by Jack Hunt
Sam looked around the store. “Take whatever is useful but stay light as we still have some distance to cover.”
“You can go out there, I’m not,” Luke muttered while staring at his reflection in a knife.
Sam’s brow knit together. “What? You going to spend the rest of your days here?”
“What I do is my business.”
“What is your problem, man?” Sam asked.
He didn’t reply but just went back to browsing.
“We might want to hole up here for a little while, Sam. It’s bad out there. We aren’t going to get far,” Corey said before snorting. “We were lucky to make it here.”
Sam went over to the window and looked out. Fortunately, there was enough crap being displayed in the store window that it would have been hard for anyone on the outside to see in. He leaned back against the wall. It smelled musty and old. “Maybe we shouldn’t all go. Just one of us.”
He heard Luke let out a laugh. “Let me guess, that’s you.”
“Well, I don’t see you volunteering.”
“That’s because I’m smart.”
“Oh yeah, so smart that you let the insane into the church.” Sam chuckled to himself.
“You’re so full of yourself, Frost. You act as though you haven’t made a mistake. Sure, I was drinking and I made a mistake but you’ve made countless ones since this kicked off. Let’s not forget you were a skinhead when this all started.”
“That’s right. Go ahead, drag that old shit up if it makes you feel better about yourself.”
Luke spun the knife around in his hand and tossed it. It embedded in a moose head near Sam.
“Luke!” Kiera yelled.
“What? It wasn’t even close. If I wanted to hit him, I could.”
Sam moved down the aisle towards Luke. Corey must have anticipated what he was about to do as he stepped in his path and placed a hand on his chest. “Come on, Sam. He’s not worth it. You know it. We all do.”
Luke hopped up on the counter. “That’s it. Let fat boy speak some sense into you.”
Corey turned around. Now it took a lot to get him going. Well, Billy had a way of getting under his skin but that was Billy. But the look on Corey’s face when he stepped towards Luke was priceless.
“You know, Luke, one of these days you are going to say the wrong thing to the wrong person.”
“And?”
Corey was about to reply when they heard a crash above them. All of them looked up at the ceiling. Every store had an apartment above it. Some were used for storage; other owners used them to live in. Sam moved towards the back of the store, and out into the corridor. He glanced down towards the rear exit. It was still secure. There was a small door off to the left. He eased it open and quickly peered around. The staircase that led up to the apartment above was dark. Billy whispered, “I’ll go up.”
“Like hell you will, you will probably trip over,” Corey said.
“And like you would be any better. They would hear your elephant feet coming from a mile away.”
Corey raised his finger at Billy and he just slapped it out of the way and started up the stairs. Sam followed behind to provide additional cover. He looked back to see who was following and was surprised to see Kiera. The girl had really taken huge strides. Then again after all the shit she had been through, there was probably very little that scared her now.
The varnished wood stairs creaked as they made their ascent. When they reached the top, the door was closed. Billy looked as if he was about to burst through but Sam placed a hand on his shoulder and mouthed the word “wait.”
He knew that it would be better for them if they announced who they were.
At least they would be able to distinguish themselves from the insane. That was the problem with the insane on the loose and everyone trying to protect themselves. At a distance, without seeing the bloodshot eyes and gunk spewing from their mouths, someone might have taken anyone holding a weapon as one of the insane. It was the reason why they were shot at near the garage. The occupants of the house must have thought Sam and his group were insane.
“Hello! If anyone is in there, we don’t mean you any trouble. We are just taking cover from the hell outside.” He paused and all of them listened intently. “I’m going open the door now, don’t shoot.”
After seeing how many handguns were downstairs, the chance of them taking a bullet was high. Everyone was living on the defensive. Sam gave a nod to Billy and he turned the handle and pushed. The door was a little stuck, so he gave it a kick and it shifted open. No sooner had they cracked it an inch or two wide when a round hit the door. Wood splintered and a piece hit Billy.
“Ah shit!”
“Whoa, steady!”
“Stay back,” a voice called out from inside.
“We’re not going to hurt you.”
Sam stepped in front of Billy who was nursing his face. A trickle of blood ran down the side and dropped to the floor. Sam used his foot to push the door open; he could hear someone loading another round. Against his better judgment he raced into the room and took cover behind a corner wall. That’s when he caught sight of the boy and girl. He took another glance and another round was fired. This time the bullet went in the wall. The kid was a lousy shot but that was a good thing. He fired again and then the sound of a box of bullets being spilled onto the floor could be heard.
Sam cut the corner with his head and saw that he was loading. He stepped out and aimed his gun at the kid.
“Put it down.”
The kid snapped the gun together and kept it focused on Sam. His eyes were full of fear as he darted between Sam and Billy. When Kiera stepped into the room, the boy dropped his weapon.
“Kiera!”
“Noah? Ava?”
They both got up and rushed over to her wrapping their arms around her. Sam and Billy looked on in amazement.
“Guess you know one another?” Billy remarked.
“I used to babysit them,” she said. “They live across the way.”
