by A. Rosaria
She tore herself away from the sight and sat down where she had found them. Together, they had sat in that spot, looking at the world as it crumbling before their eyes. Sarah let her tears flow freely. She sobbed hard. Was it hopeless? Was it all utterly hopeless? Had Vic and Mel made the right choice? A choice she should also take?
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Ralph remembered the bus trip had been a straight stretch on an interstate, which one he had no idea; he just knew that once he got closer to home, he would be able to find his way back. The road looked like every other road he had been on, a long slab of asphalt stretching to the horizon. There was nothing to see at his left or his right. He had been driving for hours now. The line of buses had stopped eventually, every single bus a charred wreck of torn metal.
The military had been rigorous in getting every last one of them. However, they had not killed everything. He saw stragglers walking but he had not stopped to ask them if they were still breathing. At fifty miles out, he saw an upturned school bus. Not all had made it to their destination. Surrounding the bus, a crowd idled around without a sign of life among them. The farther he went, he saw more stranded buses. Two hundred miles later, he stopped seeing them.
He passed some signs but none meant much to him. He kept driving once he got to the roadblock; he would know where to go from there. Or did he? The roadblock he saw that cut off his city was before they got on the interstate. It was the same for the other roadblocks he saw. None were on the interstate themselves. He had better pay attention before he missed the exit he had to take. The trip to the pit had taken about half a day. He had been driving for about four hours, but he was going much faster than he had in the bus. He should be close.
A spec appeared on the road running parallel to the one he drove on. It was growing fast. A sedan drove past; he barely saw more than a blur speed past him. Ralph honked and whooped, jumping up and down in his seat. There was still life around. The car kept speeding, now only a smudge in his rearview mirror. Far off he saw buildings loom up. First a haze, a mirage of his wishes, one he hoped was not just a specter of his imagination, but real. After each mile the truck ate, the haze slowly got more detailed and he recognized the buildings.
Taking the interstate exit, he slowed down. The roadblock was ahead and might still be manned by soldiers. They might not allow him to pass. He saw the raised barbwire blocking his way. And if the barbed wire didn't make it clear enough, a large closed road sign did. However, no soldier was in sight. Slowly, he rolled the truck. Ralph honked. It clamored in the utter silence, deafening load, even able to disturb the dead. The sound echoed away. One soldier in combat fatigues, body armor strapped on, helmet square on his head, appeared on the other side of the barbed wire. He held his rifle loosely in his hand. Ralph stopped fifteen feet away and got out. He approached the soldier.
“Sir, can I get through?”
The soldier didn't answer; he kept walking in a straight line toward Ralph. A few feet away, he pounced forward into the barbed wire. The razor cut him open wherever he was not armored. He kept moving forward until he was completely stuck. Letting go of the rifle, he reached his hand to claw at Ralph. Ralph froze, not believing what he saw. The soldier started thrashing violently. His helmet fell off. A dead face stared at Ralph, teeth snapping at him. A hand reached out to grab him. Ralph recoiled and hurried back into his truck.
His heart bobbed in his chest as he fought with the ignition. The wheels screeched as he backed away and again when he suddenly stopped. He gripped the steering wheel until his knuckles turned white. He winked the sweat out of his eyes, breathed in deeply, and stepped on the gas pedal. The truck spurted forward, tires squealing, and rocketed hard against the barbed wire, smashing the zombie soldier as it plowed through. The car skidded on the road as the tires blew, punctured by the razors it drove over. It crashed against the curb and toppled sideways.
Ralph touched his body all over. No bleeding. No injury. Though lots of pain. He quickly released his seatbelt. Grunting, he climbed out the passenger's side, suffering his bruises for every move he made. On the truck, he had a great vantage point over the destruction he caused and beyond. Barbwire was strewn everywhere; the sign was run over and split in two. The zombie soldier’s torso lay several feet away from its legs. Its head was smashed flat, brains coming out of the cracks. What worried him was the crowd slowly advancing on his location.
He jumped out and ran to the zombies severed legs. The belt was still attached to the pants and so was the holster. He removed the Beretta m9 from the holster and a spare clip. He checked if the safety was on and tucked the gun in his belt. He pocketed the clip. He had wasted enough time. Looking up, he saw the mob was closer now. They sure had his scent now; there seemed some intent in the way they moved in his direction. He sprinted away and kept running until he couldn't see the zombies anymore.
He didn't know this neighborhood. It was an upscale part of the city that he had not visited before, with well-maintained townhouses. The parking spots were crammed with expensive cars. All the front doors had a yellow X mark, the date (yesterday), and a number spray painted on them. Had they also received the bus treatment? The occupants were now a cinderblock in some remote landscape? Or had they actually been evacuated to safety?
The next street he walked down was the same. He took an alley, hoping to get a change of scenery and to see some signs of life to dispel the horror that the whole city had been evacuated to their demise. Just the thought that Ginny would be torn from her bed and taken away chocked him up. He walked for half an hour, passing yellow-sprayed doors after yellow-sprayed doors, until he came to a street with no paint on the doors. It was still empty. All curtains were drawn closed. At the end of the road, a pamphlet taped on a streetlight read that the area was to be quarantined and everybody had to stay inside, to pull the curtains and lock the doors, by order of the federal government.
