Zombie Fallout 21: The Burden of Time

By Mark Tufo

The crew of the SS Jimmy Carter is stranded on the tropical shoreline of Brazil, but Mike Talbot and his squad are not enjoying the beach. The Brazilian government might have failed in the end times, but the jungle is rife with violently patriotic guerrillas—and not the cool banana eating type.

Humans can be reasonable, more or less...but zombies? Not so much. The undead are alive and well in South America, and they are raging.
Zombies are mutating, transforming at an untenable rate. They are bigger, stronger and more terrifying than ever, and best of all, the newest adaptations are nearly impossible to kill.

Losses are piling up, burdening Mike and causing him nightmares—and daymares. His spirituality is tested by apparitions and visitations, and the captain is finally at his breaking point. With barely enough people left to make the trek, it seems his goal to head home to Colorado may end up just a foolish dream after all.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Mark Tufo
• Release date: Oct 24, 2023
• ISBN: 9798215234914

Mark Tufo

Mark Tufo was born in Boston Massachusetts. He attended UMASS Amherst where he obtained a BA and later joined the US Marine Corp. He was stationed in Parris Island SC, Twenty Nine Palms CA and Kaneohe Bay Hawaii. After his tour he went into the Human Resources field with a worldwide financial institution and has gone back to college at CTU to complete his masters. He lives in Colorado with his wife, three kids and two English bulldogs. Visit him at marktufo.com for news on his next two installments of the Indian Hill trilogy and his latest book Zombie Fallout

Book preview

1

MIKE JOURNAL ENTRY 1

Brazil sucks, I told BT.

Tell me how you really feel, Mike. I don’t think I’ve heard you say that in the last ten or eleven minutes. BT, myself and the squad, along with a few others were chopping down some trees to be used for fortification and firewood. Although, mostly it was other people chopping; I was supervising in so much as cutting trees needed supervision, meaning I wasn’t doing a whole bunch of anything. Maybe if you worked more and complained less it would be better.

In what world does chopping trees make anything better? Certainly not for the trees. Poor woody bastards probably thought their lives were finally safe now that the hairless monkeys were all gone, and now here we are murdering them again.

I don’t think you can murder a tree. Gary had removed his headphones and sat down next to us. He was coated in sweat and drinking a canteen of water. My brother at no point in his life had ever been fat, but like most Americans, he’d had a paunch—but the man sitting a few feet away was ripped, like maybe he was slipping some ‘roids into his beverages. I’d noticed more than a few women checking him out, but he, for the most part, was oblivious to the attention. The first couple of weeks on land had been among the most dismal any of us could recall, morale was so low as to be non-existent; we’d all lost loved ones in addition to our floating home. That was a lot to pile on at once. It was Eastman that had rallied us in a way I’d not been expecting.

Out of necessity he’d become a grueling task master; if he’d had a whip, he would have cracked it to get us moving. It was brilliant in its simplicity and yet he’d had to tell me what he was doing a few days later when I’d sought him out to let him know that maybe he should ease up.

Ease up? he asked.

We need time to regroup, to mourn our dead, I’d told him.

I agree, Captain, and there will be a time to mourn, but now is not that time. We have shelter, but we both know it would not withstand an attack.

I wanted to tell him nothing had happened so far, so what was the rush? But I knew the fallacy of that argument. Zombies could attack at any time without warning. That they hadn’t yet was strange. Even people could attack, and that could be even more damaging. There had to be locals, though we’d seen no evidence of survivors anywhere near where we were staying. I wasn’t calling it home; I don’t think I ever would or could.

I ended up telling him we were just tired.

That’s the idea, he said.

I came back with the extremely intelligent, Huh?

What are people saying out there? he asked as he sat back in his roughhewn wooden chair, a weary smile lifted the corners of his mouth.

They’re saying you’re a pain in the ass.

And?

And what? Isn’t that enough?

"Okay, Michael, what aren’t they saying?"

I figured this was going to be where a lightbulb popped on over my head and I understood where he was going. Thing was, I’d always had a hard time following him, whether physically or verbally.

He sighed. I thought this would be easier. What they’re not saying, because I’m working them to the bone, is how much they miss so and so, or how great life aboard the carrier was. The lines that separated us are being blurred as they rally together against me. I hope I’m not hated, certainly not my intent to get myself bushwhacked. My hope is that their disgruntlement takes the place of misery, get it? Instead of pissing and moaning, they can bitch about me with each other.

