by Max Danzig
“Look,” Rachel snapped, standing up and positioning herself between the two men, “will both of you please shut up? It's like Peter says, we have no choice but to deal with this the best way we can...”
“So what are we going to do then?” Steve asked, a little calmer but with his voice shaking with equal levels of frustrated anger and fear.
“We need to get more supplies,” Peter mumbled. “If they’re becoming more aware and more dangerous, then we should go right now and get as much stuff as we can carry. Then get ourselves back here as fast as we can and lie low for a while.”
“And how long is that going to be?” Steve asked his voice and color rising again. “A week, two weeks? A month? Ten fucking years?”
“How the hell would I know?” Peter replied, agitated.
“Shut up!” Rachel yelled, at once silencing the other two. “For Christ's sake, if the both of you can’t say anything without arguing then don't bother saying anything at all.”
“Sorry,” Peter murmured, running his fingers through his hair.
“So what are we going to do?” she asked.
Rather than answer or take any further part in the increasingly heated conversation, Steve walked away.
“Where are you going? Steve, come back here. We need to talk about this.”
Halfway up the stairs he stopped and turned to look at her.
“What's left to talk about? What's the point?” Steve said.
“The point is we have to do something and we should do it now,” Peter said. “We don't know what's going to happen next, do we? Things could be a hundred times worse tomorrow.”
“He's right,” agreed Rachel. “We've got enough stuff here to last us for a few days but we need enough to last us weeks. I think we should get out now and barricade ourselves in when we get back.”
“What do you mean?” asked Steve, now much quieter and calmer. He sat down on the stair he'd been standing on. “I don't want to shut myself away in here, living in fear...”
“No, we shouldn't,” Peter said. “There is a different way. We can seal off the farm.”
“And how are we supposed to do that?” Rachel wondered.
“Build a fence or barrier,” he replied.
“It'd have to be a damn strong fence,” Steve added.
“Then we'll build a fucking strong fence,” Peter explained. “We'll get whatever materials we need today and get started. Face it; we're not going to find anywhere better to stay than this place. We need to protect it.”
“We need to protect ourselves,” said Rachel, correcting him.
“Let's go,” he said, picking up the keys to the SUV from a hook on the wall by the front door.
“Now?” said Steve.
“Now,” he replied.
Peter opened the door and made his way to the SUV. He stopped to pick up the rifle from where Steve left it in the front yard.
Chapter 36
Steve drove the truck while Peter and Rachel sat in the back together drawing up a list of everything they could think they might need. It had been a conscious move by Peter to hand the keys over to Steve. He didn’t like the way Steve acted this morning. Sure all three of them were on the edge at the moment, but Steve seemed more unstable than he or Rachel.
There was an undeniable air of uncertainty and fear in Steve’s voice every time he spoke. Peter’s logic was that by distracting him and giving him something to concentrate on would keep his mind occupied and put off dealing with any problems for a time. He could sympathize with Steve. He knew he could handle what was going on at the moment, but if one more thing happened, he wasn't sure he'd be able to cope.
Less than two minutes of drawing up the list the both of them stopped, realizing it was a waste of time. They just couldn’t concentrate or focus on what it was they really needed.
Once there, they couldn't risk wasting time trying to find the things they thought they might need. So they filled the truck with whatever they could lay their hands on and stopped when there wasn't room for anything else.
Steve drove towards the town of Newport. Peter wished he would slow down, but knew he wouldn't. Driving was difficult because every road was littered with random obstacles like crashed or abandoned cars, burnt out wrecks and the remains of burned buildings. Motionless bodies and scores of wandering corpses were everywhere. When Peter had driven, he experienced a nervous pressure that forced him to keep speeding up. He felt sure that Steve felt that same clammy, noxious fear too.
Before they reached the town, they passed a brightly painted, warehouse-like supermarket, completely contrasting with the lush green countryside surrounding it. Steve slammed on the brakes, causing Peter and Rachel to brace themselves, and turned the SUV around and drove back towards the large building. They figured that everything they needed would be inside that store. More importantly, filling the truck with supplies found there meant they didn't need to get any closer to the center of town. This meant they could keep their distance from the diseased hordes of walking dead in the center of town.
“Excellent,” Steve said under his breath as he pulled into the parking lot and slowed the truck down. “This is fucking excellent.”
He turned the steering wheel and guided their vehicle round in a wide and careful arc into the parking lot. There were fifteen cars parked near the store. Two were empty, one held three motionless bodies and the other a corpse moving in a herky-jerky way in the passenger seat. Then there was a single body stumbling towards them across the large parking lot. Other than that they seemed to be alone.
“Get as close as you can to the main doors,” Peter said from his position behind Steve.
“We want to be out in the open as little as possible.”
Steve's immediate response was to do and say nothing. After thinking for a couple of seconds he put the truck into gear and pulled away again. He turned away from the building and then stopped when the glass entrance doors were directly behind him.
“What's he doing?” Rachel asked.
“I think he's going to back up to the doors,” Peter said. “It's what I’d do. If I were driving, I’d try to get us almost touching the doors so that...”
