by The Authors of the 2018 Summer of Zombie blog tour.

1

Harmony couldn’t stand her step mother. Aside from the zombie apocalypse killing her real mother and all her friends three years ago, her father marrying a “woman” out of their survival community who was only eight years older than Harmony herself was probably the worst thing in her life.

If Harmony held back the step mom hate long enough to be objective, she had to admit her father hurting his leg and nearly bleeding out on his last run was probably worse than 23 year old Jasmin shacking up with her 57 year old father and moving into their cramped quarters built into one of the storage containers. The survivors’ “homes” were literally stacked side by side throughout the warehouses protected behind the fences and barriers of The Community.

She liked her new baby half-sister Cadence well enough. The crying echoed inside their “home” and Jasmin was almost as shrill and as helpless as Cadence herself. With 8 year old Melody and 5 year old Opus, their party of six was a crowded blended family. Jasmin didn’t blend so well either.

“I wish you wouldn’t,” he said from his chair.

Baby Cadence cried as he bounced her on his good knee. Jasmin curled on a cot in another corner as if the baby wasn’t giving everyone a headache. Enough bathtub gin cured everything except their shortage of credits. Melody and Opus played checkers with nickels and quarters for pieces. Both were useless for any other purpose.

“You can’t drive the truck out to pick up supplies and survivors,” Harmony said. “Without bringing back either one, we’re not earning credits. Without more credits, the family account is drying up. You still need antibiotics and time to heal. And neither one comes cheap.”

“We’ll be fine,” he raised his voice above the reverb of the baby crying.

Harmony stared at Jasmin’s back and shook her head. “We need to have credits in order to eat. You’re not going to get better soon enough and she isn’t going to start working, is she?”

“Your mother …”

“She’s not my mother. Do not call her that.”

He rolled his eyes and it bothered Harmony as much as it used to bother her real mother when Harmony did it. Melody and Opus remembered Jasmin better than they remembered Mom now. They even called Jasmin “mom.” It left a sour taste in the back of Harmony’s throat.

“Jasmin,” her father began again, “is tired from nursing and being up with the baby all night.”

“Hmm, Dad, that’s weird because I was up with the baby feeding her formula and you were up with the baby even though you can’t really get up, but for the life of me, I just can’t seem to recall young Jasmin lifting her sleepy head to do much of anything. I’m thinking the baby isn’t holding her back much.”

“That’s enough, Harmony,” her father said. The baby paused in mid sob to catch her breath and started up again. “She was up and that’s beside the point too. We’re talking about you going out … there. I gave up a lot and went through a lot to get the three of you here safely. Letting you go out there on your own like this feels … it feels like a step backwards. It feels like I’m failing you as a father.”

Harmony’s throat stung and she had to swallow several times before she felt confident she could speak without her voice shaking. “I know you did, Dad. You gave up a lot long-hauling before the zombies and you long-hauled us to safety after they came. Now you can’t do it all yourself. You have to let me step up. There’s no other way. I know what I’m doing. You taught me in case anything happened to you. Well, something happened and we’re lucky you’re still alive. I have to do this and you know it.”

“I know nothing of the sort.” He looked away from her at the ribbed inside of the container in the faint light of the white Christmas lights they used. “There’s always another way. We just have to figure it out.”

Harmony turned away. “You keep figuring then and I’ll get going to earn some credits.”

“We’re not done talking.”

Harmony pushed through the sheets they used as room dividers and drapes. “Unless you can get up and chase me, we are done talking. Get Jasmin up to feed the baby, please. If she’s going to use the baby as an excuse, she can at least use her lazy body to feed one of us.”

“That’s enough, Harmony.”

She pushed out of the container.

She heard him call at her back, “Take care.”

It caught her off guard. It was a “before the zombies” kind of phrase. Her mother used to say it to him when he left for long trips. They said it to relatives who were leaving. She hadn’t heard it in a long time. As if leaving the fences on her own wasn’t alien enough, this last well wish from her father dislodged her from time entirely. She couldn’t seem to shake the feeling off.

Harmony walked between several other containers on her way to the tarmac. Sounds of recorded music and live acoustic drifted out from one shipping container after another as she went. The smells of cooking made her empty stomach roll.

The rig rumbled as she approached. It was flat blue in most places, but chipped down to primer and rust in others. Her father kept his truck better maintained before the zombies. It was hooked to a modified trailer used for hauling livestock before the apocalypse. It was shorter than a standard semi-trailer in order to save fuel.

The extra tank mounted behind the rig hummed as it finished heating up the grease and cooking oil wastes they used for bio fuel now. Refilling that cost them credits as well.

“I’m already in the hole and I haven’t even started yet.” Harmony climbed into the driver’s seat and slammed the heavy door which had been reinforced with extra steel over the past few years.

She unfolded the map and ran her fingers over the intricate pen markings from her father’s countless runs so far. He had been everywhere. She was going to have to go way out to find anything. Harmony knew that was part of his concern. Her going out anywhere on her own was most of the rest of it.

Her eyes fixed on the dried blood puddled in the floorboard. A bloody handprint marked the upholstery next to her thigh. She jerked her hand away from it and the map.

Harmony shifted into gear with only the slightest grind and the truck rolled forward. She steered through the Community and into the chute leading toward the gates. The guards raised their hands and she applied her brakes and shifted down.

They communicated with people to the right and left. Workers along the fence banged the chain link and walked away from the gates, leading the dead away.

One of the guards waved her forward. Harmony shifted and they swung the gate open as she picked up speed. She shifted again. The old man on one side waved and smiled. The younger guard on the other side blew her a kiss. She faced forward as she drove out of the camp for the first time in three years. She watched them close the gates behind her in the vibrating side mirror.

She wasn’t sure it was exactly these two, but the guards nearly refused to let her father back in as he clung to life after the last run. He could have died right outside the gate. He threatened to ram his way through and they threatened to shoot him before a doctor arrived and made them open the gates to find out he wasn’t bitten. Just cut …

“Cut badly …” She looked away from the shaky reflection of the fences and focused on the open road ahead. Before she shifted again, she dropped her hand to confirm the knife was in its sheath on her hip. It was there and she shifted. She made a mental note to check on her father’s gun under the seat.

Her heart raced and all the colors around her seemed too bright. Her head felt charged and she almost sensed static in her hair. Harmony looked down at the map twice without really seeing it. Her eyes kept fixing upon the handprint. On the third glance, she pulled the map closer to her leg to cover up the stain.

She watched the road and saw shadows moving among the trees on both sides. A little farther along, the dead encroached on the road at both shoulders. She shifted again and roared through the gauntlet of zombies on both sides. She saw them fill the roadway and pace along behind her in no real hurry at all.

They moved in front of her too until they bounced off the bumper and scraped along the sides of the trailer. The truck bounced as the tires rolled over a few bodies. She expected a tire to blow out on her from a sharp spur of bone, but it didn’t happen. She kept driving.

She left the dead behind and spied more ahead closing on the sound of her engine too slow to catch her. But like stupid, angry dogs, they kept chasing and growling after the truck anyway. She saw the darkness of their rotten wounds and the dull, bruised color of their decaying flesh. Like her father’s bloody handprint beside her, she couldn’t stop seeing them every time she looked. Suddenly, the world didn’t seem too bright anymore.

Harmony kept driving to get out past where her father’s markings ended on the map to see what she could find.

2

Harmony sorted through the CDs and DVDs. There were Blu Rays too. There were some used video games here too, but she didn’t know much about those titles. She could almost remember when every movie they watched was digital. It sat on their family account and they could watch everything their parents bought them for “Friday Night Family Movie Nights” any time on any screen anywhere.

The thought of family accounts reminded her of her brother and sisters. Her father sat in the chair trying to heal with expensive antibiotics, a crying baby, and a lazy second wife. Harmony stopped sorting and raked the disc covers until they filled to the rim of the cardboard box.  She could fit more in if she stacked them, but she would be done faster if she didn’t bother with neatness.

Harmony toted the open box out the missing front door of the store. A box titled “Shoot to Kill” fell off and clapped to the gritty parking lot beside her. She wasn’t sure if it was a movie or a video game, but she decided to pick it up on the next trip.

As she approached the open back of the trailer, she saw the legs first from underneath one of the wide doors and stopped in place. The feet turned and the right leg kept buckling out at a sick angle. Harmony glanced around to be sure no others had snuck up on her yet.

She crouched toward the pavement and tried to keep the box level as she set it down on the ground. She stood again and drew the double-edged knife from the sheath on her belt. The monster bumped into the door of the trailer, rattling the whole thing. It did not come around and did not see her yet that she could tell.

Harmony approached and held the knife up and ready. No one living was there to see her, but she did her best to keep the knife from shaking in her hands as she approached the open trailer and the single zombie.

Something clicked behind her and she froze. Her zombie friend’s legs showing under the trailer door stopped too. She hazarded a glance over her shoulder and saw nothing there. Then, more movies fell off the uneven stack in the box and clattered to the pavement.

The unseen zombie growled and the sound echoed through the open trailer. The zombie turned with its bad knee flipping back and forth. The creature paced around the open door to get to her.

