There was a sudden crash from the bottom that echoed up towards them, followed by groans and gurgles.
“That can’t be good,” Brandon muttered. He leaned over the railing to see a veritable sea of zombies scrambling to get up over each other to the live meal above. “Second floor, go!” the Officer cried, taking position at the second floor landing. He took his assault rifle from Matt as the group threw themselves into the hallway and unloaded into the horde scrambling up towards him.
Bodies fell, tripping up the ones behind them, but there seemed to be no end to the wave of corpses. When the mag was empty, Brandon turned and bolted down the hallway where Gwen fumbled with the keys to her dorm room.
Matt stared fearfully at the horde about ten yards behind the sprinting SWAT Officer, and then snatched the girl’s key, shoving it into the lock and throwing open the door.
Candace rushed in first to hopefully kill anything undead inside, but left room for the others to bustle in behind her. Matt waited, jaw clenched and heart pounding, praying for Brandon to make it fast enough. He dove inside just in the nick of time and Matt slammed the door shut, throwing himself against it.
Candace shoved a filing cabinet in beside him, sitting down with her back against it as the door rattled and thumped in its frame.
“Will it hold?” Matt huffed.
Brandon put his hands against it. “I think so, but we may want to take shifts leaning up against it.”
“Shifts?” Gwen ran her hands through her hair, resisting the urge to tear at the roots. “How long are we going to be here?”
Brandon shook his head and clenched his jaw. He didn’t know.
CHAPTER EIGHT
11:00AM
Brandon paced back and forth in the small, tense space, radio to his lips. “Come in APD, this is Officer Shelton. Please respond.”
Static.
Candace re-wrapped Kenny’s hand, lips pressed into a thin line at the greenish goo and putrid smell emanating from the wound. She didn’t have to say anything. They both knew the infection was getting worse.
“APD, come in this is Officer Shelton. Please respond.”
Static.
Phoebe nursed a bottle of water and absently stroked the hair on the back of Kenny’s head. It was matted with sweat, and he looked pale. But they all were in shock. She told herself that it couldn’t just be the infection, they all looked pale and were sweaty from all the running. It didn’t mean he didn’t have a much time left, right?
“This is Officer Shelton, come in APD, please respond.”
Static.
Matt sat against the filing cabinet. The pounding had stopped a little while ago, but they figured it couldn’t hurt to stay studious. Plus, he felt less helpless this way. Like he was contributing somehow. He watched Gwen as she stared dejectedly out the window, curled up into the smallest ball possible. She hadn’t spoken a word since they’d gotten there, and he wondered if Jonas’ death was replaying over and over in her head. Because it was in his.
“Come in APD, this is Officer Shelton-”
“It’s been like this for an hour and a half now,” Matt cut in. “I think we have to assume we’re on our own.”
The SWAT Officer scowled down at the sitting boy for a moment, but then let out a deep breath and sat down on the edge of the bed. “Yeah, I know. I just don’t like the thought of being the last officer standing. There has to be somebody else out there other than me.”
“Hey, look on the bright side,” Matt replied, “if we survive this you should be in line for a promotion, right? Captain, Super Captain, whatever the top job is?”
Brandon stared down at his hands. “Yeah. And all it took was the death of every one of my coworkers.”
“Ah,” the student groaned, clenching his fists at the thoughtlessness of his joke. “I’m sorry man. I was just trying to lighten the mood a bit.”
“No harm done,” Brandon assured him, forcing a smile. “It’s all good.”
Candace approached Gwen carefully. “How’s it looking out there?”
“Like a moving sea of death,” the girl in the window replied, voice a level monotone.
The blonde stood on her tiptoes to peek outside. “Nah, looks more like a creek of death than a sea,” she joked.
Gwen turned away from the window long enough to glare at her companion. “Really?”
“Sorry,” Candace replied, putting her hands up in surrender. “I’ll leave you to it.” She turned back to her boyfriend and headed over, plopping down on the floor next to him.
