by Bryan Way
“So… who holds up in an electronics store?” I continue.
“Seriously…” Mursak adds.
“You have to know someone’s gonna poke around.”
“Maybe they were counting on it…” Anderson says, playing with his rifle barrel. “What’d you get?”
“Batteries… they were out of GPS.”
“Battery backup surge protectors, adapters, games, and cables.” Mursak says.
“So… maybe we don’t tell Rich about that part…” I offer.
They’re quiet for a moment.
“Seconded.” Anderson says with a grin.
“Last thing we need…” Mursak offers.
“Secane next?”
If I had to choose one spot in Delaware County to avoid during an apocalypse, it would be Secane. Evidenced by the daunting hill separating it from neighboring Springfield, the main drag past the railroad tracks is full of cheap apartments that seemed to be a haven of unrest, even if the area features one of my favorite late-night dining haunts in Imperial Pizza. I always felt as though one accident could remove an escape route for thousands of people who dare not flee south to Chester.
Unlike Baltimore Pike, downtown Secane feels oddly serene; the road is free from accidents, and try as I might, I cannot spot a single member of the undead. This concerns me greatly, since Secane should be a refuge for walking corpses if they would naturally travel downhill rather than up. We turn onto the main drag, past the location of so many midnight repasts, and continue toward Anderson’s erstwhile apartment.
As directed by Anderson, Mursak pulls into the outlet for Anderson’s apartment complex and drives past a few Zombies toward the center of the buildings, each a faded brick, five-floor, uniformly square block. Following protocol, Mursak pulls the car around and parks it facing the guaranteed exit from which we just entered. Anderson is quick to depart the vehicle. “We got this one.” Anderson says to me, leading the way as he removes his keys from his pocket. “Radios on.” I call after them, watching them activate their walkie-talkies.
“Holy crap…” Anderson mutters outside.
“What?” Mursak asks.
“Still got keys to Shar’s… wonder where she is…”
His sentence fades as he enters the nearest building. Leaving my backpack in the car, I step out and immediately unsheathe my katana; having just cleaned it last week, it should be ready for action. After replacing it, I next check my sidearm, finding that the action is well-oiled and the magazine is full. I chamber a round and insert another after digging in my backpack, then check my radio volume. Feeling restless, no doubt egged on my by recent brush with death and the elevated heart rate granted me by my inhaler, I venture toward the exit.
Turning the corner, I find the walking corpses we passed on the way in spreading out along the path to our exit. I unsheathe my katana again and advance, feeling the wind pull at my trench coat. The first sullen member of the undead steps forward with his arms outstretched, his drooping face essaying a sort of displeasure he is unlikely to comprehend. When he gets close, I gently push him away with my foot.
“Sorry… it’s your time.” I whip the katana across his neck, watching stagnated blood burble up around the fresh wound before his head falls back limp. I step hard on his jaw, rendering him inert. “Who’s next?” Sure enough, another marauder gets close enough for me to touch him before I take off his head at the neck and watch his body tumble to the asphalt like a rag doll.
Wishing to avoid a type of soreness to which I am now only too accustomed, I take a moment to stretch my arms and legs before continuing the assault. A gunshot rings out from the apartments to my left, so I pop the radio off my waist. “What the hell was that, over?” No response. While I wait, I advance on the next body and end him as well. I take a moment to catch my breath and listen to the static on the radio. “Great…” I bring my katana up to the ready and notice seven corpses approaching me from both sides. Pangs of fear wash up and down my bones, but I’ve trained myself to let a rush of anger overtake them.
For some reason, I see red clearer and faster than ever before; I can’t contain my first swing, moving the katana like a baseball bat through the neck of the nearest body before kicking the next closest one. A hand awkwardly fingers at my forearm, and without thinking I locate her midsection, freight-training my shoulder into her stomach as her teeth clatter at my ear. Unsurprisingly, she topples like a house of cards. As I watch her try to stand, the katana is no longer good enough.
