Free Dry Rot: A Zombie Novel by H.E. Goodhue Page A

husks from the front of the pharmacy. A small mob turned the corner and loped towards me.
    I turned and ran back for the alley. The husks followed, but I reached the high wooden fence before they could catch me. Enough of them would fill the alley and topple the fence, but not before I was long gone.
    Straddling the fence, I turned back to look at the husks. I knew I should be running, but couldn’t stop myself from staring at the monsters. These had been people I passed on the street, people I might have called friends. What looked to have once been a woman stumbled down the alley. Her leathery skin scraped against the brick side of the pharmacy. A patch of skin peeled away, revealing her elbow bone, and fluttered to the ground. She showed no reaction.
    Watching the husks from atop the fence flooded me with an odd anger. I wanted to kill them. I wasn’t sure if it was their lack of humanity or the loss of it that angered me. Was I mad that they were monsters or that they had been forced to become them?
    My phone beeped. Another text message came through. I had no service. How were these texts getting through?
    Kara: Daddy, where are you? I miss you.
    The anger bled out of my body. My heart twisted and hurt.
    The stupid buttons wouldn’t light up. They were broken. I couldn’t send a message back.
    “I’m coming, Kara,” I said, barely above a whisper, and leapt over the other side of the fence.

 
    -22-
     
    I managed to avoid most of the husks as I made my way back towards my house. Two or three husks stumbled into my path. These husks came at me one at a time. If it had been a collective effort, I would have been left with no other choice but to shoot them. Saving ammo and making as little noise as possible were two of my main goals besides staying alive. I smashed their skulls with the stock of my shotgun and splashed their rotted insides across the pavement. 
    Thick, gloppy chunks clung to the ashy pavement like some long-forgotten primordial slime mold. I stepped over the mess, not wanting to track any into the bunker and honestly just being disgusted by it.
    The streetlights still provided sepia pools of light, but I clung to the shadows that grew between houses. From what I had seen, the husks weren’t capable of hiding or setting a trap. They wandered through the streets, until something caught their attention and then they attacked. The only motivation or thought the husks appeared to have was to feed. That knowledge was unsettling, but also helped me avoid the husks. As long as I was quiet and didn’t appear to be a meal, other things would distract the husks.
    I turned the corner to my block. The world was painted in shadows. Objects, covered in ash, had soft edges and looked blurry in the limited illumination of the streetlamps. My house was towards the middle of the block. I could have found my way home blindfolded, but saw that wouldn’t have been necessary.
    A set of blinding headlights lit up the front of my house. A boxy black Hummer was parked diagonally on my lawn. A row of extra lights on the roof of the SUV painted my house in white. A few husks stumbled towards my steps, attracted to the noise that trickled out from the open front door. More would be there soon.
    Someone had collapsed on the stairs of my porch. The husks shuffled past the body. If there had been even the slightest flicker of life left in it, the husks would have torn the body apart.
    I moved around the edge of Danni’s house and ducked down behind her parked car. The silhouette of a person moved in the driver’s seat of the Hummer. From the size and outline, it appeared to be a man. He didn’t look too concerned about the husks. Whoever these assholes were, I knew why they were in my house. They were looters. I don’t think they knew about my supplies, but they probably stumbled across my house after going through a few others. I’m sure if Jared put up a fight or they found the bunker, either one would give them reason