The Latter Days

I opened my eyes, greeting the sunshine and a new world. Then I realization hit me, and I recoiled from the knowledge that it wasn’t a happy day. There would probably never be a truly happy day, not like the ones before the disease struck. I was one of those that were lucky to know about the days before. Aaron Carver Cash was my name during the days before. Soon, I would forget that. I was now simply Aaron. Nobody bothered with last names anymore; it was easier to keep track of the few people that were left alive with one name. These were very somber times. People would forget the ways of those before the disease, including how to be nice to each other. But for the young ones, survival was the only way they knew, and they knew it well.

I stood up from bed, stretching. My back cracked and that was the moment I knew I was getting old. At this rate, I would be dead in a second if it weren’t for my team. There were three others in the group. No one dared move in groups of more than three or more. Those who actually survived may be immune to the disease, but that didn’t mean a thing when you’re being mauled by one of those creatures. Trust me when I say this, you don’t want to get mauled by one of them things. It hurts like a mad dog. I know this from experience. The others in my team, though young, were a good team. Teddy was the oldest at twenty five. He was unscrupulous, but a very vital part of our team. He was ambidextrous, working both hands like magic on our weapons to keep them in top condition. I liked the kid; he had a lt of spunk. Next to him was Alexis, a quick witted girl with russet hair and a sharp tongue. There may have been times her
tongue got us all in a lot of trouble, but she was quick to draw a gun and hold her own. I respected her for that. She was only eighteen and already taking responsibility for her actions. The youngest of our group is Ada, age fifteen. Her diffident manner may make her seem like an easy target, but there in lies a trap. She is not afraid to fight and get her hands dirty. For a fifteen year old, she scares me. As a part of the team, she’s imperative.

Speaking of Ada, there was the bang now. “Aaron, it’s time to get up.” Came her quiet voice. I threw on a shirt and walked out the door, weapons in tow. These days you never want to put your weapons far. They should always be easy to access in case of an attack, where you can simply bash the creatures skull in or shoot them. Either way it worked to kill the things that haunted us. They did come out during the day, but not in bulk like the night or in condemned buildings (which would be almost every building at this point). Normally we traveled until we hit a boarded up house with the owners gone. The only reason we could ever get the houses was the fact that the owners would go out in search of food (since every food holding area would be empty) and never return. If someone was living with them, that person would probably go looking and so on and so forth. They seemed to be consistent with this pattern. It was bad for them but good for us.

I followed Ada into the main part of the house, whistling as I saw the boards. They were getting restless now. The boards were absolutely torn away from the windows, some hanging with slobber, and others that seemed to be nonexistent. I heard the noises, but I didn’t think they did that much damage. We would have to be even more careful now. I was curious as to how we would make it with so little sleep; we were already sleeping like cats, afraid for our lives. How could we not? Nobody could be completely oblivious to what went on at night. Especially those caterwauling screams. I shivered thinking about it. I don’t think these things were doing anything for my psyche. That’s why I didn’t believe in having a psyche. If you think you’ll go mad, you will. It’s a fact, plain and simple. My wife once believed; at least until the day I found her slobbering above me. Once you have the disease you have no ability to think about such trivial things, after all this is survival of the fittest.

“Eat quickly.” I told her. “Make sure that everyone is ready to go in five minutes. We have to get out of here, fast.” She ran into the kitchen as I put my backpack (full of ammunition and other supplies) and pulled out a chocolate breakfast bar. It was delicious. I hadn’t had chocolate for a long time, so I decided to splurge today. Teddy walked out of the kitchen and stood next to me, his hair tousled.

“I never thought I would miss shampoo and hair brushes this much.” I smirked at the remark. To me it was very facetious.

“That’s why you wear it short kid. You’ll learn.” I said, squeezing his shoulder. When the ladies came out of the kitchen we all trooped outside, inspecting the damage. I flinched at the sight outside. It was a disaster zone. The lawn was torn beyond repair, cars flipped over that stuck in the cracks of the road, and the boards were nearly disintegrated. I was curious if anyone else heard what was happening last night. One glance at the team and I knew they had heard it too, how close we were to becoming zombie meat. I don’t think anyone could be oblivious to this destruction.

“Let’s move out.” I said to get everyone away. They nodded and followed my lead through the streets. None of us wanted to say it aloud, but we all knew that we weren’t intangible. They were hungry like us, and this was about the survival of the fittest.

