Appalachia Rex
JASON CORDOVA
Long before I removed her head with a twelve-gauge, Sister Margaret gave me solid advice: try your best and rise above the rest. It wasn’t until we were in the middle of the zombie apocalypse I truly understood what she meant.
If you’re reading this, you know what happened. The world pretty much ended. The lights went off. The party was over. Lots of metaphors were used by those of us who survived. Survived. That was the important word because in the beginning, it was all we had. Lock down the school. Avoid the zombies if you could, eliminate and dispose of the ones you couldn’t, and keep one another safe. For the juniors and seniors, this meant watching over the middle school girls. For them, it was helping care for the elementary kids who made it. Surviving meant listening on the shortwave radio for only two hours every night to conserve batteries. Later, though, surviving became less important. The next part was harder. We had to rebuild. Like Sister Margaret said, we needed to rise.
This is not a record of The Fall, but the slow rebuilding process those of us at St. Dominic’s Preparatory School for Girls had to endure later. I started this because Sister Ann suggested it. Her suggestions are usually carefully worded instructions, and I know her well enough to understand precisely what she meant. Since the first few months of the Fall were only about surviving, I don’t really have much to say about that time. It was hard. Lots of my friends died. My best friend, Wren, turned into a zombie and managed to turn three other girls before we stopped it. Well, I stopped it. I had to shoot them all. None of the other girls would do the deed so it fell on me to kill my best friend and the others. I didn’t sleep for a few days after that.
“If you don’t want to write about the time of the Fall, then don’t,” Sister Ann said while she handed me one of the notepads from the storage room beneath the Admin Building. They’d been part of donations the school had been receiving for years and, thanks to a lot of donors, we had enough school supplies to last us multiple lifetimes. She lifted my chin and looked me in the eye. “Someone needs to write about how we’re going to rebuild. Who better than our class valedictorian?”
She had a point. Granted, I was valedictorian only because the five other girls who had been ahead of me had all turned zombie and then died, but still . . . if someone had told me two years ago I would be my high school’s valedictorian, I would have laughed in their face. Before St. Dominic’s, school could best be described as “nonessential.” For me, anyway. I had better things to do. I don’t remember what they were, exactly, but I know I thought they were better.
Ironically, I’m not the first person in history to have shot their high school’s valedictorian just to take their place. Life was odd even before the zombie apocalypse.
Rebuilding wasn’t easy. After Sister Margaret turned into a zombie, the only adult who worked for the school and was still alive was Sister Ann. I think having Sister Ann survive actually helped us more than any other person, because nobody disobeyed her. I’m not just saying this because she might read this one day, really. Sister Ann had been in the Marine Corps during the Global War on Terror and deployed all over the place. She took her vows to be a nun only a few years back and ended up at our school for some reason. We were lucky to have her then, and eternally grateful now. It also reaffirmed the whole “God works in mysterious ways” saying.
I’m in charge of security. Yeah, weird, I know. How many teenage girls do you know of who run security for a 1200-acre site? It wasn’t my idea actually, but Sister Ann’s. The girls all backed her decision, though. Especially since I was the only one not terrified of the zombies and had little issue with shooting them.
One of the now-dead staff members who lived on campus in one of the housing units had a gun safe. He was one of those guys who went to gun shows and people made fun of him, but he’d drop like ten grand on a bunch of new guns and stuff. I thought he was a little weird but mostly harmless. Just don’t mess with his four-wheeler and you were fine. Once we saw him running around all zombiefied it was decided we needed to raid his stash of weapons. It was where I picked up Baby.
Look, I don’t know guns very well. All I can do is repeat what Sister Ann told me after I made my selection—in between her fits of giggling after I told her I was calling the gun “Baby.” The AR-15 has a pistol grip, tactical sling, an MVG vertical grip, and a green dot sight. Mr. Stitmer had it done up in desert digital camo and it even had a penguin engraved on the side with a rocket jetpack on its back. Sister Ann said it was the most ridiculous thing she’d ever seen but I loved it. I got to keep it, as well as all the ammo that came with it. The only time I don’t carry Baby around now is when I shower. Even then, it’s in the bathroom with me.
He also had a bunch of rifles in his safe but they were all chambered for .270 rounds. Sister Ann was a little irritated by this but since he had over fifty thousand rounds of ammunition for them, she forgave him a little. Getting these from his house up to the top of the hill without making a lot of noise was a hassle. It meant we had to drive his four-wheeler.
Oh, how horrible. Right?
To be fair, I drove the crap out of that thing. Having the four-wheeler would have made things a lot easier when we first heard about a guy calling himself the King of Appalachia. We knew his real name, of course. Everyone knew who he’d been before the Fall.
Alleghany County is small when it comes to population. I mean, it relied largely on the railroads a long time ago. But since railroads don’t make nearly as much money as they used to, and shipping things was easier by truck than train, the area quickly became one of those low-income areas supported by only one business. For Covington and the surrounding area, it was the WestRock paper mill.
In this type of town, everybody was either related to everybody, or they knew others through relatives. I used to joke around with Sister Margaret that you couldn’t throw a cat in the area without nailing a Persinger or a Nicely. Unfortunately, some girls in town heard about the jokes (there may have been other jokes involving cousins and third base) and a couple of fights broke out when we were allowed into town on weekends. I started being much more cautious about who I talked smack about. After all, they were probably related.
Sorry, I wandered off topic. The King of Appalachia called himself King Dale. It has a horrible ring to it. The first time we spotted some of the men working for him was during our usual recon mission to the river. They were looking for supplies. We were checking to see if Covington was still underwater. Sister Ann always sent us in groups of three when we hiked down and around to the Jackson River. One to spot, one for site security, and a backup in case someone got hurt and needed help being carried. I always handled security during these missions, though sometimes I snuck out at night to find better spots to shoot from in case the zombies came up to the school again. Don’t blame Sister Ann for not keeping a better eye on me. She was one woman in charge of twenty-five girls.
