Part 22 A Selfish Risk - Revised

When I reached the third line of trees from the break in the woods, I lowered myself to the ground, so I could hands and knees crawl to the 2nd line, then belly crawled from there. I just realized that I left the M-16 back at “camp”. I did a quick check of what I had on hand. My knife and pistol and a spare magazine. I sighed to myself and kept on my belly regardless. I wasn't worried about zombies, as I was more worried about the sniper that might (or might not) still be out there. The biggest thing I just realized, lying there crawling among the dried leaves and dirt was the increase of the unknown. Since this plague, apocalypse or whatever you want to call it, began, the unknown has been rising steadily in ever increasing increments. The places you go, or avoid, the people you meet or avoid, the weather and whats going on elsewhere in the world.

All the things we took for granted in that enlightened “information age” we used to live in. All of it, gone. This was mankind's second dark age. Oh sure there were places where the electrical systems were still turned on, but they won't last for long. The entire infrastructure of this (and other countries) is about to get much worse than just occasional brown-outs and nuisance potholes in the road. Anyone living downstream from a dam or hydro-electrical plant, had best find higher places to live. Those who have bridges to cross to get from point A to B have a need to find out which side is better to live on and so forth. Without routine maintenance to ensure the upkeep of these and hundreds of other things that gave people civil service jobs, it'll all break down sooner than later.

And people, just how are people going to change? Not that they haven't been doing so already. Evident from the Hunter group we just ran into earlier and the smaller bands and groups I've come across during my aimless wandering. Aimless until I met Maggie and her family and hooked up with them. Just why was I with them? I asked myself. Maggie was a fine woman, beautiful, capable beyond most women I had known at our age, caring, gentle, fiercely devoted to those she loved, which now apparently included me. Was I that lonely? I shrugged to myself as these thoughts crossed my mind, as I made my way towards the first line of trees.

Peering out beneath a low-hanging cedar branch I could see the remains of the carnage that we witnessed earlier. The zombies that were gnawing on the two shot-gun guys were gone, having ate their fill. So were most of the others. A couple of stragglers lingered. Bumping into the derelict cars, as if they couldn't find their way out of the maze the now useless hunks of metal created. Experience told me that they'll eventually find their way out and catch up to the herd, which, if I strained my neck out a little more past the greenery I was hiding behind, could see that they were already on the clear stretch of highway we came up on and getting more distant by the moment. The size of the herd came clear at this point. I estimated at least 200 individuals. The Hunters that got caught didn't stand a chance. The first herd that we avoided, according to James was a small one. This group was large but not the largest I've seen go by. The one that trapped me in the Semi-sleeper was pretty damned big. I was outside of Nashville when I happened to cross paths with them. It took a couple hours for the main body to get past me and then another hour for the stragglers. I wouldn't want to over do it but I'd guess there had to be at least a thousand. Some groups have said they've seen herds of five thousand or more. I don't take too much stock in those accounts, but it's possible, with herds coming out of the larger cities like New York or Atlanta.

Yet, looking back among the wreckage of cars, I could see that a good portion of the dead bodies lying about were zombies. Blackened blood mixed with darkening red as the day edged closer to nightfall. It wasn't going to be pretty by tomorrow morning when we go back down to the trucks. Speaking of which, I wondered at the possibilities of my getting my pack and a couple of sleeping bags without being seen. The nearest zombie to the truck Maggie and I drove was at least 30 feet away and facing away from it. It was bumping repeatedly into a Honda civic that wouldn't budge no matter how many times the idiot pushed against it. To it's right, a big, late model, Cadillac De Ville. On the left a Toyota of sorts.

The second zombie was already finding it's way out of the car maze and moving on. I scanned the area across the far side of the high way. Then looked at the trees lining that side. I could almost imagine the sniper peering at me through his scope, the cross-hairs centered right between my eyes, I would see a quick flash coming from the trees, before the back of my own head exploded, plunging me into eternal darkness. At least I wouldn't come back as a zombie... or a sparkly vampire I chortled to myself.