Harmony charged with her arms out and palms spread. An arm in a flannel shirt swing out into view around the edge of the door. Purple and black sores spotted the back of the pale hand. Dried bite marks ran up the arm through the material of the shirt and the dead flesh underneath.

She hit the door and slammed it into the monster’s skull. She followed through after the impact and kept pushing. The vibration of the strike traveled through the body of the trailer and unp her forearms. The body of the zombie teetered backward. Its arms went up in the air, but made no motion to maintain balance.

The dented skull bounced twice on the pavement as the milky eyes stared up at her and the zombie bared its teeth through a thinning beard. Black paste exploded under the undead man’s head in an ink blot which reminded Harmony of a hooded figure on a horse.

The zombie raised its head and both hands at her. She raised the knife. The head fell back to the pavement and the arms went limp at its side.

She stared a moment longer and then circled around it. She knelt with a certain feeling that this dead man was going to lash out with inhuman speed and bite down on her leg for getting this close. She knew in her bones this was going to happen. She was almost shocked when it didn’t happen.

Harmony jabbed the knife through the center of its forehead. The blade sunk in about an inch. Skin folded away from bone, but the knife wouldn’t budge either direction. She took the hilt in both hands and wretched it from side to side until she heard bones crackle in the neck. The knife came free. She paused a moment longer and then stabbed the thing’s head over and over. As the skull turned to Swiss cheese, the blade sunk in deeper and easier. She found spots which provided less resistance such as the eye sockets, the ears, and the temples. Her attack petered out and she stood over the ruined head. Harmony gasped for breath. She looked around to be sure no others had snuck up behind her. Then, she wiped her blade off on the flannel shirt and sheathed the knife.

Harmony gathered up the spilled movies, including “Shoot to Kill” and stepped over the body to put the box in the trailer with the others. She found four more boxes and filled three and a half of them before she closed it up and pulled away.

A few miles down the road she found a gas station with the convenience store burned out to a blackened shell. Dozens of pumps spread out unscathed by the fires in front of the store. She pulled past these and drove back to a wider section of pavement with more space between the green pumps.

If there was gas in the standard pumps, that would be worth a lot of credits, but she had nothing with her to haul it and it wasn’t any use to her in her father’s engine. Maybe she could come back with a tank for it on her next trip.

She stepped out of the truck and looked around the wide open space. Harmony approached the pumps and wondered if diesel would still be good after this many years of sitting. It was thicker than standard gasoline, but she had no idea how well it stored in comparison. The truck was converted for bio fuel, but could still handle the diesel, if any still existed in a useable form.

Before she reached the pumps, she saw the covers to the underground storage tank valves sitting open. Sections of clear hose coiled nearby and someone had spray painted orange X’s next to the valves. Someone had a similar idea as Harmony, but got here sooner. She would need to add ballpoint pen X’s to her father’s map for this spot.

The chain link fence shimmered with an impact. It was a familiar sound from the perimeter of The Community, but it still brought up gooseflesh on her arms now. She watched the hunched figure make its way along the outside of the fence a few feet away. It found a split in the fencing and stepped through to the concrete expanse of the filling station.

Instead of drawing her knife, Harmony turned to race the shambling figure back to the truck.

“I’m not going to hurt you.”

Harmony stopped and looked closer at her visitor. The old woman looked ragged and thin, but not bitten. Her flesh sagged on her bones where there was enough of it to do so like under her chin, but she did not bleed or ooze. Her steps were shifty and slow, but she had spoken. Whether it was the truth she spoke or not, the old woman was alive.

“What are you doing out here alone?” Harmony asked.

The woman stopped and smiled. Her head shook like she had some form of palsy or maybe from the strain of her age combined with the heat. “I’m doing what I’ve done for a lot of years – I just keep on living when others don’t.”

Harmony got the joke, but somehow it sounded like a threat too. “Are you part of a group?”

“I’ve been part of a couple.” The old woman’s hand shook as she wiped at her mouth. “Haven’t had much luck with others surviving though. They tried, but we drew the dead ones with our fires or … from babies crying … The poor babies …”

Shivers traveled through Harmony as she thought about Baby Cadence wailing in the shipping container behind the fences of The Community. What would it be like trying to survive out here with a baby? Or with someone like Jasmin in tow? Maybe with someone like this old woman, but she seemed to be making it so far. Three whole years and maybe a hundred more before the zombies.

“I’m sorry,” Harmony said.

“My name is Olivia Ralston. I’m eighty-nine years old and I’d be mighty thankful if you had anything to spare to eat or water or could let me ride with you a while or sleep a spell inside your transport. If you don’t liken to strangers, I understand, but I’ll be sorely disappointed just the same.”

“I’m Harmony and I have all of those things,” Harmony said. “I’m part of a community and we take people in. We take care of people. It is kind of far away, but I have fuel to get there.”

Olivia’s lips quivered and she wiped her eyes with shaking hands. “I’m … I’m without words, Harmony.”

“You have to ride in the trailer,” she said. “Those are the rules. They’ll check you for bites and interview you when we get back, but they’ll let you in. We have doctors too and they’ll take care of you. There are seats with seatbelts back there.”

Olivia nodded. Harmony guided the old woman to the trailer. After she got Olivia into her seat and set up with some water and dried fruit, Harmony realized she still had her hand on her knife as she stood over the lady. She dropped it away and smiled. Her body was tense and primed for trouble.

Harmony showed her the intercom. “You push the button to speak and let go of the button to listen. It goes to another one in the cab with me if you need anything. The toilet is right here. It dumps out onto the road, but it works well enough.”

“Thank you, Harmony. I’ll be fine now that I found you. Thank you. Thank you.”

Harmony smiled and closed Olivia inside the trailer. They pulled away from the station and spent the waning hours of the afternoon covering the miles back to The Community. After rough bumps in the road, she used the intercom to check on Olivia. She assured Harmony she was fine each time.

Zombies spread across the road bounced off the truck as Harmony barreled through the middle of them. “Olivia, we’re running through … some traffic. The undead kind. It might be a little bumpy, but we’re almost there. Keep your hands away from the openings in the slats of the trailer.”

“Thank you, Harmony. I’ll be fine.”

Dark smoke rose from a couple spots ahead in the direction of The Community. A few minutes later, they pulled to a stop outside the gates. Piles of bodies burned outside the fences. A few armed men and women stood around the fires as others dragged more bodies toward the flames. They were done clearing for the day. Which was good. The fires stunk, but it wouldn’t take as long to get inside now.

One of the guards on the lookout tower was a woman now, but the one who blew her a kiss earlier was still on post. He apparently needed extra credits for a drinking habit or his time at the pleasure houses or maybe he was paying off a fine. The gates swung open and the creepy guard blew her a kiss again. She pulled forward into the chute without waving.

Harmony whispered, “I can’t be the only one who hates you, friend.”

She drove in to collect her credits for the discs and the one rescue for the day. She already planned to refuel for tomorrow and sleep in the truck to keep from being woken by the baby. Antibiotics were expensive.

3

“Why didn’t you come home last night?” Jasmin’s voice was more irritating than having her sleep through the baby crying. “Your father was worried.”

Harmony waited for the bio fuel to finish warming up. “He was not. I ate dinner with you guys, which I bought and cooked, and I came out here to sleep so I’d be rested for today.”

“Your father brought back food for us from the road in addition to the credits he earned. You’re allowed to do that, you know.”

Harmony opened the driver’s door and stepped up on the running board of the truck. “I could, but I’m not going to because we need all the credits we can get for his medicine.”

Jasmin took a step closer and Harmony imagined smashing the girl’s face with her door like she had done the zombie and with the trailer door yesterday.

Jasmin said, “You can still bring us stuff. Stuff for your brother and sisters. Toys. Games. You can grab cigarettes or other stuff too. Your father brought us back presents. He took care of us.”

“I am taking care of us Jasmin; I’m just not taking care of you.”

“You’re so hateful. You’re not sweet like his other kids.”

“Get a job, you lazy cow, and get your own presents with your own credits.”

“What did you say to me?”

“Or better yet, earn some credits and spend them on stuff we need. The pleasure houses on the other side of The Community would probably even let you work there. It would use your best skills.” Harmony closed the truck door and pulled away before Jasmin could mount a response.

Through the gates and out onto the roads again, Harmony realized she felt better outside than she did inside. She wasn’t sure whether she liked that realization or not.

Another group left out the gate behind her on foot. They carried guns. They were either clearing zombies, which usually started in the afternoon, or they were hunting. The one in front of the group didn’t have a gun and had his hands up as the others followed him. She wasn’t sure what that was about. Harmony turned her attention onto the road.

***

Harmony opened the glovebox to the last car in the line. More papers, but nothing of value. These had all been picked clean. She mounted back up and drove the truck along open road again. She had a note on the map beside the red line for this road.

At the next shopping center, the pizza place and pharmacy were picked clean. She took two packages of napkins and a couple beach balls anyway.

The bodega on the end was swept out too, but in the office, she rifled through the filing cabinets. A bottle of Jack Daniels was hidden between the folders. She couldn’t tell if it had been opened before. She didn’t know how full they normally were, but this one looked pretty full. She didn’t mess with the cap because she thought it might be worth more unopened.

