by SP Durnin
"The top is a block of a dozen suites," George said, causing them both to stare at him wide eyed. Taking the building's size into consideration, that made them roughly three times the size of an average hotel room. "The bathrooms and showers are both at the end of the hall. Each can hold six at a time, and the roof access is through the back hallway around the far showers."
Jake was impressed. And stunned. "What the hell, Chief? When did you do all of this?"
"Started during the cold war. Used it as a jump off point for a few domestic operations, if ya get my meaning. Not that national security matters a pinch of now... The teams helped me fix it up 'bout ten years ago." He gave Jake a raised eyebrow. "What? You didn't really think I slept in the basement, did you?"
"Yeah! Everyone did."
Foster gave him a pitying look. "You think that bozo in Dallas shot Kennedy too? I thought ya were a journalist, kid. Jeez. Come on; let's go upstairs."
They went up the iron steps to the second floor, Jake and Laurel carrying their bags and still unopened lagers. He was so distracted by Foster's revelation that he didn't notice Laurel behind him, looking at the way his butt moved as he walked. She wouldn't admit it out loud, but Kat had been right. Jake had a cute butt.
The trio came up into the large common room to see the others scattered around the TV. CNN was showing images the FCC would pitch a hissy fit over if any of them were actually still in their offices and not running for their lives.
Maggie was rooting in one of the refrigerators with Kat, while Karen sat quietly on one of the stools next to the lunch-counter-sized, bar-topped, half-wall that separated the kitchen from the common area. Heather was lying on one of the couches with a bag of ice on her swollen ankle. Opposite her, Gertrude Jennings sat sipping tea from a large mug, chatting with Allen.
Jake went down on one knee beside the couch and took her hand. "How are you holding up?"
"Much better than you, it seems." She patted his arm and gave him a worried gaze. "You look done in. When did you last eat? Or sleep for that matter?"
He rubbed his eyes. "Seems like forever. I haven't had the chance for either since my oh-so-brilliant plan to see what the zombies on Broad Street were up too."
"Allen's been telling me about that," Gertrude said. "Who's this?"
Laurel had come to stand behind Jake as he knelt. "I'm the girl this one almost got himself killed over. I haven't decided whether or not to forgive him for that just yet. Laurel St. Clair, ma'am."
Gertrude took her hand and smiled enthusiastically. "I am so happy to meet you, Laurel. And call me Gertie. What happened to bring you here?"
She shrugged. "Well, I was all set to make a run for it, then this knight showed up in creaky white armor and started slaying dragons left and right, poor things. I had to promise to go back to his castle with him, just so he'd leave a few of them alive."
Gertie smiled fondly at Jake and patted his cheek with her tiny hand. "Yes, I think I might have run into that fellow a time or two myself. Brave as anything, but not very bright."
"I've noticed that." Laurel said.
"Oh I like her." Gertrude motioned Laurel to sit beside her. "Come, dear, you have to tell me how the two of you met. Jake, go get yourself something to eat and sit down. You're as pale as a sheet, and if you pass out you'll make an awful racket as you hit the floor."
He knew better than to argue, so as the women destroyed his reputation, he made for the kitchen. Jake was almost drooling with hunger as he pulled some lunch-meat and bread for a sandwich from the fridge. Kat and Maggie were occupied in a hot pepper eating contest, both of their faces beet red, laughing at each other as they consumed little agony bombs straight from the jar.
Jake smeared some horseradish mustard on his pastrami sandwich, then started feeding his face. Maybe it was the fact he hadn't eaten since the afternoon prior, but it tasted like heaven.
Allen sidled over as he finished, wearing a strange expression. "Jake, we should talk." All traces of humor absent from Al's normally light tone.
"Give me a minute here." Jake washed the remnants of the sandwich down with a swallow of Guinness. He drank about a third of it and then pressed the chilly bottle to his aching head. "I can't believe we made it."