I realized that if the sniper had such intentions he'd (or she) would've killed me a long time before all of this. Without realizing it I tucked my neck back in and scooted my body back into the greenery to hide myself better. I laid there weighing my options. How badly did I, err we, I corrected myself need the gear? It wasn't that late in the season where the nights would be too cool without some covering. If push came to shove we could use the evergreen that we've been collecting as covering. Wouldn't be as efficient as a blanket or sleeping bag, but warm enough and would keep the dew off our bodies come morning. That would also mask our scent from any errant wanderer. The only drawback would be that we'd end up smelling like taxi drivers all the next day. But there were other things in my pack that would be awfully helpful to us sleeping out in the open. A can of deep-woods OFF which should take care of any ticks... or at least most of them anyway. At that thought I could imagine one crawling up my leg as I lay there thinking about the contents of my pack. I resisted the urge to reach back and scratch at it, pretty sure it was my imagination at the moment.

I glanced down at the bumping zombie and was pleased to see it finally found a gap to shuffle on through. I took a quick look in the opposite direction of the high way and didn't see any further movement. I wasn't fooling myself. For all I knew there might be half a dozen zombies, still eating, in typical fashion. On their knees and behind the cars where I couldn't see them. I didn't rush myself into such a drastic decision, time was, after all, on my side. Although it's not always the case.

I laid there, and propped my chin up with my fists and watched the zombie continue pinballing it's way through the wrecked cars in order to join the herd. From what I could see of it, it used to be a guy of average height and build. It's belly was distended from feeding on fresh meat. I shook my head at the thought. Is that what we've become? Fresh meat? We used to be, centuries ago. Whenever a man went out into the wilderness on his own, trailing his pack horses or mules behind him. He and his mounts were fair game to the animals that ruled the wilds. I had a quick flash of memory of a painting by that western artist... sheesh what was his name? They named a rifle round after him, Remington? No, that wasn't it. The painting was of a cowboy or mountain man, kneeling by a small campfire, his horse behind him, his sleep roll and rifle on the ground and all around them was just black as night could be in those days, and will be again, once all the electricity goes down. He was looking over his shoulder as he reached for his rifle, because he, and his horse, it's eyes and ears were pointed in the direction of a unknown sound. A brilliant painting showing the dangers a lone man faced out in the wilds during the 1800's. The unknown. Now we found ourselves in similar situations. What was that noise in the night?

Normally I'd take the time to ponder and search my memory for the name of a particular artist, author or whomever until I figured it out but I chose to ignore it for the moment. The walker was moving away from the truck, and nothing else had appeared. I decided right then to chance it. It was a single zombie, so if I screwed up and got it's attention I felt that I could dispatch it with my knife or my sword if I got to it first. Slowly I broke my cover, keeping my body flat on the ground and slid over the edge of the hillside and down the slope. The noise I made was probably as quiet as it could be but to me it was as if I had broadcast it out on super-sized speakers. Maybe I just made a stupid move, going for the pack. I stopped where I was behind a large clump of tall weeds and hesitated a bit. Raised myself up on my arms to take a quick peek. Nope, the zombie was already past the last cars in the pile up and moving away.

I stayed in the same position, half crawling, half sliding on my belly down the hill. The grasses left behind by the highway department's mowing made it easier to do so. By this time next year, not quite so easily, as fallen branches, whole trees, rocks and whatever wouldn't be cleared. Nature will and already has in a lot of instances reclaimed what was once hers. Pretty soon the highways will be over-grown because people will have run out of gas for vehicles and nobody is mending the cracks that always appear in the highways. The weeds will grow and their roots will slowly widen the cracks and so forth. America, civilization as a whole will lose it's dominance over the lands it once claimed.

I shook my head and cleared my thoughts of such nostalgic melancholy. I had already reached the level where the first shotgun wielder laid dead on the ground. The other was lying further down the hill a good 20 feet away from where I lay on the grass. I ignored the body, not wanting to see it all messed up from that geek gorging itself on him. It didn't occur to me at the time, that there was something just not quite right about that one.

In another minute I was at the tall clump of weeds and vines that we hid under from the first herd of walkers. So far so good. I crawled through the openings we created and got to my knees. I looked up the embankment and saw no movement. As I stood up I could see there was a bloody hand poking over the edge where the shoulder and guard-rail ran. I thought for a moment that I saw it twitch. I stared at it and nearly missed a sound behind me. I froze and my hand reached for my sidearm before I realized that it wouldn't be a smart move. As I switched hands to my knife I turned. The shotgun guy that was killed by James stood before me on the other side of the weeds and vines.

