Thursday, August 25, 2011

Old Navy: A Zombie Story (part 8)

Disclaimer:  This is a work of fiction. The events that take place are for entertainment purposes ONLY.  This was written very quickly.

And now….

Before Noon Presents

Old Navy: A Zombie Story
Part 8
Harper’s Ferry




            Stephen Harper is having a drink at the end of the bar. This is a drinking man’s bar. They don’t sell bottled beer. They don’t have games other then one lone dart board; however no one really ever plays it. The stuff on the wall speaks to the owners and its employee’s, nothing else. They have two 20 inch TV’s, one at each end of the bar. It’s not well lit but not dark. A place where some one could loose them self in a pint, have a moment with their single malt Scotch. Stephen Decided to lose himself tonight in a few pints.
            Stephen had been drink here for years. When he wanted to talk he sat in the middle of the bar and would baby a Jack and Coke. When he wanted to get drunk he would sit in the corner booth with Shots of Jose. When he wanted to be left alone he sat and the end of the bar and drank, one beer followed by one glass of water. He would keep his head down and just space off into his beer. Tonight was one of those nights. The piss pour weather out side made him want to curl up on the couch and watch reruns of American Gladiator. But something made him go to the bar tonight. The howling wind out side blasted cold to Stephen’s core, but the lager that he was drinking kept him warm. The Bartender would not even ask, he would just give him water then a beer, then water then a beer. This went on for about two hours, and then Stephen had to pee.
            In the Men’s room Stephen stood at the urinal spacing off. He had been done for a few seconds when he looked at the wall above the pipes and flusher. Boogers had caked the wall.
            “Huh” Stephen said aloud. “Every good men’s room has a booger wall”
He heard a weird sound out side. At first he could not make it out. Then he shrugged it off as just Cows mooing. This was, you see, Gardner, Kansas. While cattle did not roam the streets if some got out of one of the farms near the town then they would have a chance to end up at the bar.

Stephen washes his hands and returns to a fresh beer. He looks across the bar and Jimbo was there. Jimbo was the local survivalist. When Stephen would be nice and drunk he would chat with Jimbo. Jimbo would rave about the best way to stay alive during a world changing catastrophe was to either fortify your self up where no one could find you or to stay mobile. Jimbo had both, or so he bragged. A concrete bunker that was old Missile Silo and something he called Bertha. He said only a tank or Nuke could stop it.
           
            Through the door burst an American soldier with a look of terror in his eyes. The three men in the bar can hardly make out the camouflage through the blood and green stuff that covers him. The green stuff smells like Vomit. The soldier passes out. Stephen and the bartender run to his aid, Jimbo looks out the window. The Bartender cleans off the solider. His name and rank also become uncovered, Sergeant Sams.
            After a few moments the soldier comes to.  “Where am I?”
            “Son you’re in a bar in Gardner Kansas.” The Bartender replied.
            “Gardner, man I must have run forever.”
            “What do you mean? Whose Blood is this? Are we under attack?”
“I was in Lawrence, We where in Lawrence, or just to the west of it any way. My platoon was sent to not let them enter the city. They had already over run Topeka.”
            “Who? Who over ran Topeka?” Stephen Asks.
            “Them, the Zombies”
Every one stops and stairs at each other.
            The Sergeant continues.
            “In Manhattan, at K-State there is a highly Secure Bio Research lab. Some one broke into it a little less then a week ago.”
            “Yeah they said that nothing was missing and that they caught the guys.”
            Right, well the good news is that they where just kids wanting to protest the lab and the War, But when security came they some how broke a cabinet and it fell on to one of the guys. There was a combo of chemicals and biological agents that absorbed into the skin. I was on the response team. We took them to Topeka to hold them for Homeland to see if any thing needed to be done or if there was more of a threat. We did not see what happened next. The one guy bit the other guy and we thought that the second one died. But in the morgue something happened. Then it spread. My Black Hawk pilot said that the groups of Zombies look like herds of buffalo roaming the flint hills.” The Sergeant was starting to ramble.
            “Sergeant!” Stephen Shakes him a bit and continues. “What happened to you?”
            “They came over the hill and we fought them off as long as we could. We had to fall back. I lost a lot of good men.”
            Just then two Zombies rip thought the door. Sergeant Sams whips up his M4 and shreds the first one, his gun clicks, it is empty. The second Zombie does not stop. He pounces on the sergeant and starts to feed. The bartender pulls out a double barrel shot gun and blows the zombies head off with both barrels.
            “Wow, that was intense” Jimbo says.
            “Yeah,” Stephen says as he nudges the dead bodies. He bends over and picks up the M4.
            “What are you doing?” the bartender asks.
            “if there are more of them then we might need this to kick some ass.” They check the soldiers dead body for more ammo. Jimbo shows Stephen how to load and “clean” the riffle. Jimbo picks up the Desert Eagle hand gun that the Sergeant had on him.
            Jimbo starts to stair out side. “We should go.”
            “Where?” Stephen asks.
            “To Bertha”
            “Bertha is real?”
Jimbo puts in a dip of chewing tobacco and offers some to Stephen. Stephen also takes a dip. Jimbo spits. “Yeah. She is not fully armed. But she runs and she has food and 2 Cases of Jack.”
            “Well ok how far?”
            “Over the hill. Bout a mile.”
The three of them start to walk out of the bar. One Zombie runs at them from a bush. Jimbo blows its head off with his new hand cannon. The Zombie’s head explodes like a watermelon.
            It starts to rain. It is a cold rain.
            “you know I don’t think I am drunk any more.” Stephen says.
Jimbo looks at him.” This cold ass rain and the Zombie killin’ will do that to man.”
            They are walking along the bottom of a valley. The Bartender shushes them and holds his hand up like he has seen a bunch of war movies.
            Stephen whispers loudly. “Why are we stopped?”
            “I heard something.”
            “Ok, I guess I will just stand here in the rain in a creek. Huh?
            “What?”
            “This is kind of cool”
            “What do you mean?”
            “Its like I’m in ‘nam”
Jimbo slaps him on the back of the head. “Yeah you would have done real well there.”