Wiping off the blade on the shirt of one of my victims, I sheathe it and wander along the base of the building until I locate a loose piece of rebar. I don my gloves before approaching the next closest body and proceed to beat his skull into mush, closing my eyes as rust flakes off the oxidized metal. I knock the next one back with a quick swipe, putting my foot on his chest to skewer his eye socket before rotating the rusted pole like a butter churn until he stops twitching.
I beat the neck of the next corpse to a pulp before she can even hit the ground, then stomp on her head until I feel the husky crack of terminal brain trauma. It’s been too long since I’ve shot my pistol, so I drop the rebar and pistol-whip the next one. He stumbles back without falling, so I kick him in the stomach. When he gets up, I do it again. “Where’s the challenge, huh?” I do it again, and he has a harder time standing. I stomp his skull into oblivion as well.
There are two left. I level my pistol and take aim, trying to decide which one is worth the bullet. One is a woman dressed for a night at the bar, and the other is a young man in hospital garb. I plug the woman in the center of the nose from only a foot away, watching a geyser of tissue spew through the back of her head. I holster the Colt and vow to engage the young man with my hands.
Taking on one Zombie in hand-to-hand combat is hardly a difficult proposition; they have no tactical skill beyond grappling and biting, so if I can eliminate the possibility of a bite, I can take it down. A roundhouse kick bowls him over, and when he’s on the ground, I press my foot into his chest. Both arms come up simultaneously, so I grab his left arm first and break his elbow.
With the left arm incapacitated, I grab his right arm, one hand on the bicep and one on the forearm, and wrench it until I hear his shoulder separate. I keep twisting until it completely dislocates and I can tear the whole feeble limb off to beat him with it. A few quick stomps deprive him of his jaw, so I set in on punching his temples hard and fast until a daze limits him to feeble twitching. I spin his neck until his vertebrae dislodge and he’s rendered useless, at which point I spit on him and stand up.
“Jesus.” Mursak says behind me with Anderson just a foot away. How did I not notice they were watching me? “Ready to go?” I ask, breathing heavily. They say nothing, so I walk past them. “Wanna tell me what you were shooting at?” I ask, but they remain silent as we get back in the car. I look back to the trunk to see Anderson’s guitar, computer tower, and drum kit, the latter broken into components. “See how weak their bones are getting?” I ask as Anderson drives out toward the street. I’m still met with silence. I think I hear them whisper to each other before Mursak responds.
“Yeah, looked pretty easy to twist that one’s head off.”
“…yeah… okay… what’s going on?” I ask.
“Nothing.”
“You don’t think you went a little overboard?” Anderson asks.
“How?” I ask.
“Well… you’re pretty good with that katana…”
“…and?”
Mursak shifts uncomfortably in the passenger seat.
“…well?!” I insist.
“…did you have to use your hands?” Mursak asks.
“I dunno… you don’t think it’s important to practice hand-to-hand?”
“Sure…” Anderson adds.
“So… why are we talking about it?”
“Good question.”
He says it so quickly I know there must be a point he’s hesitant to address. Good. I have no interest in his opini
on on this matter, so I suppose it’s just as well that he’s finally decided to shut up. I lean forward to make sure they aren’t whispering to one another as we make our way out of Secane. While they sit silently, I resume my earlier stretches in the backseat.
After a few minutes, we pass by our previous destination to see the front of the store mobbed by a small cluster of the undead. Anderson has to weave around several stopped or crashed cars until he makes it to the I-476 onramp, where it would appear his earlier scouting paid off; despite the k-rails blocking us from changing lanes, the path is clear up to the I-76 interchange, at which point the highway opens back up into two lanes, making it easier to bypass any wreckage we encounter.
“What’d you think Ambler’s gonna be like?” Anderson asks passively.
“Empty… most of the students live close and commute… the rest are out of state. They had plenty of time to get out.”
“Ballpark it.”
“Between twenty and fifty.”
“Well, that narrows it down…” Mursak offers.
“Fuck you.” I spit. “You have a better guess?”
“Relax…”
“Any survivors?” Anderson interrupts.
