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TO HELL WITH YOUR DUMBASS, ZOMBIE FLAG!

(Image taken from: spencersonline.com) 

“Are you sure people are even in there?” Lou the zombie, formerly Louis Federici of Little Falls, New Jersey, asked.

“Yes,” Jeff the zombie, formerly Jeffrey Eloy of Allentown, Pennsylvania said.
He held his only eye out with his outstretched hand so he could see even farther from the bushes. He stared at a lone cabin that stood completely in the dark.

 Ever since the viral outbreak occurred and the undead began to outnumber the living, it’s been harder and harder to find a decent meal. It was literally a zombie apocalypse since zombies were the ones starving to death and dying off. Every human who wasn’t completely consumed by a zombie became a zombie themselves, and thus the curse continued. If there could be any comparison in human history to the zombie’s plight, it would be that of the potato famine of 1845. Except instead of potatoes, zombies missed out on spleens, flesh, and brains. There could never be enough brains for the zombie population. Whenever something was seen as inventive or new, zombies said that it was the best thing since sliced brains. A picture of a brain even adorned the zombie’s international flag. It was international because zombies had taken over the world, of course. How could they not? There were so many of them!

Lou licked his decayed, corroded lips just thinking about brains.

“I’m starvin’, Jeff! Can’t we just go in there and get them already?”

            “No!” Jeff ordered. His remaining seven teeth chattered in his skull. Winter wasn’t kind to the zombie. Summer wasn’t either, as zombie skin melted and festered underneath the odious sun, but winter was the worst. During wintertime, you found thousands of zombies face down in the dirt. And they weren’t napping or looking for worms, that’s for sure.

“You think I ain’t hungry?” Jeff barked. “The last time I ate was with you. But you have to be patient, man. Those humans in there ain’t suckers. They can’t be if they made it this long.”

Zombies took over the world over twenty years ago.

            “And you’re sure there are four of them in there?” Lou asked.

            “Yeah. And a dog. It’s the dog I’m actually worried the most about. When have you ever heard a dog be so quiet when zombies were around?”

            “Never,” Lou said.

            “They must have that damn thing trained to kill. Even with a muzzle on, we’d hear it growling, right?”

            Jeff stuck his eye back in his face, twisting it back and forth like a light bulb. The last thing he wanted was to lose the only eye he had left. A crow got his other eye. But at least he still had all of his limbs, unlike Lou, who missed a right arm and part of his left knee cap. He never told Jeff how he lost his arm or how part of his knee was missing, and Jeff never asked him what happened. A zombie’s missing limbs was their own personal business. That was one of the few things they actually still had and could call their own in today’s society—secrets.  

            “I’m going in,” Lou said and he got up. Jeff brought him right back down with him.

            “Now don’t be a damn fool, Lou. We’re going to wait here until they go to sleep.”

            “And how do you know they ain’t already sleeping?”

            “Because they haven’t started a fire yet. They wouldn’t go to sleep in this kind of weather without a fire. They’d freeze to death. But they’re trying to trick us and make us think that they’re not in there.”

            “I wish I had seen them go in there,” Lou said, shaking his head.

            “Why? You don’t believe I really saw them?”

            “No, I believe you.”

            “Because if you don’t believe me, then you can go look for your own damn family to munch on.”

            “No, I believe you. I believe you!” Lou exclaimed. “I ain’t saying anything against you. I’m just saying.”

            “You ain’t saying nothing,” Jeff said. “So just shut the hell up and stay down. “I tell you there’s a family of four in there, and I plan to fill my belly up with them tonight. When they start a fire, that’s when we make our move and not a second before.”

“But what about the dog?”

“Well, I hadn’t really figured that out yet.”

