Who knew a second date could be surviving the apocalypse? That’s what they did. Survive. Through chance and the fleeting service of their cell phones they found each other along the road. Tyrell was a city engineer and Jill worked in the Mayor’s office. They were both very well off before the fall of society. Tyrell fiddled under the hood of a ’97 Ford Taurus in the cover of a bridge’s shadow.
Tyrell and Jill never thought they
would need to use their career skills ever again. Jill probably wouldn’t.
Tyrell would be needed more than ever. Soon people would need him more than
healers and soldiers. In the throes of society it was people like him, and doctors
like Samuel who were capable of bringing entire city grids back online.
“We’ve been walking for days, Ty…” she
called him Ty, only his Grandma called him that. She was so familiar with him
already. Just because it’s the end of the world doesn’t mean he has to marry
the last girl he went out with…does it? “…Where are we even going?”
“The last broadcast on the radio said
there was a refugee camp at the Meadowlands, shouldn’t be far now…” Tyrell
slammed the hood down and got behind the driver’s wheel, “...Especially if I can get this piece of-”
A hard gurgle and the engine sputtered
to ignition. “Yes!” Jill cried out softly, careful not to attract any unwanted
attention as she ran around the car to the passenger side. Tyrell was not so
cautious in the spur of the moment. “WAIT! JILL!”
Before Jill could get into the car a
body crashed into the windshield. Tyrell was already racing
around the car after her. When he got Jill to her feet they both could barely stand a look at
the carnage.
“Is it one of them?” she asked Tyrell as he braved a closer look.
“I….I don’t think so…”
“How can you tell?”
“If it was, it would still be moving.”
The fallen girl had dirty blonde hair.
Not much else could be seen of her besides the oddest choice of apparel. Tyrell
stepped back, confused, and Jill asked him what was wrong. He did not answer.
He just looked up at the bridge above them, tracing the fall of the dead girl
in the tweed suit jacket.
“What is it?”
Seven silhouetted figures peered down at
them from the bridge.
They were alive.
They were alive.
Anyone who was capable of surviving
the fall of society and world apocalypse could be inherently capable of
anything else, no matter how gruesome or depraved. People had to be treated as
hostile. Man will do anything for two reasons: to survive
and to get what they want when there is nothing to stop them. Tyrell knew this,
so did Samuel and Atticus. And yet a small sliver of hope in the remnants of
humanity allowed them to give each other a chance.
That
night they spent in a Parkway Rest Stop. There were plenty of drinks
and still some chips on the shelves, and most importantly... hardly any
zombies. They built a small covered fire and sat around it as they got
to know one another. It was not long before Jill asked about Nora, “So
she just
decided to opt out after the loss of her uncle?”
“There was nothing we could do,” Rebecca
explained, “Before we even realized she was suicidal she took the first
opportunity our backs were turned to…well… you know...”
Chambers volunteered to do a perimeter
sweep. He ran around with Jackson the dog and took care of a former burger king
employee and a man missing both of his arms and his nose. Chambers didn’t
flinch when he put them down. He spun back around to one knee as they fell,
saying, “You are released, my brothers, from this demon of an earthly body.”
Tyrell watched him from afar with Corey,
“So what’s the deal with pirate Ted
Nugent?”
“Haha, yeah, I can see that. He’s done
alright by us though. He seems to know what he’s doing…in fact…he’s damn good
at it.”
Chambers spent most of the night on
watch. He could not sleep even if he wanted to, his eye was hurting. It wasn’t
necessarily painful but it was a lasting, almost throbbing sensation. He tried
cutting his headband to take some of the pressure off. It helped a little bit,
but the eye was still uncomfortably raw.
Rebecca wanted to think about her late
husband the way she could see Samuel was thinking about his late wife. But Ansem
was always a madman, before he ever met Rebecca. They both thought that she
cured him, she solved him, but really she just unleashed him on the world.
Everybody
wanted to know how this all
started. They wanted answers that the news and radio reports never gave
them.
Of course Rebecca, Samuel, and Atticus knew but if they told them and
word got out something bad would undoubtedly happen to Rebecca as a
result. The need for an explanation was one of the
strongest human compultions. So they tried to
question and theorize along with the rest of them. “Could be something
religious…”
“Has anybody heard anything about the
second coming of Christ since all this happened?”
“Nope.”
"C'mon, that shit ain't real..." Chambers scoffed.
"Look around, man...It's the end of days," Marcus flared his convictions.
"C'mon, that shit ain't real..." Chambers scoffed.
"Look around, man...It's the end of days," Marcus flared his convictions.
