Orpheus

by DeWitt, Dan

  "You served?"

  "Army. 12 years."

  “My Dad was military, too. Air Force.”

  “I thought you said he was military?”

  “Oh, he'd like you. Feel free to take over at any point, Mickey." Ethan tried to get his point across without sounding like he was begging.

  "No can do. These people just fell in line behind you and your girl here. Hell, even I fell in line, and I didn't even know I was doing it. You're the guy, like it or not."

  "Thanks a lot." Rachel never let go of his hand but managed to punch him lightly in his thigh. "The team assignments are yours."

  "Way ahead of you, kid." Diesel held the palm of his hand up, and the dim light revealed writing. "We can go light at the beginning; everyone needs rest."

  "We're here!" Sister Ann said.

  Ethan moved to the front and started up the ladder. He paused halfway up and teased the group, "Try to give me a softer landing this time, maybe." At the top, he pushed up on the cover just enough to look through. He shined the light 180 degrees to his left, then to his right, and saw nothing. "Looks clear. Wait a second." He shouldered the cover out of the way and cautiously climbed to the street. He looked down at Rachel and blew her a kiss, then disappeared from sight.

  * * *

  Rachel returned the kiss and watched as her boyfriend stepped away from sight. She gave it about sixty seconds before worry crept in. She put her foot on the bottom rung to follow, but Mickey stopped her, as he'd recently developed the habit of doing.

  "For God's sake, girl, do you hear a ruckus up there?"

  "No."

  "Do you want to cause one?"

  She shook her head.

  "Then he's fine. Just wait."

  She didn't move up, but she didn't take her foot off of the rung, either.

  One minute turned into two, then five. A few casual conversations broke out, as people forgot for a moment the situation they were in. Once they were safe in the school, Rachel would welcome that. But now, with her man up there alone, it annoyed her. "Would you please shut up?" she said. She'd meant to whisper, but it came out as more of a hiss. The conversations stopped abruptly, and the tension that had kept them alive this far descended again.

  Rachel's neck began to stiffen, but she didn't stop looking straight up through the hole. "Come on, where are you?" she asked softly.

  She got no answer but the sound of breathing from her group.

  I'm going after hi-

  "We're good, let's go."

  Rachel shrieked as Ethan's silhouette popped into existence and blocked out most of the moonlight entering the tunnel. Her yell led to several more behind her, but the group composed itself in a few seconds when they realized there was no threat.

  She climbed up to him and took his extended hand. She got her feet under her and punched him in the shoulder. "You are such an asshole."

  "What?"

  "Never mind, you big jerk."

  "I love you, too."

  Mickey was next up. "Where the frick were you?"

  "I didn't see anything, so I went a little further out. Nothing. This entire area is a ghost town."

  Rachel and Mickey gave him a weird look.

  "Uh, the kind without zombies."

  The rest of the survivors climbed out of the manhole like clowns out of an undersized car and headed for the school.

  * * *

  The main doors of the school were locked, but all it took was one smashed window to get them in. They began to roam the corridors on high alert, but the school looked every bit as abandoned as it should have been on a normal August Saturday.

  Denise asked, "Now what?"

  "We make this place our home for as long as it takes. We should head to the nurse's office for medical supplies, the cafeteria for food, all of that."

  "How long do you think we'll be here?" Jason asked timidly.

  "As long as we have to. Plan on indefinitely."

  "Then I'll, um, volunteer to head to the library, if that's okay," Jason offered. "We need to know what to do in case someone gets sick or we need to grow our own food or fix a radio or something. I spent most of my free time in there, so I know the way around." He caught a look of immense pride on Harold's face and smiled.

  "That's a heck of an idea. As soon as we set up, go nuts."

  "Speaking of which," Sister Ann said, "where are we setting up?"

  "I was thinking either the gym or the cafeteria. We'll have more room in the gym, and we'll be close to a lot of things we can use as weapons, but..."

