The Darkest Part of the Night

by David Spell

  A group of five of the infected reached the doorway and were growling and reaching in. Jeffrey recognized a familiar face in the group. Billy Allen. One of his best friends. They played on the offensive line together. Billy was one of the few players on the team who was bigger than Jeffrey. His glazed and bloodshot eyes didn’t even register recognition for Bell. He was growling and his face was covered with blood and gore. He was wearing his green and white Peachtree Meadow letter jacket, just like Jeffrey was.

  Shots continued to sound to the right and zombies continued to fall. The entire group of ten from the other direction were now shoving against the door. Billy was one of the biggest high school offensive linemen in the state of Georgia, weighing almost three hundred pounds. It was only a matter of minutes before the door was forced open.

  Tears were streaming down Jeffrey’s face as he swung the bat at Billy’s head. It took two strikes before Allen fell, his skull shattered. His big body knocked three other zombies down as he collapsed to the floor. They immediately started trying to get to their feet.

  Bell continued to swing the bat and continued to connect with zombie heads. They piled up around the doorway as he cried and swung the bat. There was more movement up to the right. Jeffrey’s arms were getting tired. He wasn’t sure how much longer he could keep it up.

  “Police officers! We’re coming in. Step back from the door and let us make sure the area is clear.”

  Andy Fleming led them deeper into the school. Josh guided him as to which hallways to take. A teenager and a police officer, both turned zombies rounded a corner in front of them. They were covered in blood and were growling the guttural growl that all zombies seemed to make. The student’s face had been ripped apart and an eyeball was hanging out of its socket. Andy fired twice, dropping them both. He glanced at Josh and saw tears in his eyes.

  “Sorry, man.”

  “Let’s keep moving,” was his only reply.

  There were more shots from the rear of the team. Fleming stopped and glanced back. Scotty and Luis shot three zombie students that had run up behind them. Andy started moving again.

  They passed body after body in the hallway. This was like nothing that any of them had ever seen or smelled before. The floor and walls were covered with blood and gore and the smell was horrific where the bodies had been ripped open. They couldn’t help but walk through infected blood.

  They moved slowly as they got deeper into the school. The police dispatcher told Matthews that they had a group of twenty students nearby asking to be rescued. As they moved down the hallway, a loud metallic thud came from up ahead. A few seconds later, a girl screamed out, “Help us! Please, please, somebody, help us!”

  “Oh, that’s going to help,” muttered McCain. “That should bring every zombie in the school straight to us.”

  The hallway they were on ended at a T intersection. It was clear to the right. To the left was a large group of infected converging on a classroom. Another big group was coming from the opposite side of the room. Fleming guessed there were twenty-five to thirty in total. The growls of the infected echoed down the hallway.

  The former Spec Op Marine turned around and gave quick hand signals to the team. He motioned Josh and Chuck up with him and had everyone else guard their rear and the other side of the intersection that they were at. Fleming, Matthews, and McCain stepped into the hallway and started firing. The suppressed weapons were still loud inside the school and a few of the big group closest to them turned and started towards the officers.

  Zombies started to drop. Over the sound of the gunfire was the distinctive metal twang of a baseball bat. Chuck and the other two officers squeezed off shot after shot to their heads. They shot students, teachers, and probably a few parents that had been infected. In less than two minutes the first group had been eliminated.

  Now there were shots from the rear of the team. Scotty and Luis had killed four more teenage zombies that had tried to get to them. Andy motioned the team forward. Most of the second group of infected was now laying on the floor around the doorway with their skulls crushed. Another zombie teacher and student were almost to the classroom door. Fleming and Matthews made head shots on both of them. Everybody paused to reload their rifles.

  “Police officers! We’re coming in. Step back from the door and let us make sure the area is clear,” Andy said.

  Instead, the students rushed to the door and flung it open. “Thank God you’re here,” one of the girls said between sobs.

  “Is anybody hurt?” asked Andy. No one answered him and all the students seemed intent on pushing their way into the hall. We need a plan, he thought. A group this big will be tough to protect all the way back to an exit. They were near the center of the school and not close to any of the outside doors.

  Three of the male students pushed their way into the hallway, clearly in panic mode. Fleming and Josh shoved them back into the classroom. “Everybody back inside,” he ordered.

  “We want to get out of here,” a girl sobbed.

  “Listen, we’re going to get you all out. Keep your voices down and just hang on for a minute,” said Josh.

  Chuck waved the rest of the team into the room. He pointed at Luis, Scotty, and one of the SWAT officers and told them to watch the door and the hallway.

  He saw a big, hulking teenager standing off to the side. He was holding a bloody baseball bat and was crying. He had blood splatter on his coat, hands, and face. McCain stepped slowly over to the young man.

  “Are you ok? Did you get bit or injured?”

  “No, sir,” he said. “I just…I didn’t want to hurt anybody but they were trying to get in. And I had to hit Billy. We were on the football team together. And I had to hit him.”

  Chuck put a hand on the boy’s shoulder. “What’s your name?”

  “Jeffery Bell.”

  “Well, Jeffrey, you saved everybody in here. You did good. Now I’m going to have one of these paramedics come wipe the blood off of you so you don’t get sick, ok?”