She set the bottle on the corner of the desk as she continued to search. More bottles, but this time it was orange pill bottles. If they were antibiotics, she planned to keep them. It was safer for the doctors to pass the meds out, but cheaper for her if they didn’t have to. The faded labels had multiple names on them and different numbers of pills. Some had as few as three pills left. She didn’t know the names, but they all said “As Needed for Pain” on the instructions.

“Better than a pharmacy.” Harmony grabbed up a plastic bag off the floor and piled in all the meds.

As she turned, her elbow hit the bottle of Jack Daniels and spun it off the corner of the desk. She grabbed for it in the air and got a hand on it twice before it hit the floor and shattered. She cursed and then wanted to cry. The pain meds would be worth a lot, but spilling credits on the floor was still heartbreaking.

She walked out and started the truck. The grocery bag of pain killers sat on the seat between the bloody handprint and the map. She found the intersection for the shopping center and added an X in pen to the side of the road. Before she shifted into gear, a man stepped out and waved. He was older, but not as old as her dad. Maybe 30 or more. She couldn’t tell. He had a twenty-two rifle rested in the crook of his arm. The man’s beard grew in very patchy and his hair grew long over his collar.

Harmony swallowed and opened the driver’s door with the truck still running. As she leaned out, she reached under the seat and brought up her father’s pistol. She stepped off the running board and sat the gun on the floorboard of the truck where she could reach. Once she stepped out from around the open door, she couldn’t reach it anymore.

“You’re a young truck driver,” he said. He only seemed to smile with one side of his face, but couldn’t seem to hold the half grin.

“I’m Harmony. Who are you?”

“Ralph … I’m Ralph. Are you … I don’t know what to say here. I haven’t seen anyone outside my family for … for a long time.”

“How many people are in your family?”

He narrowed his eyes and his hands tightened on the stock of his gun. He didn’t bring it around or go for the trigger. He did say, “How many in yours?”

“Six counting me and the new baby and my dad’s new cow of a wife. Not counting my real mother who died when this all started. Six.”

Ralph half smiled on the cow comment, but lost the grin again on the dead mother part. He said, “Congratulations and sorry for your loss. Are you nearby?”

Harmony want to look toward the pistol, but she didn’t. “Not too close, but we’re part of a community.”

“A community.” His brow furrowed and he was stroking the gun now. “How many families?”

“Not sure exactly. A few families and few singles. Maybe a thousand or more people total. It could be a lot more. I don’t really pay attention to that stuff.”

He whistled, but then cut the sound off abruptly and looked around. “Sorry about that. You just surprised me. Didn’t imagine there were that many left in the whole world. Enough to lose count. Is the community … are they friendly?”

She shrugged. “Yeah, they take people in. Anyone who wants. They vet you out at the beginning to be sure you’re not crazy or dangerous before they give you free reign, but they take care of you once you are one of their own.”

“How many?”

She shook her head. “I told you I don’t know the exact number.”

“No, I mean, how many will they take in?”

“Don’t know that there is a limit. Enough to lose count.”

“What about food and resources?”

Harmony pointed a thumb back at the truck. “We grow food and make what we can. There are some animals too. Chickens for eggs and goats for milk. Someone is trying to make bee hives, but they haven’t got it figured out yet. People like my dad and me drive around to find stuff too. And bring more people in.”

“Is your dad with you?” Half grin for a couple seconds.

Harmony swallowed on a dry throat and said, “No, not this time.”

“Is this a trap? What happens to the people you bring in?”

“Nothing. I mean, nothing bad. No trap. Everyone works. Everyone earns their food. We have a credit system. It’s like money. People do their share, we all work, and we all eat.”

“You’ll take me there?”

“You’ll have to ride in the trailer.”

“Why?”

Harmony said, “Those are the rules. They don’t want me getting bitten in the cab and then bring disease into The Community – the disease, I mean. The zombie sickness, you know?”

“Makes sense, I guess.” He took a step toward her and she took a step back. He stopped. “You want …”

He squatted and Harmony took another step back. He lowered the twenty-two to the ground and stood back up without it. “Is that better, Harmony?”

“Sorry. People are hard to read sometimes.”

“Yes, we are. Always have to take care these days. A twenty-two wouldn’t do much for me if this turned into something ugly anyway.” He nodded and stepped over the gun. She walked with him away from the cab without getting her gun. “Can we get my family?”

“How many are there?”

“Fifteen counting my brother, me, our wives, and all our kids. We used to have dogs and a few pigs, but they didn’t make it long. Zombies …”

Harmony opened the trailer. “Your house must be louder than mine.”

“The dogs were just trying to protect us,” he said.

“Yeah, I meant fifteen people in one place.”

“Right. Okay. It’s tough to keep everyone quiet and the zombies away.” Ralph paused with one foot on the back of the open trailer. “Is your community really safe? I don’t want to take my kids from bad to worse.”

“The fences and barriers are strong. None of them have gotten in yet.”

Ralph acted like he was rapping his knuckles against the side of his head. “Knock on wood, huh?”

The crunch of footsteps on glass drew their attention to the road behind the trailer. A spread of zombies rounded the corner of the pizza place. Glass stuck to their bare feet.

“We need to go,” Harmony said.

“I have to give you directions to the cabin.”

“There’s an intercom and you can see through slats on the side of the trailer. Strap in.” She closed the trailer behind him.

Harmony climbed into the cab and shifted without closing the door. She set her father’s gun on top of the bag of pills. With the truck crawling forward and the door still open, she jumped out. More zombies stepped out into the road ahead. Harmony grabbed up the twenty-two and climbed back into the moving truck, closing the door this time.

The intercom crackled, but she didn’t hear Ralph speak.

She pushed the button and said, “Repeat that. Sorry.”

The intercom crackled again and Ralph said, “Turn right on Anderson just after the railroad tracks. There’s a jackknifed pick-up with a racing trailer on the back. Swing wide around that.”

The directions continued and Harmony drove farther and farther from the little town and away from the direction of The Community. She had to use lower gears as they climbed steep slopes into mountains.

She pushed the button. “Are we getting close, Ralph?”

“Almost there. It’s farther using the actual roads like this. We’re close now.”

At his direction, they turned on a dirt road barely wide enough for the truck and drove deep into the woods. She took the gun off the pills and rested it on the bloody handprint.

“This is it up here.”

They emerged in a clearing in front of a cabin. A man with a shotgun and a woman with an AR-15 stepped out on the porch. Harmony made a wide turn and put the trailer between her and the cabin. She pointed the truck back toward the trail.

After pushing the button, she said, “The trailer can be opened and closed from the inside. Go tell your kin to not light me up.”

Ralph’s voice came in on the middle of a laugh and startled Harmony. “Yeah, this is a surprise for them. How much time do we have?”

She picked up her father’s pistol. Harmony pushed the intercom button with the end of the barrel. “How much time do you need exactly, Ralph?”

“Can we pack up our things? Clothes. Supplies. The kids’ toys and things. We might never come back here, right?”

She pushed the button with her finger this time. “Yeah, whatever will fit. You can keep what’s yours. You can trade some stuff for credits too.”

The man and woman were approaching the truck now, she saw in the side mirror. She tried to figure out how she could drive and shoot at the same time. The trailer opened and they stopped. Ralph stepped into the view of the mirror. They talked, but Harmony couldn’t hear anything but the rumble of the truck. He pointed at her several times before the three of them disappeared inside together.

Five minutes passed and her gun hand rested on the first gear shift. They came out. Fifteen of them, like he said, carrying bags and more guns. Mostly kids, all younger and thinner than her. She felt the vibrations of them loading into the back of the trailer.

Harmony shook her head. “Who would just climb in a trailer without meeting the driver?”

Ralph approached along the driver’s side.

Harmony opened the driver’s door and leaned out with the gun behind her back. “Everything okay?”

“We’ll get more stuff, if that’s okay.”

“Sure, I’ll honk if zombies come up on us. Then, you need to load up no matter what. We can come back for more later, if that happens.”

Ralph nodded. He managed to smile with his whole mouth now. Harmony smiled too, but then felt a cold chill ride up her back. She whipped her head around expecting to see someone stalking up behind her from around the grill. No one was there, living or undead. She looked at Ralph again. He was still smiling.

He said, “I can’t thank you enough. We’ve been holding out fine, but we’re doing more fighting zombies than anything else lately. I hope this place everything you say it is.”

“It’s safe,” she said. “We use mostly shipping containers for houses, but no zombies prowling around them.”

“Shipping containers.” Ralph’s smile faded again.

“Like they put on big ships? You can turn them into houses on the inside. You and your brother might want to split up between two of them and be next door neighbors for a while.”

Ralph shrugged. “We’ll get used to it, I guess. We’ll hurry. Thank you for this.”

She nodded and closed herself in the truck. One of the women, both men, and a few of the older kids continued to make trips bringing tools, furniture, and bags. This was going to burn a lot of fuel and she probably wouldn’t get credits for the stuff. The rescues, sure, but not all the cargo.

Harmony sighed. She wished she still had the bottle of booze.

The trailer slammed and the intercom came on. “I think we got it, Harmony. Ready when you are.”