“Doubt it. I’m sure there’s plenty of supplies, but I can’t imagine anyone sticking around.”
“Supplies?” Mursak asks.
“Yeah… there’s a dining hall, vending machines, a medical center…”
“Might have to check that out.”
“Let’s not spend too much time getting anything other than Grey’s computer.” Anderson adds.
“It’s… just past ten.” Mursak mutters. “We’ve got plenty of time.”
“Alright… but if the shit gets thick, we bail.” Anderson replies.
“Seconded.” I say quickly.
The ensuing pregnant silence suggests that Mursak wants to add more. I make Anderson aware that the last exit before the Northeast Extension serves as a back way to Ambler, but we both agree with Rich’s assessment that the highway is a safer method of transit. The amount of accidents at the toll plaza is such that there is only one open lane, so after some careful maneuvering, Anderson revs up the engine and takes us through a clear patch along I-276 until we reach route 309, taking the exit just outside the campus.
As we drive along the road that leads to the dorms, I remember what it was like to live here. It may have only been two months since I’ve last been an Ambler denizen, but I feel like I’m intruding on an alien landscape with structures of stone and brick. Thousands of untouched trees scattered throughout a thick forest surround the campus on all sides with only a thin strip of blacktop and a few feet of grass separating the buildings from the foliage. Matching my expectation, the entire campus seems tranquil.
I crack the window and listen to the outside noise; between the birds chirping, the wind in the trees, and the occasional snapping branch, it still sounds exactly like it did before, the only difference being a constant ringing noise off in the distance. I remember that I would always spot someone I knew being picked up or dropped off as we continue down this road; there always seemed to be people to greet and guards to sweet talk into entering the dorms without my access card frequenting this stretch. This memory dissolves when I don’t see any people, living or dead. I instruct Anderson to stop in front of my residence halls and open the door.
A cold rush of air hits me as I step out. After looking at the building, I poke my head back in the car to get Anderson’s attention. “Two people in the dorm, one at the front door?” I ask, and he nods at me. The ringing sound off to the west continues unabated, and I still have no idea where it’s coming from. All three of us get out of the car and look toward the library, though I sense that I’m the only one to get a chill down my spine.
“Looks like we might have to put a little overtime in on this one.” I mutter.
“What?” Mursak asks.
“Nothing…”
“Okay…?”
I half nod while I start up the shallow ramp to the front entrance. I try the handle, but it appears to be locked and adorned with a hastily made sign: Don’t Open This Door! I shrug, jump over the handrail, smash one of the windows, and crawl inside. The security desk has been kicked over and looks as though it was previously pushed against the door. For a moment, I try to imagine the perspective of the security guard. “Grey?” Mursak says, startling me. He motions forward. “Yeah…” Anderson comes through the broken window behind us to have a look, and then quickly returns outdoors. “Radios on.” He mumbles through a cigarette.
I walk down three steps to the ground level hall, pull out my pistol, and turn right into the ill-lit corridor. The light switches don’t work, but there’s enough illumination from the laundry room to my left to prevent me from pulling out a flashlight. The tangy stench of rot jolts up my nose around the same moment I hear flies buzzing; the combination of these two elements insure that someone must’ve killed themselves and didn’t revive.
In the early days of the arising, we assumed that the undead simply smell like rotten corpses, but Karen eventually pointed out our folly; dead bodies, apparently, have a smell shared by the corpse we found in the shower at the Community Center. Pairing the descriptors we’ve heard and encountered, it’s a combination of rotten cheese, decaying meat, dead fish, bad breath, a filthy restroom, and a dash of nearly imperceptible sweetness.
Reasoning that the undead can’t possibly decompose normally, Karen suggested that this particular form of the Pepsi challenge could be lifesaving when searching buildings. Unsurprisingly, the undead smell worse, but not for the expected reasons, since they are not viable enough to produce any smells normally associated with human odor. Their lack of pheromones only makes this worse.
