Zombie Rock

Mob Scene

I was still awake when they came. I'd been thinking about Lilly and how good it had been to see her. I heard a shout and ran to the window. I heard Kieran behind me.

“What is it Jack?”

My heartbeat pounded in my throat and for a moment I was speechless. A third of Osborne was coming up the road, most of them carrying baseball bats and crowbars. A few must have been fans of old horror movies, because they had torches—honest to goodness, stick-on-fire torches.

“It’s a mob. We have to get out of here…now!”

“I'll get your mother,” Kieran said before I could ask.

I pulled on a pair of shoes and grabbed a T-shirt from my bag as Kieran emerged with my still half-asleep mother clinging to his arm. I was relieved she'd gone to bed in shorts and a T-shirt, because there wasn’t time to change.

“Go out the back!” Kieran yelled and pointed.

I followed him toward the back door, pausing only for a second to grab my mom's guitar. I held it tightly as Kieran led us away from his house. From behind, I could hear the sound of glass breaking, doors splintering, angry shouts from the mob—and the cries of Zombies. I wanted to turn and run to them. I wanted to help my friends who were suffering because of what I'd started…but I couldn't leave my mother.

Then, rising above the noise and confusion, I heard a familiar voice. It was Garret. “…destroy it all! Burn it to the ground!”

With a loud whoosh and crackle, the fires blazed, and smoke filled the night air. Only when we reached the thicker woods did I pause long enough to look back.

Reading about things like this was bad enough, but witnessing it first hand was horrific. To see a place I'd come to love being torched...watching people I knew and cared about fleeing from their homes…seeing them beaten to the ground by those who called us monsters. We’d miscalculated. We gave Garret the excuse he needed. Before the night was over, people I loved would be dead. It wasn't a question of if, but how many. The same question kept running through my head, over and over…what have you done Jack?

We disappeared into the black of the woods, moving as fast as we could. The sounds from the mob soon faded and new sounds replaced them—the shuffling of feet, branches breaking as people tried to weave their way through the trees in the dark. I strained my eyes, hoping to see a familiar face.

“Jack?” A voice whispered my name.

“Rob?”

We all stopped and waited. A moment later, Rob emerged from the shadows. Even in the dim light, I could see that he was in a state of shock. There were streaks of dirt and blood on his skin and clothes, and his eyes were eerily vacant. I threw my arms around him.

“I think we screwed up, Jack,” he whispered in my ear.

I wanted to console my friend, but the words wouldn’t come…only tears.

“We're almost at the creek,” Kieran said, keeping his voice low. “Let’s keep moving. We can stop there and cross in the morning.”

I nodded in agreement and Rob fell in behind us. We found a place where the creek formed a pool in a little clearing. It seemed to be the place everyone was gravitating to because, little by little, other survivors drifted out of the woods. Rob went to the water and rinsed himself off and then came back to stand by me.

“Jack.” His voice broke. “Allen—”

“I saw him heading for the woods,” I interrupted. “He made it…”