Mass Extinction Event (Book 9): Days 195 to 202

by Cross, Amy

  “That's the one I saw just now,” Katrina says, as she steps back to join us.

  “He looks so fresh,” I point out, staring at the zombie's face as it snarls on the other side of the glass and tries again to break through. “I'm no expert, but that guy can't have been dead for more than a couple of weeks. But back in New York, they said -”

  Before I can finish, there's a loud thudding sound nearby, and I turn to see that another zombie has arrived. This one is over on the far side of the room, trying to push its way through one of the other windows.

  “At least they're dumb,” Riley mutters. “Smart zombies would be a whole other threat.”

  “Are all the doors and windows secure?” Katrina asks.

  “I checked already,” I tell her. “I'm pretty sure there's no way those things can break in.”

  “I'm not so much worried about them getting in,” Riley replies. “I'm more worried about whether we can get out.”

  There's yet another thud, and another zombie slams against the window just a few feet from me. Somehow, I can't shake the feeling that he looks strangely familiar.

  “Uh-oh,” Riley says, pointing down at the creature's bare feet. “Tommy, I don't know how to break this to you, but I think that one might have come to get his shoes back.”

  Thomas

  “Are you sure this is the best idea?” I ask, as Riley stands on the counter and pushes aside a panel in the ceiling. “What if there are some of them up there?”

  “I don't know about you,” he replies, “but I never yet met a zombie that can climb.”

  “Get me out of here!” Mikey screams in the main part of the restaurant, as zombies continue to slam against the windows. “Untie me now, assholes!”

  “To be fair,” Katrina murmurs, “he does have a point for once.”

  “I'm going up!” Riley says, as he starts hauling himself into the crawlspace. “Wish me luck!”

  “Aren't you going with him?” Katrina asks.

  “Aren't you?” I reply.

  “Assuming he's right and that there really is an access point to the roof up there,” she replies, “then I don't really see what good I can do. And if he's wrong, there's no point in two of us being stuck in the ceiling, is there?”

  “I will kill you all!” Mikey shouts, and I can hear him pulling frantically against the ropes that are keeping him tied to the column. “Do you hear me? I will drain your blood and I will mutilate your corpses! Your only hope is to untie me right now!”

  I turn to Katrina.

  “I wouldn't,” she says firmly. “Call me crazy, but I really don't have a great impression of that guy so far.”

  “Join the club,” I reply, “but -”

  “I'm out!” Riley shouts from above, and as I look up I realize I can hear the sound of footsteps on the roof of the building.

  “Huh,” Katrina says, “maybe that dumb plan of his is actually going to work after all.”

  Following the sound of footsteps, I head back through into the restaurant's dining area, and I see to my horror that there are now six zombies out there. None of this makes a whole lot of sense, but it's as if suddenly – somehow – a whole load of zombies have been 'activated'. When I stole the shoes from that guy a few days earlier, he was quite clearly dead, and he showed no sign of getting zombified. Is it possible, then, that the virus somehow stayed dormant for a while and then suddenly woke back up?

  In all these dead people?

  All at once?

  “Up here, morons,” I hear Riley yelling, and a moment later a thin spout of dark liquid runs down from the edge of the roof and starts splattering against one of the zombies.

  The creature steps back, as if momentarily confused by the liquid, and then a few seconds later a flaming piece of cloth drops down and lands on its head.

  The zombie immediately ignites, with flames roaring from its withered body. It stumbles forward and bumps against the window, and then it steps back and starts to turn around before, finally, it drops to its knees and then topples over. For a moment, I can only stare as flames continue to rise from the corpse. The lower extremities of the figure are still just about visible, and I'm reminded of the fact that – regardless of whatever else has happened – that's a human being in there. Somebody's son, somebody's father or husband maybe. A person who, until recently, was just trying to live a normal life.

  “Over here!” Riley shouts, and another trickle of liquid falls down on one of the other zombies.

  “I don't think I want to watch this,” I say, as I feel a hint of nausea in my gut.

  “Don't you find it kinda fascinating?” Katrina asks, and I turn to see that she's staring wide-eyed at the scene, with a smile on her face. “It's as if the very definition of nature has changed.”

  “I don't see it like that,” I reply. “It's more like -”

  Before I can finish, I hear another roaring sound, and I see a faint orange glow flickering against Katrina's face. I force myself to turn and look at the window, and sure enough the second zombie is now toppling over as flames consume the last of its remains.

  “I'm going to check the other storage areas,” I say, turning and heading through to the food preparation area. I've seen enough. “We should probably take an inventory of exactly what we have.”

  ***

  “Riley six, zombies nil!”

  As I take another tub from the shelf and set it on the floor, I turn to see Riley standing in the doorway. He's grinning from ear to ear, and he looks pretty pleased with himself.

  “The hardest part was making sure they didn't damage the windows when they burned,” he continues. “I don't really know how glass works, but I figured I shouldn't get any of the actual stuff on the windows. Or was I being too cautious?” He shrugs. “Anyway, the windows are fine and the zombies are definitely not fine, so I think we can chalk that one up as a win.”

