The Decline

by Jessulat, Christopher

  Something unspoken told Emily to go to the bedroom and look out the window there, survey the streets on the other side of the building.

  She could hear Jacob and Madison debating their course of action, but she couldn’t make out the words.

  Emily stared at the church.

  A trick of the eye.

  The windows vibrated; the pattern of light striking the glass wavered momentarily.

  Suddenly it burst, glass twinkling in the morning sun as it spilled into the street.

  Emily’s hand covered her mouth as she stifled a scream.

  She began to tremble and shake, finally succumbing to a terrified sob.

  Madison rushed into the room to find Emily pale and stricken.

  As she moved to comfort her, she caught sight of the throng of corpses filtering out the church window. Emily buried her face into Madison’s shoulder as Madison wrapped her arm around her.

  The two huddled together as the column of ghouls began to advance towards the sounds of gunfire.

  ***

  The howling stopped.

  Feeling sick to his stomach, Sully recoiled from the aperture.

  Keeley ran towards their downed companion.

  Cox unconsciously took a step back and dropped the expended magazine from her .45.

  Isaac snapped back to the present, realizing that in her grief Keeley hadn’t recognized the futility of the situation. He bounded over the last few obstacles and intercepted her path, catching her with an arm around her waist and lifted her clear off her feet. He wrestled with her as she fought to get past him, arms outstretched and sobbing.

  Several ghouls now knelt and joined in the meal, but the space about their dead friend was becoming crowded. As more ghouls poured from the stairway, some were becoming more focused on those yet living.

  Cox slammed another clip into the .45. She snapped off a few rounds as she continued to backpedal.

  Anders came in to the main chamber and recognized their dilemma.

  ‘This way!’ he cried, waving his companions back out to the yard.

  Realizing they had lost any semblance of advantage, Sully dashed towards Anders.

  Though Isaac continued to grapple with Keeley, her thrashing was calming and Cox was falling back to their position.

  ‘We’ll clear the exit,’ Anders offered as he assessed their situation. Sully nodded to him as he ran past.

  Anders and Sully turned from the chamber and fell back.

  Sully darted through the winding corridor towards the entrance. As he rounded the final corner, a lone ghoul roared and raised its hands. Instinctively, Sully smashed its face with the butt end of the .308. The creature was sent spinning as its jaw was blasted off its hinge and crumpled to the floor. Anders threw his body against the riveted door and it swung open into the deceivingly cheerful daylight.

  Any relief that either felt at being outside would be short lived.

  A stack of ghouls, at least a dozen deep, staggered toward them from around the back corner of the barracks. A formidable line of hungry corpses shuffled through the streets from where they came.

  Anders spun on his heels, trying to determine where to run.

  A few more shots echoed from the chamber.

  The nearest infected cried out and picked up speed as they were presented with the prospects of fresh meat.

  Sully emerged from the darkness and skidded to a stop behind Anders.

  Sully cursed under his breath; trapped between a rock and a hard place.

  No doubt they were spotted.

  As Sully scanned the horizon for options, Anders grabbed him by the sleeve and pulled him towards the derelict tangle of vehicles. Several ghouls broke off from the main mass and followed them. It would have been more but for the continuing shots from the .45 echoing from somewhere inside the structure.

  Anders led them to a high backed transport, scrambled up the fender and into the bed. Sully threw the rifle up to him and Anders hauled the Irishman over the battered tailgate. The two fell back into the truck and into a pile of frost-covered corpses. Each shifted some bodies and sank into the ruin, concealing themselves as best they could beneath a layer of death.

  Anders tightly shut his eyes and tried to count how many ghouls had broken off to pursue them. He replayed the moments as best he could in his head, trying to differentiate between the infected by whatever detail he could pick out.

  His eyes snapped open as a pair of fists rapped against the tailgate; a burst of clarity in his otherwise chaotic thoughts.

  When they emerged from the barracks…

  They failed to shut the door.

  ***

  Madison watched helplessly as the grim procession shuffled towards the barracks. Nose pressed to the wall, only her eyes crested the window sill.

  Jacob had seen Anders and Sully dart in and amongst the vehicles but lost sight of them in the jumble of metal and meat.

  Emily sat with her arms wrapped around her knees and stared vacantly at the wall.

  As Madison studied the terrible parade mindlessly shamble about the streets, she couldn’t help but remember the Apple Blossom festival back home. The whole community would all but shut down, surrendering the streets to tacky floats and relics of a time that stubbornly refused to submit. They would sit, year after year, gathered together on the lawns and watch the same sad, small town floats drift along the same predictable course.

  As silly as it was, she couldn’t help but feel the world would be sadder for it.

  This was a very different parade.

  Madison and Jacob had been staying out of sight, puzzling about what to do.

  None of the options sounded plausible.

  As the two continued their debate, Emily interrupted unexpectedly.

  ‘We should leave them.’

  ***

  Keeley was tiring and struggled less.

  Isaac was dragging her away, back towards the entrance.

  Cox continued to select her targets with care as she fell in beside the others.

  ‘We need to go,’ she barked between shots.

