Very softly, and with an agonizingly slow gait, footsteps echoed from around the corner.
Sarah's skin crawled and her pulse quickened.
He couldn't be here. She wasn't ready.
Sarah was hidden behind the rows of tall shelves, but she was still standing out in the open by the windshield washer fluid, and she didn't dare to move.
The soft claps of feet came one by one from around the corner. Sarah prayed that they would travel in a different direction, but they came straight for her. She had walked right past that swinging door leading to the McDonald's, and she never thought to peek inside. He had been hiding in there the whole time, and now she was trapped.
Sarah looked at the doors around her. The ones leading to the offices obviously had no escape, but the one behind her looked like it led outside. She stared at the push bar for a while, not sure she could work up the courage to go for it. But as the footsteps rounded the corner and came into the department, hidden on the other side of the shelves, she knew it was her best option.
She wedged the baseball bat between her side and one of the shoulder straps on the backpack then slid the AK-47 off her shoulder, aiming it toward the end of the shelves where the footsteps were heading. She backed up slowly, never taking her eyes off the edge of the shelf, and it made her jump when her backpack bumped into the door. She reached a hand behind herself and shoved on the push bar. It depressed, but the door didn't open.
The sound of chains rattling could faintly be heard on the other side.
Her eyes went wide. She pushed on the door again, but was met with the same result. This time she turned around and shoved on it with her arm and her entire bodyweight, but it was hopeless. She spun around in a panic just as the footsteps came to the end of the shelf and the figure came into view.
It wasn't the killer.
A woman who looked like she had been in her mid-fifties stood in front of her in the flashlight's glow. Her hair was long and filthy, patches of it torn out. Her clothes were tattered, leaving just the collar of an old t-shirt and one half of the shirt to cover her right shoulder and breast as the other side exposed a moldy and lopsided bra. Her skin was leathery and gray, and her pale eyes followed along the floor, finally spotting Sarah's shoes as they went and widening when they got up to her face. The woman groaned as its mouth fell open, releasing a skin-crawling sound echoing in the enclosed department.
Sarah stood in shock, not expecting what was in front of her. Before she could react, she heard the swinging door of the McDonald's open again, and more footsteps came out. But the sounds were muddy and confusing. Her ears strained, puzzled by what she was hearing at first, and then she realized that she wasn't hearing one set of footsteps, but several.
She aimed the AK at the zombie just as it started to come for her. She was about to pull the trigger, but a voice inside her head shouted at her not to. She was pinned down and had to get out of there, but she knew that if she used all of the ammo on zombies, her stand against the killer would fall decidedly flat.
In a split-second of inner turmoil, she struggled with two choices, and at the last second, she grunted in frustration before throwing the rifle over her shoulder and pulling out the baseball bat.
The zombie hurtled for her as Sarah stepped forward and wound up. She twisted and swung the bat across her body. It connected magnificently and shattered the zombie's skull, leaving a puff of blood in the air as its body was sent into the shelf next to her, bouncing off and hitting the floor. As it started to writhe around, Sarah stepped over it and drove the bat down onto the back of its skull, crushing it completely and leaving the zombie motionless.
The other sets of footsteps rounded the corner into the automotive department, boxing her in. They quickened when they heard the commotion inside, and they already started to softly grown in curiosity.
Sarah held the blood-crusted bat, waiting in the back corner for them to come. She prayed they all came around the same shelf so she could slip out the other way and not have to deal with any of them, but when the footsteps split up into all different directions, her heart sank.
The backpack weighed heavily on her shoulders, and swinging the bat the first couple times were taxing. She thought of using the assault rifle again, knowing that she would never even get to face the killer if she didn't make it out of here alive, but the voice in the back of her head still shouted at her not to.
She didn't know what the voice was at first, but the answer slowly came to her that it was the voice of a newfound confidence she never had before. It was the one born in that barn when she woke up in the early morning, the one that told her she didn't have to be afraid anymore, the one that told her that she was capable to take care of herself now. It didn't take away her fear, but it let her know that she could work through it and survive. She let that voice guide her as the zombies began to pour out from either side of the shelves.
Two zombies came around the right side of the shelf in front of her where the previous one had appeared. Another one came from the left, and still there were at least two or three more unaccounted for on the other side of the shelves.
Sarah looked between them, indecisive as they boxed her in. She had a few seconds' advantage in the time the zombies took to stop and stare at her in shock before they realized they'd found a meal, and she took the opportunity and jogged for the single zombie on the left.
The backpack bounced around behind her as the straps pulled down on her shoulders and the contents inside rumbled around. Sarah used her momentum and swung the bat, following through as she jogged past the zombie, giving the bat an extra punch.
The zombie's nose cracked and shoved up into its skull as its head flew back and its body rotated in the air, slamming down on its back.
Sarah bent over and smashed the bat down on its face twice more until it was a crushed and bloody pulp and its flailing arms stopped moving.
