Dying to Live

by Roxy De Winter

  Everyone laughed at this, including Frank.

  “Jeez, you guys. Seriously? No tanks, no rocket launchers. Where’s the fun in zombie killing if you can’t do it in style”. He grinned.

  “The problem is, pal, your style would get us killed pretty quickly,” Pete laughed.

  “All jokes aside,” Xin said seriously. “Do you think maybe you’re all enjoying this a little too much?”

  For a while everyone was quiet as they considered this. Xin was starting to feel bad for dragging everyone from their good spirits.

  “Maybe we are...” Frank said.

  “Perhaps,” Pete agreed. “But this could be one of the last times in a while that we have anything to laugh about or enjoy. It doesn’t hurt to make the most of it. In a few hours’ time we’re going to leave the relative safety of this place.”

  “Relative safety?” Harry snorted.

  “Yes,” Pete said unyieldingly. “Where we’ve been for the past few weeks or so is pretty secluded and out of the way. There are zombies here but it’s a limited number and we’ve been fairly sheltered from them by the base. We haven’t had to see what regular life has turned into, or what has happened to the rest of the world. When we head out there it’s probably going to be a huge wake up call for us all.”

  “I’m sorry,” Xin apologised. “You’re right. Of course we should be making the most of any moment that we can enjoy.”

  Lucy directed Frank around the base, which seemed to take longer than necessary with Frank seeming to mishear most of Lucy’s direction. When she finally flipped and told him, “Frank that is the second time that I’ve said right and you’ve gone left!” He looked at her guiltily, with a shrug and a smile he told her, “I just wanted to break in the new car.”

  During the ride the other three chatted in the back.

  “So, Xin, I hope you won’t mind my asking, but I’ve noticed you speak very good English. You barely seem to even an accent. Where did you learn the language?” Harry asked her curiously.

  “It’s actually something that my parents were adamant about,” Xin explained. “They wanted me to learn it practically as soon as I could talk. We would use it around the house a lot just so that I could practice. I took English classes at school and by the time I left I was pretty fluent. I think with regards to my accent, it was when I moved to England to go to university that it started to level out. I learnt a lot of eye opening phrases there, and sayings that they don’t teach you at school,” She smiled.

  “Wow, you went to university in England? That must have been scary for you,” Pete asked her.

  “It was scary leaving my home and everything that I knew, but I was really excited too. I was accepted into Cambridge, which was a huge achievement in my family. It gave me so many opportunities that I was really grateful for. I wanted to see new places and make new friends. England was the obvious first choice for me because it has some of the best universities in the world. The Biomedical Research Centre campus that I studied at does some incredible work.”

  “That’s really impressive,” Harry congratulated her. Pete didn’t say anything, he was astounded. This small and unassuming woman really was something else, so brave and committed. He was beginning to see a theme within her, that she didn’t do anything by half. Once she set her mind to something she dedicated herself to it entirely and saw it through. Whether it was the English language, her university education or a deadly outbreak of a contagious zombie infection, Xin would stick around ‘til the very end.

  “This is it,” Lucy informed them. “We’re here.”

  19.

  ‘It was plain to see that it was going to be dangerous, even before we saw the building. It was suggested that as soon as the attacks had begun to occur on the base, this would’ve been the first place that people would have headed to in order to arm themselves. I hoped that my police training would come in handy but I had only minimal experience of armed raids. Whilst we were sat there, parked in the new armoured vehicle, I wished that Rodger was there with me, at my back as he always had been. The thoughts of Rodger recalled to my mind the nightmares that I’d been having every time I slept recently. I suppose everyone had been suffering from them in one way or another, but I was trying to avoid sleep as much as possible as a result. Every night those things got me and every night the monster was wearing Rodgers face, only twisted angrily with blood around his mouth. So, of course, I wasn’t looking forward to another encounter with more zombies. Looking out of the window did not instil me with hope.’

  “Wow...” Frank said under his breath, as he slowed the vehicle to a halt outside the white concrete building.

