Walking With The Dead (Book 2): Home with the Dead

by Dziekan, PJ

“Mick, I can’t hold the light and keep the gun aimed at what might come out.”

  “Yeah, you can. Hold the light and as soon as I pop the door, I’ll move aside. You’ll have a direct shot.”

  She bit her lip. If he moved quick enough. If she aimed quick enough. Too many ifs. She shook her head. “I don’t think it’s a good idea.”

  “I think it is, babe. There has to be something good behind that door. Why else would it be locked?” He took two steps toward her and pressed his heavy flashlight into her hand. He slipped her pry bar from its holder. “It’ll be fine, babe.”

  She blew out a breath. “If something flies out of there and bites you, I’ll kill you.”

  She could see his grin in the dim light. “I hope so.” He gave her a quick kiss and turned back to the door.

  Sarah held Mick’s light in her left hand, her gun in her right. She shone the beam on the door and watched as Mick stuck the pry bar between the door and the jamb. She heard him grunt as he pushed his weight on the bar, then the cracking of the wood. When the door popped open Mick grabbed the handle and flung it wide. She brought the gun up as the door drifted open.

  The only thing that came out was the intense stench of decomposing bodies. They both gagged, Sarah putting a hand to her nose. “Shit,” she whispered when she could finally speak.

  Mick reached for his light. She handed it to him and flicked her wrist, bringing hers up from its dangling position on her arm. They both took two cautious steps forward and directed their beams inside the room.

  The bodies were the first things they saw. They figured one was a woman by the long hair and bracelets on the wrist. It seemed a little more decomposed than the second one, a man based on his short beard. He was slumped in a seated position against the wall, a pistol in his lap.

  Sarah moved further into the narrow room and shone the light on the woman. She could see the exit wound in the back of her skull. Her light flicked up to the man and she saw the brains and blood on the wall behind his head. “Murder/suicide,” she murmured. “I wonder why.” Her light drifted down to the ragged tear on his arm and she had her reason.

  “Babe?”

  Sarah turned to Mick. As she moved her light, she breathed, “Oh my God.” The room was only about six feet wide, but it went the length of the house. Shelves lined all but the small space where the bodies lay and they were filled floor to ceiling with supplies. Cases upon cases of water. Canned goods. Propane stoves with spare tanks. Huge boxes marked civilian MREs. Cases of powdered eggs. A large medical kit. Guns. More guns. Ammo. More ammo.

  “I am so glad I let you talk me into opening this door!” She exclaimed as she shone her light around and saw more and more items.

  “Sometimes it pays to listen to me.”

  “Eh, sometimes.” She reached over and touched his arm. “This is really great. But we’ll never be able to fit it all in the Jeep. He must have made a ton of trips to supply this room.”

  “Why don’t we go a little further, see if there’s a town ahead? We can probably find another Jeep or truck or something.”

  “OK.” She moved her light around the room again, this time stopping on the MREs. She tore into the box and picked out three. “First, let’s have some breakfast.”

  ♦

  Sarah moaned as she ate the sausage and hash browns. Sure, it wasn’t the greatest tasting, but it had been so long since she had what was once her favorite breakfast food. “God, I could eat another two or three of these,” she said, licking her fingers.

  “You and me both,” Steven said. “How many are there?”

  “Tons,” Mick answered. “We’ll need another vehicle to get them all back, so we’ll go a little further down the road and see what we can find.”

  “Sounds like a plan.” Sarah handed Mick the instant coffee from her MRE. “Let’s get rolling.”

  Happy, their bellies full, they drove down the road. It was still barren, only an occasional car or abandoned building to relieve the scenery. About twenty minutes after leaving the house, they passed a sign saying Reedville ten miles. “Maybe we’ll find something there,” Sarah said.

  “I’m sure we will.” Mick pressed harder on the accelerator.

  About two miles outside of town, they saw their first mobile zombies. A handful were moving in the road, slowly plodding forward in the direction of Reedville. They were far enough apart that Mick weaved around them.

