Zombie Files: Maya's Calendar

 Photo: andywarthol.com

Summer 1: Skulls and Fire
I miss my mom and my little brother more than I can handle. Practically every day I cry harder and harder because I know that they are never coming back. The world isn't coming back. All of my hopes and dreams, including finishing high school, will never happen. I will never see my mom again or laugh at my brother's corny jokes. I will never go on more dates or ever get married. Sometimes I wish that I had the guts to kill myself. Any place is better than now. I have survived two years alone. In the times that I had companionship, it was usually against my will. The dead walking seems normal to me now. There are ten times as many Mannys than live humans. The people left behind have to endure the hell that remains. I have only one mission. I must get to New York...
~Maya

Photo: tripinfo.com

The world was over. The apocalypse came and spit out evil in every corner of the planet. People died, but that was only the half of it. In fact, the dead have the best deal out of the bargain. It was the living who were in jeopardy. Everyone seemed surprised that it actually happened, even after the total collapse of the world economies. Even after the multitude of vindictive sermons that haunted the souls with damnation and hellfire. Preachers from all over the South held thick Bibles in the faces of the nonbelievers. People who had lost their sanity began to sacrifice their innocent family members once the dead reanimated. The smell alone brought many people to their knees. It was the only thing that was constant. The stench was a reminder that time was still ticking towards oblivion. No matter how much you drank, cried, or closed your eyes, the smell always remained. It was the only thing that you never got used to. No one got used to it. Maya was no exception.

Talk about timing. The blistering Miami sun was directly above Maya's scarred, tanned body. The swamp had submerged her waist deep in mud and water. Her white tank top was stained with mud, sweat, and blood. Dragonflies buzzed quickly around her sweaty, dark-brown hair as other insects chirped and hummed to the sweltering haze of summer. "Figures. I'm stuck." Maya's words carried a small echo from the swamp and into the small forest in front of her. She crouched and plunged both hands into the murky water. "If I get eaten," she sighed, "I hope it's an alligator that does it, not a damned Manny." With one giant yank, Maya pulled up a decent sized tree branch. It was just a little smaller than a Louisville Slugger. The downside was that she had fallen on her ass. "You've got to be shittin' me!" Maya screamed as she frantically tried to rub out mud from her thick hair. She was only making things worse. Her kicking and screaming had managed to sink her into the mud. She was stuck. "Fuck," Maya said as she rubbed sweat off, and mud on, her forehead. That's when she heard the groaning. Talk about timing.

Before the world went all Halloween sans candy, Maya was a normal high school junior. She was on the track team and had a 3.1 GPA. Her only distractions were senior boys and her competitive nature. During her three years at North Valley High School, Maya had placed first in short and long distance running. She waited patiently for her senior year so that she could compete on the varsity level. Unfortunately, that would never happen. All of Maya's hard work, however, was not going to waste. Her athletic figure made her as sleek as a panther compared to the Mannys.

Maya's muscles instantly tensed up at the sound of shuffling feet and displaced groans. She stopped focusing on self-pity and started to focus on survival. Two years alone in hell had turned an innocent seventeen year-old girl into a predator. Although she kept it a secret, she was beginning to enjoy her fights with them. This was not her first encounter with the dead by a long shot. She was determined not to make it her last.

"Three Mannys." Maya used all of her strength to get on her feet. Even though her boots were still stuck, at least she was standing. The tree branch was clutched tightly in her hands. The first dead walker stumbled quickly towards her. Its head was slightly crushed at the top and the skull was showing. Dark, dried blood covered its grey face. Three brown teeth could be seen from the darkness of its groaning mouth. "Hmm. This one's too easy," Maya said as she started to wind up the branch like a bat. She was excited to see some carnage. "This is it, ladies and gentlemen! The bases are loaded and the pitcher is confident. The batter, Maya Puerto, has never missed a pitch!" She took a swing. KA-RAAK! The wooden branch and the zombie's head connected with tremendous force and splintered into a mist of skull bits and cranial fluid. The smell of rotten meat intensified as the brain matter sprayed. "And the crowd goes wild," Maya yelled with both arms raised to the sky. Then she immediately hunched over and vomited. She could never get used to the smell.

There were only two left. Maya had destroyed her weapon and was back on the defensive. The swamp had made it impossible to run, even for her physique. As she wiped her mouth and tried to lift her legs out of the mud, the dead kept lurching forward. They seemed deliberately slow with their approach. "Seriously, this has to be the lamest way to die in this hellhole," Maya said as she gritted her teeth. She was trapped and there were about four good seconds between her and the hungry dead. The second one entered the swamp with her. Unsurprisingly, it fell face first into the water. This made Maya smile, but her satisfaction was cut short by the other Manny. It was using the fallen one as a walking surface. "Impossible! No, this is impossible. Am I really going to die like this!?"

Out of nowhere, the Manny's head exploded as if a time bomb had been lodged in its brain. As the rest of the body flopped down, Maya glanced at two people in the distance in front of her. One was carrying a smoking, silenced pistol. The fatter person wielded a machete. From the sudden intrusion, Maya had fallen on her ass again. "Ohmygodohmygodohmygod!" Maya was in a state of shock. She thought that she was dead. The man with the pistol began to run over to her. "Sorry miss. I hate to scare ya, but it looked like you were Critter bait." The man was tall with pale skin. His head was shaven, but his goatee revealed that he was a redhead. The man holstered his pistol. "My name's Moreland. My buddy over there is named Rob." His southern twang made Maya feel oddly uneasy. Moreland reached out his hand and helped her up.

"Critter bait, huh," Maya said as she straightened herself up. "Yup," whelped Moreland. "We call 'em Critters 'cause they sure ain't humans no more." Maya looked Moreland up and down. She noticed that he was wearing a biker's jacket embroidered with skulls and fire. Rob was also wearing a similar jacket. Maya looked at Moreland and said, "Leather? In this heat. You guys must be seriously messed up in the head." Moreland, who was looking down at his headless kill, snapped back to the situation at hand. "Well darlin', we ain't the ones you need to worry about." Before Maya could contemplate on what Moreland was saying, she was punched square in the chin by his boney fist. Then, there was only darkness.

TO BE CONTINUED

Photo: metalmaniacs.com 

-Terry