Beth sat back on her heels and covered her face with her hands, spewing an endless string of profanities. Paul put a hand on her shoulder; simultaneously high-fiving Eric. Frances just watched.
The sickly creatures wandered about the parking lot at the base of the mountain, turning into car bumpers and keeling over to vomit wherever they stood.
"How the hell..." Beth started, trying to control the nervous breakdown she was on the verge of having, "How the hell did this happen?"
"It must be that virus from the States." Eric said crouching to get a lower look. The way he parted his lips in anticipation let the others know that he was a little bit more excited about this than he should have been.
"I thought they were supposed to have sealed the border to stop it!" Beth said quite loudly. A zombie stopped its stumbling to look around for the source of the sound. Forgetting to look up, it continued on its way, tripping over one of its brethren who was coughing up blood.
"Quiet!" Frances said. "Obviously the barrier failed."
The four sat in stunned silence for a minute. A zombie walked face first into the side of a boulder.
"What are we going to do?" Paul finally asked.
"What do you think? We're gonna fight 'em!" Eric said with the gusto of any teenage boy who found himself in the land of his dreams: a zombie apocalypse.
"Okay," Frances agreed, "but before we go riding into battle without any weapons, maybe we should come up with, oh I don't know, a plan?"
"Easy." Eric countered. He pointed to one of the cars. "There's a thing of golf clubs in that car. That'll give us each a weapon."
"We can go to town on these bitches!" Paul said, a fire in his eyes.
"How do we get to the car, Eric?" Frances pointed down the path that would lead them the last seventy feet to the base of the mountain. "They're all around down there. We'll be dead before we get to the ground."
"There were a few fallen trees a few meters back. We could grab some heavy branches or something." Paul suggested, jerking a thumb behind him.
Frances nodded. "That's a better plan."
"We need guns." Beth said, slowly getting back to her feet. "Where do we get guns?"
"This is a tourist town in a non-hunting provincial park, Beth. I'm pretty sure we won't find any guns here." Frances said.
"You'd think that, but I saw a hunting and pro shop back in town. If we get there I'm sure we can find something." Paul said.
"Alright then. Let's go!" Eric said, starting to go back up the mountain with Paul in hot pursuit.
Frances put a hand on Beth's shoulder as they followed the guys at a slightly slower pace.
"Don't worry, Beth."
"Easy for you to say." Beth said.
"Not at all. This is scary, but we need to keep our heads in check. Don't go nuts on me alright?" Frances asked.
Beth looked at her best friend and smiled. "I'll try."
"That's the spirit."
"Head's up!" Eric called as he tossed over a large, cumbersome branch.
Frances barely caught it. It was as high as her waist and thick as her arm.
"I hope we make it to that car…" she said, shifting so she wouldn't be hit by the branch the guys threw to Beth.
"Let's go." Eric said, heading back down the path.
"We stay together!" Frances added as an afterthought, watching her friends hurry down the mountain. She looked sideways at Beth who was holding the branch firmly, a look of growing determination on her face. "You gonna be alright with this?"
A small smile crossed Beth's face. "Yeah. Let's kick some ass!"
"That's the spirit! Just, be careful, alright? There are no do-overs this time around."
"I know!" Beth said hurrying after the guys, leaving Frances to bring up the rear.
Thunk. Thunk thunk. Thunk thunk thunk thunk. Frances hurried around the last bend in the path before it opened into the parking lot to see the boys whacking zombies over the head with their branches. The zombies were coming in greater numbers; coming in from across the 50 stall lot.
Frances momentarily panicked when the first one came at her. She barely knocked it out of her way before it took a swipe at her. Paul quickly came to the rescue and broke its neck.
"Keep our heads in check, right?" Paul asked.
"Right." Frances said, feeling less and less confident about their choice of action as the seconds ticked past.
They worked their way over to the car, leaving a pile of useless, smelly bodies behind them. Finally, they found the car.
As Paul was about to smash the window Eric stopped him.
"Does it have an alarm?" He asked.
"I don't know, why?" Paul asked.
"Well, if it does it'll make noise right? Regular people want to charge when they hear that, what about zombies?" Eric reasoned.
"I suppose. Anyone know how to look for an alarm?" Paul asked. The four exchanged looks uneasily.
"I guess we'll take our chances." Paul said smashing the glass. Nothing happened.
He started passing around golf clubs. It was a pure titanium set with black leather handles. Paul gave Beth the 9-wood, the heaviest club in the bag for the smallest person. Frances was handed a 5-wood, Eric a 9-iron and Paul chose a 7-iron for himself.
"Better, ladies?" He asked in a mildly sarcastic tone.
"Yeah, thanks." Beth responded, ignoring the sarcasm. She looked up and down the quiet highway. The sun was starting to touch the tops of the trees. It would be dark soon. "Where are we going again?"
"Hunting shop in town. If we follow the sun west through the trees we should come out somewhere around Wolf street." Frances said, taking a practice swing with her club.
"Let's go with that." Paul said almost itching to get started. One of his knees kept bending a few degrees like it was ready to pull him along if it had to. "How far?"
"Depends. The road would be safer by far, but it's almost a seven kilometer walk. The woods would likely be far more dangerous but it's only about two hundred and fifty meters." Frances said quickly. She'd practically lived in the Rockies throughout her childhood summers and knew the area like the back of her hand.
"Two hundred and fifty meters sounds a hell of a lot better to me." Paul said.
"I think I agree. Danger or not, it's faster." Beth said.
"Alright then." Frances pointed to a clearing that lead into the forest. "That way. The path is pretty straight forward." She said.
