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“Can’t blame them,” Hightower said. If he did turn, he hoped he wouldn’t get out of this basement. Let him die here and let it be done.

  “Think things are bad now, just wait till the goddamned government shows up.” Delphus had no intention of turning. It wasn’t even a possibility in his old mind. Death, however, was a different story. Death and taxes, and he hated both of them.

  “It could be worse,” Robert said. “One of us could get hungry . . .” Actually, thinking about it now, Robert was sort of hungry. He could go for some bacon or sausage or steak.

  Extra rare.

  “I didn’t mean it,” Robert said. “I’m not hungry at all. What about you guys?”

  The three men looked at each other and all three took a deep step backwards.

  - - -

  Eva Dean drove the tractor and Jenny held onto the side. The October breeze played through her hair, driving away the stench of charred meat and replacing it with the fresher rot of the season. Her bow was slung across her shoulder, two arrows jammed against the seat. She felt good, strong, tough. Optimistic, even.

  “You think they’ll be okay?” Jenny asked. She might be tough, but she still needed reassurance and comfort.

  “At the very least, we’ll be okay,” Eva Dean said. “And hopefully so will everyone else.”

  She did not sound very confident.

  They drove slowly away from the farmhouse down the path into the woods, headed for the main highway and the comforting fantasy known as “civilization.”

  - - -

  Day always gives way to darkness.

  Dew burdens leaves and curls the grass. In the forest, smoke rises where the camp burns, energy changes form.

  At the old farmhouse, smoke still trails from the corpse pile like still-simmering barbecue briquettes long after the party’s over. There is no sign of life. Though in the gray transition from daylight to dusk, distant screams echo. Had anyone been there to hear it, the listener would have guessed that those screams were the swan song for a nightmare that had gone on long enough.

  Some nightmares, however, persist.

  Where an outhouse once stood, a pile of collapsed boards take on the first shadows of evening.

  A squirrel, wild with madness, hops across those boards. It smells something under there, something tasty.

  The boards stir. A hand emerges. The squirrel sniffs the hand and bites into it. The flesh is sour but still edible.

  His name had been Sven. His life could have been someone else’s nightmare, even before his path had taken a fatal turn. But that path has turned back in upon itself, a surreal detour that will be repeated in an endless loop. The distorted signals animating his flesh don’t know how to shut themselves off, and there is no god waiting by the kill switch to mercifully end the cycle.

  He now rises from the carnage, covered in dark, wet excrement. He shakes off bits of broken boards and looks at the squirrel gnawing on his hand. The animal has already chewed deeply enough to expose a finger bone, but that’s nothing next to the existing gashes in his body. He feels no pain, only a strange excitement as the electrical signals in his brain spark in unnatural patterns. He grins, red-eyed, and chuckles.

  He grabs the squirrel with his other hand and squeezes it until his fingers puncture its sides and black blood seeps out. He sniffs it and drops the animal on the ground where it twitches and chitters, already completing its own loop and heading back to attack and feed again.

  The Sven-thing had once been a small-time dope dealer stuck in a bad situation, putting in time at a juvenile camp. He’d even become a sort of role model to the younger kids, an inspiration. The camp’s goal had been to build his character, to redeem his past, to turn out a finer contribution to the world. To better him.

  Well, some would say “Mission accomplished.”

  The Sven-thing heads into the woods.

  THE END

  Bloodthirsty mutants go on a rampage at a camp for troubled teens after an infection spreads.

  MEAT CAMP

  In a desperate attempt to save their land from tax foreclosure, Delphus Fraley and his daughter open a camp for at-risk kids, with the goal of building character through experience in the Appalachian outdoors.

  But a strange infection contaminating the camp’s mess hall soon triggers a bloody rampage. As the isolated camp turns into a bloodbath, camp counselor Jenny Usher first fights to save the children, and then finds she must fight to save herself.

  Because this infection doesn’t just kill, it brings the dead back to life…

  ----------

  Scott Nicholson is the international bestselling author of more than 30 books.

  You can find him at:

  http://hauntedcomputer.blogspot.com

  https://www.facebook.com/hauntedcomputer?fref=ts

  http://www.amazon.com/Scott-Nicholson/e/B001HCX30O/ref=sr_tc_2_0?qid=1396026700&sr=1-2-ent

  J.T. Warren is the author of Hudson House, Rampage, Blood Mountain, and the series Jeremiah Rivers: Demon Hunter.

  You can find him at:

  http://www.amazon.com/J.T.-Warren/e/B004X5LG92/ref=sr_tc_2_0?qid=1396026733&sr=1-2-ent

  http://authorjtwarren.blogspot.com

  ZOMBIE FALLOUT

  Mark Tufo

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, Characters, places and events are a product of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual names, characters and places are entirely coincidental. The reproduction of this work in full or part is forbidden without written consent from the author.

  Electronic Edition

  Copyright 2010 Mark Tufo

  Discover other titles by Mark Tufo

  Visit us at marktufo.com

  and http://zombiefallout.blogspot.com/ home of future webisodes and find me on FACEBOOK

  Edited by:

  TW Brown

  Cover Art:

  Shaed Studios, shaedstudios.com

  Electronic Edition, License Notes

  This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you're reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of the author.

