Dying Days 3 Read online

  Dying Days 3

  Armand Rosamilia

  Edited by Jenny Adams

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying or recording or by any information storage and retrieval systems, without expressed written consent of the author and/or artists

  This book is a work of fiction. Names characters, places and incidents are products of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual events or persons, living, dead or undead, is entirely coincidental.

  Dying Days 3

  copyright 2013 by Armand Rosamilia

  Cover Illustration copyright 2016 by Jack Wallen

  First printing June 2013

  Updated April 2016

  [email protected]

  http://dyingdayszombie.com

  Special Thanks to a bunch of people this time around…

  First, obviously all the fans that have made the Dying Days series such a huge success and made each new release an event. I thank you!

  To the friends and family that have made this so much fun to write, and have given me the support to finish this third installment. I promise: the fourth one won't take over a year to write!

  To Stew

  The Dying Days series from Armand Rosamilia

  Highway To Hell

  Dying Days

  Dying Days 2

  Still Dying: Select Scenes From Dying Days

  Still Dying 2

  Dying Days 3

  Dying Days: Origins

  Highway To Hell 2

  Dying Days: Origins 2

  Dying Days 3

  Dying Days 4

  Dying Days 5

  Dying Days 3

  Prologue

  Frank.

  He had a name, once, and it was Frank. He had a last name, but he couldn't remember it. His thoughts, at the moment, were on trying to figure out what exactly a last name was.

  The noise he heard was the ocean and he moved his stiff neck and looked down to see his shuffling feet kicking up sand on a beach. Frank had never been to the beach. Never felt sand on his toes, but he was doing it now. He was barefoot. He didn't know why.

  Frank couldn't stop walking. He was being driven by something, an anger… but he didn't know who he was mad at. He knew he was raging, though, and needed to strike out and rip someone apart. He didn't know why, but, suddenly, knew it was the only reason to keep moving.

  There were others on the beach, but he felt nothing toward them. No anger and no need to destroy them. They moved in the same flowing, general direction as he did. One would veer off and walk into the waves or over the dunes, and he could see more stepping out of the surf and joining the walk.

  Zombies.

  The word came unbidden to his mind. These were zombies, undead, monsters… and they were in search of the living, to tear them apart, to rape them, violate and break all in their paths. They weren't evil. They were just hungry.

  Frank willed himself to stop. A man, with his head broken and at an odd angle, bumped into him. Frank lashed out, with creaking arms, and knocked the zombie to the ground.

  It felt right. This mindless creature struggled to rise on battered legs but seemed incapable of simply rolling over and pushing himself up.

  Frank knew how to stand. He knew the mechanics of how to drive a car, how to brush his teeth, how to make love to his wife.

  His wife had been sick? Frank remembered bits and pieces of memory. He lived in Montreal. He worked in a dead-end job selling newspapers. His wife had been back to Sweden to see her sick mother. By the time she'd returned to Canada, she was coughing and wouldn't talk about the visit or her mother.

  He couldn't remember his wife's name, but he remembered the bite mark on her forearm. The wound festered and he'd taken her from the airport right to hospital.

  There was an incident. Frank remembered a nurse and doctor being bitten. By his wife? Chaos in the emergency room, followed by stampeding hospital personnel and patients. He went for his wife; she was out of the bed, dragging smashed equipment as she moved.

  Frank remembered trying to extricate her from the machines, pulling needles and wires from her body. She stared at the blood as it spurted from her wrist and onto his chest.

  Then she'd bitten down on his neck and the pain was intense. He saw red and then… he was dead. He couldn't remember his wife's name.

  Warmth on his feet, as the sun beat down. This was no Canadian beach. He had no idea where he could be, but he was walking, so it couldn't be too far.

  Frank remembered biting people and savagely attacking their bodies. He remembered ripping apart orifices and, actually, having brutal sex with people until they died. The thought appalled him at first.

  The zombie was still trying to get up on the beach. Frank was about to help him, but then he stopped. Why should he? It dawned on him: this monster was after the same dwindling thing he was looking for. The living.

  Frank reached up with stiff hands and felt his neck wound. It was just a sliver of ripped skin, although, he swore she'd done a number on him before he died. He flexed his legs and it felt good. How was this possible?

  The blood.

  Frank knew the blood, coursing over and into his body, made him stronger. It made him grow closer to whole again. With each living body he consumed, he was closer to being fully formed. He needed to find humans before the rest of these weaklings did.

  He knew by looking at them, as they walked by, they weren't conscious of their surroundings or aware like he was. He didn't know why, and he didn't care.

  "I was in the first wave. My wife was patient zero," he actually whispered through cracked lips, and was amazed he'd spoken. He felt his vocal chords flexing for the first time in, what, days? Weeks? Months? Years?

