by DeWitt, Dan
* * *
When Trent made it to room 105, the members of the three-person patrol were shining their lights on the shelves. They occasionally pulled something off and put it in a bag. "What are you doing?"
"Grabbing anything that might be useful. Not that we really know what we're looking at, but it passes the time."
"Right, Harold. Right." Trent raised his pistol. "Hands in the air, people. Now."
"I don't understand," Harold said, but the three of them complied.
"What did Ethan want to tell us?" The sole woman in the room, Denise, asked. "Did something happen?"
"Not at all. He wanted me to tell you 'Goodbye'."
Denise said, "Look, Trent, if you're in some kind of trouble, we can help you." She lowered her hands a few inches and held them out in a non-threatening way.
Trent said, "No, thanks," as he turned slightly and aimed at Harold. Denise, ever the protector, stepped in front of him. The slug took her in the chest and knocked her back about a foot, but she remained on her feet for a few unsteady moments. The confused look on her face melted away as she crumpled to the floor.
"What the hell are you doing?!?" Jason screamed. Harold stepped protectively in front of Jason, just as Denise had done for him, knowing that it wouldn't do any good.
"Cleaning up." He raised the pistol again, but he heard a whoosh sound behind him and something cold on his back. Instinct caused him to turn, and he was met with a faceful of chemicals designed to put out a Class A fire. His world went dark and his eyes burned, but he squeezed off several shots in the direction of the door. The next thing he felt was the impact of a slight, but determined, body crashing into him and taking him to the floor. A frenzied pair of hands tore at his face and eyes, while their owner screamed indistinct words. He brought the pistol up until he felt resistance and fired two more shots. A woman's scream followed, but the attack continued.
A heavy metal cylinder smashed him square in the face. He stayed conscious, barely, but the pistol was kicked from his hand. He groped for it while what felt like a hundred fists rained down on him.
"That's enough! We need him!"
Trent felt a few more blows, then was hauled to his feet and thrown backwards into a chair. His eyes started to clear a bit as his arms were pinned behind the chair back. Despite the dim light and the chemicals, a face came into focus just enough to be recognizable.
The kid. Of course it's him.
"Is anybody hit?" Harold and Jason said they were fine. Ethan saw Sister Ann kneeling next to a table, rocking slightly back and forth, eyes shut tightly, lips moving.
"Ann? Ann!"
Sister Ann held up what was left of her fanny pack. The two close range gunshots had exploded it so that there was little more than a strap left. She finished with an audible, "My thanks for your protection and forgiveness. Amen."
"You're lucky, Sister. You didn't exactly follow the plan."
Sister Ann said, "Yes. Luck. I'm sure that's what it was." She looked solemnly at Denise's body and knelt beside her. The woman was obviously dead. Sister Ann closed her eyes and held her hand. "There are some things I have to do for her."
"Soon. Please go help..."
"Give me a minute, Ethan!"
"Of course." He was sorry that Denise was dead, and he chastised himself for not being more sensitive to the fact that she and Ann had been close. She had been a quick friend to him, but she was gone now. His concern was for Rachel and the rest of the living.
After Ann had gone, Ethan turned on Trent. "What are you doing?"
His captive didn't answer.
Ethan drew back a fist. Trent anticipated the blow and twisted his face away; Ethan changed his mind and punched him as hard as he could in his balls. Trent sucked in a giant breath and screamed when he was able to. He thrashed against Harold's strong grip pinning him to the chair. Then he cried.
Ethan gave him fifteen seconds to take it all in before he said, "Talk or next time I'll squash 'em."
"Oooohhhh, God, fuck you...you nut-punching fuck..."
"You saw what I was willing to do in the church."
Trent breathed heavily a few more times. "You were full of shit in the church. That's why it's so funny that chick hates you. You never would have done it."
"Gentlemen?"
Harold and now Jason understood right away. They wrestled Trent to the ground, Harold on his arms and Jason on his legs.
"You homos probably dig this, don't y--OOOOOWWWW!"
