Experiment Undead
Chapter 26

The morning following our uncomfortable slumber on flattened boxes, we are jolted awake by James’s exclamation of ‘Yee-hah!’ as he emerges from the office where we had dispatched the soulless the day before. Clutched in his hand is a device that resembles a walkie-talkie.

‘I just stumbled upon this beauty,’ James declares, bestowing a kiss upon the device.

Nate’s face lights up as he asks, ‘Is that a handheld CB radio?’

‘Indeed, it is,’ James confirms, flicking it on—a static-filled noise emits from the device but nothing else. ‘I’ll try channel thirty-five,’ James announces, toggling the switch. Once again, the only sound is static. ‘Well, at the very least, we can use it to communicate with the one I have installed in my truck,’ he adds. Nate nods, takes James’s radio and plays around with it.

I trail behind James to the truck, where he runs his fingers underneath the back tray until I hear a soft click. As if by magic, he pulls out a concealed drawer and flashes me a grin. Inside lay the precious bounty of deer meat, swaddled in a towel.

‘Does this truck hold any other secrets?’ I inquire, intrigued by the hidden compartment.

‘Plenty,’ James replies, his smile growing wider.

’Cool! Care to share? I prod, eager to know.

‘Not a chance,’ he retorts, his tone playful.

I furrow my brow in disappointment and follow him back inside for our meal.

Afterwards, I replace Nate sitting on the roof of the building with his map. I can sense the weight of his troubled thoughts. He sits with his back hunched, his shoulders tense, and his eyes fixed on the horizon. His fingers tap nervously on his thigh, revealing his restless state of mind.

‘Nate?’ I say. He jolts, not expecting me. ‘Sorry,’ I frown.

‘It’s fine,’ he says, but the worry lines on his forehead don’t disappear. He doesn’t look at me directly; his gaze drifts back to the map before him.

I sit beside him, ‘Is something troubling you?’ I ask.

‘Bacchus Marsh is less than an hour’s drive from here. It’s where I lived with my Dad. I can’t move on with my life until I at least face my father one last time. I need to know whether he’s still alive or infected and face him either way. I should go today,’ he says.

I see the conflict in Nate’s eyes, knowing he won’t rest until he faces his demons.

‘Let me go with you?’ I say to him as I stand up.

He bites his bottom lip and looks to the right in thought, then makes eye contact with me again, ‘Okay, let’s go,’ he says, standing.

I grab my rifle when we return inside the building and follow Nate as he approaches James.

‘I’m going to borrow your truck. I have something I need to tend to in Bacchus Marsh. I’ll be back before nightfall. Penny will be coming with me,’ Nate says to James.

James throws the set of keys to Nate, ‘Don’t damage my truck, and I want the tank full again when you return. Change the station on the car radio to channel twenty-eight. Then we can keep tabs on each other while you’re gone,’ he says.

Nate nods. As we leave the main building, I hear Oscar and Todd arguing in one of the rooms. Carrie is outside the room, leaning outside the door, with her arms crossed, smiling.

As I approach Carrie, Nate places his hand on my shoulder to stop me, ‘Let them figure their shit out. I’m sure Oscar can handle himself,’ Nate says.

I nod. I can always chat with Oscar when I return.

Nate gets in the driver’s seat. I climb up into the passenger seat beside him. He puts the radio on channel twenty-eight, picks up the mic, holds the button, and talks, ‘You hear me, James? Over,’ he says.

‘Yup, I hear you. Over.’

Nate holds the button again, ‘I’ll contact you when I’ve arrived at my destination, Over and Out,’ he says and puts the mic back.

‘No worries. Over and out,’ James replies.

For most of the drive, we see nothing but paddocks. We stop at one of the fields when we see hay barrels. We lift the end of one each, carry it to the truck and load it in the back.

‘Dreamer should get a good feed out of this,’ I tell Nate.

‘She’s probably starving. I saw Kate take her out this morning to graze on small patches of grass, but it would not have been enough to fill her,’ he replies.

As we continue on the road, our eyes are peeled for any signs of infected individuals. We soon notice several small groups of them scattered about, wandering in search of their next victims.

