Authors: Tracey Ward
We were up and ready to go at dawn, just as Jordan planned. We ate apples, cheese and milk for breakfast, making a point to eat perishables while they were still good. It was tough to want to eat anything with the smell of Dee in the kitchen and the mess still there, but we muscled through it because you can’t run for your life on an empty stomach.
We stand in the entryway with our packs on and weapons at the ready. Jordan looks over at Dee’s rotting body where we slid it back into the kitchen in preparation to leave, then glances back at me and I can see he’s torn.
“Should we say a prayer for her or something?” he asks, his voice unsure.
“Why? We didn’t say one for Sara and she never ate anybody.”
“Maybe that’s all the more reason to say one for…”
“Dee.”
“For Dee. We should, don’t you think?”
I study him, surprised by this sudden idea. Where was this line of thinking when we fed Sara’s remains to the wolves?
“If we say a prayer over every infected, we’ll never get out of the city.”
He hears me but he doesn’t respond. Instead he simply stares down at what’s left of Dee. I sigh and touch his arm lightly. His beautiful blue eyes bore into mine and I can see something there, something desperate. I have no clue what he’s desperate for, but I know we need to make it right before we step out that door. His head isn’t straight and if he hesitates out there it can get us both killed right out of the gate.
“How bout this?” I propose gently. “We say a blanket prayer here and now for everyone. Not even the ones we’re going to be responsible for, or have been responsible for, but for everyone. Will that be alright?”
He nods and I pull my hand back, head bowed and waiting for him to speak. He doesn’t. When I look at him expectantly, he looks pained and shakes his head.
“I don’t know what to say.”
I sigh and force myself to smile patiently. I have no idea what I’m doing. I am not a religious person, though I’m sure some churches would have a field day with me and my hallucinations. I’ve never been to church, but I’ve heard prayers spoken by others, and of course on TV and in movies, so I patch together what I can.
“Okay. Let’s keep it simple. Um… God forgive them, they know not what they do.”
Because they are zombies.
“Please forgive us for our trespasses.”
Because we are going to kill them.
“As we forgive those who trespass against us.”
As they try to eat our brains.
“And deliver us from evil.” Jordan whispers, and I look up to see his eyes are closed.
Because evil waits outside our door.
I stay silent, waiting for Jordan to make his peace with whatever is troubling him. When he opens his eyes and looks at me, they are less haunted than before, but I know it’s still with him. I don’t pry though. If anyone understands harboring your own demons, it’s me.
“Are you ready?” Jordan asks one last time.
I nod briskly, my heart suddenly in my throat. “Ready.”
When he releases the locks, the door swings open easily. My nerves are fried and I half expect to face off with a dozen or more zombies waiting outside the door for us, but the hall is eerily empty. Jordan looks at me, makes a show of taking a deep breath and heads out the door. He looks both ways as though he’s crossing the street and then motions me forward. I keep my eyes up and level, trying not to see the bits of bone left behind from what happened to Sara. I feel bad about that. We should have buried her, buried both of them, but where? Knowing we said our prayer makes me feel a little better.
The only sign of activity in the hall is a blood trail on the floor, some holes in the plaster and a blood smear on the wall beside it. There was a struggle at some point, but I don’t remember hearing anything in the night, so it must have been there yesterday. I ran to my room in such a blind rush, searching my purse for my keys by the time I was in the hall, I had to have missed the signs. I wonder if I’d seen the state of the hall if I would have approached my roommates with more caution, but I doubt it. I was still thinking crazed gunman at that point, looking for a singular threat and never dreaming the threat was everywhere and everyone.
Jordan inches forward down the hall keeping close to the wall and I copy his movements silently. We planned for me to stay back behind him seeing as my weapon has a lot more range than his. If we encounter a threat, he’ll either beat it to death with the bat, or if he feels like he can’t make it happen, he’ll fall back, making sure to get out of my way and leave me open to take a clean shot. I worry about basically using him as a human shield but he insisted that’s not how it is. I can still use my weapon from behind him, he can’t use his from behind me. I agreed grudgingly, still feeling like I’m cowering behind him.