He took her hand gratefully, giving her knuckles a soft kiss.
“How’s our patient doing?” Brandon asked.
She sighed. “His hand is getting worse, but he seems to be in good health otherwise. I don’t think we have to worry about him turning anytime soon.”
“Well, at least that’s one thing going our way,” the Officer replied.
“I just looked outside,” she continued, “and there’s only a dozen or so in the courtyard.”
“Itching for another fight?” Brandon teased.
She stuck her tongue out at him. “No, but if we want to get the hell out of here, we don’t really have much of a choice, do we? Since I’m guessing backup isn’t on the way?”
He shook his head in resignation. “I assume y’alls car is across the way, then?”
“Yep, on the other side of the lecture hall building,” Matt said. “It’s a long ass run to go around it, though.”
Brandon cocked his head. “So why don’t we go through it?”
“Because there’s no skywalk to get over to it,” the young man replied. “We’d have to enter through the ground floor. And there’s no guarantee those doors are unlocked.”
The Officer nodded. “Ah, so if we go that route and they’re closed…”
“We’re dinner,” Candace finished.
Brandon surveyed the other three in the room. They didn’t look like they did a particular amount of running.
“How far of a run is it if we go around the lecture hall?” he asked.
Matt shrugged. “I don’t know. Two-fifty, maybe three hundred yards?”
“Let’s be realistic,” the Officer said with a sigh. “If we go that route, we’re not all making it to the car. I don’t think some of them can remember the last time they ran that far.”
Phoebe scowled. “We can hear you, you know that, right?”
“Did I say anything that wasn’t true?” Brandon raised an eyebrow.
Her cheeks turned a light shade of pink. “Well, no,” she admitted. “But come on, manners, dude.”
“We’re going for the door,” the Officer declared.
“One step at a time, cowboy,” Candace cut in. “How do you propose we get out of here without attracting attention?”
Brandon approached the desk against the far wall and sifted through a few of her books there. He picked up a wooden ruler and turned it over in his hands, shoving it into his back pocket before rifling through one of the drawers. He found a roll of packing tape and carried it over to the dresser. He took out his baton and lashed out to smash the mirror.
Phoebe let out a small squeak and everyone in the room startled at the sudden noise, even Gwen from her perch by the window. Brandon laid the ruler down on the dresser and selected a long thin shard of glass before using the tape to secure it to the piece of wood.
“Matt, I’m gonna need you to move that filing cabinet over a bit,” he said as he worked, and the young couple stood up and shoved it over so there was enough room for the Officer to slide past. He knelt and laid down on his stomach, sliding the rule carefully under the gap at the bottom of the door.
He tilted the ruler back and forth, surveying the hallway, and then pulled it back, getting to his feet. “Okay, there are four of those things to the left, and none to the right.”
“We have more than enough ammo to take them out,” Matt replied, holding up the rifle.
Candace smacked him on the back
of the head, earning a grunt and a flabbergasted noise of surprise as he gaped at her.
“Great idea, dumbass,” she scoffed. “Let’s let every zombie on campus know where we are.”
“Your girl is right,” Brandon put in, stifling a smile at the put out expression on the young man’s face. “We gotta take them out silently.”
“Well I’m certainly open to ideas,” Matt muttered, his rifle arm drooping in disappointment.
The Officer pursed his lips as he looked around the room again, this time fixating on the bed. “Good thing this school skimped on everything that went to the students,” he said, and motioned for Kenny and Phoebe to stand up.
The young couple moved over to the dresser, Kenny leaning against it but careful not to put his hand in any of the glass.
Brandon pulled the cheap metal frame out from the wall and flipped the mattress up so that it stood in the gap. Underneath were metal braces running across the frame. He popped out one of the four-foot-long beams and snatched the roll of packing tape from the dresser. He leaned the rod against the wood and produced his knife, using the tape to secure it to the end, creating a makeshift spear.
