To Be A Killer

Chapter 56: Back In Your Head

"That's them there, see? It's hundreds and hundreds of zoms," Louise says. "They're what-still a couple miles from Abel? But they're closing in fast. Do you think it's that Diana woman?"

"Yeah, probably," Sam says, and I picture him sitting in his battered swivel chair, gnawing at the inside of his cheek nervously. "Why is it always a small army of zombies? Why can't it be-be a barbershop quartet of zombies? Runner Five, you're making good time back from the village. Is that-blimey, is that a cloud of smoke behind you? I can't believe they've burnt the whole place down already."

A drop of sweat drops from my nose, and I close my eyes tight as cold air stings my lungs. I couldn't stop it. I couldn't stop the town's fate. I tried, but I couldn't change what I saw.

"We certainly won't be getting any help with curing the mind control from them," Janine says in frustration. "Don't worry about that now, Five. Just return to Abel A.S.A.P. We have more immediate problems."

"Yeah, like a whole horde of fast zoms running towards us." I can practically see the eye roll. "I have said that already, Janine."

"That's not the only issue, Mr. Yao. We sent out a party an hour ago to pick up fuel from one of our off-sight caches. It's an old Cold War bunker about a mile outside the township. Because of nuclear paranoia, the bunker's lined in lead, and maintaining a communications link is nearly impossible. I've been trying to raise them on the radio, but I can't get a signal."

I internally groan. You've got to be kidding me.

"So best case scenario, they come above ground to find Abel covered in a layer of ravenous, slathering zombies," He says with a forced laugh, and I grab my backpack strap in worry.

"Unless some of those zombies have weapons," Louise replies. "Then you'd have slathering zombies and the smoking ruins of Abel."

He grimaces. "Do I even want to ask what the worst case scenario is?"

Janine sighs. "Based on the trajectory of that swarm, they'll be on top of the bunker and our team within twenty minutes. We'll be lucky if the entire cache isn't compromised, and we certainly haven't been lucky so far today."

"Okay, then what should we do?" I question breathlessly. "What should I do?"

"Okay. Okay. Okay," Sam mumbles to himself. "Let me think. Uh, Janine, call whichever runners we've had on rest break the longest. Five, keep running. You should be able to intercept the horde before they reach Abel or the bunker."

"Do you want me to just distract them or do you want me to take them down?"

"Kill as many of them as you can without risking yourself too much. You only have your axe with you, right?"

"I have my gun with me, but I don't want to waste bullets. I don't have that many."

"Right. Lou, we'll probably need you back in the field, and bring some extra bullets for Five." He lets out a small huff. "Hey, you don't have to press your face up against the screen like that."

"I can see a woman in the center of the swarm," She says, and I blink.

"A woman? Like, a human-not-zombie woman?"

"Yeah. She's wearing these funny looking robes. I think I know her... Yeah, we both do. From that old sawmill. She helped us escape from the zombie cult."

"What?"

"No, wait," Sam says. "Wait, you mean-move your head. I can't see... No... No, that doesn't make sense."

"What?" Janine asks.

"Well, Lou's right... It's Moonchild."

Moonchild... I remember her. It's hard to forget someone like her, a weird talking hippie that has a stash of drugs on her and helps in saving your life. But even with her whole 'peace and harmony and being one with nature' thing she's got going on, there's no way she can be walking in the middle of a zombie horde without being eaten. The only way she could be doing that is if she's wearing that zombie repellent Veronica created, which she's probably not.