Oh, that’s happening, I blurted out.

It’s one of the oldest tools available to military leaders. Perhaps if you’d ever read the manual...?

I shrugged, he continued. In a nutshell, morale will improve or the beatings will commence. I am forcing them to not think about what they have lost and to band together—

Against you. It’s working. You might want to be leery with how far you go, I warned. Once upon a time I’d sworn Eastman would never lead us again, but I didn’t want the job and no one else was willing to step up for the challenge, so here we were. He was a natural and slid back into the position before any of us really knew what had happened. But it was working; we’d secured adequate lodging, found clean water, food scavenging and hunting parties had been formed. We were fortifying what we had. Camp life was busy, and yeah, too busy to be all sodden. I don’t know if he was a genius for doing all of that, or I was just an idiot for not seeing it.

I’m going to need you to keep this to yourself, Captain. It only works as long as they don’t know they’re being manipulated.

I didn’t know how I felt about that. I’m married, I know all about manipulation, but usually I am completely ignorant of it until such time as I look back and reflect how I’d gone ahead and done something I’d had no intention of doing, ever. Like that one time I’d gone to her aunt’s and ripped out the old carpet throughout the entire house on my only weekend off in a month. And maybe that doesn’t sound completely horrible, but her aunt at times took in stray cats and they didn’t always believe in or have a desire to use a litter box. I’d lost my sense of smell for close to ten days after snorting ammonia for the weekend. And then the b—I mean in-law that I could marginally deal with—instead of giving me any real compensation for my efforts had baked me a cherry pie. A fucking cherry pie! Yeah, my wife was a master. I think she used to hold workshops for other spouses.

Thing is, I couldn’t tell if I was better off knowing Eastman’s sly methods or not. I realized he’d told me not to say anything to anybody, but Tracy was my wife and there wasn’t much I didn’t share with her.

You’re just realizing that? she’d asked after I relayed the conversation. Oh my sweet husband, sometimes you make it too easy. Do you want to help me move that bed upstairs?

I, in fact, did not.

She looked over seductively. We could test it out once it gets there.

This is manipulation, isn’t it? I asked.

What do you think? She bent over to pick up a corner of the furniture, making sure I got a fantastic view.

Sucks being this simple, but this is the kind of manipulation I can get behind. I about dragged that thing up the stairs by myself, not listening to the protests my wife was making about slowing down. I won’t relate what happened on that new bed, not knowing who might end up reading this, but we broke that thing in, in ways that it wasn’t designed for.

That had been three days ago. After reliving that moment, I once again told BT Brazil sucks, but this time I had a stupid grin on. We were finishing up for the day, placing the wood in a cart and were heading for the camp when Grimm whistled the signal that he’d seen something. It was a fair imitation of one of the local birds, but it sounded exactly like what it was, a human making a birdcall. Gary was the first to get his weapon ready and up; we’d jokingly called him Gambo once upon a time, but he was actually closer to the version with an R at the beginning than he was with the G. He’d really come into his own recently. My squad formed a defensive perimeter, and I directed the others to get in the middle.

Where’s the captain? I heard someone ask.

I looked over at BT. No fucking way, I said to him when I recognized the voice.

Is that Hammer? BT asked.

I slung my rifle over my shoulder. Just when you think the day can’t get any worse.

Grimm came out from his observation post leading Hammer. The guy looked like he’d just stepped off the set of Apocalypse Now. His face was painted with streaks of black and green, he was wearing a green t-shirt and torn camouflage pants. I half expected The Ride of the Valkyries to begin playing.

Hammer, where the hell have you been? How did you escape the ship?

He ignored my questions. Do you have a doctor?

Major Dylan is in the camp, BT told him. Hammer walked past us without saying another word. I followed.

Mike, the wood, BT said.

Shit, Top, I didn’t help cut it down, why would I help drag it back? I picked up the pace to catch up to Hammer.

Kiss my ass, Captain! BT shouted to my retreating back.

Hammer, are you going to tell me what the hell is going on? I asked as I reached out, trying to slow him down.

He glanced over his shoulder, and I think if he hadn’t believed it would delay him he would have swung at me. Questions later, doctor now.