  “Great,” I reply.

  “You don't seem happy.”

  “Obviously I'm really glad that we're safe,” I tell him. “I just find it kinda hard to celebrate.” I pause for a moment. “My brother turned into one of those things a while back,” I add, “so I can't really separate the zombies out from the people they used to be.”

  “Fair play,” he replies. “For what it's worth, a fair few of my folks got turned as well. It wasn't much fun to watch.”

  “Did you destroy them?” I ask.

  He hesitates.

  “No,” he says finally. “To be honest, I left them where they were. It was hard, but I couldn't set them on fire. I'm pretty sure that someone will have sorted them out by now. Maybe that makes me hard-hearted or some kind of bastard, but I don't care. I couldn't incinerate my parents.” He pauses again, and then he chuckles. “I didn't have any trouble with those assholes outside, though. I mean, what was the alternative? Just let them keep wandering around and groaning out there?”

  “I guess.”

  “So did you really kill your own brother?” he asks. “Like, for real?”

  “It's complicated.”

  “Sure. I bet it is.” He pauses yet again. “Okay, right, but here's a question for you. If -”

  “We've got more company!” Katrina blurts out, rushing through to find us. “I'm sorry to be the one who keeps bringing bad news, but I counted two more zombies heading this way and I wouldn't be surprised if there are more right behind them.”

  “What's going on?” Riley asks with a sigh. “We've gone weeks without seeing any, so where are they suddenly all coming from?”

  “There are still plenty of bodies out there,” I point out.

  “Sure, but they've been there for a while now. Some of them, at least. Why are they suddenly getting up and bothering people again?”

  “Can we maybe work that out later?” Katrina asks. “I don't know about you guys, but I really want to get out of here. The sooner we clear the parking lot, the sooner I can get that car started. I'm almost done, but I don't fancy getting a chunk taken out of
me in the process.”

  “Fine,” Riley grumbles, turning and heading out of the room. “I'll get back up on the roof, where I apparently belong.”

  “This was supposed to be over,” Katrina points out. “Everyone said it was over. So why are they coming back all of a sudden?”

  “I have no idea,” I tell her. “But I think you're right. I think we need to get out of here as soon as we can. Once Joe's killed these latest zombies, you need to try to fix that car.”

  “Joe?”

  I hesitate, before realizing the mistake I just made.

  “Riley,” I say, correcting myself. “Sorry, slip of the tongue. I'm serious, though. The minute it's safe for you to get back out there, we need to have that car up and running. This place isn't safe, not anymore. We've got to hit the road as soon as we can.”

  Thomas

  Several hours later, as the sun begins to set, I stare out across the parking lot and watch as zombie bodies burn. The light is low, causing the flames to stand out more, but I can already make out a couple more zombies heading this way, and one thing's very clear.

  “We're not getting out of here any time soon,” I whisper.

  “What was that?” Riley asks breathlessly, as he sets another container on the table next to me. “I thought I heard some pessimism there, Tommy.”

  “It's not that I'm pessimistic,” I reply, “it's just... I mean, look at them. They just keep coming. How are we going to get out of here when there are always more zombies turning up?”

  “We'll burn them until there aren't any left, I guess.”

  “And how much of that stuff do you have?” I ask, turning to him. “An endless supply?”

  “I've got enough to last us through the night, that's for sure,” he replies. “And probably enough for another day after that. I mean, how many more of these things can there be, anyway? At some point they just have to stop showing up.”

  “At least the windows are strong,” I point out. “There doesn't seem to be any way for them to break in.”

  “Great,” he mutters, “so we're like animals in a zoo. That doesn't exactly fill me with confidence.”

  The latest zombies are still quite a way off. At least they're still pretty slow, although at the same time they seem to be utterly relentless. They clearly don't seem to tire at all; instead, they just keep going until eventually they wear out and drop. And now, as they edge closer, I'm overcome by a sense that they're never going to stop. After all, we were all told that they were gone, we all allowed ourselves to start thinking that we'd won this battle, and now the damn things are back. What if this is it? What if they're never going to go away?

  “I'll get ready to burn this latest bunch,” Riley says, but he's sounding more tired than excited now as he turns and heads back through to the food preparation area. “There's no point just standing around and watching them.”

  “I'll kill you all,” Mikey says nearby, but even he doesn't sound quite so energetic as before.

  Turning to him, I see that he's staring at me, with one side of his face illuminated by the flickering light of the burning bodies beyond the window.

  “I swear,” he continues, “you're all gonna pay for tying me up like this.”

  I pause for a moment, wondering whether it's even worth replying to him. After a moment, however, I realize I can hear someone weeping in one of the storage rooms. I head over to the door and stop to listen, and I quickly realize that it must be Katrina who's on the other side.

  Should I go in and talk to her, and try to make her feel better?

  What would I say, anyway? After all, our only hope is that the zombies magically go away, and it doesn't look like that's going to happen any time soon. I could tell her that we're going to be fine, but I'm not sure that I believe that. I could tell her that we'll be out of here soon, but I'm not sure that I believe that either. Or I could tell her that some kind of miracle is going to rescue is all, but I definitely wouldn't believe that one.