  They pulled into town, a burg slightly bigger than Thornville. Sarah scanned the town, seeing a grocery store with the windows smashed, a clothing store with a body half in and out of the door, a diner with the doors wide open and a bloodstain on the sidewalk.

  The car stopped suddenly, jerking her against her seatbelt. “What’s wrong?” She asked, turning her head to Mick. He pointed through the window.

  Three blocks ahead, about fifty zombies were gathered around a three-story building, groaning and moaning and stretching their decaying arms towards the roof. Sarah squinted, trying to see what was so interesting to the zombies. All she could see was a pile of trash.

  “What’s up there?’ Steven asked, leaning forward in the back seat to peer out the windshield.

  “Probably a person,” Mick said. “Got trapped up there on the roof.”

  “It’s like déjà vu all over again,” she said with a laugh. Mick shook his head and smiled.

  “What?” Steven asked, looking from Mick to Sarah.

  “We pulled Dylan, Julianne, April and Dominic from a roof,” Mick explained.

  “And you think you can do that again?” Steven sat back in the seat. “There’s gotta be fifty zombies out there.”

  Sarah shrugged. “We’ve seen worse odds.” She looked at Mick. “What do you think?”

  “Can’t leave someone.”

  “If they’re still alive.”

  “Oh, they are,” he said. “Otherwise, they wouldn’t be surrounding the building.”

  “So, how do we do this?” She asked. “There are a lot of them and we don’t have the firepower we had before. We should have grabbed some of those guns at the house.”

  Mick rubbed his goatee. “A distraction, I guess. Get them away from there.”

  She nodded. “OK.” She looked out of her window at the creatures. “Let me out and I’ll get a little closer. You can honk the horn to get their attention and lead them away. I’ll go get whoever it is and we’ll meet back here.”

  “Or I could get out, you be the distraction and then we’ll meet back here.”

  She looked at Mick for a moment. “OK,” she finally said. “Looks like there’s a fire escape on the side of the building. Maybe you could use that?”

  Mick nodded, surprised that she had given in so easily. “Will do.”

  She watched as he put his hand on the door and eased it open. “Be careful,” she said as he got out. She scooted over the console to sit in the driver’s seat.

  “Always.” He leaned in and kissed her. He reached between his seat and the door and drew out his bat.

  “Wait.” Sarah shifted on the seat and unholstered her gun. “Take this.”

  He took the weapon from her. “You be careful.” He placed the gun in the small of his back.

  “Of course.” She adjusted the seat so she could reach the pedals and put her seat belt on.

  He softly closed the door and she bit her lip as she watched him walk away. He moved a block closer, then tucked himself into a recessed doorway. He waved and she took a deep breath before she pounded on the horn, two long blasts.

  The majority of the zombies immediately turned in her direction. She saw the pile of garbage shift. She tore her gaze from the roof and pointedly ignoring where Mick was hiding, she drove towards the crowd.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

  Mick watched as she drove slowly away, tapping the horn every few seconds. Most of the horde started to shuffle after the Jeep. He peered around the doorway and saw about half a dozen still hanging in front of the building. Easy as pie, he tho
ught. Drawing a deep breath, he slipped from his hiding space and trotted down the sidewalk.

  He focused his gaze on the menace in front of him, but from the corner of his eye he saw movement on the roof. He just hoped this wasn’t a waste of time. He came to the first zombie, a tall one in the remains of a suit, so deteriorated it was barely recognizable as a man. He pushed it back with the tip of his bat, watching it fall and hit its head on the curb. The thin skull crunched, fluid pooling on the street. “If only they were all that easy,” he muttered as he swung on the next zombie, caving in the side of its head. He evaded the next as he sprinted down beside the building to the fire escape.

  The last rung of the ladder was about two feet above his head. He set the bat on the ground. He could pick it up when they came back down. He jumped and caught the final rung. His weight was supposed to make the ladder drop. It didn’t. “Shit,” he said as he dropped to the ground and tried again. The ladder stayed in place. He started to release his hands to jump back to the ground when he saw the zombie reaching for his dangling feet.