“Matt, give me six inches on the door,” he instructed. “Candace, Phoebe, I’m gonna need the both of you backing him up. I’m gonna try to take care of these fuckers as quickly as I can, but if all of them are pushing on that door, they could easily break in.”
The two women nodded, taking deep breaths to ready themselves, and stood on either side of Matt. The young man crouched and waited for Brandon to be ready.
The Officer nodded and Matt dragged the filing cabinet back half a foot. It screeched against the linoleum, and the four zombies immediately turned and threw themselves into the door. The latch exploded with the impact, and the three students slammed their own bodies back against it, bracing it as best they could.
Brandon took aim and then lunged forward, catching the first corpse in the eye. It slumped forward, another taking its place, bloody arm flapping all over the place through the gap. The SWAT Officer took his time again to line up his strike, and stabbed forward again, avoiding the thrashing arm to stab right into the zombie’s temple.
The last two were easier, and as the hallway fell silent, the students let out a collective sigh of relief.
Brandon held up a hand. “Hang tight, you three,” he said quietly. “Give it a few minutes to make sure we didn’t attract any unwanted attention.”
They stayed like statues against the door, holding it fast and straining their ears. Brandon half-expected a fresh batch of corpses to come shrieking at them, but a few minutes ticked by of complete silence. He finally relaxed, and the students slumped, loosening their muscles.
He nodded. “Time to move.”
CHAPTER NINE
The group of six stood at the doors to the courtyard, staring through the glass with somber trepidation.
“Okay,” Brandon said in a low voice. “I see one set of doors about sixty yards away. If they’re locked, do we have any other options? Windows we can break out? Another set of doors? Anything?”
Candace shook her head. “That’s it, on this side of the building, anyway.”
“What’s to the right?” He pressed his face against the glass to try to see, but the angle was impossible.
“It’s the main walkway through campus,” the blonde explained. “I can only imagine the shitshow that is at the moment, so I would recommend we avoid that at all costs.”
Brandon took a deep breath and stepped back from the glass. “So, if we can’t get in through that set of doors, the only other option is to run to the left and to the parking lot?”
“Yep,” she confirmed, “pretty much.”
He sighed. “Fantastic.”
He checked his weapons, prompting to two armed students to do the same. Gwen gripped the spear, not having wanted to not have a weapon for this journey.
“Okay, listen up,” Brandon said, straightening his shoulders. “We’re gonna bust out of this door quick. Matt, I want you to run as hard and fast as you can do those doors. Candace and I are going to cover you, and our flanks as you get up there.” He gave each of the gun-toting students a hard look. “Shoot only if necessary. As soon as that first shot goes off, we’re gonna be made, and we don’t have much of a window to begin with.” He waited for their nods of understanding and then glanced at the other three. “Okay, everybody ready?” There was a round of more nods, and he put his hand on the door. “Here we go.”
He waited for Matt to lower into a springing position and then threw open the door. The young man ran hard, not paying attention to anything on his left or right side, just focusing on the door. His only mission was the door.
Brandon and Candace trotted after him, staying at a jog so that the others could keep up. Gwen kept her spear pointed away from her face, suddenly wondering if it was a good idea to be running with such a sharp object. The door slammed behind Kenny and Phoebe, and a chorus of groans and shrieks rose.
“Hurry!” Brandon urged, keeping his eyes on Matt to make sure they were covering him from potential threats.
“Kenny!” Phoebe squealed, and there was a thud as she fell to the ground. He turned and dove into the throng of zombies about to overwhelm his girlfriend. The motion caused them to stumble back into their brethren, tripping up a few, but enough of them were hungry enough that one managed to bite into his arm as he tried to help Phoebe up.
He screamed in pain as his girlfriend screamed in horror, gripping his wrist for dear life and struggling to get to her feet. The remaining horde crashed into him, toppling the whole tableau down on top of the young woman.
