***
"Are there more?" asks Eze after he and Chimola has dumped a body of a dead human in the other train wagon.
"Yes." says Chimola looking back at the first train wagon, empty from dead bodies and zombie corpses.
Chimola, Eze, Monifa, Chidi and Giconi are in the first train wagon, sitting and waiting for the train to reach its destination. And Akinyi is at the train driver seat, controlling the train to move forward and not stop a bit. In the second wagon lays all the dead bodies and zombie corpses who were killed by the squad of the five survivors.
"You think it will be safe out there." asks Monifa to the group, laying on her butt on two seats like it is some sort of bed.
"What do you mean?" asks Giconi who is sitting on the left side.
"I mean. What if that said camp is actually safe for us? What if it is like in the movies where a camp gets raided by zombies and the military fails to contain."
"Not going to happen." says Chidi to Monifa. "I've been in the Army for a few months. I've seen the weapons they've got. And judging by the way these things infected with this Z virus work… The military would survive."
"But why they didn't do it when this apocalypse begun? They let everyone fend for themselves."
"That's not what they did." says Chidi who is approaching to Monifa and sits on the other seat to face her. "I've been in police for a long time… These people from "The Organization" gave us something. A manual to read. They've given to me and my team ten years ago. Told us we will deeply need it in the future, and we all brushed it off and left it somewhere. I didn't read it completely. Only a page or so, and then dumped it."
"So, this "The Organization" is the one who we are going to trust? Rather than our own military?"
"Pretty much." says Giconi, then he decides to lighten the mood and change the conversation: "What jobs you guys had before this? I'll go first. I was a university student, in engineering with my friend, Dumisa, but we both worked in this company for a while, before we decided to leave it."
"Why?" asks Monifa to Giconi.
"The Boss was a prick. Hopefully he died."
"I hope mine too." says Chimola. "I worked as a cashier for a few months, then decided to quit the job and become a stall seller for my friend. Left it because of the boss who continued to do sexual assaults on me. He was into men."
"Disgusting." says Chidi.
"You worked in the police force?" asks Eze.
"Yes, son." says Chidi. "I was most of the time at the office where nothing big happened."
"I was a footballer for the team Zimbabwe Tigers." says Eze.
"Heard about it." says Chidi to Eze. "You guys had a rough season."
"Yes. One who lead to relegation and disband."
"That's a bummer." says Giconi, and he looks at Monifa. "Where you worked?"
"Ice cream vendor." says Monifa. "Not missing the job one bit."
"Why?"
"That was the only job I was qualified for. Serving food and everything."
The group continues to talk a bit about their lives before this apocalypse has hit the entire planet. While they were talking, Giconi is looking outside at the window, and sees a zombie running at full speed toward the train. But Giconi decides to ignore that zombie rather to alert the people of its existence and continues to listen into the conversation he just created on this train. Giconi notices the smell of urine, poop and blood from the zombies and the dead bodies they've found in the train isn't leaving the air even if they opened all the windows.
"Hello!" says the announcer coming from the loudspeakers installed in the train wagons. "Here's Akinyi speaking! We are going to go straight to Mutare which is for two hours or so. From there we will have to find another way to go to Mozambique."
"But why?" asks Giconi to the loudspeaker.
But nothing came from the loudspeaker back to response, because Akinyi has come into the first wagon with a map to show them one of the reasons they cannot go in there. Akinyi and everyone from the train wagon are gathering around the map, looking at it and reading the writing that it is on the map written in the Shona language, one of the sixteen official languages that Zimbabwe had. The map shows the entire region of Zimbabwe and a lot of marks with an "X" on cities and under them are written words like "Kuparadzwa" (Destroyed), "Kutorwa nezvikara" (Taken over by monsters) and "Isina kuchengeteka" (Unsafe). But all from one city on the map is not marked, and that one being Mutare.
"So, we're going in there?"
"We are." says Akinyi. "It's the only choice we have now. Other cities are dead."
"But how do we know if we trust this map?" asks Chidi.
"That's too late," says Akinyi. "we are already going in there."
"Well…" says Giconi. "Guess we go in there."
