"That's going to screw up your s.e.x life," Ray says with a laugh. That laugh. The loneliest laugh in the world.

"Jesus Christ," Tyler says and covers his eyes with hand.

"Well," Ray offers with raised hands. "I was just trying to add a little levity. And you know, since you guys are..."

"It's alright," Big Donna says. "We're used to Ray. And we've dealt with a lot worse."

Little Dawn is staring at me as Big Donna talks. She still looks like she hates me. Or maybe she's just terrified. She wraps her good hand around the stump of where her other hand used to be and leans back on a pile of pillows. A small para-cord noose hangs down from the upper bunk and Little Dawn attaches this to the end of her bandage to keep her arm hanging above her heart.

"I don't guess we have any cigarettes left," I ask. Eddie throws a half a pack of Salems in my lap. "What are you doing with these things?" He shrugs but watches as I light one up. "They'll stunt your growth you know. Don't let me catch you smoking these things."

"Can you stand?" Tyler asks. I don't know if I can. I move my leg slowly waiting for the pain but it isn't too bad. "After you pa.s.sed out, I took the scalpel and cut out the stuff that looked infected. We washed it all out with iodine and put some more antibiotic cream in there. It wasn't as wide as it was deep. but it is still a pretty long cut."

I bend my knee down over the side of the bed and everything in my thigh complains. But I can move. I limp across the floor a few times and practice straightening it and bending it. "I'll be alright to walk in a couple of days probably."

That night, Karen slides in next to me and leaves Eddie to sleep on the bunk above us. Sleep has become our new drug as we while away the hours, waiting to emerge from our coc.o.o.n. Karen snuggles up next to me and her hand finds its way to my crotch. I feel her pulling my belt loose and unb.u.t.toning my pants. "Sure you want to do that?" I ask her.

I feel her head nod yes against my shoulder. "I don't care. Even if I switch over, I'll be free of all of this. Just promise you'll take care of me if I do change. Make it quick. Make it painless." Her hand pulls me free of my pants and I lift my a.s.s so that I can pull them down a little. Her head moves down from my shoulder and her hand moves to the base of my c.o.c.k. It seems like it has been a long time. Her lips take me into her mouth and I rest a hand on the top of her head. She works silently in the complete quiet of the bunker. Only the sound of my breathing could give us away. I grit my teeth as o.r.g.a.s.m builds.

If I'm contagious, she's killing herself. If I'm the cure, she'll live through all of this, regardless of whether or not she ever gets bitten. If I'm neither, then it is just a wonderful b.l.o.w. .j.o.b. My toes curl inward as the first few spurts of death or life or nothing fill her mouth. I hear her swallow. My breathing slows and she remains there for a long while, lying still as a suicide victim with an exhaust hose from a car snaked through the driver's window. My eyes become heavy and I can feel myself shrinking. She brings her head back to my shoulder and kisses my neck, a tooth grazing the sensitive skin. Little Dawn lets out a moan in the darkness and Ray sighs and turns in his sleep. Eddie mutters something and I have the feeling Tyler is listening.

Karen begins to snore softly and I wonder again if I've killed us all.

Chapter 21: Walk'n in a Wonderland.

"You can't see anything?" Karen asks. I shake my head no. Her eyes are just as blue as the day we met out by the cornfield. The only change has been from anger to panic. "I just thought for sure that..." She lets the thought trail off without finishing it.

It hasn't been for lack of trying. We've been going at it like teenagers ever since I could get out of bed. In the back of the supply container, outside the container doors, at night when everyone else is asleep. It has become her way to try to step through without being at fault; the gun to the head that she can later claim wasn't loaded if there is anyone to inquire on the other side. Something more pleasurable than an overdose, more subtle than cut wrists. A perfect form of suicide for the indecisive and afraid. But her eyes show no sign of looking like mine.

It feels like morning, but I can't tell. I'm awake anyway. And spent inside her. I pull out and move to the side of the bunk. I pull on my pants by the light of the flashlight and then my socks. "I'm going outside today."

She is so quiet behind me I have to wonder if she is still there. A voice from above answers instead. "I was thinking it was about time also," Tyler says.

