Within These Walls: Series Box Set

by Tracey Ward

  “Dee.”

  He nods again. “Especially with Dee at the door. I think Dee is covering any scent we might be putting off, but Sara, she was a lot of blood, a lot to smell. I don’t think Dee could have covered that.”

  “Wow,” I say emphatically, marveling at how thought out this all was.

  He grins and shakes his head. “Are you still ragging on me about this? I’m saving your life, remember?”

  “I know and I’m grateful,” I tell him, my voice earnest. I would be dead if he hadn’t burst in and bashed my friend’s head in, and for that I am eternally grateful. “You’re my hero.”

  His smile disappears and he looks around the room, refusing to meet my eyes.

  “Yeah,” he mumbles. “Look, we should get some sleep. I want to get moving at first light and get out of here. I’ll sleep in the next room. Keep your door closed, barricade it if you can.”

  “Wait. Shouldn’t we stick together? First rule of horror movies is you don’t split up. Even I know that.”

  He’s still not looking at me but he nods. “Right. Yeah.”

  I frown. “What’s wrong with you?”

  “Nothing. You’re right, we should stick together.”

  “Jordan?”

  His eyes flicker to mine for the briefest of seconds then he’s gone out the door. I hear movement in the other room, and he appears again in the hallway dragging a mattress.

  “I’ll sleep on the floor on this. Is your bag all packed?” he asks as he flips the light off.

  It is and parked by the door. When we did our scavenging, we ended up with a lot of protein bars, single serve chip bags and sports drinks. Sara was a candy freak and I found her stash in her room. Tons of M&M bags, Snickers bars and assorted other chocolate coated goodness. I thought they were a waste of space in our bags being pure junk food, but Jordan insisted the calorie content and energy boost we could get from the sugar made them worth it. Apparently running for your life from the undead is a big fat burner. Better than Spinning.

  “Yeah,” I say as I climb onto my bed and pull the comforter around me. I’m still fully dressed and wearing running shoes, something Jordan warned me to do. Always be ready to run.

  “Good,” he grunts, and lowers himself onto the mattress.

  We fall silent and I immediately start to think about my meds. I don’t have enough to last me very long. That’s a big problem. I’m fine for now, but what happens two or three days down the road if I don’t keep up with my doses? I could start hallucinating again, and with this as my new reality, it’s a sure thing that I will dream up some wild, violent stuff. I absolutely, positively cannot be near this guy if that happens. What if I imagine that he’s turned into a zombie and is coming at me, trying to kill me, when in reality he’s fine and wants to hand me a granola bar? I’ll kill him to defend myself. From granola. He doesn’t know about me and I won’t risk his life by sticking with him for any longer than necessary. Plus, I’m just not great with people. I do believe I need his help in getting out of the city though, and he needs mine, so I’ll stay with him for as long as I can. I just hope I can keep it together that long.

  “Jordan,” I whisper into the dark.

  “Yeah?” he responds immediately, and I know he’s wide awake.

  “When we get out of the city, once we’re a safe distance from it, I think we should split up. Go our own ways.”

  Jordan stays quiet for a long time and I start to wonder if he’s ignoring me or pissed off. When he speaks, his voice is tight.

  “Whatever you want.”

  “Are you pissed about this?”

  “I don’t really care. Hopefully it won’t take long to get somewhere safe.”

  “You’re mad so you do care. What’s your deal?”

  “Why do you want to split up? Are you worried I’ll take advantage of you? ‘Cause that’s the last thing on my mind, believe me.”

  “What? No, that never even crossed my mind.”

  “It probably should. You should at least consider it, for your own safety.”

  I turn and look down at him on the floor. He looks over and meets my eyes in the semi-darkness. “Jordan, do you plan on taking advantage of me at any point?”

  “No.”

  “Okay then.”

  He frowns at me in confusion. “So then why do you want to split up so quickly?”

