***Author's Note*** For this entry I had to retell a classic story in any time period I chose and it had to feature zombies. And be a maximum of 1500 words. I chose Lord of the Rings as my story and it's set more or less in modern times. But after the zombie apocalypse, of course.
"Fred! Look out behind you!"
Fred whirled around and shot the zombie in the head with the small handgun he'd acquired somewhere along the course of his journeys. It had served him well. He had nicknamed it "Sting."
"Thanks, Sam. That was a close one. Do you think we're almost there? I don't know how much longer I can keep this up."
"It can't be too much further, Fred. Hang in there. I'll carry you if I have to."
*
Fred's Uncle Bill had warned him the ring was cursed, but Fred was broke and needed something on the cheap so he could propose to his best girl. In a moment of boredom he had idly tried on the ring himself and unwittingly unleashed the zombie apocalypse.
A crazy old homeless man who claimed to be a wizard named Rudolph the Beige had shown up at his front door shortly afterward. He said the only way to end the zombie scourge was to destroy the ring in the very fires in which it had been forged, which turned out to be a place called Frank's Smelting Shop in the Bronx. Fred had initially been skeptical, but after the two of them smoked some really righteous "hobbit weed" together, he became convinced.
Fred had set out from his small little town in rural Nebraska with three of his frat brothers. Along the way they had picked up more companions until they had formed a Fellowship of nine. Over time, the group had gotten separated. Most of them were currently off battling the zombie hordes, but Marty and Pip-Pip had gotten into the stash of hobbit weed, wandered off into the forest and begun talking to trees. Rudolph the Beige had fallen off a bridge while trying to hold back a giant warthog, although he had shown up later under the guise of Rudolph the Off-White. And, of course, the mysterious street warrior known as Barometer had attempted to steal the ring and subsequently been torn to shreds by zombies.
Only Fred and Sam were left of the Fellowship although they had been joined for a time by a creepy little dude named Ollie.
*
It had been a long journey from Nebraska to New York City, but they were on the final stretch. Ollie had been helpful at first. He had shown them some back ways through Manhattan and guided them across the High Bridge into the Bronx before he had attempted to murder them in their sleep and steal the ring. They had parted ways after that, although Sam was pretty sure he had caught some glimpses of Ollie following them.
Having been a major population center, New York was especially thick with zombies, so the going had been slow. They'd also encountered numerous rats and the biggest damn spider they'd ever seen in their lives. Sam had borrowed Sting from Fred and blown that bastard away.
The ring had begun to grow oddly heavy and that had slowed Fred down even further. He had grown pale and thin and his eyes had a dead glaze to them. Truth be told, Sam didn't think Fred looked all that much different from the zombies.
"I see it!" Sam shouted. "It's that building with the sign with the big red eye painted on it!"
"I can't go on, Sam," Fred said as he collapsed to the ground behind a flaming dumpster. "You're going to have to finish this off."
"But Rudolph said you were the only one who could end the curse! I told you I'd carry you, Fred. And I will. Lord knows I carried you home enough times during college when you hit the keg a few too many times. If I did it then, I can do it now."
Sam heard something pop in his back as he hoisted Fred onto his shoulders. Nonetheless he pressed on the final few blocks until he made it inside Frank's Smelting Shop.
A little bell rang on the door as they walked through.
A grizzled bald man looked up from a huge vat of hot liquid metal as they entered. "Can I help you with something?"
"My friend here needs to destroy a cursed ring that was forged here," Sam said. "Would that be okay?"
"Is that the reason all these damn zombies have been running around here?" the man who was presumably Frank said. "Have at it."
Fred opened his eyes weakly and crawled towards the nearest vat. He slowly got to his feet and started to hold the ring over the molten liquid.
Suddenly the little bell rang again as the door swung open behind them.
"Freeze, mofos!" a raspy voice called out.
Sam turned around to see Ollie holding a gun on them. "Give me the ring! Now! I'm not playing with you fools!"
"The ring is mine!" Fred shouted as he slid it onto his finger.
The next few seconds passed in a blur as Ollie pulled the trigger. Fred let out a shrill scream as the bullet hit his hand and tore his finger clean off. Ollie likewise let out a scream as he dropped the gun and rushed forward in an attempt to capture the detached finger, which still had the ring on it. He made a flying dive and managed to catch the finger in mid-air, but then his momentum carried him into the vat where both he and the ring met an agonizing end.
"Now there's something you don't see every day," Frank said as he scratched his head.
With the destruction of the ring, the zombie apocalypse came to an end. There was some unfortunate business back in Fred and Sam's hometown where some other crazy homeless man claiming to be a wizard named Solomon was trying to scour the place for some reason, but they took care of that business in short order.
Fred had unfortunately suffered some pretty serious PTSD during the whole ordeal and couldn't seem to find any peace at home. Eventually he decided he needed to leave the Middle-West and so he traveled westward with Rudolph and his Uncle Bill to the mystical Undying Lands of the Elves, also known as Fresno.
And so ended the Fourth Age, more commonly known as the Age of Men. Next up came the Age of Aardvarks. And what a glorious time that was. That remains a story for another time, so stop your yapping and get to bed!