  “I don’t have a great feeling about this,” Lucy whispered. Her face had gone a little pale and made the passengers in the back scramble to the windows.

  “Yeah, that looks grim,” Harry stated.

  The five faces were all greeted with the same eerie sight. The glass double doors were shattered and only a few angry shards were left in the frame. The scattered broken glass was interspersed with spatters of dark blood. The old dried blood also smeared the white concrete of the walls. Trails of it were left where some poor soul’s fingers had clawed along the building. Any sounds that might indicate that they weren’t alone were inaudible inside of their vehicle, but there were no signs of movement either.

  “I think the girls should stay here,” Frank said, his eyes not leaving the scene outside the window.

  “Don’t be ridiculous, you need me to show you were everything is,” Lucy argued.

  “I’m sure we can find it ourselves,” he countered.

  “Look, I don’t want to go in there,” Lucy told him. “But we all have to toughen up, learn to take care of ourselves and we do things we don’t want to do, even girls. Though I appreciate you trying to protect us, we have to fight for our own survival rather than letting everyone else risk themselves for us.”

  “It’s in everyone’s best interests for us to come with you. The more of us that go inside, the more there are to carry things,” Xin offered.

  Frank knew when he was defeated. He turned to look at the other guys, who just shrugged at him. “Fine,” he sighed, throwing up his hands. “What’s the plan?”

  “Inside there is just a straight corridor. The different kinds of weaponry are in separate rooms directly off that main corridor. There are about six rooms, three on each side. Each one has an access panel that is opened with a key card. There is always someone on duty that has a card and armed security patrol the corridor. There’s a window at that you can go to for clearance if you don’t have your own card, that way they can come out and open the doors for you. Obviously that won’t be the case for us, so we have a couple of options. If we’re really lucky we’ll go in and the doors will already be open. If we aren’t that lucky then we’ll go in and be able to find the key. If our luck has totally deserted us then we’ll have to break our way in,” Lucy explained.

  “Okay, say we have to break in...?” Pete questioned.

  “Well, if we can force the access panel off the wall. Then I can play with the cables a little and voila.”

  “Will that work?” Pete wondered.

  “If I’m any good at my job it will. These fancy panels never work as well as people think. Ultimately they’re all hooked up with the same wires and you only have to know the right ones to work with. Hopefully it won’t come to that, though. It’s time consuming and probably not a safe environment to work in.”

  “Can’t we just use explosives?” Frank asked.

  “No, Frank.” Lucy rolled her eyes. Before he could ask why, she continued. “If we start blowing doors off, we risk blowing up entire stocks of explosives. Not to mention it could jeopardise the structural integrity of the whole building. I think some of the explosives in there might even be enough to blow up the entire base.”

  “They don’t do things by halves here, do they?” Pete asked rhetorically.

  “Well, this is the biggest military base
in the whole US. Pretty much anything you can think of is kept here. It’s useful because nobody knows its true size, most of it is underground after all.” Lucy sighed, “So, are we ready?”

  “No, wait,” Pete said. “When we get in there we need to have a plan. I suggest that, unless all the doors are open, we all head to the clearance room and search for the key while Lucy checks out the control panels. We should probably expect to encounter a lot of... those things,” He stumbled over the words. It still felt surreal to have to call them zombies, it seemed too ridiculous. “Once we get into the right lock ups, I say we grab anything we can. Be careful with everything and don’t pick anything up that looks like it could explode by accident. Lucy, will it be easy to get everything back here?”

  “Hmmm...” Lucy’s eyes drifted upwards as she thought about it. “There are some crates or containers, whatever you want to call them, and like, baggage trolleys to load them onto. I think realistically we can fit three of them lined side by side behind the front seats here. There could be some canvas sacks too, military ones. We can use those, they’ll be in the cabinets.”