“…Anything about it where you came from?”
Corey asked Tyrell.
“One of the last news reports said the military was calling the virus Ansem's Death…”
Rebecca's heart sank in her chest, all this time she had almost forgotten about her late husband.
"They should call it Zombie Death"
"God, I never thought that word could be taken seriously..."
"I never thought I'd be living one of my favorite TV shows."
"Are you talking about The Walking Dead? I loved that show!" Jill squeaked.
"Walking Dead had nothing on Dawn of the Dead." Chambers argued, "George Romero is the king of-"
Rebecca's heart sank in her chest, all this time she had almost forgotten about her late husband.
"They should call it Zombie Death"
"God, I never thought that word could be taken seriously..."
"I never thought I'd be living one of my favorite TV shows."
"Are you talking about The Walking Dead? I loved that show!" Jill squeaked.
"Walking Dead had nothing on Dawn of the Dead." Chambers argued, "George Romero is the king of-"
“Never mind all that!” Quinn interrupted
them, “Has anyone heard of a refugee camp or anything?”
“Last we heard they were taking people
in over at the Meadowlands, that’s where we were going when ya’ll found us”
Tyrell announced.
“We should go there!” Quinn suggested.
“You got to be out of your goddamn mind,”
Atticus chimed in.
“Why?”
“Think about it... People are scared and
stupid, they’ll go there even if they're bit. The military won’t be able to keep
quarantine. It’s as good as overrun. We should do our best to avoid it.”
“Atticus is right,” Samuel agreed,
“That’s why we need a place like a prison, no one will be there-”
“…Except the inmates.”
“Right, but they won’t be broadcasting
it on the radios.”
“Marcus have you ever been to the
prison?”
“…A couple of times after his trial.
It’s right by the east coast, right off of I-95.”
“We’re on 95 right now.” Chambers
pointed out.
“That’s one of the reasons why we’re
going there” Samuel led the conversation.
“What about Baltimore and D.C.? We can’t
go anywhere near there.”
“We go down the Jersey shore,” Chambers
added, “There's a ferry in Cape May.”
“Why Florida? Why not one of the dozens
of prisons we could find along the way?”
“For starters my brother is there. Also
Florida is hot year round. These things seem to slow down in the heat.”
“Florida’s surrounded on water by
three sides” Atticus added, “Marcus says the prison is on the east coast, which means with our backs
to the ocean we will be able to focus on one front instead of four.”
“Wait a second, does anyone even know how to drive a ferry?”
Tyrell countered.
“I’m
a United States Air Force pilot
that has captained the most advanced piece of equipment ever built,”
Atticus comforted them, “There's no vehicle on this godforsaken rock I
can't comandeer.”
“We have a pilot and an astrophysicist”
“It’s theoretical-”
“Whatever you are,” Chambers finished
his thought, “including a doctor… we almost got a full deck. All we need is an
engineer…”
“Actually... I'm an engineer” Tyrell
admitted.
The fireside fell silent after that. They all
just looked at Tyrell in awe. Engineers were one of the most precious
commodities in post-apocalyptic America. Tyrell was the key to water, heat, and
electricity. Most modern comforts run by factories and fossil fuels;
computer systems beyond a common man’s realm of knowledge. Samuel was somebody
who could learn all of that or eventually figure it out, but Tyrell was the
real deal. Samuel looked over at Atticus. They both knew what happened next. Tyrell
was as important as Rebecca now, an integral part of the plan.
“Nothing personal, man...” Corey said to break
the ice, “but I think everybody here just assumed engineers were white.”
Everybody laughed at the awkward racial
joke that Corey took a chance on. Samuel talked to them before going to sleep about the road ahead. He
gave them both comfort and warning. He offered up crucial rules to go by like
never wandering off alone, or setting rally points if they get split up. His
most important law he first told them in latin, “Salus populi suprema lex esto”
And told them it was an ancient quote from Cicero, “You might know it as the good of the many outweigh the good of the few.”
“What’s that got to do with zombies?”
“When danger inevitably comes for us, we
have to be prepared to make hard choices for the wellbeing of the group, like
leaving Frank behind in the cage or taking care of Ed. Remember this… nobody’s
life is more important than the group’s safety. There will always be hope, as
long as we still have each other.”
Samuel gave them some inspiring words to
end the night on so they didn't all go to bed depressed.
Samuel wanted everyone not to worry while they sleep. They would have to be
focused and get an early start tomorrow, maybe even use the cover of night before
dawn as a way to avoid being seen by any unwelcome visitors.
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