Her head rocked back and forth as if she was looking around for something. I could tell that her eyes were open and her arms seemed to jerk around as she tried to reach out. I really hope that Zeds don’t feel pain. I hope that there was nothing left of her mind, nothing left of the woman she once was. I really hope that she wasn’t looking around for that child. What a miserable thing to happen to a person.
I could see Kerri eyes were starting to water as she looked down. Anne had seen enough and she took the rifle off of her shoulder and took aim below. She lined up the woman’s head in her sights, said a short prayer and then squeezed the trigger. The shot was on point. It hit the woman directly in the forehead and with that the moving stopped. It was for the best but the death and gruesome violence was becoming just too much. I had seen things that would ruin the rest of my natural life.
Anne wasn’t finished after that. She raised the rifle again and pointed into the crowd of Zeds that were still gathered at the back of the store. She scoured the crowd of former teachers, doctors, soldiers, mothers and fathers and chose a target. She picked out a man who looked like he had once been a construction worker of some kind whose entire shirt was covered in blood. She needed something to pay for what she had just seen and that Zed ended up being it. She fired and I watched as his head snapped back and he dropped to the ground. Then she shouldered the rifle and walked away.
After seeing what had happened to that woman we all came to an agreement. We were all scared that something like that could happen to us. Lying on the ground, missing half of our body, still alive in a way yet not quite dead. I didn’t want to end up like that and it was pretty obvious that the others felt the same way. So we made a pact that afternoon that if anyone of us became infected the others would put him or her out of their misery. We decided that there would be no more voting, no more trying to save someone, no more waiting for a cure. It was kill or be killed and it was better to be dead then like that woman down there.
It wasn’t my turn to be on watch until the following morning so I decided to try and go to bed early that night. Between the lack of sleep and the drinking I felt exhausted and I had hopes of getting my first full nights sleep since the outbreak had started. But as per usual I woke up in the middle of night.
When I woke up there was nobody else around which was strange because they were usually spread out across the break room sleeping in their usual spots, but I was alone. I walked around the upstairs and then went down into the back room but still couldn’t find anyone. I started walking across the sales floor calling out for the others but nobody was responding. It was when I got to the front doors that I finally found where they had all gone.
Every one of them was standing there covered in blood. Grey skin, sunken eyes, missing limbs it was apparent they were infected and they weren’t alone. There were hundreds of them all across the front of the store and they were all looking at me. Suddenly I was running trying to get away, but everywhere I turned there were more of them. I darted through the doors and into the back room desperately trying to get back upstairs.
Then just as I reached the stairs I felt a hand grab me by the shoulder and suddenly I felt myself being pulled to the ground. Then they were all around me while I lay on the ground unable to move, their faces looking down at me, faces of those I knew and of those who I had never seen, all coming for me. I started to scream for help but I wasn’t making a sound.
That’s when I woke up to see Paul shaking me. He told me I had been making a lot of noise in my sleep and he was worried. He thought that something was wrong. Nothing wrong, just the usual nightmare and another night of broken sleep.
Why write about a nightmare you might ask? Why even bother to share such a thing? I guess because I never told anyone about it before. Even when the others shared their nightmares and worst fears with me, I just never felt comfortable talking about it. Just writing it down here is very difficult for me. It was the same nightmare almost every night. Sure the building changed, the faces changed, but the one thing that was always the same was that I was running. It was what I had to look forward to every time I closed my eyes and went to bed. There was never a break from the outbreak, not even in sleep.
DAY SIX
Writing this story isn’t easy. In truth writing down the adrenaline filled scenarios that were a matter of life and death for my friends and I is far easier for me then I thought it would be. Where I struggle is trying to put into words the moments in between and just how difficult they were. As strange as it might sound the down time, the hours that made up most of the day were the worst. They felt like a relentless, energy-draining, test of willpower that dragged on for what seemed like an eternity. I am just not sure how to properly put that into words.
The morning of that sixth day was my first turn on watch. I was tired, but there was something about being up on the roof that I had come to love. It became an escape from me, a chance to be alone and away from the others. It wasn’t that I had become anti-social or anything like that. I just enjoyed the peace and quiet that came with being alone.
One of the other benefits of being on the roof was the scenery that surrounded us. I would look through binoculars or through the scope of the rifle and survey the landscape. I would spend a ridiculous amount of time just studying abandon buildings and military vehicles. I could see a M2 Bradley fighting vehicle that had been left on a corner just a few blocks away. I could see assorted personal carriers and trucks littered throughout the streets just sitting there, obviously left during the military pull out.
From the west side of the building down one of the main roads I could see what looked liked the main gun of an Abrams Tank just sticking out past one of the buildings. I had always been interested in military technology and I wish I could have seen all of these things under different circumstances but at least it was something that would help pass the time.