"Anything is better than listening to you two s.c.r.e.w.i.n.g all the time," Ray says from his bed. Quack. "But seriously, you're really going out there today?"

"Yeah," I tell anyone who is listening. "It's past time we had a look. What time is it, Tyler?"

"Time for you to buy a watch," he replies. I see a green glow from his bunk. "Little after 10 in the morning. I'll start the generator."

The fluorescent tubes overhead blink to life and everyone squints in the harsh white light. The long sleep is over. "So who all is going?" Tyler asks.

"I'll go," Eddie says. He's holding the little Ruger I gave him and turning a full magazine over and over again in his other hand.

"I'm going alone," I tell him and anyone else. "But I ain't going far. If I see my shadow, it's going to be six more weeks of winter." No one laughs. Not even Ray. I take the last Salem out and light it. "I'm just going to poke my head out. If it looks alright, I'll try and make my way to the main house, see if there's anything in there we can use. Just have to wait and see when we pry the door open."

I've got the cleaver back on and the .45 ready to go. I've taken the ammo for the big pistol and reloaded my AR-15 with it. Only about twenty rounds left. Shouldn't matter once I'm outside. I'll either have way too much ammo or not nearly enough.

Karen picks up her Winchester and checks the chamber. I guess I don't really even have to ask. "It's not open for discussion," she says flatly before I can say anything. "I'm getting out of here today."

"Suit yourself," I tell her and we all move towards the doors beyond the doors, past the big black spot on the ground where the Zed whale had brought Kevin inside. The bullet holes in the cellar doors show light pa.s.sing through. I quietly push my eye up next to one to see if there is anything to be seen. The view is obstructed about four feet away by something brown and porous. I shift my head around to see if I can see past it, but it looks like a giant chunk of coral has landed from outer s.p.a.ce.

"See anything?" Ray asks from behind me. I shake my head no and turn the handle of the door. I give it a small push but nothing happens. I put my foot against the bottom of the door and push again. Nothing. A harder shove and the door flexes and bangs, but doesn't open.

"Oh my G.o.d," Karen says crying. "We're trapped in here. We can't get out."

"Relax," I tell her and put my rifle down. I put both hands against the door and shove as hard as I can. Ray and Tyler join me and the door begins to move at the top. I kick the bottom over and over with my boot and a small crack appears. Like a car stuck in the mud, we start rocking it back and forth, slowly opening the door.

"What the f.u.c.k is out there?" Ray asks gasping for air. Tyler is bent over with his hands on his knees. I lean against the wall and wish I didn't smoke. Through the s.p.a.ce at the bottom, more of the brown spongy material is visible. It should move easier than it does. "I've got an idea," Ray says and walks towards the acetylene torch. He takes a length of half inch rebar out of the rack beside it and begins ramming it under the brown stuff. "Leverage," he grunts. "We just need more leverage."

The rebar bends too easily but the stabbing motions seem to work. Tyler and I push on the door until we can work my cleaver through enough to swing it. The brown stuff cuts easily, but there are long pieces of hard wood or something embedded in the brown stuff. A broken piece clatters back in through the door after a big swing. I pick it up and look at it. It's bone.

And it must be a leg bone at that. I continue cutting and finally the door pushes open enough to slip through. The world outside is not as we had left it.

Karen squeezes out behind me. She makes it two steps before she is struck as speechless as I am. Eddie follows next, then Tyler, then Ray. Even Little Dawn is up and ducks out into the cool morning air. Big Donna's exit is less graceful but she finally manages to get out. So much for going it alone. We all stand there, transfixed, unable to comprehend what we are looking at.

"Jesus," Ray finally says. "What the f.u.c.k?"

Tyler takes a tentative step across the brown stuff and sinks slightly into it. Eddie starts to bend down and touch it with his hand when Tyler stops him. "Wouldn't do that if I were you. Not yet, anyway. Could be psychotropic, could be poison. I'd advise no one touch it with bare flesh until we find out more about this...stuff."

The brown stuff is everywhere. Every spot on the ground is covered by it and large, five to six foot tall lumps of it dot the field. Brown stuff up on the catwalk in places, across the front porch of the house. Two clumps of it hang from the lower windows of the house, the arms and head of each clump still plainly visible as human forms. Shoes and boots and clothes and coats stick in and out of the fungus making them look like lumpy scarecrows and s.h.i.t brown snowmen.