The town was very taciturn this morning and it unnerved me. I felt as if they were plotting against us, and we couldn’t stop it. I halted to a stop in front of a large truck, seeing a line of the creatures watching us with hungry eyes. They didn’t attack like they normally would, they just watched. I kept my eye on them as we scaled the truck, skeptical of their intentions. “Pilot formation.” I whispered to them, hoping not to disturb the silence of the world around us. We all stood back to back, watching every side with our guns pointed and ready. They gave us an empty stare, but otherwise left us alone. When we were a couple of feet away from the truck everyone was about to take a sigh of relief when all the creatures came down and sped toward us. We took off in the opposite direction, going as fast as we could but sticking in our group. This took me by surprise. They never ran like this during the day. Normally they were dormant during the day except those few (by few I mean about 100) that tiredly walked around without a purpose. So this was a big surprise.

“Into that building ” I yelled, motioning to an old steel factory. We all hopped through a window and immediately ran up the stairs, hoping to lose them. There’s no telling what’s down in the darkness; it’s better to go up toward the light anyway. That’s what my Big Ma told me a long time ago, when her time was up. I shook my head of these thoughts. They did no good right now, especially since they slowed me down. We made it to a control panel above the factory and slammed the door shut, barricading it with a desk and our bodies. They were very persistent today. Their perpetual slamming on the door proved just that. It rattled my bones and made me feel shaky. Running like this would kill me soon. I hoped they would stop soon. They were notorious for not stopping on a hunt, especially when the kill seemed easy. Hours seemed to pass before they finally seemed to deem this hunt not worthy and stopped. I breathed a sigh of relief, my face sweaty from holding the door closed.

“Where do we go now?” Asked Alexis. “Those stupid things threw us off track ” It was true. Apparently there was a safe zone where survivors could go and stick together. Since we obviously didn’t have anything else to do, we decided to check it out. I just hoped that this place wasn’t full of bigoted people. That was the was the last thing during this time that we needed. I never went to any of the safe zones a couple years ago; it’s a good thing too, because for the people in them it spelled disaster. But now it seems like a safe distance away from the initial beginning and we might as well take a chance. There’s nothing else to do. That’s when I noticed Teddy next to the window.

“Watch your tongue.” I pointed at Alexis, then spoke to Teddy. “Hey kid, what are you doing?”

“We can get out and make a run for it at this window. There are rooftops that we can run across.” He replied, lifting the glass and setting it down carefully.

“That’s the best news I heard all day.” I told him. “You go first, then I’ll help the ladies out. But we must be quick and quiet.” This plan wasn’t flawless by any means, but it would do. We needed to escape. Ada went after Teddy, hitting the roof with a big bang. It made us all jump and she had a guilty look on her face, but I assured her that it was okay. Alexis followed suit, then me. We climbed to another roof and ran across, finding that the horde of zombies expected this, surrounding us. I guess it was time to fight. I pulled out my Tommy gun, ready to shoot these things off the face of the planet. The horde closed in at once and separated us with ease. This made me worried, but I didn’t dwell on the thought. I shot a two of the creatures in the head, instantly killing them. One decided to sneak up behind me, but that was the worst idea ever. I used the butt of my weapon and smacked his head clean off. Oh yeah That’s what happens when you play baseball practically your whole life.

I smirked as five more zombies fell to my bullets, none of them touching me once. I smiled. This was actually a lot of fun. That was before the scream. That caused me to get serious and turn to the noise. A huge zombie that was easily twice the size of the Rock had a punitive hold on Ada’s arm with his mouth. I noticed Alexis trying to fight her group off as she tried to get to Ada, using extremely abusive language in her plight to get past them. But they simply held her back. I saw Teddy aim his shotgun at the things head, getting a clear shot. But it didn’t collapse. Instead it screamed bloody murder, letting go of Ada and charging at him, causing him to fall off the roof.

I pointed my gun at the thing and it looked me in the eye. I was taken aback. Zombies never looked you in the eye. “Remember.” It snarled, words so slurred I wasn’t sure if he was speaking or not. “A chain is only as strong as its weakest link.” It signaled to the zombies and they jumped in formation, leaving a bloody trail and dead bodies in their wake.

“But now you’re the weakest link.” I murmured out of shock. The big zombie knew he had no chance so he ran, just like we did. This is just what we needed too, humanized zombies. If any more became that way it would be the death of human society as we know it. I took a shaky breath, and in seeing Alexis taking care of Ada I looked off the building where Teddy fell. I sighed in relief. The kid was fine. He hit a roof that was only about a foot down.

He climbed back to me, staring in shock and surprise. “Did you hear...” I nodded before he finished the question. I’m pretty sure my fear was reflected in his eyes.