  Bell nodded and McCain waved over a paramedic to clean him off with the new solution developed by the CDC scientists. Chuck stepped back to confer with his men. A shot came from the doorway from Scotty’s rifle. Two more shots came from the SWAT officer’s suppressed MP5. Three more infected had been eliminated. McCain glanced over. Smith smiled at him and gave him a thumbs up.

  “I don’t think it’s a good idea to move such a big group. I counted nineteen heads. What do you guys think?” he asked Andy and Josh.

  Fleming nodded. “Yeah, that’s a lot of people to protect. What about we take ten and then nine? We can leave a few guys in here to protect everybody.”

  “What do you think, Josh?” Chuck asked.

  “It’s probably better to do it that way. It just seems dangerous splitting the team.”

  “Ok, I think that’s what we’ll do. Andy, grab ten of these kids to go with you. Me and Scotty will stay with the rest of them until you get back. That still leaves you guys with four shooters.”

  Andy nodded and started grabbing students to leave. He picked the nine girls. That left eleven boys. Chuck made eye contact with Andy and nodded at Jeffrey. Fleming stepped over to the big teenager.

  “We need one more to go out with us. You’ve done your share today. Come on, let’s get out of here.”

  Bell wiped his eyes with his now clean hands and shook his head. “Take one of them,” he said, pointing at the other students. “I’ll go out with the next group.”

  Chuck and Andy shrugged at each other. Fleming grabbed another one of the young men, picked one of the paramedics to stay behind, and then lined everybody up. Andy and SWAT Sergeant Josh were in the front. Luis and the other SWAT officer brought up the rear. The ten students and the other paramedic were in the middle. He briefed them about the importance of staying together and moving fast.

  The ones that were getting left behind continued to protest but Chuck and Scotty told them that they were staying with them to protect the
m until the second trip. Fleming looked everybody over and then stepped out into the hallway. There were bodies sprawled all around the doorway and they had to be careful not to trip over them. McCain shut the classroom door and watched them leave.

  The other side of the school, Friday, 1150 hours

  Jimmy led Team Two through a back door on the far side of the school. After they were all inside, they started moving slowly and cautiously, deeper into the unknown. There were four mangled bodies lying just inside the doorway. They had to be careful not to slip in the blood.

  The sound of footsteps came from up ahead. Suddenly, several students burst around the corner and came running down the hallway straight towards them. Jimmy raised his rifle and had his finger on the trigger, not sure if these were zombies or not.

  A skinny young black male was leading the group of thirteen other students. He raised his hands over his head and stopped. The rest of the teens followed his lead.

  “Don’t shoot. We’ve been hiding in a classroom but we haven’t seen any of those things for the last five minutes so we decided to make a run for it.”

  Jimmy motioned him forward with his rifle. As the students got to the officers, Eddie waved them towards the exit. Jones stopped their leader and said, “Do you know if there are any more students or teachers hiding in this part of the school?”

  The young man shook his head. He was out of breath. “We were hiding in a classroom back down the way we came. We didn’t see anybody but the zombies,” pointing behind him. “We kept seeing big groups of them going past us and down the hall. They were all moving towards the other side of the school, back to the right.”

  “Any idea how many you saw going that way?” asked Jimmy.

  “A lot, man. Maybe sixty or seventy. Maybe more. We’re all scared and just want to get out of here. There are still a lot of them in the school.”

  “And they’re heading right towards Chuck’s team,” said Eddie. He waved the student out the door, telling him to check in at the command post. Marshall pushed the transmit button on his radio. “Team Two Alpha to Team One Alpha,” he said quietly.

  “Team One Alpha. Go ahead,” came the answer.

  “We just had contact with some students who had been hiding in a classroom. They said that a bunch of infected are heading in your direction. They said sixty or seventy or more.”

  “Ok, thanks. We came across a big group of students that were hiding in a classroom, too. Me and Scotty stayed with half and Andy took the other half, and the rest of the team to an exit. Maybe you guys could start this way? I’m really not sure where we’re at but you’ll probably hear us shooting.”

  “Eddie said that some kids told him a group of sixty or seventy Zs are heading our way,” Chuck said quietly to Scotty.

  “Well, let’s get this party started. I think I hear some growling out there now.” The big man stepped over to the doorway, where he could peer through the broken window back down the hallway.

  McCain looked at Jeffrey and the other students. “There’s a big group of infected people coming towards us. You guys get in that corner over there. Jeffrey, make sure everybody stays back.”

  Chuck saw the fear in everyone’s eyes. The paramedic was holding a serrated knife that he had pulled out of his medical bag. Better than nothing, he thought.

  A shot came from Scotty’s rifle and then another. McCain moved across the room and stood next to Smith, who shot a third one. The first three had rounded the corner one at a time. The corner was only twenty-five yards away.

  Now, the infected started pouring into their hallway and moving quickly towards the classroom. Zombie teenagers and zombie adults were moving faster than Chuck had seen them move before. He and Scotty started shooting and dropping them one after another, but they kept coming.

