Soon, jagged fragments and shivers from the entire window strewed the pavement outside. All that remained intact was the window frame that stretched from the ceiling to the floor around the circumference of the restaurant like a metal skeleton.
“Let’s get the rope in the pantry,” said Rogers.
Halverson, Tom, and Rogers made for the pantry. The rest of the passengers who had guns kept laying down fire at the ghouls outside.
Halverson, Tom, and Rogers each hoisted a coil of rope in the kitchen and returned to the glassless window in the rear of the restaurant. They searched for a secure foundation to tie down the ropes.
“We can anchor the ropes to the legs of the tables,” said Halverson.
The steel legs of the tables were secured to the floor by means of angle irons, Halverson noted.
He tied the end of his rope around one of the table legs.
Rogers and Tom tied their ropes to legs on other tables.
“Are the ropes long enough to reach the ground?” asked Tom.
Halverson eyeballed a coil of rope. “Looks like it.”
“Is anyone downstairs in the lobby?” asked Rogers.
“I don’t know,” answered Tom. “Ray was there. I got him to come up here, like you said.”
“And nobody took his place?” said Rogers with a trace of annoyance.
“I don’t know.”
“We need somebody posted down there at all times so we know when the things break through the door.”
“I’ll go,” said Halverson and made for the stairwell.
“Not you,” said Rogers. “We need your firepower at the window.”
“I’ll go,” said Tom.
He cut toward the stairwell.
“If the front door looks like it’s gonna give, holler,” said Rogers.
Tom nodded as he strode away.
Rogers turned to Halverson. “Once the things break into the lobby, we can post men at the top of the stairs and cut down a slew of them as they jam into the stairwell.”
“Not forever,” said Halverson. “There are just too many of them.”
“I know that. But we can buy some time to get over to the ropes and abandon this place.”
Halverson peered out the back window. “I still don’t see any ghouls near the rear entrance.”
“If they show up there, our goose is well and truly cooked.”
“Maybe we should split right now while the coast is still clear.”
Rogers paused in thought. He massaged his square chin with his big mitt.
“We need to move,” said Halverson.
“Maybe . . . ,” Rogers tailed off. “No. I think we should wait till the things are pouring through the front door. That will keep them distracted so they won’t notice us slipping out the back window.”
“I say we go now,” said Lemans, strutting up from behind them.
Halverson started. He didn’t know Lemans was near.
“If those things see us climbing down the ropes, they’ll be waiting for us as soon as we hit the ground,” said Rogers. “It’ll turn into Custer’s last stand.”
“If they’re at the rear entrance when we leave, the same thing,” said Lemans.
“No matter what we do, it’s risky,” said Halverson.
“We need a diversion,” said Rogers. “When they break through the front door, it’ll give us half a chance.”
Halverson thought about it. “There’s one other option.”
“Shoot.”
“What if we open the door for them right now while we know the rear entrance is clear?”
An eerie silence greeted Halverson’s suggestion. Nobody said anything for the better part of a minute.
Halverson figured his suggestion had caught Rogers and Lemans off guard. Nonplussed expressions registered on their two faces.
“That’s like admitting defeat,” said Rogers at last.
Lemans was blunter in his appraisal. “It’s an invitation to death.”
“We’ve already conceded them the restaurant,” said Halverson. “There’s no way we can stay here, now that they know we’re here and there are so many of them.”
“I don’t think I can give that order,” said Rogers. He stared down at the floor in a brown study.
“We should get out while the getting’s good.”
“Still, we’re all safe as long as we stay here with the door locked. When those things charge in here, the situation becomes unstable. We’re more than likely gonna lose people unless everything goes exactly according to plan.”
“Which happens on a cold day in July,” said Lemans.
“The point is we’ve already decided our course of action,” said Halverson. “All it is now is a matter of when we start. The longer we put it off, the more chance there is that those things find the rear entrance in the wall. Then we’re out of options.”
Rogers remained silent. He ran his quarterback’s hand through his hair. “Now’s as good a time as any,” he said at length.
“I don’t know that we should tell the others about our opening the door.”
Rogers nodded. “They probably wouldn’t like it.” He hung fire. “I’m not too keen on it myself.”
“Should we toss the ropes out the window now?”
“No. The things might see them hanging out. Then they might come over and investigate. I’ll bring the fire hose to the window and have it ready to throw out. We need as many ropes as possible to expedite our escape. I want us all out of here within minutes.”
“OK. We’ll throw the ropes out after the door opens.”
“Who’s gonna go down there and let them in?” asked Rogers.
“Are you volunteering?” Lemans asked Halverson. “After all, it’s your bright idea.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
Zombie Blog #2: “Never Touch a Zombie”
by
Jonathan Parker
Whatever you do, don’t touch a zombie. These creatures are filthy. Lice, maggots, bugs of all description, and teeming multitudes of bacteria cover the creature’s putrescent flesh. Zombies are, after all, dead, even though they possess motility. Their entire infection-riddled bodies are necrotic.