The two that had seen her before came around to the back where she had been standing and followed her in a hurried trot.
There was an empty aisle next to the felled zombie she stood over, or she could have continued forward and wrapped around the edge of the department. When a zombie appeared at the other end of the aisle next to her, it made the choice clear.
She ran forward and rounded the corner, running into two more undead. She bowled into them as she tried to stop, and their bodies stumbled backward, their faces painted in sheer surprise.
Hurried footsteps came behind her, and she knew they would round the corner at any moment.
Sarah felt trapped, and her heart rate increased, her anxiety starting to get the best of her. That voice in her head that told her she could do this started to fade away, and she was suddenly unsure of herself. That made her arms shake, and it made her grip on the bat feel loose and slippery.
Then an epiphany came to her, clear and brilliant. Strange machinations in her mind were at work, and they suddenly produced to her the image of the killer, imposing it on each of the two zombies in front of her. She saw his long, greasy black hair, his crazy eyes and his demented smile.
The two killers leered at her, starting to gain their composure and moving toward her.
The image caused something to snap in Sarah, and she thrust forward and slammed one of them in the side of the head with the bat, sending him crashing into the wall, then she planted her feet and swung the bat the other way, aiming low and taking out the other killer's leg.
His knee popped like a chicken wing and he collapsed to the ground, his ridiculous smile still beaming as his face pointed up at the ceiling.
Sarah hopped over the two killers, who were still alive, but injured. She looked behind her as the two sets of footsteps following her rounded the corner, and she saw two more holograms of the killer stalking her. She continued to run, but her ankle and the backpack slowed her down.
She spun around as she got to the end of the shelf near the front of the automotive department, facing the killers with her bat rai
sed.
Another one came at her from the side and tackled her, hysterically clawing at her and trying to bring his gnashing teeth to her neck.
Sarah stumbled and bounced off the wall. The killer clung to her, and she instinctively pulled the bat up with both hands and wedged it between them, pressing it against his neck. He was stronger than her, and he kept pushing her toward the wall, keeping her pressed against it as the other killers closed in.
She cried out and used the bat to twist him around and redirect his momentum, sending him crashing into the others. Sarah stumbled backward, feeling the pain in her ankle swell up as she regained her footing.
Another killer came around the corner from the end of the aisle where she had come from, and now she saw all of them lined up in front of her: the one that just appeared behind them all, the two that she had beaten down to the ground who had now gotten back to their feet, the two who had been following her, and the one who tackled her.
Six killers stood in front of her, and they all sized each other up.
Sarah felt the weight of the bat in her hand, and it almost felt like an extension of her own body now. It was comfortable and easy. She looked from one menacing face to the next, and though her adrenaline kept her on edge, a sense of calm came over her.
She took a wide stance and let them come one by one. And one by one, she struck them down, the bat causing mists of blood to spray out of their fractured skulls as their bodies sailed every which way. Each hit felt incredibly satisfying as the bat erased their demented faces.
Every last one of them hit the ground, and her arms were exhausted, but she wasn't through. As they all writhed on the ground, trying to get back to their feet, she marched up to each one and extinguished their lives forever.
She stood in the midst of the lifeless pile of zombies, breathing heavily. She felt a heavy mask of perspiration on her face, but when she touched it she realized it was blood and knew it wasn't hers.
Sarah stumbled out of the department and headed for the exit of the store, passing through the housewares department. She grabbed a towel and wiped the zombies' blood off her face, drying off her front as well.
When she was out of the store and back in the brisk whiteness of the afternoon, she stopped for a moment and took a breath before carrying on. She knew the road ahead of her wasn't easy, but she was filled with the confidence that she could do it.
Her mind was on the killer and the showdown that was coming.
16
The Hospital
Sarah practically fell through the doors of the hospital. She dropped to her hands and knees and gasped for air. After a long journey to get there, the sliding glass doors leading to the emergency wing were locked, and she had to heave a heavy rock through it to gain entry.
Her instincts had been correct about the hospital being abandoned. She had to wedge her way through a gap in a warped fence surrounding the property, and there were no vehicles in sight. The parking lot had been cracked and broken apart with tall weeds growing through, and she envisioned that that was what it had looked like before the world went down the drain.
A particularly odious smell hit her and she turned her nose up and tried her best to ignore it as she slowly lifted herself off the ground and took a look around. She desperately wanted to peel the heavy backpack off her shoulders, but she made an agreement with herself that she would do it once she scoped out the building and settled in a few floors higher first.
She flicked the flashlight on and looked over the counter at the emergency check-in. Old furniture and computers sat in the room behind it, and the whole area gave off an intensely creepy vibe. It hadn't dawned on her that picking an abandoned hospital would be in any way harmful to her psyche, but it had already started to put her on edge.
On the entire trip to get here, she thought about the killer as she occasionally glanced over her shoulder, and she was surprised that she hadn't seen or heard a single trace from him since the night before and she wondered if she really did get off the hook. But she refused to entertain the idea until she got prepared. When she was finished, she would reassess the situation then.
