The next morning Rob was waiting outside my gate with a pistol and a scoped 30.06. As Rob and I drove down the highway toward Chico, we didn’t meet any other cars. That is until we neared our exit, there was a pickup in the center divider in the opposite set of lanes. The driver was out of the truck wandering around on the highway median. As we drove past him he looked at us and I could see him in my rear view mirror stumbling in pursuit of us. We turned on to East Ave. without seeing any other vehicles and headed west. There was a tool store and a super market about two miles from the freeway. Pulling into the parking lot I spotted the first Zombie, a girl in the apron of a grocery store clerk stumbled in our direction. The front of her apron was soaked in blood and her head tilted awkwardly to the left. You could see the massive wound on the right side of her neck as her hair swung in rhythm to her shuffle. As she advanced on us I could smell urine…I guess Rob was starting to get the idea that this was serious. I jumped out and climbed into the truck bed. I asked Rob to slide over and drive toward the supermarket and stop just outside the doors. When we came to a stop I jumped out of the truck bed, brought up my 12 gauge and fired. The girl flew backwards several feet, but sat up and started to regain her feet. The second shot took her full in the face. She flopped backward and lay still.
"What are you doing!" shouted Rob "you can’t just shoot people; she needed help, not shot."
"Well, when the cops get here I’ll tell them I did it and you didn’t have anything to do with it" I said as I reloaded the shotgun. "Look at the wound on her neck. Do you think she would be walking around the parking lot if she was just sick? And did you see how she got up after a shotgun blast to the chest at what 10 feet? Put your pistol in your pocket and let’s shop. Maybe shopping will relax you, by the way I think you spilled something in your lap" I told him.
I pushed open the door and waited for Rob. There was a body lying across the first counter. The sound of running feet brought my attention to a carrier coming in our direction at full speed. I brought up the shotgun and pulled the trigger. I hit it in the chest and it staggered and fell. The next Zombie was shuffling toward me at a much slower rate. I racked a round and shot it in the face and it crumpled to the floor. The original Zombie slowly got to its feet and staggered toward me. My next round blew most of its head off. It finally went down and stayed down. By now a third Zombie was shuffling toward me, I brought up the shotgun and blew its head off. I looked at Rob and said, "Take a note Rob, just like in the movies, head shots".
I pulled a cart from the rack, and glancing at Rob I said, "Grab a cart fill it with as many canned goods as you can push, stay close and keep a watch out for anyone". Rob got his cart and numbly followed me to the canned foods aisle. We saw three other of the slower moving kind but before they could reach us I dropped them with head shots. We pushed our first cart loads back to the truck. We loaded my truck two carts loads at a time. After loading the truck with six or eight cart loads of canned goods, all of the flour and corn meal, all of the rice and beans we had a full truck bed.
I looked at Rob and said, "Well I think we may have a load, can you think of anything you need?" Before I could say lets go, Rob ran back into the store. I heard two shots, but as I started toward the store to investigate, I met Rob carrying eight 12 packs of beer. "Soda would have been good" I said. He quickly ran back and returned with several 12 packs of cola. As Rob fired up the truck, we saw a group of 5 of the fast Zombies and a couple of the slower type. I guess they must have been drawn by the shooting. The first two bounced off of the brush guard on the front of the truck. Although they were fast, they couldn’t match the trucks speed. As we hit the on ramp for the freeway, I glanced back and noticed they were still running after us. Four miles later when the road narrowed to two lanes I asked Rob to stop. In about ten minutes I could just make out the three fastest ones loping up the road in our direction. I remember the news reports of the mob that chased vehicles for miles.
"Rob, we need to kill them before they follow us home", I told him. Rob nodded his head in agreement and put the truck into reverse and backed toward the approaching Zombies. Rob stopped the truck and I got out of the cab with his rifle. Kneeling on the road, I shot all three of the Zombies. Rob saw one of the things sit up and look in our direction. "You must have missed him" He told me. I got out of the truck and walked back to the one getting to his feet. I put a round in his head and he dropped back to the pavement. After a quick visual I pulled the .38 from my pocket and put a single round in the other two zombie’s heads. "What was that for?" Rob asks. "I shot him in the chest and he got back up, it seems they only stay dead with head shots", I told Rob. "OK", was all Rob said.
We arrived back at the Drying shed about 2:00 pm. The trip to town and back had taken about five hours. We parked the truck and I reached into the bed and grabbed a 12 pack. I removed 6 of the beers and tossed the rest to Rob." Make sure you stay sober enough to defend yourself" I told him. "That’s not an order just a suggestion". Rob laughed and he and I headed back to our respective homes on foot. When we reached my drive way, I asked "Need a ride Rob?" With the most serious look I had seen on his face, Rob said, "Naw, I’ll walk. Look man, I’m sorry, I didn’t understand how scary it was out there, I’ll do whatever is needed" Rob said and extended his hand to me. I grasp Robs hand and told him "No problem man. I know it was had to believe without witnessing it for yourself."
As I entered the yard, Jack came out onto the porch smiling. Jack filled me in on the results of the crew that had gone to raid the road work staging yard. Jack said they had returned with about 2000 feet of fencing and several hundred posts. They located another 4000 feet of fencing and the cement to set their posts, but that would require several more trips to retrieve it all. They also brought back Johnny’s cousin, his wife, and four kids. There was an empty house next door to Johnny’s where all of them could setup house keeping. In the staging yard the crew had also found a 50 Kw diesel generator. There was a couple hundred gallons of diesel stored there as well. We should be able to keep our water pumps running and house lights working for months with a little conservation.