Songs Listened To:

Make You Smile - Plus 44

Bleed it Out - Linkin Park

My Hometown - Bowling for Soup

The Curse of Curves - Cute is What We Aim For

Amazing Flight - Ayreon

Tower of Hope - Ayreon

Cure for the Itch - Linkin Park

So, this started out as a fear of cemeteries as suggested by A Kiss For a Kill and seconded by inu-hottie, but then it sort of accidently mutated into a fear of churches and cemeteries combined so... yeah...

Oh, and Church Guy is making an appearance in this chapter.. Thought I'd mention that.. Because he's such a character.

Better safe than sorry. Seems like something Columbus would have as a rule.. Hm.

Now, don't be offended by what Columbus says in here about churches. Just.. Please don't get your panties in a twist. Those are not my opinions, and its just a fanfiction. Don't let the fictional characters with irrational phobias offend you.

Consider yourselves warned. If you are offended by a fictional character saying crap about church, don't read.

On with the story!


Riverside... Gee, who would have guessed it was a town next to a river? Or that it was like some land locked Bermuda Triangle where the laws of regular shit had no place and only Murphy's Law existed.

What can go wrong, will.

That had certainly been the case so far. First, the Hummer had broken down in this hellhole, then going through a mechanic's shop, they had found nothing, but had managed to set off a car alarm and bring zombies running in. The only other place they would be able to get a car would be somewhere in town, but Tallahassee didn't want to push it. There had been enough zombies as it was already, he didn't want to risk anything more, especially with Columbus getting that freaked out look. He knew that look. It usually preceded a full blown spaz attack.

He had the duffel bag over one of his shoulders, the guns shifting quietly against each other with reassuring clicks inside, the pockets full of ammo, the top of the inside covered with those boxes, bullet boxes with ducks, geese, deer, animals on them. There should have been pictures of the real animals they hunted, Tallahassee thought to himself. Put a picture of a zombie on the ammo..

His train of though was interrupted as he looked up at the grey sky, darkening more and more with each passing minute.

"Shit fuck." He swore. Okay. They were now in a heavily zombie populated area, with no car, and it was getting darker out. Not the best of situations.

"Tallahassee... Its getting dark out." Columbus said, almost redundantly by this point.

"Ya think I didn't noticed?" Tallahassee snapped, without meaning to. He watched the kid flinch and go back to staring at the road under them.

"Look kid, -" He started to say something that might resemble an apology in some dimension, but then he was interrupted. He heard a scream, one that was definitely human, then a gunshot. The almost-kinda-apology was soon forgotten as Tallahassee's head whipped around, pinpointing the location of the shot and scream.

Against the now navy blue clouds, Tallahassee's eyes came to rest on a church tower, boarded up, but golden light spilling out between the cracks. That was their mark.

"C'mon kid." He started to move towards it, keeping an eye out for any zombies that had been attracted in the same way they had. A stone wall surrounded the church, and he could see floodlights put up around it, lighting their way.

He kept walking until he noticed something rather different. He heard one set of footsteps. Not the two he should have. Sighing and pushing up his hat, Tallahassee turned around to look behind him. He hadn't heard a zombie, but knowing the kid, he'd been distracted by a fucking firefly or something.

"Columbus, come on."

The kid was standing there with his bag, pale in the light that still remained, and staring at the tower.

"Why are we... going... over there?" His voiced was halting, and Tallahassee sighed. Really? Had he missed the program up to this point?

"Because someone is in there. And we need a place to hang over for the night."

"Why don't we just go back to the ah...the hummer?"

"It'll be too dark by the time we get back."

"So why'd we leave it in the first place?" He watched the kid's Adam apple bob. Something had him upset. He was easier to read than a dog

"Because I thought we'd have found a god dammned car by now."

"We haven't."

"Thanks for the update, General Obvious."

"Your welcome."

"Get yer ass up here."

Columbus did as he was told, albeit somewhat slowly, and more hesitant than he would have liked. Tallahassee just rolled his eyes and opened the gate into the cemetery, the church and whoever was in there only yards away. He wasn't surprised when he heard the tell-tale gurgle and shriek, and raised his gun with barely a glance, blowing the brains out of the nearest zombie. A few more rushed out at him, and Tallhassee shot them all with time to spare, watching the grey matter slide down the bricks with bored eyes.

"Ya think there'll be any more?" He asked, starting to move once again through the tombstones. His tone wasn't fearful or angry, it was the exact tone of voice people used to use when talking about the weather. Zombies were more common than the weather in conversations now, and it wasn't like they were new news anymore. If anyone stepped outside by now and hadn't heard anything about the apocalypse, Tallahassee would swear off twinkies forever. However mild his tone, however, he was only answered with a squeak. A very Columbus squeak.

"What now?" He didn't even bother to look behind him. Hell, don't look back, that sounded like one of the kid's fucking rules. Either way, Tallahassee was just too lazy to turn his head the six inches.

"... There's dead people in there."

Now that surprised him, and as such, it was worthy of turning his head. Tallahassee did so.

"No. Duh. They're called zombies."

