Authors: Peter Cawdron
I don’t catch everything that’s being said between Ferguson and this young man, but a few words drift on the breeze.
“Unusually quiet, especially given all we’ve been through... I don’t like it... We normally see two or three stragglers a night. To double the guard and not see a single zombie over the course of the whole evening is unnerving... James reported seeing thousands of them... Something’s wrong.”
“Keep your men back in reserve,” Ferguson says with the authority of a general commanding his troops. “If you see a flare, converge in force.”
“Understood,” the man says.
“We’ll make three passes, slowly venturing deeper toward the city limits, and try to figure out what the hell is going on out there.”
“And the girl?” he asks, glancing at me.
Ferguson looks at me before he replies, thinking about his response.
“If there really are tens of thousands of zombies over that hill, we’ll run long. Draw them away from the camp. She’s the bait.”
“She knows that?” he asks, looking at me for some kind of confirmation.
“She does,” Ferguson replies as I nod, and I’m impressed by the caliber of men Ferguson has under him. Although I’m also left realizing he just lied, at least in part. Finding his dead son escaped mention. As for me, I have no intention of being dragged along behind Ferguson on a bait run. He must know that. First chance I get, I’m going to venture out to find Steve.
I’m nervous, but I want to press on. I’m pretty sure Marge has no idea about this. Ferguson’s going rogue, and that’s fine with me. There’s no way my dad would let me do this, but I have to go. I have to find out what happened to Steve, David and Jane. I can’t live the rest of my life trapped behind a chain link fence.
Ferguson kicks gently at his horse and continues on as the guard walks back to the gate. As we trot away from the camp, I find myself settling into a gentle rhythm in the saddle. I take some of my weight on my feet, pushing against the stirrups and rocking with the motion of the horse. What had seemed impossible is now natural.
My horse pulls alongside Ferguson and he talks freely.
“We cannot risk being overrun again. Ours is the largest settlement in the south. If we fall, there’s nowhere left to go. Marge wants to sit tight. She wants to double our fortifications and wait for their next move, but even if we saw them coming, there’s no way we could stop a horde numbering in the thousands.”
Dawn breaks in the distance. If I was doing chores back at the farm, I’d be up by now. I’d stop to admire the beauty of the pink and scarlet clouds streaking across the sky, but today those clouds look blood red. This could be the last dawn I ever see.
“Smell, sound, sight,” Ferguson says. “In that order. Remember that.”
“Yes, sir,” I reply, although I’m unsure where the sir came from as I don’t think I’ve ever used that word before.
“Dealing with zombies is somewhat counterintuitive. Move in a large force and you’re loud and you stink. You’ll bring them right to you. The more zombies there are, the smaller the units you deploy. Small and nimble, that’s our best chance. Stay on the move.”
I point at the zombie strapped behind Ferguson, saying, “And these guys cover our scent.”
“Exactly.”
We ride on in silence for a while.
As we round the bend where Steve, Jane, David and I dropped down from the cart onto a small wooden bridge, Ferguson asks, “Tell me about him.”
Him. He wants to know how David fared during our escapade.
“Well, he was just like you,” I begin, and I catch a grin on Ferguson’s face. “He taught us what to look for, constantly using things around us to prepare us for what lay ahead. I don’t think he was ever nervous. If he was, it never showed.
“A zombie jumped us on one of the forest tracks. David was ruthless. He dispatched him with a machete before Steve and I realized what was happening. Afterwards, we asked him about it. We asked him how many zombies he’d killed. David just laughed, saying, one.”
“Haw haw,” Ferguson laughs. “Damn. I wish I could have seen that. He he he! You know, he had actually killed one before then, but we held it with ropes and poles, making it easy. I guess he figured that didn’t count.”
Ferguson sounds distant, lost in fond memories. Although that particular thought isn’t something I’d consider fondly.
“He was always so calm, so confident,” I say as we plod along on our horses. “Without him, we would have never made it.”
Ferguson nods quietly as he sways in the saddle, moving with the rhythm of his horse. I’m not sure, but I could swear there are tears in his eyes.
Shadows move in the woods, but as the early morning light is dim and a mist sits on the ground, it’s hard to tell if it’s just a soft wind rustling through the trees or if there are zombies out there on the edge of our vision.