  Dedications

  I want to dedicate this book to my wife without whose encouragement this would have remained a file on my computer. She is the light that shines my path and for that I will be eternally grateful.

  I also need to send out an honorable mention to my brother, no matter what he may say to the contrary, the sickest thing you will read in this book came from his festering mind.

  To all the brave men and women, that are currently on active duty or who have ever served in the armed forces, police, or fire department! I salute you all my brothers and sisters in arms!

  Table of Contents

  Prologue

  Chapter 01 - Journal Entry 01

  Chapter 02 - Journal Entry 02

  Chapter 03 - Journal Entry 03

  Chapter 04 - Journal Entry 04

  Chapter 05 - Journal Entry 05

  Chapter 06 - Journal Entry 06

  Chapter 07 - Journal Entry 07

  Chapter 08 - Journal Entry 08

  Chapter 09 - Journal Entry 09

  Chapter 10 - Journal Entry 10

  Chapter 11 - Journal Entry 11

  Chapter 12 - Journal Entry 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15 - Journal Entry 13

  Chapter 16 - Journal Entry 14

  Chapter 17 - Journal Entry 15

  Chapter 18 - Journal Entry 16

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20 - Journal Entry 17

  Chapter 21 - Journal Entry 18

  Chapter 22 - Journal Entry 19

  Chapter 23 - Journal Entry 20

  Chapter 24 - Journal Entry 21

  Chapter 2
5 - Journal Entry 22

  Chapter 26 - Journal Entry 23

  Chapter 27 - Journal Entry 24

  Epilogue

  Prologue

  Late Fall – 2010

  Reuters – Estimates say that nearly three thousand people nationwide and fifteen thousand people worldwide have died of the H1N1 virus (otherwise known as Swine flu). Nearly eighty thousand cases have been confirmed in hospitals and clinics across the United States and the world, the World Health Organization reported. The influenza pandemic of 2010, while not nearly as prolific as the one that raged in 1918, still has citizens around the world in a near state of panic.

  New York Post (Headlines October 31st) – Beware! Children Carry Germs! – Halloween Canceled!

  New York Times – (Headlines November 3rd) – Swine flu claims latest victim – Vice-president surrounded by family and friends at the end.

  Boston Globe – (Headlines November 28th) – Swine Flu Vaccinations Coming!

  Boston Herald – (Headlines December 6th) – Shots in Short Supply – Lines Long!

  National Enquirer – (Headlines December 7th) – The Dead Walk!

  There would be no more headlines.

  It started in a lab at the CDC (Center for Disease Control). Virologists were so relieved to finally have an effective vaccination against the virulent swine flu. Pressure to come up with something quickly had come from the highest office in the land.

  In an attempt at speed, the virologists made two mistakes: First, they used a live virus; and second, they didn’t properly test for side effects. Within days, hundreds of thousands of vaccinations shipped across the U.S. and the world. People lined up for the shots like they were waiting in line for concert tickets. Fights broke out in drugstores as fearful throngs tried their best to obtain one of the limited shots.

  Within days, the CDC knew something was wrong. Between four and seven hours of receiving the shot, roughly ninety-five percent of the recipients succumbed to the active H1N1 virus in the vaccination. More unfortunate than the death of the infected was the added side effect of reanimation. It would be a decade before scientists were able to ascertain how that happened. The panic that followed couldn’t be measured. Loved ones did what loved ones always do. They tried to comfort their kids or their spouses or their siblings, but what came back was not human, not even remotely. Those people that survived their first encounter with these monstrosities usually did not come through unscathed. If bitten they had fewer than twenty-four hours of humanity left; the clock was ticking. During the first few hysteria-ridden days of The Coming as it has become known, many thought the virus was airborne. Luckily that was not the case or nobody would have survived. It was a dark time in human history; one in which we may never be able to pull ourselves out of the ashes from.

  CHAPTER 1–Dec 8th, Denver, CO – 7:02 p.m.

  Journal Entry – 1

  This wasn’t supposed to be how it began…dammit! I had just turned the shower on and was preparing to scrub the dirt and grime away that I had amassed during my day on the job. I worked for the highway department fixing potholes. At one time in my life I was what you would consider a white-collar worker. I was a Human Resources Generalist for a Fortune 500 company. To put it delicately, I made bank. And then President Bush saw fit to end my salad days. Was it really his fault? I don’t know, but he was an easy scapegoat.

