by Tim Moon
“Thank you baby Jesus.”
Carefully unwrapping one stick, I folded it and popped it into my mouth. The other stick of gum was tucked lovingly into my pocket. A special treat for later.
The wretched burning and sickening flavor dissipated ever so slightly. Enough that when I kicked my feet up and leaned back, I was able to forget about the zombies wailing down below and drift off to sleep.
91
Chilled to my bones. That was the only way to describe how I felt when I woke up.
My eyes cracked open slowly. The sun had dropped low in the sky. Combined with the already dark clouds gathering overhead, it made for a moody evening.
I stretched and looked around. For a moment my heart fluttered. The horizon seemed to wobble and I had to grab the chair to calm down. A few slow, deep breaths helped. At this point, I should be used to waking up in weird places.
Finally, I could look over the edge of the cab. The shitty roof party from earlier in the day had grown into a legit mob, I felt like I was looking down on a New Year's celebration. The space was packed and they all seemed to be jostling around for position. Their attention wasn’t focused anywhere in particular.
They’d grown bored, I guess. Did zombies get bored? It’s not like they had other stuff to do. The evidence was there though. None of them were clawing at the crane or staring up at the cab.
That nugget of information wasn’t very useful though.
I watched the mesmerizing scene below. The zombies milled about like ants. Several wandered too close to the edge and toppled over. One was bumped off by a random shift in direction of the crowd, while another teetered on the edge. It flailed wildly before dropping. This one got caught on re-bar like the earlier guy. He twitched or a while before slipping off.
I felt slightly better, since I had slept, but my legs ached and I knew that I would get cramped sitting in the cab. My stomach felt hollow and ticklish as I climbed out of the cab and stood on the catwalk, stretching.
My mouth felt and tasted like death. The gum did little to clear out the nasty tobacco flavor. I spit out the old piece and watched it fall to the roof. The other piece of gum went in to fight the battle.
Going down to the roof was out of the question. Therefore no stairwell either. It was way too crowded for something like that. I’d be surrounded in no time and swarmed like Katie was.
My brain felt like it was stuffed with lead balls that rattled around every time I moved my head. I was ravenous and my grumbling stomach didn't let me forget about it for a moment.
I leaned my butt against the cab and put my hands on the railing around the catwalk. I was stuck in a crane; a fucking crane on the roof of a building. Trapped – the name of my autobiography.
I stood and banged my fist against the window and frustration. The noise created a slight commotion down below. I peered down and watched as the crowd of infected surged towards the edge of the building where the crane was anchored. At least five more bodies toppled over the edge while they shifted around searching in vain for the source of the noise.
Just out of amusement, and to taunt them the way they had taunted me, I banged on the window a few more times. My reward was seeing more bodies topple over the edge of the building.
“I hate you all!”
My shout was rewarded with more falling bodies. The whole crowd was surging to this side of the roof. The trickle soon grew to a rush of flying zombies. It was hilarious.
Encouraged by the result, I kept yelling and laughing. Thank goodness I was alone because I knew I had to look like one batty sonofabitch.
My voice gave out before my enthusiasm did. The crowd had thinned noticeably. If I gave it a rest for a while, I may be able to rile them up again and repeat the effort. If enough of them went over the edge I could potentially make a break for it.
My hands shot up like I’d scored a touchdown. A big grin spread on my face and I gave a whoop. Perhaps I’d found my way out after all.
92
Bright sunlight and the annoyingly loud chirping of birds woke me up. I sat up in a panic, gasping for breath and saw a bird flutter away from the window. Once again vertigo hit me and I barely contained my panic when I saw where I was.
The night had passed with relative calm. At times the wind coming off the ocean made the crane move, and my stomach flip-flopped. Swaying in the breeze was not fun.
I went to the catwalk and out of habit looked down at my watch. Since the battery had died, and I had no way to charge it, the smart watch was looking pretty dumb. My sense of time went from twenty-four hours to four time periods – morning, noon, evening, and night.
The crowd on the roof still looked smaller which was heartening. However, I realized that as the crowd thinned it would be more difficult to get more to fall off. As long as more infected didn’t emerge from the stairwell to take their place, I was happy.
What better way to start the day than encouraging the demise of zombies? I slapped my hand against the outside of the cab. The crowd grunted and groaned, clearly unsure where the sound was coming from. Fucking idiots.
“Over here you dirty meat munchers! Come and get me!”
It felt good to yell. The release was soothing.
Most of the infected bunched in the corner of the roof. A few stragglers ended up wandering over the edge.
Since I had so much free time, I set about trying to count the remaining infected.
One thing became apparent. The infected below were a mix of every type of person imaginable. From young children to old women, middle-aged men to teenage girls, and every ethnicity in Miami. Some were fairly clean, as far as zombies were concerned, and it was hard to tell how they had been turned. Others were horrible messes with guts hanging out or bones exposed. All of the infected had black eyes. Their mouths all gaped open, emitting a steady drone, while I was perched safely, up high, in my nest.