They saw us at the same time we spotted them. It was stupid, and my fault. We hadn’t seen an actual human for so long we stopped worrying about what clothes we were wearing. So when a couple of young guys spotted three teenage girls wearing plaid skirts, hiking boots, blouses, and knee-high socks, all armed with either rifles or one seriously tricked-out AR-15, they must have thought they were hallucinating. I would have thought that. A redheaded Catholic schoolgirl with an AR-15?
Only in America . . .
We scampered off, not going directly back to campus but instead making it look like we were heading towards the old social security office. In hindsight it was stupid, but at the time we were in full flight or fight mode. It never occurred to me they would instantly recognize our school uniforms from St. Dominic’s. Yeah, dumb on my part.
The next time we went down there, a note had been left on one of the trees. It had been written on a dry erase board and hung on a large branch. It was a simple message, but one which set Sister Ann on edge. It simply told us to surrender, gave us a meeting time, and to bring everyone still alive from the school with us.
“I’ll go and meet with them,” Sister Ann told me once the other girls had all gone to bed. News had spread quickly and a few of the elementary school girls were excited. They thought we were being rescued. None of the high school girls wanted to break the news to them, so we didn’t say anything. The middle schoolers were the ones who came up with nasty ideas about why a bunch of old men wanting to “save” them was a bad idea. That shut the rescue talk down really quickly.
“That’s a bad idea,” I warned Sister Ann. “What if they just start shooting?”
“Then I die, and the council is in charge of the school,” Sister Ann replied calmly. I had to hand it to her. A lot of people could talk the talk, but Sister Ann walked the walk. “Next time you’re out on patrol, don’t wear the school girl outfit. See if you can go through the clothing closet and find some donations with old hunter’s pants or something.”
“I should have been doing that from the start,” I berated myself. “Stupid.”
“No, just shortsighted,” Sister Ann corrected me. “We didn’t count on survivors coming around. I should have, not you. I’ll meet with him, and you’ll be my visible second. Let them get an eyeful of Baby. We have three other girls nearby with rifles hiding in the bushes in case they start shooting at us . . . which I doubt they’ll do.”
“Why?”
“I don’t think they want us dead, Maddie,” Sister Ann said as she shot me a look.
“Oh.”
“But what I want you to do is get there eight hours before the meet time,” she continued after a moment. “Only you. Set up in that old hunter’s blind we put up last year and see if King Dale has anybody setting up the way we are. They’ll probably get there a few hours before we do. Once I arrive, you come out and stand with me. Let them know we’re always watching, always ready.”
“That’s why you want me getting there so far in advance,” I murmured. “That’s smart.”
“Be prepared,” she reminded me. “I have no idea how our meeting with Appalachia Rex is going to go.”
Oh, I would be prepared, all right. I was not making the same mistake again.
King Dale may be an idiot, but he had what looked like a freaking tank. I know it wasn’t a tank, but the first time I saw it I thought it was a tank. He didn’t send any advance scouts ahead, so I spent eight very dull hours watching the dirty waters of the Jackson River swirl about. I could have wiped him and his entire crew out before they’d realize it when they stepped out of the large armored vehicle. Sister Ann gave me explicit instructions to simply observe until she arrived, so that I did.
When Sister Ann walked onto the scene, it created a visible stir across the river. She’d ditched the stole and penguin outfit when Sister Margaret turned in favor of something a little more economical and sensible. Jeans, a hoodie, and comfortable hiking boots made up her normal everyday wear. Now, however, she’d donned her full habit and even wore her veil, which was rare indeed. Only during Mass did any of the school’s nuns wear their stiff headpieces that hid their hair. It was psychological warfare; she’d told me the night before. It was meant to send a message.
Sister Ann 1, King Dale 0.
The so-called King of Appalachia stood on the far banks of the Jackson River, surrounded by a large group of people. The river wasn’t too wide here but it was definitely deep, courtesy of the Gathright Dam failing six months back. It was also the reason nobody had been able to get up to the school yet. When the dam failed, it also took out the only road bridge and passable route up to the school for miles, as well as the two railroad bridges crossing the river. We’d thought it was a bad thing at first because all the large stores were on the other side of the river, but it turned out to be a blessing in disguise. Not only did the zombies get swept downriver when they tried to cross, it had also managed to stop anyone else from coming to us. We had a natural boundary to protect us. Other than a small community of houses near the top of the hill by the school and the Moose Lodge, our little valley and mountain top was empty.
This was the first time I’d really gotten to get a good look at the guy Sister Ann had dubbed “Appalachia Rex.” St. Dominic’s still taught Latin so I understood what it meant. It was the same as what the King of Appalachia called himself, but since we were dealing with hillbillies he probably thought the sister was insulting him. The man wasn’t what I would normally call a hick, though. He was tall, well built, and actually wore what appeared to be new clothes. He sported a giant blond beard but since they weren’t really making razors anymore I cut him some slack. I mean, I hadn’t shaved my legs in months.
We must have been a very weird sight to the men. Armed girls on a river with a nun. I know what men think whenever they see a Catholic school girl, even if she’s carrying a heavily modified AR-15 and not in her uniform. Or maybe the fact we were better armed than his group was even more appealing, I don’t know for certain. What I did understand, thanks to Sister Ann’s “briefing” beforehand (it’s what she called it), this was the beginning of a negotiation process. The so-called king believed he was dealing from a position of power.
“Let him,” Sister Ann had told us before I started the long hike down. “If he thinks he’s in control, he’ll underestimate us. He has no idea we’ve been watching them for days now. Let him believe he is in control, because we all know who really is.”
Sister Ann was, and will always remain, a Marine trapped in a nun’s habit.
The negotiations did not start smoothly.