"No... In the graves... Tombstones..."

"Oh hell... You're afraid.. Of the people who were dead before the infection?"

He nodded. The kid fucking nodded.

"Bu-but... Not just that. There's a church."

"There usually are."

"Churches aren't fun places. They make you sit there, and do nothing but make you feel guilty, for being human, and and and... and so unsanitary, with the water, and the bread, and giving wine to kids, and tell you its body and blood, and they worship a zombie! They worship a guy who came back from the dead!"

"I get the point. So shut up." Tallahassee couldn't take much more of the kid's gibbering.

"...Or nut up?" Columbus finished his motto for him, and Tallahassee cracked half a grin.

"Yeah. That." Once again, he watched Columbus swallow nervously, and shrugged.

"C'mon, kid. There's someone in there. You can tell them all about your fireflies." With that, Tallahassee started walking in again, passing through the headstones. He dully noted an open grave, and stepped around it. He wouldn't have been surprised if it was for one of the first to go when he virus hit, when people were still ignorant... Damn, if they could just turn time back to those first days, and take it seriously, start evacs and bring in the military to crush the first few zombies.. Then they wouldn't be here. He would still have Buck. The world wouldn't be in chaos.

But then, some small part of him rationalized, you wouldn't have met Columbus.

Tallahassee was surprised to hear himself think that, but wasted no more thought on the matter as another zombie rounded the corner of the church. A shot to its head, blowing the skull into so many pieces and sending so much crap flying that Tallahassee doubted Columbus would argue for a double tap on the fucker. Two zombies later, they were stepping into the church, and they could hear someone talking.

"Better safe than sorry... Better safe than sorry... Better safe than sorry..."

Which again, Tallahassee thought to himself, sounded like something Columbus would have as a rule. Go figure.

"I trusted him... I can't believe I trusted him... Better safe than sorry."

One more zombie came sprinting out from between the pews, and this time, Columbus shot it before it had taken half a step. Damn, the kid must be jumpy. This thought was seconded when he heard a triple tap. These gunshots served a further purpose though.

A door stood off to the side of the large cavernous chapel they were in, separating the entrance of the church from the larger room for the serviced. Tallahassee figured it was like every other church. There would probably be some switch on the inside for the bells to ring, a bathroom, maybe stairs going down into the basement if it had one.

From behind this door, the muttering had turned into yelling.

"Wh-who's there!?"

Tallahassee moved over to the door quickly, stepping over the pulp that remained of Columbus's zombie. Columbus followed behind him, wide eyes checking every shadow, every crevice, every nook and fucking cranny for a zombie. He waited a moment to answer, first checking the door. Locked.

" 'M Tallahassee, and this here spit fuck is Columbus. Now open the hell up! There's fucking zombies out here." He called back.

"N-no!"

Well... Tallahassee hadn't been expecting that. He wasn't sure wear to go from here. He opened his mouth to speak again, taking in the sight of a very twitchy, very nervous Columbus, and a bloodshot eye peeking through a crack in the door and taking in the sight of them, but before he could say anything, he was cut off again by the warbling, high pitched voice.

"You.. You think you're so fancy! With your fancy snake skin jacket, and your fancy guns! Well no! Its my safe house! Get the fuck outta here!"

"A'ight, now you're starting to get on my nerves. Its fucking dark out, we've got no place to go, our car is fucking broken, and you're some toddler who doesn't want to share. Well, I'm going to come in there and shove your animal crackers up your ass unless you open the door." Tallahassee threatened, shaking his fist. The eye watching them from the crack disappeared for a moment, and they could hear coughing. Thick coughs that made him wince in sympathy.

"Not to mention you sound sicker than the fucking zombies. Now let us in."

"Please?" Columbus added hopefully.

"N-no! I told you! Its MINE. MINE. No one rides for free! Now leave... Leave! I have a bell in here!"

"Oooooh. A bell. I'm soooo scared." Tallahassee mocked him, voice dripping with the sarcasm. He didn't like this.. Not one bit. Not how nervous it was making Columbus, shaking like a rabbit, not how pissed it was making him, not how much it was endangering their lives...

"You.. You should be!"

"Um.. Tallahassee... Maybe we shouldn't mock him... He does kinda have what we need, you know." Columbus said, voice shaking.

Fuck.. And let this bastard win the contest of wills? Not likely, Tallahassee thought to himself, listening to more terrible coughing from beyond the door, then a splatter and stench that revealed someone had vomited.

"Open the fuck up. Now. Or I'm coming in and feeding your ass to the zombies myself."

"No! No, no, no, no, no, NO! NO! Can't be trusted... No one can... Ding-dong!"

Tallahassee perked a brow at the "ding-dong" as the man on the other side took a few seconds to cough up his lungs once more. If he hadn't been sure he was off his rocker a few minutes earlier, that sealed it.

"They can have YOU! DING-DONG, DING-DONG. COME AND GET IT!"

With this latest outburst from the maniac, Tallahassee finally got what the man had meant when he threatened them with the bell. Loud, reverberating chimes rang through the wood of the building, pure in their sound, evil in their intent.