I don’t know how native he’d gone, his syntax resembled Tarzan. If he was the one in need of Major Dylan, it was nothing obviously discernible.

This have to do with your lady parts?

He paused for half a moment before continuing. I was trying to get him to stop, to tell me where he’d been and why he was in such a rush for the Major. Didn’t work. Now it was my turn to ponder taking a swing. Instead I figured I’d see how it played out. Wasn’t hard for him to find the small hut with the painted red cross on it. He walked in, strode past the corporal sitting at the desk and into the Major’s exam room, where unfortunately for him (and me, really) she was in the process of checking out what can only be described as the world’s worst hemorrhoid on one Staff Sergeant Summers.

My eyes! I blurted out before turning and walking into the door jamb.

Excuse me! Major Dylan shouted. I am in the middle of an appointment.

Although you could probably hook a tow chain to that, it’s not life-threatening. I need you now, Major.

Captain Talbot? she asked.

I still had my hands over my eyes when I turned to respond. Just showed up, I shrugged. I thought he was dead. He won’t tell me what’s going on. I came with him to find out.

And you are?

Hammer, Matthew Hammer. Not hard to notice he didn’t use any military rank. I was thinking of having him tossed into jail for desertion. If we’d had one, that is. Then, as quickly, I came to the conclusion of no, I wouldn’t, because that would mean he stayed here. We hadn’t technically been adversarial, but we were far from friends, and of all the bleakness I’d been dealing with, his lack of presence was not part it. I felt for the scientists stuck with him, but there wasn’t time to dwell on much. Hammer went to grab the major’s arm and forcibly remove her from the room.

Yeah, I don’t know what the fuck you think you’re doing but don’t, I told him.

He turned, his arms down by his side, his hands curled into fists. Sure thing, I’ve been wanting to pop you a few times in the head, anyway.

I put my fists up in response to his words.

Gentlemen! The major stood.

Staff Sergeant, could you please pull your fucking pants up? I looked past Hammer, the Staff Sergeant with his ass facing me was looking to the side to watch.

Oh yeah, sure, he said gruffly as he got off the table.

Have you named it yet? I had to ask, I had to.

It wasn’t what I was shooting for, but Hammer’s hands relaxed and he smiled. Fuck you Talbot, that’s funny.

This man has a medical condition, there’s nothing funny about it! Major Dylan intoned.

Itchy and Scratchy, the staff sergeant said as he pulled up his pants. Sorry doc, but I did, and Itchy and Scratchy seemed perfect, beat my first one, Bloody Mary.

Bloody Mary? I asked.

After my first wife, Captain. She was a royal pain in the ass.

Ah, gotcha.

Hammer seemed less inclined for a fight as worry seemed to flood back in.

Tell me what’s going on? Major Dylan asked.

My wife, Lina, had a tick on her last week. For the last few days she’s been complaining about fatigue and nausea, now she has a rash and is burning with a fever. I found some antibiotics, but they’re either not strong enough or are the wrong kind. It’ll only take a day to get there.

Was it Doxycycline? she asked, sidestepping his statement.

He shook his head.

Is the rash a bullseye?

Again he shook his head. Looks like chicken pox.

I’d have to see it, but it sounds like Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever. She was heading over to her understocked medicine cabinet. Here, take this. She handed a blister package of a strong antibiotic. One a day. You should see improvement either tomorrow or the next day. If not, you will need to bring her here. Most common side effect is nausea.

Hammer looked at the drugs and the Major, he’d come for one thing and wasn’t sure if he should leave with another.

Matthew, I have patients here; some are as sick or sicker than your wife. I cannot leave them for two days. Like I said, if you need me to see her, you are going to have to bring her here.

Fine, he snatched the package and turned to go. Thanks, was added as an afterthought.

You going to tell me anything? I asked, matching his fast walk.

No. He began to jog.

Got a feeling you jogged the whole way here. What do you want to bet I can keep up with you the whole way back?

I wouldn’t suggest it.