They started walking. It was quiet at first, each hoped that the zombie population had remained road-bound and hadn't wandered into the forest. That hope was almost immediately squashed when they came across six infected having what appeared to be a gang fight. They were smacking each other with surprising force and were uttering unintelligible shouts.
Each teenager looked at the others, trying to silently decide what to do.
Paul was about to say 'Go for it' when one of the zombies tore another's throat out and it fell to the ground. Beth backed away, clearly telling the group to wait until the zombies had finished each other off.
Her plan had been good, until the part where there was one zombie left. Eric heroically took the lead and drove the head of his club into the zombie's abdomen.
They kept walking. It was darker among the trees, but the rays of sunshine coming through were enough to keep them going in the right direction. As the day died more moans filled the air, heightening each one's sense of fear and dread.
They managed their way through the trees for a considerable distance, only having to beat a single zombie here and there. They all heard the cry; the sickening chorus of more zombie voices than shouldn't have been a;; in one place.
"Ohhhhhhhh gooooood!" Frances said sarcastically.
"What do we do?" Beth said her voice nearly quaking with a mix between anticipation and petrification.
"Climb the trees," Eric suggested.
"Hide," Paul tried.
Frances saw them come barreling through the trees. "Back-to-back, or we're finished."
A huge horde of easily twenty or thirty zombies had them surrounded within seconds of their backs touching.
None of them had time to think, they just kept swinging.
Paul was the first to cry out in pain, quickly followed by Beth and Frances. The zombies had stopped pouring from the trees but they had all pooled around the group, clawing and tearing at whatever they could reach.
Unfortunately for Beth, this meant her unruly hair. She was pinned to the ground before any of them knew what had happened.
Paul managed to kick two away in a single shot, giving Beth the room to cover her head with her arms.
Eric had fought off enough that he could take a few swings. With Beth so low, it was easy to make more powerful shots and take out important things; kneecaps, stomachs, even the heads of a few infected that were crouching.
Eventually the number had been diminished and the forest had fallen relatively quiet again.
Paul and Eric hauled Beth into a sitting position and Frances went right to work making sure her best girlfriend was alright. She had one deep cut running about two inches down her collar bone, but other than that she had survived almost unscathed.
Frances sat back on her heels and sighed. "Well that's alright, we can fix that." She started inspecting her clothes for something she could tear off to patch it. No one noticed the coughing.
A tongue as long as an anaconda shot from nowhere and bound Frances' arms tight to her sides.
"Oh shi-" she never finished her curse before she began hurtling backwards, scraping her back and legs against rocks and roots.
"Nooooo!" She screamed. She couldn't see her friends anymore. She wondered if they could hear her.
As abruptly as she'd started moving she stopped. She wondered momentarily if it was over, but two massive hands adorned with sizable fingernails tore into the exposed skin at her collar.
"Hang on, Frances!" She vaguely heard Eric shout. She tried to respond, but to her horror the only sound that came out was a strangled cry.
The hands suddenly released her flesh and she collapsed to the ground. She could barely see the legs of Eric and Paul as they rushed past her and beat the thing with their clubs.
Each landed the head of their bludgeon on a side of the boil coated monster's head and it exploded into a cloud of overpowering gas.
Beth was hauling Frances to her feet. She was coughing and bleeding, but before long she could feel herself regaining her composure and balance. She'd make it.
"What the hell was that?" Paul asked, waving a small cloud of the noxious gas from around his head.
"I don't know, but I didn't enjoy that at all." Frances said weakly. "But it's dead. So let's give it up and get moving. We should be getting close."
Luckily she was right. After getting back to the main path and following it a few more meters they could see houses through the trees. They all started running.
"There's a Bed and Breakfast on this street!" Frances said. "See? Just there!"
There were zombies wandering through the streets and sitting in backyards. The group only killed the ones in their way. The B&B was the second house on the street. The door was feet away.
Mooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!
"What was that?" Paul asked as he turned just in time to take what looked like a tree to the face.
The others tried to figure out what had just happened. Paul was back at the three-way intersection by the trees they had just worked so hard to get out of. He was being hurtled into the ground by what looked like a giant, filthy, sweaty, fleshy model of R2D2 with one arm shaped like a tree trunk and the other resembling an antenna on a car.
Smash. "Fuuu-". Smash. "Help m-". Smash. "God Dammi-" Smash.
"I really don't think golf clubs are gonna work here guys!" Eric shouted as they ran down the street, beating zombies as they went.
Frances looked around wildly trying to find something else that would work. Boulder; too heavy, fence post; too brittle… then she saw it. A barbeque.
"Beth find a big rock!" She yelled hopping the fence and smashing a zombie's chest in.
"For what?"
"Just do it!" She jumped onto the deck and detached the propane tank from the grill.
"Ahhhh, fuuuu-". Smash.
Frances turned around and made eye contact with Beth, who had found a rock the size of her fist. Frances threw the tank at the zombie, Beth's rock followed quickly. Miraculously, the plan worked. The tank blew up, blowing bits of metal into the zombie, effectively taking it down.
Paul lay on the road groaning. The three hauled him up.
"Come on, we're right here!" Beth yelled at the same time that sickening chorus reached their ears.
"Run!" Frances yelled, readying her golf club and preparing for the worst. Her chest hurt and she was having trouble breathing. God, let us make it alive.
The front door of the B&B had been replaced with a huge, heavily metal monstrosity. It was red and had bars for a window.
"Everyone get the hell inside!" Paul yelled.
Eric slammed the door shut on the horde just as Paul limped through the threshold. Frances and Beth shoved a couch near the front door in front of the door to keep it closed.