  "The kitchen's closer to the food."

  "Yup."

  Diesel continued. "We can always move the food. The cafeteria is right in the middle of the school, so if anything bad happens, we could conceivably get surrounded. The gym, at least, has a bunch of different exits through the locker rooms and to the parking lot, if we absolutely have to."

  "Right." Ethan turned to address the whole group. "Okay, everyone, I know that you're tired and freaked out, and we can rest in just a bit, but we have to prepare first. Let's have some groups of three to go get some food and medicine. Jason, the library's yours, so pick two people...okay, Harold and someone else...to help you out. Denise, take the kitchen. Sister Ann, the clinic. The rest of you, wander around and look for useful stuff like lights, radios, and anything else you think might come in handy. Especially batteries. The power's not going to stay on forever. Mickey, you're with us. We'll secure the gym."

  Ethan waited a minute as the groups were formed, then asked, "Okay, we might as well use the power while we have it. I know that these things notice light," he told of his little experiment with the flashlight while he and Rachel were on the run, "but has anyone seen anything to make them believe that they're attracted by light? You know, like moths?" Several survivors shook their heads, and no one said anything. "Okay. I guess we'll find out for sure." He handed one of the radios to the roving group headed up by Trent, then sent them on their way with, "And for Christ's sake, this isn't a race. Stay within shouting distance of another group, or just join up with one and take a little longer. We fought hard to get here. Stay safe."

  The remaining three formed a triangle outside the gym doors. They chatted for a few minutes, swapping ideas. The light switches were laid out in a row to the left. Ethan flipped them all up and within a few seconds the hallways were bathed in light. He opened the doors and stepped in. "It might be more comfortable to sleep on the bleachers. Oh." The last syllable was in response to the seemingly endless amounts of heads that swung violently in his direction. He slammed the doors, put his back up to them and said with surprising calm, "I just fucked up."

  "What? What'd you do?" Mickey asked.

  Ethan started to answer when the first zombie hit the door at full speed. The impact moved Ethan a few inches forward but he slammed back against it. "Crowbar! Crowbar!"

  Rachel understood faster than Mickey did. She snatched the crowbar out of his hand and slid it through the handles, as several more bodies hit the door from the other side. She put her shoulder into a door to hold zombies at bay for the second time in less than a day.

  "What the fuck did you do?!?" Mickey screamed as he threw himself against the door next to them.

  The door began to heave violently as more zombies pressed against it. If not for the crowbar, the three survivors would have been overrun already. As it was, they'd already managed to force a two-inch gap between the two doors before the immovable metal stopped them cold. Four or five hands slipped through the crack and moved side to side, looking for something to grab and, presumably, munch on. A finger brushed against Mickey's right ear, and he pulled his head away just before the rest of the fingers clamped down on his lobe.

  "How many?" Rachel yelled.

  "I didn't count, but fifty's low!"

  "We're in trouble, kid! They'll eventually get out, then what?"

  "Any ideas?"

  Rachel said, "Can you two hold this for a few minutes?"

  "Why?
" the two men asked in unison.

  "Can you hold it or not?"

  "We'll have to!"

  She grabbed the radio off of Ethan's belt and ran down the corridor. The last thing Ethan heard was her yelling for Trent.

  * * *

  "Trent! TRENT! You there?" Rachel's breathing got heavy fast, less from exertion than from sheer terror.

  "We're here. What's going on?"

  "Where are you?"

  "Maintenance closet near the science rooms."

  "Does anyone in your group know where the emergency shelter is?"

  "Hold a sec." He clicked off as Rachel took a left. She paused for a second and closed her eyes, visualizing where she wanted to go. She hadn't been in the school for three years now, and hadn't had a whole lot of occasion to go to the shelter other than the yearly drills. "Yeah, we're real close to it."

  "Go there now and clean out as much good shit as you can!" Rachel had just gotten out the last word when she almost ran Denise and her group over.