“I don’t know why y’all calling me Rex!” he shouted at us from across the river. The men around him were armed but he wasn’t. Nobody was pointing their weapons at us, either, and all of them seemed to be showing good trigger discipline from what I could see. “My name is King Dale, and I am the ruler of Appalachia!”
“Nice to meet you, Dale,” Sister Ann replied back as she raised the megaphone. The young nun was always prepared for everything and, quite frankly, was probably my favorite sister at the school. The megaphone had been in the gym, and it even had working batteries still. “You stay on your side of the river now, you hear?”
“With all due respect, ma’am, y’all are in my domain, and I have right to rule,” Dale yelled back. “We’re gonna cross that river, and y’all need to respect that!”
“Again, we reserve the right to refuse, since we still live in the United States, my son,” Sister Ann replied sweetly. “Since we’re not a confederate state in some medieval German principality, you cannot be a king in a republic guided by a legal constitution. Now please disperse and go home.”
Dale was flustered. I was just confused. Sister Ann was really smart and sometimes pulled out historical references which even left the former director of our school dazed. Her ability to defuse a situation by simply being the biggest nerd in the room was why her cottage was always on their best behavior. I couldn’t even remember when the last real fight broke out in there. She had a way of just keeping the peace with only a look.
“You don’t understand what I’m saying here, Sister!” Dale shouted.
“No, I understand you perfectly,” Sister Ann replied. The megaphone squealed a little from feedback and she smacked it with her palm before continuing. “You think that because nobody’s heard from the government in a year means you get to go and form a new government however you like. This great nation of ours does not work this way, Dale. Have you heard the news? The Navy and Marines have already begun to take back our country along the coast. Parris Island has been retaken. That means more Marines, young man, only eight hours away. You think our government is going to be okay with some tin pot dictator less than four hours from our nation’s capital?”
“Bullshit!” He practically screamed. “The government died the day they released this poison onto the world!”
“Language, young man.” Sister Ann frowned. I was confused. What did he mean, they released the flu? That wasn’t how I remembered it all going down. I specifically remember the words “Pacific Flu” being thrown around, and even rumors than it had been released by some nutjob.
“Sorry!” Dale looked down and kicked a stone into the swollen waters of the Jackson River. “Sister, I have the canned goods, supplies, a tank, weapons, and manpower! What have you got?”
“Apparently I only have the correct side of the river,” she called back. “And that is not a tank, but the MedCat SWAT armored vehicle you stole from the Alleghany County Sheriff’s Department. It’s used for medical evacuations in a live-fire engagement area. Medical counter attack truck. MedCat. Learn your equipment and do better research. Go back to your home. Our school is in the state of Virginia, which is still part of the United States of America and under the guidance of the Constitution. It is not, nor will ever be, part of your so-called Kingdom. Nothing you say will change that, Appalachia Rex.”
“God damn it, quit calling me that!”
“Young man!” Sister Ann’s voice was stern this time. Even I winced, because you knew you were in deep shit when Sister Ann used that tone. I heard one of the girls nearby suck in her breath sharply and hiss, “Ooooooh shit, he done fucked up now” to another. So I wasn’t the only one who’d been on the receiving end of a Sister Ann verbal beat down. Sister Ann continued, and boy was she hot. “You will not take the Lord’s name in vain! He did not die for your sins to have you run His name through mud and filth in such a foul and disrespectful manner! This will be the last time I warn you. Do you understand me?”
The self-proclaimed King of Appalachia nodded, albeit reluctantly. This did not appease Sister Ann, however. Not by a long shot. We all knew it wouldn’t but it was almost funny to see someone else suffer for a change. I would have been laughing my ass off except I knew better. The last thing I wanted now was for her basilisk gaze to turn on me.
“No, I can’t hear you,” she told him. “What do you say?”
“I promise,” he shouted.
“You promise what?”
Oh man, she is not letting him off easy, I thought and watched him struggle for words.
“I promise to not take the Lord’s name in vain again!”
“Very good,” she smiled, tone sweet and angelic once more. “Have a good afternoon, Appalachia Rex.”
“Confound it, woman!”
Well, at least he was watching his language now. St. Dominic’s existed for a reason and had a pretty good track record, all things considered. One thing the school was noted for was instilling proper manners while operating as a school. St. Dominic’s didn’t just teach us how to be independent women, but ladies as well.
She clicked off the megaphone and lowered it from her face. Turning away from the river, Sister Ann motioned for me to come over. Once I was close enough, she started to speak.
“They’re going to find a way across that river eventually,” Sister Ann said, eyeing the heavily modified AR-15 in my hands. She crossed herself before continuing. “Probably within a week or two. I wouldn’t ask you to take a human life, Madison, but if it comes down to it, we can’t let those vile creatures on the campus. We have young girls to protect and I can only imagine what he thinks he’s going to find if he makes it onto campus. Even if he means well, there might be men in his group who have ulterior motives involving high school girls in uniforms.”
“I have no problem with shooting that type of guy, Sister Ann,” I told her. “I was the one who shot Sister Margaret when she turned into a zombie, remember?”
“I didn’t forget, Maddie,” Sister Ann offered me a reassuring smile. “But there is a cost to the soul when taking a life. I’m not sure if there’s one for shooting zombies, but humans? Definitely a dark stain.”
“No offense, Sister, but I’ll let God judge me when I go to heaven,” I told her. “The school’s given me the ability to protect others in a way nobody ever protected me. I intend to use it.”
Sister Ann rested a hand on my shoulder. Despite the camouflage coat I could still feel the warmth and concern in the gesture. She bowed her head.
“Just . . . don’t come to enjoy it,” she told me. “It’s addictive and becomes easier if you let it. I saw it many times in the past, in both Iraq and Afghanistan. You start seeing your fellow humans as nothing more than targets, and you lose a large part of yourself when that happens.”