She shifted and negotiated the trail back toward the mountain road. Harmony opened the pistol and saw every chamber empty. Her father had used them all and never had a chance to reload after getting back. She had ridden around with an empty gun for two days. She was never going to confess that to her father. Bullets and more fuel would burn a few more credits for tomorrow. Hopefully, the pills and rescues would more than cover that and her father’s medicine. She checked the twenty-two after she made the first turn and saw it had one small bullet left. She assumed the rest of the family was better armed and loaded in the back.

Harmony shifted again and shook her head. She estimated where the cabin was in a wide green patch on the map. She marked an X and made a note.

The intercom clicked and Ralph said, “Hey, Harmony? My wife wants us to meet your family. Maybe have you all over to break bread with us once we’re settled in.”

She imagined her train wreck of a family sitting down for a polite dinner and it made her teeth hurt. “Sure, I might only bring the ones who don’t embarrass me though.”

Ralph held the button down to laugh and that was it.

A woman’s voice in the background said, “Ralph, shut up and let her drive.”

The intercom clicked off again.

She consulted the map and didn’t notice the bloody handprint this time. “Another day, another whatever.”

4

The drive was tedious. Especially, since she had several children in the back that continuously must stop to use the restroom. As if on a timer, Ralph clicked the intercom, and asked if they could stop again.

“Sorry for the trouble, Harmony, but can we stop again?” Ralph didn’t sound too concerned with the constant stopping, but Harmony knew that the more times they stopped, the greater risk of something happening.

She clicked the com. “I’ll stop one more time. Everyone needs to try to use the restroom on this stop. The more we stop, our chances increase of running into trouble.”

“Got it.” He clicked off right after.

Harmony contemplated staying in the truck, but then decided that she better take her own advice and use the restroom. She hopped down from the higher elevation, watching her fifteen passengers unload, as she tucked her unloaded gun into her waistband. The air around them was warm and thick with humidity, seeming to suck the life directly from her.

She headed the opposite direction of the family and found a place to pop-a-squat. When she finished her business, she noticed a humming hovering through the air. She glanced around, wondering if one of the children was singing a tune. She neared the rear of the truck and the buzzing in the air increased. It was then that realization dawned.

Zombies.

“Get in the truck!” She yelled.

All heads snapped in her direction. There was a pregnant pause before everyone began to run back to the truck. The trees surrounding them acted as partial camouflage for the approaching horde, keeping them hidden until they broke away from the tree line. The moaning increased once they set their decaying eyes on their prey.

“Hurry!” Ralph hollered for the kids to finish climbing into the rig.

Harmony was about to close the cab door, when the passenger side door opened and Ralph hopped in. “What are you doing? You know the rules.”

“We don’t have time for rules. You’re small and young, you might need my help up here.” He rebuffed.

The statement immediately offended Harmony. “I’m old enough to be out here alone,” she quipped as she tried to jam the key in the ignition.

The zombies were beginning to surround the truck, pawing and grabbing at the side, attempting to gain entrance for their next meal. The vehicle swayed with the force of their assault, even though it weighed several tons. Bone scrapped against the metal and glass, leaving bloody smears behind.

“Move. Let me drive.” Ralph grabbed Harmony’s collar, trying to pull her from the driver’s seat.

“What the …” She planted her feet to steady herself, before she could be yanked from her place. She only had a moment to think, before he pulled her again. She was half out of her seat, when the metal of her gun scraped her back. “Get your damn hands off me!” She yelled.

“Move!” Ralph ordered. “I can get us going.”

The keys clatter to the mat from the ignition. She had no choice, as she reached around her back to pull out her gun. There are no bullets, leaving her with only one option other than a bluff. She flipped the gun in her hand, hanging onto the barrel, and slammed the butt against the back of Ralph’s head. He dropped like a sack of potatoes to the floorboard of the truck unconscious, the back of his head bleeding, plastering his hair to his face. That worked faster than she expected.

She prayed that he was still breathing, as she grabbed the keys from the floor, cramming them back into the ignition. The truck roared to life, as a zombie smashed its face against her window. A scream ripped from her throat, startled from the grotesque features, smearing blood and grime on the glass.

The startled family members in the back clicked the intercom. “What’s going on? Is Ralph with you?” one of the females asked.

“Hold on! We’re getting out of here!” Harmony replied, leaving out the fact that Ralph had been knocked senseless.

Grasping the wheel tightly, she plowed into the moaning undead, their arms reaching out for her as she ran them down. She weaved from side to side, careful not to high center the truck with built up bodies. She down shifted and pushed the gas, rolling over zombie after zombie. They were everywhere. She hadn’t seen a horde like this in years, not since the early days of the apocalypse.

Adrenaline pumped through her body, causing her heart to pound, and her hands to shake. She sent a silent prayer up to her dead momma and plowed through the last line of zombies. Blood and gut spatter plastered to the front windshield, making it hard to drive. Harmony breathes in deeply, calming her anxiety, and then clicked the spray for the wipers.

The first swipe tinted the view red, blanketing the world in blood. The second stroke cleared the way for a new day. As Harmony kicked the truck up into the next gear, she glanced down at Ralph, still unconscious. Guilt dropped to her stomach, wishing she didn’t have to harm him. His family was going to be furious when they find out, but given another chance, she’d do it all over again. Out here on the road, there was no room for mistakes. He could’ve killed them all.

Harmony decided to drive the remaining couple hours home without stopping. The others would think it was because of the attack, when in reality, she needed the backup when they noticed what was done to Ralph. She glanced down at him again, but from this far away, she couldn’t tell if he was breathing. This was not going to go over well with those who ran the Colony either, a group who might be hostile based on Ralph’s behavior. It would be ugly on both sides with her in the middle.

Hopefully, he survived.

5

“What the hell were you thinking?” Mr. Creep raked his shaky fingers through his hair. “Are you trying to get us all killed?”

“Don’t you have anything better to do?” Harmony folded her arms defensively across her chest, trying to disguise the thundering against her sternum. “Are you always on the front gate?”

“You bring a dead one here, in the front cab of your truck when you know that’s against the rules for a damn good reason…you’re an idiot!”

“Ralph isn’t dead, he…”

“Well, he sure ain’t breathing.”

“He…he isn’t?”

“Honestly, this is why kids shouldn’t be sent out on missions.”

Funny how she wasn’t a kid when he wanted to make lewd gestures at her, but now she’d all of a sudden become too young.

“Eve won’t like this.” He shook his head fervently. “She won’t like this one bit.”

“Eve?” The name struck Harmony ice cold. “Why does Eve need to get involved in this?”

He snorted nastily. “You think she doesn’t need to know every time a scouting mission goes wrong?”

“It didn’t go wrong…”

“Well, it didn’t go right, did it? We have a dead guy and a hysterical family. His wife is spitting mad, she’s about ready to rip your head clean off.”

He pointed to where Ralph’s kin stood, but Harmony couldn’t bring herself to look at them.

“This wasn’t supposed to happen … I just wanted to help.”

“Fat load of good your help did.”

“Oh my God, it’s true!” Harmony’s shoulders bunched up around her ears as she heard the shrill voice attached to the person she least wanted to see in the world. “You really have created a big ol’ mess. Well done, Harmony. Real smooth.”

“Alright, Jazmin, the sarcasm isn’t much appreciated. Nor the slow clapping. Where’s Dad?”

“He’s too disgusted by what you’ve done to come anywhere near you. He sent your mommy instead.”

Harmony’s fists curled into tight balls by her sides. Tearing some shreds out of Jazmin might’ve made her feel better, but it wouldn’t help her case with the guards. Even if the nasty piece of work had only come to mock.

“Well, I don’t need you here. Can you please get my dad?” Harmony found herself searching Jazmin’s face for the scrap of humanity she already knew wasn’t there. “I have to see Eve.”

“Eve?” Jazmin’s hands clutched to her chest in mock horror. “Oh my. Daddy will be proud, won’t he? His precious little girl being hauled up in front of The Community leader. Probably a good job he’s far too busy with his other kids to mess around with you.”

This was said to rile her, Harmony knew that but it didn’t stop it from working. Her blood boiled over, there had to be another reason her father wasn’t around. She hoped he hadn’t taken a turn for the worst.

“If you’ve just got off your lazy backside to come and mock me then I could do without it.”

“Oh, I know. You have more…important things to deal with. Well, it looks like you don’t need me here so I’ll just let you get on with it.” She wiggled her fingers teasingly. “Bye!”

A screamed threatened to burst free from Harmony’s chest, but she refused to let it out. Mostly because she didn’t want to give Jazmin the satisfaction.

“We’re gunna have to go.” Mr. Creep grabbed her arm, but she rapidly shook him off. “Look, I don’t like this any more than you do. This is just the way it is.”

“Well you don’t need to manhandle me. I’ll come with you.”

“I just don’t want any more trouble.”

“Trust me, nor do I.”

Harmony felt small as she was led to Eve’s place of work, where she’d likely be yelled at like a school kid in the headteacher’s office. She’d never met the leader of their community, her father had dealt with everything when they first arrived since she was only twelve at the time, but she figured she had to be quite a formidable character since she’d managed to keep this place under control.

Taking care of all these people needed a seriously powerful person spearheading it.

This child-like feeling was the complete opposite to when she was outside the walls, when she was free and in control, more grown up than before.