Each time we come across a small group, we stop the truck and hop out, our knives ready. We cautiously approach the soulless, trying to take them out as silently and efficiently as possible.

It’s a brutal task, but it might help others to survive with less soulless around.

Seeing so many dead bodies scattered about is gruesome, but we have become desensitised to the horror of it all.

We drive passed the Werribee Gorge. Mountains covered with trees with a lookout at the top. Suddenly Nate slams on the brake as an infected kangaroo jumps out from the brush and in front of the vehicle. The kangaroo has blood all over its face and down its front. Its eyes are dark and soulless. It’s still alive and digs its claws into the bonnet as it pulls itself back up to the windscreen, baring its teeth.

I quickly wind my window up in a panic.

Nate revs the accelerator, ‘Put your seat belt on,’ he says.

I quickly buckle up, and Nates floors the accelerator and slams into a tree, pinning the soulless kangaroo between the tree and the vehicle. He puts the brake on, steps out with his rifle, aims, and shoots it in the head. Its brains splatter all over the windscreen, ‘Really, Nate?’ I sigh.

Nate gets back in the truck and reverses. The kangaroo slides off onto the ground with a thud. He puts the windscreen wipers on, wiping away most of the blood, but it pushes the chunks of flesh around.

I give Nate a look, ‘What?’ he says.

I replace a rag tucked near the back window in a toolbox and pass it to Nate, ‘Here, at least wipe its brains off the windscreen,’ I tell him.

Nate takes it without saying anything and, using the rag, flick bits of the kangaroo’s flesh off the front of the truck, ‘Do you think James will be pissed when he sees the dints at the front?’

‘Yup,’ I smile at him.

‘I’m sure he’ll get over it,’ Nate replies.

‘I highly doubt that,’ I tell him.

‘We’ll see,’ he says.

‘So, we shall,’ I reply as he returns inside the truck.

As we arrive in Bacchus Marsh, three large men quickly approach the road and aim guns at us. Nate stops the truck and raises his hands, ‘You got those knives still tucked in your boots?’ he asks me.

‘And the handgun still tucked in behind me,’ I smirk.

‘Let’s show these men who’s boss then, shall we?’ I nod and also raise my hands in surrender.

‘Get out of the vehicle,’ the ugly brute in the middle shouts.

We open our doors and step out.

‘Kneel and put your hands on your heads!’ Ugly yells.

We kneel a metre apart next to each other and place our hands on our heads. Ugly struts passed us, going straight for the truck, while Smelly on my left grabs my arm and yanks me up.

‘Ever heard of a bath?’ I ask him in disgust.

The man next to Nate bursts into laughter, then places his foot on Nate’s back and pushes him to the ground with force, ‘Oomph,’ I hear Nate say as he faceplants the ground.

‘You probably should not have done that,’ I smile sweetly at the jerk.

‘Hmm, whys that?’ he asks, tilting his head at me.

‘You’ll see,’ I chuckle.

Smelly grabs the back of my hair, ‘I see we have ourselves a little smart ass here,’ he says.

As he says this, Nate swiftly grabs the knife hidden in his sleeve and slices across Jerk’s ankle. He shouts in pain and falls back as I kick Smelly in the nuts, simultaneously grabbing my knife from my boot. He lets go of my hair and drops his gun as he stumbles back, holding his balls. I squat down and stab him in the foot. He shouts in pain again and hobbles back, only for me to stab him in the other foot.

Smelly falls back, swearing at me, ‘You little bitch,’ he shouts.

I pick his gun up and throw it over for Nate to catch. As Jerk tries to stand up, Nate punches him in the stomach, then his face, knocking the brute back to the ground.

We spin around to face ugly with both handguns pointed at him.

Ugly aims my rifle he found in the truck at me and pulls the trigger a few times only to hear a clicking sound. He begins to shake with fear when nothing happens. I aim the gun lower and pull the trigger, shooting Ugly’s kneecap.

