by bret Wellman
"Listen," said Dicky. "We've got guys guarding every street and building from Madison to Broadway. No zombie is getting near here."
"But why would you make me unarmed myself? Wouldn't it be better if every single person had a weapon?"
Dicky seemed to think about his response for a moment. "Let me put it this way, eighty percent of these people are weaponless, they came here frightened and looking for protection from crazy attackers. These same people see the other civilians toting weapons and it makes them grow uneasy. Right now we don't need everybody armed, we need everybody relaxed."
"I don't see how that helps," said Dan.
"If that crowd of people, the crowd that is already on edge, switches into panic and riot mode, we are going to have one hell of a shit show on our hands. If I have to waste manpower on crowd control, I will be spreading a thin line even thinner. That is how zombies get in. So do me a favor, stop arguing and turn in the sword."
"Where will you put it?"
"We have a room in the library where we put all the weapons we have confiscated."
"Chief!" said the cop.
Dicky ignored him. "If I suspect the zombies might break past our defenses, I will let you take your weapons back."
Though he did not like it at all, Dan reluctantly removed the katana from his shoulder and handed it over. As soon as it was gone he felt weak and naked, defenseless.
"Now go mingle," said Dicky. "This will all be over soon enough."
“Just don’t forget to give them back when the time comes.”
As Dan began to walk away another cop came running up. "We have to pull all the riot guys back," he yelled, gasping for air. "They got overwhelmed at the village and are getting slaughtered. We also got report of over twenty other casualties spread across the rest of the teams." He paused to catch his breath, "They are saying their weapons are ineffective."
"Alright," said Dicky. "Round up the plow trucks, let’s bring them back. Let them know we are coming."
"Yes sir, should I send a truck to the village? We aren't getting a response from them on the radio anymore."
"Hell, yes, I want a truck sent there, I want one sent there first."
"You," said the original cop that had confronted them, "open your backpack."
"Not happening," said Dan.
Zoey elbowed him. "Come on Dan, just do it."
"You hiding more weapons in there?" asked the cop.
"Don't worry about it," said Dan.
The cop moved to take the bag, but Dicky stopped him.
"Don't worry about the bag, we have more pressing matters to attend to."
"But there could be a gun in there."
"I said, don't worry about the bag."
"Yeah," Dan added. "Don't worry about the bag."
The cop gave him a stare that said nothing less than, I will kill you. His face went from red to purple in no time; Dan mildly wondered if he was having a heart attack. Fortunately he was forced to turn and walk with Dicky back to the front of the library.
"What the hell was that about," asked Zoey. "What is so important in that bag that you were willing to risk getting us in more trouble with the cops?"
"It was just the concept," said Dan. "I'm not going to let someone push me around."
"But it was a cop, Dan."
"Especially a cop."
As they got closer to the park they could hear an accordion playing a soft melody that could be heard over the rumble of hundreds of people talking. The National Guardsmen let them pass through the trees without incident. They nodded when they made eye contact.
When they reached the civilians, none of them paid any attention as they passed. A lot of them were crying, Dan noticed. It made him imagine they had already given up. Their clothing was blotched with stains of blood and sweat. They looked worn down and scared. The closer he got, the more morbid it seemed.
"Dis sure be sad," said Barns. "I bet dey all lost dey families. We need ta get them some flip flop too."
Dan nodded as he looked around. "Yeah, Barns, I think we could all use a little flip flop."
They were nearing the center of the park when they came across a sidewalk made of pavers. Looking both ways, Dan could see that one end went to the street and the other, to the back of the library. The grass came up to the pavers on both sides, there were trash bins and benches set along the sides every so often as well.
He was about to sit down right there on the pavers; everyone else in their group did the same. They weren't there for two minutes when a female cop walked up holding a blanket. The blanket was dirty and covered in patches; it looked like a goodwill reject.
"Here," she said, holding the blanket out for them to take. "There is enough room on the grass over here for you to have a spot."
Zoey took the blanket and followed the cop to a spot on the grass where she fanned it out for them to sit on.
"Thank you," she said as the cop was walking away.
Dan lay down on his back, staring up at the blue sky. He felt Zoey lay down next to him and could see Barns sitting down out of the corner of his eye.
"We are going for a walk, I don't think my nerves are calm enough to sit around at the moment," Carl said before he and his boy went wandering off.
Dan laid there, more comfortable than he had been in days. The air might have been chilly but Zoey and Barns were both warm, their thighs touching his side as they both sat around him. He was content staring up at the clouds rolling by.
"Right now would be the perfect time to be able to fly," said Zoey. "I think I would head straight to Florida and watch this all unfold from the keys."
"Yeah," Dan agreed. "Swinging in a hammock near the beach, sipping a piña colada, and wishing these people the best of luck."
Instead we are stuck here, Dan thought, trapped like rats. The only thing they could do now was wait, but for what? To be rescued? To be eaten?
Chapter 23
Barns was sound asleep and snoring, his facial hair blowing back and forth with the wind coming in and out of his mouth. A line of drool seeped from the corner of his lips and his chest rumbled along with his snoring. Carl had come by and dropped off the deck of playing cards from the night before. Since then, Dan and Zoey had managed thirteen games of speed.