My stomach growled. Clutching my belly, I sat in the cockpit. The hunger pains were incredible. This was the start of my second day with no water and probably my fourth or fifth without food. The hunger churning my stomach was almost more than I could bear. Food filled my mind.
I had to find a way down, out of this crane, and off this roof.
That was the real linchpin, I had to get past the roof. Once I did, the lower floors should be relatively safe. At the very least they would offer a chance at freedom. If there was rope or some kind of safety harness I could use to lower myself down the broken section of roof, I might be able to escape. Why hadn’t I thought of this earlier?
I looked around at the controls. A key was on the dashboard in the ignition. Would it even have power? I didn’t know if these things were gas powered or electrically powered. The hook on the crane could definitely reach the ground. But would it be of any use to me? The wire would be so thin and the heights would make my hands sweat, spelling certain doom.
First things first. I had to start it up and see if it worked.
I grasped the key and turned. The lights flickered on and electricity seemed to buzz all around me.
“Hell yeah!” My fist pumped in the air. I accidentally hit the roof and winced.
At any other time in my life, using a crane to escape a roof would seem ridiculous. Yet it seemed plausible. Options were limited. I had to work with what I had.
Grabbing the control sticks, I slowly tested out each one individually. I turned the crane to the right and then back to the left, and smiled.
I fiddled with several other buttons that seemingly did nothing. Come on, baby, I need to get you moving up and down. I smirked as my thoughts went into the gutter. Then the line and hook moved closer to the cockpit. I watched intently, carefully noting each control. Next to it was the knob to raise the hook.
An idea struck me. “Oh, that’s good.”
I raised the hook until it was just above the edge of the roof. I continued to experiment until it was perfect. Now the hook was close enough and at the right height that if I swiveled the
crane back and forth, I should be able to smash zombie skulls. And maybe send some out for solo flights.
The noise of the machinery drew everyone’s attention and the infected surged towards the edge of the building, once again, knocking off some of their own. That suited me just fine. I shouted and cursed at them like a raving mad man but I didn't care. No one could hear me and even if they did, fuck ‘em.
I began to swipe the hook back and forth across the roof. At first there wasn’t enough momentum to do much damage, but after a few times of going back and forth it was a regular wrecking ball against skulls. The work was both necessary and gruesome.
For a while it was almost fun. After maybe an hour, I began to tire of it. Things would go a lot quicker if the hook had something like a steel beam attached to it. As things stood, I felt like I was trying to scoop water with chopsticks.
I leaned back in the seat and kicked my feet up on to the dashboard to relax. The hook’s momentum kept it swinging back and forth, smashing zombies that had wandered into its path. I closed my eyes and rested.
A memory popped into my head of a cartoon character standing atop an I-beam, holding on to the wire as the crane lowered the beam to the ground. I couldn’t do that by myself though.
Hmm…
What if I lowered the hook all the way to the ground? Assuming it could reach of course. I sat up and peered over the edge of the building. Could I even hope to climb down the wire? The steel wire was thicker than I expected, but still. It was so far down. I doubted that I had enough strength remaining to pull it off.
Nope, my hands would slip and I’d fall to my death. A preferable way to go, if being eaten was my other option. Neither was my first choice, however.
I thought about it some more, searching the far reaches of my brain for other ideas. Nothing. The idea of crawling out along the crane’s arm like James Bond and shimmying down the wire was terrifying.
If I stayed in the cab I would die of dehydration. That wouldn’t take too much longer. If I waited too long, I would be too weak to defend myself or to do anything useful. At that point, the best case scenario would be to fall. The worst case scenario would be to fall down the ladder and end up on the edge of the roof where the infected could reach me.
If I was going to do something stupid, I had to do it now.
93
My mind was made up. As bat shit crazy as it was, I had to try climbing down. A simple movement of the joystick swung the hook just past the edge of the roof.
When I was holding onto the wire, I might need to touch the building with my feet. Otherwise how could I break a window to get back inside? That’s what I told myself anyway, having something solid and firm to touch would help with the mind game I played against myself.
As that thought popped into my head my eyes sprung open. Laughter bubbled up and I couldn’t contain it. I was so excited and filled with a rush of emotion at the sudden thought that I could legitimately escape. Why break the windows by hand as I dangled from the wire? That was dumb!
Instead, I lowered the hook and began to swing it towards the building. I watched it smash through the windows down by the pedals of the machine. The heavy metal hook crashed through the windows with ease. I watched shards of glass fly into the rooms and cascade to the ground far below.
More infected fell off the broken edge of the building.
“Yeah, that's right motherfuckers. You're all going to die and I'm going to get away. I'm going to live,” I shouted at them.
Repeating the procedure several more times, I smashed the hook into the side of the building and progressively lowered the hook before swinging it again and again. This way, I would have options. If the higher floors were filled with infected or had some other obstacle that prevented escape, I could continue climbing down.
Smashing the glass was good fun. It took until roughly noon to finish. Satisfied that I had busted enough windows, I stopped to admire my work. My smile faded when I thought through how I was going to get out to the wire.