  He gripped the bar tighter and kicked out, hitting the zombie square in the chest and knocking it over. He let go of the bar and dropped into a crouch. He grabbed his bat and stood, swinging on a zombie before he sprinted past, not bothering to check if it was a killing blow.

  He swerved around two more before he reached the front of the building. A quick look showed that most of the zombies followed Sarah. He eased past a straggler that was facing away from him and slipped into the building. It was once a coffee shop but was now a looted mess. The windows let in very little light but enough for him to see the three zombies scratching at a door. He stopped when he saw them, but his foot hit a bottle and sent it skittering across the floor. The zombies turned at the noise, their moans loud in the quiet room when they saw food just a few feet away. “Fuck,” he breathed as they advanced on him.

  ♦

  Sarah drove slowly down the street, making sure the zombies could keep up. She wanted them far enough away not to be able to touch the vehicle – the sounds of hands slapping on the metal was the soundtrack to her nightmares – but close enough so they didn’t lose interest and turn back towards Mick. A pace of about ten miles per hour seemed to work. “Let me know if they’re getting too close,” she said.

  “They’re about five feet away.” Steven was watching them through the rear window.

  “Good enough.” She honked the horn every so often as she drove, drawing even more zombies from where they were hiding.

  They drove out of the town proper, finding themselves on a road lined with trees and the occasional building. It had been fifteen minutes since they had left Mick. “Think he got him?” she asked.

  “Probably. We should head back.”

  She sped up a little and swung a hard left onto a dirt road. They bounced as the Jeep jolted along the rutted road, their tires kicking up dust. She followed the road as it curved left, looking for a way back to the main road. What she found was a thick stand of trees across the road. She slammed on the brakes, her seat belt snapping taut. “Shit,” she spat.

  “Uh, yeah.”

  Sarah turned to look at Steven. Through the slowly settling dust, she saw the road about eight yards back was nearly filled side to side with zombies.

  “Well, shit,” she repeated. She looked around at the trees surrounding the road. Fucking boonies, she thought. Putting the Jeep in reverse, she started to back up.

  “You can’t go through them!” Steven exclaimed, his voice shrill.

  “I’m not.” She found the spot she was looking for and stopped. The back bumper was just a foot from the nearest creature. She put the Jeep back into gear and turned left between two trees, heading right into the woods.

  ♦

  Mick shifted his position, his weight on his back foot. He waited until they were just a bit closer before he swung hard, hitting the one on the end, the blow shattering its skull, momentum sending the zombie into the next one. They both fell to the floor. The third zombie stumbled over the bodies on the ground. He tripped, falling forward, too close for Mick to swing. He drew his foot back, kicking it as it fell, the toe of his boot connecting with the chin of the zombie. Its head snapped back; its mouth slamming shut with the crunch of broken teeth. It fell onto its back and Mick stepped around it as he drew his knife. He dropped into a crouch and drove his knife through its eye and into its brain. A quick turn and he stabbed the other one, still pinned under the body of its brethren.

  He blew out a breath as he got back to his feet. He sheathed his knife as he stepped over the bodies and tried the door. Locked. “Of course.”

  He looked around the room. He saw overturned tables, chairs strewn all over the floor. But nothing to pry with. He pounded on the door, not knowing if whoever was on the roof could hear him. No one answered, but his hammering revealed that the door was hollow. He took a step back, mindful of the corpses on the floor, and planted a hard kick to the left of the door knob. Again. A third time. He drew back to kick again and heard moans from behind him. He turned to see a zombie stumble in the door. “Sarah’s pied piper routine didn’t fool you, huh?” He turned back to the door and kicked it once again.

  His boot went through the flimsy door. He twisted his foot out and reached his hand in, unlocking the knob. He pulled his hand out and grabbed his bat, his eye on the zombie only four feet away. Behind that one, he could see a few more gathering on the sidewalk. He opened the door and slipped through, closing it behind him. He locked the knob then laughed. They couldn’t open the door, why would locking it make a difference?

