If I Die Before I Wake Chapter 11
So... I'm switching POV... to Miles. You'll get why later on in the story, but I'm too far in to rewrite that last chapter. But during editing it will change to Miles. So for now... you get to be in his head xD
Chapter word count: 2,236
Total word count: 23,257
----------------------------------------------
Gary, IN. Some random suburb of Gary.
Still in fucking Gary.
At least, that was what the signs and our fearless leader were saying as we meandered through the stupid city. The factories that loomed over somewhat peaceful, albeit obviously dead, suburbs were intimidating and could easily house anything. Or hell, they could give us the shelter we needed for the night. But I knew that Alex didn’t want to stay here, so close to Chicago. We had only been walking for about five hours or so and weren’t very far. I knew we were going to have to get some sort of transportation soon, and fast.
Especially if Giselle didn’t shut her fucking mouth soon.
At least she didn’t sprain an ankle after falling into that fucking hole. But the fact that both the nerd and Alex had known about such a risk and had decided not to tell anyone else, especially me? That made me pissed off in the worst of ways. But I knew that if I got too pissed off and ended up storming off, my chances of survival were going to be slim, even compared to hanging around Princess and Geek-boy. So I tried to attempt to get my temper to settle, especially after the understanding conversation I decided to have with Alex.
At least he understood that he had fucked up by not telling us everything. I knew there was no private jet waiting for Giselle up in New York. If a guy didn’t have the resources to get a lab to help him out with a vaccine that was detrimental to the survival of the entire country and possibly even the entire world, then he didn’t have shit, let alone a jet to get to England or wherever the fuck Giselle was from. Especially if he had to rely on some stupid punk ass kid from inner city Chicago for the key to the vaccine or whatever the hell kind of role Alex was playing in this fucked up game of ‘Save the Country from Zombies’ we were playing.
“We need a car.” I stated plainly, staring pointedly at Alex for a moment before noting the nearly empty roads that were ahead of us. It wasn’t nearly as crowded here as it was in Chicago and I had a feeling we would be able to cover more ground in a car, even if we had to push other abandoned cars out of the way. Not to mention it wasn’t like we had to worry about gas prices or anything like that. It would get Giselle to quit her bitching and then we’d be able to focus on a few other things. One person driving, the other three either getting some sleep, getting food ready or keeping an eye out for threats. But I highly doubted that Zombies would be able to claw their way through some of those supped up SUVs that people bought nowadays.
We had to find ourselves one of those. And now. And it seemed that Alex and everyone else agreed as they nodded. A car would give us at least a bit of shelter, even if we had to make like the previous owner and abandon it eventually. I thought it was ironic how Alex had managed to pinpoint a military upbringing in my blood, and how we were living now. Like refugees in a war. Or forgotten soldiers attempting to get across dead man’s land and into the safety of our own foxholes. Dead man’s land. Interesting phrase, that one, wasn’t it? Ironic in of itself considering the next God knew how many more miles were going to be filled with dead men, women and children, all of them vying for the same thing.
Us.
Giselle had moved to wrap her arms around her stick thin body and I had to wonder how in the hell she had gotten herself wrapped up in something like this… how she had managed to survive thus far and how she had gotten stuck in Chicago. With the way she had stated how she wanted to go home, I would have easily assumed she would have tried to be one of the first ones on those fucking helicopters over in the park. But she wasn’t.
She was with us. Which made it suspicious. Did she have the means to go out there? Surely prices were skyrocketing out in L.A. for things like rent, gas and all other things needed to survive in a Zombie apocalypse.
Glass crackled and crunched beneath our feet as Alex and I began to shop for a car. Sedans and smaller cars would be pointless, especially if what Seth said was true and we were going to get hit with something much more dangerous than the regular dead heads. I shifted my shot gun from one hand to the other, eyes constantly searching for the perfect vehicle, but I was distracted as Alex began to veer from the road, something that was obviously dangerous. Giselle had done the same thing not ten minutes earlier and had gotten stuck in a hole for her curiosity.