  The zombies around him were growing as well, but they were nowhere near where he was. But, in time, they would rival him, and grow aware. They would try to destroy him as the enemy. Frank couldn't have that. He was even angrier now, but he let it wash over him. He could control it, little by little. He knew his brain was now his driving force, and not the insatiable hunger.

  With his back threatening to pop, Frank bent down and lifted the zombie to its feet. The mindless creature began to shuffle away without a notice to Frank or the help.

  Frank moved behind him and wrapped both arms around its neck, crushing the unused windpipe and yanking as hard as he could, trying to dislodge the head from the body. He struggled for several minutes before stopping. The zombie didn't fight back; its feet still trying to propel it forward.

  Finally, the head snapped back and the zombie went lifeless. Frank dropped it to the beach. One less to contend with. The beach was filled with them.

  Claudia.

  His wife's name was Claudia, and he'd met her online. In a chat-room. They'd talked and had webcam dates for months before she flew from Sweden for a visit. She never really left, moving in with him, getting a job at the local daycare, and only returning to Sweden to pack her things and for family emergencies. They'd been wed six months later, a small ceremony attended by friends and family. Their honeymoon was spent in Florida, a week holed up in a hotel room making love while the sound of the waves crashed outside their balcony.

  Frank knew he wasn't in Montreal, and he wanted to find his wife. Or did he? She would try to feed off the living as well, and once the stock was gone, he knew he would become a dried husk. He needed the living.

  Another zombie got too close and Frank twisted its neck until he heard the snap. These creatures had no fresh blood he could use, but they needed to be eliminated.

  Frank trudged down the beach, weaving back and forth as he came across new undead, breaking necks with wild
abandon and feeling better and better as he did, using muscles he'd not used in a long time.

  There was a pier up ahead and he made his way to it, dropping bodies as he moved from side to side. He went to the dunes and snapped the neck of a little girl, bloody and carrying a small yellow shovel. Two men came out of the surf and he made his way to them. They didn't resist or seem to notice him. He dispatched both, feeling his atrophied muscles seeming to come back to life.

  By the time he made his way up to the boardwalk and onto the pier, he was grinning, which hurt, but not as much as he thought it would.

  He could read the signs around him, as his bare feet slapped on the warped wooden boards. The large building, at the mouth of the pier, was a restaurant. Frank thought he'd seen it before, and knew Claudia was in the car with him. A rental car. His honeymoon?

  The sign painted on top of the building said FLAGLER BEACH.

  Where he'd spent his honeymoon. In Florida.

  Frank had walked about 1,400 miles. How long would that take?

  His nostrils expanded and he took in some of the fresh salt air. A zombie walked right up to him before veering to his left. Frank broke another neck.

  He began moving north on A1A, sure this was the direction he'd gone when he was here with Claudia. He needed a place to stay and recover. He could feel his body struggling to survive and grow now. His wounds would heal and his blood would begin flowing again. Frank just knew it. Would he be able to pass for human? Would he be able to get close to them without being destroyed? His mind was filling with memories and thoughts and overloading.

  He needed time to process everything in his head, and form a game plan.

  The streets weren't crowded with zombies but there were enough of them. He knew it was pointless to wander and try to kill every single one of them, but if he didn't they would eventually gain consciousness and try to destroy him. He'd been one of the first. He had no idea how many more, from the initial wave of attacks, were still out there, and if they were plotting as well. He couldn't take the chance.

  He stopped, the hot pavement burning his feet. He didn't actually feel the pain but it was instinctive to him. His feet were black with grime and the bottoms were probably flayed of skin. It would grow. He needed to find shoes to wear.

  Across the street was an abandoned restaurant with a wooden walkway leading to its front door. Java Joint. It was a coffee place, the windows blown out. Frank decided he would stay there, out of the sun and away from any of the living. He would gain strength and destroy any zombies who got too close.

  He would begin to plot his next move. But, first, he needed to find a good pair of Nikes. And a living person so he could bathe in its blood.

  Chapter One

  "If I hit the next three in a row, you owe me a kiss," John Murphy said to Darlene Bobich. "Deal?"

  "Fine. But I get to pick the targets."

  John shook his head. "No way. You'll see a zombie out in the middle of the damn ocean and point him out. It has to be in range and fair."

  Darlene smiled. By now, he knew all her tricks. She walked to the side and looked down at the multitude of undead wandering the dunes, underneath her stilt house, and on A1A. She pointed out three zombies in the distance but still in range of his crossbow. "Hit all three and I will give you a kiss."

  John smiled. "I'm hoping for a big, sloppy kiss. Not some lame peck on the cheek."

  Darlene blushed and looked away. Even though they'd been playing this game for a long time, they still hadn't done anything about it. Each day the flirting got more intense, the sexual innuendos more pronounced, and she caught him staring at her and smiling when he thought she wasn't noticing.

  And she stared at him. Constantly. Since coming back from St. Augustine, things had changed between them. They were even more awkward, in fact. Darlene wanted him and she knew he felt the same, but there was something holding them back. It wasn't the thought of his wife out there, still alive, somewhere. Darlene had overheard John and Murph, his dad, talking about it the other night.