  After the unemployment benefits petered out and still no hot prospects, I took a city job. It was dirty, backbreaking work, and I made less than when I was collecting unemployment—go figure. I made more sitting on my ass playing the Wii. But at least it was honest work. Never once in the three months that I had been working there did I wake up in the middle of the night in a cold sweat and stress out about having not filled in a hole on Havana Avenue. There were benefits to blue-collar work; lack of stress being one of them. But I digress…

  So there I was, sticking my hand into the shower to see if it was the right temperature. I had even begun to spread some body wash on myself in preparation for the invigorating feeling of being clean. (Yeah BODY WASH, you got a problem with that?) I have two pet peeves in life. Well shit, if I’m being honest I probably have about seventeen, but who’s counting? In particular, two come to mind, and I’ll explain. The first is being dirty. I just hate feeling dirt and grime around my neck. I hate the way my shirt collar will stick just a little bit. It irritates the living crap out of me. The second pet peeve is feeling dried soap on my body. I don’t know if any of you have ever been to New Orleans. The water is ‘soft’ or ‘hard,’ I don’t know which—I always get the two mixed up. Anyway, the water just won’t wash the soap off of you, so you walk around all day with this invisible film on you. Everything’s sticky. Your clothes stick to your body; shit, your own body sticks to you. Just bend your arm, you can barely straighten it back up. So you walk around all day like a scarecrow with a stick up its ass. Yeah I know, I know! My wife tells me all the time I have problems! Shit, where was I? Yeah, so there I am about to hop in the shower when I hear my wife scream this bloodcurdling shriek. Now you’ve got to know my wife; she wouldn’t scream if I fell down the stairs and broke my arm. Hell, she’d probably call me a klutz and get me into the car for the ride to the emergency room, all the while calling the kids to tell them how Dad hurt himself again. She’s just not that into histrionics. So when I heard the scream, I knew something bad was up. I stared longingly at the shower I was foregoing as I grabbed a towel and headed downstairs.

  “What the fuck….” I yelled, but the rest of my expletive sentence died on my lips as I saw the terror in my fifteen-year-old son’s face. Nothing scares Travis—not even me, and I’m a former Marine. Hell, just last week I watched him tear a phone book in half, and not of some little town in Nebraska either. The kid was starting middle linebacker on his freshman team, and he was scaring the hell out of the starter on the JV team. The boy didn’t care who was coming after him or who he was going after. Well I guess that’s a lie…they have to be living.

  He never looked up when I came down the stairs. “Mom, lock the door!” he yelled. “LOCK IT!” he screamed again.

  “I can’t figure out the lock!” my wife yelled back.

  I didn’t know whether I should laugh or be worried. To be honest, it was a funny scene: My wife frantically trying to lock the security door with no luck while my linebacker son, who normally towers over his mother, was cowering behind her. I couldn’t see out the door from my vantage point. When the front door is open it blocks off the landing, so I rushed to push it closed, forcing my wife and son away from the security door. I had no sooner shut the heavy gauge steel front door when I heard the glass pane in it shatter. (We had to move to a townhome in a less-than-desirable neighborhood after I lost my job, and security was a big issue. We even had bars across all the lower windows, THANK GOD!

  I was a millisecond away from opening the door and severely chewing the ass off some neighborhood punk who was going to cost me a hundred dollars to repair the glass.

  “NO!” my wife and son yelled in unison. My wife slammed up against the door to reiterate her point.

  “What the hell is going on?” My adrenaline was pumping. My pet peeves were throbbing—all seventeen of them.

  “Look out the peephole,” my wife whispered.

  I put my eye to the hole expecting to see some little shit gang-bangers out there tearing things up. What I saw was a tongue.

  “I see a tongue! Some asshole is licking my peephole,” I said, and then I laughed a little bit. That sounded a little gross even to me.

  My wife didn’t see the humor, her face still hadn’t regained her color, and my son looked like he was starting to hyperventilate.

  My wife told me to look out the window, but she made no move to look with me. I’m not the brightest bulb on the string but even I knew at this point that something was really messed up. I put on my best male bravado and stepped over to the window. I rolled up the shade, and to this day I don’t know how it happe
ned, but I simultaneously felt my stomach lurch into my throat and my balls fill in the abandoned spot my belly left behind. There had to have been at least a couple of dozen dead people milling about our communal lawn. Okay, so they weren’t dead in the traditional way, they were still moving, but they were dead all the same.

  My quasi-nightmare dream had come true. ZOMBIES were afoot. Now, I know this is a sick fantasy, so bear with me. I had always wished for this. I had watched nearly every zombie movie, from the early Dawn of the Dead, with the slow shuffling brain eaters, to the newer 28 Days Later flicks with the fast, semi- intelligent brain eaters. Hell, I even liked the films that made fun of the style, like Shaun of the Dead and Boy Eats Girl. If it involved a zombie, I was game.

  Now back to the slightly insane part of my fantasy. I guess if you get right down to the guts of it, no pun intended, it would be a way to escape the responsibilities (and boredom) of everyday life. Forget the 9-to-5 grind, the mortgage, and clothes shopping, it would just become all about survival of the fittest. I had been planning for this day for almost twenty-five years of my life. I know, pathetic, right? I had a gun safe full of multiple caliber rifles and pistols. I told my wife it was for hunting. I’ve never even BEEN hunting. Either she was REALLY gullible, or she was just turning the other cheek. We all have our own crosses to bear. I’ll be honest though, my fantasy involved more the slower, shuffling zombies than the ultra-fast Resident Evil kind. Like it or not, it appeared that IT had finally happened. I closed the blinds as fast as I could, hoping that I didn’t attract any undue attention. My brain was in overdrive.