  Isaac twisted Keeley around and ushered her towards the door with the corporal close behind. Most of the creatures that yet poured from the basement paused to join in the frenzy about Daniel; Cox had sufficiently thinned the rest. A few broke off from the feast to pursue them, but they were gaining some distance.

  With only a few more yards to go, the first ghoul rounded the corner to the main chamber from where they had entered together.

  Cox’s .45 was up in a flash, blasting a perfectly placed round through the thing’s forehead. With the proximity of the flash and the subconscious signal that their exit was now cut off, Keeley seemingly regained control of her body.

  The dead now approached them from two sides.

  ‘Fuck,’ Cox cursed as she slammed her final clip in. She racked the slide on the Colt, ‘I’m almost out.’

  Sensing Keeley’s change in demeanor, Isaac released his hold around her waist and considered their options.

  They couldn’t go back.

  Ghouls continued to filter into the room, groaning and growling, lifeless eyes wild with hunger.

  Isaac put his hands on the corporal’s shoulder and shoved her into the middle of the chamber, towards the immeasurable remains.

  ‘That’s further in,’ she protested.

  Isaac glared at her; he didn’t need the reminder.

  ‘Well, there’s nothing coming from that direction,’ he retorted cynically.

  Cox dropped the nearest ghoul as it lurched towards them, its frost-bitten flesh bursting under the percussion of the .45.

  The trio waded into the sea of death, away from the grim familiarity of the entrance and pushed towards the far right end of the chamber. Isaac led them on, pausing occasi
onally to chop anything on the floor he thought had moved as Keeley traced his footsteps as best she could. He had no idea whether this direction was safe or suicide, but knew insofar as he and Sully had pressed along the offices they’d find no shelter there.

  Their only chance was to push deeper.

  Cox brought up the rear, choking back painful tears as she watched many of the ghouls pouring from the entrance jockey for position at the meal.

  His sacrifice had kept them alive.

  Even now, as his blood wet the tile, he was buying them time.

  As she glanced over her shoulder she realized that not every ghoul in the chamber was content with fighting for the leftovers.

  ***

  Madison turned from Emily and lowered her eyes to the floor.

  ‘Look, they’re not getting out from that,’ Emily pleaded, appealing to her companions’ better sense, ‘we have a chance!’

  Jacob left the room in disgust and went back to the front window.

  His heart rate was elevated; he could feel every beat in his stitches.

  He flicked a few of the blinds down and surveyed the yard.

  ‘We warned them,’ she sobbed, ‘we fucking told them!’

  Only a handful of ghouls had broken off to pursue Anders and Sully – the rest had mostly disappeared into the depths of the Armories.

  ‘Madison, you know I’m right,’ Emily continued, unabashed. ‘They’re all going to die. If we go after them, we’ll die too.’

  Madison ignored her and peered out the bedroom window.

  Emily brazenly folded her arms across her chest, clearly annoyed that common sense was lost among her company.

  Madison scanned both directions; the line had thinned out. A few ghouls staggered up the street but no more dead belched from the church.

  She whispered to Jacob and the two plotted once more.

  Emily hugged herself tightly and began to sniffle.

  ‘We’re not going to make it,’ she lamented as heavy tears streaked her face.

  Jacob cursed their vantage; their sight lines were limited.

  He missed his hatchet.

  They had only kept a handful of kitchen knives with them.

  It would have to do.

  ***

  They reached the back of the chamber.

  As they neared the entrance to another dark corridor, Cox shifted to the head of the column and Isaac dropped back to the rear. Keeley was moving under her own power, but she was in a daze, eyes thick with fog and disillusionment.

  Cox immediately noticed the same bundle of wiring tacked to the ceiling and set about tracing its winding path. Sidearm raised and at the ready, she led them through the blood soaked aisles as fast as they could manage in the dreadful darkness, always following the overhead web of wiring.

  She was on autopilot now, mind trying to reconcile Daniel’s sacrifice as an act of stupidity as much as selflessness.

  Whenever a creature emerged, Isaac would leap forward and drive the hatchet into its head until it went limp, then fall back to his position.

  Finally they arrived at a heavy set of doors with an uncharacteristically large cluster of wiring anchored to the ceiling as if it formed the center of a major intersection. Its fingers stretched outwards in all directions. The doors were reinforced metal, severe and imposing.

  It looked important.

  Cox pressed her ear against it and strained to hear anything at all.

  The cool metal of the door kissed her ear mischievously.

  The anguished sounds of their pursuit loomed in the shadows behind them.

  ‘Is this it?’ Isaac asked, trying to mask his fear.

  In the distant light from the main chamber, Isaac and Keeley could make out several silhouettes as they bobbed and lurched towards them.

  Their mournful chorus grew louder.

  The distance was closing.

  Keeley pressed her back against the wall, wishing she could sink into the cold concrete block.

  When Cox didn’t answer, he asked again, tone as sharp as the hatchet.

  ‘Is this it, or do we keep pushing?’

  Cox didn’t reply. She removed her ear from the door and threw her shoulder against it. It scraped against the floor but didn’t yield.