Since their digestive functions have ceased, whatever remained in their intestines leaks out slowly, leading to a variety of distinct and pungent smells based largely on rotting food. The longer they remain undead, the more this smells like pure rotten meat thanks to their limited diet. But our old friend Steve, still lying bound, gagged, and broken behind our castle, once again provided us with an indispensible tipping point.
Steven didn’t excrete much after death, and those smells are now gone, so it was easy for Karen to deduce that his body wasn’t being attacked by the bacteria that causes putrefaction, and the mere fact that he is still functional contrasts the tenets of autolysis, or self-digestion. The result is pure, unfiltered Zombie stench: mildew and rust. Unwashed skin, hair, and especially wet clothes become fungal after a few weeks, and the spilled blood of victims and spoiled blood in their veins emit a faded metallic aroma.
“Got a body…” Mursak says behind me, peeking into the laundry room. I glance past him to see a broken window and a motionless corpse that has nearly been picked clean. Considering that it’s not worth the risk, I reach into my backpack for a flashlight. Mursak does the same and the two of us walk quietly down the hall toward my room.
The door across from mine shudders with a dull thud, startling me. Mursak wields his crowbar, but I put my hand on it and push it down, shaking my head. Turning to my door, I holster my pistol, pull up the keys, and open the lock. I push it in slowly, and, as expected, no one is inside. I look at the far side of the room and spot my computer with great satisfaction, shutting the door behind us as I walk toward the wall opposite the door and open the blinds.
I go to my closet and grab the leather bag I use to transport most of my computer accessories, stuffing them inside while Mursak examines my room. With everything bagged except my tower, I grab my cell phone, charger, a framed prom picture of Julia and me, my metal shot glass, my flask, and the engraved Zippo lighter Jack gifted me. Struggling to prioritize the necessities, I seize several notebooks, my copy of the Zombie Survival Guide, and then every CD tree in my room. With my arms nearly full, I glance at my keyboard.
“Mursak, do you think…?”
“Sure.” He responds, to my surprise.
“Thanks…”
I unplug my Ethernet cable and power strip with battery backup, grab my headphones and the jack for the keyboard, then glance over my room for about a minute. My roommate’s belongings are still scattered around, so I suppose that he either left in a hurry or remained permanently. I ignore the pangs of depression informed by the higher education I will never complete and follow Mursak to the hall.
I turn back and set my tower down for a moment to write a message on my whiteboard. 12-20-04. This is Jeff, I have survived. Reach me on my cell phone. I leave the number, pick up the tower, and we walk out to the front. After we exit and put all the stuff in the car, I start toward the cafeteria. Aside from the odd building poking out of the grass and the overly large parking lot, we’re surrounded by open ground for about a thousand feet in every direction until a solid wall of trees traps us in on all sides. “Where’s the medical center?” Mursak asks. I motion to my left.
“Is there a police station?”
“A small one, yeah.” I reply.
“Hmm.”
“‘Hmm’ what?” Anderson asks.
“There might be guns.” Mursak asserts.
“If they had guns the cops would’ve taken them.”
“Come on, Grey, don’t you think it’s worth checking out?”
“Maybe. I don’t know, what time is it?”
“10:34.” Anderson responds.
“So we have plenty of time.”
“That’s not the issue …” I add. “I don’t want to stay any longer than we have to.”
“We just swing by in the car, right?” Mursak insists. “I don’t see what the big deal is.”
“One thing at a time.” Anderson says authoritatively as we approach the cafeteria.
“Fine…”
I first try the door, but it’s locked. I go around the right side to a big bank of windows, putting my trench coat over the edge of one pane and smacking it with the butt of my Colt. “Did you really have to do that?” Mursak asks. I stare back at him for a second, reach inside the hole I just made, unlock the window and swing it open like a door. “Oh. Never mind.” It seems as though half of the tables and chairs are missing from the cafeteria, but it otherwise looks as though it was just closed a week ago. With no bloody messes anywhere inside, I have to assume that anyone who saw this building realized the windows made it a poor choice for a safe haven.
