The civilian police officer, now in charge of the local military unit
,
spoke to the soldiers in front of him. "What did they do?"
The soldier who acted as the clerk to the General said, "About three in the morning, this large group of re-ans set a
boat
on
fire
and pushed it into the center of
Ferril
Lake
,
over
in
City
Park
. The scientists said it has to be some kind of territorial ceremony. The re-ans are claiming the park as their dominion."
Colton
ran his fingers through his hair. "Why didn't you burn the General's body last night? There's been a standing order for both the military and civilians to cremate dead bodies immediately after death."
The young lieutenant quickly glanced at the burning pile of bodies, back to the officer and he replied, "When we saw General Brown bleeding from his nose and ears, we ran to get the bio team. By the time we came back, he had already died and turned into a zombie."
The other young soldier next to him continued, "All the flame throwers were being used in the battle downtown and all the diesel is in the vehicles until we get that reserve shipment. The only thing we could do was let him stagger away."
Colton
shook his head. "Great, that's all we need is a giant yeti-like zombie with all of our military intelligence fighting against us." He tilted towards the remains of downtown
Denver
. "Where did he go?"
The lieutenant pointed to the east and said, "He wandered off toward the red zone."
Throwing his hands in the air, John said, "Fantastic. He's probably already the new leader of the horde. I'm sure without his flask of booze, he's one cranky zombie."
* * *
General Brown sat on the curb in front of the library drinking from a bottle of whiskey. His new body was that of a thin, somewhat short young man
,
with a bullet hole under his chin and a large exit wound in the back of his head. The bullet hole caused the whiskey to drip from his jaw. Vic, from
Chicago
, walked up to him and said, "Yo leaking guy, you're doing it all wrong."
Angry, the General yelled back, "Back off re-an, or I'll kick your decayed ass back across town."
Vic stood his ground. "Hey butthead, I'm trying to help you.
Besides,
you're dripping the booze all over yourself. You're going to go up in flames the next time the humans launch an attack."
Brown stood up, still holding the whiskey bottle and said, "That's it, I'm gonna-" He
paused,
as he scanned the dead
man
in
front
of
him,
paying particular attention to the top of his head. "There's something wrong."
"What's that?"
"You're taller than me. Nobody's taller than me."
Vic replied, "Yeah, welcome to your new body, get used to it." He pointed to the bottle in the General's hand. "I know what you're trying to do and you're doing it wrong."
Brown looked at the whiskey and said, "What? I have quiet an extensive history of drinking. It's the one thing
,
I know how to do rather well."
"If you want to get drunk, you can't do it with booze."
"Then what should I drink?"
"Coffee. Only, if you keep letting it drip out of your chin, you'll have to drink twice as much." Vic told him.
"Coffee? What?"
"Yeah, coffee. Follow me, I'll show you." As they walked together across the street, Vic asked, "So what's your name?"
"General…Chris. I was Chris Brown."
"Great, in your new life, we'll call you General Drips-a-lot."
* * *
Inside the remains of what used to be a coffee shop, undead filled the room, staggering around with ceramic mugs and various other vessels. It wasn't their usual zombie
stagger,
but more of a drunken nature. Overturned tables and broken chairs mixed with broken glass and pieces of sheetrock. Behind the counter, zombies crowded around two large coffee makers
,
pouring the beverage into their cups. Vic led the General across the room. "This is our pub and the coffee maker is our version of a still. It's not like we get thirsty or need to stay
awake.
For
some reason
,
the caffeine gives us a pretty good buzz. Our dead bodies soak the stuff up like a sponge.
Considering,
we can no longer feel anything with our senses, the ability to get drunk becomes a great pleasure."
Brown quickly held out his whiskey bottle as another living dead filled it with java. Vic pointed to the power cable behind the coffee maker. "We ran a line to the next building where there happens to be one live circuit. Nobody even considered using the power for electric
al
light
ing,
especially when booze is at stake. I imagine
,
if the humans knew we still had power
,
they would cut it off so we protect this place quite fiercely."
The General took a swig from his bottle. He leaned his head back as a few drips fell from his chin. A smile of relaxation and enjoyment spread across his face. "Yeah, that's what I was looking for."
The full moon lit up the streets with an eerie gray light. Hundreds of ravens scattered on the sidewalks and streets searched for scraps of food. A few small fires glowed inside some of the empty homes. An unusual silence filled the streets with no military actions against the walking dead this night. A brisk chill hung in the air, causing Daniel and Wendy to pull their heavy coats close to stay warm. He said to his wife, "I had hoped the cold temperatures would have taken away that awful rotting meat smell that blows around the city."