  I roll over onto my back again and stare at the ceiling. I don’t know what to tell him. I don’t have a good excuse other than the real one and I’m not about to tell him that. He’d probably want to leave me behind right now, and as selfish as it is, I need him to help me. He seems like a good guy and I don’t want to kill him, but I can’t tell him that either. I decide to go for as much honesty as I can muster instead.

  “I don’t know how to handle what’s coming and I don’t want to get you killed.”

  He thinks on that for a moment and then replies, “Look, I can’t make it alone. Me and a bat, that’s not going to be enough to survive. I need someone I can trust, someone to help watch my back while I watch theirs. Someone to sleep in shifts with. And you do too. Alissa, if we split up, we’ll probably die. If we stick together we have a chance.”

  I know he’s right. I know that if I go off on my own and let the meds leak out of me without a single touchstone in reality, I will go off the deep end and end up either completely crazy or dead. Neither is appealing to me. And the truth is, I don’t want to leave him. I don’t want to do this alone.

  “Let’s just take it a day at a time, okay?” I ask, my voice becoming tired. “Just know that if I feel like I’m going to get you killed, I’m leaving.”

  “That’s fair. Do me a favor though?”

  “What?”

  “Tell me you’re going. Do not run away without telling me, not under any circumstances. If I wake up some morning and you’re gone, I will search for you and probably get myself killed doing it. Promise me you’ll say goodbye.”

  I’m surprised by the sentiment, by the idea that he’d search for me considering he barely knows me, but it’s kind and I feel like this is a promise I can most likely keep. I lean over the side of the bed, hold out my pinky like a little kid and wait for him to link his with it. I hold his firmly with mine, meet his eyes and smile.

  “I promise,” I tell him, then I frown. “Wait, what about you? I can’t believe I haven’t asked, but what about your family? Why aren’t you going home?”

  He pulls his hand away immediately and stares at the ceiling. “Home is Boston. My family is safe, for now, and I’m just worried about getting out of here alive.” He yawns, loud and long like a bear. “I’ll worry about the rest later.”

  He falls asleep soon after that. I hear his breathing even out and a slight snore begin in the back of his throat. I don’t hear any more noises from outside and I’m relieved. I don’t think I could have slept knowing they were right outside. Waiting. I’m nervous about tomorrow but I’m confident we can make it, though I don’t know how I’ll do looking at a human face and loosing an arrow at it, but I tell myself it will be just like hunting. These are not humans anymore and even if they are, even if they aren’t the dead risen to walk again, they will kill me if I don’t kill them. They will kill Jordan, and even though I’ve only known him for an evening and I’ve been kind of a jerk, I feel protective of him. Maybe because he saved my life and I owe him a debt or maybe because he’s the only other truly living being I’ve seen since this started just five hours ago and that makes his life precious to me. Or maybe it’s just because I kind of like him. It’s a breakthrough; I’m forming a connection to someone. My therapist would be so proud.

  Assuming she isn’t a zombie.

  Chapter Six

  We were up and ready to go at dawn, just as Jordan planned. We ate apples, cheese and milk for breakfast, making a point to eat perishables while they were still good. It was tough to want to eat anything with the smell of Dee in the kitchen and the mess still there, but we muscled throug
h it because you can’t run for your life on an empty stomach.

  We stand in the entryway with our packs on and weapons at the ready. Jordan looks over at Dee’s rotting body where we slid it back into the kitchen in preparation to leave, then glances back at me and I can see he’s torn.

  “Should we say a prayer for her or something?” he asks, his voice unsure.

  “Why? We didn’t say one for Sara and she never ate anybody.”

  “Maybe that’s all the more reason to say one for…”

  “Dee.”

  “For Dee. We should, don’t you think?”

  I study him, surprised by this sudden idea. Where was this line of thinking when we fed Sara’s remains to the wolves?

  “If we say a prayer over every infected, we’ll never get out of the city.”

  He hears me but he doesn’t respond. Instead he simply stares down at what’s left of Dee. I sigh and touch his arm lightly. His beautiful blue eyes bore into mine and I can see something there, something desperate. I have no clue what he’s desperate for, but I know we need to make it right before we step out that door. His head isn’t straight and if he hesitates out there it can get us both killed right out of the gate.