There was just so much to see from up there. It was amazing to see the damage done to the buildings that I used to drive past almost every day back before all of this began. It was crazy looking at the amount of cars and trucks that had been piled up in the streets that I used to walk down. Even the vast emptiness of the city that used to be so brimming with every day life was astounding to me.
Then there were the Zeds themselves roaming the city, the parking lot, well pretty much everywhere and I used to watch them the most. I would search through the crowds looking for faces of people I used to know. Luckily for me I never found any, but I always looked and as long as I couldn’t find any visual confirmation it was enough to have a little bit of hope they were somewhere safe.
It was that morning while I was looking out across the city just trying to take it all in that I found him. Across the street and in front of this small corner store I saw this one zombie that for one reason or another stood out to me. He looked like someone I might have known, but deep down I knew that I had never met him before. I am still not exactly what it was that drew me to him. He was in terrible shape, much worse then some of the other Zeds out there. His skin was dry and gray, his hair was thinning, and his face and arms were covered in a wide variety of cuts and gashes.
He wasn’t anything to look at trust me on that. His jeans were worn and ripped, he was missing one of his shoes, and he wore a white t-shirt that was incredibly dirty and stained that read “ Green Energy?” in simple black letters. I still don’t get it. But it made me laugh the first time I saw it anyway.
After I saw him out there, I found myself constantly making excuses to go to the roof just so I could check on him. I would watch him for hours and try and figure out what he was up to over there. Maybe it was because he was all alone, separated from the huge group that had surrounded our building or the others that wondered around in the parking lot. He was the only one in front of that store and he never left for some bizarre reason.
After I watched him for a while, I started thinking to myself about how he got there and what he was doing and eventually I ev
en gave him a name. Don’t ask me why but I decided to call him Hal.
The store he was hanging out in front of looked empty. But honestly I really couldn’t tell from my vantage point on the roof. All of the windows and doors had been boarded up which I guessed the owner had done before he or she evacuated the city. Sometimes I wondered if it had been Hal’s store and he couldn’t find himself to leave it even after turning into a zombie. I know it sounds strange, but those were the type of things that used to run through my mind while I was up on the roof watching him. Maybe it was a product of boredom or sleep deprivation, but I would waste hours creating a story for him and how he ended up where he did.
The story I would create would change almost every time. I would add just a little or change a small thing of the little biography I was writing for him in my mind. How he had fought to survive before he ended up infected, his last days before he turned, and how he got to where he was. I had a little story for almost every little aspect of this fictitious life I was creating for him. I know it may seem a little dramatic but it kept me busy. The more I watch the more the story grew and as the story grew the more I watched. It might seem sick or an early sign that my mind was starting to slip. But I found it entertaining and it was far less depressing then watching the news all day.
You have to understand that he was just alone over there. None of the other Zeds ever approached him or hung around that store like he was. I almost felt sorry for him and his situation. Feared by survivors and outcast by his own kind, he appeared to be out there by himself, unwanted and isolated. Plus I couldn’t tell if he was just lost out there or if he knew something that the others didn’t. Either way, I was hooked and as sad as it seems, Hal became very important to me.
It was around that same time that I had also noticed that the group was having a hard time holding it together. Don’t get me wrong we weren’t fighting with each other, not at that point. People were just starting to feel beaten and broken and like any group of strangers locked together under strenuous circumstances, conflict was inevitable. But all things considered I had always believed that we were doing the best that we could with what we had.
But I could see that Ray was watching the news more often then ever before. The great conversations we had shared became less and less frequent. He would just spend most of his time starring at the television taking it all in. At first I understood why he was spending so much time watching. It was an ever-changing situation out there and if we weren’t living through it I would have considered it to be incredibly fascinating as well.
Paul and I always seemed to get along pretty well but I could tell that his demeanor had changed after he had shot that child. He was still easy to talk too for the most part, and he was still enjoying his leadership role within the group, but there was just something different about him. Once and a while he would say something that I just found out of character for him. Things about everyone being doomed without him or that without his leadership we would all end up like those things out there. I just chalked it up to lack of sleep and stress. But it was obvious that he was having a hard time with everything.
But mostly I just noticed that a few of the others were talking a little bit less, saying things that seemed a little more odd or just spending more and more time alone. Not that I was the picture of mental health either. Instead of trying to talk to the others or offering to help them work their way through things, I would vanish to the roof to be alone or just engage in small talk to pass the time.
Luckily I had a few things to distract me from the growing depression that was circulating through the building. I had Hal, and I had my gun training with Anne. I had another session with Anne on that day and I would like to think that I was at least improving a little. I managed to kill two Zeds or zombies or whatever the hell you want to call them that time. Then we were forced to call it a day so that we could conserve ammo.