Ray lets out a long whistle as he inspects one of the lumps. He points at the reading gla.s.ses looking out from under the brown stuff. "You mean to tell me..."

A roaring moan cuts him off as a half-rotted Zed charges from behind one of the clumps. Ray tries to move, but his foot drags in the brown stuff and down he goes with the screaming, clawing, rotting b.a.s.t.a.r.d nearly on top of him. The Zed is a middle-aged man with no shirt and torn pants. His eyes bulge and his grey skin is freshly dead-ish; probably one of the last ones to get infected by a bite. Ray kicks him from where he is lying and knocks him off to the side. The Zed knocks over one of the brown clumps. A nearly skeletonized lower leg bone sticks up from the broken clump.

Eddie steps up before anyone else can act and puts several rounds into the Zed. Another low moan and the sound of something running comes from the right. Karen catches the Zed with a shot through the neck. The second one stacks up neatly on the first one.

"We need to get higher up," I yell and we all make for the corner of the compound. It is like running through a labyrinth inside a pinball game. As one person hits a dead end, the one at the back has to turn and become the new pathfinder. Where the path opens up, we move forward in twos and threes.

Just as we reach the corner, a small child Zed pops up around the corner of a clump and runs at us, lipless teeth bared and hands swatting the air in front of her. I go to pull the .45 but it hangs up in my belt, the hammer caught in my jacket. I grab for the cleaver but I'm going to be too late. She's got me.

But she runs right past me. The little Zed squares up on Eddie who walks a line of rounds up from her chest to her head. She falls face first into the brown stuff, her arms motionless at her sides. I manage to get the .45 out finally and join the others as they set up a ladder to get up onto the catwalk.

Eddie stands looking at the dead girl. He reloads mechanically and I hear him say, "It's okay. You're free now."

From up high we can see all around us, hundreds of yards in every direction both inside the compound and out. The brown stuff covers everything. Here and there a Zed stumbles through but they are as lost and uncoordinated in the spongy maze as we were.

"Holy s.h.i.t," Ray gasps. "Look at this s.h.i.t. It's... everywhere. And on everything. It's just like all of those things stopped and put down roots and...sprouted."

"I wonder how much ground it covers?" Tyler says as he looks around. "It could be countless square miles, counties, states..."

I catch Eddie staring at me instead of the puzzle surrounding us. "She ran right by you," he says quietly. "Like you weren't even there."

"Who?" Ray asks.

"Her," Eddie says and points at the now completely dead little girl below us. "It's like she couldn't see him. Like he was one of them."

They all look at me for only a moment but then look away.

"Doesn't mean anything," Ray finally says. "Hard to tell anything from anything in this mess."

"I smell something cooking," Little Dawn says and points with her stump at the house. "There's smoke coming out of the house. Someone's in there."

"Nah," Ray says. "It's just... yeah. I smell it too. They're frying something." He brings his hand up onto his stomach and several gurgling sounds can be heard between us. "Somebody's in there f.u.c.king frying something."

"You gonna go check it out?" Tyler asks. I look to see who he's talking to. It's me. "Yes, you. They can't see you or smell you or whatever. So you can cover all the open ground between here and there."

I shrug and hand my rifle over to Ray. "I guess I'll go check it out. Try to keep me covered from here just in case we're wrong. At least give me warning if you see one coming. And Ray..." Ray looks at me and raises both eyebrows. "Don't shoot me."

"Wha... I wouldn't. Just because of the thing with the grenade doesn't mean that..." He stops and puts his hand on his hip. "I won't shoot you. Just go. Before I eat my f.u.c.king shoes. Do you guys smell that? It's like... fried potatoes or something."

Karen turns to come with me. I push her back slightly and shake my head no. "I'll be right back. No worries."

I descend back into the brown stuff and take out the cleaver. I put the .45 in my left hand and begin to pick my way through. I can see the roof of the house over the brown clumps but finding a way to it is difficult.

"Go to your right," Tyler yells. "And watch out for the Zed that's about 10 feet in front of you." I stop moving and bring the cleaver back. "No, you're not close to him yet. Just keep moving. I'll let you know when he's close enough to worry about."