“Zombies are one thing, Sister,” I admitted, feeling slightly embarrassed. Once again Sister Ann saw through my mask and pointed out what I was truly feeling. I had been looking forward to hurting the men across the river. They wanted to do horrible things to the girls who were closer to me than my own family. I’d heard stories from other survivors via the shortwave radio. They alluded to a lot of abuse suffered before they were rescued. I wasn’t about to let that happen, not to anyone at the school. Didn’t matter if they were my worst enemy. They had a soul, and everything I’d learned while at St. Dominic’s told me the soul was most precious indeed. Including my own. “I know it’ll be rough, ma’am. I’ll be aiming at their legs to start with, it that helps ease the conscience a little.”
“God always was a little fuzzy about kneecaps, wasn’t He?” she asked, amused.
Sister Ann had been overly generous in her estimates. It actually took them a month to figure out how to construct a bridge and get across the river. In the end, they simply lashed a bunch of logs together and made a floating bridge of sorts. It worked well enough, but before they could test it properly it floated farther downriver. Nobody had tied it off. To be fair, zombies can be very distracting. Especially when they show up in a horde and without much warning.
I hadn’t realized the city of Covington was still chock-full of the aggressive types of zombies until Rex and his gang started making all sorts of noise trying to complete their bridge. The idiots thought that just because they didn’t see any zombies meant they’d all left. In reality, the zombies probably all went down by Interstate 64 because one of the buildings there was solar powered and featured a tall pole with a lantern and a sign on top. While not the brightest light in the world, it was still the only one around and the zombies were drawn to it. Since Rex and his group had come the most direct route from Lexington, which meant over the hill along I-64 until they exited at State Road 60, they’d unwittingly avoided the zombies—until the chainsaw started, at least.
It was stupid, really. If they’d have gone down I-64 farther they would have found the rear entrance to the school. It wasn’t really that big of a secret. Or they could have even just waded across the river. Yeah, it wasn’t shallow, but it was easier than trying to rebuild a bridge using logs from the nearby lumber company cut onsite. To be honest, if would have been even easier if they’d just waded across the river and raided the partially collapsed paper mill plant right there next to the ruined bridge and did the repair work from the mill’s side. Well, what was left of the paper mill, anyway. When the dam went, it had done a number on every building next to the river. Most of downtown Covington remained partially flooded, but still . . . for a guy who was supposed to be king, he seemed pretty dumb and not the most creative thinker.
He must have really wanted to make his grand entrance to the school with his armored vehicle. Otherwise, he could have just made a simple rope bridge.
I was perched high in a hunter’s blind we’d set up on our side of the river when the zombies arrived, drawn in by the noise Rex and his crew were making. These were not the same as the early ones we dealt with up at the school but skinnier. And slower. They weren’t the horror movie shamblers though. The zombies were still able to surprise Rex and his crew. It was interesting to watch precisely how they dealt with them from a purely tactical point of view. I took notes because, well, I’d never seen anyone else handle zombies before. Up at St. Dominic’s, zombie clearing was always left to me. None of the other girls could do it from up close. Or would, rather.
The first zombie hit the guy who was supposed to be on lookout but seemed far more interested in watching the bridge being built. He didn’t even have time to scream before the zombie had latched onto his neck and started chewing away. Between the noise from the river, the loud arguing of Rex’s men, and the one chainsaw running there was almost zero chance they heard the poor guy die.
Rex must have sensed something, though, because he half-turned towards the lookout just as the man stopped twitching on the ground. He shouted an alarm as a large mass of zombies appeared from out behind the ruined old Post Office. The group turned as one and the guards were up and ready before the zombies reached their position.
I’ll give credit where it’s due: they knew what a proper firing line was. They were precise with their shots and didn’t seem to waste any rounds. They might not be the brightest bunch but they knew how to defend against an oncoming horde. Zombies dropped in rapid succession as the men fired. Rex’s men were clearly good shots, which was something to keep in mind. I didn’t want to admire their abilities against the zombies, though. Rex’s followers were potentially the enemy, after all.
The group made one huge tactical error right off the bat—they forgot to make sure the scout on the ground was really dead and not just injured. Always double check the body. After killing the zombie who attacked him, they’d just forgotten about him to engage the approaching horde. It didn’t take long for him to turn, and even with the gaping neck wound their lookout was up and back on his feet in a matter of minutes. The newly created zombie almost made it to Rex before the so-called King of Appalachia pulled out a monster cannon of a handgun and blew the guy’s head off with one shot.
With the new zombie down, Rex began barking orders to his men. I couldn’t hear exactly what he was shouting over the gunfire, but eventually they began focusing zombies as they approached. Golden rule of the zombie apocalypse: if you can bring friends to a shootout, bring lots of guns, and even more ammo.
I looked around the area to see if I was still safe. No signs of wildlife or any zombies, but that meant nothing. Sometimes you could almost step on a zombie without waking them up if you were quiet enough. Other than Lucia, I was probably the sneakiest girl on campus. More than once I’d stumbled onto a zombie nest and had to get out of there without waking the creatures up. Fortunately, they stayed away from the railroad tracks and closer to the water. This was helpful because the railroad tracks led straight into the back entrance of campus. Back before the world ended it was also the best route for some of the girls to sneak out at night to meet up with townie boys.
Not that I’ve ever done anything like that. I’ve just heard rumors and stuff. I swear.
One of the lookouts suddenly shouted and pointed in another direction, back behind the paper mill. I was still safe but he was pointing up U.S. 220. I turned and followed his arm before blinking, surprised. An ungodly number of zombies were coming down the road, quicker than the original group. These zombies were clearly better fed. There was also a lot more of them. I hadn’t seen that many in months.