Ethan's love tap had the desired effect. "That's your last warning before you start leaking." He brought his leg all the way back.
"Okay! Okay! We're running a test."
"What kind of test?"
"A chemical one."
"What?"
"Hell, you're gonna know soon enough anyway. But first, you have to tell me how you got out."
"Got out of where?"
"The gym...wait, you weren't even in there? You've gotta be shittin' me. How lucky are you?"
Ethan grabbed Trent's radio and called Rachel. "Where are you?"
"Getting to the gym right now. Hold on a sec." The transmission lapsed for a few seconds. "What the hell is this?"
"What?"
"You need to get down here. The doors are, I don't know, welded shut."
"What???"
"Just come quick."
Ethan straddled Trent's shoulders and punched him in the face twice. "What did you do? What the fuck did you do?"
Tiny droplets of blood flew from his lips as he said, "Jus' breakin' a few eggs..."
Ethan hit him again. Trent's head flew to the side, and Ethan noticed the earpiece in his left ear. He pulled it out and followed the wire to another radio in an interior pocket. He pulled the rig out and said, "The assholes on the roof?"
Trent nodded.
Harold said, "Ethan, we should go to the gym. That can't be good."
Trent fought weakly to keep Jason from binding his wrists with the duct tape that he'd found on the shelves. "You don't want to be near the gym. You don't want to be in this school in a few minutes. Trust me on that one. I have a car. Let me go and it's yours."
"Fuck off. Bring him."
Ethan broke into a sprint and was at the gym in a hurry. Rachel was trying to pry the doors open off with her pipe, but was having zero success. She'd said that the doors were welded but she'd understated the extent of it. The metal along every edge was melted together
Ethan heard a commotion inside. Everyone had to be awake by now, and panic must be setting in. He pounded on the door. "Mickey!"
"Hey, kid. What's going on out there?"
Ethan briefed his friend as quickly as he could. "You're welded in here, all right, but you have all the tools in there. I bet you can pop the hinges off from the inside."
"Way ahead of you." Mickey's voice faded as he moved away from the door, presumably in search of the proper tools.
Within two minutes, he was back and banging away on the hinges. Harold and Jason had caught up, Trent in tow.
"Any luck?"
"Not yet, kid. These are the most stubborn goddamn hinges I've ever seen. Same for the other doors, too."
"Keep trying," Ethan said. He wished they hadn't moved all of the tools into the gym, even though there had been no rational reason not to. They had to keep as much as possible as close as possible. Just in case. Unfortunately, that meant that Ethan could lend no support from his side of the door.
"Goddamn, are these things moving at all?"
"Let me check." Ethan shined his light on the hinges and took his first real good look. Not only had they not moved even slightly, but they looked wrong.
"Ethan..." Harold said.
"Hold on a sec, Harold." The hinges were welded, too.
"Ethan! I just heard something over his radio!"
"What did they say?"
"Initiating in sixty tiara? Sienna? Something like that."
"Sierra?" Mickey chimed in from the other side.
"Th
at's it! Then something about rendezvous at eight-thirty AM, I think."
Trent blanched, and Ethan noticed. "Sierra means seconds. What happens in sixty seconds, Trent?"
"More like forty-five now. We have to leave."
"What happens? Your test?"
Trent confirmed Ethan's supposition with his silence.
Ethan ripped the pipe out of Rachel's hands and started banging on the hinges. The vibration of metal on metal made his bitten hand throb with agony.
"Those are chemical welds! You can't break 'em!"
"Mickey, pour it on!" Ethan gave up on breaking the welds and started working on the handles, instead. He hoped that if he could break those off they might get enough leverage to open the doors. He managed to bend one of them out of shape, and he thought that a few more whacks would do the trick.
"Kid!" Mickey bellowed out between strikes. "Another problem!!"
"We have to go!" Trent added, panicked now.
"Shut up," Ethan said. "What's happening in there?"
Mickey had to yell as loud as he could to be heard over the growing cacophony of screams. "We got some gas coming in through the vents! It's...holy Christ."
