The dead howl along after the thunder as it rumbles low in the clouds. In a wild frenzy, they scream as the vibrations course through the ground and up their withering legs.
A snap of lightning strikes a corpse on the street beside the apartments as Johnny pulls April up into the tree. “This probably isn’t the safest place to be during a lightning storm,” he remarks as he watches the corpse shake. Trails of electricity course through the creature and finally ground out as it shudders from the current. Sparks filter through the cadaver’s head, popping its eyes from their sockets.
“Holy shit…” April exclaims. “That was way too close.”
“Too late for second guesses, we have to go,” Johnny replies, hoisting her foot up between his interlaced fingers. “Climb!” he shouts.
Once on the branch, April extends her hand to help Johnny up. He kicks out at the bark of the tree while he grasps at her wrist, gaining enough traction to pull himself up.
Again, the sky crackles with light, sending another thunderous boom into the air. Johnny edges April forward, guiding her higher into the dampening branches after she rubs the pain from her wrist. Higher up, she slips and he catches her. She smiles back at him as her heart races.
“A little more,” he instructs.
“I’m going as fast as I can,” she replies, gripping the next branch.
“Don’t worry,” he says. “I won’t let you fall.”
She is caught up in his words, staring down at his outstretched arms. She smiles briefly. “I know,” she replies.
Directly against the building, April reaches out to a decorative lip jutting from the brickwork. Even wet, she can feel that it has grip. She pulls herself up and braces herself against a window as she stands on the flashing.
“Move along to the edge of the building, we’re going to have to climb up the gutter,” Johnny shouts over the rain as it begins to strengthen.
He climbs up next to her and places his back firmly against the bricks. He looks down and takes a deep breath as he closes his eyes, trying to purge the height from his mind.
“Okay, now what?” April asks once she’s next to the rain gutter.
“Use the fasteners around the gutter and pull yourself up,” he instructs. “You can use them for footholds too, but don’t try to use the gutter, itself, it’s too wet.”
April begins to ascend the gutter as the rain pelts her back. She pushes through the pain in her muscles and hoists herself up onto the roof, falling onto the hard, wet tile once she’s over. She breathes erratically through fear and exhaustion as she lies, waiting for Johnny.
His head finally pokes up and he throws his arms over and pulls himself onto the roof in time to hear another crack of thunder exploding from behind. Lying still, waiting for his heart to slow, he looks over to her and says between pants, “Tell me how good of an idea this was again.”
April laughs and looks into his eyes in remembrance. She misses how he used to be before life became so serious. And in a time of peril, it was good to know that, deep down he still had a sense of humor.
Drenched, Johnny gets to his feet and scours the roof for the ladder he saw yesterday through the binoculars. Leaned sideways against the lip of the roof, it glistens from the rain that soaks its surface. The wood is aged and bleached from the sun, but looks sturdy enough.
“All right, let’s do this,” he says as he picks the ladder up and extends it as far as it will go.
Standing it on end, he gently lowers the ladder to the next building, careful not to let it drop. Once it is extended out far enough, he drops to the lip of the next roof with a wet slap. He peers over the side of the building at a half dozen corpses reaching upward toward him. They wear the same hungry, lustful looks as every other body he’s seen, but soaked under the backdrop of lightning, they somehow manage to frighten him that much more.
“That’s great,” he says as the dead are lit up from behind by another flash. “Whatever you do, don’t fall.”
“Just lovely,” April replies as she also stares at the hungry faces.
“If it’s any consolation, I don’t think we’d survive the fall anyway,” he says, forcing a grin.
On her knees, April feigns a smile and crawls across the ladder, positioning her hands along the outer edge and using the steps to support her weight. The rain washes her hair into her face and she’s tries to squint through her poking bangs. At the other side of the gap, she continues to crawl, afraid of standing until she knows she’s safely on the roof. When she finally opens her eyes, she realizes that she’s safe and breathes a sigh of relief.
“Hey, it’s not that bad,” she smiles through her drenched face. “Whatever you do, don’t look down.”
Johnny is already making his way across when he hears her comment, prompting him to do the exact opposite of what she suggested and look down. He can see more of the dead converge on the yard below. His face tightens as he closes his eyes again. “Yeah, thanks for that,” he says, clenching his teeth.
The ladder begins to creak as he suddenly stops in the middle. He waits out the noise and continues on once he’s satisfied that it isn’t breaking in the same way that it is in his imagination. He says a silent prayer to whatever gods will listen and bridges the remaining few feet.
Safely on the other side, he pulls the ladder over and lets it slap against the side of the building before he pulls it up.
They cross the roof together and simultaneously peer over the edge.
“Oh, that’s not good,” Johnny comments.
“No, no it isn’t,” April agrees, staring down into the canal, filled with rushing water.
At the edge of the canal there is a small maintenance road that has become nothing more than a muddy trail. A fence divides the canal from the outer block wall of the building they’re standing on, leaving a distance of a few feet between the two.
“Maybe leaving in the rain wasn’t the brightest idea,” Johnny says, pondering their next move.
Debris races by in the canal as the water surges, creating white caps that plunge the litter down beneath the cresting rapids. Farther down the maintenance road, April can see movement. Bodies speckle the roadway, shambling back and forth through the blinding rain.
Squinting, April’s mouth suddenly goes wide. “If we’re going to go, we’re going to have to go now,” she says, pointing at the mob.