“Aaron ” Alexis called and I charged straight over. Ada was squirming in her arms. “She- she’s not immune.” I saw tears form in the young girls eyes. I realized then that Ada was like a younger sister to her. I knelt next to her and firmly grasped her shoulder. Ada was the only one who hadn’t been bitten, so we never knew if she was immune or not. We dedicated ourselves to never finding out.

“Aaron.” Came the small voice. I saw the anguish in her eyes. “What will happen to me now?”

I hesitated. I didn’t want to make her feel worse than she already did now. But I couldn’t lie; she would see right through it. “You will get to see the beauteous fields of heaven.” I whispered. “You’ll see the celestial gates open so fast for you that you’ll see all the flowers stir up. Then you’ll see your parents and the rest of your family waiting for you, telling you that they missed you and they’ll welcome you home.”

She seemed to calm at this fact. We waited until the light faded from her eyes. I pulled out my Nambu, ready to put her out of her misery.

“What are you doing ” Alexis demanded, half screaming half sobbing.

“This is only equitable to her. We know she wouldn’t want this.” Alexis and Teddy bowed their heads as I finished the job. My heart filled with the anguish as the most sweetest and understanding person left us forever.

“We must get out of here.” I said, standing up. “We don’t want to greet the night unprepared like this.”

Alexis stood also, allowing Ada’s body to drop as I poured fingernail polish remover over her body. This is the reason why I keep this stuff. It’s not like I ever needed the stuff. “I swear to get revenge.” Alexis pledged as I lit the match and dropped it. We all jogged away as the fire spread.

“You can’t think like that and you know it.” I told her. “We already know the zombies are culpable; they’re culpable for many deaths. But they out number us, and it’s not like we can go shooting everyone of them. You saw what happened. If we go out for revenge a repeat of this is bound to happen. There’s also the possibility of worse happening.” She looked me in the eye with a challenge written on her face. She backed down when she realized this was a losing argument. As she sighed Teddy asked, “Where are we?”

I looked around and saw an intact street sign near a stoplight across from our building. “Pine Avenue I believe. Why?”

He had the map out and looked excited. “According to this the safe spot is only a couple blocks north.” I looked at the map and noticed he was right.

“Let’s not waste all day then.” We ran across two rooftops then climbed down, since the next five were absolutely destroyed and crumbled in. I led the was to the giant metal walls, relieved. These people knew what they were doing. There was one more street left when the giant zombie and his horde found us. This time they didn’t attack us. They surrounded us, our little group in the middle with the giant zombie. “Hello again.” He slurred, making our situation all the more eerie.

“You- you murderer ” Alexis yelled, running at him. But we held her back.

He chuckled. “You can’t kill me. I am the thing of your worst nightmares.” He stomped forward with inhuman speed and picked up Alexis. I noticed her squirm, so Teddy and I pulled out our shotguns. It was almost over. “You can’t kill me ” He roared and Alexa threw a smoke bomb into his mouth, causing him to throw her into the nearest building. Teddy and I took our shots, causing him to roar more. The horde swarmed around us and I knew we were zombie chow when they all began to fall. Confused I looked around, noticing soldiers with hunting rifles were the ones killing the zombies. Somebody threw a grenade with amazing accuracy and the giant zombie went down.

“All clear.” Said an older soldier, walking over to us. “Are you okay?” The soldier seemed very affable. But I didn’t know if he was trustworthy or not. There were some people in this world that were good at putting on a mock personality.

“We’re fine.” I replied. Then I thought about my manners and said, “Thank you, for saving us.” The guy nodded and signaled to the other ten people.

“Hey,” Teddy began at my side, “Is there a safe zone anywhere near here?”

The man shook his head. “There was one here, but before we were able to get here the zombies had already taken over. Now it’s sort of a race, against time and the zombies.”

“Shoot.” I nearly slammed my weapon on the ground, but thought better of it.

“If you want, you could travel with us. We found a couple of vehicles, so travel will be faster.” The man told me, looking tense in case he had to restrain me. But I wasn’t going to do anything. I couldn’t. I was tired and I just wanted to give up. Ada and Alexa were dead, two of our only companions, then I glanced over and saw the kid. He had that hopeful gleam in his eye. I knew he would be lonely if I left him alone, or at least that’s what I thought to encourage myself. I also thought of what the giant zombie told me, that the weakest link broke the chain. Well, I wasn’t going to be that weak link.

“Fine. Let’s go.” Teddy and I followed the men, hoping that we would find a safe haven eventually. But if we didn’t, oh well. At least we went down fighting.