We make it down the steps, an open staircase that looks down on the common area, and weave back and forth. I feel exposed and freaked out but this open area is exactly what Jordan wants. He’s very nervous about enclosed spaces and I want to agree with him but I felt safer in the four tight walls of the apartment than I do right now with 360 degrees of vulnerability.
Just as we touch down on the main floor, the exit in sight, I hear the moan. The shuffle. The drag. Jordan and I both spin on our heels and face the infected coming toward us. It’s Zombie Boy again with his ball and chain still around his ankle. It occurs to me that he’s on the ground floor now instead of the second floor where we first saw him, so either he took the elevator or he banged his ankle biter buddy down the steel stairs to get here. Either scenario is funny to me and a giggle escapes my lips. I clap my hand over my mouth, horrified, and I look to see Jordan scowling at me like I’ve gone insane.
Oh, man,
I think wryly.
You haven’t seen anything yet.
“Sorry.” I whisper.
“Don’t be sorry, shoot it.” he whispers back fiercely.
Zombie Boy is still a good twenty feet away. His motor skills suck and he’s toting at least a hundred pounds of dead groaning weight behind him. I’ve got time. I actually think that we don’t need to kill him. He’s not between us and the exit and there’s no way he can chase us down. But I haven’t faced down my fear of shooting a human-ish being yet. I decide it’s best to get my first one under my belt now when there’s no pressure instead of finding myself locked up when it really matters. I lift my bow, notch the arrow and use the sight to line him up. Then I decide to test a theory.
I let the arrow fly and it hits the mark perfectly, exactly where I wanted it. Right in the throat. On any living human creature, this is a kill shot. The windpipe is broken, I might have nicked an artery and with how much force I put behind that arrow, I probably touched down on his spine as well. But he doesn’t care. Black tar blood flows from the wound but there’s no pulse to it, no heartbeat behind it spilling it out rhythmically. It simply runs out around the arrow, the way it would if you poked a hole in a milk jug and gravity took over spilling the contents out to the ground. And he just keeps on shuffle dragging toward us, his head dangling back at a worse angle than before.
“I told you, head shots are the only ones that work.” Jordan says, his voice starting to become edgy as Zombie Boy creeps toward us. “You have to destroy the brain.”
“I know.” I say, grabbing another arrow and notching it.
“Really? So is this how you won your trophy?”
I don’t like his tone.
“No,” I say pulling the string taught and taking aim. “This is.”
I let the arrow go and it enters the exposed soft tissue under his chin and slices through his brain, lodging itself in his skull. The tips on the arrows are meant for hunting small game and not expected to pierce bone, so my target areas on a human skull are going to be limited. Eye socket, mouth, ear, temple, or that sweet spot at the base of the skull. Unless I get my hands on chisel point broadheads, then I can shoot through a human skull and straight into the gooey center. The tissue under the jaw works today, though, because Zombie Boy drops like a stone to the ground. No more groaning. Except from his partner, now rendered immobile. Jordan and I close the distance left between us and them, and as I pull my two arrows from my kill and use a cloth I took from the kitchen to wipe them clean, he flattens the head of half pint on the floor.
Jordan motions for the rag I used, presumably to wipe his bat off, but I shake my head and loop it through a belt loop on my jeans so it dangles in front of me.
“Use your shirt.” I tell him.
“What? No.”
“It’s already sprayed in their blood and if you put more on it, it’s a good thing, right? You said they can smell us. If you’re wearing their scent, they’re less likely to detect you.” I swing my blood soaked rag for emphasis.
“Ugh.” he groans, but he does it, taking the bottom hem of his shirt and swiping it over the bats surface.
We continue our progress toward the exit, getting back on alert when we enter the narrow passage between the common room and the front door. There’s a reception desk off to the left and we proceed by it carefully, both of us expecting someone to leap up from underneath it and lunge at us I’m sure. I breathe a little easier as we pass it and stand side by side at the door, ready to push out into the sunlight. We look at each, he grins and I grimace, then we’re out the door.