“Alex.” I barked, surprised at how Military it sounded, that single word. That single name that made him turn and jerk his head towards the hunting shop that was shadowed and cloaked in darkness. Wonderful. A small sigh escaped and I nodded, catching a nervous look from Seth. “Yeah. We’ll get more stuff here. At least check it out.” I caught Giselle and Seth exchanging looks as the kid gripped his bat tightly, so tightly I thought he was going to snap it in half. Freak out. He needed to learn how to chill or else he was going to stay so high strung he was going to give himself a heart attack. Or end up shooting someone that wasn’t a zombie.
Like one of us.
“Relax, Seth. It’s just a gun store.” I called to him cheerily before following Alexander into the gloom. I wasn’t nervous and was actually looking forward to killing a few more dead heads. The first few that had struggled into the parking lot and had lost too much muscle in the barbed wire had been utterly boring. I wanted a challenge
Something fun.
“J-just be careful…” Seth replied and I could hear the kid swallow across the street as Alex and I let the shadows wash over us. Silently we agreed on who was going to be searching and who was going to be keeping a look out for all things dead. Alex knew what he wanted, so I let him go first, my shotgun trained on the inside of what looked like a regular hunting supply store. Guns racked up in the back of the store, dead and stuffed animals populated the small amount of aisles and bull shit that filled the place. I could hear Giselle’s shoes behind me and I knew they were going to stick close. “Guard the street.” I barked, hoping at least one of them would be able to shoot their gun or else at least yell for one of the more competent marksmen. Not that I knew how Alex shot quite yet, but I figured if he knew what weapons to look for, he could at least handle some of them.
Hopefully.
The fluorescent lights above us flickered, buzzed and ultimately died as Alex attempted a few of the switches next to the counter and a soft curse came floating across the store, reaching my ears from his lips. Not really shocking. We were going to get less and less working shit as we approached the east coast. It was going to suck and I knew that soon enough we were going to need to do some dangerous traveling as well.
Joy.
“Hurry the fuck up so we can go car shopping.” I chided, a wry smile on my face as Alex’s middle finger flipped up from his dark fist as he rummaged around in the register with his free hand. “What the fuck are you looking for?” I questioned, approaching the glass counter filled with handguns and boxes of ammunition, glancing up at the cabinets behind him filled with all kinds of guns. Big guns. Little guns. Probably some guns in the back that weren’t for hunting. At least not for hunting animals and that was what I wanted.
“Key to the cases.” Alex mumbled, which made me roll my eyes as I flicked my fingers, gesturing him to take a few steps away. And just as he was probably at a safe distance, the butt of my shotgun crashed through the case in front of me, shattering the glass and sending it all dropping down into the box, littered amongst the guns and boxes of ammunition. This merely got an eye roll from Alex as I moved on to do the same to the cases that were holding the lovely bigger guns hostage.
“Key to the cases… I fucking swear…” I mumbled, shaking my head and chuckling as I moved around him to hit the nearest case that held something worth breaking shit for, but just as the gun was raised above my head to crash into the glass, the sound of something inhuman hit my ears. A low rumble of a snarl and the sound of shuffling feet. And with those sounds, the smell of rotting flesh, stronger than the lingering scent that I had gotten so used to in the past few weeks, hit my nose, making me grimace. Instantly, Alex had his own gun out and both of us whipped around to spot something way larger than ourselves shuffling off to munch down on our two unsuspecting friends, who were most obviously not doing what I told them to do
Dumb fucks.
“Seth! Giselle!” Alex cried, bolting around the counter and jettisoning himself outside, immediately setting his sights on the rotting corpse. But this thing was different… it was shaped like a gorilla. Huge shoulders and knuckles that dragged across the pavement, his whole body hunched with the size of his fucking arms. Shit that could probably strangle any one of us with one little hug. But it wasn’t the arms of the thing that made me jump over the counter and start shooting. It was the giant ass claws the thing had attached to those dragging hands. Huge and razor sharp. Large enough to rip through concrete, asphalt and a human body in a few swings.