She missed that.

“I’m going to leave you here, go and relay the situation. Eve will get you when she’s ready.”

There was nothing but trust keeping Harmony where she was. She couldn’t stop her eyes from darting towards the wall and yearning to be on the other side of it. Since her family seemed so content to keep that awful woman around, maybe they didn’t need her anymore. Perhaps it was time for her to make her own way in the world…

But then she remembered her father’s injured leg, and the dream vanished to dust.

No way in hell she could just up and leave him.

Harmony jumped as a hand rested down on her shoulder. Exhaustion had almost sent her to sleep as she waited to find out her fate.

“You must be Harmony?”

She turned her head quickly to see a friendly grin looking back at her. Not what she expected.

“Erm, yeah, I am.”

“Do you think you can come with me? Apparently, we have some things to discuss.”

“Yeah. Sure.”

The lady took Harmony to a small picnic-style table surrounded by no more than four chairs and she indicated for her to take a seat.

“Are you Eve?”

“I am. Why, are you surprised by me? Not disappointed, I hope.”

“No, not at all…”

But Harmony wasn’t sure she spoke the truth. Eve was smaller in stature than she’d been expecting, and she didn’t create an aura of authority and fear either. She was just a very normal, middle-aged woman, the sort she could picture wandering around the supermarket looking for avocadoes. The person who controlled Harmony’s world was just ordinary.

“I’m just a bit surprised. By everything really.”

“Yes, I gather Gavin has given you a bit of a scare. I do appreciate how well the guards do their job, this wouldn’t run as smoothly without them, but sometimes a scrap of common sense wouldn’t go amiss. Do you want to tell me what happened?”

“Erm, sure.” Harmony had been so shaken by everything, all her memories we now jumbled. “I was out on a supply run…”

“May I ask why such a young girl was out on her own?”

Harmony bristled. She hated the insistence on focusing on her age.

“My dad is injured. Badly. There are six of us too, so we need food and also medical supplies. I didn’t want anyone to go hungry.” Except maybe Jazmin. “And I also need antibiotics for my dad.”

“So, you’re struggling with the credits system?” Eve nodded slowly, drinking her words in as if she actually cared. “Hmm, that troubles me to know. It’s one of those ideas that might be much better in theory than in practice. I might have to revisit it. I will also come and speak with your father to see what I can do to help him.”

All of a sudden, it became clear to Harmony this woman got to where she was today by doing that really rare thing of being nice. It wasn’t a quality seen too much in this world, it was good to know it could still have power.

“Oh, well, thank you. So, I was out and I came across this family.”

“Fifteen of them?”

“Yes, many of them children. I explained about The Community and offered to bring them back here, but a bathroom break sent everything spiraling.” Harmony’s eyes hit the floor as the recalled that heart-stopping moment. “As we were all out the truck, I saw a horde, a massive horde, one so big I think we might need to worry about it soon…”

Eve touched Harmony’s hand reassuringly. “Thank you for letting me know. But you let me worry about that, okay? Once I have all the information, I can do something about it. Continue, please.”

Easier said than done!

“Yeah, okay, I will. We all scrambled to get back in the truck, but Ralph wouldn’t get in the back like I told him to. He knew it was the rules, but he wouldn’t. He fought me for control of the steering wheel, but I couldn’t let him have it. That’s why I…I knocked him out. I had to, to keep myself and everyone else alive. I didn’t mean to kill him, that wasn’t my intention, but then we got back here and Mr. Cr … Gavin said he wasn’t breathing anymore.”

A tight panicky feeling coiled through Harmony’s organs, squeezing tightly around her lungs. She couldn’t seem to suck back enough air however hard she tried. The possible ramifications of what she’d done struck her hard, knocking the wind right out of her.

“He’s with the doctor now, so we’ll get a proper judgement of what’s happened to him soon.”

“And…what about me? Do I have to leave for breaking the rules?”

Eve tilted her head back and laughed. “Of course not. It sounds to me like you were just acting off instinct which is what kept you and those other people alive. What you need to do now is…”

Bang!

“What was that?”

“I don’t…”

Bang! Bang!

“Was that…?”

“Yes, Harmony.” Even Eve looked panicked now. “That sounded like gunshots.”

6

Oh, great, thought Harmony to herself. I’ve just met Eve and discovered she’s the only sane person in this place, and now there’s a friggin’ wall breach.

That’s all it could be. The blasts came from inside the compound and we wouldn’t be shooting at ourselves… would we?

Eve snatched a semi-automatic, threw Harmony a revolver, and they raced outside the shipping container, in the direction of the gunfire.

Outside, the avenues of containers were empty and silent. People had followed protocol and locked themselves away at the sound of danger. But it was hard to pinpoint where the gunfire had come from in the maze of crates. Eve pointed in the direction of the gate, the most likely source of an incursion, and they ran silently towards it.

A shrill voice ripped the silence, a high, angry babble that could have been a man or a woman. It then changed into sobs of tectonic grief that made Harmony shudder. But there was no mistaking the location. It was just inside the gate, where Ralph’s family had been waiting. Harmony was fairly sure what she was going to see when she got there. A member of Ralph’s entourage, maddened by loss, wielding a gun at everybody and anybody. Probably his wife. It happened from time to time, even to the best people. Under the hot sun of middle America and amidst the wreckage of Western civilization, anyone could lose it. And Ralph’s wife had some extra reasons. Harmony wasn’t sure she didn’t prefer this kind of protest to the one her Dad had gone for, sleeping with a girl half his age.

But then another bullet blasted through the air. It’s my fault, thought Harmony, and bit her hand to stop herself from crying. Such thoughts were a luxury until after the camp had been secured.

They crept to the corner of the crate used to process new arrivals and peered round at the open space that lay between it and the fence.

It wasn’t Ralph’s wife. Harmony could see her, crouching behind a table in the dusty, uncharming al fresco area where the guards ate their meals in good weather. She had no gun. She wasn’t babbling, or sobbing. She hadn’t lost it, in fact she was heartbreakingly in touch with the situation – she was trembling and tears were streaming down her face.

The person with a gun was a small, hunched figure with scraggly grey hair. It was the old woman, the one Harmony had picked up the day before Ralph.

“People keep dying!” she wailed. “I have such bad luck with people dying…” And yet she was grinning horribly, three teeth grinning at the sky. She took aim again and Harmony finally realized what she was firing at. The gate, specifically the chain that kept it secure. A horde was massing in the distance and she wanted to let it in.

Eve nodded and Harmony trained her gun on the old woman. But before she could fire, another figure zipped out from nowhere and ran up to face her. It was Jasmin, cunning little Jasmin in her cut-off shorts, not so perfect really around the hips and butt, getting a bit saggy now, but positively Lolita-ish to a man her father’s age, if he let himself be lured by such ugly empty things, which he clearly had. Harmony loved Cadence… who couldn’t love Cadence? Like herself, her half-sister took after the paternal line – she had the jet black hair and the blue eyes, and beneath the baby-chub she had the same length and strength to her limbs as Harmony and her father. But Dad… they all needed him to be another kind of man, not the kind he had become, who could be manipulated so easily.  It was as if the infection in his knee was also in his brain. He wasn’t a zombie, but he wasn’t the person he’d been either.

What the fuck was Jasmin doing? Harmony watched in horrified fascination as her creepily sexy ‘step-mother’ reached her hands out to the grinning banshee with the gun.

“Mom?” said Jasmin.

7

“Mom?” Harmony whispered as she exchanged disbelieving looks with Eve. “Olivia is Jasmin’s mother?”

“You know the old woman? And the girl?” Eve asked in a low-pitched whisper.

“I brought the old lady in as a rescue the other day, and the girl is my … step-mother.”

Eve’s eyebrows shot to the roof. “That’s your step-mother?”

Harmony’s cheeks reddened her face tightened. “Yes.”

“I’m sorry. That must have been hard for you,” Eve said while shaking her head.

Harmony nodded. “It still is, but…”

“Yes?”

“That can’t be her mother. Jasmin’s only twenty-three, and Olivia told me she was eighty-nine when I found her.” Harmony eyed Jasmin, noting the crafty gleam in her eyes. “What’s she up to?”

Olivia had frozen when Jasmin uttered that single word, confusion filling her face. Now she shook her head and said, “I’m not your mother. I’m nobody’s mother anymore. All my children are dead.”

“But…you have to be my mom,” Jasmin pleaded as she reached beseeching hands toward the old woman. “You look just like her. Please?”

The old lady hesitated, allowing Jasmin to get closer.

“No. No, get away,” Olivia screamed, snapping off another shot at the chain holding the gate shut. She missed, and Jasmin jumped forward to grab the gun.

Harmony gasped as she watched the two wrestle for possession of the weapon. Olivia, old and frail, but strong with the bitterness granted by grief, and Jasmin, young and vital, her petite frame straining to gain purchase in the dust.

Despite her hatred for her step-mother, Harmony now found herself cheering for her. They couldn’t allow Olivia to succeed. Couldn’t let her open the gates. If that happened, they were all doomed.

Suddenly, another boom echoed through the clearing, and the struggling pair stumbled to a halt. Jasmin’s eyes grew wide, while Olivia bared her teeth in a gap-toothed grimace.