"Ten feet sounds plenty f.u.c.king close," I mutter and start working my way through the clumps.

"He's on your left now," Tyler yells. "But he doesn't seem to know you're there."

I take a right turn looking to my left and practically step on the short Zed that is blocking the way. It is a short, pot-bellied Zed with a stained wife-beater shirt and no pants. His eyes look like mine and his breathing is labored. His shoulders rise and fall in angry breaths and he stares straight ahead without moving.

I freeze where I am and wait for the familiar charge. The snapping teeth, the clawing hands, the howling, moaning frenzy and the blood l.u.s.t that all of these things have. But nothing happens. The short Zed just stands there. Staring. And panting. With no pants.

I take a slow and careful step towards him but he doesn't move. I hold the .45 up and push it into the gray, rotting skin that covers his forehead. Nothing.

"You alright?" Ray yells from the catwalk. "We can't see ya down there."

"Yeah," I yell back. "I'm alright. I guess." I take the cleaver and bring it down into the short Zed's head, slicing it cleanly into two halves. He slumps against the brown, porous walls formed by the clumps before falling onto his back. Black blood pools in the divots of the brown stuff. I wonder if he could see me. I wonder if he was thinking clearly somewhere on the inside but was unable to say anything or obey his own will. A cold chill rolls through me. What kind of h.e.l.l is it, being one of them?

I step over his body and turn left. The Zed they had spotted from the wall is standing in front of me and I send him out with the cleaver as well. Two more fall as I walk towards the main house. It is more like weeding the garden than fighting for your life.

The clumps at the front door of the main house are tall and thick. I begin whacking away at the growth with the cleaver. A rib cage, a femur, a skull, a foot. I chop out big sections and push them out of the way until I can see the door k.n.o.b to the house. The door itself is full of holes but the unmistakable smell of something frying fills my nostrils. I reach out for the k.n.o.b but the door opens before I can get to it.

"Got any onions?" Kevin says with a big smile. He's holding his machete in his right hand with a small joint balanced carefully between two fingers. "These things taste a whole lot better with a little onion."

Chapter 22: Story Hour.

"You cut her hand off?" Kevin says and licks the seam shut on a fresh joint. "How did I miss that?"

"Dunno," I tell him. Little Dawn isn't saying anything or looking at anyone. She just stares at the end of her bandaged arm. The rest of us continue to look at the plate of half-eaten brown stuff sitting on the table.

Kevin shakes his head again. "Pretty quick think'n I reckon. She'd be dead as h.e.l.l if you hadn't a give her the chop." He nods at Little Dawn but she still doesn't look up. He rolls the joint between his fingers for a while before finally asking, "What the h.e.l.l did happen? One minute I'm up on top, shoot'n away, next minute there's some kinda explosion and s.h.i.t flying everywhere and everybody running everywhere. I missed sump'n."

Ray clears his throat. "That, uh, well..." he slaps both legs and parks his hands on top of his thighs. "That'd be my fault. I guess. I don't know. I threw the grenade, thinking I could keep them out farther and well, it bounced back off a tree... I mean, I could sit out there all day and throw things and not hit that G.o.dd.a.m.n tree again." His hands come up and out. "Just bad luck. Some kind of cosmic 'f.u.c.k you'. It's like... I just..."

"Just f.u.c.king stupid," Betty says. She's sitting very close to Kevin with her hands wrapped around his arm. "Mr. Hong Kong Phooey over there in that f.u.c.ktarded karate outfit. Jesus. Who the h.e.l.l gave him grenades anyway?" Her hands slide back and forth over Kevin's arms like she may never let go of him ever again.

"Hey," Ray says trying to work up some indignation. "You saw the corners of the walls. Those things ended up spilling over and in anyway. I just kind of sped things up."

"Are you sure those things can't get in through the front gate?" Eddie asks me.

"Nah, there's not enough of them to work through all of that brown stuff," I tell him. After finding Kevin, the two of us had climbed up on the roof of the house and shot the few remaining Zed roaming inside the compound. The lump of brown stuff by the front gate looked impenetrable.

"We'll need to get that tractor righted and running," Tyler says from the far corner of the room. He looks annoyed that Kevin and Betty are still alive. Betty in particular.