Wendy pulled her knitted wool hat farther down around her face. "I remember how people would complain when the smells from the stockyards blew across town. Compared to the smell of the re-ans, the stockyards seem like fresh flowers." She cautiously glanced at the black birds gathered on the street and turned to her husband. "Are you sure this is still a safe place to walk? I thought the green line moved back to Federal. We're at least three or four blocks into the quarantine zone."
"That green line was moved to keep the population a safe distance from the front lines of the re-an zone, way down in LoDo." Daniel pointed toward the abandon downtown buildings off in the distance. "I talked to the military two days ago and they told me I might be able to move back into my lab on Wyncoop next week
,
because they're pushing the re-ans out of downtown. We're safe
here,
because
there are military units
all around us."
She scanned the area and blew warm
air
on her hands, while rubbing them together. "I don't see any soldiers."
He smiled. "That's because they're holding the re-ans back all the way over on
Larimer Street
right now. Besides, this shortcut takes three miles off the walk home. You're too weak to travel that far every night after your treatment."
Clouds blew across the dark sky and covered the bright moon turning the street in front of them dark. Shadows stretched into black areas of unknown. With the absence of light, each minuscule sound became a possible threat. Wendy said with an edge of caution in her voice, "I have a bad feeling about this area. I think I can walk the extra miles if we stay in the green zone. Look around, we're the only one's here."
They came to the corner of the block. Daniel pointed to the large
three-story
building, which
had
stood since the early 20
th
century, and said, "Look
,
all we have to do is cut across the
North
High School
campus and we'll be one block from the green zone and four more blocks from home."
As they approached the old red stone building topped with a bell tower, flocks of ravens blanketed the open ground with several large vultures mixed in the population. Daniel looped his arm through his wife's and helped her pick up the speed of her walk. The sporadic sound of crunched leaves or the crack of a stick made his nerves slightly jolt with fear
,
but he tried not to show it
so he wouldn’t
worry his wife. He wondered if there could be re-ans just out of sight hiding in the
darkness,
but
he
kept his
focus
on the illuminated
streetlights
several blocks away. They indicated the edge of the green zone, which meant their home and safety.
As they rounded the north side of the building in the parking lot, he saw several vultures feeding off the remains of a dead body. Ravens fought for space between the giant birds as they picked the bones clean. As they pecked and tore at the dried decayed flesh
,
the carcass would flinch as if it tried to come back to life. Still trying to keep his wife calm, with a nervous tone in his voice, he said, "Maybe we should pick up the pace a little more. I'm sure you're just as eager to get out of this cold air as I am."
Walking around the corner of the building, they came face-to-face with six re-ans. The living dead, with gray deteriorated skin and dried blood stained clothes, pinned them against the building. Daniel stepped in front of his wife trying to shield her from the demons. A zombie with stringy dark hair in a waitress uniform, pulled out a sword from around her waist and held the tip against the scientist's throat. Another undead
,
wearing a canvas kilt and leather vest with a sword strapped across his back
,
held his hand up and moaned in their strange language. The waitress lowered her sword with a hiss and they all groaned and tightened the circle around their human prey.
Wendy asked, "What are they doing? Why aren't they trying to eat us?"
A dead woman in a blue nightgown, moved close to her and scanned her body with her grayish-white haze covered eyes. Wendy shook with terror and tried not to move as the dead woman sized her up with curiosity expressed on her dead face. The zombie reached out and jerked the knit hat off the human woman's head
,
revealing her bald head
,
which caused the dead to moan even louder intermixed with hisses. Wendy screamed to her husband, "What are they doing?"
Daniel pushed the nightgown undead back and the waitress pressed the tip of her sword into his chest moving him a few steps away from his wife. A dead young soldier with bright green eyes, decayed gray skin and dried blood around his mouth
,
slowly staggered toward Wendy
,
who could no longer move out of fear. The zombie let out a deep moan and stood inches from the cancer victim. He raked his bony fingertips down her shoulder, across her chest and stopped at her abdomen. She began to cry with her body trembling
,
while trying to hold back screams of panic. Her husband tried to come to her
aid,
but two of the other undead
held him back
. He yelled, "Leave her
alone,
you bastard!"