Bloody children streamed out of a doorway. Their small hands and teeth tore into the legs of several women who tried to help them. One woman lifted a child from the ground as it attached itself to her arm. It bit and growled like some rabid animal, clinging to the screaming woman.
Another man smashed a chair through the front window and attempted to flee. Mary watched as he ran to a car and fumbled in his pockets for the keys. Several of the creatures swarmed him. The car’s alarm began to blare as the man slammed onto the hood. Mary saw his arm rise straight in the air, holding the keys; the alarm bleeped off.
A body fell from the balcony onto the tile of the lobby in front of her. Blood began to pool at her combat boot–covered feet. Mary felt her arm being grabbed. She screamed.
“ Move, girl, we have to get out of here!” a woman screamed back at her while pulling her forward through the broken plate-glass window. The lady was fit, dressed in running gear. Mary did as little movement as possible, preferring to “contemplate life,” so her savior was moving faster than she could. Mary stumbled through the doorframe and over the chair. The woman paused and then yanked her forward. Mary’s shoulder felt as if it was being pulled from the socket, and her wrist screamed at the viselike grip. The cool air caused her to shiver. She was wearing a short black skirt and T-shirt; her leather jacket had been lost earlier. She kept brushing her long black-and-purple hair from her eyes.
“ Slow down, I can’t keep up,” Mary whimpered. The woman didn’t answer but pulled and dragged Mary as fast as she could from the front of the building. The glow of the bright lobby was lost to the gloomy lights of the parking lot. Cars were parked together in a chaotic mass. People had converged here in a hurry when it had been designated an evacuation zone. Mary tried to pull her hand free. “Thanks for your help; I have to go,” Mary tried to explain.
The woman was scanning the area, looking for the best way out. Taking a step this way and that, not finding what she was looking for, she finally pulled Mary up onto the hood of a car and began to pick her way across the crumpled metal. Mary slipped over the smooth hood of a sports car. Wrenching her arm free, she was better able to steady herself. The woman glanced back but did not stop moving forward. Mary followed as close as she could. She must be one of those crazy obstacle runners, Mary thought. Freaking obstacle Annie.
“ Annie” jumped, catlike, off the last car onto the grass between the parking lot and the road. She hissed and waved Mary forward. Suddenly all Mary could see was the road. She heard a soft thump as Annie jumped out of sight. “Come on!” a voice rasped from the darkness.
“I’m coming!” Mary hissed back.
A young boy clawed his way out from under a car. The skin above his right eyebrow was now hanging on his cheek, leaving thin blood trails as he staggered forward. He could see the silhouette between him and the well-lit road. Taking a few struggling steps forward, the boy groaned. Mary, dressed as she was in all black, disappeared into the ditch at the edge of the lot.
“Where are you, girl?” Annie’svoice asked.
“Mary.”
“ I’d say nice to meet you, but under the circumstances…” A noise further down the ditch caused them both to freeze and stare into the darkness. A raccoon was briefly visible, running from the ditch in the pool of light from a streetlight. Across the street a car door slammed and an engine revved. Tires squealed out of the lot as a woman came out of the building, screaming, “You have a duty to this station and to the state! Get back on that board!”
“ Where are you?” Annie’s hand grabbed Mary’s, and she sighed in relief. “Come on! It must be safe over there.” As if to urge them on, several screams and the sound of more breaking glass issued from behind them. Mary caught a glimpse of a young boy moving toward the ditch.
Annie ’sgrip tightened. “Let’s go!” Mary found herself being pulled out of the ditch, across the grass, and into the light of the road. She was surprised how fast Annie could move as they sprinted across the concrete. Mary glanced back; she could see people milling about in front of the YMCA they had just left. She knew none of them were alive, and she hoped they didn’t look over this way. Quickly as they could, Mary and Annie were off the road onto the grass in front of large windows spewing light.
“ Not good, too much glass,” Mary warned. Annie shushed her. They stopped at the corner, watching the screaming woman. She was standing several feet away in a parking lot, staring at the last place she had seen the taillights. She waited, clenching and unclenching her fists. “Get back here!” she yelled at the empty space. While she was yelling, another person ran past her. She made a mad grab for him.