Sarah passed a gift shop, heading in the other direction now, and a couple of derelict elevators sat sadly in the wall.
The hospital had a fairly long and straight design, and the hallway she walked along stretched in front of her all the way to the other end of the building, separated only by a few sets of doors along the way.
She found a map on the wall and shone the flashlight on it, seeing all the different wings of the hospital lit up in once-vibrant, but now faded colors. The building was four floors high, and she decided that the third floor, barring any unforeseen circumstances, would be where she would make her stand. The straightforward layout of the hospital didn't afford any circular routes, opting only for long hallways connected by elevator or staircase, and she had been disappointed that it didn't give her as much flexibility as she was hoping for. But it was fine. She would just need to adapt, and if the killer closed in on her, she could always flee down or up the staircase to the next floor.
Sarah passed the radiology check-in, glancing down a branching hallway leading off to the side with signs on the walls asking patients to turn off their cell phones. She pointed the flashlight up at the ceiling and saw a sign ahead with an arrow pointing to the left and a symbol of a black stick figure heading up a flight of stairs.
She went up to the door and shone the flashlight through the little window in it, checking around in the corners for any surprises. When it appeared empty, she opened the door and the long-unused metal handle produced a whine that echoed up the tall shaft. She paused at the foot of the stairs, looking up and sighing.
The heaviness of the backpack on her shoulders pulled at her now more than ever, but she soldiered through it and started heading up, one step at a time. She stopped at the second floor and poked her head out into the long hallway stretching north and south. She didn't go far, but she wanted to check around a little just to make sure the floor truly was empty. But she didn't hear anything or see anything, and so she headed up to the third and then the fourth floors, coming up with the same result.
When she stood on the top floor, she took a moment to stare out the window. The sun was setting and she had a perfect view of the reds and oranges washing over the horizon. Every once in a while she would come across a strange existential moment, or something of beauty would nudge her and remind her that it still existed amid the mundane and cruel world that remained. This was one of them, and as she admired the sunset's beauty, she felt sad as she realized that whatever was out there in the universe—the sun, the stars, billions of other planets, some perhaps teeming with life not too different than what had been brought up on Earth—all of it continued on without a second thought while Earth and everything on it slowly died.
When the moment passed, she got back to work. Sarah made her way down to the third floor again and dropped her backpack on a bench near the nurses' station. She took the AK-47 off her neck as even that had started to really irritate her, and she set it down next to the backpack. She opened the zipper and started pulling out each item that she picked up, setting them down on the floor next to her. When they were all lined up in a row, she swept the flashlight across each one, going through the plan in her head.
Windows occasionally interspersed the rooms on the west side of the hallway, and as the sun disappeared over the horizon and was replaced by the moon, there should have been just enough light to see where she was going without the aid of the flashlight if worst came to worst. But darkness and low visibility was part of her plan.
She set off to work, finding good places for each of her booby-traps and makeshift items. It took longer than she anticipated to prepare, and night soon fell. When she picked up the second can of primer spray to finish off her plan, she glanced out a window and saw that she was out of time.
Just inside the fence where she had come in, the killer stood, staring up a
t her. He was just a dark silhouette in the moonlight, but she could see the light glinting off the blade of his knife as he slowly twisted it back and forth by his side.
That familiar and insidious fear grew inside her like a seeping gas, causing her to tremble. Now that she was actually standing in an abandoned hospital with the killer about to come in and add her to a long list of victims, she started to have second thoughts about what she was doing.
But now it was far too late.
17
Showdown
Sarah stepped back from the window, looking up and down the hallway, not knowing what to do. She had gone over everything in her head beforehand, but now that the time had come, she seized up.
She ran over to the backpack and stuffed the primer spray inside with the leftover road flare and hid it behind the desk at the nurses' station. She stuffed her head inside the football helmet and made sure the face mask and chinstrap were secure. It obscured her vision, blocking her peripheral and making it hard to see what was around her. It also muffled her hearing, leaving her vulnerable to missing subtle noises that she may have otherwise picked up. But she needed protection more than anything.
Sarah grabbed the baseball bat and hid it in a cramped closet in one of the patient rooms in case she needed it later.
Pulling the assault rifle off her shoulder, she ran back to the window, hearing her own breathing amplified in the cramped spaces of the helmet. Her eyes scanned the empty lot, but she didn't see him. She pressed her head to the glass, bumping the front of the helmet into it as she frantically tried to see down to the entrance, but he was already inside.
Sarah looked at each end of the long hallway, keeping an iron grip on the rifle. Her heart was like a jackhammer and she tried to calm down, but it was no use. She jogged to the stairwell next to the nurses' station and quietly opened the door, poking her head in and listening.
Ashes in the Mouth (Zombie Apocalypse Series Book 3) Page 15