Free Zombie Fallout by Mark Tufo Page A

any more. The old American Express ads moved into my hemisphere of thought. "Don't Leave Home Without It.” ‘Thanks, Karl Malden,' I murmured to myself.
    “I made scones,” Tracy teased.
    I stopped short, lucky to not twist an ankle with the forces I used to turn around. “What kind?” I asked, hoping beyond hope. (Not the cranberry almond, not the cranberry almond, not the cranberry almond…) My fingers crossed like a third grader’s.
    “Blueberry.”
    “With glaze?” I asked, my voice tremulous.
    She nodded.
    “Yes!” I pumped my fist in the air. “I might be able to spare a minute or two,” I said as I closed the front door.
    “I thought so,” she answered as she poured a glass of milk.
    The meeting was being held in the complex’s clubhouse. It was a sturdy looking structure, an ‘A’ frame that would probably look much more at home at some alpine setting than here in Aurora, Colorado. I showed up to the meeting twenty minutes late.
    “Nice of you to show, Talbot,” Jed said from the dais at the front of the committee room. Everyone present turned to see.
    “Um, I got a little detained,” I answered sheepishly.
    “What is that on your mustache?” Jed said, straining to get a better look. “Is that blueberry?” he asked incredulously.
    I licked it away furiously before he could confirm his suspicions.
    “Where is everybody?” I asked trying to change the subject, only realizing too late that I had just made matters worse.
    The room was usually standing room only, and that was if we were only going to discuss the mailbox placement. This seemed infinitely more important, and there were dozens of available chairs.
    Jed let the blueberries go. His shoulders slumped. “This is all that’s left,” he answered.
    I sat down with a thump into one of the many vacancies. “Oh dear God,” I muttered.
    Jed was a crotchety old fart but his community had been turned asunder and he was having a difficult time coming to grips with it. This was the fastidious man who scolded children for sledding on the snow-covered hills, fearing that they might tear up the grass underneath. And now his assembly was reduced in one night to a third of the mass it had been. It had been a shock to him, but the tough old badger was going to make sure the rest of us made it through the turmoil. I was impressed, considering he was prior army. I wouldn’t have thought he had the intestinal fortitude for this. But he had already gone far above any of my expectations. While everyone had been running around like chickens without heads, he had the Northern gates shut, guarded and appropriated an RV from the Millers, who were here and still glowering. He had also somehow got hold of a bus to close off the last gate, all the while assembling a team to go house to house (not garage to garage) to dispatch the enemy. I was amazed, and that offer of a kiss was still valid if he ever decided he wanted it. I had done everything humanly possible to save my family; Jed had thought on a much broader scale.
    The first part of the meeting had been a sounding of the bell ceremony for the Little Turtle fallen. I was thankful I had missed that. I had no wish to hear the names of the dead. They were just about to get to the meat of the meeting (sarcasm intended) when I showed up.
    Jed continued. “I know it’s going to be difficult to guard so much area.” There was no reason for him to verbalize the reason; there were so few of us now. “We have to keep two people at each of the fenced gates at all times, and I’ll take ideas on how to shore those up. They were never designed to stop a determined pedestrian. No need to worry about the southwest gate. The RV isn’t going anywhere.”
    Old man Miller got up to protest. “You didn’t say anything about turning it over on its side when you ‘borrowed’ it Jed,” Gerald Miller sneered. “That was mine and the missus’ vacation home!” he yelled as loud as his oxygen tank fueled lungs