Lord of the Dead Read online

  “Kara, Henry, you okay?” I asked.

  “We’re good, “Kara said.

  I wasn’t. I was on my feet and moving towards the men who couldn’t decide which direction to look: at me, as I came at them, or at Greg and Travis coming up from behind. They were all scared, and I didn’t blame them. I was ready to beat the shit out of someone.

  “Joel,” Kara shouted, “what are you going to do?”

  I heard feet rushing up from behind me, but I ignored them as I put myself on a collision course with one of the men who had just surrendered. He was a beefy guy wearing a black motorcycle helmet with a couple of spare tires worth of weight around the middle. I could feel my blood rushing through my veins. When I got to the man, I whipped my gun across his helmet, sending him to his knees.

  “Who the hell do you think you are?” I screamed. “We offered you help, and you attacked us.”

  The man cowered, his arms up to cover his face, but I didn’t care. I pulled my boot back and prepared to kick him when someone slammed into me and knocked me off balance. I tottered on the slippery surface for a couple of seconds, nearly losing my balance but staying upright. I turned to see who had knocked into me and saw Kara standing between the man on the ground and me. Her hands were on her hips, and there was a set in her face that I had never seen before. It was a combination of disappointment and righteous indignation.

  “We’re not beating unarmed men,” she screamed.

  “What do you think they would have done to us?” I shouted back.

  “Is that what we’ve come to? Lowering ourselves to the level of people who attack us? We’ve got to be better than they are.”

  “Those are high ideals to have in a world gone to shit,” I said, almost regretting it before it came out of my mouth.

  Greg walked up to beside Kara, “People, this isn’t the place to have this discussion. Was anyone else hurt in our group?”

  “Other than Aaron and Joel, no,” Kara said.

  “Where’s Henry?” Greg asked.

  “Here, Dad,” Henry said stepping out from behind the shelter of one of the pillars that held up the guard tower. His voice sounded far away, and his eyes looked vacant.

  Greg ran to him and grabbed his shoulders, looking him over from head to foot. “Henry, are you okay?”

  Henry looked past our group. I followed the line of his sight, which led to the short man who lay still in the snow, blood pooling under his body.

  “Dad, I had to shoot him,” Henry said, his eyes tearing up. “He was going to shoot Joel.”

  “It’s okay,” Greg said, quietly, “it’s okay. You did what you had to do.”

  People began to stream out of the main building. Most had weapons, but a couple of people brought some medical supplies. Doc Wilson, who had come with us from the church, went to work on Aaron’s wound.

  Greg’s wife, Ellen, rushed out the doors and ran to Henry; her face creased with worry. Like Greg, she examined Henry to make sure he was alright and then hugged him tightly.

  “Ellen, can you get him inside?” Greg asked.

  “What’s wrong with him?” she asked.

  “It got rough out here,” Greg said.

  “I had to shoot a man,” Henry said. “He was going to shoot Joel.” He was crying in earnest now. “I killed him.”

  Greg gently squeezed Ellen’s shoulder and asked her to get Henry inside and away from the carnage. She turned Henry away from the scene, draped an arm over his shoulder, and led him back into the building. His sobs filled the air around us until he went inside.

  Greg turned to Kara and me and asked, “What’s the assessment?”

  “Our people are good, with the exception of Aaron,” Kara said. “I think we have two of their group dead and one wounded.”

  “What are we going to do with these men?” I asked, pointing to the attackers around the truck. Three were standing with their hands above their heads, and the tall one was lying propped against the left front tire of the truck. Several men of our group trained their rifles on the attackers.

  “We actually have six men captured,” Greg said. “That’s what took Travis and me so long. They had setup two snipers on the hills.” He pointed to one of the hills to the south of the compound and then to another one just to the north. “We spotted them, but it turned out to be very tricky to get to them. We made it just as the shooting started, or else it could have been a lot worse for us.”

  “Those sons of bitches,” I said, my anger rising again, “they had planned to attack us from the start.”

