900 Miles: A Zombie Novel by S. Johnathan Davis Read Free Book Online Page B

on the deck of the ship, was the blood soaked orange life preserver bob up out of the water.
    Despite our best efforts to fight them off, there were over a dozen of these things, and only a few of us left.
    Mr. ’Stache had a handgun. He was screaming that he was almost out of bullets, as he followed a few of the creatures up the stairs to where the captain of the ship was driving the ferry. I heard a number of shots echo in the cabin, and then a few more screams.
    Less than two minutes from land, I thought.
    Looking over at Kyle, and then toward the stairs, I said, “Best to head up there.”
“Yep, we’ll be able to guard the stairs as a choke point if needed,” he agreed.
    “We’ve got to make sure this ship gets to shore,” I snapped as we darted to the upper deck.
    As we turned the corner at the top of the staircase, it was Mr. ’Stache we ran into first.   He was still holding his gun, his finger locked on the trigger, but it was clearly out of bullets and pointed at the ground. His eyes moved slowly up to meet mine.  His mustache blew in the wind.
    Kyle said, “They got him.”
    There was a pause, as I realized what we had to do. He ran towards us with that wild look in his blood shot eyes. Kyle apologized out loud before delivering that final blow to his head.
    No time to think about it.
    We both headed to the cabin of the ship and quickly discovered that Mr. ’Stache had taken out the two creatures before they took that chunk out of his leg.
    The captain was curled up in a ball in the corner of the cabin. He kept repeating,
    “Not the water! Not the water! Not the water!”
    He was right; the water must have been filed with those creatures and there was no way in hell any of us wanted to wind up in it.
    I grabbed the steering wheel, and aimed the ship at the nearest shore where there was a road. Kyle ran back out to the staircase. I could hear him grunting as he swung his metal pole at each creature that tried to make it up the stairs.
    Thirty seconds to ground. Thirty seconds until we could escape.
    I reached into my pocket pulling out the car keys to the Hummer. There was no slowing down this boat. We were going to make land.
    Kyle ran into the cabin empty handed. He explained that he had dug the hook, at the end of the pole, into one of the creature’s brain, and couldn’t get it back out before it tipped overboard taking his weapon with it.
    Ten seconds to ground.
    “Anybody still alive, you should grab on to something, and don’t let go!” I screamed out the cabin window.
    Five seconds to ground.
    There was a point just before we hit, where everything literally stopped.  My arms were clasped tightly around the steering wheel of the ship. I could see Kyle bracing himself in the doorframe.
    I didn’t feel us hit ground as much as I saw it.  Anything not nailed down, or holding on for dear life, simultaneously flew into the air crashing towards the front of the boat. I watched a red fire extinguisher shoot above my head and through the glass window; the captain of the ship followed it.
    I swear we made eye contact as he flew over. His eyes were wide with a look of surprise, mixed with horror, as he passed above. He was lucky; the extinguisher had shattered the glass, so he flew straight through the window frame unscathed.
    He passed right beyond the front of the boat, over our Hummer, and rolled into a ball as he hit a patch of grass. It was a million dollar landing. I watched as he stood up, brushed his clothes off, and looked back up at the boat from which he came. He gave it a look as if to say, “I friggin’ made it?”
    It was in that instant that all of the zombies that had flown off the boat with him started to stand back up as well. He reached for the closest object, a wooden paddle that had landed next to him, and began swinging around his head.
    He was doing a decent job of warding the zombies off, when it became clear that the boat crash had caused enough noise to catch the