I’d have to scurry along the crane’s long arm, on the tiny-looking steel supports, over open space with no safety harness. If only someone was here to witness what I was doing. This was easily the dumbest, brave thing I had ever thought about attempting.
As I looked around the inside of the cab to see if there was anything useful, I spotted a harness and hardhat. I bypassed the hardhat because it was basically worthless. I didn't have to worry about OSHA regulators or some bullshit like that; I had to worry about the infected and not falling to my death and the helmet helped with neither of those.
I picked up the harness and looked at it. At first it seemed like an odd thing to have in the cab but then I realized they probably used it for maintenance. I wasn’t one to look a gift horse in the mouth. My arms slid into the loops of the harness. When I tried tightening it around my chest, I realized I'd put it on completely wrong. I took it off, put my legs into the loops, tightened it around my waist and it instantly felt more comfortable.
A large D-link hung from the front ready to clip onto a safety cable. Clip made me think of chip, which made me think of fish and chips. Damn, I needed food. Seeing as how there was no safety cable for what I was about to do, it slowly became apparent to my sluggish brain that the D-link wasn’t going to help me as I would simply be attached to the cable. It wouldn’t stop me from falling if my hands slipped.
“It’d be nice to catch a break right about now,” I grumbled, unable to think of a way to get around that. I would have to rely solely on wrapping my legs around the cable and holding on for dear life.
“You’ve got this, Andy,” I said, trying to bolster my courage.
Standing on the catwalk outside the cab, I looked at the crane’s arm reaching out into open space. Everything seemed a lot worse outside the cab. The air brushed my cheek and the groans of infected filled my ears. Just looking down at the roof made me queasy.
It was going to be a perilous journey. There was enough water left in my body for my hands to sweat. I wiped them on my shorts and climbed on top of the cab to start my way across.
Adrenalin made me shaky and I had to fight to keep a solid grip on the metal frame.
It took what felt like ages to crawl and shuffle my way across. Every gust of wind felt like the end of my life and every time one of my hands or feet slipped, my heart launched into my throat like a rocket. Then I’d cling to the frame and wait to calm down before I could continue.
Once I reached the place where the cable dropped down, I stopped. It took some time to plan my descent. The piece that held the cable included a large metal frame and pulleys. That part hung down from the crane’s arm. The distance between the two was maybe five feet. Not far under normal circumstances but my stomach lurched when I looked at it.
The zombie chorus was in full swing, their death music floating to me on the breeze. I strained to block it out so I could focus on the climb.
Once I had planned out how to execute my next step, I took a few seconds to pump myself up. I crouched down, laid flat, and then draped my body over the edge of the crane’s arm. My feet hung freely over the street. Rather than focus on the negative, I took in the beauty of the city one last time, before I continued my insane escape.
When my feet touched down on the edge of the metal frame, my shoe slipped. Thankfully, my death grip on the edge of the frame kept me stable. I made a quick adjustment of my feet and was good to go.
Now came the tricky part. I had to lower myself over the pulley to the bare cable without getting pinned between the cable and pulley. After that I’d be dangling on the steel rope like a water droplet on a spider web.
My hands trembled and my breath came in short gasps as I tried to contain my anxiety. I couldn't bear the thought of looking down but knew I would have to in order to get my feet around the cable.
Never in a million years would I have guessed I’d be doing something like this. No one would believe it. If there was anyone left to tell.
> The cable swayed perilously as I gripped it between my feet. The cable wrapped around my right calf and across the top of my right foot with my left foot over the top of it. This gave me control over my movement and I could stop, if needed. A friend’s dad had taught me this little trick when I was a kid learning to climb down from his tree house.
“I’ve got this.”
My palms were getting slick with sweat and the hollow sensation in my stomach almost made me want to vomit. Nothing would come up. I barely had enough moisture left in my body to swallow. Gripping the cable between my feet and squeezing my legs together, I wiped off one hand at a time.
Before I lost my nerve, I attached the carabiner to the cable even though I knew it wouldn’t do much good. I was roughly forty feet from the top of the building.
How did that insipid quote go? A journey of a thousand miles begins with one or some shit. Mine began by climbing down a few inches.
When I got closer to the roof, I would be dangerously close to the building and possibly within reach of the infected. At that point, if I made it past their greedy hands, I would have to watch for falling bodies.
If a zombie tumbled over the edge and hit me … A shiver raced down my spine.
94
After scooting down a few feet, I had to wipe each palm on my shorts and blow on them to get rid of all the sweat. My gut tingled at the sensation of dangling on the wire. It was intense and all my senses were alert. I had to focus on my breathing because it was coming in short gasps.
Before I could second guess myself, I lowered my body a few more inches. All of my weight was on the wire. My legs held most of the burden while my arms just kept me from slipping off. It swayed a little, but not too much.
“Oh my God,” I repeated to myself. I’d made it this far which was a miracle in itself. Now I had to keep moving down. One inch at a time.