  “We don’t know that,” Kara said. “Maybe if we had given them more supplies, they would have backed off.”

  “You don’t know that,” I said, “why are you defending them anyway?”

  “I’m not. I’m just pointing out what could have happened.”

  “Again,” Greg said, “this isn’t the time or place for a debate. We’ll get the captives inside, and then we, as a total group, will decide what to do with them.”

  “Captives?” I asked. “We’re not setup for prisoners.”

  Greg looked to me and said, “What are you saying, Joel?” Everyone around us stopped and looked our way.

  I looked around, and all eyes seemed to be looking at me. An uncomfortable feeling washed over me, and, while it took a couple of seconds, I felt the animus dissipate. Being shot can get you really pissed off.

  “Okay, okay,” I said, “move them in, and then we’ll decide.”

  “And you should have Doc Wilson take look at you,” Greg said. “I know you’re wearing a vest, but your chest still has to hurt.”

  In the heat of the battle, I hadn’t had any time to pay attention to the pain radiating across my chest and side. Now, my chest was throbbing as if someone had shot me because well, someone had.

  Chapter 4

  Pre-Trial Proceedings

  Doc Wilson checked me out after patching up the tall guy and Aaron. Aaron’s wound wasn’t too bad, but it would put him out of action for a while. The tall guy’s name turned out to be Henderson, and his wounds were significant. He had taken a bullet to the shoulder, and the bullet had broken the socket where the arm connected to the shoulder. Doc Wilson said he wasn’t sure the man would ever be able to raise that arm again.

  When he finally got to me, he told me that he didn’t think any ribs were broken, but he said it would be a few days before I wouldn’t feel tender. An ugly bruise was forming at the point of impact. The next day, it would be even prettier.

  When I got to the dining room, I found Greg, Hub, Kara, and several others huddled around a table. They were keeping their voices low, but there was no covering up what they were talking about. Others sat at tables around the room, listening in.

  As I got closer to their table, Kara turned in my direction and asked, “How are you feeling?”

  Being the macho-man that I am, I waved her off and took a seat. In truth, my side pulsed with pain with every breath.

  “I’m for executing them,” Steve Hampton said.

  “Will you do the shooting?” Kara asked pointedly.

  Steve lowered his eyes. Anyone who had been outside knew that he had taken cover during most of the shootout, but we kept our mouths shut. Why we took this moral high road with him, I never figured out.

  “Where are we?” I asked.

  “Steve wants them shot,” Greg said. “Hub wants to drive them west into the hills and release them which is almost like shooting them. If what they said is true, then they’d probably never make the trip back to their home base.”

  “They would have killed us for our supplies,” Travis said, “and that’s after we would have given them something.”

  “But killing them,” Kara said, “do we have the authority to execute anyone?”

  “In case you hadn’t noticed, there is no authority. It’s every man for himself. Besides, it will mean that we have a better chance of survival,” Brandon said. “They know where we are. We have no idea where they a
re. They could come back en masse.”

  “But they said they only had thirty people in their group,” Kara replied.

  “And we’re supposed to believe them after they attacked us?” Steve asked. “They could have a hundred people for all we know.”

  A voice came in from a doorway leading off to the apartments, “The Good Book says an eye for an eye.”

  We looked in the direction of the voice. It was Brother Ed. That’s what he insisted on being called. He and a small group had shown up at the gates just over a month ago, seeking shelter.

  Unlike today’s group, they had no weapons. They had taken shelter in a house a few miles away from The Manor after the Outbreak and had managed to hold on, but winter pushed them over the edge. Most of the group showed signs of starvation. We welcomed them in and fed them. Despite our efforts to fatten him up, Brother Ed still looked gaunt, his cheek sunken, and his eyes hollow. He was tall and gangly with legs and arms that seemed unnaturally long, always making me think of Ichabod Crane. He also claimed to be a preacher, but no one could testify to that.