It took him another thirty minutes to come upon the first living human being. A couple was loading their station wagon with boxes filled with canned food. They had surgical masks on. The man couldn't be more than forty; however, the bald head made him look older than his face would suggest. The woman was in her twenties with long, dark hair, an olive complexion, and a little plump around the hips. They stopped loading when the saw him approach. Their eyes fell on his gun. Alarm passed on their faces and their bodies tensed only to then relax. They looked at each other and smiled.
Ralph didn't know if he should get closer or keep walking.
“Hey,” the man called out, “what's the gun for?
As if it wasn't obvious why one should be armed. “It's dangerous outside.”
“Well, we mean you no harm.”
They indeed looked harmless, but he would rather keep his wits about him, just in case his perception was wrong.
“And don't stay in the middle of the road,” the woman said.
Ralph looked up and down the road. No car was going to come anytime soon. They didn't look like they were out to harm him, but neither did Norm when he pushed him in the path of two zombies. However, they didn't look like Norm and he could use some information about where he was and what had happened while he was gone.
He kept his distance from them.
“I'm John and this is Mary.”
John stuck his hand out in greeting. Reluctantly, so as not to be rude, Ralph closed the distance to shake his hand. “I'm Ralph.”
“How you doing, Ralph?” Mary asked.
How to answer that without shocking them, not that he was particularly joyful to begin with. “Could be better.” John and Mary sighed. An awkward silence fell between them, which compelled Ralph to say something. “Could you tell me where I am? I think I'm lost.”
John pointed to the street name sign, River Street.
“Do you know how to get to Bloomfield Street?”
“I do, south part of town, isn't it?”
He felt a burst of hope. “Can you tell me how to get there?”
John shook his head. “Not really, but if you keep walking south, you'll eventually get there, but it's a long way on foot. If you ask me, I would say you best get out of town quickly. Weird things have been going on.”
“Yeah, with the dead walking and eating people you can say that again.”
John laughed and Mary looked on smiling.
“That's a very gloomy way to state things,” John said. “Dead people don't walk, but with the flu pandemic, the protest, and rioting, it's best we leave town for a while.”
“Protest? Rioting?” Ralph shook his head; there were much worse things going on than that.
“You scared us a minute there; we thought you were a rioter or a looter, though when we saw your face draw back almost to a pure white, we knew you couldn't be one of those.”
He couldn't believe this. Had they been kept everyone in the dark? Did they know less than him about what was really going on?
“Yea,” Mary said, “it has been scary. People were protesting at the highway access when they closed it down. And most people from this street went to protest, only to be evacuated. That was before we were ordered to quarantine ourselves inside our homes. The military took those who stayed outside protesting away in an old yellow bus. We stayed inside; most people did. They don't even answer their doors anymore. Everybody is scared of the flu and the military.”
John loaded the last box. “Last night, there was shooting and fires. Lots of shooting really. Must have been heavy looting and stuff.”
They were finishing up to leave.
“John, could you drive me home?”
“Sorry, we are going north to try the country road to leave this city.”
He could use a ride at least to someplace where he knew how to get home. Just walking and hoping for the best could get him killed.
“St. Mark’s High School, could you get me there?”
John frowned. “It's in the middle of the city, but it still is a detour.”
“Oh, come on,” Mary said. “It couldn't hurt. It would just be a few minutes more.”
John sighed. “Okay, okay, get in.”
His luck might have turned—that was if he could still speak of luck in the world left to them. He got in and they drove off. It would not take long to get to the high school. He would figure out what to do once he arrived there.
What about Tommy? He felt ashamed only now thinking about his friend. Tommy had been healthy when he left him. It could be he still was inside the building; the government probably quarantined his high school—sending the sick away and keep the healthy ones safe. Maybe this was a sign from God; that he first went this way because he had to get his friend out. Or it could be a coincidence. He didn't know. With zombies walking the Earth, not even physics was sure anymore. He would see what happened. For now, he would be content with going back to St. Mark's.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
The zombies walked mindless over the school yard, bumping into each other, shoving each other aside, falling down, getting up again, and on and on. Their moans were a continuous drone in her head. Sarah stood on the edge of the roof, balancing upright with each gust of wind. She wondered if a real strong gush would blow her right of the roof. Would she still be alive after the fall? An hour had passed since she sent zombie Mel and Vic careening over the same ledge she stood on.
The fires in the distance settled and only smoke remained. There were houses or cars set on fire. Rioters, maybe, the soldiers, or just accidents the fire department could not get to, because instead of doing their jobs, they were roaming the street for someone to eat. Jump or not jump? Straight down lay Vic and Mel joined in death by hand. They went together in life as in death. A tear rolled down her cheek and made the fall she contemplated making herself. Her last tear, she decided. She got off the ledge, not realizing that in a world like the one she lived in now, there would never be enough tears to shed.
