Adrian's Undead Diary (Book 6): In the Arms of Family Read online

  So as I slowed down, maybe thirty feet away, the dualie catches fire, and within maybe a minute, the whole fucking thing was engulfed in flames. Luckily as a diesel it didn’t explode, but the damn thing sure as shit went up in flames, and car fires suck. Lots of thick, dark smoke, and the fumes are just awful.

  Everyone started to run around like chickens with their heads cut off, moving the other vehicles out of the way and such, and after about five minutes of all of shitting our pants in unison, we calmed ourselves, and realized we were fucking surrounded again by undead.

  Danny was already back up on the HRT plinking into the crowd that had entirely surrounded us, and the people who could get their vehicles away and free were getting out and firing again. We couldn’t travel without securing the barrels though, so we were kind of stuck until we were free and clear of the dead.

  Despite my fear of being eaten alive, I stepped out of the truck. Martin was hobbling really bad, and in our panic to get the vehicles moved away from the spreading flames, he’d been left on foot outside. I couldn’t risk orphaning another kid.

  I got out and started opening fire with the M4. I needed heavier fire, and with the M4 I was able to start dropping everything that had somehow managed to get close to Martin. Martin had sat his AK in the back of the plow bed, so he was entirely unarmed. I snapped off an entire magazine before I reached him, and while I was changing mags out, he limped his way to the rear of the truck, and got his AK into the fight.

  I stopped to make sure he was okay, and to check on everyone’s safety real quick. All my people were firing accurately, and backing into a circle so we couldn’t get our lines broken. It was damn near picture perfect. Almost one whole magazine later I had a misfire. It was a jam, and at that very moment Martin was struggling with getting a fresh magazine into his rifle, so instead of taking the time to clear my jam, I slid the M4 to my hip, drew my Glock, and dropped the three undead that were danger close to him.

  I went to drop a fourth zed, and the Glock fired, but no bullet came out. I knew I had a plugged barrel, and I knew I was fucked. Both guns jammed. I keep the Walther in an ankle holster still, but after swearing like a drunk Irish sailor with his balls jammed flush in his zipper, I opted to holster the Glock, and clear the jam on the rifle.

  It was a fairly easy jam to undo, and I only had to throw maybe five more rounds out before we had time to get the barrels strapped in, the lids back on the fuel tanks at the station, and get us the fucking hell out of dodge.

  Oh, and somehow I managed to cut the fuck out of my left forearm. It isn’t deep, really just three nasty scratches. It’s already really red, which means it inevitably will get infected, so I have that to fucking look forward to.

  The Glock’s barrel is a wreck. The round jammed up bad for whatever reason, and I can’t fix it. I’m saving that one for parts for the moment, and I’ve switched to the 10mm Kimber. We’ve got a plethora of 10mm on hand, plus it’s a 1911, and after Gilbert’s death, I’ve really wanted to carry a 1911 in his honor. I rarely need to use my handgun, so the magazine capacity isn’t a do or die issue, especially when you consider I’m not out there alone all the time now. I’ve always got at least two or three guns with me in the hands of good to great shooters.

  I’m frustrated. Lost a truck today, lost a Glock today, and damn near had someone set on fire.

  The good news is that based on our measurement of what was in that gas station’s in-ground tank, we should be able to get at least another nine barrels out of there, which is a fair amount of fuel. As I said, there are also other stations in town we can check. Granted, the longer we wait to pull fuel or supplies out of somewhere, the higher the likelihood that someone else has gotten to it already. Finite resources, right?

  I’m out. Angry masturbation while watching widescreen porn is calling me. Otis might get kicked off the bed here. I hope these scratches don't distract me.

  -Adrian

  July 13th

  I should expect bad things to happen more often. That way I won’t be surprised when they happen. For example when we hit the gas station the other day, I should’ve expected two weapon jams and a vehicle to be sat on fire. That way when it happened I wouldn’t have been quite so pissed or surprised.