The boy couldn’t have been more than eleven years of age, the girl seven.
“Great, more kids to babysit,” Luke said trudging back down the stairs.
Kiera dropped down to their level. “What are you doing here?”
“We’ve been here since our parents were attacked. They told us to go to Benjamin.”
“Benjamin?” Sam asked.
“He was the owner of this store,” Kiera replied. She hugged them tight. “Have you eaten?”
“Not since they got Benjamin. He told us to stay up here, lock ourselves in the bathroom. When we heard your voices, we thought it was Ben.”
Kiera looked at Sam. He knew immediately she didn’t want to tell them that Benjamin was one of the two people dead downstairs. They had been turned. The kids were lucky to still be alive, as they would have probably been next.
“Ally, do you have the bag of food?”
Ally came up the stairs and dropped it on the ground. Kiera reached in and pulled out some of the cans. Within a matter of minutes, the kids were scoffing it down and looking better for it. How many other children and families were still alive and slowly dying of starvation because they were too scared to venture out? Sam went over to the upstairs window and gazed out at the chaos below. The insane ran separately and at times together from building to building. He studied their movement. It was almost like they were searching now. It wasn’t reaction anymore, but almost intelligent choices. Two stopped across the street at a storefront. They peered in through the window, tried the door and then used the tools in their hands to break the glass and enter. It wouldn’t be long before others would do the same and the store they were in would be overrun.
Sam turned back to the kids who were sitting on a sofa, working their way through a second can of beans.
“How long have you been up here?”
“Five days.”
He turned back to the window, which gave him a good view of the church.
The boy nodded. “That was all we could do.”
“Did you see four of five men with older man?”
His face frowned a little, as if unsure.
“There were a lot of people running. Every night we’ve seen people moving from building to building. Those things are all over the place.”
“Right but what about people who aren’t infected? Did you see anyone like that?”
“Only a few. I saw this one man killed.”
“And the others?”
He stopped scooping food into his mouth with his fingers. “Yeah, now you’ve mentioned it, I do recall them. His hands were bound. They were pushing him forward.”
Sam cast a glance at Ally. “Where did they go?”
He got up from the couch and went to the window and pointed in the direction of Mount Pleasant Brewing Company. “Right over there. They went in there. They were being chased.”
“Are you sure?”
He nodded.
“You think that’s Tom’s father?”
“Perhaps. Tom said they went out and never returned.”
16
Murphy and Shaw spotted the truck along Silver Valley Road. The horses galloped over and he slipped to the ground before his horse had even stopped. Murphy checked the inside and then stared around at the forest. They weren’t anywhere to be seen. He called out to them but no one replied.
“Looks like they purposely parked here.”
“That, or they were forced to abandon it.”
“What did he say about those things they encountered?”
“He thought they were here. I still think they were making shit up.”
“Maybe it’s best we leave the horses.”
“Screw that, I’m taking them. I want to get in and out.”
Murphy mounted his horse and they took off in the direction of Mount Pleasant Inn. The first stop was at his home. They tied the horses up outside and went in. He figured that if they had made it here, possibly, just maybe Sam had the good sense to leave his daughter at the house while they went about trying to find Tom Barrington.
The moment he stepped inside and called out her name, that idea went out the window.
“Ally!”
The echo was all he heard. He picked up a family photo on a side table. He brushed his hand over the dust that covered it. Kate came over and rested her hand on his shoulder.
“We’re here. We’ll find her.”
Despite Luke’s opinion, the others were onboard with checking the brewing company. The young kid had told them that in the initial days when people started going mad, he and his family had barricaded themselves in their house. Once they had made it to Benjamin’s place, he had put them upstairs and fed them. The upstairs had a large balcony and for a few days they were able to use it, until the insane began to climb. At which point Benjamin had sealed off the upstairs doors and covered up the windows using wood and nails. That, however, didn’t stop Noah from slipping out between two planks to get a better look. The night he saw who Sam believed was Tom’s father with Bryan and his men, he had gone out onto the balcony. He had leaned over and saw them disappear into the brewing company a block down from Ben’s store.
“I nearly lost my life that night. Those things can climb. If it wasn’t for Ben I would have been dead,” Noah said.
The idea was to head out onto the roof and move along the top until they reached the last building, which was an art gallery. At least that way they could avoid the insane that were filling up the streets. There was no easy way of doing it. No matter how they got up onto the roof, there was a chance they would be spotted. Billy pried off the wooden planks from the upstairs door that went out to the balcony. Sam, Corey, Billy and Luke would go leaving Ally and Kiera to look after the two kids. Luke protested that he didn’t want to go so at the last minute it was decided that he would stay.
“Okay, go!” Billy went out, turned and climbed a metal drainpipe up to the roof, Corey went next and Sam last. Once he was up they lay on the graveled roof looking up into the bright day. Billowing clouds passed overhead and for a few brief seconds in between the noise of screams, it almost seemed like just another day in Mount Pleasant. No bombs being dropped, no biological weapon released, just three guys in a sleepy town, staring up into the day.
