Zombie Apocalypse Series (Book 4): In Shadows Read online

  Sarah's M1 Garand ran out of ammo and she dropped it on the floor, searching around the garage for a melee weapon. A heavy wrench sat on a workbench at the side of the garage and she sprinted over to it and snatched it up. She came back to the door and started hammering on the closest zombie, who had almost pulled itself through. She crouched down low and kept her distance, throwing a blow when she could get one in, as the zombie was ceaselessly aggressive and quick.

  She swung the wrench and heard a crack in its skull, but it still had the dexterity to flail its arm and knock the wrench out of her hand. The weapon sailed through the air with surprising force and landed in the hallway leading to the front end of the shop. Sarah staggered over to it just as Carly finished reloading her gun with the loose cartridges Sarah had taken from the storage room. She aimed and got a lucky shot on the zombie Sarah had been working on, hitting it at the base of the brain and killing it.

  The remaining zombie pulled its leg through the door and shot up to its feet, coming straight for Sarah. It dove for her and caught her by the ankle, causing her to fall and strike her chin against the floor in the hallway. Sarah's head spun and she tried to ignore the pain as she kicked her legs out to free her ankle from its grasp. She clawed her way through the hallway toward the wrench, only making slight inroads as the zombie got its balance and came after her.

  Carly stood in the middle of the garage, squarely facing the hallway and holding the pistol in front of her. Her arms were shaking from fatigue, but also from uncertainty; she had a clear shot at one moment, but the next the zombie had shrunk down to attack Sarah who was still crawling on the floor. Her finger was on the trigger and kept it half-pulled.

  Sarah threw herself forward with a final lunge before the zombie fully descended upon her, trying to feast on the back of her neck. Her fingers wrapped around the heavy metal and she twisted around, throwing her arm and smacking the wrench against the side of the zombie's head. She struck it just below the earlobe and sent it into the wall. Its skull bounced off and its body fell to the other side. Sarah sat up and grabbed its arm to hold it steady as she raised the wrench into the air.

  Before the zombie could gain its composure, Sarah clobbered it in the head, causing a small burst of blood to splatter on the wall. Its head bobbed and swayed like a drunkard, but its eyes locked on her and it was undeterred as it fell forward, scratching at her with its cold fingers. Its filthy fingernails scraped up some of her flesh in the crook of her neck and the pain stung and at the same time caused a long and rolling shiver of disgust. She swung the wrench again, but the edge of it glanced off the top of its head, throwing her arm unexpectedly into the air and causing her to pull her shoulder.

  The zombie came in close, chomping at her face, but she held it back with her knee and dragged her arm across her body, catching it in the chin with the weighted part of the wrench. Its neck twisted and something cracked, but still it kept on her. She choked her grip up on the wrench and held the zombie by the shoulder as she thrust the weapon forward into the middle of its face like she were holding a knife. The blows were gentler, but she landed them repeatedly and began to cave the zombie's nose into a bloody mess and disorient it.

  She let the wrench slide down in her hand until she felt the full heft of it again, then she raised her arm and brought it down hard on the top of its skull. That familiar cracking noise filled the narrow hallway as little sprays of blood flew in every direction. She hammered it until she started to see a distinct concave shape in the top of its head.

  The zombie came forward with a last burst of ferocious strength, still enough to overpower her if she wasn't careful, but she wedged her foot against its chest and kicked it back.

  No sooner had its body flown up than Carly pulled the trigger from behind it and its brains exploded out of its forehead, coating the hallway and Sarah. Sarah rolled over onto her stomach and tried to shield herself from it as the zombie fell forward and landed on her back.

  Carly put her gun down on a workbench and ran into the hallway, yanking the corpse off of Sarah. She rolled her onto her back and frantically checked her up and down. "Are you okay? Did it bite you?"

  Sarah looked around, still confused from the whole event. She dropped the wrench and leaned her head against the floor. "I don't think so," she said. After she rested for a moment, she sat up, looking around and checking for wounds.