The plan is to find his car, which he thinks he parked a couple of blocks away.
Thinks
being the operative word here. Once we get to the car, wherever it may be, we get the hell out of town, killing zombies left and right along the way. That’s as much of The Plan as I know, but I’m really hoping there’s more to it than that. Maybe a Big Picture section that I’m not yet privy to. I’m going on a lot of faith here, and for a girl who doesn’t trust her own mind let alone other people, it’s a pretty big leap. At any rate, that is The Plan.
When does anything ever go according to plan?
The sound of groaning hits me like a wave when we open the door. There are so many of them at all sides, I can’t even count right away. My body freezes and I simply stare. I have no idea what to do, but the thought banging around the loudest in my head is that I don’t have nearly enough arrows for this. I’m about to either pee my pants or go back inside or both when Jordan grabs my hand and yanks me toward the crowd.
“Run!” he shouts, and once he gets me moving he releases me and starts swinging.
He’s not aiming for the heads every time, he’s mostly just trying to clear a path and with how slow these guys move it’s actually working. I pop my arrow back into the quiver on my back and follow his lead, swinging my bow and bracing it between my hands to slam against shoulders and chests, knocking them out of my way. A lot of them go down and roll on their backs like turtles trapped on their shells. They snap and claw at us as we run through, but we’re careful to never get close to too many at one time. Two or three it seems you can fight off, but I worry that if more than that get around me, or if even two get their hands on me, I won’t be able to fend them all off before one takes a bite. I’m also stressing my back, wondering if a crowd of them is forming behind me, reaching for me, grabbing at my hair—I lock the panic down as I am so skilled at doing and force my way forward. I can’t do anything about what’s behind me. The best I can do is forge ahead.
I lock my eyes on Jordan, shut out the rest of the world and I run.
After leaving the crush of undead behind us at the apartment we run for several blocks, away from campus and heading east. I’m not sure where we’re going or how far away he parked, but I’m getting seriously winded. After the adrenaline rush of fighting our way through the horde, I ran with what seemed like unending energy. Now, however, I am crashing down and my lungs are starting to burn. We’re still going full tilt, running at a sprint, cutting down side streets and weaving between cars crashed onto the sidewalks and stopped at angles on the street. Finally I notice that we’ve taken four lefts and I call out for Jordan to stop.
I lean over, putting my hands on my knees and gasping. “Where are… we going?”
He stands in front of me with his bat raised over his head and stretches out. His stained shirt lifts with the movement and in my hunched position I’m eye level with his stomach. With his abs. Jordan, it seems, works out. His breathing isn’t as labored as mine but I find myself mesmerized but the steady movements of his stomach in time with his breathes.
“Alissa.” he says, and it doesn’t sound like the first time.
“Yeah.” I say, snapping to attention and wincing.
“Are you okay?”
I groan and stretch from side to side to loosen a stitch that’s building. “I’m great.”
“We shouldn’t stay stopped like this. We need to keep moving.”
“You’re running us in a circle. Where are we going? Where is your car?”
“Truck.”
“Whatever. Where is it?”
His face is flushed from running, but I still see the blush of embarrassment hit his cheeks.
“I don’t know. I thought I parked it on this block but I don’t see it.”
I look around, but for what I’m not sure. I have no idea what his truck looks like.
“Maybe someone stole it?”
“Maybe.”
“Okay, so what’s the plan now? You’re right, we can’t just stand here. We need a car, right?”
“Preferably.”
“Okay.”
I jog down the street to where a car has plowed into a yard and sits parked on the lawn. My thinking is that the owner was overtaken by The Fever while driving and crashed when they changed, and from what I’ve seen I doubt they had the presence of mind to take their keys with them. When I poke my head in the window of the little green Ford Focus, I give a quick shout of triumph. Jordan comes running up behind me and I turn to smile at him.