  Isaac took a deep breath and brandished the hatchet as he stepped towards the advancing line of corpses.

  ***

  Why won’t they wander off?

  Anders kept his eyes shut as tightly as he could as the creatures continued to beat the outside of the truck. The irregular drumming of their dead hands against the steel made it impossible to tell their number. Their voices were virtually indistinguishable, the same breathless sound of grating stone.

  Anders felt as if he was suffocating beneath the weight of his camouflage. While the infected seemingly lacked the fine motor control required to climb, they clearly weren’t interested in anything but their whereabouts. He considered fighting his way out, but each time he had nearly mustered the courage to do it, he pictured a ghoul cresting the tailgate just as he revealed himself.

  So he waited.

  Sully also grew restless, but in a different way. His stomach was in his throat and his breath felt shallow. He knew he had made the merciful choice, the choice he hoped anyone would make for him, but the sight of Daniel’s body exploding through the aperture burned his eyes.

  It wasn’t getting any easier.

  He lied still, hoping the terrible images would fade.

  ***

  Cox reeled back and threw herself against the door again.

  Isaac swung the hatchet in a wide and upward arc, burying the blade beneath the jaw of the nearest ghoul. He grabbed the creature by its collar with his free hand, taking a few steps back as he twisted the hatchet free.

  He couldn’t slow them enough.

  The dead were almost on top of them.

  Keeley stared at the blood soaked floors and gasped for air.

  The crowd of ghouls was thick and several deep. Isaac had been able to pick off the few loners at the head of the column, but he now struggled for options as he retreated from their perverse line.

  A bullet snapped over his shoulder and the face of a ghoul exploded, bits of bone and flesh burst onto the walls. The fallen ghoul delayed those behind it for a moment, and the once seemingly impenetrable front now had a gap.

  Isaac seized the moment and rushed forward, hatchet spiking down and collapsing the skull of another. He gripped the hatchet with both hands and yanked it free as he bounded back a couple steps, out of reach of the prying hands that slashed the air at him.

  Cox could see Isaac was almost out of real estate.

  His arms were low at his side; exhaustion was claiming him.

  She squeezed off another round into the crowd and crashed against the door.

  It grinded open an inch, but refused to give. Something barricaded it closed from within.

  Cox screamed in desperation and kicked the door.

  The stroke echoed pitifully into the black corridors, drowned out by the coming tide.

  Keeley straightened off the wall.

  Isaac was backpedalling fast now; the ghouls’ pace quickened.

  Cox fired twice more before she launched herself against the metal a final time. It yielded beneath the weight of the blow but she found herself involuntarily following it in; her shin banged into something hard and she tumbled awkwardly into the gloom.

  Before she could regain her senses, she was under attack.

  A uniformed ghoul was on top of her in an instant. She fought to keep the jaws from finding her flesh, but the sudden ferocity had her on the defensive from the outset.

  The absolute black of its eyes reflected the dark of the room as its teeth gnashed wildly.

  As Cox squirmed
beneath the creature, it shuddered violently, and its thrashing stopped. Its dead weight sagged on the corporal as she struggled to roll out from underneath it. A blade poked diagonally through its open mouth from where Keeley had driven her knife through the back of its neck, severing the brain stem. A thick morass of blood dripped down the blade.

  Isaac’s feet kicked and slid manically as he struggled to shift the filing cabinet back against the door. He had managed to sufficiently close the gap between the downed cabinet and the door to prevent a whole body from slipping through, but a tangle of hands and arms flailed between the few inches of space.

  The infected roared outside.

  Cox came up to an elbow and shirked the thing off of her.

  Jesus Christ… twice in one day…

  She kicked at the creature and shifted it a fraction of an inch, its head comically propped up off the floor by the blade yet protruding from its mouth.

  Cox’s gaze lifted to find Keeley kneeling over her. Isaac crossed the distance to them in a single bound, grabbed her by the shoulders and spun her to face him. Even in the dim light, Keeley could see the blood spatter dotting his skin and glasses, the fear of loss plainly written on his face. She met his eyes as he wrapped his arms about her.

  Stunned, she halfheartedly returned the embrace.

  He broke off the hug and scanned her, pushing the hair from her face and checking her for any visible cuts or scratches. Satisfied none of the blood on her was her own, he squeezed her shoulders warmly before returning his attention to the mounting throng eager to beat their way into the room.

  The ghouls’ primal, sorrowful wails continued as the inhuman crowd tried to squeeze through the narrow opening. The flesh of those at the front of the column was being torn by the edges of the doors as the line behind them surged and pushed, impossibly trying to cram through. Isaac swatted the ragged arms with the hatchet, but it wasn’t sharp enough to take a limb off in a single whack; instead it left a brutal wake of tattered bone and muscle.

  Cox’s head swam. She was sitting up now, holding herself up with her hands behind her and staring at the bloodstained floor between her boots. Daniel’s messenger bag hung heavy off of her, like a noose of weighted chain.

  As she considered the strange spectacle unfolding around her, she was overcome with something unfamiliar.