  "You don't want to hear it, son, but she's gone. If she isn't, there's no way she'll find you down here. I loved her like a daughter, but there comes a time in a man's life when he needs not dwell on the past and what might happen. You have a great girl right here, and you know you can't afford to waste anymore time," Murph had said.

  "I know. I really like Darlene. Shit, I'm in love with her. But it still feels like cheating. I love being with her, love everything about her. Yet… if I commit to us, it will feel like I let my marriage go. The commitment we had."

  "There are no more laws."

  "There is for me, pop. There's still a God above us, and he still wants us to obey him. You know my marriage vows are still in my heart."

  "I thought I raised you better than that," Murph said with a snort. "All law-abiding. It makes your rebel old man sick. But I get you. More than you think. But don't let her get away from you, because Darlene is special. She won't always be here. Someday, she's going to get sick of this game you two play, or head back to Maine and home, or find another man."

  "Better than me? I doubt it."

  "Shit, boy, you better make your move. If this old man finds some little blue pills in one of these raids, I'll be giving you a run for your money with her."

  "First one gone. Are you even paying attention?" John said to her, bringing her back to the present. "I'm not falling for your lame tricks. If I hit them, they count."

  "Whatever. Big baby."

  The second one was dropped with little effort. John puckered his lips. "Wet your whistle, because the John John train is about to pull into the station.

  "Dork."

  John leaned against the railing and aimed the crossbow. "The one with the blue shirt, right?"

  Darlene came up next to him. "Yes."

  "Get ready to kiss me."

  Darlene slid a hand between the rail and his jeans and lightly stroked his crotch with two fingers.

  The shot went wide, disappearing into the dunes.

  "No way, I get a do-over!" John cried.

  "Do-over? Are you five?"

  "You know you can't do that." John shook his head. "I get another chance."

  "Nope." Darlene puckered her lips and blew him a kiss. "This is as close as you're getting, John John."

  "You don't play well with others."

  "I never said I did. And you lost. How are you going to survive in this cold, dark world? You let a little thing like that distract you. Thankfully, it isn't a life or death situation, or you'd be a zombie. And I'd get to shoot you in the head."

  "I love it when you talk dirty. I want a rematch."

  "Maybe next time." Darlene lifted her tanned face to the sun and put her hands on her hips. She'd been gaining back a few pounds since their return. She didn't think she'd ever be the overweight girl she was when this all started, but she wanted some of her curves back. She'd replaced some fat with muscle, and probably weighed more. But she was getting solid. And she knew John was responding to her.

  But she didn't want to rock the boat. If he was still in love with his wife, she didn't want to come between them. And she knew a kiss might lead to so much more, in the blink of an eye. She wanted it, but didn't want to be the reason he did something regrettable. It was better to have the fantasy with him. To flirt every day, have his back when they hunted and be good friends. But it was starting to strain their relationship. She knew John was fighting a constant war inside his head about her.

  "You know I would've made that shot. No problem."

  "Yet, you had a problem making the shot. Weird."

  "Someday…"

  Darlene laughed. "Someday might never come, you know. You're so Charlie Brown to my Lucy. I keep pulling the football away. You'll never learn, will you?"

  John was trying not to laugh. "Tomorrow, we'll do it again, only I'll get Eric over here to hold you back."

  "And then I'll flash my boobs at you or show you my thong, and you'll prob
ably shoot Eric in the foot."

  "Probably."

  "Besides, you're forgetting the most important part of your loss."

  "What?"

  "I grabbed your dick."

  John blushed and looked away. "I didn't forget. It's just… I guess I lost but really won."

  "I'd like to think so." Darlene opened the door to her stilt house. "I'm going to make coffee. Want some?"

  "Sure. I'll be in. Give me a minute."

  "I will bring your cup out. We can sit out here. If you look far enough out to sea, you can't see zombies looking to eat you. It makes for a pleasant way to enjoy coffee. I might even have something to snack on."

  "I'll set the chairs up." John was smiling at her.

  "What's that look for?"

  "Nothing." He turned away again. "Just glad to have met you."

  Darlene walked up to him and put a hand on his arm. "Same here. I can't imagine going this alone."

  "I know I keep sending you mixed signals, and I'm sorry. You have to know I want to be with you. But I can't right now."

  "Shh." Darlene put a finger up to his lips and, suddenly, wanted him to kiss it, but knew it would be wrong. "You don't have to explain a damn thing to me. Let's just kill the rest of this afternoon sipping coffee and pretending there's a future for all of us."

  "Alright."

  Darlene leaned in, suddenly, and kissed his cheek. "I cheated, so you get the kiss."

  "I'll take it."

  Darlene pulled away before she really kissed him. She was excited just being this close to him. "Coffee coming right up."

  Chapter Two