We reach the rise of a hill a couple of miles from the commune and Ferguson brings his horse to a halt. Vapor condenses into a mist as our horses breathe in the cold air. Fall is upon us. Winter isn’t far behind. Zee slows up with the cold. I’m hoping that will give us an advantage, but with the sun already on my face, I know it’s going to be a warm day. We might get some rain, but we could equally have a bright, sunny day in spite of the change in seasons.
Ferguson peers through a set of binoculars, looking out over the forest. A few of the distant oaks are beginning to turn, with hints of yellow and orange preceding the brilliant reds of fall. I wait patiently, keen to hear about all he can see. From where I sit on my black mare, the track ducks in and out of the trees, winding its way down toward the river. Beyond the river, rooftops mark the outer suburbs. Most of the buildings are only one or two stories high, but in the distance, skyscrapers rise out of the fog.
After roughly a minute, he says, “I’m not seeing them.”
Them. Zee.
“That’s good, right?” I say, somewhat naively, and then I remember David’s warning—
it’s not the zombie you see that gets you
.
Ferguson ignores my comment.
“There’s a small clutch of zombies feeding on the carcass of a horse down by the river, but there’s no more than ten to twenty of them.”
That must be where David and Jane fell. Ferguson has to be thinking the same thing.
“No bodies.”
And I hear the sadness in his voice, understanding the implication latent in his comment. David would have saved two bullets—there should be two bodies, or at least torn remains. Perhaps we’re still too distant to see bloody rags strewn in the forest.
I’m silent as Ferguson asks the question I’m wondering as well.
“Where the hell is the goddamn herd?”
James warned us about thousands of zombies in this valley. Could such a large number of zombies disperse within a day? We’re only used to hearing about small bands of zombies in the woods. The hordes keep to the cities. Hundreds would be unusual this far out. Thousands is unheard of. Where could they have gone?
“Too quiet,” he says, almost to himself. “Something’s wrong. Feels like we’re walking into a trap.”
I’m impressed by Ferguson’s resolve. He isn’t distracted by his desire to find and bury his son. He’s seeing the bigger problem before us, or the problem that’s not before us, as the case may be.
“Maybe they’ve returned to the city,” I say.
Ferguson holds his hand up, signaling for me to be quiet. The slight turn of his head indicates he heard something out in the forest to our left. Slightly behind us. I listen. I can’t hear anything, not even birds. And that’s when my blood runs cold.
Ferguson dismounts without making a sound and pulls a lever action rifle from a scabbard on the side of his saddle. A quick glance at me, and I copy him, lowering myself quietly to the sandy track. He holds his finger to his lips, signaling for quiet, and directs me to duck down out of sight.
The hairs on the back of my neck stand on end.
Moss grows over an old log lying in a ditch beside the trail. A tree must have fallen across the track at some point as the marauders have shifted it to one side, stripping most of the smaller branches.
Ferguson leans his rifle against the log and unhooks a bag from his saddle, resting it quietly on the ground. I crouch beside the log not knowing what I’m hiding from. Paranoid, I look around. There’s nothing but forest. There’s no movement anywhere beyond the gentle sway of nature. Knowing how easy it is for Zee to blend in with the trees, I scan the woods for the slightest sign of motion, but there’s nothing.
Birds fly high overhead, but they don’t settle in the trees, and I remember how David looked to them for early warning. Zee is close. But where?
Ferguson positions himself between the two horses and yells, slapping them hard on their hind flanks, just behind the bound, growling zombies. The two startled horses break into a short gallop, but within ten to fifteen yards, they slow to a trot and finally come to a halt not more than fifty yards from us.
Ferguson ducks down beside me, pushing his back against the log and breathing hard, surprising me with how quick he can move. He holds his rifle to his chest with the barrel pointing straight up. Slowly, and with pains to be quiet, he works with the lever, silently loading a bullet into the chamber.
My heart races. What is he doing? We need those horses. What has he seen? I can’t see anything, just trees in the forest, but whatever spooked him, it must be behind us, out of sight behind the log. I want to say something, but Ferguson is deathly quiet. His eyes dart up and to the side as though he’s expecting Zee to come bounding over the top of the log.