“No,” Harmony cried when she saw the red spot bloom on Jasmin’s back, the crimson stain growing as her step-mother fell to the ground.

Olivia stepped backward before leveling her gun at the gate for the last time. She squeezed the trigger just as several other people, including Eve, fired, riddling the old woman’s torso with bullets. She too, fell to the Earth, her body twitching as her last breath left her lungs. Next to her, Jasmin choked on the blood filling her mouth, the precious liquid spilling over her lips onto her chest.

Somehow, Harmony found herself running. She collapsed next to her step-mother and lifted her head onto her lap. “Jasmin, it’s okay. I’m here. I’ll get help.”

Jasmin coughed and sputtered, her fingers clawing at her throat. Harmony tilted her sideways to clear her airways, and the girl sucked in a breath. “I couldn’t let her open the gate. You understand?” Her eyes pleaded with Harmony. “For Cadence.”

“Of course. I know. She…the old woman was crazy. You did the right thing,” Harmony said.

“I’m sorry…for everything…I was just jealous. He always loved you more.” Jasmin coughed again, her eyes rolling in her sockets.

Harmony swallowed against the panic rising in her throat and looked around. “Help, somebody, help me!”

Eve rushed over, her kind face twisted with worry. “I’ve sent for the medic. How is she?”

“Not good, I … I don’t know what to do,” Harmony replied, her hands stained with Jasmin’s blood.

The injured girl twisted as a wracking sob tore through her body. “Take care of your sister … Cadence.”

“No! Don’t die! Cadence needs you, my dad needs you…” Harmony cried.

Jasmin shook her head. “I did love him, you kn…know. It wasn’t all … an act.”

Tears leaked from Harmony’s eyes. “It’s okay. I know that now. Save your breath, the medics are coming.”

“T…too late…for me. Save your sister.” Jasmin stilled as a long ragged sigh left her lips. Her final breath.

Harmony shook her head, but she knew it was too late. Her step-mother, Jasmin, was gone. “No! You can’t leave us. What about your baby? She needs you.”

“She’s gone, sweetie. Come on,” Eve said, coaxing Harmony to her feet. As she rose, a different voice grabbed her attention. A male voice, low and gruff.

Her father.

“Harmony? What’s going on here?” he asked, his disbelieving eyes fixed on Jasmin’s corpse. “What did you do?”

“Nothing, I…”

He grabbed her by the shoulders and shook her so hard her teeth clipped shut on her tongue, drawing blood. “What did you do?”

“It wasn’t me!” she cried. Wretched despair flooded her veins when she realized he blamed her for Jasmin’s death without even hearing the facts. Her father, the one she used to love and cherish, was gone.

Eve stepped forward, her face and voice a haven of calm in the chaos as she tried to explain the events to Harmony’s father. He hardly listened, keening over the death of his young wife.

Harmony shook her head and turned away, bitter at the sight. That’s not my father anymore.

The clearing buzzed with activity, and people rushed to and fro. A guard dragged away Olivia’s body, her face slack in death. A puddle of blood marked her death. Harmony wondered in passing why she’d gone crazy. What had happened to her during her lifetime to make her go from the calm, polite woman of before to a deranged banshee intent on killing them all?

She turned in a slow circle until she came face to face with Ralph’s wife, her accusing gaze fixed on Harmony’s face. The woman raised an accusing finger, and she opened her mouth as if to say something when a strange noise interrupted the business in the clearing..

The sound of grinding, tearing metal.

As one, everybody paused and turned toward the source. The chain holding the gate. In front of Harmony’s shocked gaze, the chain snapped. It seemed Olivia’s aim had proven true after all, damaging the metal links beyond repair.

The gates swung open, and the uncleared zombies filtered through. On the horizon, the first shuffling figure appeared. It was followed by another and another until the hills teemed with undead life. Unearthly groans vibrated through the air and into the ground sending each and every human being’s pulse into overdrive.

The horde had found them at last.

8

Eve had spent time around the zombies before they formed The Community. Others with her since the beginning had similar experience.

The first thing a person notices when they get up close and personal with a zombie horde isn’t the sound of the moaning. No, the hair-raising sound is more of a precursor, a warning not unlike the klaxon of an air raid siren or fire alarm. It’s not the vast, uncountable numbers hell bent on overrunning your patch of real estate. Nor is it the twisted and tortured visages of the undead shambling forward, reaching out with gnarled, emaciated hands to grab and eat you.

It’s the fucking smell, and it kicks you in the gut.

Zombies have a distinct aroma, one most survivors were nose blind to by this stage of the game three years in. Fresh corpses stink of dried shit and other bodily fluids, not to mention the rotting meat. Rising to undeath doesn’t stop decomposition. Bacteria eats the flesh of the undead host in much the same manner as it does to an unanimated body. The end result blends methane and other sulfurous gasses as they leak from the zombie’s body. Rotted flesh takes on a personality of its own after exposure to the elements for weeks, months, or years. This is called Dry Land Rot by the people who still fancy themselves to be scientists.

With one or two zombies, you wouldn’t notice it, except for maybe a sick-sweet tinge in the air you taste more than smell. Increase the numbers to critical mass and you discover there’s something truly remarkable about the stench of a zombie horde. In an open-air scenario, a horde is somewhat reminiscent of a country town with a cow pasture on a hot, summer day. Except cattle didn’t want to eat you. By contrast, if you contain a horde within an enclosed area, it creates another problem, altogether. Far too many unprepared civilians succumbed to this malady than to a zombie’s bite, although the former almost always led to the latter. It’s the reason you always saw gas masks on Army and Marine Corps vets. They knew better. They called it CS Syndrome.

CS is the military designation for tear gas, the infamous riot control agent. Fundamentally, it’s a tamed down version of the far deadlier sulfur mustard based blistering agents used in WWI. To many military vets, conditioned to its use in training, CS is the world’s greatest decongestant. To the bad guys, it’s a crippling mephitis, bringing even the strongest willed men to their knees.

Imagine, if you will, all the fluids in your body exiting through your nose and eyes and mouth. All the mucus, snot, spit, everything down to your last two meals sitting in digestive juices in the pit of your stomach. Imagine, if you can, the sensation of every pore in your skin on fire. It burns with such an intensity your first thought is to find the nearest body of water and jump in it. Doing so isn’t advised. The agent is activated by water. Making yourself wet only exacerbates the effect. CS Gas is a bitch to the unprepared.

The same could be said of a zombie horde, Eve thought. She had hoped she’d never experience that again, but deep down, she always suspected this day would come no matter what she did to prevent it.

Harmony felt the first symptom of CS Syndrome within moments of the gates crashing open, as the horde swarmed into the compound. The fetid odor radiating from the horde raised in intensity as the undead plowed into the compound, sending her olfactory senses into overdrive. Her eyes watered and burned, obscuring her vision. Snot filled her nose, followed by an overwhelming urge to heave. The God-awful stench set off her gag reflex, the second symptom, and the one most deadly to the living. A vomiting person is an easy target for a single zombie, but for a horde, the retching soul becomes a blue light special in aisle six. She held the contents of her stomach back, quelling the diaphragm spasm, and pulled the collar of her shirt up. She held it over her mouth with a free hand in a desperate attempt to stifle the nauseating malodor. It worked, mostly. She didn’t feel the urge to hurl anymore.

Ralph’s wife wasn’t so fortunate.

Bent over, her hands on her thighs, she was spitting and drooling when a trio of zombies exploded out from the side of a container. Before she could react or even scream, the things were upon her. A banshee like wail erupted from her mouth as one of the zombies ripped her left arm out and off at the shoulder. A fountain of blood, two shades of red, Harmony noted, sprayed the surrounding area pink and crimson. The zombie on her right side did the same. Not quite as much blood shot out of this dismemberment, most of the gallon and a half of blood in her body had already painted the town red. The zombies then proceeded to beat Ralph’s wife with her own arms. She stopped screaming after the second blow to her head. When the zombies felt she was tenderized sufficiently, they fell upon her exsanguinated body. Harmony could hear them chewing the wet flesh.

The Community was compromised and chaos ensued. Zombies poured into every vacant square inch of ground, pushing outward at a remarkable rate of speed. More people were trampled by zombies, adding to their numbers, in the first few moments. Gunfire and screaming people added to the confusion. Had most of The Community not been already safely locked away in their containers, the death toll would have been catastrophic.

Harmony saw her father, still collapsed in a heap on his dead wife. Eve stood near him, frantically trying to shout orders as she gagged with each inhalation. She was too busy looking at what was coming to see what was on her doorstep.

Her father had joked in better times about the fear of a younger woman being the death of him. He was prophetic. Jasmin, or what had been Harmony’s step-mother, sprung to unlife with no fanfare. She simply reached up, grabbed her husband with both arms, and pulled him on top of her, sinking her teeth into his shoulder and neck in the process. He screamed in agony. Blood squirted in a high arc out of the wound, covering the side of Eve’s face and catching her attention. Harmony didn’t know what to do. She’d never seen a person animate this fast.