Sarah climbed down the ladder to the landing. She froze. The window was closed. She remembered leaving it open. Sweat broke out on her forehead. She knocked on the window. No one was there. Jake was not there; he must have been the one that had locked her outside. He alone would do something like that to teach her a lesson for whatever wrong he imagined she had done. She needed something to break the window. She hurried back up to the roof, searched every inch of it, and found nothing. How could he do this to her? She shook her head while gritting her teeth; it didn't matter why. She had to find a way back inside. If she stayed here, eventually she would die of thirst. A slow death.
A withered wooden door in need of replacement barred the roof access. It must have been in place since construction of the building in the early fifties. Most access doors were made of steel, not wood, nowadays. She kicked the door, putting all her weight behind her kick. The door shuddered, but that was about it. It might look worn out but it was sufficiently sturdy. She wouldn't be forcing her way in anytime soon.
She observed the lock more closely. It was a normal door handle with a keyhole. She tried it and the door opened. She felt stupid not having checked it sooner. Someone must have been lazy or someone left it unlocked. It didn't matter. She’d take it. Besides, it was not like things were suddenly going to be easy. She still had to get back to the classroom.
The staircase was narrow; the walls pressed close on her. Only one person could walk comfortably down the steps. The stairs went from the roof directly to the ground floor. There was no access to the first floor. Roof to ground only. A door barred her exit to the ground level. The joke would be on her if this one was locked. She pulled it open. A hazmat zombie blocked the way out. Its back was turned to her. From here, it was about a hundred yards to the main stairs. It would be a suicide run, but she had no other choice if she wanted to get back to her group.
Slowly, the zombie turned around. She pushed the zombie, sending it staggering out of her way. She ran. The zombie was not the only one; two more walked in her direction. Using speed and her smaller size to her advantage, she ran between them, ducking as she went. She slipped past. They put on a chase, but at that speed, they would never catch her. She turned the corner right into Mrs. Evergreen's arms; the school nurse had turned into zombie. The peak of her nose had been bitten off, and she was missing an eye, gnawed off probably. Sarah slid out of her grasp and crawled over the floor on all fours before she got back up. She rushed out of the nurse zombie's reach.
Her heart beating in her throat, she ran from the narrow escape. The path seemed clear. One more bend and one more doorway and she would be in the main hall. She turned the corner to see five zombies; five of the eight she had met in the classroom the previous day. They hadn’t made it out after all. She could not stop running. She slid like she had seen baseball players do when they were trying get to home plate in a pinch. She slid past the first three and stopped sliding in front of the remaining two. Their feet and with the doorway were only a few inches out of reach. Two pairs of hands rushed to grab her. She rolled sideways away from them, scrambled up, and ran for the opening. Fingers brushed against her clothes, and the rotten air of decay swamped after her as she rushed into the main hall.
Four soldiers, including the one who shot Sam, occupied the hall. Sam lay against the wall. The soldiers had moved him, although they had neglected covering him up and left him like road kill to be disposed of later. Served the bastards right, turning into zombies themselves. It was of little comfort. She zigzagged between the zombies, dodging their clawing hands, and rushed up the stairs, jumping the steps by twos or threes. At the landing where the stair split to the right and left wing, the zombie she had pushed down the night before waited for her with the hazmat zombie that had attacked her. Sarah didn't slow down. She ran full force into them, pushing them against the wall. She jumped back before they could grab or sink their foul teeth into her. She fled up the stairs and ran back to the classroom.
The door was locked. She banged on it with both fists, screaming for them to open up. She heard stumbl
ing from the other side. She pressed her ear against the door. There was yelling, arguing. She could not hear what they said, but she needn't to know who was arguing. She pounded harder on the door, screaming to them that it was her and she was all right, to open up.
A sound came from her side. She turned to look. A zombie had followed her up and was just rounding the corner. It was not the one in the hazmat; it was one that could bite her. It stood still, watching her from the end of the hallway. The sunlight covered half of its decaying body, while the other half was cast in shade. Sarah rapped her knuckles franticly on the door, yelling for them to hurry, that a zombie was coming. She heard a ruckus from the other side, but didn't stop banging her fist. Quick footfalls closed in. She dared not look. The door was pulled open, and Zach pulled her in and slammed the door shut. It hit the zombie's head as it went. They heard a loud crack before the door close.
Sarah leaned on her knees, each hand cupping a knee, breathing heavily, just now realizing her narrow escape. Her body trembled uncontrollably. She paced the room, rubbing her arms. Why did these things keep happening to her? And why was she fighting to survive despite the hopelessness of it all?
“We thought you were dead,” Zach said.
She stopped pacing to look at him. Blood ran from his nose and Les stood next to him with a cut lip. Jake stood in the corner glaring at them.
“Thanks for saving my life,” she said to Zach and Les, before she turned to glare at Jake.
Lilly approached her with tears in her eyes, closely followed by Emily, who had become sort of a shadow to Lilly.
“The bastard said you went up to the roof and they got to you. I didn't want to believe him, but it has been hours. We were about to leave the building when you started to knock and yell for us to open. I...” Lilly hugged her tightly. “Jake didn't want us to open the door, saying you must be infected and about to turn.”