If you have an open wound and a zombie touches it, that wound will become infected. Dead bodies are breeding grounds for diseases. Zombies are the walking dead. If their bite doesn’t kill you, the diseases they carry will.
There is some question as to whether an open wound touched by a zombie will necessarily lead to the victim’s zombification. For certain, the wound will become infected. Suppuration will quickly ensue. Disinfect this wound immediately! This advice cannot be overstated. If possible, take penicillin for at least two weeks following the aforementioned physical contact with a zombie.
Whether the festering flesh thus infected will lead to zombification is as yet undetermined. There have been several reports that infection can lead to zombification. But, at this time, none of these reports have been substantiated. This subject needs further study.
When handling a zombie that you have destroyed, be sure to wear protective gear, such as gloves. Make sure your gloves are waterproof. You don’t want any zombie fluids on your skin. The zombie disease is transmitted by means of the zombie’s fluid, namely its saliva. (In certain cases, the disease can spread via zombie blood. But not all zombies have blood. See below.) Do not allow zombie fluids to make contact with your mucous membranes. Infection of the mucous membranes via zombie fluids can lead to zombification.
Re zombie blood, I have gleaned the following information. If a zombie rises from the grave, the zombie does not have any blood at all. Its blood is long gone. If you shoot this type of zombie, it will not bleed. In other words, old corpses that become zombies are bloodless.
However, if a human turns into a zombie quickly after dying, the zombie retains blood in its body; albeit, the zombie’s heart does not function. The heart does not pump blood. If you shoot this type of zombie, blood will not ooze out—since
there is no heartbeat to pump it out. As everybody knows, a dead person does not bleed. You might see splotches of blood at the entrance and exit wounds of the gunshot, but nothing more than that. Blood will not ooze out.
Be advised that these splotches of blood are highly infectious. Whatever you do don’t touch them or make physical contact with them in any manner.
If you have time, pile up the zombies you have dispatched into a pyre and torch them. As I stated earlier in this blog, these creatures are infested with vermin and diseases. To insure against further infection, burn their plague-ridden bodies to ashes. Unlike the legendary phoenix, zombies cannot rise from the ashes.
All traces of zombies must be wiped off the face of the earth to insure the safety of mankind.
The human race is closer to its extinction than it has ever been in its brief history on this planet.
Destroy all zombies!
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
Halverson wasn’t looking forward to opening the front door for the ghouls. It was his idea, after all, so it was only right that he do the honors. Still, if somebody had a better idea, he would be the first to endorse it.
He accompanied Rogers and Lemans back to the other passengers, who were grouped for the most part in the bar area near the center of the lounge, except for the shooters manning the window.
Halverson hived off from Rogers and Lemans and headed for the window to find out if the ghouls storming through the wall’s front entrance showed any sign of letup. The situation was deteriorating, Halverson saw.
Ghouls were scaling the mountain of dead ghouls in greater numbers to get to the front door of the restaurant. Why the ghouls were so intent on getting to the front door, Halverson did not know. He could only speculate. Maybe it was some kind of herd instinct with them.
The pile of dead ghouls in the wall entrance had reached six feet high. The height did not faze the ghouls. Undeterred, they clambered over the pile, scrabbling with their ungainly hands and feet. Then they tumbled down the opposite end, only to rise to their feet and shamble to join their comrades at the restaurant’s front door.
“What do you think?” Halverson asked Ray, who was blasting the ghouls with his MP7.
Ray shook his head. “We’ll run out of ammo before we can stop those things coming through the wall.”
Halverson nodded. “That’s the way I see it.”
“The front door’s the only thing that’s standing between us and them.” Ray wiped sweat from his brow with his left hand. “The question is, how long can it hold?”
“I don’t see how it can hold much longer against the weight of all those things pressing against it.”
“If they get through the door, we can bottleneck them in the stairwell. That’ll slow them down.”
“It’s only marking time. You see how those things are stacked at the wall. No matter how high the pile, they just climb over it. The same thing’s gonna happen in the stairwell when we start plugging them there.”
Ray fired two single shots at a portly ghoul who had just mounted the stack of his dead fellows. After one of the shots penetrated the ghoul’s brain it tumbled down the stack and landed in a heap at the bottom of the pile.
“They get through the door, we’re toast,” said Ray.
Halverson heard Lemans’s voice booming out behind him. “Our reporter friend Chad has decided he’s going to open the front door to let the ghouls in.”
Halverson’s face fell.
Sighs and gasps escaped the mouths of the passengers.
Rogers hurried over to Halverson’s side. “I couldn’t stop the double-dealing fink.”
“Does he want to get us all killed?” cried a passenger, furious with Halverson.
Halverson stepped up to address the passengers. He saw that he had no other choice, what with Lemans’s snitching on him.
“Listen up, people,” said Halverson. “The front door’s not gonna hold forever. We can’t stay here. We have to leave. The sooner we leave the better. Right now our escape route is clear. The longer we wait to leave, the less chance there is that the route will remain that way.”