Enough to tear those two sticks outside into a few measly bites for its mid-afternoon snack.
At Alexander’s call, both turned and an ear destroying screech came from Giselle, who immediately turned on her heel to book it into the sunlight. As if that was going to stop the thing from attempting to eat her. Instead, it just seemed to entice it more as it shuffled out of shadows and into the noon light. Sunlight didn’t do shit except keep them in the darkness. But if there was something out in the sun that they wanted badly enough, there wasn’t much to keep them from getting it.
Except a few well placed shots to the head.
And shockingly enough, the two marksmen weren’t the first ones to get a shot at this thing. The resounding crack and ping of a metal bat hitting something else equally as hard echoed with Giselle’s scream as Seth took a swing or two at the thing’s head. Which of course, made it turn towards him. Luckily for Seth?
Both of us managed to get close enough with our shot guns that any wandering pellets weren’t going to wander into our friends. Alex pulled off a shot with his that made his whole body rock back, but I was ready for my recoil, sending pounds and pounds of force and a good handful of buckshot into this thing’s head. And luckily for us?
It went down pretty easily with a crash.
One quick look at Giselle showed she was shaking viciously with the freight and Seth looked absolutely green as he stared at the ugly mother fucker that was sprawled across the cracked street. Drool, bile and blackened blood seeped from its mouth and whatever other orifices it had and the stench was… bad. Enough to make me even gag as I came up to the thing and threw another couple shots of pellets into its skull.
Yum.
“There’s our Digger.” Alex finally spoke after a moment and Seth gave a quick and very nervous nod as he pushed at the leg of the thing with his bat. The same bat that was splattered with gore and hair and probably some brains.
“You got some smutz on that bat of yours, Seth.” I pointed out with a wry grin and the horrified look on his face was enough to make me chuckle as he dropped the thing next to the zombie, immediately discarding it. Which was fine considering we were sure to find another one soon enough as it was. But the grin on my face flickered and died as I finally took in the seriousness of the event. If this was what a thing like this was like in fucking Indiana… what were they going to look like in New York?
The thought sent chills down my spine and made me grip my warm gun even tighter.
Fucking Zombies.
Chapter word count: 2,236
Total word count: 23,257
----------------------------------------------
Gary, IN. Some random suburb of Gary.
Still in fucking Gary.
At least, that was what the signs and our fearless leader were saying as we meandered through the stupid city. The factories that loomed over somewhat peaceful, albeit obviously dead, suburbs were intimidating and could easily house anything. Or hell, they could give us the shelter we needed for the night. But I knew that Alex didn’t want to stay here, so close to Chicago. We had only been walking for about five hours or so and weren’t very far. I knew we were going to have to get some sort of transportation soon, and fast.
Especially if Giselle didn’t shut her fucking mouth soon.
At least she didn’t sprain an ankle after falling into that fucking hole. But the fact that both the nerd and Alex had known about such a risk and had decided not to tell anyone else, especially me? That made me pissed off in the worst of ways. But I knew that if I got too pissed off and ended up storming off, my chances of survival were going to be slim, even compared to hanging around Princess and Geek-boy. So I tried to attempt to get my temper to settle, especially after the understanding conversation I decided to have with Alex.
At least he understood that he had fucked up by not telling us everything. I knew there was no private jet waiting for Giselle up in New York. If a guy didn’t have the resources to get a lab to help him out with a vaccine that was detrimental to the survival of the entire country and possibly even the entire world, then he didn’t have shit, let alone a jet to get to England or wherever the fuck Giselle was from. Especially if he had to rely on some stupid punk ass kid from inner city Chicago for the key to the vaccine or whatever the hell kind of role Alex was playing in this fucked up game of ‘Save the Country from Zombies’ we were playing.
“We need a car.” I stated plainly, staring pointedly at Alex for a moment before noting the nearly empty roads that were ahead of us. It wasn’t nearly as crowded here as it was in Chicago and I had a feeling we would be able to cover more ground in a car, even if we had to push other abandoned cars out of the way. Not to mention it wasn’t like we had to worry about gas prices or anything like that. It would get Giselle to quit her bitching and then we’d be able to focus on a few other things. One person driving, the other three either getting some sleep, getting food ready or keeping an eye out for threats. But I highly doubted that Zombies would be able to claw their way through some of those supped up SUVs that people bought nowadays.