You know what? I stopped and placed my hands up. You’re right. I don’t give a big enough fuck. I’d wish you luck, but I wouldn’t mean it. I hope Lina gets better. I watched him keep running, he never once turned back. Weird, just weird. I shook my head. There were many more important things to do than wonder about Hammer. Setting up the defense of the small village was going well, but short of a twenty-foot-tall steel wall, I was always going to feel like we needed to do more. We were building what Major Eastman had called cheval de fries, I would have gone with wooden spiky things, easier to identify that way. They were basically twenty-foot sections of sharpened logs set in an X pattern with a crossbeam to support them. The idea was to encircle the encampment, we were halfway there. They’d do wonders to halt a medium sized horde. Anything much bigger and the structures would be pushed over and trampled no matter how well we anchored them. The bonus was that Brazil, while not quite as gun-crazed as their neighbor to the north, had had a well-armed populace, so we’d done fairly well restocking all we’d lost, arms-wise, anyway.

It was difficult to say what had happened, at least in our general area, which was somewhere around a twenty-mile radius. What we’d encountered so far was strange, to say the least. Everything appeared normal. There had been no looting, no destruction, fires or firefights. Everywhere we went was just deserted, like everyone had got up and left at the same time. Food was left on tables, clothes, valuables, guns, all left behind. Even in a mass mandatory evacuation, people would have brought their expensive jewelry or the means to defend themselves. I was leaning toward alien abduction. BT thought I was nuts and took every opportunity to tell me that, though as of yet he’d not given me a better alternative.

I’m not fighting alien creatures on top of everything we’re dealing with, Talbot, so just let that shit die a lumbering death, will you?

You all right? You don’t usually let my conspiracy theories get to you like this.

I don’t know man, when you bring up the aliens I get this strange picture of alligators in my head. It’s unsettling.

Alligator aliens? Yeah, and I’m the weird one. How do they fly ships with those little arms and legs?

These ones can stand.

Oh…yeah I don’t like that either.

I doused that line of thought as I sought my Top out. We were getting ready to head out further than we had thus far. According to the map there was a hospital some twenty-two miles away and, having got a look inside Dylan’s cabinet, I knew how important restocking med supplies was. She’d given me a list, but I’d had to have it translated as she must have been the one that taught doctors poor penmanship. Stenzel had rejoined our band of brothers; now that there wasn’t a ship to learn, her options were limited, and I had a feeling after she had wrestled the keys from Eastman during the supposed mutiny, she didn’t like being around him. From the way Eastman frowned every time he saw her it wasn’t hard to see the feeling was mutual. I think there was some harbored sense of betrayal from the both of them, and unless I was completely off the mark, I think she held some for me as well for allowing the man to slide back into command. Somebody had to do it and it just wasn’t a responsibility I wanted. And to top it off, I wasn’t planning on hanging around for the long haul anyway. Brazil sucked. I had Aspen on my mind; I figured I could finally afford a house there now. Unless a local government was in place, then I’d never be able to afford the property taxes.

We had bikes with saddlebags for the mission at hand. Not the way I’d wish to roll, but they were quiet and a hell of a lot faster than walking. What could easily have been a three-day excursion instead could have us back by dinner if we hurried up and got going. Another reason to be mad at Hammer, for delaying us. I felt a little shitty that I hadn’t thought to give him a bike. It wasn’t on purpose. Whom I felt bad for was Lina, that she’d have to wait longer to get the meds.

Are you sure about this? BT asked when he wheeled my bike over.

Yes, Top. We talked about this add nausea all night.

Ad nauseam.

Don’t be that guy. Anyway, splitting up is better. Keeping half the squad here to guard the village is the right move. And do you really want to sit on a bike for fifty miles?

No, no I don’t, he answered honestly as he absently rubbed his ass.

I was taking myself (and the three voices that lived in my head) along with Grimm, Stenzel, and Tommy. Rose had IEDs planted all over the place and was hesitant to let anyone else near them, not that many were jumping up and volunteering. Kirby was still nursing a nagging leg injury, Gary, while he may have trimmed all of the fat off himself and was in arguably the best shape of his life, had never been great with cardio, having suffered some lung damage from pneumonia when he was young. It had been a judgment call about Dallas and Reed, ultimately I’d taken neither. Dallas had seemed less and less interested in being in the military, and if she wanted out, that was her call. As for Reed, keeping his head in the game was something he hadn’t fully achieved yet. He was in a great deal of pain from his loss of Walde, something we were all still dealing with, although this was much more acute for him.