"What? What?!?"
Screams of panic turned into shrieks of pain. Ethan was pretty sure that Mickey said, "Gas...it's like acid..."
Ethan began to hammer wildly, ineffectively at the door. "Open, you piece of shit!"
Mickey's voice became unnaturally calm. "We're done. You gotta get out of here."
"That's what I've been saying!" Trent was in a full-on panic now.
"Shut the fuck up! Mickey! Help me out here!"
"No good, kid. Go."
The screams and panicked banging against doors grew in intensity, as if to emphasize Mickey's assessment of the hopelessness of their situation. Ethan saw the sense in what he was saying and nodded to himself. "Rach, take everyone to the other side of the school. Keep the radio close."
"What about you?"
"I'll be right behind you. I promise."
Rachel trusted him. She took a moment to address Mickey, and a few tears rolled down her cheeks. She put her palm flat on the door. "Mickey..."
"Hey, girlie. It's been fun. If you ever meet anyone I know, tell them I kept trying to sleep with you. I have a rep to protect."
She laughed through her tears. "I'll tell them you were wearing me down."
"Attagirl. Bye."
She led the other four away from the gym. Trent seemed happier than anyone to be led away from there, even though his escorts were being none-too-gentle about it.
"Kid, you still there?"
"I'm not leaving yet."
"Yes, you are. You have people who are counting on you. You did good here. Your dad will be proud when he hears about it. But do me a solid, Ethan."
"Name it."
"Make someone pay. And forgive me for what I have to do. I just can't let everyone...I just can't..."
Ethan heard two knocks on the other side of the door. It was a goodbye. He had a suspicion that he knew what Mickey's last remark meant, and he didn't want to be around for it. "I will," he said mostly to himself.
He took one more frustrated whack at the door, then ran after the group.
As he ran away, Ethan heard a semi-familiar sound. It was the whupwhupwhup of a helicopter landing on the roof. It almost masked the rapid popping sounds coming from the gym.
Almost.
Aw come on...like we need another problem. He knew that they any zombies that may be in the area would descend on the school in short order because of the noise. He called Rachel.
She answered with, "Do you hear that? I think it's a helicopter!"
"Yeah, that's what it sounds like."
"I doubt it's a rescue."
"Stay far away from the roof, and don't even think about going outside until I tell you. When I do, move to the parking lot as fast as you can."
"Where are you going?"
"We need transportation, babe. Just get ready."
"All of the keys are locked in the bomb shelter!"
"Hopefully not all of them."
* * *
The obese cowboy zombie was utterly ruined from the neck up, and a few weeks of decomposition hadn't exactly helped his looks. Ethan held his breath and grimaced as he rifled through his suit jacket pockets. He came up with a handkerchief, flask and a silver tin of cigarettes.
This man was a traditionalist, Ethan thought, but these don't help me for shit.
He patted down the pockets on the man's prodigious backside. Nothing. He reached for the man's front pockets, but they were buried under his enormous girth. Ethan's initial attempt to roll him over met with failure and a pulled muscle in his lower back. He took a breath and readjusted. He knelt and leaned over he man's back. He managed to slide a pudgy arm around his neck. He lifted a heavy leg and slid his own between the dead man's, planting his foot against the wall for leverage. He heaved backwards and pushed off the wall at the same time. The man finally rolled onto his back and temporarily pinned Ethan's leg.
Ethan extricated himself and patted down the pockets. He hoped the lump in the man's right one was what he thought it was. He had a hard time getting his hand inside the taut fabric, but when his fingers closed on jagged metal, he was reinvigorated. He freed the keys with a hard yank. He heard the fabric tear as he did, and the keys were free.
"Thanks, Tex," Ethan said as he sprinted back up the stairs. He hoped the large man had a large ride.
Chapter 21: Familiar Territory
Ethan experienced an odd moment when he made it to the parking lot. The first thing he had to do was wait until the helicopter had gone. As he'd suspected, it wasn't a rescue. It was an escape. If he wasn't mistaken, its path would take it right into town. He had no idea why anyone would willingly go into that area, but didn't really have any time to waste thinking about it.