We had to find ourselves one of those. And now. And it seemed that Alex and everyone else agreed as they nodded. A car would give us at least a bit of shelter, even if we had to make like the previous owner and abandon it eventually. I thought it was ironic how Alex had managed to pinpoint a military upbringing in my blood, and how we were living now. Like refugees in a war. Or forgotten soldiers attempting to get across dead man’s land and into the safety of our own foxholes. Dead man’s land. Interesting phrase, that one, wasn’t it? Ironic in of itself considering the next God knew how many more miles were going to be filled with dead men, women and children, all of them vying for the same thing.
Us.
Giselle had moved to wrap her arms around her stick thin body and I had to wonder how in the hell she had gotten herself wrapped up in something like this… how she had managed to survive thus far and how she had gotten stuck in Chicago. With the way she had stated how she wanted to go home, I would have easily assumed she would have tried to be one of the first ones on those fucking helicopters over in the park. But she wasn’t.
She was with us. Which made it suspicious. Did she have the means to go out there? Surely prices were skyrocketing out in L.A. for things like rent, gas and all other things needed to survive in a Zombie apocalypse.
Glass crackled and crunched beneath our feet as Alex and I began to shop for a car. Sedans and smaller cars would be pointless, especially if what Seth said was true and we were going to get hit with something much more dangerous than the regular dead heads. I shifted my shot gun from one hand to the other, eyes constantly searching for the perfect vehicle, but I was distracted as Alex began to veer from the road, something that was obviously dangerous. Giselle had done the same thing not ten minutes earlier and had gotten stuck in a hole for her curiosity.
“Alex.” I barked, surprised at how Military it sounded, that single word. That single name that made him turn and jerk his head towards the hunting shop that was shadowed and cloaked in darkness. Wonderful. A small sigh escaped and I nodded, catching a nervous look from Seth. “Yeah. We’ll get more stuff here. At least check it out.” I caught Giselle and Seth exchanging looks as the kid gripped his bat tightly, so tightly I thought he was going to snap it in half. Freak out. He needed to learn how to chill or else he was going to stay so high strung he was going to give himself a heart attack. Or end up shooting someone that wasn’t a zombie.
Like one of us.
“Relax, Seth. It’s just a gun store.” I called to him cheerily before following Alexander into the gloom. I wasn’t nervous and was actually looking forward to killing a few more dead heads. The first few that had struggled into the parking lot and had lost too much muscle in the barbed wire had been utterly boring. I wanted a challenge
Something fun.
“J-just be careful…” Seth replied and I could hear the kid swallow across the street as Alex and I let the shadows wash over us. Silently we agreed on who was going to be searching and who was going to be keeping a look out for all things dead. Alex knew what he wanted, so I let him go first, my shotgun trained on the inside of what looked like a regular hunting supply store. Guns racked up in the back of the store, dead and stuffed animals populated the small amount of aisles and bull shit that filled the place. I could hear Giselle’s shoes behind me and I knew they were going to stick close. “Guard the street.” I barked, hoping at least one of them would be able to shoot their gun or else at least yell for one of the more competent marksmen. Not that I knew how Alex shot quite yet, but I figured if he knew what weapons to look for, he could at least handle some of them.
Hopefully.
The fluorescent lights above us flickered, buzzed and ultimately died as Alex attempted a few of the switches next to the counter and a soft curse came floating across the store, reaching my ears from his lips. Not really shocking. We were going to get less and less working shit as we approached the east coast. It was going to suck and I knew that soon enough we were going to need to do some dangerous traveling as well.
Joy.