“Are you driving or am I?”
Jordan is driving because I have no idea where we’re going. We have reached the extent of my knowledge of The Plan. We make slow progress through the streets and I can feel Jordan’s anxiety rolling off of him.
“This is exactly why we’re not getting on the freeway.” he says, pointing at the chaos of cars on the street. “Can you imagine what it looks like now? People were probably devoured as they sat in rush hour yesterday and there will be car after car abandoned and in the way. Not to mention confused zombies roaming around the road, grabbing a snack when they can find it. We’d be trapped with them. It’s so stupid.”
I nod my head and listen to his rant, hoping it helps with his frustration.
“If we’re not getting on the freeway, then where are we going?”
He smiles as we slide into a roundabout and then come to stop.
“There.” he says, pointing out my window.
To my right is a marina loaded with boats of all shapes and sizes resting on the shimmering Willamette River.
“We’re taking a boat?” I ask, looking back at him with surprise. “Can you drive a boat?”
He smiles and scans the area, making sure it’s clear. “The kind of boat we’re taking? Yes.”
“Okay, but why are we taking a boat? Where are we going?”
“Come on.” he says, and jumps from the car. We grab our packs from the backseat where we tossed them and jog toward the ramp that leads out onto the water. “Here’s a fun zombie fact; they can’t swim.”
“So if we get out on the water, they can’t touch us.”
“Exactly. They don’t have the coordination for it and I doubt they have the reasoning skills to find a way out there. At the most, they’ll walk straight into the water, float a bit and get taken away by the current. And look at the river. Do you see any ten boat pile ups? Any congestion? There’s no one here, it’s completely clear. Unlike the freeway that’s probably a death trap from here to Seattle.”
“Alright, but you still haven’t answered about where we’re going.” I say as we step onto the ramp and jog down to the docks.
We’re surrounded by sailboats and large yachts scattered with a few open speed boats. I hope he means it when he says he can drive (or is it pilot?) one of these because I sure can’t. I could probably figure out a speed boat, but one of these mammoth yachts or the sailboats, no way.
Jordan steps up to the first yacht and motions me closer. He sets down his pack on the dock so I do likewise, but when I go to step onboard he stops me.
“Wait. I’m just jumping up there to untie that.” He points to a small white boat that looks more like an industrial inflatable raft. It’s only about eight feet long and wide enough to fit two people side by side. I’ve seen boats like this before, only a little larger and used for fishing. “Cover me while I untie it.”
“That’s what we’re taking?” I ask incredulously as I get my bow ready.
With all of the boats to choose from, with all of the massive engines and extra room, we’re stealing a dinghy. The two of us with our packs will barely fit in it.
Jordan nods as he walks around and starts working on the knot securing the dinghy to the yacht. “It’s perfect.”
“Is it?” I ask sarcastically.
He smiles. “Yes. We want something that we can easily run ashore. These are made for that. And I want something small and quiet, something we can camouflage and hide on the shore if we need to leave it for a bit to go inland.”
“Jordan?”
“Hmm?” he replies distractedly, his eyes never leaving the rope he’s working on.
I don’t know what I was going to say. The early morning sun is shining in his brown hair, making it look gold in places. His tan skin is set off by the wan yellow light and his face is furrowed in deep concentration, his tongue sticking out the corner of his mouth. He’s handsome and adorable and there’s a zombie walking up behind him, inches from grabbing his neck.
Running on pure instinct, I get an arrow in my bow, sight the eye socket and let fly. The wiz of the arrow shoots right past Jordan’s head and the zombie drops before Jordan even knows what happened. He shoots up straight at the sound, looks at me, then looks behind himself and I’m worried he’ll faint. It all happened so fast and he’s having a hard time catching up with it even though it’s over. My own heart is steady and strong, the only indication my body gives me of the danger is the telltale adrenaline response of pin pricks across my skin.
Jordan looks down at me on the dock, his chest heaving with short, panting breaths.
“You really are a good shot.” he breathes. “An inch to the right and you would have hit me instead.”