Allen looked at the stairs leading up to the fourth floor apprehensively. "Yeah, that's one for the record books. Look there's something…"
"Can you believe this, Al? Zombies. Who would've thought? And George! This place! I should've known..." Jake couldn't register anything except how good the frost covered beer felt against his forehead. "I have to say, pal-o-mine, I never saw zombies coming. Personally, I would've picked global warming or ozone depletion…"
"Jake, really, I've got to tell you…"
"Or a super-virus. Or aliens!" Jake shook his head. "Giant, super-intelligent, highly-evolved, space badgers or something."
"That's great, but seriously, you…"
"I'm telling you, I don't know how things could get any worse."
"Jake!"
They both turned to see a blonde bombshell straight out of a lonely man's wet dream. She'd followed George and a couple other new faces down from the fourth floor. In another setting, she'd be enough to arouse a dead stick. The right shaped parts crammed inside a painted on pair of jeans, a strapless push-up style bra showing under a pitiful excuse for a baby-doll tank, all topped by a wreath of wild honey-blonde hair. Even looking frazzled and half out of her mind with fear, she projected an aura of raw sex.
"They're worse." Allen closed his eyes.
The blonde ran towards Jake and tried to throw herself into his arms. Instead, he caught her by the shoulders and held her back, wearing an expression of utter horror.
I don't know how things could get any worse, his back-brain mocked. What are you? Retarded? Did you really think you could say something like that, out loud, and the fates wouldn't take it as a challenge? You dumb-ass.
"Who is that?" Laurel asked Mrs. Jennings in a whisper.
"That awful creature is Jake's ex-girlfriend," Gertie said, with a sniff of disdain. "He ended it with her over six months ago and was very glad for it. He wouldn't want anything to do with her again if the alternative was a monastery."
The blonde finally stopped trying to wrap herself around him and Jake stepped away a couple of paces.
When he spoke, even Maggie and the hard-headed George Foster caught the chill in his voice.
"Hello, Nichole. What are you doing here?"
* * *
The city was done screaming. Now, it burned.
Stoves left on when the wealthy elite left their homes—because their servants had abandoned them—started house fires. Thick columns of black smoke plumed into the clear May sky. Flames, fanned by the winds, raced towards the now blood-drenched campus and empty dormitories. In a matter of minutes, the stadium where enthusiastic cries of 'Oh! Aich! Eye! Oh!' had been chanted on game days became a roaring furnace of hot, glowing steel.
The dead didn't pay it any notice.
They shuffled through the flames, hundreds burning down and finally falling to the concrete, truly dead this time. Others exited the fires resembling used up matchsticks, charred and crisped like burnt paper. These were little more than blackened skeletons bereft of even sexual characteristics and, in many cases, with their clothes fused to their blackened bones.
It didn't matter how many were cremated by the awful heat, there were more. So many more. The dead were coming close to outnumbering the living across the globe and millions fled cities from Plano to Paris. The ones that couldn't, or wouldn't flee, began to barricade themselves within their homes. Some tried to get to government buildings. People fled to havens like police stations or courthouses, seeking shelter from the moaning horrors. The few, who survived their harrowing journey, huddled together behind oaken doors and barred windows, hoping for the authorities to save their collective asses.
Not realizing the authorities couldn't even save their own...
C
hapter Eight
Three weeks later Jake was ready to commit suicide. Or homicide.
He worked the heavy-bag near the common room's north corner, wearing nothing but a pair of sweat pants and hand wraps, trying his best to make the leather-sleeved sack of sawdust and sand say uncle. Maggie lay on the weight bench close by, pressing about two hundred and fifty pounds for the eighth time, while Allen exercised his eyes spotting her. Kat stretched on her yoga pad not far from Laurel and the soft-spoken Karen, both on the treadmills working out the kinks. Unlike Maggie, who wore a tank top, boots, and a pair of army-issue pants, they were in the tights and sports bras Kat had stuffed in her pack on the day of the outbreak.
