Aliens Versus Zombies by Mark Terence Chapman

stab or a machete to hack off a limb. It took quite a while for some of them to understand, but eventually they did.
    Although not able to put the thought into words, he recognized that The Pack would now be better able to find food and protect its territory against other packs.
    Even that strange new pack of golden foods.

Chapter Five
     
    Ex-Sgt. Daniels, USMC Retired, struggled to get his shoes on in the dark. It wasn’t yet dawn but he didn’t want to turn on the lights.
    “Chick, honey, come back to bed.” Her voice was slurred from too much drink and not enough sleep.
    “Sorry, babe. Didn’t mean to wake you. I’ll have to hump it to get to work on time.”
    “Why don’t you come over here and hump me, instead?” He barely understood her words, with her face half-buried in the pillow.
    He laughed softly. “Patty, you’re insatiable! Believe me, I wish I could stay. But I gotta get to work. Same time Friday?”
    A muffled “Sure,” emanated from the pillow.
    Daniels leaned over the bed and kissed her on the cheek. She’d already fallen back asleep. She’d been another in a long string of easy lays, but he really liked this one. They had been dating off and on for two months.
    He smiled as he closed her front door behind him.
    It had been a wild night of clubbing and crazy hot sex. Two days later, all hell broke loose and he never saw her again. That was also the last time he’d gotten laid.
    “Your watch, Sarge.” Moose Villa waited for Daniels to yawn and stretch and grab his gun, before taking his place in the cot to catch a few winks before morning. “Good dream?”
    Daniels yawned again before replying. “Good memory.”
     
    * * * *
     
    Moose had grown up in a poor neighborhood, where preteens were often bullied by older kids and joined street gangs for protection. He’d been lucky. Always big for his age, he’d fought back and kicked the shit out of some of the bullies. After that, they left him alone.
    It seemed everyone was either in a gang, or beat up by the gangs for not being in one. As a result, he joined the 49 th Street Hoodlums when he was fourteen. It wasn’t that he wanted to, but he was now old enough that to not join would show disrespect for the gang in their eyes. Gangs that felt disrespected tended to get angry and the last thing he wanted to do was anger the 49 th Street Hoodlums. They had a reputation for gunning down people they didn’t like in drive-bys—usually in front of other people, to ensure their reputation as the biggest bad-asses around stayed intact. If they offered you membership, they’d threaten your family if you declined.
    So he joined. He’d managed to avoid jail, despite a string of crimes he’d had to commit: armed robbery and B&E, auto boosting, and enforcing for protection money. The main reason he’d never been incarcerated, although arrested several times, was that the victims were so afraid of the Hoodlums they somehow always managed to forget what the perps looked like. As a result, none of the charges stuck.
    He hated himself for participating in those things. He told himself he was protecting his family. He knew that was mostly true. There was also the adrenaline rush from getting away with a heist. He hated himself even more because of it.
    For him, the zombie apocalypse was almost a blessing. Sure, it killed everyone he knew, including his family, but it freed him from that life. Six months into the apocalypse, scratching and clawing his way through life and, doing whatever he could to survive, he ran into Sarge and Chrissy.
    Since then he’d tried to do the right thing. He didn’t always know what the right thing was, but he did his best.
     
    * * * *
     
    The Pack closed in on a rival pack, visible in the light of the full moon. They inched within twenty yards of the store where the other pack was holed up before being spotted. A sentry shrieked and howled and woke the others. The Pack charged and within seconds the two groups