"You cheat!" Zoey both yelled and laughed at the same time.
Dan grabbed the deck and slid it back in its box, knowing he had won. "I'm sorry, but you are just going to have to accept the fact that I am better than you."
"Bullshit! Come on, shuffle the deck, we are playing again."
"Nope, I retire."
"That's crap, Dan, you can't just lose every game and then stop on the only time you beat me."
He shrugged. "I was the last one to win, that means I am the champion."
"Bull shit. Bullshit!"
Were she not laughing, he might have thought she was mad at him. She balled one of her hands into a fist and shook her head like she couldn’t believe what had just happened.
"Come on," he said, standing up. "I can't stand sitting here anymore. Let’s go find Dicky, see if there isn't anything we can do."
She grabbed his hand and he helped her up to her feet. "Okay, sure."
The people were scattered across the grass in groups, some sleeping, some sitting. Most of the talking was hushed, the sound of the wind in the trees; distant gunfire could be heard over it.
Dan and Zoey were able to zigzag through the crowd fairly easily on their way up to the library. As soon as they reached it they came across a bunch of firemen lounging around on the steps. They looked sweaty and exhausted, but overall they seemed surprisingly cheerful. They were very animated as they told stories and jokes. Despite everything that’s going on, Dan thought, they are just happy to be alive.
He expected to be stopped but the firemen let them through without incident.
"So I climbed into the window expecting to find normal people that needed to be rescued from the fire," Dan overhead one of the fire
men saying as he passed. "Instead I find myself face to face with two zombies. Now I didn't know that at the time, they were just people to me. All chewed up and sick, I swear I almost threw up in my mouth a little. Now I’m going through the whole routine, telling them to relax and that I am here to rescue them. Well they were zombies, so they start coming at me, right?"
Dan slowed down so he could hear more of the story. Zoey didn't protest, he could only assume that she was thinking the same thing.
"I could see it in their eyes as they got close. It wasn't the kind of look that says rescue me, ya know? It was instinct, I shoved them to the ground, boom, boom." He flailed his arms in motion with the story. "So I'm trying to tell them to calm down, I'm only here to help. You know, standard procedure. But these people start getting back up, they looked mean too. So I start thinking to myself, Pauly, you gotta defend yourself from these wackos. By then the smoke was coming through all the vents and the paint on the wall was beginning to bubble. Actually, an orange glow was casting some light through the crack under the door, that was when I really got a good look at them. All sick with those dead eyes, freaked me out. I thought I was dealing with demon people like from that exorcism movie or something. So I'm freaking out right, because these guys are getting back up. That's when I grab my axe. I didn't even think twice, I came down one after another, right on the top of the head. Needless to say, I got the hell out of there. Didn't know what to tell the captain though, am I right?"
Dan opened the library door to let Zoey go in ahead of him. She gave him a look as she passed. It was something that said, did you hear that? He nodded.
They were met with a blast of warm air as they stepped inside the library. It had to have been a good twenty degrees warmer in there than it was outside. Dan cupped his ears, he had not noticed how cold they had gotten; the warm air felt great.
The door they had come through was marked Exit Only and it was the smallest door in the building. It was tucked into a corner and painted to match the wall. It was there for emergencies only, and probably just to keep the building up to code. In contrast, the room they had walked into was massive; the size matched two hockey rinks lined end to end. Everything had a rustic look to it; Dan felt like he had traveled back in time. He gazed up at large vintage chandeliers that hung over row upon row of desks. The desks themselves were so large that there were only two in each row, stretching from one side of the room to the other. Spaced every few feet, on the desks, were green lamps. There was a bookshelf on the wall that wrapped the entire length of the room, up to about chest height, making it fit under the large cathedral windows. On the ceiling was a painting of a blue sky amidst white clouds. In a way it looked like parts of the ceiling were made of glass, as if he weren't looking at a ceiling, rather up at the sky itself.
"The rose room," said Zoey.
Dan imagined the room as it once was, clean and tidy, because it certainly did not have those attributes anymore. The National Guard had completely taken over half of the room, firefighters and policemen had taken over the other half. They ran all over the place, tracking supplies they had sitting on the floor in duffle bags and scattered all across the room. A few of the people had clipboards and would mark them whenever people brought new information. It looked like they were getting ready for a massive yard sale of food and weaponry.
"Come on," said Dan, grabbing Zoey’s hand and pulling her through the room.
A few of the policemen and one of the National Guardsmen eyed them suspiciously as they passed, before turning back to their work.
Dan kept them moving through more large rooms with grand arches, past countless servicemen, until they emerged at the front steps of the library. Dicky was at the bottom of the steps with his back to them, surveying Fifth Avenue as a plow truck drove up.
"Hey, Dicky," said Dan as he got closer.
Dicky glanced back at him for a moment before turning back to the plow truck. "What do you need, Dan?"
"We want to help," said Zoey.
Dan took a step forward so that he was even with Dicky. "Is there anything we can do? Something to keep us busy instead of sitting around and waiting to die."