  "Your neck..." Carly muttered.

  Sarah pressed her fingers to it and felt the scratches. The pain stung her and her eyes squeezed shut for a moment. "It's just a scratch. It didn't bite me."

  "Are you sure?" Carly asked, and she continued checking all around Sarah's exposed skin.

  "I'm sure," Sarah assured her. "But I'll want to find something for the scratches, all the same."

  She got to her feet and sauntered out into the garage, looking around at the aftermath of the scene. She looked at the zombies stuffed under the garage door and at the other survivors huddled in the back of the cold and smelly room, looks of fear still adorning their faces. She went up to one of the zombies pinned under the door cautiously and kicked at its head.

  It rolled around, but the zombie didn't come back to life.

  She took the pistol Carly was using off the workbench and motioned for her to help her open the garage door. The two of them hoisted it up and they went out into the driveway. Sarah inspected the fence and saw that it was damaged beyond repair with boards twisted and cracked and the gate hanging limply off one hinge.

  Sarah stepped through the threshold and peered around the dark street. There was nothing else in sight and everything was quiet. She stared in the direction from which the terrifying new zombie came, and wondered what on earth it was. While she was lost in thought, Carly spoke behind her.

  "Sarah."

  She turned around.

  Carly stood next to Wes's dead body. He had stopped bleeding, but a massive pool of his blood surrounded him, and his flesh started to look cold.

  Sarah looked at the bites on his neck and knew he was going to turn soon.

  2

  A Quick Burial

  Sarah finished dragging all the zombies to the fire with the help of the other survivors. The corpses left trails of cold blood on the floor, but she didn't worry about that for now. She made sure everyone hustled as quickly as possible, and Carly still stood next to Wes, anxiously glancing down at his body as if she were waiting for it to spring up at any moment.

  They threw the zombies onto the fire one by one, and the flames twirled and licked at them. The smell came almost immediately and was horrible. When all of the strange new zombies were engulfed in flames, Sarah covered her nose and trotted inside the garage. She brought out a wheelbarrow and a shovel, and she and Carly hoisted Wes's body up into the air by his arms and legs. They strained under his weight, but they managed to lift him just over the edge and slide him in. He tumbled to the side under his dead weight and he fell on his face. The other half a dozen survivors looked on from the garage door, some of their hands placed to their mouths in malaise and sadness.

  Sarah glanced over her shoulder at them, knowing that everyone was still reeling from the shock of what happened to Wes. If she had her way, she would have put a bullet in his head right then and there, but she knew that would have done nothing for the psyche of the group. No, she and Carly would wheel him deep into the woods, and only then would they take care of it.

  She grabbed Wes by the back of his shirt and struggled to turn him over, and Carly quickly bent over and helped. They laid him out on his back with his head hanging just over the front lip of the wheelbarrow as his legs dangled on either side of the handles. His eyes were half-open in a dreary glaze and Sarah wanted to get him out of there as soon as possible. She just had one last thing to do before they left.

  "Go inside and shut the door," she said to one of the survivors. "Make sure all the windows are shut." She tilted her head toward the burning zombies. "When they're burned down to the bone, put the fire ou
t. But no sooner. I don't know what these things are and I don't want to take any chances."

  The survivor nodded and brought everyone else inside. They all took one last look at Wes's sad corpse and Carly gave them a sympathetic look back. They slid the garage door shut and locked it.

  Sarah held her arm over her face, trying to hold her breath when she could. Carly followed suit and soon both of their eyes started to water from the pungent smoke. They nodded at each other without a word and Sarah pulled up the handles of the wheelbarrow and pushed it out into the street as quickly as she could as Carly carried the shovel. They glanced nervously along the street in each direction. For both of them, an evil presence fell over the night that was as thick and black as tar. Though it had started to get warmer in the past couple weeks, the air felt cold and dead. Neither of them said a word as they crossed the street, their teeth chattering. The breeze had stopped and the night was absolutely silent. The drumming of rubber rolling over the asphalt sounded like a faraway thundercloud rumbling, and they could hear every distinct nuance to their footsteps and even the breaths coming out of their mouths.