Pained expressions swept over the faces of the passengers.
“Are you telling us we’re dead?” asked a middle-aged man in the back of the crowd.
“We will be if we stay here.”
“And you want to speed up the process by opening the door for those things out there.”
Rogers waved his hand in the air to attract attention. “I’ll keep this short and sweet. If we stay here, we’re dead. If we use the ropes to climb out the back window, we have a chance to survive. It’s that simple.”
“Climb out on ropes?” said Tanya. “What are you talking about? I’ve never climbed a rope in my life.”
“We’re not a bunch of athletes,” said Valerie, Lemans’s statuesque blonde follower. “We don’t know anything about climbing ropes.”
“It’s not that difficult,” said Rogers. “We’ll rappel down.”
“What’s rappel?” said Tanya in confusion.
“We’ll show you how to do it.”
“Basically, you put the rope under your arm, around your back, and under your leg to create friction and slow your descent,” said Halverson.
“Oh, piece of cake,” said Lemans. He touched his forefinger to the side of his imposing nose. “I can’t even understand what you’re talking about. It sounds like gobbledygook.”
“Pipe down,” said Rogers.
Lemans pulled on his nose. “Why should I? I have as much right to talk as you. It’s about time someone with common sense started talking here.”
“Then count you out.”
“You’re the one who got us into this mess. You should talk.”
“Do you have a better idea?” asked Halverson.
His expression smug, Lemans puffed up his chest, but remained speechless. He held his head on his stubby neck arrogantly up in the air above his stooped shoulders.
“That’s what I thought.”
Lemans found his voice. “The first thing we need to do when we get out of this debacle is eighty-six flyboy as our leader. He’s the one who put us here.”
“Can’t anybody shut this guy up?” said Ray with a sneer.
“It’s a free country.”
“It may not even be a country anymore, the way things are going,” said Tanya.
Ray sidled up to Halverson. “If you open that door, those things are gonna crush anything in their path coming through it, including you.”
“There’s no way you’ll be able to move fast enough to get out of their way after you turn the doorknob,” agreed Rogers. “They’re gonna burst through the door and pound you into the floor like a tidal wave.”
“I’ll have to figure out another way to open it.”
Rogers heaved a sigh. “Maybe we should just go back to our previous plan and wait for the ghouls to break down the door themselves.”
Halverson shook his head. “We have to go now while our escape route out the back is clear.”
Not that Halverson was looking forward to opening the door for the zombies. It was about the last thing he wanted to do.
“It’s a suicide mission,” said Rogers.
“Maybe someone should go down to the door with you to help,” Ray told Halverson.
“Then it’s suicide for two,” said Rogers.
“I’ll go alone,” said Halverson.
Rogers craned his neck and cast around the room. “By the way, where’s Tom? I sent him downstairs to check on that door a long time ago.”
“Is he down there all alone?” asked Ray.
“I told him to take your place.”
“I’ll check on him,” said Halverson. He started toward the stairwell.
“Are you gonna open the door now?” asked Rogers. “We need to know so we can start throwing the ropes out the window.”
“Let me case the lobby down below first. Then I’ll get back to you.”
Halverson made
for the stairwell.
“You won’t be happy till we’re all dead, will you, gunslinger?” Lemans called after him.
“Personally, I’ll be happy when you’re dead,” Ray told Lemans.
Lemans gave him a look. “You’re not a whole lot better than him.”
Ray ignored him and returned to the window to shoot ghouls.
Halverson entered the stairwell. He stood on the landing and scanned the lobby down below for Tom.
Pistol in hand, Tom was standing in the middle of the lobby, seemingly rapt with the front door. He didn’t even pick up on Halverson standing above on the landing.
The locked door was vibrating under a flurry of blows rained down on it by the ghouls outside.
Halverson could not tell from his vantage point if the door was coming loose in its frame.
“How’s it look?” he asked.
Tom did not respond. His expression intent, he kept his automatic trained on the raucous door.
“Earth to Tom,” Halverson said louder.
As if snapped out of a trance, Tom whipped his head around to look up at the landing behind him. “Yeah.”
“How’s the door holding up?”
“So far, so good. That ruckus they’re making out there is giving me a bad case of the willies.” Tom shivered. “I feel like shooting through the door at them.”
“That sounds like a good idea.”
“What?” Tom did a double take. “Bullet holes in the door will weaken it. Those things will pound their fists through the holes and break down the door.”
“That’s the idea.”
“Now I know you’re kidding.”
“You come back upstairs and help with the ropes. I’m taking your place.”
Tom scaled the steps.
Halverson met him on the landing. “When you hear me open fire, that’s the signal to throw the ropes out the window. Tell that to Burt.”
Tom stared at him wide-eyed. “Are you really going through with this?”
“It’s our best chance now.”
“What if we can’t hear your gunfire from upstairs?”
“I won’t be using my silencer.”
“But our gunshots from upstairs will drown out yours.”
Zombie Apocalypse: The Chad Halverson Series Page 13