"Sure," said Dicky. "I got something you can do, but it is going to have to wait. The first of the riot guys is just getting back."
As soon as the plow truck stopped the back gate flung open. Two riot policemen hopped out and then turned back to be handed one of their comrades. The man was unconscious and bleeding from a gash in his neck, the blood ran down his skin before getting lost on his dark uniform. His comrades were all covered in blood from holding him.
They laid him down gently as the rest of the squad piled out of the truck. They were calm, their movements precise. One of the men, the one putting pressure on the wound, looked up at Dicky.
“We need a doctor fast. He has been losing blood for the better part of an hour.”
"Has he been bitten?" Dicky asked.
Nobody in the squad responded, it was as if they were afraid to say it out loud.
"Has he been bitten?"
"Yes," said the guy holding the wound. "But we don't think he is going to turn."
"They all turn," said Dick, unholstering his pistol. "Step back."
He cocked the chamber and aimed it at the unconscious man’s head.
"I said he's not going to turn," said the man, reaching out to grab Dicky's gun hand.
Dick let the man grab his hand, using it as leverage to pull as he came around with a right hook.
Blood poured from the unconscious man’s neck as soon as the pressure was removed.
Dan could tell the guy Dicky had punched had broken his nose, even as he fell to the ground. He hit the pavement next to his comrade and held his face.
Dan suddenly found himself wondering what would happen if the entire squad decided to jump Dicky for punching one of their own. Would he be able to run inside for help, or would they grab him and beat him before he could?
The unconscious man snapped awake and lunged for the man with the broken nose. Dicky put a bullet in his head before he could do any harm.
"You've all had a rough day," said Dicky. "Head inside and get some rest. Don't worry about your friend."
"Sam," said one of the guys. "His name was Sam."
"Right, don't worry about Sam, I will take care of him."
The group of riot police scraped their broken-nosed friend off the ground and began to shuffle inside. They looked defeated.
Dicky turned back to Dan and Zoey as if nothing significant had just happened. "I'm running border patrol on shifts, your standard mornings, afternoons and midnights. My guys are in charge of every intersection in a two block radius. I've also got teams sweeping the surrounding buildings, going door to door in an attempt to clear out any stragglers, so there are no surprises. Needless to say, I am spreading my manpower extremely thin. Had I known the riot police would have backfired, I would have kept them here." He kicked the ground as if he were angry with himself. "Anyway, it would help me out if I didn't have to waste manpower running supplies. We have a sedan; if we load the thing with supplies, do you think you two could take them to the front line?"
"What kind of supplies?" asked Dan.
"Food, water, ammunition."
"We would love to," said Zoey.
Another plow truck turned down Fifth Avenue and started driving towards them. Its engine whined and smoked, there was flesh hanging from the passenger’s side mirror and most of the windows were cracked.
"Damn it," said Dicky. "I sent a truck to the village, it should have been the first one back."
As the truck got closer and slowed to a stop, the engine cut off on its own. The hood sounded like it was sizzling. The front plow, once yellow, was now red with gore. It slid down like water and dripped on the pavement.
"She ain't gonna survive another trip," the driver yelled down to Dicky. "She barely made this one."
When the back gate swung open only six guys jumped out.
Dicky looked like he was in shock. "Where are the rest of you?"
"Dead by now," said one of the guys as he limped forward. "They got through our defenses. Everybody that was bit volunteered to stay back and keep giving them hell."
Dicky seemed to pull himself back together and nodded to the man. "Head inside and get that limp checked out."
Dan and Zoey stood there waiting for Dicky to show them to the supply car. Before he could, the next truck came and unloaded its beaten and battered cargo, and the next truck. As far as Dan could tell, the truck that had been sent to the village had never come back. That didn't stop Dicky from waiting for it. He stood there, stone-faced and determined.
The shadows shifted against the buildings. Dan and Zoey went closer to the library to sit with their backs resting against the wall. The clocks ticked, the time passed, the truck that had been sent to the village never came back.
Chapter 24
"Alright, this should be the last of it," said a female police officer as she loaded two jugs of water into the trunk of a red car. "Everything in the trunk goes to Forty-first and Broadway, everything in the back seat goes to Fortieth and Broadway. Got it?"
"I think we got it," said Dan as he eyed two firemen suspiciously.
They were carrying the body of the dead riot policeman. They didn't say much, just lifted the body up and set it on the roof of the car. A streak of blood ran down the back windshield.
"And what is the point of that?" asked Zoey.
The cop looked at the body like she was disgusted. "We need to keep the quarantined area sterile. That means that we can't have any dead bodies lying around, rotting. They want you guys to take it to the front line and toss it over."
"Lovely," said Zoey.
Dan caught the car keys as they were tossed to him. They were tangled and old, not an automatic lock in the bunch. A small pair of dice hung from a chain connected to the center ring.
"Come back when you are done, so we can load you up with more supplies," said the cop before walking away.
Dan and Zoey eyed each other once they were alone. The idea of helping out sounded good at first; now that they were stuck with a job, it didn't seem so good.