  "Rachel. What...?"

  "Come on!" She didn't break stride, and Denise's group broke into a full sprint behind her.

  Trent's group had beaten the rest to the shelter and were dumping armfuls of batteries, canned goods, bottled water, and other survival supplies unceremoniously into the hall. Three of the new arrivals lent themselves to the effort. Rachel grabbed Trent and told him to listen closely to his radio. "Keep going, but when I tell you to, drop everything and hide and don't make a sound." She ran into the shelter and looked for the old boombox that ostensibly would be used to monitor the airwaves in case of emergency, but really just sat there collecting dust. It was exactly where she remembered it. She flipped the switch to FM and got nothing but static. She didn't need music, she just needed noise. She turned the volume all the way up. It was uncomfortably loud, and she hoped it would be loud enough. With that, she sprinted back to the two human doorstops.

  The men were struggling to hold back the zombies. The crowbar was doing its job, but the weakest point was the screws used to secure the handles to the doors. The constant back and forth was slowly but certainly loosening them. It was only a matter of time before the zombies got out, and then the survivors' last chance at sanctuary would be gone. Rachel quickly outlined where she'd been and what her plan was.

  "Great plan. Now go hide."

  She held up a hand and dismissed his objection. "Oh, shut up."

  "I'm with her, kid. Shut your yap and let her work!"

  "Rachel, get your ass back here!"

  She ignored him and backed up two dozen paces; close enough for the zombies to get a good look at her, but far enough away to get a good head start. She keyed her radio and told Trent to get his people out of there. She yelled, "Whenever you're ready, boys!"

  "But...but..." Ethan gave up. "Fuck. On three."

  They both stood quickly, and on three threw their respective doors open. An immediate wave of fresh zombies left the gym and looked for meat, but, as Ethan and Mickey were hidden behind their doors, all they saw was Rachel.

  Once she was sure that she'd been spotted, she took off towards the bomb shelter. This time, there were five times as many zombies and no rooftops to keep between her and them. This was just a footrace. If she was faster than all of them, her plan should work. If just one of them was too fast, she was dead. That thought kept her in the lead. She was comically worried that she'd get too far ahead of the flesh-eating monsters behind her and they'd lose interest, but they stayed with her.

  When she was a little over halfway to the shelter, she heard a faint siren-like noise coming from the floor below her, where the shelter was. She kept running, plowed through the stairwell door and bounded down them as quickly as she could without breaking her leg. She didn't need to look to see if she was still being followed, because hundreds of footfalls behind and above her let her know.

  She hit the landing and went through another door. She was now in a concrete corridor, and the door to the shelter was about a hundred feet away, one turn to go. She figured out what that siren noise was: someone must have figured what she was trying to do with the radio and one-upped her by rigging up a megaphone. That piercing sound would definitely do the trick.

  All she had to do now was live.

  She heard the door slam against the wall as it was thrown open by the zombies. She rounded the final corner, swung open the door, and hid behind it. Again. This trick had been good to them so far, and she hoped that the luck would hold out a little longer. She breathed as silently as she could, but the constant wailing of the megaphone made her want to scream. Thunder passed two feet from her face, attracted by the siren. How many were there, anyway? It seemed to last for ten minutes, when the reality was more like fifteen seconds. Gradually, the thunder faded into individual footsteps that she could have counted if she was of a mind to do so. When the footfalls faded completely, she slammed the door shut behind them. This one had no crash bar, and they'd shown no signs of being able to figure out how to work a knob.

  She put her head against the door and enjoyed the cool metal against her skin. It was over. She'd done it.

  When she saw the remaining zombie lumbering at her, it made sense why it had been so far behind its friends. In life, it had been a morbidly obese man in a cowboy hat. In death, it was several hundred pounds of maneater that fell on top of her before she could move, not that she had any place to move to. She wrapped both of her hands around its throat and locked her arms.