  Zach died today.

  I thought I would be sad to say that, or pissed, but mostly I’m just… empty about it. Neutral. I almost feel angry because it was a needless accident, and it means we are one hydroponics brain short. In all actuality we have been tremendously lucky that we haven’t had more deaths via accident or sickness here. A few violent deaths, lots of injuries, but no major accidents or cases of diphtheria, cholera, or some other random ass fucked sickness.

  We were out working on the fence both today and yesterday. Martin has been given a few days to elevate his busted toe, so we were sort of moving at half speed just to take a break, and try to be extra safe. Clearly, that failed.

  We had split into two groups again to try and be efficient. I was with the group on the campus side, and Zach was in the group that was opposite the river cutting down trees for the wall. We’d been waiting on the tree side for maybe twenty minutes when Angela came over the radio saying there had been an accident. Right down the way in the center of campus we keep some of the mountain bikes the kids used, and we’ve been using them all summer to get around campus. A few of us jumped on some bikes, and rode across the bridge and into the desolate area of forest that was just stumps. It's a funny feeling to ump your legs like a madman on a mountain bike while you've got a rifle strapped across your back. When we were young my brothers and I would do that crap for play, and now it's just the way things are.

  Sitting on one of the fresh stumps, head in his hands was Alex. He’d been operating the chain saw today for the second time, and from what I was told after the fact, he was cutting down a pine tree that was about ten inches in diameter, and I guess Zach walked underneath it just as it went down. Everyone hollered for him to run or get the fuck out of the way, but he didn’t hear them in time.

  His body was crushed under the tree, and he was pinned to the ground. The tree had landed on his shoulder and neck, and the wood had crushed half his side like he was made out of play doh. Just nasty. By the time I’d gotten there he had reanimated already, and from his spot underneath the tree he reached out hungrily, hands clutching at the air, trying to kill me. No one had put him down yet.

  I walked back to the truck the wood crew had been using, and grabbed the wood axe to finish him off. Everyone looked away, especially Alex, and I brought that big blade down into poor Zach’s skull. Split it open as easily as a log. It was tremendously painful to drop someone that was in our group, especially after they’d reanimated. I can’t quite recall, but I think this is the first time I’ve had to do that.

  We’ve always killed them before they’ve reanimated, or destroyed the brain after death, but before they come back.

  It was a shitty feeling. I don’t want to do it again, even though I know I will have to eventually. That thought sucks too.

  I tossed the axe away and went to Alex and got the whole story from those around. Everyone kind of rallied around the guy and made sure he was okay. We called back to campus and got George, and he ran right out to be with Alex. It was a little weird for me to watch two gay guys hug affectionately, but at the same time, it was kind of neat to see it firsthand. I don’t know how to describe it. It felt really normal.

  I can definitely say that Alex was hurt, angry, and will be suffering from guilt for awhile until he figures out how he feels about it. As I explained to him, Zach should’ve been paying more attention to what was happening. You can’t just wander around where trees are being cut down and not watch what’s going on carefully.

  No blame to lay here.

  Myself and Patty wound up riding our bikes up to the gym to tell Ryan the bad news. He took it surprisingly well, and frankly, I think he looked a little relieved. That made both Patty and I wonder about their actual
dynamic. Patty said all along she’d felt like Zach was the alpha male between the two, which I guess does make sense the more I think about it. Zach did always tell Ryan what to do, despite Ryan seeming like the more intelligent one.

  As I said Ryan was sad, but also seemed a little relieved.

  That happened pretty early today. Once we got Alex and George away from the scene of the accident we cut the tree apart, and removed Zach’s body from the graveyard of stumps. It didn’t seem quite right to just toss his body on the funeral pyre way out in the back of campus, so we used some of the branches and wood clippings we’ve been saving for winter and the stoves to make a fresh, immediate fire, and we gave him an impromptu funeral right there. No one said anything really, we just sprayed the wood with lighter fluid, shot a little on him as well, and gave it a light. We didn’t stick around to watch it finish, we just made sure he was going well, and left. I hope he’s fully burnt to ashes. I really do not want to go out there and start another fire under his half burned body tomorrow morning. I just don’t want that problem in my life right now.