In a burst of red and flesh a pack of 5 Zombies jump out of the brush and engulf the Bartender. He gets of one shot with the shot gun and takes out the legs of one of the Zombies.  Stephen and Jimbo lay down a path of bullets that would make Schwarzenegger Proud.  After both of them reloaded and empted again the Zombies where no more than a pile of flesh and the creek was red.
            Stephen stands there, jaw open, holding his riffle. Jimbo picks up the shot gun and the bag with the shells in it. “Come on man, not far now.”
            “I need a drink”
            “Well that I have”
As Jimbo works on Bertha, Stephen proceeds to drink away the pain and the cold.

After about three days spent with his good friend Jack, Stephen Drunk calls Danice all he gets is her voice mail.
            “DANICE, Woo, I am drunk and it’s the end of the world. I hope that you are still kicking and not a Zombie thingy. Work Sucks and last I knew you are <burp>  at the Old <burp> Navy. Woo, we are all going to die! Damn it. I need another one. He hangs up.

Back at the store all of the Old Navy survivors are in the Break room going over the plans that Andy had left.  Jason, Scott, Josh and Shawn where building a wall in the back so they had a place to get fresh air.
            Shawn looks at the almost done wall. “Weird, Andy took the time to make plans about a wall in the back so we could fort-a-fie the back as well as the front.”
            Josh and Jason finish the wall. They had “cut” the fence and welded it to the trash dumpsters. Then moved three cars together and turn them on their side to complete the wall. Shawn turns to Scott and asks “What will you miss about the old world?”
            “Getting paid to sing”
            “Yeah”
            “What will you miss?”
“Humor, I think it will take some time for humor to reach the level that it was at. Death on this crazy scale does that to people.”
Jason walks over. “You know what I won’t miss.”
Josh, “No what”
“Those assumptions that people have for no reason.”
“Oh like racism and bigotries”
“Well those too, but I was thinking more along the lines of because of steroids when I would see an athlete do something great I would think that they cheated. Because of Porn I would see a hot young chick with a nice rack and think that she would jump my bones if I was just a plumber or cable repair man.”
Shawn pipes in, “I know what you mean man.”

Danice comes running out side. “Burr it is cold out here.”
            Jason replies “well it did snow.”
            “Shut up and Stephen just left me a voice mail. I think he is drunk.”
            “Is?”
            “Yeah it just came though about 10 minuets ago.”
            “Do you wanna call him back?”
Danice just stands there shaking from the cold.

Jason takes her phone and calls Stephen back.

“Hello?”
“Harper is you drunk?”
“Hell yeah man, it the end of the world, bitches.”
“Where are you drinking at?”
“I am in Jimbo’s Winnebago of Death, This thing is awesome.”
“Great can you come and get us there are about a thousand Zombies in the store.”
“Well yeah Jimbo, Bertha and I will be there as soon as we can good buddy.”
Stephen hangs up.

Danice asks, “Well?”
“I think he is come here in what he called a Winnebago of Death.

Next week a totally new Part 9…

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