"And from there we will have to find a way to get to Mozambique." says Chidi.
"But to where in Mozambique?"
"To any available dock."
A while later, the small majority of the group has fallen asleep, those who did are Eze and Giconi, while the others are in the wagon, looking at the landscape of the ruined cities they are all passing by. And Akinyi is on the train conductor place, checking the train and making sure it will not crash into anything.
"These two are sleeping like logs." says Monifa to Chimola and Chidi.
"Yeah." responds Chidi who is looking through the map Akinyi has showed them earlier. "If the cities are infested or destroyed… We can still try to go in them and try to search for help."
"Not really the best idea." says Monifa. "I saw on the news how many of the cities on our country have been devastated by these monsters."
"I was suggesting it. Hopefully when we get to Mutare, we all have to face the worst."
"Mutare wasn't as populated like Harare.", says Chimola.
"That is true." says Chidi. "But there may be chances for that city to be under the control of these zombies."
"Speaking of zombies," says Monifa. "are we sure these things are dead for sure?"
"What do you mean?" asks Chidi to Monifa question.
"You may call me crazy after this one. And I will not blame you. When the apocalypse begun, I was only I and my granny in the home. I was attending her house, helping her to clean the house."
"Granny?" asks Chimola. "How old are you again?"
"Doesn't matter." says Chidi to Chimola.
"Anyway. As we were cleaning the house, our neighbour walked in the house, with a bite mark on his neck, yelling for help and all sorts of things to stop the pain from the biting. My granny has fallen on the floor unconscious, while I was running to my kitchen room to check the medicine I have. Like spiritus, cotton, things to stop the bleeding. But, when I arrived there, it was too late, the neighbour became a zombie… and ate my granny while I was gone… It is an image I will never forget, guys. But one thing I will not forget is… Granny stood up, and she pushed the neighbour back, then she pinned him to the ground. But then. Granny turned around, and she ran after me while I was jumping out of the window and running away from her house."
The two people have listened to the conservation, both of them didn't know what to say to this for the next minute, then Chimola asks.
"So you're saying… The zombies are still humans?"
"It is a possibility, right?" asks Monifa. "I mean. What I saw there, couldn't be explained. Aren't zombies supposed to be attracted by humans?"
"They are." says Chidi. "I don't understand it one bit. Did your granny got bitten, transformed into a zombie and then fought the zombie…"
"And she ran after you?" asks Chimola.
"Yes." says Monifa sounding a little worried. "I know it is not the best time to bring it out, but this thing still remained on my mind for the following days while we were still in the lower danger threat. Never told anyone about this incident."
"And you trust us to help you come to a solution to this?" asks Chimola.
"Yes. You two seem to have more knowledge on these things than an ordinary ice cream vendor like me."
"This is the first time I ever heard something like this," says Chidi. "so, I don't know what to say."
"Me neither." says Chimola. "But it would be game changing if these zombies can still be human after transformation."
"Like… Control them?" asks Chidi.
"More like we can control their abilities and use them to fight like fire with fire."
"I see." says Chidi. "But, that is not possible."
"That is what we said when zombies were on movies," says Giconi who just woke up from his sleep. "but now look at it. We have a lot of zombies all around us."
The group did not argue further about this, because they heard a bang coming from the second wagon. The group of four people, Eze still sleeps, are looking at that door of the locked wagon scared. Chidi is taking the knife from his belt, he rises from his seat, walk toward the door and he opens it. From that door, a zombie walks out of the wagon, but in the next second, gets stabbed into the head, of the brain zone, and then the zombie is pushed back into the wagon by Chidi. The zombie lies on the floor of the moving wagon.
"I shot that thing earlier." says Chidi scared.
"Y-You did?" asks Giconi coming over to Chidi, and looking scared at the zombie he just killed, he remembers that zombie. It is the one he killed on their cleaning in this wagon.
The group closes the door of the wagon, Chidi locks it and then drag a few detached seats from the wagon, moves them to that door and use it as a blockage to that door.
"They can come back to life?!" asks Monifa scared.
"Looks like it." says Giconi who is as terrified as the other by this thing they just saw.