He could tell alone from the way Columbus shifted this was bad. Could tell from the way his eyes widened and he clutched his gun.

That bell was loud.

It was in a central location.

It would bring zombies like flies to honey

Tallahassee did not like being honey.

"Sonovabitch!" He swore, taking up his own gun, Columbus already shooting at dark shapes that ran in through the doors.

"DINNER IS SERVED. DING-DONG....." There was a gurgle Tallahassee barely heard over the sound of his gun as another zombie crumpled, then more coughing.

"Better... Better safe than sorry... Better this way... ding-dong.."

Tallahassee glanced over at Columbus, and just in time. A zombie scrambled over the top of the pipe organ, black pus dripping from its lips as it leaped for the boy. It had not anticipated the shotgun blast connecting with its face and splattering even more crap over their surroundings. He heard a yelp from Columbus as the body landed too close for comfort, but kept going, dropping his shotgun as the chambers emptied, everything just being too hectic to want to reload, and reaching for his pistols, the Desert Eagles barking bullets just as fast.

Beside him, he heard the familiar click, BOOM, click, BOOM of the kid's double barrel, cutting down zombies with its wider spread, dropping the fuckers before they could get close. Tallahassee tried to avoid those big, green, fearful eyes. They would only make him more angry.

One of the stained glass windows broke, and Tallahassee was treated with te sight of a zombie crawling over the Little Baby Jesus, spattering blood along the way, and hitting the wood floor ignorant of the glass stuck in its skin. Behind it, more zombies were quick to make use of the new method of entry, and they scrambled in, some biting each other in the process, and all focused on one thing.

Warm, living, yummy meat.

Tallahassee unloaded into them, the undead around him being a convenient way for him to loose his anger. He didn't see them as a danger, as a threat. Just something to take his anger out on. That's all they needed to be.

The trickle of undead slowly ceased, and the two zombie hunters were left standing there, spattered in blood, brain, and pus, ears numb and ringing from all the shooting, and both breathing heavily, Columbus doing so through a Kleenix. Where the hell Columbus got a Kleenix after a zombie massacre, Tallahassee would never know, but he was more occupied by something else.

Behind them, he heard fumbling at the door.

"So, ya little fucker, ya finally come to your senses..." Tallahassee growled. He heard a deadbolt slide, and reached out to open the door, and give that asshole a piece of his mind. He would wish he had stayed out for the zombies.

He was definitely surprised when the door opened forcefully into him, knocking him off balance, and he heard the bone shattering, blood curdling scream of a zombie, and he felt hands, inhumanly strong and insistent, grab at him, push him down. His hands fumbled for weapons that weren't there, that had been left laying around or tossed away, used up during the massacre, and Tallahassee felt his heart flutter with real fear as he got to see a close up of a zombie's face, dark liquids trickling from its mouth as it moved for his neck.

Holy crap... This fear.. Was this what Columbus felt all the time? Tallahassee didn't know why that would be his last thought, but it was clear in his head.

However, that train of thought was derailed.

He saw a flash of gold, heard several thick thwaping noises, and kept his mouth shut as he felt blood spatter across his face, and saw those teeth stop centimeters from his skin.

Surprised, thankful blue eyes looked up from that face.

Up to a Columbus, chest heaving and eye twitching, holding a bloody candlestick. The gold was now spattered with red, dripping off and onto the wood floors of a church.

Tallahassee pushed the zombie, apparently the man from the other side of the door, off of him in one smooth move, gave the corpse the finger, and stood up, still staring at Columbus. The kid didn't move. Only his eyes, flicking about from corner to corner of the room, then Tallahassee, darting over every inch of skin until he was sure it was all okay again, until he could tell himself it was safe. Then, he dropped the candlestick, and picked up his double barrel again, loading two shots into it for whichever zombies they came upon next.

Tallahassee stared. The kid.. The kid had saved him. There was a change. And not only had he saved him, but with a candlestick.

"Columbus... I do believe that was your most inventive kill yet, kid."

The once college student nodded, still shaky. "W-wet nap?" He asked, voice trembling to match. Tallahassee figured it was a good idea with the blood splattered across his face, and held out his hand. He'd humor the kid.

Within seconds, a pristine damp germ cleaning napkin that was so epic to be deemed a necessity to Columbus was placed in his hand, and Tallahassee wiped off his face, then stepped forward, into the entryway they'd worked so hard to gain entry to. A zombie lay dead on the floor.

"Now that.. Would explain alot." Tallahassee said.

"Fucker musta came in and bit Churchy back there and sent him on his trip to Looneyville. Zombie, I salute you. But he musta tasted bad."

There was another nod from Columbus, and Tallahassee had to think for a moment. He of all people knew that with all the kid's phobias and his psychosis, he wasn't the most.. mentally normal in the book. But where was the line between people like Columbus and the Church Guy?

Tallahassee would rather not find out, and just dragged the body out of the barricaded church entry and back into the chapel, giving the Church Guy's body the finger once more before going back inside with Columbus to wait out the night.

Every single lock was put in place, and they slept in shifts.

After all, better safe than sorry.