  “How ‘bout this?” I propose gently. “We say a blanket prayer here and now for everyone. Not even the ones we’re going to be responsible for, or have been responsible for, but for everyone. Will that be alright?”

  He nods and I pull my hand back, head bowed and waiting for him to speak. He doesn’t. When I look at him expectantly, he looks pained and shakes his head.

  “I don’t know what to say.”

  I sigh and force myself to smile patiently. I have no idea what I’m doing. I am not a religious person, though I’m sure some churches would have a field day with me and my hallucinations. I’ve never been to church, but I’ve heard prayers spoken by others, and of course on TV and in movies, so I patch together what I can.

  “Okay. Let’s keep it simple. Um… God forgive them, they know not what they do.”

  Because they are zombies.

  “Please forgive us for our trespasses.”

  Because we are going to kill them.

  “As we forgive those who trespass against us.”

  As they try to eat our brains.

  “And deliver us from evil,” Jordan whispers, and I look up to see his eyes are closed.

  Because evil waits outside our door.

  I stay silent, waiting for Jordan to make his peace with whatever is troubling him. When he opens his eyes and looks at me, they are less haunted than before, but I know it’s still with him. I don’t pry though. If anyone understands harboring your own demons, it’s me.

  “Are you ready?” Jordan asks one last time.

  I nod briskly, my heart suddenly in my throat. “Ready.”

  When he releases the locks, the door swings open easily. My nerves are fried and I half expect to face off with a dozen or more zombies waiting outside the door for us, but the hall is eerily empty. Jordan looks at me, makes a show of taking a deep breath and heads out the door. He looks both ways as though he’s crossing the street and then motions me forward. I keep my eyes up and level, trying not to see the bits of bone left behind from what happened to Sara. I feel bad about that. We should have buried her, buried both of them, but where? Knowing we said our prayer makes me feel a little better.

  The only sign of activity in the hall is a blood trail on the floor, some holes in the plaster and a blood smear on the wall beside it. There was a struggle at some point, but I don’t remember hearing anything in the night, so it must have been there yesterday. I ran to my room in such a blind rush, searching my purse for my keys by the time I was in the hall, I had to have missed the signs. I wonder if I’d seen the state of the hall if I would have approached my roommates with more caution, but I doubt it. I was still thinking crazed gunman at that point, looking for a singular threat and never dreaming the threat was everywhere and everyone.

  Jordan inches forward down the hall keeping close to the wall and I copy his movements silently. We planned for me to stay back behind him seeing as my weapon has a lot more range than his. If we encounter a threat, he’ll either beat it to death with the bat, or if he feels like he can’t make it happen, he’ll fall back, making sure to get out of my way and leave me open to take a clean shot. I worry about basically using him as a human shield but he insisted that’s not how it is. I can still use my weapon from behind him, he can’t use his from behind me. I agreed grudgingly, still feeling like I’m cowering behind him.

  We make it down the steps, an open staircase that looks down on the common area, and weave back and forth. I feel exposed and freaked out but this open area is exactly what Jordan wants. He’s very nervous about enclosed spaces and I want to agree with him but I felt safer in the four tight walls of the apartment than I do right now with 360 degrees of vulnerability.

  Just as we touch down on the main floor, the exit in sight, I hear the moan. The shuffle. The drag. Jordan and I both spin on our heels and face the infected coming toward us. It’s Zombie Boy again with his ball and chain still around his ankle. It occurs to me that he’s on the ground floor now instead of the second floor where we first saw him, so either he took the elevator or he banged his ankle biter buddy down the steel stairs to get here. Either scenario is funny to me and a giggle escapes my lips. I clap my hand over my mouth, horrified, and I look to see Jordan scowling at me like I’ve gone insane.

  Oh, man, I think wryly. You haven’t seen anything yet.

  “Sorry,” I whisper.