But really other then finding Hal and a little time practicing shooting the day was pretty much uneventful. Even while watching the news there didn’t appear to be any new developments other then the Navy setting up along the eastern coastline. Carrier groups were gathering just off the coast and nobody had any idea why.
The first cases were reported in Colorado and Arizona that day. It wasn’t hard to predict what was going to happen. Once the virus arrived in any state the outcome always seemed to be the same. So with nothing really going on I volunteered to take Ray’s turn on watch and retreated back up to the roof for the evening. I took the opportunity to watch Hal again and see if I could discover what he was up to. So I grabbed a bottle of whiskey on my way up and shared a drink with my new friend Hal.
DAY SEVEN
That seventh day. To be honest when I woke up that morning I had no idea what we were in for. The day started out just like every other day had since the outbreak had begun. I went up to the roof for a smoke and to have a cup of coffee and then returned downstairs to check and see if Ray had seen anything new on television. That morning the national news was showing clips from some presidential speech that he had delivered from some secure bunker in an undisclosed location. He was telling the American people to hold on and that the country would find a way to persevere. I guess it was supposed to be inspiring. Maybe it resonated better with those out west, but around here we really didn’t give a damn.
I know he was trying to be a symbol that we still had stable government. I know that he wanted to discourage people from plunging further into anarchy and was trying to get people to pull together and save what was left of our nation. But the dead were walking and this plague had consumed more then half of the country. Unfortunately for me it was the half I happened to be in.
But none of that was what I was talking about. What I was referring to earlier happened in the middle of that afternoon while we were all just minding our own business and killing time. Cody had just relieved Sandy on watch and only a few minutes later he called down to all of us to come and have a look at something unusual he had spotted. I think we were all filled with mixed emotions as we made our way up there that afternoon. I don’t remember what I thought I was going to see when I got up there, but I still remembering thinking that it wasn’t going to be anything good.
When I arrived on the roof most of the others were standing at the front ledge of the building and looking out across the parking lot. Cody pointed out at the store’s gas station that was in the far corner of the lot and to my surprise there was a car parked there. I couldn’t see anybody in the car and there was nobody around it except for a handful of Zeds that seemed to be lurking around the area. So that left us trying to figure out where it had come from and when it had got there.
Anne and Tanya walked up and down the roof with binoculars trying to get a better look to see if they could find any sign of the driver. But all that they could confirm was that the car was empty. We stood there puzzled trying to remember if that car had always been there or if had shown up recently. I had spent more time on that roof then anybody and I knew that it hadn’t been there before. But when you’re as tired as I was your mind starts to play tricks on you and you start to doubt what you know is right.
The easy thing to do would have been too just ignore it and believe me Trevor was on board for that. He thought that we were all getting our hopes up over nothing and that we were setting ourselves up for disappointment. But as it turns out our curiosity would get the better of us. I knew I wanted to investigate the matter further. The possibility of other survivors nearby wasn’t something we could just ignore. There was a chance they could have information on what was happening in the city, if there were parts that were safe or other survivors out there. So we looked around the building trying to see if someone might be hiding nearby in the surrounding areas but our search came up empty.
Now you would think that finding an answer would have been easy. You would think that with somebody always on the roof keeping watch that someone would have seen a car pull into the parking lot
. Believe me, we thought of that as well. Problem was that Adam, who was supposed to be on watch last night admitted that he had been exhausted and had fallen asleep until Sandy relieved him in the morning. Sandy, well she said that she never really paid close attention to anything when she was up there. She used her time on watch to read.
So we weren’t going to get our answer from either one of them. But there was one obvious possibility that was starring us right in the face the entire time. What if the person or persons in that car were still hiding in that gas station? It was small, designed for a cashier and a few aisles of snack food and self-serve coffee but a person could have easily still been hiding somewhere inside. But without a clear angle to see inside, and the glare of the afternoon sun on the windows we had no way of knowing for sure.
That was until Kerri came up with an idea. She knew that there was a phone in that station behind the cashier’s counter. Now the phones had been down for days but that phone was connected to the store’s intercom system so there was still a chance that we could call that extension from inside the store. So we tried.
Kerri and Cody were downstairs in the break room calling out on the phone while the rest of us stayed up on the roof to keep an eye out for any sign of life from inside. Kerri dialed the extension and we all waited quietly. We could tell that phone was ringing because a few of the nearby Zeds started moving closer to the station as soon as Kerri dialed. The sound of the ringing phone was drawing them in but still nobody had answered.
In Hiding: A Survivors Journal of the Great Outbreak Page 11