“Get back in there!” she screamed.
“You’re crazy, Diane! Go home to your family!”
“You have a duty to our viewers!” “We’re a public broadcaster, you crazy bitch! No one is watching us!” The statement was punctuated by a slamming car door. The woman named Diane was advancing on the car as it started.
“Get back inside or you’re fired!”
“I quit! The dead are walking, and you’re insane!”
Diane jumped out of the way of the screeching car. Stamping her feet and shaking her fists, Diane continued to scream, “After all we’ve done! You’re fired! You’ll all be fired! I’m going to the boss!”
Annie dropped Mary ’s hand. She quickly moved out of the shadows, hurrying toward the flailing woman. Annie held up her hands, trying desperately to calm her. Mary could hear the groans of the undead across the street. She was torn between running and staying with her companion.
“ Shh, shh, they’ll hear you!” Mary whispered while Annie was trying to calm the raging Diane. Suddenly feeling very alone and vulnerable without being dragged along, Mary started to panic. Looking quickly around her, she heard everything moving and coming at her. Something popped up out of the ditch and disappeared again. Mary was at Annie’s side in an instant.
“Those ungrateful people…” Diane was growling but had calmed enough to notice where she was. Her eyes were darting around, searching the blackness outside the amber lights of the parking lot.
“ Please, let’s get inside. It’s not safe out here,” Annie coaxed. Mary was slowly edging her way to the door. She was sure there was something moving just out of the light of the lot. The shadows swayed and shook. Diane caught the look on Mary’s face. She spun to see what had the girl so entranced.
“ I see you! I see you. If you leave, don’t bother coming back!” Diane screamed. Mary spun to face the road, catching the flash of a car as it sped away. More shadows seemed to be moving across the pavement.
“ Seriously, it’s not safe! We need to get indoors.” Annie was trying to get Diane to focus. Fear was starting to overtake Mary. She strained her eyes until she was sure. Two of them were crossing the road. Mary waved frantically over Diane’s head, pointing across the road. Annie’s attention was completely on Diane, whose attention was on the back of the lot. Not wanting to make a noise but desperate to be seen, Mary jumped up and down, waving. Annie just waved her off, pulling on Diane’s sleeve.
Throwing her hands up in frustration, Mary let her panic carry her to the glass front door. Grabbing the handle, she pulled with more force than she needed. The door swung easily, banging into the low concert wall that stood nearby. Mary didn’t even pause as she ran into a small glass vestibule. Straight ahead was another door. Through it there was a reception desk and a lobby. Mary grabbed the handle and heaved. Her fingers slipped, and she fell back, banging into the first door, causing a crack she had made when she opened it to grow longer. The door to the lobby—and hopefully safety—remained tightly closed, mocking her.
That crazy lady must have a way back in , Mary thought. She spun around, pressing her hands against the glass. Staring into the darkness of the lot, she could see Annie still motioning to the door as she took a few steps toward it. Diane was pointing at the road, arguing with her. Mary breathed out in relief as she saw that Annie finally had Dian
e moving toward the building.
Mary felt suddenly drained. She was so tired, her shoulders ached from tension. She sagged, rubbing her eyes. Turning back to the lobby, she noticed it looked deserted. That was good. The YMCA had been full of people and police and the army, and it was overrun in minutes. Fewer people had to mean fewer zombies. Anxiously she turned, willing Annie and Diane to hurry. Mary’s warning was too late. She hadn’t been watching their progress, and Annie was too intent on getting Diane to follow her; they never saw the lone zombie lunge from behind the ornamental bush.
“Bill! No!” Diane yelled. Blood sprayed across her face and the window. Mary jumped away from the gore-covered glass. She was transfixed with horror.