  They cut through an alley on the other side of the street and continued to a field behind it. The overgrown grass wrapped around the bulbous landscape as it swelled up to a crest and fell over on the other side steeply into shaded woods. The two of them were happy to get the wheelbarrow onto the soft grass to mask the noises of their transgress, but the rustling grass made them think that someone was following them.

  The pistol felt heavy in the back of Sarah's waistband, always making its presence known to her. Her hands started to itch as they gripped the handles of the wheelbarrow, as if they were screaming out to shoot behind her and snatch up the gun. But Sarah tried to keep herself calm and continue on. She looked behind her here and there, trying to judge the distance they had gotten away from the shop—judging if they were far enough away yet for the others not to hear the gunshot. She didn't think they were, so they kept moving.

  Carly stayed right by her side, snapping her head back and forth from keeping an eye out for any dangers around them to staring down at Wes. His head lolled and bounced about over the edge of the plastic frame as the wheel jostled over small bumps in the ground. The animation gave the illusion of life, and Carly found herself becoming scared, trying to convince herself that he hadn't yet turned. As his head rolled around, sometimes it would strike an angle perfectly aligned with her gaze, and she was sure that she started to see his eyelids slide open and his jaw shift and chatter. His fingers twirled around as he slowly started to stretch his elbows. She looked up at the moon suddenly and concentrated on it, watching wisps of cloud drift by in front of it. When she steeled her nerves to look back at Wes with a clear set of eyes, she saw that he was still dead. She let out a sigh of relief, and Sarah didn't even notice as she trained her gaze on the woods ahead as they started their descent on the other side of the hill.

  Just before they reached the tree line, Sarah noticed Carly giving her furtive looks. "What?"

  "Oh," Carly said, surprised. "Nothing."

  "Why do you keep looking at me?"

  "Well... your neck," Carly said.

  "What about it?"

  "You're not going to..."

  "Going to what? Turn into one of them, you mean?"

  "Are you?"

  "No, of course not," Sarah said.

  "But can't scratches turn you into one of them?" Carly asked.

  Sarah shook her head. "Only bites." She hesitated for a moment. "Or getting their blood or saliva into your bloodstream."

  Carly looked at the blood on her neck surrounding her wound. "Did you?"

  Sarah stopped and put down the wheelbarrow. She placed her fingers to the wound and gingerly felt around the edges of it. The wet, sticky blood greeted her touch and she started to second-guess herself. She remembered Carly shooting the zombie in the head and watching its viscera spew out of its forehead and rain down on her. "No," she said, more to reassure herself than Carly. "No, I turned over in time." She wiped the wound with the sleeve of her sweater, ignoring the stinging pain. Before she gave Carly or herself any more time to think about it, she picked up the wheelbarrow again and carried on into the woods.

  They penetrated the tree line and didn't go in far before Sarah stopped again. The ground became very bumpy and hard to navigate, and Sarah didn't want to press her luck being out in the woods in the dark. "Here's good enough," she said, looking back at the hill and knowing they were far enough away.

  Carly dropped the shovel and went around to the front of the wheelbarrow, grabbing the shoulders of Wes's shirt. Sarah tipped him out and he slid down the hard frame and slumped onto the ground. She pushed the wheelbarrow to the side and pulled the gun out of her pants. Carly took a few steps back as Sarah stepped beside his head and aimed the gun.

  His eyes were just as lifeless as they'd been before and his jaw hung open like a ventriloquist's dummy.

  Carly started to cry, but Sarah found herself hardened to these kinds of things. Just before she pulled the trigger, she thought she saw his hand twitch. She stopped and looked down at it and realized it was her imagination.

  A gust of wind picked up and howled through the trees. It sent a chill up her spine and the paranoia started to set back in, feeling like they weren't alone.