I’m petrified.
The horses look relaxed. One of them bends down to eat some grass growing by the edge of the trail. The other looks back at us with bewilderment.
I want to run.
And it’s then I see them.
Zee is all around us, hiding behind the trees.
“I’ll be damned,” Ferguson whispers, shrinking down another half a foot below the edge of the fallen log.
Across from us, on the other side of the trail, dozens of zombies turn behind the trees, keeping a tree trunk between themselves and our horses. There must be hundreds of them, perhaps thousands stretching back into the woods. The closest is not more than ten feet away—a young girl with ragged, dirty clothing standing behind a tree just off the track, but she’s motionless, like a statue. She couldn’t have been more than ten years old when she turned. I shrink a little further into the ditch.
“They’re supposed to be dumb,” I say under my breath.
“That’s pretty damn smart,” Ferguson whispers in response.
For now, they haven’t seen us. Their hands touch the tree trunks as though they’re a part of the woods, as though they can feel the cellular life pulsing within the bark. None of them peer out from behind the trees. They stare blindly at the wood. Perhaps that’s why they don’t notice us crouching beside the fallen log.
Ferguson peers back along the trail. There are zombies as far as we can see off behind the trees.
“They’re stalking us.”
It’s all I can do not to scream at the terror of so many of these monstrous creatures. Torn rags reveal rotting green skin. Dark eyes peer out from behind gaunt, starved cheeks. They have only to turn their heads slightly and they’ll see us.
“No breeze,” Ferguson whispers. “Our scent will stay on the path. It won’t drift.”
I’m struggling to understand how that’s relevant, but Ferguson thinks it’s important.
With his hand resting gently on my forearm, he whispers “Follow me. Stay low. Don’t make a sound.”
He slips his backpack over one shoulder and holds his gun by its wooden stock, which leaves me thinking he doesn’t intend on using it. And why would he? He might drop maybe half a dozen zombies, but there are hundreds of them lining the path. Gunfire is only going to make matters worse.
Crouching as he moves, Ferguson darts along the edge of the track, staying in the shallow drainage ditch. I’m not letting him get more than a few feet away from me. I have my fire iron out, which is feeble, really. I could take one, maybe two zombies before they dragged me down.
Once we’re out from behind the log, it’s apparent the zombies on this side of the trail can see us. They’re not more than a few feet away, but somehow we don’t register. Zee stares blindly at the tree bark. Zee is focused on remaining hidden from our horses. Regardless of the soft crunch of pebbles under our boots, the zombies don’t react. It’s as though they’re in a trance.
Ferguson ducks under a low bridge, hiding in a culvert and I understand what he means about our scent. By staying on the path we traversed, we’re blending in with the original scent trail.
The horses wander back to where we dismounted at the top of the rise. The zombies adjust their stance, remaining hidden. It’s strange seeing so many of them from the rear, all staring away from us, staring blindly at tree trunks just inches away. How do they know? They can’t see the horses, and yet they align themselves perfectly with them.
Something spooks one of the horses. It can’t be the scent of zombies as the stallion has a zombie strapped to its back, but that one, sudden action, kicking violently at the trail is enough to spring the trap. Hundreds of zombies converge, swarming out of the forest and onto the trail.
The horses rear up, lashing out with their legs, but Zee overpowers them. The poor animals scream with fear. I know horses can’t scream as we do, but that’s all I can think of to describe the terror they’re in. Bloodied arms reach for them, clawing at their thick hides. Teeth sink in, tearing at their skin. They fight, but they’re overwhelmed by the crush of zombies and within seconds they sink beneath the swell.
Ferguson taps me on the shoulder, signaling we should stay on the move while Zee feasts. He creeps beneath the bridge, leading me down into a gully. Water sings merrily over rocks and stones, dancing and giggling, and yet behind me, the last pitiful cries of the mare I rode send a shudder down my spine.
The sides of the gully are steep, hiding us from view. Ferguson wastes no time, running along the edge of the narrow stream. He leaps from one rock to another, barely touching them as he springs from side to side. The speed with which he picks out each rock is astonishing. I’m a fraction his age and I can barely keep up, trying desperately to copy his every leap.