  “They attacked us with no provocation, and that was after we offered them Christian charity,” Brother Ed said as he came to table. “These men would have shown us no mercy. I say we treat them the way they would have treated us.”

  “How can we do that and remain true to what we believe? I’m not saying we have to blithely turn the other cheek, but killing them? How can we do that?” Kara asked, but the people around the table weren’t in a forgiving mood. “Okay, maybe I’m reaching for something else, but executing them is going too far. If we do that, it’s going to change us in ways that we can’t imagine.”

  “Forgiveness is out of the question,” Brandon said, “if the bullet that hit Aaron would have been a few inches north of where it hit, he could be dead. And what about Joel? I’m not much into forgiveness right now.”

  “Listen, people,” Greg said, “we haven’t had to face this type of situation. We have no rules or laws, but maybe it’s time we did. At the bare minimum, we need some way to determine how to handle something like this. I propose we have a trial and let our group decide. I say we….”

  The alarm sounded again, cutting him off. Everyone’s expressions changed in a millisecond seeming to ask, “Now what?”

  Greg picked up his walkie-talkie and spoke into it, “Guard stations, what’s up?”

  He listened for a few seconds and then keyed his talk button. “Stay at your stations, and shoot if you need to. We’ll have some people outside as soon as possible.”

  He moved the walkie-talkie from his mouth and said, “Zombies are coming in from all sides. A lot of them.”

  Oh, just what we needed: a horde of the undead.

  I jogged with Travis and Greg up the stairs to the third floor of the main building. The designers had wanted an open feeling, so the buildings were not connected on the first and second floors, but they had put in glass walkways connecting the four main buildings on the third floors, though. These glass walkways provided a great view of what was coming our way. And what a preview that was.

  The sun was about to sink in the west, painting the crest of the hills with a pinkish-orange glow, silhouetting the zombies as they stumbled in our direction. Zombies were coming in small groups, pairs, and as individuals, slip-sliding along in the ice and show. It wasn’t a horde, but the group was still daunting since we hadn’t seen any large groupings of zombies since we had ended up at The Manor.

  “Travis, have you ever seen anything like this in the time you’ve been here?” I asked.

  “No,” he said, “we’ll have a couple come in every once in a while, but nothing like this.”

  “But have you ever had a shootout like we had today?” Greg asked.

  Travis shook his head.

  “That’s it then,” Greg said, “a single shot, now and then, might not catch much attention, but an all-out shoot out, that’s like sending out a brass band invitation.”

  After a few more seconds of watching the undead shamble our way, we decided to move on to one of the guard posts. We pushed our way into the southwest-facing guard posts where Jo, a square-shouldered, middle-aged woman with a tangle of red hair, was on duty. She had come to The Manor with us from the church.

  “What do you see, Jo?” Greg asked.

  “They started coming over the hills a few minutes ago,” she said scanning the fence with the binoculars. “At first there were just a couple, but now there’s a lot more. The few that have made it to the fence are trying to work their way inside.”

  “Any of them make it?” Greg asked.

  “Not on this side, I think the fence is strong enough to keep them out, at least at the numbers that are out there now, but if they make it around to the back, that’s another story.”

  The fence only covered three sides of the perimeter of the compound. It was designed to keep any of the less mentally able of those staying at The Manor from wandering off. Those same designers left the backside open for people who wanted to stroll the golf course on their own. It seemed an oversight to me. Sooner or later, a demented octogenarian was going to wander out the back and past the golf course. Of course, that wasn’t our concern; we only had to worry about zombies. What a trade-off.

  “What should we do?” Travis asked, “If we start shooting them, won’t that bring in even more?”

  “You’re right,” Greg said. “We’ll have to take them out hand-to-hand with no guns?”

  Travis looked from me to Greg, wide-eyed. “Are you crazy?”

  “I know,” I said, “but we had to fight that way all the time in town. With such a concentration of zombies, a gunshot in the city would bring them on the run. When we were foraging, there were plenty of times we took them out quietly and effectively. We always reserved the option to use our guns if it got tight.”