  “Okay. Well, Harry, I think it would be best if you cover Xin and help her with one container. Frank, you will obviously do the same with Lucy. I’ll work on a container by myself. If need be we can resort to bags afterwards,” Pete suggested.

  “That sounds alright to me.” Frank nodded to Lucy.

  “Let’s go.” It was the last thing that Harry wanted to do, but he tried to sound enthusiastic as he said it. “Watch each other’s back’s and keep safe. I wanna see each one of you back here afterwards.”

  “Catch you on the flip side,” Frank said, drawing a deep breath and opening his door.

  Lucy hit a button and with that the ramp flipped out of the back of the typhoon again. Everyone raised their weapons and guardedly stepped off the vehicle. Frank looked at Lucy as she climbed out, before quickly following suit. The group gathered in front of the glass doors, each checking a different direction for signs of danger. There was a chilling silence that was broken only by the crunch of glass under their feet. From a few feet away, Pete, who was stood at the head of the group, could see the fluorescent tube lighting was still glowing inside the building. Obviously, since this building had access pads that needed to keep functioning, it had its own generator. The suns glare on his face meant that he still had to squint to see inside.

  “I can see two open doors, more broken glass and a few shapes on the ground. They look like bodies,” he hissed to the others, giving them a heads up. “I can’t see very far in, though.”

  At that moment every head whipped towards the doors, as they heard a shrieking, scraping sound. After a pause, they heard it again.

  “I can’t see what it is,” Pete whispered.

  No sooner had the words left his lips than a wailing, angry scream filled the air. The sound was followed by a figure that, at lightning speed, projected itself at Pete. He barely had time to process its twisted face as he swung his machete up to defend himself. The smooth arc took its head clean off of its shoulders, surprising even Pete himself. The body slumped to the ground at his feet and the head rolled away, still gnashing its teeth. Pete glanced quickly at the others, wide eyed and shocked but still determined, before turning and taking the few steps over to where the head lay. With only the briefest hesitation, he steadied the snapping head with his foot and pushed downwards with the machete, slicing straight through its cranium. The eyes stilled immediately in the ruined head and when Pete pulled his machete from where it was wedged, a slick trail of discoloured goop came with it.

  After the first encounter, the others were too afraid to make further noise but exchanged similar worried looks. Pete gestured with one finger towards the door and started forwards, his machete readied for another attack. Once out of the sunlight, their eyes adjusted to scan the interior. There were indeed three bodies on the ground amongst the debris. There were empty ammunition shells dusting the floor and a section of the ceiling had fallen in. It was anybody’s guess what had happened there, but clearly the three bodies were completely dead. Two had obvious gunshot injuries to their heads and the third was pinned beneath the rubble of the collapse.

  In fact, four of the doors were open already and a fifth was totally inaccessible due to the heavy concrete that sloped down from the ceiling in front of it. The final door, which was also the closest to the entrance, looked totally untouched. Upon closer inspection, beneath numerous warnings and cautions, a sign on the door read ‘W395: Propellants. Incendiaries. Pyrotechnics. Liquid, Rubberized and Nuclear explosives. Detonators.’

  Taking tentative steps closer to the first open door, the crunch of glass seemed too loud to avoid further attention. Sure enough, they heard a gurgling howl and the heavy-footed, clumsy sounding movements of multiple attackers. The group readied their weapons and seemed to be taking in much shorter and sharper breaths. From around the door came three hostile nightmares. The first blast of Frank’s shotgun seemed to shake the building. Dust fell from the precarious ceiling and the roar of what sounded like a hundred zombies echoed in its wake.