His screams of pain echo with the gunshot. Nate and I slowly approach him. I pick my rifle up and smile, ‘You forgot to take the safety off, Dumb ass,’ I say to him.

Ugly rocks, hugging his knee, ‘You pieces of shits!’ he shouts at us.

Nate pistol whips him across the face. A tooth flies out from his mouth.

‘That’s no way to speak to a young lady,’ Nate says, ‘Now apologise,’ he says to Ugly in a serious tone.

‘Fuck you,’ Ugly replies.

Nate raises the gun, pointing it to Uglies face, ‘I beg your pardon?’ Nate says.

‘I-I mean,’ Ugly quickly looks at me, his forehead dripping with sweat from fear. ‘I-I’m sorry,’ he says.

‘Sorry for what?’ Nate says, pushing the gun harder into his forehead, ‘I’m sorry for calling you a piece of shit,’ he says.

Nate sighs, ‘Let’s try this again. I am sorry for calling you a piece of shit, Miss Penny,’ Nate smiles.

‘Yes-yes,’ Ugly nods frantically, ‘I’m sorry, so sorry for calling you a piece of shit, Miss Penny,’ he says, pleading for his life.

‘That was pretty good,’ I smile. ‘Apology accepted, now for Smelly’s turn,’ I beam.

‘Now get the fuck out of here. You’ve got five seconds to get out of my face, or I’ll shoot your ugly mug off,’ Nate says to Ugly.

Ugly quickly stands and hops away in pain down the nearest road as quickly as possible.

As we approach Smelly, I notice Jerk is crawling away into the long grass. Nate grabs Smelly by the hair and drags him over next to Jerk, ‘Now, fellas, you both need to learn some basic manners on how to speak to a lady,’ he says and crouches in front of them, holding the handgun. Nate looks between them, ‘Now, which of you will apologise to Penny first?’

Jerk has both hands tightly gripped around his ankle to stop the bleeding, ‘We’re sorry, so sorry, Penny. Please don’t shoot me,’ Jerk begs.

‘Five seconds,’ Nate says to him.

Jerk doesn’t need an explanation as to what the five seconds mean. He already knows. He stands on his good leg and hops down the same road as Ugly.

We are left with Smelly, who has now just pissed his pants. Blood trickles out his shoes as he scuffles backwards away from us, ‘I’m sorry, Penny,’ he quivers, ‘I’m sorry,’ he trembles.

I twirl my knife around in my fingers and approach him. With my free hand, I grab a handful of his slimy hair and yank his head back. I slowly but gently glide my knife across his throat, so it doesn’t cut him.

‘I’m s-sorry,’ he says once more as tears run down his face. I lower my face to his ear and whisper, ‘So you should be,’ and roughly release my grip from his hair and walk back to the truck.

Nate follows and gets back in the driver’s seat. He smiles and takes the handgun Ugly left in the car when he had taken my rifle, ‘Sweet, another handgun,’ he says and tucks it in the back of his pants.

We casually drive further into the town of Bacchus Marsh. There are many dead soulless along the roads and in people’s yards. Nate turns left. There’s a trail of smoke rising in the air. As we drive closer, we notice a pile of infected bodies in a pile have been set alight. A few survivors are dragging more bodies toward the fire.

‘Keep your guard up, Penny. Don’t trust anyone,’ Nate says in a serious tone.

‘But they seem to be trying to clean the town up?’ I tell him.

‘Maybe,’ he says, staring at two men on his right, beating and robbing another man.

‘Shouldn’t we help him?’ I ask as we continue to drive past.

‘No, there are probably more of them nearby. We can handle three between us, but a whole gang is another story,’ Nate says.

‘It doesn’t feel right not helping him, though,’ I say, feeling guilty.

Nate narrows his eyes in concentration and adjusts his rear-view mirror. There’s another car behind us that has stopped to help the man.

‘Check this out,’ Nate says to me. ‘Something doesn’t feel right,’ he says.

‘Yeah, it’s called a guilty conscience, Nate,’ I say, shaking my head at him.

‘No, I’m serious, Penny,’ he says.

I undo my belt and turn around to watch out the back window.