He stopped speaking when Steve jammed the truck into reverse gear and slammed his foot down on the accelerator pedal. The force of the sudden and unexpected movement threw Rachel and Peter forward in their seats.
“Jesus Christ!” Peter screamed over the screeching of tires tearing across the parking lot. “What the hell are you doing?”
The other man didn't answer. He was looking back over his shoulder, looking past Rachel and Peter and towards the supermarket doors. The engine whined as the truck hurtled back towards the silent building.
“Steve!” Rachel shouted. She turned to look behind her and then crouched down with her hands over her head as she braced herself for impact. The truck smashed through the plate glass doors. The deafening roar of the engine was replaced by the crash of shattering glass and the ominous groan of metal on metal. Steve stomped the brake and Peter looked out of the window to his side. The truck stopped a third inside the building and two thirds out in the parking lot. They were wedged in the doorway.
“You stupid fucking idiot!” Rachel screamed.
Ignoring her, Steve turned off the engine, took the keys from the ignition and climbed over the back past Peter and Rachel and opened the rear door of the SUV. He stepped out into the supermarket, his boots crunching and grinding jagged shards of glass into the tiled floor.
“Good move,” Peter mumbled under his breath as he watched Steve. While the unorthodox parking method banged up the exterior of their truck, it made things easier for them.
Steve got them safely inside the building, and also blocked the entrance at the same time, and it would stay blocked until they left. Peter was impressed, but he didn't want Steve to know he approved. If he boosted Steve’s confidence by applauding his risky actions what would he do next? Peter followed Steve into the supermarket and Rac
hel followed a few seconds later.
Chapter 37
“Oh hell no,” Rachel scowled, screwing up her face in disgust.
“Stinks, doesn't it?” Steve said, turning back to look at the others.
Peter covered his nose and took a few steps forward. The air was heavy with the sickening stench of rotting vegetables and meat. The smell was stifling and suffocating. It hung in the air, oily and pungent. He could feel it coating his throat and settling in his clothes and hair. Rachel retched and heaved. She had to fight to control the need to vomit.
“We should get moving,” Peter suggested. “We don't want to be here any longer than we have to be.”
“Agreed,” Rachel said. “I can't stand much more of this...”
Her words were cut off as she was knocked off balance by a lurching, staggering figure that appeared from out of nowhere in the dimly lit building. Another stumbling creature dragged itself along an aisle of decomposing food. Rachel screamed and pushed the rotting corpse away and down to the ground.
Peter stood over a gaunt, mousy-haired store-assistant wearing a blue apron. It lay still for a second before its withered arms and legs thrashed around as it worked to haul itself back up onto its unsteady feet. Before it could get up, he kicked it in the face and it dropped back down again.
“We should have a look around,” he said, looking from side to side. “There's bound to be more of them in here.”
He was right. The deafening crash of the truck plowing through the glass doors attracted the unwelcome attentions of five more ragged cadavers trapped inside the building. Four store staff and a delivery driver advanced towards the three survivors. The battered body on the floor reached out a bony hand and grabbed a hold of Peter’s ankle. He shook it free and kicked the creature in the head again.
“Fuck this,” he said. “We've got to move them.”
He looked around again and saw a set of double doors behind a bakery display piled high with stale, moldy bread. Without saying anything else he took hold of the body at his feet by its shoulders and dragged it across the floor. He kicked open the doors and heaved the flailing body of the woman into a room filled with cold, lifeless ovens. Peter made his way back towards Rachel and Steve, and took hold of another corpse, a cashier, and kicked the legs out from under it. He took it by the back of the collar and dragged it across the floor and deposited it in the bakery room.
“Steve,” he yelled as he made his way towards the third creature. “Grab a hold of another one. If you're quick, they don't have time to react.”
Steve took a deep breath and grabbed hold of the back of the nearest corpse, bent it over and marched it to the back of the store. With its thrashing limbs carving desperate, uncoordinated arcs through the stagnant air he hauled it over to the bakery and pushed it through the double doors. It collided with the body of the dead cashier which, a fraction of a second earlier lifted itself back up onto its feet.
Rachel acted quickly running towards the walking cadaver of a large elderly man, who was staggering dangerously close to Steve. Rachel dropped her shoulder and charged at the figure and she shoved it through the doors. The unexpected force of the impact sent the shuffling corpse with the weight and resistance of a rag-doll, flying into the other corpses in the bakery.
In less than three minutes the survivors cleared the main area of corpses. Once the last one was pushed through the double-doors Peter wheeled several shopping carts in front of the doors. He jammed them between the doors and the front counter, barricading the corpses in the bakery back room and preventing them from being able to push their way out.
“Let's get moving,” Peter said as he wiped his hands on the back of his jeans. He stood up straight and rested his hands on his hips. “Just get whatever you can. Load it into boxes and pile it up by the truck.”
In silence, they worked.