“They’re lost, keep going!” Brandon cried, tugging on Gwen’s arm to get her legs to move. They caught up to Candace, the blonde wincing as the sounds of the young couple’s screams grew muffled under the rapidly growing dog pile of rotting flesh.
Matt finally reached the door and yanked, his heart leaping into the heavens as the latch clicked and the handle turned. He headed in, handgun first, sweeping back and forth to be ready for anything coming his way.
The blast of sudden sunlight hit a bloodied corpse in the face, and it opened its mouth into a gurgling scream before tearing towards him. Matt fired, hitting it in the chest, and let out a frustrated yell before emptying three more rounds into the monster before finally catching it in the forehead.
As the creature hit the floor with a wet smack, the other three barreled inside. Brandon jerked the door shut, and immediately raised his rifle, sweeping the area as the students huffed behind him.
“Kenny and Phoebe?” Matt asked breathlessly.
Candace simply shook her head, eyes wide and sad. Gwen clutched her spear to her chest, jaw clenched and lips pressed into a thin line. The blonde gave her shoulder a reassuring squeeze and then noticed Brandon taking up position at the nearby hallway. She raised her gun and joined him, the two of them standing tense just in case a horde was going to come at them.
Zombies hit the outer door behind them, banging hard, and though the quartet knew that they couldn’t get in, the noise was disconcerting. A few minutes ticked by and no more zombies bore down on them from the inside.
Brandon turned to Matt. “Where are we going?”
“Straight down the hallway, until we get to the end,” the young man replied.
Brandon nodded and led the group forward. He kept a brisk power walk, but stepped carefully and deliberately. He froze at the squeak of running shoes on tile, holding up his hands to stop the group behind him.
A boy tore around the corner at the end of the hallway, and then skidded out, landing hard on the floor. He’d barely scrambled to his knees before a pack of zombies were on him, tearing him apart as he screamed for help. Several of the corpses noticed the group and led a charge towards them.
“This way!” Brandon yelled, noting a set of double doors just ahead and to the left. Matt tore ahead and threw them open, holding it for the others to fly through
. Candace and Gwen ran in first, Brandon bringing up the rear, and the quartet rushed down the descending staircase towards the stage of the large lecture hall they’d broken into.
As Matt and Brandon made it about halfway, the doors burst open behind them as the zombies crashed inside.
Candace stood tall on the stage, firing a spray of bullets into the oncoming horde. The lead zombies tumbled down the stairs, tripping up the ones behind them, buying the boys enough time to reach the raised platform.
He gave Matt a boost and then he and Candace pulled Brandon up, just missing the outstretched hands of the hungry corpses below. Gwen gripped her spear with white knuckles, the other three a heap on the stage, all four of them staring at the zombies clustered around the bottom of the stage.
“Why aren’t they climbing?” Matt huffed.
Brandon shook his head and got to his feet. “Don’t know, don’t care,” he said. “Just glad they aren’t.”
“We’ve got a door,” Candace said, rushing over to the side of the stage. Gwen and Matt kept close to her. Brandon walked backwards, his gun still trained on the zombies in case they decided to swarm up over the edge.
“Any idea where it goes?” he asked as the group clustered around the door.
Candace shrugged. “Out of this room.”
“Well, I guess that’s enough of an improvement,” the Officer replied flatly. “Lead the way.”
The blonde carefully opened the door, taking care to be as quiet as could be, and stepped into the narrow hallway. There were no signs of movement, and she waved the others after her.
As Brandon stepped through last, he closed the door silently behind him and then made sure that the latch was firm so they wouldn’t have any dead creatures following them.
He surveyed the hallway, noting the doors lining it. They all had names and titles on them, and he assumed they were offices for various teachers and staff on campus. He took the lead of the group, motioning to the end of the hallway.
“Does that lead to the parking lot?” he asked.
“Not entirely sure…” Matt bit his lip. “But it’s definitely in the right direction.”
Dead America | Prequel | Ground Zero Page 4