  As a result, we called off the wall work and moved on to a new project that Blake and Martin had been working on together. The two of them had figured out how to install the solar panels we’d stolen off the roof of MGR. We got the ladder truck in place, and moved all the needed folks to the roof of the gym as well as the tools, parts, and panels.

  Martin stayed off the roof and watched from a lawn chair in the grass, and Blake came up and worked with us. It took us the entire afternoon and a few hours into the evening to get everything done and wired in, but we did it. Of course we don’t really know if it’s working, due to the fact that the sun had largely gone down by the time we were done, but first thing tomorrow we’ll check it out, test it, and make sure that the shit was set up correctly.

  I’d like to throw out the fact that there is a 50% chance one of us gets electrocuted tomorrow. There’s also a 50% chance that we fucked it up, and nothing happens at all. Somewhere in the mathematics I know, that means we have a 50% chance everything works fine too. Yay Army math. Martin and Blake also said that they can work on getting some batteries hooked up in series similar to the setup in Hall E, that way we can store juice on the sunny days to use on the cloudy days.

  I guess they can do it using car batteries from the vehicles all about. Blake said tomorrow he’s going to go down the road taking car batteries out of abandoned vehicles. Ambitious guy.

  Not much else to talk about. More fence work as I said, and the solar panels.

  Tomorrow I believe Mike is set to arrive here for a trade. Although to be honest, my mind seems to be slipping away, and there’s a good chance I’m full of shit and it might be the 17th. I just remember that it was an odd numbered date, somewhere around the 15th or the 17th. I can’t say for certain.

  If he shows up, awesome. If he doesn’t, we’ll just put our noses to the grindstone, and put up more fence after we test the solar panels. It’s like the never ending fucking story here. Fence all day, every day.

  Oh, and we also have to staff MGR here soon so we can feel like we actually did that for something other than just rescuing a few folks, which I suppose should be reason enough.

  Crashing hard Mr. Journal. I need a day off. I hope I have good dreams here. I’m not wanting to fall asleep and deal with a nightmare tonight. I’m hoping this is the reverse jinx so that fairy can blow me.

  -Adrian

  The Great Fire

  “Jesus Christ they’re fucking everywhere over here,” Mike said to LaFrenz, his younger National Guard private. After his outburst Mike raised his M4 rifle to his shoulder for the twentieth time that day and snapped off a round at an approaching zombie shuffling down the street. The high velocity round punched through the skull of the deceased older lady and she went face down on the pavement, gray brains spilling out on the yellow dotted line.

  LaFrenz grunted in agreement and fired a shot of his own past his Sergeant’s target, dropping a zombie as well. “Sarge, where do you think they came from?”

  Mike lowered his rifle and searched the area he and his small group of survivors were searching for more undead. When he saw nothing, he responded to his soldier, “Fucked if I know. I would’ve thought after last summer’s big push to get all these things dropped in town there was no chance we’d find this many again. Lisa is gonna shit a brick when she hears how many we killed today. Something is stirring them up.”

  Mike was speaking of Lisa Goldman, the physician’s assistant who had been elected as leader of the group of survivors in their town. Currently they had about sixty allied survivors in Westfield, and they called the town’s high school home.

  It had been just over a year since the end of the world began. Presently it was June 28th 2011, five days past the one year anniversary of the first sightings and attacks of the walking dead. Westfield had over ten thousand living and breathing residents back then. Now there were perhaps a hundred frightened, hungry survivors scattered around the empty shell of suburbia, picking the bones of a dead civilization clean. The rest had either left town or died and became murderous zombies. Mike and Lisa’s group had fared better than most, or so they felt. They were reasonably well armed, well fortified, and had the support of a well run farm for food, and a few towns over they were closely allied with another group of survivors at a private school where they got fresh water from their artesian wells.