I hate when we do this shit.

I can’t quit you either, BT. I looked up at him with puppy dog eyes.

That makes it easier, thank you. Tommy is all hitched up.

We’d repurposed a small trailer to hook onto a bike, and since Tommy was the equivalent of ten people he got the unenviable task of pulling it, not that he minded.

Appreciate it. I’ll see you later tonight, and if you could round up a few beers I’d think about getting you promoted.

If you’re not back by tomorrow morning we’ll come looking for you.

Flippant thoughts flitted around the tip of my tongue; instead I went with the more sincere, Thank you, see you in a bit. Couldn’t quite equal the dramatic flair of pulling away from our loved ones on Jeeps, Hummers, tanks or light armored vehicles; it’s difficult to be cool on a bike with a handlebar-mounted bell that Tommy dinged repeatedly. We looked like glorified Boy and Girl Scouts going door to door to sell our goodies. What I wouldn’t have done for a box of Tagalongs just about then. We were making decent time, not great. Even though we had mountain bikes with the wider, knobby tires, most of the roads were in horrible disrepair. Got jostled around a fair amount until I voiced, I wonder if Staff Sergeant Summers has any of those inflatable donuts.

What? Stenzel asked. She was a couple of feet off to my left and nearly abreast.

Just wishing I had a bit more cushion on my ass.

Don’t we all.

Grimm, who couldn’t jog for a mile without sounding like a bear in heat, could ride a bike like he was related to that Lance fellow—and the Lance that was doing all the doping shit, not the run of the mill, all cleaned up Lance. According to the map, we’d gone nearly halfway. It had taken a little over an hour, a wee bit slower than I would have liked, but not embarrassing. Normally I would have called for a break but we pushed on, no matter how much my ass protested. The second half of the trek was much better as we’d hit a main road. It wasn’t a highway, but it was leagues better than the backwater side streets we’d been traveling. Two miles from the hospital I called for a halt, a small bite to eat and some rehydration, and to get circulation back in my posterior. The lack of people, or rather the lack of any sign of people, was troubling. I couldn’t shake the feeling that somehow, something had happened here that was more traumatic than a zombie invasion. What that was, I didn’t know, and there was nothing to guess at. No major pile up of cars, no burned-out military vehicles, no roadways littered with shell casings. Occasionally some trash would get windblown by, but other than that not so flattering reminder of human habitation, there was just nothing.

The sun was climbing, my hope was to get in and get out before noon. We were on course to do that. I had a nagging feeling our timetable was going to take a hard left, as usual, but my gut had been wrong before. There was the time I went on a date with this woman named Wendy, and my gut had given me all sorts of warm and fuzzies when I looked at her. The fucker had been wrong big time, because she was psychotic with a capital P. It had been an uncomfortable dinner with her telling me about all the men that had left her and what she’d subsequently done to them and how it would be in my best interest if I didn’t do the same. I couldn’t pay that check quickly enough. She’d invited me back to her place, presumably to see her trophy room stocked with all the severed members of the men that had wronged her; I politely declined. If I’d thought it was descending into chaos from the get-go, I was not ready for the free fall into Hell that was a scorned Wendy. We’d been on an hour-long date that a co-worker had set-up, Kenny. God, he was a douche. I should have known he’d set me up with a woman like that. He was still pissed off I’d taken him for nearly his entire paycheck at a poker game. Not my fault he couldn’t bluff worth a damn. I don’t usually play because I suck at it, but they said low stakes, and there was going to be food and beer. I somehow ended up with a full house and bet the farm on it. Kenny, not picking up on the cues that I wouldn’t bet fifty cents on anything less than two pair got his clock cleaned.

Back to my pal Wendy. Like a fool I’d told her I wasn’t coming in while she was still in the car, told her I had an early morning. She started kicking my dashboard—in like a toddler losing their shit kind of tantrum. I wasn’t driving a new car around, as a matter of fact, it was much closer to junkyard status than brand new, but I liked it and treated it as well as I could. Her beating the living shit out of it with her feet was pissing me off. Got a secret for you: want to know what entitled, psychotic drama-laced people love? More drama. And the more I shouted at her to stop what the fuck she was doing, the more fueled with rage she became. It dawned on me to become less concerned about the car and more concerned about myself. Her head was swinging back and forth, she was still playing the bass drum on my car, and now she was full throated screaming. I’d never been exposed to anything even remotely similar. I quickly dismissed the notion of pushing or pulling her out of the car, that would only be walking right into whatever this was.