  “Shit,” Frank cursed. He took better aim this time and blew the head off of the first staggered zombie. The group moved back a few paces as more unnatural beings poured in from all angles. There were now at least twenty of them, looks of comprehension sneaking slowly over their mangled faces. Harry and Pete quickly came to their senses and joined Frank at the head of the group, blasting into the surging bodies. Frank tossed aside the empty shotgun and pulled out a lethal looking knife. Harry was putting his handgun to use and Pete his machete. The girls were pushed back behind them as the bodies surged forward, running to beat the others to their latest snack. The guys moved fast spearing and shooting and hacking at the crushing horde. Frank’s knife went quickly from shining silver to glistening brown. He jammed it into whatever part of the head he could get to, above an ear, down through the top of a head, up through a chin or straight through an eyeball. The bodies fell at his feet. Harry shot cleanly, through a forehead where he could and up through a chin if the quarters were too close. Pete hacked into skulls, frenzied but never faltering.

  Xin felt sure that this was not going to end well, as she tried to take aim with her gun. The guys had left her no room to get a clean shot and she lowered her gun in frustration. Lucy’s hand found hers and pulled urgently. The guys were still grappling with a mass of zombies. Turning to Lucy, Xin saw that she was pulling her towards the first door. She followed unnoticed through the door. Its sign read: ‘W392: S.A.L.W – Small arms and light weapons’.

  “Look out!” Lucy yelled, alerting Xin, who was still staring back at the fighting men, to two further zombies lurking inside the room. Lucy already had her gun pointed at one of them and Xin reacted quickly. In a matter of seconds their way was clear once more.

  To call the cavernous area they had stepped into, a ‘room’, was definitely an understatement. It was longer than it was wide, stretching backwards and lined with lockers, wall mounts and glass fronted cabinets. Everything about it was grey, except from the matte black weaponry and mounds of small, white ammunition boxes.

  “Be careful opening anything that’s big enough to hide a person, you never know!” Lucy said hurriedly, as she scurried over to the right hand wall. The closest corner housed a small bank of trolleys, similar to the ones found at airports, only bigger. Alongside them were a number of large, reinforced, square boxes, maybe three feet each way. “Help me with this.” She indicated the nearest of the cases. The two of them struggled to haul one onto a trolley.

  The men rushed into the room in panic and frowned angrily at them. They were blood splattered and sweating, their faces bore grim determination.

  “You couldn’t wait?” Pete asked.

  “Just help us with this,” Lucy winced under the weight. With some assistance they managed to get it in place and rolled the trolley down the room. All of them took to throwing open lockers and snatchi
ng up boxes that tinkled as they moved them, or heavy guns that they didn’t even have time to take note of. Between the five of them it didn’t take long to pack whatever weaponry and ammunition was left into two of the cases. It looked as though roughly a quarter of it had already been liberated before they arrived.

  “Harry, Frank, can you take these outside and load them up? Xin, Lucy and I will check the other rooms. I think we got most of the zombies before, but be quick,” Pete instructed.

  Harry and Frank took a trolley each and wheeled them quickly from the room. Pete and the girls paused in the corridor, there were so many bodies slumped on the ground. Upon seeing them, guilt trickled into Xin’s bones that she had not stood alongside them and fought.

  “Which one should we check next?” Pete asked, reading some of the signs on the doors.

  “Find one that mentions anything to do with body armour,” Lucy said quickly. “The weapons we have should suffice and the rest won’t meet our needs, but extra protection would be a bonus.”

  She darted cautiously towards the next door. Xin made towards the one opposite it, but Pete caught her arm.

  “Please, don’t do that again...” He whispered, almost pleadingly. He was talking about her and Lucy going off without them. His face was sincere and he gazed deep into her eyes. Xin was confused by his level of concern but nodded back and he let her go, leaving her stood there as he went to check another door.

  “I’ve got it, this one! ‘Regular non-plated and hard plate reinforced personal armour, riot gear and other protective clothing including: Kevlar and Dyneema.’” Lucy read aloud. She poked both her gun and head around the door and added, “It’s clear.”

  The three of them entered another equally dauntingly sized space. It was indeed empty, aside from another body. A middle aged man lay in the centre of the room. Most of his innards were now outwards and not much was left of, what must surely have been a sizable stomach at one point. Most of the floor seemed to be smeared or pooled with wet, shiny, red blood. A bright, crimson red.