Two men exit the car whilst aiming their guns at the other men. An unarmed woman exits the car. The woman goes to help the victim, but instead, he holds a gun to her head and laughs before shooting her point blank. I scream and cover my mouth in horror. The two men that had gotten out of the car to help are also shot in the head. The three men jump into the car and speed up behind us, ‘Nate,’ I say with fear.

‘I knew it was a trap. I knew it,’ Nate says.

‘Nate, they’re catching up behind us,’ I shout.

‘Maybe they’ll overtake and drive past us?’ he says, unsure.

‘What if they don’t?’ I reply, desperately looking around and punching the glove box. It opens to reveal a hand grenade.

We stare at each other in shock, ‘I swear, Penny, if you weren’t a cat in your past life, then you must have been Lady Luck,’ he says, leaning over to grab it.

‘See this pin? Pull it out but hold this trigger down. Don’t release the trigger until you’re ready to throw it. Hopefully, we won’t need to use it,’ he says.

I nod, hesitantly taking it from his hand. The car behind us beeps repetitively. One man hangs his head out the window, swearing profanities at survivors they drive past. The car rams into the back of our truck before it speeds up beside us. I quickly put my seat belt up and hold the grenade tightly in my lap. The driver gestures for me to wind my window down.

‘Do it,’ Nate tells me.

I roll the window down.

‘Hey blondie,’ the guy says, wiggling his eyebrows at me with interest.

‘What do you want?’ I snap at him as I discreetly wipe the tear from my face, thinking of that poor woman and her friends, or maybe one of them was her husband and the other her brother. I’ll never know.

‘Ooh, I like a woman who gets straight to it. Maybe you should be riding with me, a real man instead of that scrawny pipsqueak?’ he says.

Nate tightens his grip on the steering wheel in anger.

I glare at the driver, ‘I’m only twelve years old, you perverted creep!’ I shout.

His mates in the back laugh. He glowers his eyes at me and pulls a handgun out as he continues to drive beside us, ‘What the fuck did you just call me?’ he says angrily.

I smile at him and discreetly pull the pin from the grenade and hold the trigger down.

One of his mates pats him on the shoulder, ‘Dude, she doesn’t even seem the least bit afraid of you,’ he laughs.

I ignore the comment and continue to smile, ‘I said, catch this,’ I say to him, tossing the grenade through his window.

‘What the fuck did she throw in here?’ the other man says.

Their car swerves as the dick head driver feels around the car’s floor and holds up the grenade. His eyes widen, ’Oh shit! - ’the grenade explodes in his hand.

Nate slams on the accelerator to distance us as much as possible from the explosion. The force propels us through a low brick front fence as debris from the car’s explosion flies all other the road and onto the rooves of houses. Nate extended his arm out in front of me to stop me from flying into the dashboard.

It takes me a moment to realise I’m still clinging onto his arm tightly against my chest as my fingernails dig into his skin.

‘My arm,’ Nate says, with a heavy breath.

I look down and quickly release his arm, ‘Sorry,’ I frown.

‘Are you okay? Are you hurt?’ he asks.

I shake my head, ‘No, it just feels like I’m about to have a heart attack after that, though,’ I tell him breathlessly.

‘Same,’ he says, trying to calm his breathing and holding his hand to his chest.

Suddenly something lands on the truck’s bonnet, making us both jolt in fright.

We stare silently at the arm through the window for at least a whole minute until Nate turns the windscreen wipers on to brush it off, but instead, it smudges blood everywhere. I give Nate the “Are you serious?” look and hand him the old rag, again, which is the same one I gave him earlier to remove the chunks of kangaroo flesh.

Nate rolls his eyes, takes the rag, gets out of the truck, and scrunches his face in disgust as he removes the arm and places it on the nearest letterbox. I shake my head at him, but he smiles and returns to the car.

‘So,’ he says, ‘Where were we?’

‘We were going to your Dad’s house,’ I remind him with a raised eyebrow.

Nate nods, with a nonchalant expression, ‘Yes, that’s right. Buckle up, then,’ Nate says as if we’ve had the most normal day ever.