Good gawd he was a mess. He almost had been entirely disemboweled by the walker that feasted on him. His t-shirt torn to shreds exposing the gaping hole that used to be his torso. In that freeze-frame moment I was able to take in every detail of the guy. His face, head and neck wasn't too messed up, though it might've been had more zombies been eating on him. Where his chest began and ended were a tattered edge of flesh. Several ribs were broken in an effort to get to his heart, which was missing. Below the rib cage was virtually nothing. Lungs, liver, stomach, smaller organs, and intestines were all gone. I could see clear to his spinal column. Yeech. And I thought I had gotten used to it all.

We stood there for I don't know how long until he growled from his throat and took a step towards me, his arms raising up to bring his hands to play. Reacting instinctively I brought my big knife out and held it in front of me. I learned to let the suckers come to you, rather charge them. Usually they're so imbalanced that they tend to trip or at least stumble over obstacles lower than their knees. This guy was no exception. As he stepped forward, the tangled vines caught on his foot and he started falling awkwardly. I took a step back and went into a half-crouch. As the walker fell, I aimed the point of my knife at it's skull and swung down as hard as I could.

The knife penetrated but not deeply, yet the blow served to force the body down faster and land on it's face. Before the thing could struggle I centered my body over the handle of the knife, grasped it with both hands and pushed down hard, letting my body weight do most of the work. The knife went through the skull casing easily this time, with a wet squelching sound, punctuated by the crunching of the bones of the skull. I bit down the bile that built up in my throat as I rolled off the carcass. Cursing myself for being stupid in so many ways that I couldn't count. Hadn't I seen the results of stupid people enough? I damned near decided to forget about the pack, and make my way back up the hill where I came and ask Maggie to kick my ass for being so stupid. Hell, might even ask James to do the same thing. The boy would probably enjoy it. Stupid idiot! I berated myself.

I caught my breath and got to my knees, grabbed the handle of my knife and pulled. It wasn't going to come out easily. I sat down on the ground and placed my foot on the skull by the knife and pulled again. The knife made the same sound coming out as it did going in. I fought not to vomit and nearly lost. Instead I spat on the body and wiped the blade on the back of the t-shirt. The bright red of blood creating a morbid splotch of color on the otherwise dirty white cotton t. Keeping my knife in hand I turned to the rise of the embankment and made my way up it.

Then it hit me. Doolittle. Bev Doolittle was the name of the artist of the painting I had been thinking of. Ok enough of that, time to focus. I crouched low behind the guard rail and peered over the metal edge. The spot where the Hunter leader lost his head was now revealed to me in all it's gore and mayhem. There were at least half a dozen bodies laying about, both human and zombie. I realized that none of them, except the leader had their brains destroyed. Though I knew that reanimation times varied, I didn't want to hang around that long. Our truck was just in front of me. I knew that my pack and sword were on the corner closest to the driver's side of the cab, in the bed. The tarp covering it all was still undisturbed, which was a good thing. It meant that none of the Hunters had a chance to pilfer anything before the herd attacked them. I glanced over to Frank's truck and saw that it too was largely unmolested. There were a few bloody hand-prints on the side of the bed though. Poor bastards.

I thought I heard a noise behind me and spun on the spot with my knife held out ready to slash, stab, whatever. It was a large black crow. It landed on one of the bodies and I guessed it was about to feast until my movement scared it off. I stared at the bodies for a long moment, almost daring them to move. They didn't. But I knew that they would eventually. That settled it. We would definitely have to spend the night in the woods until the dead hunters re-animated and moved on in search of food. Now I realized that I definitely had to get my pack and at least another sleeping bag to make our stay in the trees more comfortable. Not to mention I still had a good portion of food and a small camping stove to cook it all with.

I untied the strap holding the tarp down at the corner where my pack laid hidden and flipped the corner up quietly. I paused and looked around me again, particularly at the bodies on the ground. Nothing had changed, good. Grabbing the loop at the top of my pack, I hauled it up out of the bed and set it on the ground besides me. I searched and saw one of the other sleeping bags near the center of the bed of the truck against the front wall. I did another quick turn around and searched. Everything was as it was a few seconds ago. So why was I sweating and my heart was pounding? I turned and had to do a little hop to get my chest up over the side of the bed and reach for the sleeping bag that sat in the middle of the bed on the cab end. My fingers fumbled for the tie-strap and finally hooked it. I pulled it towards me and got my grip on it.

As I lowered myself back to the ground, my imagination must've worked over time because I saw movement out of the corner of my eye by the front of the truck. Crap!