He had just started walking through the lot in search of Tex's Cadillac. At least, the keychain was for a Cadillac. He hoped that Tex wasn't one of those guys who headfaked people with a high-end keychain but really drove a POS. He assumed that a man of Tex's size would choose to park as closely as possible, so he began at the handicapped spaces and pressed the unlock button on the fob every few seconds, straining to hear that telltale short beep.
Luck was with him, and he soon heard the beep. He hit the button a few more times until he had pinpointed the exact location. It was, Ethan was relieved to find, not only a Cadillac, but an SUV. He couldn't have asked for better. He only hoped the battery was still good. It had only been sitting for about three weeks; in warm weather, that shouldn't present a problem.
He hadn't gotten halfway there when a dark figure came out of the woods near the back edge of the lot. At first, he'd thought it was one of Trent's goons and ducked behind a car, but it wasn't moving like one. It didn't move like a zombie, either.
It moved like a man out for a stroll in the woods. This was reinforced by the fact that the man was speaking. Ethan strained to make out the words.
They were numbers. "...seventy-one, seventy-two, seventy-three..."
And there Ethan was, spying on a man who was walking alone in a zombie infested town and seemingly unconcerned by it, counting whatever he was counting. But he was a human, and the vehicle had plenty of room, so Ethan felt honor-bound to see if he wanted to come along. He stood and threw out a tentative, "Sir?"Are you okay?"
The man continued walking toward him, and counting.
Great, Ethan thought. He keyed his mic and whispered, "Rachel. You at the door?"
"Yes."
"Okay, get ready to move. You'll see a big black Escalade in the second row, right behind the handicapped spaces. Head right to that. I think we picked up another passenger."
"Huh?"
"I'll explain when we get moving. Hold on a sec..." He left the counting man where he was and walked to the SUV. Ethan opened the door, put the key in, mentally crossed his fingers, and turned. The engine roared to rea
ssuring life. The man turned his head at the noise, but never lost his place counting. "We're in business. Come on out."
Two seconds later, a door opened and the group of five moved quickly towards the SUV. Even Trent, who wanted to escape from whatever he'd helped to unleash in the school, seemed to be cooperating.
Ethan turned back to the man. At some point his count had flipped back to the beginning, because he was in the twenties. "Sir, you've got to come with me, okay? Can you hear me?" He got no response other than more numbers. "I don't want to leave you here, but-"
"Ethan," Ann whispered.
"Just get in the car, already," he said, without taking his eyes from the counting man. "Man, I will leave you here if you don't move your ass."
"Ethan!" This time it was more of an urgent hissper. It got his attention. "What?"
Ann said nothing, but she was pointing off to Ethan's right. He turned and saw no less than twenty zombies walking towards them. He froze. "Do they see us?"
Five heads nodded vigorously.
Then why aren't they charging? Ethan wondered. It almost didn't matter, because even at their entirely uncharacteristic slow pace the zombies would be closer to the SUV than the survivors were in a few seconds. They'd left in such a hurry that they had no weapons at the ready, other than a pipe and a single pistol with maybe ten rounds left. They couldn't retreat, because the door that they came out of would have locked automatically. He motioned for the group to continue to the car. Slowly, he mouthed. They hesitated, and he reiterated, GO.
They began to move at an agonizingly slow pace that was still somehow faster than the zombies' almost disinterested shuffle. The zombies showed no signs of aggression. They seemed almost...docile. Ethan took the counting man by his elbow and tugged. He didn't respond well to voice commands, but he let himself be led easily enough. "There you go, buddy. Almost there."
Rachel's group made it to the SUV and began to pile in through the open driver's side door. Ethan was struck by how much it reminded him of clowns climbing out of a tiny car, only in reverse. "A few more steps pal," Ethan said. The zombies were uncomfortably close to Ethan and his guest, not that any distance between a human and a zombie could truly be classified as "comfortable."