The sight of Laurel, skin glistening, her breasts pushed high and breathing heavily, did little but feed his aggravation. They'd had precious little time together since the steel plate had come down and sealed them all inside Foster's bolt hole.
As a group, they decided to split watching the monitors George had connected to the warehouse's exterior security cameras into four-hour shifts. That meant everyone had to take a turn, which pleased the ever-more abrasive Nichole to no end. They divided their time between monitor watching, checking their supplies, inventorying Foster's more than impressive armory and desperately trying to glean some small bit of information from the outside world.
However, the only things broadcast on TV anymore were the occasional talking heads with bad scripts and automated public service announcements. The Internet slowed further every day as servers went down and the people manning the infrastructure died by the thousands. But they kept trying, hoping for some tidbit of information on possible aid or rescue. They spent fruitless hours trying to contact other survivors via shortwave radio. Those who had families rarely spoke of them, but they did try to search for them via the web. All of these things left their days rather full, if not terribly stimulating. But none of these issues were bothering Jake very much.
What did piss him off was that every time it seemed he and Laurel were beginning to get close, Nichole would appear and make unwanted advances. That always caused the redhead to cool off quickly. He was losing patience with his blonde ex at an accelerated rate.
"So what's the word on Chicago?" Maggie dropped the bar she'd been pressing into the cradles and sat up. Allen found her quite attractive. In a barbarian sort of way. Muscles rippled as she worked the stress out of her shoulders, causing him to have a flash of said shoulders holding her up as the two of them lay on fur sheets. Like Mrs. Schwarzenegger.
"George's friend on the short wave said the military is continuing to pull west. They're retreating, trying to build up a rally point, but the zombies aren't giving them time. The things don't sleep, so they just keep stumbling on and on after them." Allen shook his head. "They're trying to fight them like they would another army and that just won't work."
"Why not?" Kat folded herself in half at the waist, one leg straight on the ground in front, and the other stretched out behind, as she grasped her lead heel with both hands and sank horizontally to the floor.
"No command structure." He shrugged. "They don't have any organization. They don't feel fear or pain. Shock and Awe be damned… might as well be throwing spitballs at a bulldozer. It doesn't matter how many of them you kill, the others will just keep coming. Makes it tough for the living to stop and rest, let alone win a fight."
I hate this, Jake thought. His wrapped fists beat a staccato on the bag and it started to indent with the force of his blows.
"Are they planning to send any help?" Maggie asked.
Allen shook his head. "Nothing yet. Mostly people have headed away from the cities, trying to find safety. There's one group in Montana that's doing pretty good, another in the Black Hills and some in Texas...a few in Canada. Other than that, it's just a bunch of isolated people, trying to hold out."
I hate this. I fucking hate this. Jake's blows were coming faster now and the bottom of the bag was beginning to lean away. He ignored the first twinges from his hands and really started to lay into his strikes.
Laurel and Karen slowed their treadmills and started to cool down, but Kat kept at it on the mat. She was able to run for over eight miles now anyway, so she concentrated on stretching. Lots of people built their bodies, spent thousands of hours making themselves look good, but they didn't possess the ability to scratch their own backs because they were so inflexible. Besides, with Maggie around, she was going to stay in top shape.
That wasn't fair really, she thought. The blonde woman was honest, open, and extremely nice. But that didn't change the fact that the girl was stacked in front.
"So we're stuck for a while," Laurel huffed, still walking, hands behind her head, bringing some guns of her own into play.
"Looks like, and who... knows…" Allen trailed off, looking from face to face. The others were staring at something behind him. He realized he was hearing the sounds of meaty impacts and turned.
Hatethis!Hatethis!Hatethis!Hatethis!Hatethist!Hate…The bag was tilting up at an angle. Jake's hands were a blur as he landed blow after blow, sending little puffs of sawdust into the air. His face was drawn up into a snarl of animal fury. His eyes were wild, as he tried to shove his fists through the bag and into the wall beyond.