Where are they coming from? I asked myself as I looked across the river. The area around Covington, including Clifton Forge, had maybe ten thousand people in total before everything happened. A lot of them died during the original outbreak of the Pacific Flu. The math didn’t add up. Something else to talk to Sister Ann about. Shaking my head, I climbed down from the hunter’s blind, jumping the last few feet to save time. Landing on the loose gravel near the tracks, I crouched down and checked to make certain I hadn’t damaged Baby any. After a quick inspection I was satisfied. The AR-15 didn’t even have a scratch.
I needed to leave. I didn’t want to get tagged by a stray round or a ricochet and since Rex’s men were on a shooting rampage the odds were decent of that happening. High-tailing it along the tracks, I headed back towards campus. It was time to report in. Sister Ann was not going to be happy about the amount of zombies still in Covington.
I was right. She wasn’t happy at all.
“You saw how many?” Sister Ann asked, clearly bothered by the news. We’d been planning exploratory scouting missions farther out from the school for a few months now, hoping the zombie population had died off over the past year. This sudden arrival of more zombies seemed to have everyone in a down mood.
“A few hundred at least, coming from Warm Springs,” I reported. We had all gathered in the dining hall, which had become our de facto headquarters after everyone began turning into zombies. There was a bunker in the basement which had been set up during the Cold War because the Greenbriar, a really fancy resort not too far away, was once a potential target for nuclear bombs since it had been prepped to hold all of Congress in it if a nuclear war broke out. I guess it made sense to want to keep all the girls at St. Dominic’s alive should something like that occur, and the bunker was built when they refurbished the dining hall.
Who could have guessed it would be used instead during the zombie apocalypse?
“That’s not good,” Sister Ann murmured and leaned back in the chair. She glanced at the six other girls sitting with us around the large dining hall table. They were all high school aged, like me, and we all served on the student council by default. “Still, they’re on the other side of the river. We’re okay for now. Options?” she asked them.
“Stores are good for another four months, maybe five if we stretch it,” Lucia Archuleta reported. She was from California originally, like me, and had initially found the quiet Blue Ridge Mountains to be horrible. She’d almost run away a dozen times before settling in. I thought she was just a vapid slut but when the zombie apocalypse began, she was the one who managed to get all the elementary school girls into the dining hall without attracting any attention from those who had turned. I cut her some slack and it turned out she was really good with keeping track of things and a whiz at math. Sister Ann put her in charge of figuring out the food situation, usage, and organization. Everyone had come to rely on her almost as much as they did on myself or Emily. “The problem is protein. We’re running low on canned chicken and we’re out of Spam.”
“And vitamin supplements.” Sister Ann sighed. “Those too.”
“At least we still have pads and tampons. We need to raid a store though, and soon,” Lucia said as she looked at her notepad. “Or we start hitting houses down by the Moose Lodge and take our chances there might be zombies inside them. They had a good stockpile of canned goods the last time we volunteered down there.”
“If we get spotted by King Dale and his group, they’ll figure out there’s a way across the river,” Rohena Stephens pointed out. I rolled my eyes but didn’t argue. As much as she irritated me, she was right. Appalachia Rex would figure out how we’re crossing the river if he spotted us. That would be the end of our excursions, and maybe worse. Rohena continued. “If we head north, then circle back east and check the gas station up on top of the hill along State Road 60, we might get a few things if the zombies haven’t destroyed the inside yet and Dale won’t spot us. Even if those zombies came from Warm Springs.”
“Girl . . . I’m telling you, that one cute cashier is either a zombie or dead,” Kayla Washington remarked with a smirk. “Even if he lived, there’s no way he stayed around here.”
“Talk all the smack you want, but they had a lot of canned stuff there,” Rohena reminded her. “Water’s probably gone, but they might have sodas. I know it’s not water, but it’ll add caloric intake a bit. Maybe some of those vitamin-laced waters? I don’t know. Point being, unless zombies figured out how to use complex locks, it should still have some stuff in back. They’re only dangerous now if they horde up or get in too close.”
“Lucia, draw up a plan for checking out the gas station,” Sister Ann said. “It’s a low priority, though. At most, Maddie and two others with hiking backpacks.”
“People gonna die,” Lucia muttered under her breath as she continued taking notes. I almost laughed but managed to turn it into a cough at the last moment.
“Speaking of water,” Sister Ann continued, ignoring the girl’s comment. “We’re still okay with the pump?”
“For now, Sister,” Emily Mottesheard responded. She was the only girl at the school who even had a bare understanding of any kind of informal mechanical work. With a little bit of help from one of the middle school girls, Emily fixed all things mechanical for us—as long as the thing that needed fixing had an owner’s manual available. “I know some of the girls want to use the solar panel to heat the showers, but without the power from the solar panel we don’t have water. They can either have cold showers, or no water at all. They need to quit bit—uh, complaining about it.”
“I’ll mention it again at Devotionals tonight,” Sister Ann promised. “Hand pumps?”
“Yes ma’am, sorry,” Emily looked down at her notepad. “I understand the concept behind it but finding water is actually harder than it sounds. Yeah, if we had a lot of pressure we could bring it up from Dunlap Creek. That’d be the easiest way but we would need mechanical pumps for that. Our well pump here is already not doing so well. I was reading about something interesting but we’d have to find a lot of pipes and a natural spring above us somewhere. Basically, water flows downhill, and we just build a gravity well with piping to direct it into the purifiers . . . ”
“Which there isn’t any,” Sister Ann pointed out.
“I figured you would have mentioned a natural spring flowing down the mountain if there was one,” Emily stated. “No manual well pumps for now, sorry.”
“How long do you think the mechanical pump will last?” I asked, curious.
“Really hard to say,” Emily replied as she looked at me. I could see the worry in her eyes. A seventeen-year-old girl shouldn’t be under the stress she was. It was her responsibility to keep everything mechanical running. Then again, nobody should be doing what we had to in order to survive. “They’re built to last thirty years and this one was just installed five years ago. If the pipe doesn’t freeze or rupture, then we’re good for a long time. Last winter was mild. This year? I don’t know. Next? Again, no idea. February is always the worst. If it gets too cold and the pipe bursts . . . ”
“We’ll worry about that when the time comes, Emily,” Sister Ann told us all in a gentle tone. She looked at Kayla. “How are the gardens?”