The truth was, though, Jeff had figured it out, and long ago at that. Lou did have another arm, after all, and he really didn’t need it, especially with Jeff looking out for him. As soon as they caught the people by surprise, Jeff planned to push Lou on the dog and go after the family himself. He hadn’t really gotten a great look at them, but he saw that two of the members were little girls who couldn’t be more than ten years old. He saw the family running through the woods earlier in the day and followed them the best he could, dragging his dead leg quickly across the snow. When they went in the cabin, he saw that they carried light. The father was a slim, bald man with a rifle on his back, but Jeff didn’t see any more weapons with the family; though, they could have always been packing pistols. That’s why surprise was imperative in this situation. Hopefully, they hadn’t seen him following them as he kept close to the trees. And thank Heaven, if such a place even exists (Note: whenever a zombie mentions or even thinks of Heaven or an afterlife, they immediately follow it with—“If such a place even exists.”), Lou hadn’t been with him at the time when Jeff saw them. Lou, as good as he’d been as a companion, wasn’t the best when it came to stealthy matters, as he was loud and bumbling, just like most zombies. He had been down by the river at the time Jeff saw the family, washing his rags. Zombies didn’t like to stink if they didn’t have to, and for all of Lou’s faults, and least he was pretty clean. For a zombie, anyway.

            “Wait, what was that?” Lou asked suddenly, and Jeff heard it, too. It was a rustling noise, but a bit farther off.

            “That wasn’t you, right?” Jeff asked.

            “No, I didn’t move.”

            “Crap,” Jeff whispered.

            It must be other zombies. Jeff hadn’t seen any out here since he came so deep in the woods about a month ago and he didn’t think he would see any zombies, either. Most zombies stayed closer to the cities as the last bit of people hid out in the malls and warehouses, making their stand in wide open spaces with lots of supplies. The forests were especially dangerous because there wasn’t much wildlife left, and thus, not much food available. Only a true survivalist would hide out in the woods, since most of the animals that hadn’t already become extinct, either hibernated or flew to warmer climates in the wintertime. It was a big gamble to stake out a forest, especially in the winter, but Jeff had taken that bet, and it looked like he was finally going to be rewarded as no zombies hid out in a forest.

            So who the Hell—if such a place even exists—were these jerks?  

            Jeff stood up and saw seven zombies shambling toward him.

            “Just great,” he said.

            “I knew we should have gone in sooner,” Lou whined. “Now we’re going to have to share with them.”

            Zombies have no use for money. They deal in human flesh instead. That said, zombies aren’t Capitalists in the flesh department. On the contrary, zombies are more like Communists, as they get an equal share of human flesh when they find it. It’s probably the reason that zombies are almost extinct in the first place. It’s rare that a zombie would travel by oneself or in low numbers like Lou and Jeff did, as humans had no problem wasting zombies in low quantities. A zombie’s strength is in numbers. So it would only make sense that the undead would share with the horde for that sense of protection. But this is the biggest problem with zombie-kind and why they’re all dying off, as they don’t starve as one, they starve as a group. So if one starves, then they all starve, which was what was going on with zombie-kind from continent to continent.  

            It’s too bad that animals were now so hard to come by, as animals weren’t half bad. Especially deer. Venison was awesome.

            It also sucked that zombie skin was so nasty and rough, because they’d have an unlimited source of protein if they only ate each other.

            “Hello,” the lead zombie said. His ribcage was fully exposed as he wore no shirt, even in this cold weather. The undead behind him were just as malnourished. Some of them were even children. Jeff didn’t know that children even existed anymore. But then he remembered the two young girls inside the cabin. Yes, they too would become zombies if he didn’t eat them whole, which he intended to.

            “Hi,” Jeff muttered to the lead zombie, extending his hand.

            “We saw them first!” Lou exclaimed.

            “Lou!” Jeff shouted.

            “It’s alright,” the head zombie wheezed. He sounded a million years old if not older. “We’ve been watching you for quite some time and just wanted to know when you planned to make your move.

“Soon,” Jeff said.

The lead zombie looked at Lou since he scowled so openly.

“Why are you so angry, young man?”

            “Because I’m starving!” Lou said. “Why do you think?”

            “Lou!” Jeff barked again. God—if such a deity should exist—Lou could be such a child sometimes.

            “Hey,” another one of the seven zombies said. “What do you think this is, huh? We’re all starvin’ here. You can’t just have them for yourselves, ya know.”

            “There’s no need to be upset,” the lead zombie said. “So let’s not raise our voices or cause a scuffle. Even if there is only one person in there, we still share, you know that. That’s the zombie creed after all: ‘One for you, one for me, one for every zombie!’” He laughed and began to cough. A young woman with no breasts and clear, white eyes rubbed his back.

