Humanity's Death: A Zombie Epic by D.S. Black Page A

couldn’t scream. The dead old man moved closer, crawling
with blood dripping, creating a bloody trail. They held each other
now.
    They held each tight as they could for the last
time.

Chapter
Three: A Ghastly Return
    1
    Back in the pontoon, the swampy trees surrounded
Jack. In them, a gloomy darkness seemed to scream loneliness. Down
the narrow river the pontoon sped; and all around the innumerable
trees, with their thick trunks, hid what might be an unseen fear—a
hidden violent multitude, just waiting, hungry for the taste of
flesh. In that solitude, there was nothing to do but sit still and
think. Think about what was happening all over the world. How bad
was it in other nations? What about the west coast? How much of the
population now roamed flesh eating zombies? Can any of the Old
World be saved, resurrected from this deathly squalor?
    Jack looked at Candy. Her head was down, staring
at the floor of the boat. He could sense her sanity cracking like a
dam about to flood the once fertile, happy lands of her mind.
    His glasses slipped down; he pushed them back
up.
    Was his sanity slipping as well? Would his mind
come crashing down like a shattered wine glass against dark, black
stone?
    He watched Andrew guiding the boat. The thin
shoulders of his cousin were hunched; an unseen weight pressed upon
them.
    A flock of black birds screamed out of the trees
to Jack's right; they flew high in the sky like a ominous black
cloud. He thought of Jenny from Forest Gump asking God to make her
a bird so she could fly far far away. The birds were safer than any
human; that was for certain; able to fly and go as they pleased;
the world now belonged to them and the dead; it belonged to the
crows and the gators, the wild things of the night.
    The black water swirled around the boat. The sun
was rising like a hell's beacon; a fire strip across the sky. His
stomach rumbled; he hadn't eaten in almost twenty four hours; at
least not a decent meal, he'd only picked at the food Okona gave
them. He felt weak and tired. He wanted to sleep.
    Up ahead, he could see their small swampy
home.
    2
    Back at the shack, the trees enveloped Jack in
lonely shadow like a forgotten ghost. He watched his cousins enter
that rickety home. Candy’s maddening scream made him jump. His neck
tensed and his heart pounded. He ran for the house. His feet
crunched into leaves and soft swampy earth. Her screams persisted—a
loud tearful bellow, hell's siren call.
    Jack darted in. His heart stopped. My mind went
numb.
    Candy laid on her knees screaming out of her
mind. Andrew sat in a corner not saying a word, just watching, void
of emotion.
    Two little girls, piled on top of each other,
ripped open; and Jack's dear ole granddad, dead as can be, savoring
their entrails, one bloody handful at time.
    Jack fell to his knees, his glasses slipped off
and cracked on the blistered wood floor. He saw his reflection in
the broken glass; and stared back at his shattered self. He saw his
hand reach down, and remove his pistol. He held it by his side, and
stared with hopeless eyes. He breathed in deeply as he lifted the
pistol with a shaky hand, placing it against his temple.
    Hidden deep within a swamp, far from the world
outside, he still couldn’t save them; in a world set with only
tragedy, horror, and depravity—no man can live, no humanity can
shine. In a world where the living and the dead walk, there is no
place for good men to stand.
    He knew it had to end; so he squeezed the cold
steel trigger.
    3
    Candy’s mind was slipping. Her thoughts a grave yard
of growing instability as she dragged Jack to his bed. He was
bleeding badly; but he’d done a poor job of killing himself. She’d
seen failed suicide attempts like this before. A gun to the temple
was not always the best way to do it. The gun can slip just a bit
and only leave a nasty graze. She quickly applied a bandage, but
did nothing else then.
    She walked back into the living room. Her
thoughts wheeled quickly