Chapter 6: The Abercrombie Guy
"Hi guys!" the silhouetted figure says in a deep raspy voice that was very noticeably masculine. Its arms were raised in some stupid otherworldly greeting type of manner and its body was covered in various assortments of twigs, branches and leaves. It was like some kind of tree-man-person of some sort. However, it was not his—if it is a "his", appearance that disgruntled me, but the fact that someone other than us was alive. I didn't know whether to scream or jump for joy. I didn't have a chance to choose.
"Wassup?" the odd-looking stranger says, stepping forward.
"Stay back!" Wichita shouts, suddenly, levelling her shotgun's barrel towards the figure's head. Her raised voice causes both Little Rock and Tallahassee to stir in their sleeps, but not wake up them up indefinitely. Damn heavy sleepers. Why can't I sleep like that?
"Whoa, whoa, hold it tuts." The tree-man says, showing her his palms in a sort of I'm not dangerous kind of way. Wichita doesn't buy the gesture, as she fires off a shot at the floor in front of the tree-man. Bang!
"Holy shit!" He yelps, jumping back to avoid the spray of dust the shotgun shell caused. "What the hell was that for, eh?" In the distance, I could hear birds flying away, squawking a warning to those within the forest. This was not good.
"Guys!" I interrupt, looking wildly around at the darkness that surrounds us. "This is not the time to argue." To the tree-man, I point my gun. "Who the hell are you, first of all?"
At my inquiring, he removes his costume, which comes off pretty easily as it is more of a cloak. "I," He begins, as he reveals his true self, "am Abercrombie!"
My only response to this was what the ***? Standing before us was an old man who obviously wanted to look a little younger. He had dusty black hair and a face with wrinkles so huge you could put several babies inside them. He wore tight-fitting jeans and a shirt that bore the logo of Abercrombie and Fitch. On his head was placed a curved hat much like a cowboy's but black in color with a greyish trim. His clothes clashed so much with his physical appearance that I had to laugh. He wasn't even wearing shoes. It's ridiculous, and this is coming from a guy who doesn't even care about clothes, much. From the corner of my eye, I could see Wichita cracking up as well.
"What'd you do," I begin, the corners of my mouth curving, "rob an Abercrombie store while the plague struck? Because if you did, you're kind of a bad robber…"
"No…"He protests, but it is pretty obvious that he is lying.
Wichita is not amused. She raises the gun higher, cocking back the loader. "You didn't answer his question." She states, stepping forward. "Who are you, really?"
The man looks confused. "I'm Aber-"
Wichita fires another shot. "We know who you are!" In the distance, a ruffling of tree leaves was heard this time. I look in that direction warily. I lick my finger. There wasn't any wind. "Guys…" I begin, but Abercrombie interrupts.
"Alright people," he starts, launching into his own personal biography. When he was finished, I was half asleep. Apparently this dude was a lonely single guy whose lifelong ambition was to survive an apocalypse. He got his wish. Check one on his list. He then decided that he couldn't stay cooped up in his dirty house so he escaped and for some miraculous reason, got through an entire horde of zombies completely untouched. The rest of his neighbourhood? Well, they got eaten. Check two on his list. He hated his neighbours. After that, he robbed an Abercrombie store and hid inside a forest. Check three.
I shook my head, despite knowing his story to be true. His survival was just as likely as the rest of ours. Besides, the more people we had, the higher the chance of survival. Screw the "safer when you're alone" bullshit. The more guns, the better.
"You do have a gun, right?" I ask him.
He nods, pulling a couple Colts from his belt. I smile, satisfied. "We better get out of here." I say, picking up my sleeping bag and supplies. The rest of the group does the same. "While you two were talking, I heard some rustling in the leaves which I found odd becau-"
ROAR!
I nearly jump out of my underwear. Without thinking, I run to the other side of the camp and stand next to Tallahassee, my gun raised. My hands went into traditionally quiver-with-fear mode. Tallahassee looks at me with disgust, before pulling out his shotgun. Abercrombie I saw, had a similar reaction to mine only he stood next to Little Rock. Poor guy. Wichita stood in the middle, her gun also raised. We sorta formed a pentagon of sorts.
Another roar was heard in the forest, followed by others. The zombies had found us. I loaded my gun. "C'mon you little ugly monsters. Let me get a piece of you!" I hissed. Tallahassee looked at me and laughed.
"You're going to run, aren't you?" he says. I nod.
"That's what I thought." He commented, shaking his head. I hear more rustling. Louder this time. I feel as if I need to go to the bathroom… Nevermind. I start hearing the groans. They were here. I squint at the openings in between the trees. I spot a zombie silhouette and fire at it. The zombie collapses. I laugh, enjoying my first kill. Turning to Tallahassee, I was about to gloat about my kill when all hell broke lose. A zombie horde numbering in at least one hundred broke through the clearing and charged. I looked at Tallahassee. He looked at me. We share glances with Little Rock and Wichita, and even the Abercrombie guy. We knew what we needed to do. At the same time and in unison… we ran away.