Annie ’s throat blossomed out a deep crimson that spread down her shirt. Her hands flew to the wound, trying desperately to stem the stream shooting between her fingers. Diane finally seemed to finally understand what was going on. Annie tried to push Bill away. Diane ran past him. She threw open the outer door and flung Mary aside. Annie was pressed against the glass, and Bill was tearing into her shoulder. Her eyes met Mary’s. Annie began to slide down the window. Pulling the bloody hand from her throat, she pressed it to the glass. The look Annie gave Mary was filled with an apology, terror, and sadness. Bill lunged in again, desperate for another bite. He stopped, cocking his head to one side as if confused. Annie lay still. Bill’s attention was now on the two women in the glass cage.
Diane fumbled for her keys, dropped them, cursed loudly, picked them up, dropped them again, stamped her foot, and grabbed them again. Mary’s attention turned from the corpse that had been her companion to the one standing in front of her. Bill was bumping his hands and head into the glass. The loud cursing of Diane seemed to agitate him more by the second. Diane was oblivious; she continued to curse and stamp her feet as she retrieved her keys for the third time.
“ Shut up, he can hear you!” Mary warned. Bill’s fist crashed against the glass, rattling the entire wall. Mary was now very aware of the broken glass in the door. She stumbled back in terror, slamming into Diane.
“ Get off me!” Diane barked, pushing Mary off. Mary overbalanced and was thrown against the glass, face-to-face with Bill’s dead, staring eyes. Mary grabbed the outer door and held it tight. The keys hit the floor again.
“Open the damn door already!” Mary cried.
“I’m trying, I’m trying!” Diane whined.
Bill ’s fist hit the glass again. Mary jumped back but held the door firmly. Behind her she heard the key finally click in the lock. Bill moaned, slamming the glass again; the crack grew. Mary turned in time to catch the inner door before it shut. Diane was already halfway across the lobby. Mary was through the door, pulling it shut as fast as she could. Bill had stopped hitting the door, as it had splintered so much that he couldn’t see Mary clearly. She backed away slowly, not wanting to recapture his attention. A slamming door caused her to spin on the spot. She was now facing an empty lobby.
“ Bitch,” she breathed. “Bitch!” Anger forced the word out in a yell. “You almost left me!” She immediately regretted it. Bill pounded on the glass door, shattering the rest of it. Terror turning to fascination, Mary watched as Bill was completely baffled by the metal bar running across the middle of the door that held the lever to open it. No matter how much he tried, Bill could not seem to figure out how to move forward. “Not very bright, are you? I guess you could be considered…brain-dead.” Mary laughed at her own bad joke. She jumped, pulling her attention away from the fumbling zombie. His phone was ringing and vibrating in her pocket. She had been trying it for hours when she was waiting to evacuate with no luck. Fishing it out of the tight skirt, she quickly crossed the lobby to a door at the far end.
“Hello?” she whispered while she peered cautiously through a small window that looked in at a hallway.
“Mary! Thank God! I’ve been trying to get through for forever! Where are you?”
Mary’s brother Chris’s voice burst from the speaker. Mary flinched and switched ears, pushing the door open as she whispered, “I’m in that TV-station thing across from the Y.”
“Why are you there? Why aren’t you at the Y? That is the rescue center!”
Mary glared at her phone. Her brother always had the amazing ability to annoy her. “Maybe because of all the zombies there! Where are you, then?” Silence followed her question. “Chris?” Mary pushed the door open and slipped through it. She quietly eased the door shut. Through the phone came a loud crash and a muffled cry. Mary strained to hear what was going on. “Chris?” she whispered. There was another crash and what sounded like a door slamming.
“Hold on,” Chris hastily replied. A heavy thud, a start of an engine, and a quickly turned-off radio. “Stay where you are. I’m coming to get you.”
Mary edged forward and stopped instantly, terrified. “Why? Why aren’t you with Mom and Dad? Mom said you were going to the rescue center in at the end of Londonderry. She was pissed because I was over here, like I knew the dead were going to rise.” Her mother was always pissed at her lately, Mary thought. “Kevin and I had this date planned.” The last words caught in her throat. She had no idea where her boyfriend was or if he was OK. Then again, she had no idea why Chris wasn’t with their parents either, if they were OK.