  “What about silencers or something?” Travis asked.

  “We only have a couple of those, and they cut down on accuracy, so we’d have to be close anyway,” Greg answered.

  “I still think this is insane,” Travis said.

  Greg looked to me and said, “You up to it after taking a hit today?”

  I raised my arms in the air and spun them in a circle, seeing how my side felt. “It’s not too stiff yet, but it will be tomorrow. I say let’s do it.”

  Twenty minutes later, the old gang consisting of Greg, Brandon, and I, collected at the front doors, ready to venture out. We usually had four-man teams, but with Aaron out, we had to improvise our approach. Several of the guys at The Manor offered to go out with us, but Greg said they’d need time to train in hand-to-hand combat with the undead.

  Each one of us put on the riot gear that we had brought with us from town. I felt a lot like Iron Man with all the armor I was wearing even though it was only made of thick molded plastic. The suits covered vulnerable areas such as the forearms and shoulders, along with padded gloves. We had lost a couple of foraging team members to hand and forearm bites prior to getting the gear. As usual, I refused to wear the helmet with the face guard even after Greg tried to force me.

  We had our weapon of choice. Brandon had his long sword, and Greg had a long-handled ax. I had my aluminum batting practice baseball bat that differed from regular bats in that it was long and thin, not wide on the end like a regular bat. We carried two handguns each, just in case.

  “Brandon,” Greg said just as we were about to head out the doors,” I know you’re eager to get out there to slice up some zombies after what happened with Aaron this afternoon, but we’re down a man, and I need your head in the game. Okay?”

  Brandon didn’t answer.

  “Listen, you’re not going out there until I know you can handle this.”

  “Okay,” Brandon said, nodding his head, “I’m good now.”

  “Then let’s go,” Greg said as he led the way out the front doors.

  The sun was down now, the night sky seeming to be an impenetrable wall of obsidian pressing
down on us on all sides. In this blackness, we had an unfair advantage as we had the night vision goggles from the guards in the corner observation room. We had taken them from our local military armory when we were in town. It had been Greg’s idea to check the armory after our initial raid had netted a lot of guns and ammo. On the second check, we found that the people still in town foraging had cleared out most of the armory, but Greg found a box of night vision goggles, and we became hunters of the night.

  The world seemed strange and new when I powered up my set of goggles. My Technicolor-world shifted into a narrow stratum of colors: greens and black. The snow bloomed with a ghostly glow, and the stars shone like bright beacons overhead. The moon glowed as intense as the sun with a light greenish tint.

  All the lights in the main building were off as were the lights on the guard towers around the perimeter.

  “Freaky,” Brandon said, “Joel, you look like the Hulk.”

  “Yeah,” I said, “it’s a green, green world. Hulk smash.” I raised both my arms in the air and brought them down in an exaggerated smashing motion. My night vision goggles bounced around on my head. Those things took some getting used to, but when I did, I was like a ninja-killing machine when it came to the undead. They never saw me coming.

  “They call me Batman,” Brandon said in a hoarse whisper with his lips as tight as he could make them.

  I started to laugh.

  “Ahem, gentlemen, need I remind you that this is serious business. We’ll take them out: in small groups or as singles,” Greg said. “If we get more than four on us, we will pull back inside the gate. If you feel as if the situation is getting too hairy, then pull your gun. Agreed?”

  Both Aaron and I did.

  The temperature had dropped significantly with the sunset. A bracing wind whipped out of the west right into our faces, chapping our cheeks. While the riot gear was hot as hell in the summer, it did little good against the frigid temperature. Still, it was better than nothing, and I knew as soon as we got into action, we’d be generating enough heat.

  As we got to the main gate, Greg looked up to the guard tower where one of Travis’ men was on duty. I think his name was Wes. Greg made a hand gesture to him, signaling that it was time to open the gate. A second later, the gate swung open, and its slight creaking got the attention of three zombies about thirty feet away. They looked like green ghosts shambling along in the night.