Surface: Doomed Planet

Excerpt 19- Zombies Not To Scale

By now, you're probably wondering how the old nun was going to react to me shooting the priest of her church straight through the face, even though she asked me to. The answer to that question is...as expected I would say. She was understandably upset, but she understood that he was a threat to the rest of people under her care, and sometimes you have to make choices you don't want to make. Been there, done that, wasn't exactly a pleasant experience. After I had taken care of the Priest, Mother Angelica asked me to clean the zombies out of the cemetery behind the church so they could bury the priest and a couple of other survivors that had died recently. So that's what Jacob and I did while the others helped out inside with straightening things up. We were rounding up the kills when he asked.

"Skyline, how long have you been Hunting bounties?", he asked.

"I dunno", I said shrugging, "about 5 years? Maybe 6?"

He sighed, "does it get easier? Seeing shit like this?"

I shrugged, "maybe not for you, everyone's different when it comes to this. It's never really bothered me because of how I was treated when I was a kid and never mind the fact I've almost met death about 10 times over the course of my life. Way I see it, we all gotta go home to God sometime. Some just go sooner than others."

"Ain't that the truth", Jacob said as he laid the last zombie down. Will and another guy had come out from inside the church with shovels and a bunch of white fabric. When they say the pile of bodies, they shook their heads.

"How much worse can this shit get before it ends?", Will asked.

"That's not a question you should be asking", I said, "chances are it will get answered with worse, much worse. Trust me."

"I'll take your word for it", Will said, "by the way, Mother Angelica wants to talk to you again."

I nodded and Jacob and I returned to the church, where a service was now in progress, with a few of the survivors, non believers by my guess, were discussing the current supply situation. It amazed me how even in situations like this, people would still question God's existence, where I was over here 100% sure I'd be dead by now if he wasn't on my side.

"You know", I said in a quiet voice to avoid disturbing the service, "even if you don't believe, Mass might help you take your mind of the hell that's festering outside."

"Oh trust me brother", One of the three guys said, "tried that, didn't work, just made me feel even more screwed, because if there is a God, why hasn't he stopped all this? Why has he allowed so many people to die?"

"Couldn't tell you myself", I said, "the Lord works in mysterious ways sometimes, which might mean horrifically bad things have to happen to pave the way for something infinitely better to come along. According to Mother Angelica, she knew I was coming."

"That old woman says a lot of things", the man said, "doesn't necessarily make them true."

"That may be", I said, "but just in case, remember that we're fighting for our lives right now and I need everyone's head put towards the same goal, and I'm sure Mother Angelica would tell you the same thing."

He nodded, "she has, we're all in this together, trust me, I understand that."

"Good", I said, "now what, if anything, can you tell me about the cities water pumping station?"

"All I know is the water got shut off a while ago", the man said, "I was out looking for some tools to bolster the church against...well what ever the hell those things were and when I got back the water was off. I got chased away from where they were by gangsters, and since you look like you've seen your fair share of fights, think you could retrieve them for me?"