Shaking off the fear from her head, she turned a corner. An empty office stared at her on the other side of the hall. She passed another open door. This one looked into a room full of blinking lights, computer screens, TV monitors, and tape decks. Halfway down the hall was a window that looked into a room with a very large screen sitting in front of a board with buttons and lights all over it. On the huge monitor, some kind of manufacturing plant was being toured.
Mary watched the man explain how to make gas burners. Not wanting to know but needing to, she asked. “Why isn’t Mom yelling at me?”
Chris sighed. “We never made it to the rescue center.”
“Where are you?”
“I just left the neighborhood.”
“Chris, where are Mom and Dad?”
“ Dead.” The silence that followed dragged on. Mary couldn’t register what she had just heard. Somewhere down the hall, a door slammed. Mary’s head snapped toward the sound. Chris spoke at last. “Listen, Mare”—a name she embraced yet hated—“just stay where you are. I’ll be there as soon as I can. It is a mess out here.”
“I’ll be here,” Mary whispered. The phone went silent. Mary hated the idea of being rescued by her brother. “The good twin,” she spat out.
“I don’t understand how twins could be so different,” her mother would often say.
The angry frown faded from her face as the realization of what Chris just told her sank in. Her parents were dead. Her stomach clenched, and she grabbed the wall. Were they dead dead, or were they wandering around dead? she wondered and then immediately felt awful for thinking it. She prayed they were dead dead. She had not gotten along well with her parents for the last couple of years, but she had never wanted this. Looking from her black fingernails to the all-black outfit, she cringed. She did it to annoy them more than anything else.
Her guilt was cut short as a door at the end of the hall was flung open. Diane strode through, moving with purpose. Mary caught a glimpse of stairs before the door swung shut.
“ I told him! I told him, the boss. I told him they all deserted us. I asked if I could fire them all, and he said yes!” Diane shouted while advancing on Mary. “I said they should be fired, and he agreed!” Diane laughed, grabbing Mary by the shoulders and shaking her painfully. “Fired…! Who are you? Get back on the switcher.”
Mary broke free and began to back away. “Whoa, hey, I don’t work here.”
“That’s right—you won’t unless you get back on that switcher!”
“You…you told your boss everyone left? Is he still here?” Mary demanded as she continued to back away. Diane was still advancing on her. Mary stayed just out of reach.
“ Yes, he
’s in his office upstairs. I said everyone should be fired, and he agreed! He always values my opinion. I can fire everyone, including you. Now, get back to work!” Diane’s eye bulged as she screamed, lunging at Mary again.
That was enough. Mary pushed past the flailing woman and ran to the door to the stairs. She was through the door, taking the stairs two at a time. Spinning around on the landing, she saw Diane had not followed. Taking the last set of steps at a quick pace, she paused at the door at the top. There was a small window embedded in the door. Mary peered through it at an empty open area that held some cubicles along the walls; some chairs sat in the middle of the room like a conversation area, but farther down the room, she couldn’t see.
Pushing the door open a crack, Mary heard the door at the bottom open. She backed away from the door and looked down at the floor below. Diane glared up at her. She threw her hands up. “Fine! I’ll run the whole thing by myself, and why not? I always have, and I always will!” she screamed. Mary watched Diane storm out of sight. Returning to the door at the top, Mary pushed it open and stopped cold. The sight that met her eyes sent her heart to her throat.
To her left was a short hallway that led to a break room. She could see overturned tables and chairs in the darkened room. A dark red stain ran the length of the hall, and bloody handprints littered the wall. In front of her was the large common area. A huge dry-erase board on wheels was lying on its side, blood smears obscuring the smudged writing. Mary carefully picked her way through some overturned chairs, smashed computer monitors, and broken keyboards. In the middle of the room was the conversation area. The small couch was drenched in blood. Something that looked like an ear was on the floor just under it.
Standing next to the gore-covered couch, Mary whispered, “Hello?” She heard no response. Didn’t Diane just say she had talked to the boss? Mary thought as she surveyed the trashed room. Cautiously she picked her way farther across the room. Kicking over a trash can, Mary cried out as she sprang back. Under the bin, still clutching a keyboard, lay a severed hand. Blood pooled behind the ownerless limb.
Nothing is Certain Page 3