“Daddy!” she shouted, for lack of anything better to scream. Eve turned and fired her pistol at zombie-Jasmin and her victim, emptying the magazine and making sure both wouldn’t come back. She dropped the empty clip to the ground and slapped a fresh one in. Harmony hadn’t been allowed the luxury to mourn her dead father. The horde had seen to it with fury.

“Either grab a weapon and kill something again, or get out of here and find your container. NOW!” Eve ordered Harmony. They were the last orders the leader would give.

A zombie, carrying its own zombie baby still attached to the undead mother’s body by the umbilical cord, stepped out from the horde. Judging from its appearance, the woman had died while giving birth. Harmony mused the undead thing it held by the feet had chewed its way out from her womb. Considering the zombie’s midsection had a gaping hole in it the size of a basketball, the theory was solid. The dried intestines and other organs hanging out of the hole made it look as if Zombie-Mom was wearing a grass skirt and welcoming the residents of The Community to Hawaii.

Zombie-Baby’s moan was as high-pitched and shrill as a living child’s. It screamed through the air like whistling bottle rocket as Zombie-Mom swung her undead child at Eve’s head. Their faces connected with a wet crunch. The blow knocked Eve down, her nose smashed in but her head intact, dazing her and creating a highly unfavorable and unfortunate circumstance for The Community leader.

Zombie-Baby wasn’t as fortunate. The undead baby’s skull popped like a melon on impact. Black ooze, that had once been blood and other fluids, seeped out from cracks along the kid’s rotting cranium. Its body went limp in its undead mother’s hands, the head squished and flattened on one side. Zombie-Mom swung the child with both arms, repeatedly clubbing Eve in the head and face. Each blow resonated with a wet slap, intermixed with the popping and cracking of bone. Within moments Zombie-Baby was nothing more than tattered bits of skin, muscle tissue, and bone.

And Eve?

Harmony was having difficulty discerning between the The Community leader and the ground, around which the gray and pink sludge that had been Eve’s head puddled. Before Harmony could solve the riddle, a half dozen zombies fell upon Eve’s lifeless body to a symphony of something wet being torn apart and masticated.

Zombie-Mom released her grip on the remaining pieces of its undead child. The lower half of Zombie-Baby, still attached to the umbilical cord, slapped on the ground and dragged behind Zombie-Mom as she shambled on, seeking her next living victim.

At least it stopped screeching, a relieved Harmony mused as she ran off, not wanting to be the next selection on Zombie-Mom’s menu at The Community Zombie Horde Buffet. Zombie-Baby had reminded her of one thing.

The most important thing.

Cadence.

Her brother and sister too.

Harmony’s baby half-sister, Opus, and Melody were all she had left of her father. She had to take care. Harmony ran away from the encroaching horde. She needed to reach the family container before the horde spread any further.

9

Harmony stared at the ground. Blood trickled in from seven different directions. It oozed around imperfections in the pavement under her feet. There was a depression where the asphalt met the concrete which supported the weight of all those cargo containers – all those lives. This sunken spot in the ground at that seam accepted the blood trails from all sides. It started to pool and she expected the blood to overflow the uneven edges, but then it gurgled down into the dark recesses somewhere under the concrete.

She probably could have watched this until dark, if the dead allowed it. But the dead didn’t allow anything for the living. No space, no comfort, no rest, no peace, no parents, no home, no future, and no happy endings. They only cared about one thing and Harmony was the only living thing left for them to feed upon at that moment.

They closed in from all sides. It wasn’t the stench or the unearthly growls which brought her out of it. The telegraphed attack of a ragged zombie with an open belly to her left jarred her back into motion. He staggered on his approach, causing the excesses of meat he had consumed to tumble out of his open gut around his feet. He padded through his lost meal, but two others dropped to the pavement and lapped up what he had spilled. He took the leg he was chewing out of his mouth and swung it at Harmony’s head. She ducked as the meaty thigh whirled past her, above the back of her skull.

She ran toward the containers. The zombies she dodged between should have been able to grab her easily, but going from total stillness to a blur of motion, confused their senses which had been dulled by death. They grabbed for her hair and limbs moments after she was already past.

She reached the containers, but pulled up short. Her mind pinged between the metal dwellings. She knew some of the people closed inside. Others she might recognize, if she saw them. Some were still strangers to her, most, in fact. She could reach Melody, Opus, and baby Cadence, but then what? Close herself inside to slowly starve after supplies ran out and they sweltered in their own stink? Fight off the zombies single-handed and raise three children alone? Or rule the whole Community as the new Eve? Listen, everyone, I know I led them all in and brought in the people who ruined this for all of us, but I will now be your new leader. Follow Me! What did that leave? Gather two young kids and a baby and run through the dead to safety? Where? Ralph’s old cabin?

She turned to see the monster with the open belly dragging the masticated leg by the ankle behind him. He led the others. She wondered for a moment how he got to the lead of the pack again. Maybe his air-conditioned guts made him lighter because he wasn’t toting the pounds of meat the others carried in their distended bellies.

She only wondered for a moment, because the next moment, he was swinging at her head again. She ducked and the leg boomed off the side of a forest green shipping container behind her. Several people screamed from inside. Other dead heard it too and their eyes darted between the box and Harmony. They were not curious or thoughtful creatures the way living animals were. Their undead brains were singularly focused, empty, base, and uncomplicated, but screams and gunshots drew them. It connected to their predatory hunger. More dead scanned the containers and sniffed the air.

Harmony dodged away from the dwelling area and ran out into the open tarmac. She was running out of room as most of the horde either finished off the bones scattered about the grounds or zeroed in on her with mindless determination. Some of those bones were her father, her step-mother, their leader, and everyone else.

Others scratched at the sides of the cargo containers and weaved between them. More people inside whimpered or screamed. More dead clawed at the metal sides, trying to peel them open with their cold bare hands.

Harmony spotted her father’s blue tractor trailer closer to the gate. The driver’s door hung open as did the doors to the trailer. She felt her pocket and still had the key.

She ducked another swing of the leg too late to realize the zombie was coming at her overhand this time. She staggered backward as the thigh slapped the ground at her feet. Harmony pinwheeled and dropped to her butt on the concrete. They reached for her from all around.

She didn’t rest on impact, but rolled over several times to keep in motion. The fingers still clawed at her clothes as she went, but she found clear ground again. Harmony sprung to her feet and ran toward the gates.

Her father hadn’t told her about the dead using body parts as weapons. That wasn’t in any of the movies from before the zombies really came. That might have been worth mentioning before she went out there on her own like this. The dead could be scary out in the open, but having them pour into the home base was terrifying. Being afraid in the open was mitigated by having somewhere to come back to and rest. There was no place like that anymore. This was their world now and the living were the invaders.

She had the gun in one fist and the keys in the other, but she didn’t take any shots. She dodged the attacks and the grabs of the dead. Twice she had to backtrack to get around clusters of them.

At the truck, she started to unhook the connections for the trailer. The dead were closing and she didn’t have time to lower the legs to lift the trailer off the hitch. She left it attached and climbed into the cab. She started it up and saw she wasn’t a pinky’s width over empty.

Harmony shifted into reverse and eased the back end of the trailer along her course to keep from jackknifing the whole rig. The open doors on the trailer banged open and closed a few times. Then, she realized some of the bangs were coming from inside. She was hauling some of the dead now.

Super. Just wonderful.

She steered away from the containers and aimed toward a refueling slot several yards farther along. The zombies thundered off both sides of her rig and crunched under the wheels, jarring the cab. The dead cleared as she left the clusters around the gates and had not yet reached the masses clawing at the containers. Her back and forth motion had scattered the dead in odd patterns.

She neared the walking corpses that dogged her before she changed course for the truck and altered her plans. She spotted the Open Belly Beast with his leg club in her driver’s side mirror. She showed her teeth and adjusted course ever so slightly. At the last moment, she opened the driver’s door wide and pulled her hand back. The zombie reached for her, but didn’t have the sense to duck. The door clobbered him and bounced the back of his skull off the concrete.

She left the door opened as she parked in the fueling slot. She heard the feet lumbering about inside the trailer and saw a spread of dark figures strolling toward her. Harmony popped the gas cap and started the bio-fuel flowing into the thirsty tank. A dead woman fell on her face off the back of the trailer and crawled along the ground toward Harmony.

Leaving the fuel running, she took the keys and ran toward the containers from the northwestern side. She still had to dodge several of them as she entered the aisles between the dwellings. At every gap between containers, she saw more and more heads turn toward her.

She came in sight of her family’s home. The undead looked up from other boxes and left them to close in on Harmony. She looked behind her and saw more filtering into the passage she had left in her wake. She could open the door and get inside, but she would have to close herself in and would be surrounded then.

What am I willing to do to save them now? Anything. That’s a dangerous answer. Her chin trembled as she looked at the containers around her. I’ll never be able to forgive myself, if I do; I won’t forgive myself, if I don’t.

Her hands shook and she felt sick because of nothing that had to do with the stink of death. She opened the door to the container next to hers. “They’re everywhere. We have to go. Run for the gate. There’s no time. Go now. Go!”

A family of seven gathered up their packs and ran. As they left, Harmony swung the door wide and blocked off the passage between them and her home. They were already screaming by the time she opened the door to the container on the other side. “Run south. It’s the only way. Hurry before we’re trapped.”

