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smoke, I assumed Gus had lit her corpse on fire. I didn’t ask.
    The first couple of miles went by without incident. When we got to the edge of the town of Neah Bay proper, I sensed dead nearby.
    “Gus, Bobby, there’s Roamers close by,” I whispered.
    “We need to save ammo. Think we can get them with hatchets?” asked Bobby.
    “Probably,” I answered. “Here’s your chance.”
    I pointed to a shambling and badly decayed Roamer walking in our general direction.
    “I got this one,” she said as she approached it.
    We each had a hatchet that hung from a loop we had fashioned on the backpacks. Bobby had taken hers out and held it at her side. As she came face-to-face with the rotten corpse, she raised the weapon and stopped mid-air. I watched her, not sure what she was doing. She took a few steps back as the creature raised its nose to the air and sniffed.
    “It can’t see me!” she cried out followed by a slight laugh. “The bastard can’t see me!”
    She began circling the creature, confusing it. She was faster than the animated carcass and was acting like a kid playing a game.
    “C’mon, Bobby. Kill the fucker already,” said Gus.
    “Another one. Behind you, Gus,” I warned.
    I turned to face the new arrival. This Roamer seemed fresher than the one Bobby was playing with. It groaned as it sensed fresh meat. It still had color in its clothing and was obviously a woman. Her black hair was long and snarled. She didn’t look wounded but was pale and her skin dirtied. Her dress was not fitting of the season, boasting spaghetti straps and ending just above her knees. She was still bloated from death, making the dress look comically too small for her body. Gus ran up to her, swinging his hatchet at her neck. The blow didn’t go through cleanly as it might on TV or in the movies, but rather got stuck somewhere in her spine. The strike was strong enough to sever the nerves that went from her brain to the rest of her body. She fell to the paved street. Her head lay awkwardly to one side, still half attached. A black substance that I had begun to think of as ‘Zombie Life Blood’ pooled beneath her. Her jaws continued to pathetically work themselves in search of food. Gus put one of his large boots on the side of her head and pulled the hatched from her spine with an audible snapping followed by a nauseating slurp. He then used the weapon to split her face, giving her the chance to finally rest at peace.
    I looked back to Bobby, wondering if she might need help. She was still walking circles around the blind zombie, tormenting it. Approaching her was another Roamer. I walked up to her and pulled her back.
    “Seriously, stop playing,” I said, a bit irritated.
    She rolled her eyes at me dramatically. “Ok, ok.”
    Sensing the creature just behind her, she turned and swung her own hatchet at its head. It was an easy kill. Its head disintegrated from the blow. The rest of it fell apart as it hit the ground.
    “Ew, gross. That one was dry,” she said.
    “Better dry than sludgy,” I said as she began moving toward the next one. Once she reached it, she kicked at its torso, causing it to fall onto its backside. She jumped onto its chest. As it began thrashing about in an attempt to get up, she brought the machete down onto the top of its head. It grew still in short order.
    “Ok, girls, let’s get off the streets for now,” said Gus as he approached us.
    The sun was quickly approaching the west horizon, casting long shadows around us. This area of town boasted a few small buildings and a lot of empty parking lots. I didn’t see any vehicles around aside from a large silver and black crew cab pickup that was facing the wrong direction and upside down. .
    “Gus?” I called to him quietly.
    “What babe?”
    “That truck. Do you think it’d be usable if we could get it flipped over?” I pointed at the monster.
    “Well, probably not. If you look carefully at the frame you’ll see the cab is about six