  “Don’t be sorry, shoot it,” he whispers back fiercely.

  Zombie Boy is still a good twenty feet away. His motor skills suck and he’s toting at least a hundred pounds of dead groaning weight behind him. I’ve got time. I actually think that we don’t need to kill him. He’s not between us and the exit and there’s no way he can chase us down. But I haven’t faced down my fear of shooting a human-ish being yet. I decide it’s best to get my first one under my belt now when there’s no pressure instead of finding myself locked up when it really matters. I lift my bow, notch the arrow and use the sight to line him up. Then I decide to test a theory.

  I let the arrow fly and it hits the mark perfectly, exactly where I wanted it. Right in the throat. On any living human creature, this is a kill shot. The windpipe is broken, I might have nicked an artery and with how much force I put behind that arrow, I probably touched down on his spine as well. But he doesn’t care. Black tar blood flows from the wound but there’s no pulse to it, no heartbeat behind it spilling it out rhythmically. It simply runs out around the arrow, the way it would if you poked a hole in a milk jug and gravity took over spilling the contents out to the ground. And he just keeps on shuffle dragging toward us, his head dangling back at a worse angle than before.

  “I told you, head shots are the only ones that work,” Jordan says, his voice starting to become edgy as Zombie Boy creeps toward us. “You have to destroy the brain.”

  “I know,” I say, grabbing another arrow and notching it.

  “Really? So is this how you won your trophy?”

  I don’t like his tone.

  “No,” I say pulling the string taught and taking aim. “This is.”

  I let the arrow go and it enters the exposed soft tissue under his chin and slices through his brain, lodging itself in his skull. The tips on the arrows are meant for hunting small game and not expected to pierce bone, so my target areas on a human skull are going to be limited. Eye socket, mouth, ear, temple, or that sweet spot at the base of the skull. Unless I get my hands on chisel point broadheads, then I can shoot through a human skull and straight into the gooey center. The tissue under the jaw works today, though, because Zombie Boy drops like a stone to the ground. No more groaning. Except from his partner, now rendered immobile. Jordan and I close the distance left between us and them, and as I pull my two arrows from my kill and use a cloth I took from the kitchen to wipe them clean
, he flattens the head of half pint on the floor.

  Jordan motions for the rag I used, presumably to wipe his bat off, but I shake my head and loop it through a belt loop on my jeans so it dangles in front of me.

  “Use your shirt,” I tell him.

  “What? No.”

  “It’s already sprayed in their blood and if you put more on it, it’s a good thing, right? You said they can smell us. If you’re wearing their scent, they’re less likely to detect you.” I swing my blood soaked rag for emphasis.

  “Ugh,” he groans, but he does it, taking the bottom hem of his shirt and swiping it over the bat’s surface.

  We continue our progress toward the exit, getting back on alert when we enter the narrow passage between the common room and the front door. There’s a reception desk off to the left and we proceed by it carefully, both of us expecting someone to leap up from underneath it and lunge at us I’m sure. I breathe a little easier as we pass it and stand side by side at the door, ready to push out into the sunlight. We look at each, he grins and I grimace, then we’re out the door.

  The plan is to find his car, which he thinks he parked a couple of blocks away. Thinks being the operative word here. Once we get to the car, wherever it may be, we get the hell out of town, killing zombies left and right along the way. That’s as much of The Plan as I know, but I’m really hoping there’s more to it than that. Maybe a Big Picture section that I’m not yet privy to. I’m going on a lot of faith here, and for a girl who doesn’t trust her own mind let alone other people, it’s a pretty big leap. At any rate, that is The Plan.

  When does anything ever go according to plan?

  The sound of groaning hits me like a wave when we open the door. There are so many of them at all sides, I can’t even count right away. My body freezes and I simply stare. I have no idea what to do, but the thought banging around the loudest in my head is that I don’t have nearly enough arrows for this. I’m about to either pee my pants or go back inside or both when Jordan grabs my hand and yanks me toward the crowd.