I did something then that is far from my strong suit. I got out of the car and put some distance between me and the wailing banshee. By now, more than a few of the tenants at the apartment building she lived in had come out to witness what was making all that racket. I got a little worried thinking these people were going to believe I’d been hitting her—or something even more unimaginable.

An older gentleman came closer, and as I was heading over to tell him what was going on, he dipped his head down and looked inside. I’d left my door open, so the dome light was on.

He stood and turned back to the burgeoning crowd. It’s Wendy.

More than a few that had assembled turned and headed back inside as if this were all old hat.

Young man, a woman called out. Do you want me to call the cops for you?

I was thinking, for me? What kind of reputation did this woman have?

Honestly, ma’am, I just want her to get out of my car so I can go home.

Oh, sweetheart, you’re funny. Naïve, but funny. I’ll call the cops for you. She went back inside.

First date? the older man asked.

First and last.

Smart. She stabbed her last boyfriend. She’s on parole. She’s supposed to be wearing an ankle monitor.

Is he alright?

He half-shrugged. He’s gonna limp for a while, but my guess is he considers himself lucky.

The cops showed up about twenty minutes later. Wendy had destroyed what she could in the car while we waited.

Jesus Christ, Wendy, the first cop on the scene said when he looked into my car.

He…he raped me! she screamed.

That made my blood freeze. There was the potential for this bad date to go to all the way to Hell.

So you’re sitting in his car? And not trying to get away? he asked.

I’m terrified! she again screamed. Oh, and she was waving a knife around. Where she’d had it stowed and why she felt now was the time to wield it was beyond me. There was no way for a saner mind to comprehend the inner workings of one that was so fouled.

The cop reached for his taser while stepping back. Two more cops joined in, and three taser deployments later, Wendy was face down on the ground and handcuffed. The original cop came over.

Son, do you want to press charges for the damage to your car?

I shook my head, some was in disbelief, but most was that I just wanted to get away from whatever this was as quickly as possible.

Does she know where you live?

No, and if she finds out, I’m moving.

She’ll be locked up for the weekend, but her dad is loaded and has no problem with bailing his daughter out of jail. Again. She’ll likely move on to the next victim in a week or two; in the meantime, be extra vigilant.

I nodded while the other two manhandled the jerking and fighting creature that was Wendy.

The neighbor next to me clapped me on the shoulder. They say the best sex is with a crazy woman; if that’s the case she’s in a league of her own. He shook his head and walked away.

I wouldn’t know, I told him truthfully and, because I’m a guy and have few thoughts that don’t revolve around sex, I was slightly saddened that I didn’t.

We got to within a few hundred yards of the hospital and I again called for a halt. Tommy handed me a pair of binoculars; the place looked as vacant as the rest of the country. That nagging feeling was back.

Stenzel, you see anything? I asked.

She was looking through her scope. "Nothing. No movement, no shadows...but I feel something, Captain. Hard to explain. It feels like it’s...staged?"

Kind of how I feel. Tommy?

Same, was all he offered.

Seems fine to me, Grimm wasn’t even looking at the hospital; as he said the words he was busy eating a power bar.

Now what, sir? she asked.

We go in slow. If we see anything, we do not engage. We retreat until such time as we can assess the threat, then either leave or continue on with our mission.

Thought about walking in; we compromised and walked our rides in. The hospital was the first place that we’d seen that didn’t look like the rest of the entire country, simply abandoned. There had been a firefight here. It wasn’t a last stand type of battle, didn’t look like more than a dozen casings on the ground. There was some dried blood remaining, but it was swirled, like someone had tried to clean it up. That was strange. The only thing that made any sort of sense was that some potentially drug-fueled miscreant had come into the hospital looking to obtain his next fix by any means possible and had been shot down by security. Maintenance had then been cleaning up the crime scene just as the great unexplained disappearance happened. When fighting zombies, folks didn’t generally stop to mop up.

Tommy gave me a look that neatly translated to WTF. I shrugged as we advanced cautiously.

Grimm pointed to a sign that said Drogaria. It’s that way.

How do you know?