was under several feet of snow, but they
did their best. And the quartet eventually came across other cars, most
abandoned, some wrecked. None would start, but they did find additional
clothing, mostly lightweight summer stuff, along with the occasional tidbit of
food. It was better than nothing, and everything was divided equally.

Things
grew worse when it became clear that the burns on Morgan’s hands and arms were
infected. The initial, angry red coloring had taken on an even more vivid hue,
with dark blotches appearing underneath. Pus was oozing as well, and he had
grown far weaker than the others, often mumbling to himself without appearing
to be aware of it. A little over a week after the fire, he collapsed in the
snow.