  They shot around twelve of them and the fallen bodies created an obstacle in the hallway. The next zombies began to trip over their dead comrades. By now there were at least thirty or forty pushing towards them, growling and snarling. McCain and Smith both knew that they would very likely be overrun. The infected kept getting closer to the classroom. It was just a matter of time.

  Both men continued to make head shot after head shot but the crowd continued to surge forward. The only reason that they hadn’t been overrun yet was that many of the infected kept falling over the bodies lying scattered on the floor.

  “Reloading,” said Smith. His M4 had locked open. McCain continued to shoot. Scotty hit the magazine release button, dropped the empty mag, and quickly fed another thirty rounder into the rifle. He hit the slide release and started shooting again.

  Now, Chuck’s rifle locked open. He said, “Reloading,” dumped his empty mag, and deftly inserted a full one. He was quickly firing again. As more and more zombies kept rounding the corner and moving forward, McCain realized that they were now less than ten yards from the door. There had to be at least another thirty or forty infected pushing towards them and intent on killing and eating Chuck, Scotty, and everyone else in the room.

  McCain’s EOTech sight filled with a face he knew. Paul Miller. He was dressed in full SWAT gear. Chuck hesitated when he saw the familiar face. A face now covered with blood and gore. McCain had been his Field Training Officer many years before. He had later been on Chuck’s SWAT assault team.

  Miller’s head snapped back and blood spurted out of a hole between his eyes. Scotty had made the shot. Chuck looked over and nodded at Smith and then turned his attention back the horde of infected trying to kill them.

  Jeffrey Bell couldn’t see everything from the angle that he was at but he could see the two big police officers shooting zombie after zombie. Neither man acted like he was the least bit afraid. They were shooting quickly but they didn’t appear to be rushed. The bearded guy on the left actually looked like he was having a good time. How can they stay so calm? he thought.

  The growling in the hallway sounded like it was coming from a large group of zombies. And it sounded like it was getting closer. Jeffrey could see them now almost at the classroom door. Suddenly, a woman he recognized as a math teacher lunged forward and slammed into the door. The police officer on the right who seemed to be in charge calmly shot her in the face.

  The petite redheaded girl that Bell had saved earlier suddenly appeared at the door. She was so small the officers didn’t even see her approach. As the officer on the right kept shooting through the broken window, the redhead jumped and got her teeth on his right forearm. Jeffrey heard the officer gasp in pain and then lift her off her feet. She still had her teeth locked onto his arm and was pulling at it with both of her hands. The bearded officer looked on in concern but he had to keep shooting to keep the crowd back.

  Oh, no, Jeffrey thought. What if that officer becomes one of those things? He saw him release his rifle and let it hang across his chest. He punched the girl in the head with his left hand, once, twice, three times. The powerful punches destroyed what had been beautiful features on a beautiful face. The third punch by the big man caused her to release his arm and to collapse backwards. He quickly pointed his rifle down and shot her.

  A male student with half of his face chewed off and missing one of his eyes, reached in the broken window and got his hands on the same officer’s rifle. He drove the muzzle of the gun into the zombie’s face and pulled the trigger. Another student reached in and grabbed at the bearded officer’s right arm. He was unable to swing the long gun around. The officer on the right shot the zombie off of him.

  Now there had to be at least thirty of them at the door, pressing against it and trying to get in. Others appeared behind them, the crowd continuing to grow.

  “Back up,” the officer on the right ordered. The two men backed as one, back-stepping and shooting as they moved about ten feet towards the middle of the classroom.

  The weight of the mob was causing the door to shake. There was a cracking sound and it swung open. Other zombies seemed to replace those that the officers had shot. At least twenty-fiv
e infected surged into the classroom. McCain and Smith stepped to their right, putting themselves in front of the students and the paramedic. They would protect them even if it meant their own deaths. This isn’t going to end well but at least we’ll go down fighting, Chuck thought.

  Both men fired until their rifles locked open. No time to reload, they released the long guns and let them hang from their slings. They drew their 9mm Glock pistols and kept shooting. Soon, the slide on Scotty’s pistol locked back empty.

  “Reloading,” he said.

  Chuck kept shooting to cover for him but his Glock locked open as well. There were still seven infected left and they reached for the two officers. McCain hit the magazine release button and dropped the empty pistol magazine. As he reached for another mag, he kicked the zombie that was closest to him with a front kick to the chest. The powerful blow propelled the student turned zombie back into his infected classmates and knocked them down like bowling pins. They scrambled to get back to their feet.

  Smith had reloaded his pistol and started shooting again. Chuck finished his own reload and shot the one that he had just kicked. A tall teenage girl managed to rush around Chuck, growling towards the group of students that they were protecting. Even shooting the unsuppressed pistols, Chuck heard the loud metallic twang of Jeffrey’s bat connecting with a head. McCain and Smith shot the last two who had gotten into the classroom. The area was finally clear. For the moment. They both quickly reloaded their pistols with full magazines, holstered them, and then did the same for their rifles.

  Smith looked at McCain. “Are you ok? Did you get bit?”

  “Yeah, I’m going to have a nasty bruise. She really clamped down on my arm. Thank God for these kevlar jackets,” he said.