“Hurry the fuck up so we can go car shopping.” I chided, a wry smile on my face as Alex’s middle finger flipped up from his dark fist as he rummaged around in the register with his free hand. “What the fuck are you looking for?” I questioned, approaching the glass counter filled with handguns and boxes of ammunition, glancing up at the cabinets behind him filled with all kinds of guns. Big guns. Little guns. Probably some guns in the back that weren’t for hunting. At least not for hunting animals and that was what I wanted.
“Key to the cases.” Alex mumbled, which made me roll my eyes as I flicked my fingers, gesturing him to take a few steps away. And just as he was probably at a safe distance, the butt of my shotgun crashed through the case in front of me, shattering the glass and sending it all dropping down into the box, littered amongst the guns and boxes of ammunition. This merely got an eye roll from Alex as I moved on to do the same to the cases that were holding the lovely bigger guns hostage.
“Key to the cases… I fucking swear…” I mumbled, shaking my head and chuckling as I moved around him to hit the nearest case that held something worth breaking shit for, but just as the gun was raised above my head to crash into the glass, the sound of something inhuman hit my ears. A low rumble of a snarl and the sound of shuffling feet. And with those sounds, the smell of rotting flesh, stronger than the lingering scent that I had gotten so used to in the past few weeks, hit my nose, making me grimace. Instantly, Alex had his own gun out and both of us whipped around to spot something way larger than ourselves shuffling off to munch down on our two unsuspecting friends, who were most obviously not doing what I told them to do
Dumb fucks.
“Seth! Giselle!” Alex cried, bolting around the counter and jettisoning himself outside, immediately setting his sights on the rotting corpse. But this thing was different… it was shaped like a gorilla. Huge shoulders and knuckles that dragged across the pavement, his whole body hunched with the size of his fucking arms. Shit that could probably strangle any one of us with one little hug. But it wasn’t the arms of the thing that made me jump over the counter and start shooting. It was the giant ass claws the thing had attached to those dragging hands. Huge and razor sharp. Large enough to rip through concrete, asphalt and a human body in a few swings.
Enough to tear those two sticks outside into a few measly bites for its mid-afternoon snack.
At Alexander’s call, both turned and an ear destroying screech came from Giselle, who immediately turned on her heel to book it into the sunlight. As if that was going to stop the thing from attempting to eat her. Instead, it just seemed to entice it more as it shuffled out of shadows and into the noon light. Sunlight didn’t do shit except keep them in the darkness. But if there was something out in the sun that they wanted badly enough, there wasn’t much to keep them from getting it.
Except a few well placed shots to the head.
And shockingly enough, the two marksmen weren’t the first ones to get a shot at this thing. The resounding crack and ping of a metal bat hitting something else equally as hard echoed with Giselle’s scream as Seth took a swing or two at the thing’s head. Which of course, made it turn towards him. Luckily for Seth?
Both of us managed to get close enough with our shot guns that any wandering pellets weren’t going to wander into our friends. Alex pulled off a shot with his that made his whole body rock back, but I was ready for my recoil, sending pounds and pounds of force and a good handful of buckshot into this thing’s head. And luckily for us?
It went down pretty easily with a crash.
One quick look at Giselle showed she was shaking viciously with the freight and Seth looked absolutely green as he stared at the ugly mother fucker that was sprawled across the cracked street. Drool, bile and blackened blood seeped from its mouth and whatever other orifices it had and the stench was… bad. Enough to make me even gag as I came up to the thing and threw another couple shots of pellets into its skull.
Yum.
“There’s our Digger.” Alex finally spoke after a moment and Seth gave a quick and very nervous nod as he pushed at the leg of the thing with his bat. The same bat that was splattered with gore and hair and probably some brains.
“You got some smutz on that bat of yours, Seth.” I pointed out with a wry grin and the horrified look on his face was enough to make me chuckle as he dropped the thing next to the zombie, immediately discarding it. Which was fine considering we were sure to find another one soon enough as it was. But the grin on my face flickered and died as I finally took in the seriousness of the event. If this was what a thing like this was like in fucking Indiana… what were they going to look like in New York?
The thought sent chills down my spine and made me grip my warm gun even tighter.
Fucking Zombies.