  Justdon'tletitbiteyoujustdon'tletitbiteyou...

  She was as successful at that as she could have hoped to be, but the thing's sheer mass was squeezing the air out of her, and it became impossible for her to breathe. Her arms began to weaken and its jowls inched closer to her face. She fought for as long as she could, but it would be over soon.

  The hooked end of a crowbar, held by her new friend Mickey, wrapped around its throat and heaved. The claw dug deep into the meaty flesh of its exposed neck. Mickey pulled the thing's head back, and enough of its body followed that she stole a breath and stayed conscious long enough to see her boyfriend crush the fat zombie's head with three quick but devastating blows to its head. Satisfied that it was dead, they all worked to extricate Rachel from under the mass.

  When she was free, Ethan hauled her to her feet and hugged her fiercely.

  She buried her face in his shoulder and cried. When the moment had passed, she asked, "Can we please stop running for a while?"

  Chapter 19: Haven

  For the next few weeks, they stopped running.

  Though the power only stayed on for less than two days after their arrival, it had been enough time for them to prepare. They moved all of the casino tables to the sides, but left them intact. Most made use of them at some point, especially the poker tables. The gear from the bomb shelter had been moved to the gym and inspected. Same for the medical supplies. Jason had taken to his job as librarian with gusto, and had not only grabbed dozens of books on medical treatment, herbology, and some fun reading, but had managed to hump a large bookshelf into the gym to hold them, as well.

  Some of the non-perishable food items had been brought into the gym, as well. They'd barely scratched the surface of what the kitchen pantry held. The institution was built to feed over seven-hundred appetites every day; the fifteen of them could make use of that for quite some time. The inevitability of losing the power presented a problem for the perishable food. It was decided that it would be a waste of fuel to run the generator for anything but an emergency. They turned that problem into an opportunity in true "lemons into lemonade" fashion. The two women of faith organized a giant cook-in with hamburgers, hot dogs, pizza, and dairy products. What they didn't manage to eat then at least had a few more days of shelf life after it had been cooked.

  The members of their little commune all had their roles to play, and each of them pulled their weight. Small disagreements often broke out, but were soon settled, and business as usual continued. Friendships were made,
and everyone was at least cordial to each other.

  The sole exception was the sister, Tonya, whom Ethan had threatened to use as bait back in the church. She didn't cause any problems. If anyone, including Ethan, asked something of her, she did it without delay. She was a model of efficiency and teamwork.

  Ethan's concern was that she had yet to say a single word to him outside of a yes or no or clarification of instructions. Not one. After a while, Ethan brought this to her brother's attention.

  "Cliff, she hates my guts."

  "Naw. I've talked to her about it. She understands why you did what you did."

  "She's got a funny way of showing it."

  "It'll take some time, but she'll be okay." He held up three fingers. "Scout's honor."

  Ethan kept waiting for the warming up.

  In the meantime, their preparation was rewarded and their collective spirits were lifted by the arrival of two separate groups of survivors. Those groups brought to nearly thirty the number of hopefuls who now called the high school their home. There were still plenty of supplies (they'd brought backpacks filled with their own that they gladly added to the kitty). Their price of admission was information: where did they come from, had they seen anyone by this name, what had they learned about the zombies...they were barraged with questions, and answered every one with as much accuracy as they could muster. And then they turned the tables, peppering Ethan and his people with similar inquiries.

  When all was said and done, the summer class of 2011 was a small force made formidable by the breadth of information they'd gleaned and their mutual desire for survival. Ethan still had no word of either of his parents, but the existence of other survivors helped him to believe.

  * * *

  Trent stood his watch on the roof of the school with his two compatriots, a woman named Helen and an elderly man, Amal. The watch groups had been shaken up to incorporate the new arrivals like Amal and give them the lay of the land. Additionally, this meant that people only pulled a watch every couple of days, and ensured that everyone was well-rested.