As Peter packed cans of beans, soup, and spaghetti into boxes he kept looking over his shoulders. The cold, emotionless faces of the bodies in the bakery stared back at him through small round safety-glass windows in the doors. They moved constantly. They were clamoring to get out, causing the shopping carts to clank, but didn't have the strength to force themselves free. Were they watching him? If they had not acted fast in locking the bastard things away, would they have attacked the same way the lone ghoul in the field had attacked him earlier?
“Jesus,” Steve blurted.
He was standing at the opposite end of the store from Peter and Rachel, close to where the truck had smashed through the entrance doors. His voice echoed in the cavernous room sounding eerie.
“What is it?” Rachel asked concerned.
“You don't want to know,” he replied.
Rachel and Peter looked at each other for a fraction of a second before dropping what they were doing and running over to where Steve was standing.
“Shit,” Peter hissed as he approached.
Steve was about to load boxes into the back of the SUV when he noticed a large crowd of diseased and rotting bodies outside the store entrance. They pressed their cold, dead faces against the store windows, and all of them made a low, guttural moan. Every exposed area looked occupied with a dead face. More of the creatures tried to force their way through the slight gap between the sides of the truck and the buckled remains of the supermarket doors.
Rachel stared through the truck at the mass of grotesque faces which stared back at her with dark, vacant eyes.
“How did they...?” she began. “Why are there so many of them...?”
“They heard us breaking in,” Peter whispered. “It's quiet out there. They'd have heard us crashing into the store for miles around.”
Steve leaned inside the truck and took in their situation.
“There are dozens of the fucking things just around the truck,” he said, his voice just loud enough for the others to hear.
“There's got to be thirty or forty of them out there at least.”
“Shit,” Peter cursed.
“What?” Rachel asked.
“This is just the start,” he replied. “Fuck… that was a lot of noise we made getting in here. The whole building's probably been surrounded by now.”
The three survivors stood together in silence for several moments. They exchanged awkward, uncertain glances as each waited for the other to make a move.
“We've got to get out of here,” Steve said, stating the obvious.
“Do we have everything we need?” Peter asked.
“I don’t care,” Steve said. “We've got to go.”
Peter loaded boxes of food and supplies into the truck.
“You two get inside,” he said as he worked.
Steve loaded another two boxes and then climbed back through to the driver's seat.
“I'll get the engine going,” he shouted.
“Leave it,” Rachel shouted back. “For God's sake, leave it to the last possible second. The more noise we make the more of those things we'll have to get through.”
He said nothing as he climbed through the gap between the front seats and slid down into position. The moans of the ghouls surrounding the truck increased. The sound was inhuman and eerie. On Peter’s instruction, Rachel entered the back of the truck and lowered herself into the passenger seat, and sat silent. Trying hard to concentrate, Steve tried putting the key in the ignition. He was shaking with fear. The more he tried to ignore the bodies and keep his hands steady, the more they shook.
“Last couple of boxes,” Peter yelled as he crammed more and more into the back of the truck. He'd left just enough space for himself to climb inside and pull the rear door closed.
“Forget the rest of it,” Rachel shouted. “Just get in here.”
Steve forced the key into the ignition. He looked up and to his right. One of the closest bodies in the wretched throng lifted a clumsy hand into the air above its head. It drew its weak and diseased fingers together to form an emaciated fist which, without warning, it brought down on the driver's door
window.
“Peter,” he shouted, his voice wavering with strained emotion. “Are you in yet?”
“Almost,” the other man replied. “Last box.”
Steve watched as a second body lifted its hand and smashed the side of the SUV. Then another and another. The reaction spread through the ragged bodies like fire through a tinder-dry forest. Within seconds the inside of the SUV was ringing with a deafening crescendo of dull thumps and bangs. He turned the key and started the engine.
“I'm in,” Peter yelled as he hauled himself into the truck. He reached out and grabbed hold of the door and hatch and pulled them shut. “Go!”
Peter settled in next to Rachel. The two of them stared in abject horror at the wall of dead faces gazing and moaning at them. The corpses pawed and slapped at the windows, but unable to open the doors, which they remembered to lock.
Steve pushed down on the accelerator. For a second there was no response then a slow, jerking movement as the truck inched forward, shackled by the twisted metal remains of the supermarket entrance doors. Another lurch forward and they were free of the doorway but progress was slow. The sheer volume of bodies surrounding the front and sides of the vehicle prevented them from moving forward faster than a crawl. Terrified, Steve pushed harder on the accelerator and this time the truck powered through the crowd of corpses. The bulk of the bodies bounced off the sides of the truck but others fell beneath the wheels of the SUV.
“Fuck,” Peter yelled, watching events behind them through a small gap between boxes of food.
“What's the matter?” Rachel asked.
“They won't stay down,” he said. “The fuckers just won't stay down.”
He stared in horror and total disbelief as the crowd surged after them. The slow staggering ghouls were no match for the momentum of the truck. The relentless persistence of the decomposing gathering caused an icy chill to run the entire length of his spine. There was no point in them following the truck, but still, they came.
“Almost there,” Steve said under his breath as he steered towards the parking lot exit.