I dropped the sleeping bag next to my pack and knelt down to untie my sword and scabbard. There was a growl and I looked up and saw one of the Hunter bodies had sat upright and was looking right at me. I glanced to my right and saw yet another zombie standing by the front fender, it's jaws still dripping fresh blood. I grabbed the scabbard in one hand and the handle of the sword in the other and separated them. I needed to stand up to fight. I dropped the scabbard and as it clacked loudly on the ground at my feet, the hunter-zombie began getting to it's feet as the one by the fender shambled quickly to me.

Twisting my waist I swung the sword and caught the zombie by the shoulder, instead of the neck as I wanted. The blow slammed it's body against the truck. I had to twist the sword to work it free and drew back once more before the walker could recover, yet the hunter-zombie was moving quickly towards me. I had to back off and move away from the truck to give myself more swinging room. The hunter-zombie had to dodge around the body of a dead walker on the ground which gave me time enough to get into a fighting stance. Thankfully there weren't anymore behind me or up and about.

The fender zombie recovered enough of it's balance and moved into sword range, it's nearly severed arm flopping loosely at the shoulder. I swung again this time higher and caught it perfectly on the neck, severing it cleanly. The body took another step as I moved out of the way and then collapsed on the pavement. With the sword blade now over my opposite shoulder I was in position to swing back and catch the hunter-zombie. But before I could do so, a shot rang out and the side of it's head disappeared in a bright red spray of blood, brain and bone. It too collapsed immediately.

I crouched down low holding the sword out in front of me. I did a quick study of the hunter-zombie's head and saw that it was hit from the high way side opposite to me. The sniper scored a hit.

I stayed in a crouch and hustled over to the stuff on the ground by the truck. Re-sheathed my sword in it's scabbard and stuck it back into the side-straps of my pack and put the pack on. Then grabbing the extra sleeping bag I hauled ass on out of there, staying low. I was careful as I stepped over the guard-rail and slid down the embankment to the dead shotgun-zombie's body.

There I rested for a moment, knowing that I was shielded by my position in the culvert. I pondered at the risk of getting up the hill to the tree line. The sniper would be able to pick me off easily. But why shoot the zombie instead of me? I weighed my options. I could stay down there until dark and make my way up. I cursed myself again for my stupidity. The weight of my pack now felt like the weight of my stupidity on my back. Was it worth it? Almost got killed three times to retrieve this thing, when it could've waited until morning. Alright, too late to berate myself now. Had to get back up in the trees. The shot could've been heard by other zombies nearby. I knew it definitely was heard by the others back at camp. I had to get back under cover.

I looked up to where the trees were and spotted movement in them. A face appeared low to the ground, and it was Maggie holding the hunting rifle she used earlier. The barrel was pointed across the high way and I got the idea that she was scanning for any hint of the sniper. Alright then, time to move and hope I don't get shot in the back. I worked my way over the tangle of vines and weeds and positioned myself for the fastest way up the slope.

I kept an eye on Maggie and suddenly saw her wave to me to hustle on up. Taking a breath to calm myself I took off up the hill. I didn't even bother with trying to stay low, except to maintain my balance. Within moments I was behind the tree line and fell to the ground, breathing hard and spun around. I saw Maggie still looking through her scope and scanning the area, then put the rifle down and turned to me. Her face was livid. “Are you out of your freaking mind??” She didn't yell but she might as well have as the tone dripped with acid. I felt my face flush and lowered my head for a moment, then looked up at her not answering. I knew saying “I'm sorry” and all that would only aggravate the situation so simply said nothing. She spun around staying low and worked her way over to me. When she got close she kissed me hard on the mouth, holding my head with her hand.

Our kiss broke and she sighed. “Damn, that was stupid of you, brave, but stupid” and kissed me again. Told myself that you gotta love a woman like this. Others I think would've been freaked out and screaming, but I suspected that she saw the pack on my back and the sleeping bag in hand and realized that I was thinking of the group and took the risk. She slapped me on the arm. “Whatever you got in that pack had better be worth the heart attack I experienced when we heard that shot.” She looked back over her shoulder. “The sniper?”

I nodded and shrugged, “it had to be.” She nodded again and got up in a crouch and waved me towards our camp. “C'mon you can tell me, us about it.” She moved for a few feet then stood and walked back towards camp. I laid there for a long moment, watching her as she slung the rifle over her shoulder. The view was nice I thought, then got up on my own and followed her.