“Less than an inch.” I tease him with a grin.
I pull the hand towel from my waist and hold it up toward him. He nods, yanks the arrow free and tosses it to me.
“Sick!” I cry, and hurry to the edge of the dock to scrape the arrow against it.
“What?”
There’s a
plop
as the eyeball slips off the end of the arrow and lands in the water. It floats there, bobbing around lazily. Staring at me.
Jordan is chuckling and I glare at him.
“How is that funny?”
“How is that not funny?”
I lower my head, focus on cleaning my arrow, and grumble incoherent curses about fan boys.
“Thanks, by the way.” he says seriously, and when I look back up, I see he’s standing perfectly still and watching me intently
“Just doin’ my job.” I say with a grin. “It’s what I’m here for, right? Watching your back?”
He smiles briefly and takes a somewhat shuddering, deep breath before going back to work on the dinghy tie. He works faster this time and soon it’s free and in his hand. He leads the small boat toward the dock and secures it tightly to it. We grab our packs, toss them in and then hop in ourselves. It’s not as small as I thought, though it is a little cramped with us and our gear.
There are two oars attached to the sides and Jordan tells me to sit in the front while he slips them into their guides. Once we’re untied from the dock, he sits with his back to me and starts rowing in powerful, even strokes. We clear the marina in no time and are out in the middle of the wide river, the water lapping gently against the sides of our boat.
“So, on to Corvallis?” I ask, scanning the empty banks of the river.
“Yep. It’s as good a destination as any.”
“I wouldn’t go that far. Where were you going to go if you weren’t taking me there?”
“No clue.”
I frown at him. “What?”
“I don’t know, I hadn’t decided. My first thought was getting to the safety of the water. Beyond that, I didn’t have a plan.”
My blind faith in the plan (it has been demoted in my mind, no more caps) is beginning to fade. What happened here? When he was sitting around playing Xbox, absent mindedly dreaming this up, did he get bored at this point and switch to thinking about something else? Like who would win in a fight; Batman or Superman? It’s Batman, don’t kid yourself. The point is, where is the second half of this brilliant plan?
“This isn’t very well thought out, Jordan.”
He shrugs. He’s unbothered by my questions and I have to admire his resolve, his confidence. I question every sight I see, every noise I hear, every decision I make because of my illness, and his ability to make a choice and hold true to it without wavering, even in the face of my obvious adversity, is astounding.
I ache with jealousy.
“I put more thought into it than you.” he says, smirking at me over his shoulder. “And besides, we’re still alive aren’t we?”
“That’s true.”
“What matters is getting away from that.”
He points to the Portland skyline where it rises and glows in the morning sun. It looks as it always has, unchanged by the chaos that I know lurks within the buildings and crisscrossing streets. Seeing it from here, it’s hard to imagine that it’s not a safe place to be, but he’s right. As this disease rolls through it, it’s a powder keg set to explode and we need to get as far away from it as possible.
“Who knows.” he says. “Maybe they’ll contain it, or already have. Maybe Salem or Corvallis aren’t even touched by it and that’s as far as we’ll need to go.”
I nod my head in agreement, hoping he’s right that The Fever hasn’t made it out of Portland. I hope that by the end of the day we come into a clean city, my pack full of snacks and first aid will feel ridiculous and unnecessary, and we’ll find a safe place to stay. Maybe there will even be more meds for me and we’ll sit and sip cocoa together while we wait for the nightmare to blow over. Happy ever after.
I may have hallucinations, but I’m not delusional.
Jordan is rowing us up the river into the current and I’m tired just watching him. I want to lay my head down on a fluffy pillow, fall asleep and come to in a world that isn’t ending. It’s this image that sends my searching through my pack wildly, digging in every corner and coming up empty.
“Shit, shit, shit.” I mutter.
Jordan glances over his shoulder at me, his rowing rhythm disrupted. “What’s wrong?”
I sigh hea
vily and huck my pack back down.
“I forgot my damn toothbrush.”