"Jake... Jake!" Kat yelled.
"What?" he exclaimed, turning.
"Are you alright?" she asked.
He blinked a few times as reality imposed itself into his eyes again and he straightened up from his predatory crouch. "Yeah, I'm good...why?" He turned his head, giving each of them questioning looks.
"You went a little... odd... there for a minute," Maggie said.
Jake looked around the group. "Don't know what you're talking about."
Kat rose from the mat. "Alright. Enough pulping that helpless bag, killer. Time for your daily beating."
"You want to skip it today, Kat? I was thinking…"
"You need to practice every day or you lose your edge," she said peevishly. "You're the one who wanted to have these sessions. You're the one who said you were getting rusty. You're…"
"Okay, okay!" Jake said in defeat. "You win."
"Good," Kat said brightly, "I like to win. Karen? Can you come get us in an hour if we're still at it?"
The girl nodded sheepishly and gave her a thumbs-up.
"You'll realize that trying to talk her out of something is pointless. Eventually," Laurel sipped her water, "I'm going to have a shower and go roof side for a while. I'm starting to feel like a mushroom cooped up in here. Want to come with, Mags?"
The blonde EMT did another ten reps and set the weights down again with a clang. "Sure. I'm done. I'm not due to relieve Foster for another two hours for camera watch. Let me grab a pair of scissors and cut myself a top."
Laurel's brow furrowed in confusion. "Why?"
Maggie looked at her, stunned. "You're going to go nude?"
"Sure. Rooftop, four stories up, abandoned city...who's going to see us?"
The blonde thought about that for a moment. "Good point."
Jake's eyebrows rose and Allen waggled his own.
"Don't even think about it," Maggie told them.
Jake toweled the sweat from his face just as Mike Barron came down to get himself a beer. The writer kept his eyes averted, hoping Mike would just go away, so of course he made a beeline for their group.
The too-pretty clubber had climbed a rear gate to get away from zombies, who'd followed him from the overdone and now useless Mitsubishi street racer he'd totaled. After swerving around an ambulance, Mike had wrapped the front end around a light pole. He almost matched Jake in size, but lacked anything resembling grit, had a face like an evil cherub, and the standard line of memorized catch phrases to go with it. His frame was a little skinny, but like Allen he was fit in an understated way. He wore his shirts either half open or with only the bottom button done up to show off his great tan and Egyptian hieroglyph tattoo, just under his navel.
Jake couldn't stand him. His d
islike for the man stemmed from the fact that Mike was an unscrupulous, pussy-hound. He hit on everything with a heartbeat, including Laurel, and he didn't like the way the guy looked at eighteen-year-old, Karen one bit. If it hadn't been for the fact that Mike did the same thing to Maggie, and even tried to flirt jokingly with Gertrude, Jake would've politely asked him to turn down the charm ray a few notches.
With something heavy and blunt.
"How ya doing, O'Connor?" Mike took a sip of his beer after pulling it from the fridge, looking curiously at Jake's hands.
"I got bored with my current career and took a job as a meat tenderizer."
Mike thought about that for a moment. "Going well, I take it?"
"It has its moments." He glowered.
"I heard something about gettin' a little sun before it goes down?" He gave Laurel what he thought was a compelling look and a winning smile. It would've worked better if his eyes hadn't been glued to her breasts. "How about it, Red? Want some company?"
Jake seethed inside and put another black mark next to the man's name on the list he carried in his head.
Laurel managed to keep the revulsion out of her voice when she answered. "No thanks."
Mike knew better than to ask Kat. Especially with her smiling at him in a truly evil way.
"Ah well, another time then."
Jake had visions of murder.
"How about you She-Ra?"
"I've asked you not to call me that." Maggie cracked every one of her knuckles twice for effect, which was lost completely against the side of Barron's thick skull. "Next time you do? I'll tie your package in a knot."