  In fact, if it were not for the support of Adrian Ring, the leader of the small group over at Auburn Lake Preparatory Academy, Westfield would have eaten itself alive from the inside out. Sean, their prior leader had been a cancerous politician, and was setting himself up slowly and meticulously as a dictator. It was only when Sean failed in two foolish attacks against the school that Adrian came to Westfield, and incited enough rebellion to start a coup.

  Now with good leadership in the form of Lisa and the ex-National Guard sergeant Mike, Westfield had but a single major problem on their hands. The diesel powered backup generator in the school had broken down. They could live without electricity for some time, but the lack of hot water was becoming a real drain on morale and hygiene. One of the defining requirements of proper civilization Lisa had said many times was maintaining good hygiene. Dirty bodies led to dirty living conditions, and that led to disease. Hot water meant clean bodies, and even though they could light fires to heat water, it was tough to manage the capacity required to clean sixty people with regularity. In the center of the town it was difficult for them to properly gather firewood and find a place to safely start a fire to boil water in quantities that were efficient. Bathing sixty people that way was too damn much work.

  When the generator broke a few days prior it had taken half a dozen of the survivors looking at the diesel fed beast in the bowels of the school to decipher what had gone wrong. One of their more nerdy survivors, a large, slightly pudgy man in his early twenties named Chris Sunderman had repaired the machine. Chris was a bit of an outcast prior to the end of civilization, but his status as one of the few remaining men in Westfield had catapulted him into much higher social status. It helped that he was an intelligent, tall man with a good sense of humor as well. Mike was thankful the young man had figured the machine’s problems out early. The nerds always did well in the long run.

  And the meek shall inherit the Earth… Mike thought.

  Mike and LaFrenz had assembled the team of ex-National Guardsman, and the folks who had joined into the security forces of Westfield, and they had begun to scour the businesses and homes that might have the parts needed to repair the massive diesel generator. They’d gone into areas of town where they hadn’t yet, and as a result, they’d happened upon large groups of the animated dead. Fortunately, no one had died in the search yet, and in a way, it was a good thing to be putting them down. With any luck, today would be the day they would find the needed parts to finish the repairs.

  Chris Sunderman walked out of a small pawn shop carrying an armload of tools
and mechanical bits. He had a grin on his face a mile wide. Next to him was one of the newest security people, Mary Roberts. Mary was a hard edged 22 year old with her hair pulled back tightly. She carried her rifle with the cockiness of a fresh recruit that had a little too much confidence in her fledgling skills. Mike winced on the inside as the two approached them, prizes in hand.

  “Got it. This should totally do it,” Chris said to Mike with a huge grin. He lifted the various engine parts, tubes, and unidentifiable widgets. He presented them as if Mike would automatically understand their value.

  “Fantastic. Pack our shit up and let’s scram.” Mike swung his fingers in a circle, and the handful of armed Westfield citizens collapsed in on him. Within minutes they were in their National Guard humvees, and they were gone, leaving a few scattered undead to shuffle the empty streets.

  *****

  As promised by Chris, the diesel generator was up and running by midnight that night. No one really understood how he fixed what he fixed, but when the lights inside the expansive high school kicked back on, there was a collective cheer amongst those still awake. Mike was with Chris at the time, holding a flashlight deep in the bowels of the basement when everything turned back on. Chris turned to Mike and smiled a warm smile that genuinely made Mike feel good. He gave Chris the same smile in return, and patted the young man’s back heartily.

  Westfield was back in business, plus one nerd hero.

  *****

  Several days later on the eve of Independence Day, Mike made the forty five minute long trip several towns over to visit the survivors at Auburn Lake Preparatory Academy. It was a scenic country drive through green forests and steep hills. He always enjoyed that drive with his family before things went to shit, and even now, despite all the heartbreak, it gave him some satisfaction to drive it again.