"We got time for that, man," Kevin says in his slow stoner way.

"How the h.e.l.l did you two survive? That's the story I'm waiting for. You're both holed up in here, eating that brown stuff like it's filet mignon and just as happy as clams and... Did you guys already get the story? Did I miss this somehow?" Ray flails his hands in the air as he talks. "How the f.u.c.k did you guys live through this s.h.i.t?"

Kevin shrugs. "I dunno. Just got p.i.s.sed off." Betty squeezes his arm again. Kevin smiles at her and looks around the table before continuing. "I just kinda figured I couldn't leave Betty here behind, so I reloaded, came up out of that hole just blaze'n away. Then I ran out of ammo and started swinging the rifle around, but then I broke the stock over one of them thing's heads. p.i.s.sed me off too, I liked that gun."

"Then I let one of them little short b.a.s.t.a.r.ds have it with the machete and there was this like, wall of zombies. They were all over. There's so many that the one I just kilt, couldn't fall down so I picked him up by the neck and just started using him as kind of a shield. He didn't weigh nothing and I just managed to wade through'em all on the run kinda. I dunno. I done looked a whole buncha times and I ain't got a bite on me. Just kinda weird really."

"I was in the house," Betty says as she picks up the storyline. "I figured it was going to take all day to shoot those things and I just couldn't stand the racket, so I came up to the house for a drink. I heard the big boom out front and saw everybody running, but there was one running right at me, so I just slammed the door shut and went upstairs. I could hear the windows breaking and all of them starting to come through the house and then I heard Kevin yelling my name." The look on her face is bordering on o.r.g.a.s.mic. "He just came through chopping and smashing and I opened the door to the upstairs room up there and we just stayed in the attic."

"It's a pretty stout door," Kevin continues. "I propped some stuff up in front of it and we just hung out."

"Hung out?" Ray asks, completely incredulous. "Just hung out. Went for a stroll, fought through a few million zombies, knocked on the door, hung out a little bit. Didja play Bee Bee b.u.mblebee or Hangman? You've got to be f.u.c.king kidding me. We've been down in that f.u.c.king bunker thing for days. How the h.e.l.l did you get by up there?"

"Well," Kevin says still smiling at Betty. "We got a little rainwater in through one of the holes in the ceiling and we just kinda, thought up ways to pa.s.s the time." He laughs at his own comment and squeezes Betty's hand.

"Why are you eating that?" Karen asks and points at the plate. "How can you possibly eat that?" There is no masking the disgust on her face.

"Well," Kevin starts, "it got pretty quiet up there after a couple of days, so I eventually opened the door and all of this brown stuff was everywhere. But I knew I'd seen it before and I got to think'n about it and well, it ain't much different than a morel mushroom." To emphasize his point, he takes the side of his fork and cuts away a piece. "Ain't nuthin better than mushrooms pan-fried with a little b.u.t.ter so, I dunno. We came down here, couldn't find anything to eat in all of this brown stuff so I started hack'n away at it, trying to find something underneath it all and I just got to think'n, f.u.c.k it. Why not? So I cooked up a little piece and tried it. Tasted alright. Didn't get me high or make me puke so I cooked up summore. That's when all you guys showed up."

"It's got kind of a nutty flavor to it," Betty says and nods her head. Her leg is now across Kevin's lap.

"You just tried it?" Tyler says with disgust from the back of the room. "No test on anything. No worries about it being contaminated or a carrier for the infection or anything you just fried up a slab and ate it?"

"Well," Kevin says as he fires up the joint. "You can fry just about anything and eat it. Squirrel, possum, groundhog, crawdads. This here ain't much different than any of that. There had to be a time when somebody looked at all them other things and got hungry enough and said, 'f.u.c.k it, man. I'm gonna eat this.' So it ain't that big a deal."

"How come you didn't come out to the bunker? You could of let us know it was all clear," Ray says.

"How the h.e.l.l could we tell it was all clear, man? And we didn't figure we'd be able to get in. Or we'd get shot try'n to get in. And if we got out, we wouldn't be able to seal up the door again." Kevin rubs his hand along Betty's leg. "Sides, we were alright. We figured y'all were too."