The Adventures of Steve and Terry: The Zombie Chronicles by Mark de Jong

guys just gonna leave us
here?!” Sean asked, shocked.
    Steve and Terry started to leave,
but Steve stopped and pulled his tomahawk. He cut the counter weight and Sean
collapsed face first to the ground. He quickly got his leg free and moved to
Mike. By the time he got the bola cut, the two pudgy men had disappeared, like
phantoms—or demons.
    “What in the hell just happened?”
Jake asked from under the net.
    “Those guys were a few cards shy
of a full deck,” Mike said as he and Sean got the net off of Jake.
    “Uh, you think?”
    “Come on, let’s get going, we can
still get back to base by nightfall,” Sean said.
    The group shrugged off their
encounter with the unbalanced “demons” and made their way back to their base
camp. They moved cautiously, knowing the dead were more active at night. They
were close to the office building basement they used as base when a group of
undead rushed from a side alley and ambushed them.
    The group fired wildly. Sean
unloaded all five rounds of his shotgun. Both Jake and Mike unloaded their
pistols as well. More and more dead swarmed. The group reloaded on the fly,
running as fast as they could. Another zombie stumbled out of an empty parking
garage and collided with Jake. The man twisted away from the creature as he
fell, but his knee snapped like a twig. Jake screamed in pain as he hit the
ground. Sean spun and took the zombie’s head off with a quick shot. He rushed
to Jake, but the man could barely stand.
    “We gotta find a place to hole
up,” Sean said to Mike as he helped support Jake.
    “Just a liability,” Mike said.
    “What?” Sean asked in shock.
    “I’m not gonna let him slow me
down.” With that Mike turned and jogged off into the growing darkness.
    “Asshole!” Sean yelled after him.
    They heard the moan of the
pursuing undead. The two stumbled along, Jake trying to keep quiet even though
his leg was causing him excruciating pain. They wound their way through side
streets and small alleys. They emerged from one such alley and came face to
face with a lifted truck. To their shock the vehicle sat idling. Both looked at
each other, not sure what to make of it.
    Sean helped Jake into the
passenger seat and then climbed into the driver’s seat. He looked around, but
saw no one nearby. Without a second thought he put the truck in gear and sped
off.
    Steve and Terry emerged from a
nearby convenience store hauling a slurpee machine. Both stopped when they got
to the street and looked around, confused.
    “Oh, you’ve got to be kidding me!”
Terry said angrily.
    “Hey, it was your idea to
leave it running this time.”
    “This is ridiculous! Twice in as
many days! Really?”
    A zombie suddenly stumbled onto
the street. Steve dropped his end of the slurpee machine and pulled his
tomahawk. He quickly buried the blade in the zombie’s skull. As the creature
collapsed he looked at it curiously.
    “Hey Terry, doesn’t this look
kinda like one of those guys we ran into?”
    Terry walked over and looked down
at the zombie. He hadn’t been turned more than a few hours at most. From the
hair, he looked ex-military. “Yeah, it does.”
    Both looked at each other and then
shrugged. They abandoned the slurpee machine and disappeared into the night.
     
    Dave looked out into the dark
night. Before the plague of the undead, nighttime in the city was just a
different kind of light. The city was never truly dark, ever. But now it was as
dark as a tomb. He looked up through the window of the office building, where
his small group was seeking shelter, to the stars. They were so bright now. He
had never really seen them before; of course he had never really looked up
before.
    Dave had been an investment banker
before the apocalypse, and he had been a damn good one. When the plague first
hit he had been at the office, watching riots in small towns in nowhere
America. As the plague had escalated he had gotten a gun, like everyone else, intent
on survival, and holed up in