We’d gotten lucky on that one. The old farm manager who worked for the school had gotten permission years before to convert the old, unused tennis courts into a garden. Because it had been a tennis court, there was a ten-foot high chain link fence surrounding it. It also happened to be between the gymnasium and the dining hall, which was very convenient and close to our little safe haven. She’d also left behind a lot of seed packets so we’d have enough fresh vegetables for years. So far, none of the zombies had taken an interest in it and no wild animals had gotten inside except for the occasional snake . . . which we quickly learned to leave alone, since they ate the mice and voles who tried to eat our crops.
“Lots of tomatoes and peppers,” Kayla said. “Rain’s been good enough to keep the potatoes going as well. We should have enough vegetables to can to make it through the winter so we won’t have to ration too much. I’m worried about the corn, though. It’s got some weird bug on it. One of the farming books mentioned weevils but there wasn’t a picture. I don’t want to spray them if I don’t have to but . . . if it is weevils, then I’ll have to, and we’re running low on the stuff. Anybody know a chemist?”
“Okay, keep doing the best you can.” Sister Ann smiled. She loved hearing the updates around the council, even if she already knew the details we were all about to share. I think it had something to do with keeping our mental health stable. If everyone was upbeat and talking about what was going right, we didn’t need to worry about what was going wrong.
Unfortunately, I was next up, and I was always the bearer of bad news. Yay me.
“Rohena’s partially right about one thing, though,” I said as everyone else quieted down. “The zombies aren’t as much of a threat to us anymore and we should start exploring a bit, though avoid any other people for the time being. I watched Appalachia Rex and his boys do a decent job of handling a mass of zombies. They’re good shooters. If they push for us here, we need to be prepared to defend. Before you get all scared, just remember there’s only one way up the hill for their tank and—”
“MedCat,” Sister Ann corrected me. Even though she took her holy vows years before, Sister Ann never truly forgot her Marine training.
“Yes ma’am, sorry,” I automatically replied. “Their MedCat can be stopped at the bridge across Dunlap Creek if we block it with something big.”
Dunlap Creek was a good-sized creek which eventually joined the Jackson River. It was a secondary natural boundary for the school, not nearly as wide as the Jackson but almost as deep. It was great for fishing and swimming, and since it was above the river from the paper mill, it was also clean. Even before the Fall it was one of the more popular places the school held public fundraising events.
“Couldn’t it just drive across the creek?” Rohena asked nervously. Sister Ann shook her head.
“No, it’s too deep on the north side of the bridge,” she explained. “Maddie?”
“Their ta—uh, MedCat didn’t have a snorkel,” I pointed out, recalling all the details I could from the lumbering armored vehicle.
“If the engine goes underwater, it’ll die,” Emily put in immediately. “Even if it is a diesel, it needs air for the combustion and heat. Unless it’s amphibious. Did it look like a badly designed boat? No? Okay, we should be good then. The MedCat probably can’t go to the south side of the bridge because the slope down is too steep, and that’ll flood the engine as well when they hit the creek, even if the water is down. Which it’s not. Supposed to rain more tonight. Yeah, I can see it now. If they push here, we just block the bridge over the creek somehow, only make it wide enough for people to walk through, and Maddie kills them all while staying safely behind cover.”
“Or we use it to embarrass them and make them go away once they lose the MedCat,” I suggested, remembering what Sister Ann had told me down by the river. Killing them would start us all down a dark path. “Stealing it is a little riskier but . . . ”
“It’ll make them rethink everything,” Sister Ann finished for me, looking thoughtful, “taking their MedCat from them. It’s a brilliant idea. Here’s what we’re going to do . . . ”
Of course, I was chosen for the dangerous part of the mission Sister Ann jokingly called “Operation Not-A-Tank.” I didn’t expect anything else. Nobody else was even remotely close to having my skillset. With full hunting gear and my red hair tucked safely away under a black beanie, I blended in better with the environment than normal. The one person who went with me was Lucia, who was dressed similarly. She was the only person I trusted to not wake the zombies and Rex’s crew. The tiny Latina was not happy about it, though. She let me know about it from the moment we left campus.
“This is stupid,” she whispered for the umpteenth time as we made our way down the railroad tracks. We knew already where Appalachia Rex and his crew were holed up at. The gas station that Rohena had been so interested in before was where they had set up for the night. It was pretty easy to see them from one of the perches we’d set up upriver of the paper mill.
Aware that zombies could still be around, I shushed her and made a walking motion with my two fingers. She sighed, held up the letter “B” in sign language to her chin, and jerked it down before giving me two quick waves of her hand. I giggled. We’d barely begun taking sign language before the Fall, but a few of us quickly learned some of the dirty words. No, I’ll be honest. We knew all of them since it was the only way we could curse without getting demerits. Back when they were still giving them out it had been a pretty popular way of cussing another girl out without bringing the wrath of Sister Margaret or any of the other nuns down on our heads.
Bitch, please, I mentally translated. Lucia had a point. We didn’t need to be silent, merely quiet.
We crossed the makeshift floating bridge Rex had managed to tie up. Surprisingly, he didn’t have anybody out there to protect it. Considering they probably didn’t have any way to see in the dark, it made sense the longer I thought about it. It wasn’t as though the zombies would do anything to the bridge besides cross it, right? He had to be thinking something along these lines. Plus, a school filled with teenage girls protected by a single nun? How dangerous could they be to his plans?
He had no idea what nun he was messing with.