That fantasy was soon cut short by the sound of screeching nearby. Staying low to the roof’s surface they scrambled across like soldiers moving through no-man’s-land. The store they were above was called Pleasant Antiques. The next was a photography store. They kept moving while keeping away from the edges and out of sight of any of the freaks below. It was when they reached the fourth building that Billy lost his shit.
“That’s got to be a twelve-foot gap. You didn’t tell me there would be a gap.”
“I forgot.”
“Great. What are we supposed to do now?”
“Jump it,” Corey replied.
“Yeah, you can barely jump over a puddle without getting out of breath,” Billy replied.
“I’ll toss you over the edge, I swear.”
“Settle down. No one is jumping. It’s too damn wide. We’ll have to use the trees.”
“Dude, I’m not Tarzan,” Billy said.
“Oh my god, you are really starting to get on my tits,” Sam said moving to the back of the building and reaching out for a branch from one of the many trees that were pressed up against the rear. That was the upside to living in Mount Pleasant. It was a town built inside a forest. At times it felt comfortable and other time claustrophobic.
“Okay, back up.”
Sam gave himself a good amount of distance to run, and then launched himself off the building onto one of the thicker branches. He nearly lost his grip but managed to hold on with one arm.
“Nice job,” Billy said. Sam didn’t waste any time in moving down the branch to the trunk and then working his way across to the next tree. To anyone looking at it, it would have been the strangest sight ever. He felt like a chimpanzee. But anything was better than being on the ground dodging the crazy.
The sound of leaves rustling made him look back. Billy had landed and was working his way over. It was going to work, he thought. The moment they heard the branch crack he knew that it was Corey. Once the branch gave way, he dropped at least thirty feet through the branches with all the finesse of a drunk man trying to walk around cones. He bounced off the last thick branch and landed on his front.
“Corey!” Billy hollered but he wasn’t moving.
“Oh shit.” They started making their way back when they heard the screams and pounding of feet against pavement. Billy was the first to hit the ground. He raced over to him and rolled him over. There was a nasty cut above Corey’s eye and he was unresponsive.
No sooner had Sam landed when two of the insane raced around a corner. Both of them were holding large knives in their hands. Sam reached over his shoulder and grabbed a sword that he’d snagged up from the antiques store. It was as blunt as shit but he figured it might come in handy for causing some damage. Before he had a chance to use it, two rounds were fired and they dropped.
He looked back to see Billy placing his gun on the ground and slapping Corey, trying to wake him up.
“Come on. Don’t do this now. I take back whatever I said. Just get your fat ass off the ground.”
Sam was hoping not to fire any rounds. It was like waving a flag in the air and letting the entire town know that they were there. The place would be swarming with them in a matter of minutes. He hurried over and took hold of one of Corey’s arms. Both of them hauled him up but it wasn’t easy. He was a big guy. Contrary to Billy saying he was fat, he wasn’t. It was muscle. He was just one of these really big-boned kids with a crap load of muscle, and a little fat.
“We aren’t getting him out of here.”
Sam had to drop him when he saw four come racing around the corner. He dropped to a knee to take the shots. The fourth flew back
and off the ground when the bullet struck him. But these weren’t kill shots. Unlike what some may have thought, it usually didn’t just take one bullet to kill someone. At times they had to fire several. He got up and put another few into them.
Here they were stuck behind a store, unable to carry Corey and they were coming under assault from multiple directions. With Corey pushed back against a wall, they unloaded one bullet after the next as more of them descended.
As they crouched there working their way through what little ammo they had, Corey began to stir.
“Urgh. What happened?”
“You failed the audition for Tarzan,” Billy said before firing off another round. “Now get up, you big ape, and help us out.”
Though he was unsteady on his feet, he staggered over to a tree and fired off a few rounds. At the beckoning of both of them, they told him to climb.
“And please don’t fall,” Billy said. “As I don’t want my last memory on earth to be your ass landing on me.”
All three of them scampered up the trees and worked their way across to the second set of buildings. Below them, others came around the corner, looked down at the dead and rushed on thinking that whoever had killed them had run. And yet here they were seated in the nook of a tree. Billy had his hand over Corey’s mouth.
One of the insane appeared and sniffed the air. That was new. Did they have heightened sense of smell? It twisted and turned its head scanning the ground and walking towards the tree in a creepy fashion. Then as if picking up their smell, its head jerked upwards and looked directly at them. It let out a bloodcurdling scream and began to climb.
“Oh fuck.” Sam pulled his handgun and leaned over and fired a round straight through its skull. “Now let’s go before they all get smart.” They crawled along a thick branch that hung over the second section of buildings and once again found themselves out of sight. Sam rested on his back trying to catch his breath. There were three more buildings that they had to cover before they reached the one on the end. When they got to the corner that ran up against Bank and Sixth Street, they now had a clear shot of the brewery. It was a two-story, red-brick building with gray window covers and a cone-shaped structure at the far corner.