            In truth, Jeff was just as peeved as Lou, but he held his corroded tongue. Even though zombies didn’t eat each other, it didn’t mean that they didn’t fight each other. They were once human, after all. And Jeff liked keeping his limbs.

            “So, what do you know about the occupants inside?” the lead zombie asked. “My name is Jeremy, by the way, and these are my friends. We’ve come from the city.”

            “Hi, Jeremy,” Jeff grumbled. “There are four humans inside.”

            He neglected to mention the dog.

            “I see, and what’s our plan of attack?” Jeremy asked. 

            “What do you mean, what’s our plan of attack?” the hot-headed zombie from before asked. “We rush them and eat them like we always do. There’s nine of us and four of them. The odds are in our favor.”

            “No,” Jeremy said. “This one, what’s your name?” he asked Jeff.

            “Todd,” Jeff lied.

            “Todd here is in charge of this mission. He found the people first, after all. What do you think we should do about these people, Todd?”

            “I think we should wait until they light a fire,” Jeff said, who was gaining more confidence the more he thought out this plan. It was true that more zombies meant less food for him and Lou, but it also meant that they didn’t have to contend with the dog and Lou could keep his remaining arm. They just had to find a way to ditch these dweebs when this was all over.

            “You want to wait until they light a fire?” Jeremy asked with fear in his jaundiced eyes. Along with a good sharp object to the skull, fire was a zombie’s worst enemy.

            “I’m thinking that’s when—”

            But then, it all happened in a flash. A low, dark shadow, rushed through the night from the cabin. A second later, a zombie fell backward as a dog bit into his arm. The dog didn’t even bark when it attacked. What kind of dog was this?

            “Move, move, move!” The skinny man Jeff saw earlier with the rifle, said, and he rushed out the door. He aimed his rifle and fired.

            POW! The gun popped.

            Just like that, the hot-headed zombie had black blood spurting from his head. He went down like lead.

            “Take your positions,” the man said, and the wife and their two little girls rushed out and stood side by side. The father fired again with the rifle and the other three shot pistols.

            They weren’t leaving the cabin. They were defending it!

            Of course, this had been their plan all along. Round up as many starving zombies as possible and then shoot them like ducks in a barrel.

            All Jeff heard was the zombie screaming on the ground as the dog tore away at his arm and whipped it back and forth. The zombie’s rasping call for help droned on and on as he died from fear and blood loss.

            “Somebody kill that damn dog!” Jeff screamed.

            But the other zombies already retreated, staggering backward as the family of four continued to shoot at them.

            “Die, you undead scum!” the father yelled over his rifle blast.

POW!

The daughter next to him, who was about at his hip, screamed it, too, as she shot from her revolver.

            “Die, you undead scum!”

            Two more of the zombies went down, including Jeremy, and the blood spilled from their skeletal chests like lava.

            “We got to get out of here!” Lou screamed, and Jeff seconded that notion.

            As soon as they retreated, the dog was off the other zombie and right on top of Lou.

            It tore into his backside and ripped his spine right out with its teeth. Lou cried as loud as he could, but died almost instantly.

            Jeff began to stagger away, but a bullet shot through the back of his shoulder and sent him spinning to the ground.

            How had everything gone awry so quickly?

            “I got him, daddy!” Jeff heard in the distance from the ground. “I got him!”

Great. Shot down by a ten year old girl.

            “Excellent shot, pumpkin,” the father said. “But next time, aim more for the head.”

            “I will, daddy,” she said proudly.

            “Help,” Jeff moaned, but the other zombies were either dead or had already deserted him. He dragged his way on the ground, and the dog growled at him. It crept closer and closer.

            “Down, Kujo!” the man called, and just like that, the black dog sat.

            The father walked over to Jeff and when he got to him, he pointed his rifle right down in his face.

            “We’re taking this world back from you undead scum,” the father said. “To hell with your dumbass, zombie flag.”

            The last thing Jeff saw was the blast of the rifle.

            Whatever he saw after that, only God— if such a deity should exist —knows for sure.

END