One thing Sister Ann had done before locking the main admin building up was to take all of the hand-held radios. They were good ones, not the cheap sort you’d find at a discount store. They had to be to work in these mountains. Sister Ann had hoarded these radios, keeping them safe from harm and conserving all the batteries we could find. There was a surprising amount, actually, but since most of them were size “D” batteries, we’d only used the radios when I went out scouting. The small, hand-held radios needed “C” batteries, which were in short supply. The “D” batteries we had in abundance were perfect for the shortwave radio, however. It allowed us to keep track of everything going on along the coast, including the exploits of the so-called “Wolf Squadron,” even if it was only for two hours an evening. Emily thought we had enough batteries to last the shortwave radio five more years at our current use, so we listened in. Other than chess, which I hated, the shortwave was our only source of entertainment.
I turned my radio on and switched to the prearranged channel. We were risking a lot in using these radios. Anybody who happened to have the same channel we were using could potentially hear us. It was why Sister Ann told us not to talk, merely turn it on and hit the transmit key three times before shutting it back down. The signal was meant to tell her we were safely across the bridge. The next time we were supposed to use the radio was when we completed the second stage and found Rex’s stolen MedCat.
The gas station Rex had holed up in for the night was near the river. I was a bit surprised to see it standing complete with glass doors intact and everything. The pumps were gone, but since they were the newer kind with the emergency shutoff valves the gas was probably still in the underground tanks. Contaminated with water, undoubtedly, but still there. Maybe one day we could get to them.
I spotted the MedCat parked directly in front of the door, partially blocking the front entrance. It was a smart idea, actually. It provided them with added reinforcement to the station’s main entrance while keeping their vehicle close. The problem with their plan, however, was that Rex had left the keys in the ignition and nobody to guard the MedCat. The doors were unlocked and we didn’t see anyone sleeping inside.
Talk about a stroke of luck. It would make what we were about to do next that much simpler.
Locking the doors, Lucia slid into the back area to ensure it was secured as well. We did not want any unexpected passengers during our attempt at grand theft auto. Satisfied it was locked and there was no way, outside of a spare key, of anyone else getting in, I flipped the radio back on and clicked the transmit key three more times. Turning the radio off, I climbed behind the driver’s seat and waited. My gaze drifted towards the makeshift floating bridge, which could just barely be seen down the block.
It took a bit longer than expected. I chalked it up to the logs being wet from the rapidly flowing river. Or perhaps the coolness of the evening. But eventually the combined kerosene and Styrofoam packing peanut bags lit the logs on fire. Soon there was a bonfire any southern boy would have been proud to call his own. If anyone had been outside on watch, that is.
I was irritated. Sister Ann and the other girls had worked hard on making their makeshift napalm, and there was nobody from Rex’s crew to witness it. I leaned forward and peered inside the gas station. It was absolute darkness inside. This was smart, since zombies were drawn to light. I looked back down at the river. The flames were high in the air now, making short work of the rope lines which Rex and company had used to lash the logs together. The bridge began to break apart, though a few stuck together for some reason. There was a lot of smoke rising into the air. I turned back to let Lucia know what was going on when disaster struck.
I slipped and my elbow slammed down hard on the steering wheel. The loud car horn of the MedCat echoed loudly into the still night. I jerked away from the horn, horrified, and scrambled into the back with Lucia. She was staring at me, eyes wide.
“You think anyone heard?” she asked in a hushed whisper.
As if in response, a keening wail answered. Then another, and another. Hundreds, if not thousands, of angry zombies howled somewhere out in the darkness.
“Shit,” I hissed, terrified. “Yeah, someone heard.”
Inside the gas station, Rex and his men were awake and running outside. They were well armed but clearly had not been expecting a truck horn to signal for all of the zombies to wake up. Confused, a few tried the doors to the MedCat, only to find it locked. I could hear them arguing outside.
“Who locked the fucking keys in the tank?!” someone screamed. It sounded like Rex, I couldn’t be certain.
“Forget the keys!” another voice interjected. “The bridge is on fire!”
“How did the bridge catch on fire?” a third voice asked. “Quick, to the river!”
I risked a peek and saw eight men, all armed with AR-15s similar to mine, running towards the fire. As they drew closer one of them raised his rifle and shot across the river. One of the younger girls was out in the open. I winced but the shot missed. She continued scrambling behind a small pile of rocks but there wasn’t enough cover. As the shooter readied a second shot, a screech interrupted him. He turned but the zombie was in too close now, and his screams ended abruptly as the zombie’s teeth opened his throat wide. A melee erupted as the zombies poured into Rex and his men. Vengeance was no longer an option. Clearly they were fighting now purely to survive.
“Time to go,” I muttered and set Baby safely on a small mounted rack. Lucia climbed into the passenger seat. Checking the dashboard, I was surprised to see the truck was an automatic, just as Sister Ann predicted. I silently cursed. “I owe her three packets of noodles.”
“You bet against a nun? Stupid.” Lucia grunted as I turned the key. The well-primed diesel engine coughed and roared to life. I flipped the switch for the lights, which drew the attention of all of the zombies—as well as Appalachia Rex and his men.
I revved the engine once and shifted it into gear. The MedCat had a very powerful engine and it kicked up a lot of smoke and dirt as the wheels spun out a little before finding traction. The MedCat slid sideways a little, then quickly straightened out as I barreled over a small group of zombies who were late to the party. I barely registered their impacts as I drove over them in the big armored truck. It was glorious. I preferred this method of killing zombies over any other I’d tried so far. With gore sticking to the windshield and more zombies trying to rush the truck, I decided it was time to get out of there. However, I had one more pass to make.
The image of Rex’s face when I shot him the bird as we drove past is one I’ll cherish forever.
Sideswiping a zombie and running over two more, I pressed the gas pedal as far as it could go. The big diesel engine roared in response. I’m almost certain another zombie was killed by the exhaust plume alone. A large crowd soon tried to follow us, but the armored MedCat was too fast and soon enough we left them behind. I guided the armored truck up State Road 60, cresting the large hill on the eastern half of the town. From what I could see behind us the zombies were falling behind in their pursuit. I had no idea what happened to Rex and his men but it seemed like pretty good odds they had bolted when the zombies had all charged the MedCat.