  “I'm going to kill you!” Mikey sneers again.

  I turn to him.

  “I don't think you'll have to,” I reply, as one of the zombies starts bumping against the window, trying to break through. “I think we're pretty much dead anyway.”

  Day 202

  Elizabeth

  Sitting alone on my bed, I stare into the darkness and listen to the silence of the city.

  In a few hours, when the sun rises, we'll have finally arrived at the day of the rededication ceremony. Survival Day, they're calling it now. There are even big posters in the streets, urging everyone to show up and celebrate the fact that we survived. Sometimes I wonder how the governors can still be rationing our food, while at the same time they manage to get postesr made. I guess some resources are scarcer than others right now. Still, I shouldn't be too cynical. Faced with a potential mass extinction event, the people of the world have pulled together and found a way through, and now the future looks bright. That's what they're saying, at least. Everyone seems so happy, and so optimistic, but I'm sitting here with the strangest, most nauseating sensation in the bottom of my gut.

  Maybe it's because of what I've seen over the past six months. Maybe it's because I'm a natural pessimist. Hell, maybe the fact that I was briefly a zombie means that I can somehow sense the damn things. But even though I desperately hope that I'm wrong, I'm still very much sure of one thing.

  Something bad's coming this way.

  Thomas

  “Go to Hell!”

  In a flash, the three zombies start to burn, flames whooshing from their bodies. One of them falls straight against the window, and for a moment I see the outline of her skull as an inferno rips through what remains of her flesh. Her mouth opens slightly, and then she slithers down with her face still pressed against the window, before landing in a heap on the ground.

  “And you get a fiery death,” Riley yells on the roof, directly above, “and you get a fiery day...”

  More liquid dribbles down, splattering against the head of yet another zombie.

  “And you get a fiery death!”

  The zombie bursts into flames, and this time I swear I hear a brief scream coming from its mouth. I've heard that kind of thing once or twice before, and I'm pretty sure that it's some kind of involuntary response to the sudden flames, but it's still disconcerting. And as the zombie collapses, I want to look away but I can't. I must have seen fifty of these things die since late last night, and now – with no sign of the morning sun yet – I feel as if this hellish night is just going to last forever.

  Maybe the sun won't be rising this time. Maybe even the sun has given up.

  “I've got a plan.”

  Startled, I turn and find that Katrina is standing right behind me. She's spent the past few hours in one of the storage rooms, crying, and to be honest I kind of thought she'd stopped caring. It was as if she'd decided to just wait for death.

  “I've got a plan,” she says again. “I wasn't lying earlier, I was this close to getting that car hot-wired. I've been going over and over the way it worked, and I'm absolutely 100% certain that I can get the motor running in less than thirty seconds.”

  “But -”

  “I already siphoned off the gas from the other cars and put it all in that one. I think it has close to a full tank.”

  “Sure, but -”

  “I just need to get it started.”

  “How can -”

  “And I know how to do that,” she says again, her eyes glistening with tears that she seems to be holding back with sheer force of will. “I've run it through my head a thousand times, I know every move, every touch, every connection. I can get that car started and we can leave.”

  “What...”

  I pause for a moment.

  “What if you're wrong?” I ask finally.

  “I won't be.”

  “But what if you are?”

  “Then we'll be trapped out there with the zombies, and we'll have to run. We might escape at first, b
ut eventually we'll be too exhausted to keep going. We'll end up dying, and we might even turn into zombies ourselves. But the thing is, none of that will happen, because I'm not wrong.”

  I can't help but sigh.

  “I'm not!” she hisses, stepping closer and putting a hand on my shoulder. “I'm an idiot, Tommy. I screwed up my old life, I screwed up the lives of people who loved me and who I loved. I'm not gonna give you a sob story about it all, because it's in the past and I'm not a sharing kinda girl. I also screwed up my life after everything went wrong. You might have noticed that I was living alone in a hovel when I met you. I'm a screw-up, it's just what I do. I'm a pretty bad person.” She pauses for a moment. “But one thing I know how to do, and it might be the only thing I'm really good at... I can hot-wire that car out there. Thirty seconds or less. I'm an excellent thief.”

  “Sure,” I say cautiously, “and I believe you, but -”

  “These windows aren't going to hold for much longer.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “The cracks, Tommy.”

  “There are no cracks.”

  Sighing, she forces me to turn around, and then she points to the bottom of the nearest window. The other side of the glass is already a little blackened, thanks to the burning zombie on the ground, but after a moment I realize that there's a tiny, hairline crack running up from the corner of the pane.

  “I'm not saying they're gonna shatter in the next few minutes,” Katrina continues, “or even the next few days. But eventually one of them will break, and that'll be enough. Plus, the twisted firestarter on the roof will run out of magic juice, and we'll run out of burgers. And the zombies will pile up outside until they start clambering over one another, and then they really might make it onto the roof, and then they'll find their way down into here. Do you really want to wait around for that moment?”