  Out of the corner of her eye, Sarah thought she saw Carly glancing around as if she'd heard something, but she ignored her. She readjusted her aim and squeezed the trigger. The bullet punctured his skull and sank into his brain, and the look on his face was completely unchanged. Sarah stood there for a moment, judging him. She remembered that he had only been bitten by one of the regular zombies before the new one came along and transformed all of the other undead, and she knew he wouldn't exhibit any strange new characteristics.

  She put the gun back in her waistband and noticed Carly standing stock-still, staring through the woods at something. Sarah followed her gaze but saw nothing. "What's wrong?" she asked.

  Carly kept her mouth shut and her eyes wide as if she'd seen a ghost.

  Then the wind died down and Sarah heard what she had heard.

  Faintly in the distance there was a sound that was familiar and yet almost foreign to her after all the time that had passed since she last heard it. She waited to make sure she wasn't crazy, but then she heard it again: something was mooing. The sound of something plodding against twigs and dirt followed it, and then came the even stranger sound of chains rattling.

  Carly walked toward the noise.

  "Hold it!" Sarah whispered. She pulled the gun out of her pants and went after her.

  Carly wove her way through the trees as sounds of distress came from ahead. She made her way past a wide oak and stopped. Sarah came up behind her and saw what she was looking at.

  A metal spike had been driven deep into the ground, pinning down a thick metal chain about eight feet long. And attached to the other end of it was a cow, just as Sarah had suspected, even though her mind told her it couldn't be; the only animals left alive in the world were the wild ones, as the domesticated ones or farm animals had been left defenseless to starve or die to the hordes. But despite that fact, a full-grown spotted cow stood in front of them. It clomped around restlessly, turning on the spot until the chain would pull its collar, and then it would twist the other way. Its eyes were wide as if it were scared, but Sarah got the distinct feeling that it wasn't scared of her and Carly.

  "What's it doing here?" Carly asked in wonder.

  Before Sarah could answer, she saw something moving toward them in the distance, and it was moving fast. "Move," she uttered. "Now." When Carly just looked at her, she seized her by the wrist and yanked her away from the cow.

  The zombie tore through the woods, making a beeline straight for them. There was nothing clumsy to its movement as it sliced through its path like a knife through butter. The speed at which it ran was incredible, and Sarah didn't think she could outrun it from the brief flash of th
e corpse she saw before she took cover behind the thick oak tree.

  She held Carly tightly to her side and clamped a hand over her mouth. But Carly didn't fight or try to free her mouth from under Sarah's grip; if anything, she was more scared and more still than Sarah was.

  The cow whined in distress and ran around uselessly, pulling on its chain. There was nowhere for it to go as the zombie closed in. When the crazed flesh-eater reached it, it leapt at the cow and sailed through the air, landing on the broad side of it and immediately sinking its teeth into the thick hide. The cow wailed and bucked, using its tremendous mass to push the zombie around, but it was like a ravenous tick, unable to be shaken. The zombie climbed on top of it as the cow spun from one direction to the other, the chain whipping and rattling and suddenly snapping taut each time the cow pulled away from it. The zombie pulled itself forward and chewed the back of its neck. The cow wailed again as its movements slowed. Its legs wobbled, and before long, they buckled. The front end of the cow went down first, then its rump tipped over and crashed onto the forest floor, sending a huge plume of dirt into the air. The cow's whines turned into whimpers as its eyelids slowly slipped down over glassy black marbles. Soon it became still and quiet as the zombie continued to feast.

  Sarah peeked around the tree and watched it. She had never seen any of the dead with that amount of ferocity, not only in its movements but in its eating tendencies as well.

  It tore huge chunks of flesh at a time off of the animal's corpse, chomping with great strength in its jaw and swallowing the meat in gulps. Blood coated its entire face as the zombie lustfully buried it into the open wound.

  Carly sat with her back to the tree. She didn't move a muscle, but her body shook. Sarah knew she wouldn't be able to control herself much longer and she stared in the direction they had come from, trying to judge if they could sneak away, or if the only way would be to shoot the zombie and kill it once and for all.