“Well, Rohena isn’t going to be happy,” I commented and slowed down as we passed the gas station she had wanted us to explore a few days before. It had been burned to the ground at some point and now was nothing more than a charred husk of a building. The roof had collapsed in during the fire and the front was completely gone. I counted six bodies near the fuel pumps, all burnt to a crisp. There were signs they’d been gnawed on a little, but with that much fire damage there wasn’t much left for a zombie to eat. “I seriously doubt there’s any bottled water or supplies in there.”
“Ay chi mama,” Lucia added. “I hope none of them were that cute boy Rohena liked.”
“Probably all zombies,” I guessed and turned onto I-64. From there we began to head west, the abandoned interstate only partially overgrown with kudzu here. Sticking towards the center of the freeway we passed over the Jackson River, the bridge well above where the mass of water surged when the damn gave way. It was still terrifying, though, since part of the opposite side of the road had fallen off sometime. One of the support beams must have failed on that side.
Once we were across the high bridge, we were home free. I knew the back way into the school was at Mile Marker 10, then we’d have to backtrack a bit to make it to the school. Before I could get off the freeway though, Lucia had me stop.
“Just . . . wait a sec, okay? Stop the tank,” she said. I obliged and parked the MedCat right there in the middle of the freeway. Looking over the fuel gauge, I was surprised to see it at almost full. Rex had gotten gas somehow. I made a quick mental reminder to ask Sister Ann about it.
“What’s up?” I asked her as I shut off the engine. No point in wasting fuel. We were completely safe inside the armored vehicle and had time to spare. Sister Ann and the other girls wouldn’t be able to return to the school for at least an hour. It wasn’t the shortest hike, even following the railroad tracks.
“We could go home,” Lucia whispered.
“We are,” I said. “We get off at the next mile marker exit and head back to school. This way is safest, just like Sister Ann said.”
“No,” Lucia shook her head and pointed straight down the freeway ahead. “I mean, home.”
“Oh.” She meant California, where our families were. It was over three thousand miles away. There was no way we could make it, not on one tank of gas. It was impossible. Yet . . . the temptation was too real. The idea of driving off, going home. Finding our families and discovering that they all somehow survived. We could use the armored MedCat to go anywhere and not worry about the zombies. Maybe Utah? I’d always wanted to go to Utah and see the mountains there.
I sighed. I knew they were gone. Los Angeles had a massive breakout before the rest of the country had even been infected. It was a mess. The last thing we’d heard over the shortwave before Sister Ann had made us turn it off was that L.A. was half-burned. Fires had torn though Chavez Ravine. The San Gabriel and San Fernando valleys had been devastated by structural fires. Even Orange County, my home, was ruined.
“It’s all gone,” I reminded her. “Our families. Our old lives. Even if we could go back, what would we find? Nothing will ever return to normal. Not the way it was. I know, deep down, my family’s gone. Yours? I don’t know. But . . . why not build something here, for them to come to? Maybe . . . I mean, if we could get lucky heading west, maybe they’ll head east, to us? Luck swings both ways, you know?”
“They wouldn’t make it,” Lucia said in a despondent voice. “My mama can’t drive. Mi padre is a horrible driver on a good day, and Tia Juanita’s car couldn’t even get out to Riverside. No, they’re stuck there, if they lived . . . which they probably didn’t. I don’t know, Maddie. I just want to go home.”
“I know. It’s a hard decision, but one we need to make. Tonight. So what’s it gonna be, chica?” I asked Lucia. “Head west, possibly make it all the way there, and find out what happened to our families? Or stay here, be the protectors of the younger girls, and maybe build something better for ourselves here?”
“Odio cuando tienes razón,” Lucia muttered in a quiet voice.
“No habla,” I told her. “White girl from the O.C., remember?”
“I hate it when you’re right,” she translated for me and let out a weary sigh. “Let’s get this tank back up to the school. I don’t think we need to worry about Appalachia Rex tonight. Not as long as we have his tank, and the bridge burned up.”
“Pretty sure it did. Plus, that was a lot of zombies drawn to the bonfire. As long as they’re not on their way up to the school already, we should be okay,” I reminded her as my mind drifted.
In my heart, I’d figured my family was dead months before, but I don’t think I’d really accepted it until that moment. The weight of it felt crushing on my chest. It hurt. As annoying as my brothers were, they were still my brothers and I loved them. My parents too, even if they’d shipped me off across the country to a private school to help me figure out who I was. I wiped my eyes as they started to burn from tears and tried to comfort Lucia instead of focusing on my own pain. Home wasn’t California anymore, not for either of us. “Besides, you know our families are probably . . . dead, right?”
“I know.”
“This is the safest place to be. At the school, I mean.”
“I know!”
“Hey, it’ll get better. The Marines are coming to rescue us.” I tried, but Lucia still appeared upset. It was hard to cheer someone else up while I was on the verge of bawling my eyes out as well. Humor had always been my fallback position. I decided on my one remaining option. “So . . . you wanna drive the tank back to the school?”
Lucia looked at me, a frown upon her face. She’d stopped crying at least. This was good. “I don’t have my driver’s license.”
“Neither do I. What, you worried about a ticket? Ha!”
Lucia was quiet, clearly intrigued by the idea. Her facial expressions ranged from curious to fearful, with a dash of excitement at the prospect of driving something like the MedCat. I couldn’t blame her for any of it. I recognized those facial tics. They were probably the same ones I had on my face when Sister Ann first suggested we steal the armored vehicle. Finally, she nodded once.
“You know what? Yeah, I want to drive the tank up back to the school.”
“Atta girl!”