An old woman hobbled out with a cane. A young mother carried a baby in one arm and a toddler in the other. Harmony felt her stomach heave and opened the door to block the passage as the father of the doomed family grabbed up a rifle. A few shots popped off leading south and the dead followed.

She swung open both doors on the container to the south and sent them toward the gates. She opened the doors of the container to the north. The family inside refused to leave and yelled at her to close the doors. The dead were on her. Harmony climbed up on top of the container and ran across the metal roof as the dead poured inside. She heard the screams echo as she dropped down into the closed off section she had created around her home at the cost of four families.

Harmony opened the door to her home and closed it back behind her. Her eyes had to adjust to the decorative lights.

Opus spoke low. “Where is Daddy and Mommy?”

Harmony said, “They got hurt. They’re gone. We have to go to the truck.”

She started gathering packages of food into a pack along with bottles of water and jars of baby food and formula.

Melody said, “The baby will cry, if we wake her up.”

Harmony swallowed several times. “I’ll get us to the truck. You have to keep moving though. Unless I say stop, but then we have to go again no matter how scary it is. Always go again. Okay.”

The kids nodded, but Harmony had her doubts. She created masks for them with bandanas and tucked Cadence, swaddled in her blanket, into the crook of her left elbow. “Stay close.”

She held the gun and the keys clutched in the other arm as she swung the door to their home open. The smell punched her in the gut again. She hoped the masks helped the kids. They moved up the side of the trailer to the north.

“Stop,” she whispered.

The dead still ate and bumped around inside that home. She peaked around the door, but saw no stragglers. She swung the doors closed and latched the dead inside. “Go. Go.”

They ran along and buzzed past the gaps between containers. Some of the dead turned, but they were gone by then.

A few wandered by east to west in front of them. “This way.”

They dodged east. She peaked around a corner and saw a few retreating with their backs to her. She whispered, “Stop.”

The baby let out a whimper. Harmony raised her gun at the backs of the zombies and she made soft clicking sounds over the baby’s face. The baby quieted and the dead turned a corner without turning around. She lowered the gun. “Go.”

They moved north along the open passage. Harmony peeked through the gap. It was clear. “Go. Go.”

They reached the end of the containers and ran out onto the tarmac. They dead turned and closed in on them from the open ground. “Go. Go. Go.”

They ran and then Melody spilled on the concrete. She let out a deep grunt and skinned her chin. Opus stopped and looked at Harmony with wide eyes. Cadence started to cry. Harmony used her gun hand, under the girl’s armpit, to haul Melody back to her feet. “You’re okay. Run. Run. Go. Don’t stop.”

They left the dead behind and closed in on the passenger’s side of the truck. Mr. Creep sat behind the wheel searching for the keys. Harmony raised her gun. “Get out.”

He held up his hands. “Come on. I’ll help you with the kids. We can get out of here before it’s too late.” He smiled, held out his hands, and waved them forward. She started to lower the gun, as Cadence continued to wail and drew the dead out from every aisle between the containers.

Then, he winked at her.

“Cover your ears and close your eyes, kids.”

Both Opus and Melody clapped their hands on both sides of their head and squeezed their eyes shut. Mr. Creep’s eyes went wide. “No. No, I …”

She fired through his forehead and brain matter exploded, out the back of his head, through the open door. He clawed at the seat and steering wheel as if trying to clutch onto life a moment longer. He toppled out of the driver’s side backward. Both kids startled at the sound and the baby went silent. As Mr. Creep hit the ground, Cadence started crying louder than before.

“Get in the truck.” She hauled both kids into the cab with her gun hand, one after the other.

Opus hissed and said, “Ouch, Harmony, that’s hot.”

“My ears are ringing and my chin hurts,” Melody said.

She handed the baby to Melody and closed the passenger’s door. More dead stepped out of the trailer. Harmony turned off the fuel line and closed the tank. A dead woman crawled out from under the truck and grabbed her ankle. Harmony jammed the fuel nozzle through the back of the zombie’s skull and left her on ground.

Harmony stepped over Mr. Creep’s body, climbed in truck, closed the driver’s door, and started the engine. The fuel gage climbed as she pulled away from the pumps. It paused still below half a tank. She frowned.

“I can’t make her stop crying,” Melody said.

“She’s scared and hungry,” said Opus.

“Make her a bottle.” Harmony saw the Open Belly Beast zombie with the leg. Its nose was crushed, but he was still moving. She aligned the truck and barreled down on him. He took a swing, but she plowed him over and left him splattered on the concrete.

“There’s no bottle,” Opus said.

“What?” Harmony shook her head.

“You got formula and water, but no bottles.”

Harmony cursed and beat her fist against the steering wheel. Tears stung her eyes. She picked up speed as they approached the gate. The impacts thundered around them as she ran over the dead and pushed through the bottleneck at the gates. The dead were thicker just outside.

Harmony called over the crying baby and the growling zombies. “Get her some baby food. I’ll figure out something with the bottle later.”

The cab bounded as she plowed over the bodies outside on the road. The truck slowed and she shifted to a lower gear to keep climbing.

I should have ditched the trailer.

Melody said, “There’s a diaper bag under the back seat.”

“What?” Harmony tried to keep the truck straight and moving.

Opus brought out a bag with purple and blue musical notes. The fabric was dirty. Harmony recognized it from before they arrived at The Community. It had been Melody’s diaper bag once long ago. Her mother had been a music teacher and the other teachers had a baby shower for her at school. Everything had musical notes and instruments on it. Opus started mixing the bottle.

Harmony got past the mass of bodies and shifted again, driving away from The Community. “How did you know that was there?”

“It’s not warmed up,” Opus said.

Melody said, “Just give it to me, Doofus.”

She started to feed the baby and the truck went oddly quiet with the baby feeding and the dead behind them doing the same. “Dad packed it there. There’s all kinds of stuff under there. Food. Water. Clothes.”

“Why?” Harmony turned on a gravel road and hooked the truck around and up the slope.

Melody looked up from the baby. “So, we could get away like this. Why else?”

Harmony wiped her eyes as she pulled around to a bluff overlooking The Community. The destruction from above was ghastly. She turned off the engine to save the fuel.

“Where are we going?” Opus asked.

“I don’t know,” Harmony said. “Maybe we’ll go back if the zombies get cleared out. Maybe we’ll go somewhere else, if they don’t.” Not far on half a tank. “We’ll stay here for now.”

Later, before dark, she got out and unhooked the trailer. As she brought down the legs and lifted it off the rig, more dead climbed out of the trailer. She took them down one by one with her knife. A few more wandered up the gravel road. She stood high on the back of the truck and waited for them to come to her. She took them out with her knife, too. Harmony sheathed it again next to her gun.

She got back into the truck to find everyone asleep. A few more dead banged around in the trailer still. She might “second kill” them later or just drive off and leave them. She started the truck long enough to pull away from the trailer and hook around a few degrees, so she could drive off in a hurry, if she needed to. Harmony cut off the engine again.

The baby started to fuss on the seat between her and Melody. Harmony changed Cadence’s diaper using the supplies in the diaper bag. She swallowed on her tears as she thought about her father, preparing this escape for them. Harmony rolled down the window just enough to drop the dirty diaper out. She mixed a bottle and started feeding Cadence again as full dark set in. The other kids didn’t wake up. They would probably wake up hungry once the fear and exhaustion wore off enough.

She couldn’t see the dead down below anymore, but a few of their growls still carried as far as the bluff. Harmony created a nest of blankets for Cadence on the seat because she didn’t want to doze off with the baby in her arms.

They needed a plan. They needed a home. They needed more fuel. If the dead spread out enough during the night, she might be able to go for the pumps again with just the truck itself this time and no trailer. Maybe they needed someone better than Harmony after all she had done to get them stranded on this hill with no mother or father. She thought about the families she had fed to the dead, the man she shot through the head because he winked at her, Ralph in her floorboard, his family pulled from what was probably a safer home, the old woman Harmony brought to shoot open the gate …

Maybe someone like me is exactly who these kids need in a world like this to really take care of them …

All of those were problems for the morning as she drifted off to the sound of crickets, distant growls, and the undead thumping around inside the trailer.

###

If you enjoyed what you read, keep an eye out for more work from Tom Clark.

Check out the Dangerous Days series by Baileigh Higgins.

Also, check out The Splits by MV Clark.

and, check out the AM13 Outbreak series by Samie Sands …

and check out Jessica Gomez’s Flash series.

Jay Wilburn

Jay Wilburn has a Masters Degree in Education that goes mostly unused since he quit teaching to write about zombies. Jay writes horror because he tends to find the light by facing down the darkness. His is doing well following a life saving kidney transplant. Jay is the author of Maidens of Zombie Kingdom a young adult fantasy trilogy, Lake Scatter Wood Tales adventure books for elementary and middle school readers, Vampire Christ a trilogy of political and religious satire, and The Dead Song Legend. He cowrote The Enemy Held Near, Yard Full of Bones, and The Hidden Truth with Armand Rosamilia. You can also find Jay's work in Best Horror of the Year volume 5. He is a staff writer with Dark Moon Digest, LitReactor, and the Still Water Bay series with Crystal Lake Publishing.

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