  On the other side of the door was a small storeroom with a set of stairs to the left. Flashing the light around, he moved across the room to the stairs. He took them two at a time to another floor filled with boxes and old equipment. He moved quickly, leaving tracks in the dust on the floor to another set of steps. The second set took him to an apartment with an open floor plan. The light in his hand picked out a charming breakfast nook, two privacy panels at opposite corners of the room, a small seating area gathered around a big screen TV, two bodies on the floor, their heads freshly caved in.

  He heard a rhythmic tapping coming from his right and he moved that way, his bat held tightly in his hand. He found the door to the roof. Sitting in front of it, slapping at the door was a child zombie, a little girl no more than three years old, oblivious to him as he approached. He swallowed the lump in his throat as he slipped his bat into the loop on his back and drew his knife. Before she could turn her head, before he could see her ravaged face, he forced the knife down through her skull.

  He pulled his knife free and stuck it in his sheath. Gently, he pulled the tiny body away from the door and covered it with a jacket that had been draped on a chair. Sighing, he opened the door to reveal a short staircase with another door at the end. He pulled the gun from his waistband and started up the stairs.

  ♦

  The Jeep bounced over rocks as Sarah steered between the trees through gaps so narrow, she just held her breath and prayed they’d make it. At one point, she steered too close to a pine and the passenger side mirror shattered, the housing hanging by a cable. But she kept going, moving through the trees, towards where she thought the main road was. The horde followed but the rough terrain was proving difficult for their uncoordinated limbs. More and more fell behind as they tripped over rocks and gopher holes, the zombies following tripping over the prone bodies in front of them. She smiled.

  A hard bump and the Jeep lurched. She nearly hit her head on the roof. From the muffled “Shit!” from the back seat, she assumed that Steven did. “You alright back there?”

  “Fine,” he said through gritted teeth. She flicked her eyes to the mirror and saw him holding his head. He’d live. She put her eyes back front, searching for the next gap, their next break through the trees.

  A few minutes later, along with a couple of scraped panels and the near loss of the driver’s side mirror, they emerged f
rom the trees into a field. She could see the road in the distance. “Home free, Steven,” she said with a grin as she pushed on the accelerator, the tires chewing up the overgrown grass.

  “It’s about time. Remind me to never go out with you again.”

  “What, and miss all this fun?” Without taking her foot off the gas, she took a hard-right back onto the road. Steven slid across the back seat, hitting the door with a curse.

  “You’re nuts!”

  “You should be wearing a seat belt,” she said.

  ♦

  Mick opened the final door and found himself on the roof of the building. The gun held loosely in his hand, he walked across the pebbled surface. “Hello?” He called as he approached the pile of trash.

  A head appeared. A thin face drawn gaunt by hunger. His skin was the color of chocolate, his eyes just as rich. “Are you real?” He croaked.

  Mick smiled. “Yeah, I am. Are you bit?”

  The man shook his head. “No. No, I’m not.”

  Mick moved a few steps closer, keeping the gun in his hand. “You look like you could use some help.”

  His laugh was more like a wheeze. “Help? You could say that.” He was aware of the gun in the stranger’s hand. He moved very slowly as he dug himself out from under the pile of rags and cardboard he used for warmth. “I haven’t eaten anything in a week. I haven’t had anything to drink for two days.” He paused. “I think.”

  Mick watched as the man extricated himself from the trash. “You’re not going to do anything stupid, right?”

  Again, the wheezy laugh. “I don’t have the energy to do anything but sit here and I’m quickly running out of that.”

  Mick hesitated another moment then he shoved the gun in his waistband. “I’m Mick Cooke,” he said as he shrugged his pack from his back.

  “Troy Smith.”

  Mick unzipped his pack and pulled out a bottle of water. “Nice to meet you, Troy. Here.” He walked a few steps closer, extending the water to Troy.