Lowering the ladder over the wall and the fence, Johnny says, “You first.”
“Such a gentleman,” April replies and starts down the ladder.
Quick on her heels, Johnny scurries down behind her. Through the rainy film, he sees an undistinguishable mass a few hundred yards away along the maintenance road. He squints and tries to make out the shape when he realizes it is the same formation he saw on the first night he was in Mike’s apartment. He is certain of it when the blob of darkness moans and howls, barking out from different positions along its surface.
“Let’s get the hell out of here,” he says, almost pushing her as he trudges up behind her on the road.
They start off in a jog as they hear the mass behind them, slopping through the mud. They round a corner, following the canal as the downpour intensifies, obscuring their view. What little they can see through the rain washes away as they flee, making one direction blend with the next.
“Exactly how far does this go?” April asks, raising her voice over the storm.
“About twenty miles to the coast,” he replies.
“They’re going to follow us all the way, aren’t they?” she asks.
“Yeah, probably,” Johnny replies, lowering his head to keep the sting out of his eyes.
April stares at a mass of black shadows ahead. She looks back and forth at the gathering shapes and tilts her head slightly as she tries to make out the forms “Hey, what’s that?”
Johnny follows her gaze and squints through the rain, “I’m not sure. Whatever it is, it’s blocking the road.”
“Oh shit,” she stammers, “
there’re more of them!”
Johnny stops abruptly and slides in the mud. His eyes go wide at the horde and he checks over his shoulder to see the other mass getting closer. “We’re completely fucked,” he breathes.
“What are we going to do?!” April shouts. “Johnny,” she shakes him, “what the fuck are we going to do?!”
As the mobs approach from both sides along the maintenance road, they moan out a symphony of wet rasps. Johnny and April stand transfixed, unsure of their next move as the formations twist and jerk closer.
“Jump!” Johnny shouts as he grabs her hand.
“What?” she asks in a shriek.
“We’re going to have to jump,” he says, grabbing her hand.
They launch through the air as their legs flail, descending quickly to a heap of debris in the canal. They hit hard, legs first, a few feet from wood pallets that twirl in the frothy rush. Johnny is the first to pop his head up, followed almost immediately by April. They gasp for air as they swim through the roaring water, trying to make their way to the pallets that surge under whitecaps and spin when they glance off the other waste in the water.
Johnny struggles for the pallets, inching his way through as April trails a few feet away. With the tips of his fingers, he snags one of the cross supports and drags himself halfway up onto the makeshift raft.
“Come on, just a little more,” he yells at April as he reaches out to take her hand.
Her head bobs up and down in the swirling waves and she gasps each time she pops up from the murky wash. She reaches out, her fingers reaching, grasping at the air.
“Help,” she gurgles, bobbing below the spiral.
Her body sinks beneath the water, a dark swatch of clothing barely visible through the swampy depths. Johnny claws through the whitecaps, trying to reach her, searching for something to grasp. The torrent beats at his face and stings his eyes, leaving his sight blurred and unfocused. “April!” he yells and releases the pallet raft before diving down beneath the slapping rush.
A faded image appears to his right as he turns under the water. The dark clothing, the light hair – he reaches out, dives down, and kicks his feet hard. With a burst of energy, he grabs her and wads her shirt in his hand. He swims to the top of the rain peppered water with April trailing behind and gasps for air once he feels the wind on his face. He pulls her head up, but he can’t tell if she’s breathing.
She is unresponsive. Her body is slack as he tries to keep her head above the water. With the raft in sight, he kicks out, bridging the gap between the hellish canal and the pallet. He pushes her body up and raises her arms above her head.
“April!” he yells again and slaps her face. “April!” The dead moan from the road overhead as Johnny slaps her again. “Goddamn it, April! Don’t you do this to me. Don’t you fucking do this!” he spits.
A faint movement - a shrug of her shoulders and she is coughing, hacking up dirty water and struggling for breath. Her eyes blink repeatedly as she turns her head toward him in a daze. She coughs, spitting up foul water that traces along her chin and she looks at him in shock. She mouths inaudible words and coughs again.
“Oh thank God,” he says exasperated. “Don’t you ever scare me like that again, do you hear me?”
She coughs and nods her head in a daze as the raft pounds through the current, dipping slightly at the corners as it makes its way along the canal. Her breath is short as she stares up at the sky, watching the thunderheads roll like oceanic waves, pummeling the horizon. Below the darkening storm, she can see the dead gather at the edge of the roadway, hovering along the concrete wall, wavering like drunken teenagers at the cusp of jumping. Every face is a nightmare, exploding with rancid decay as they lap out at the air, trying to lick their way closer to the pair. She closes her eyes at the dead, trying to blink them away.
Johnny hangs from the edge of the raft, kicking and maneuvering around the obstacles in their wake. His legs scream out in pain and he pushes through, gritting his teeth to focus on the objective.
“Over there.” He motions toward a high-rise in the distance. “Those are the offices where I work. We might be able to hole up in there for the night.”
“I thought we were going to try to make it to the coast,” she says, coughing up the last remnants of wastewater.
“I can’t make it,” he says. “I need to rest.”
She peers back at the dead, “They’ll follow us.”
“We’ll have to take our chances,” he says as he looks over his shoulder at the creatures.
The rush of the canal brings them to a series of outlets, sanctioned off from above by chain link fences and gates marked Do Not Enter. The water settles as its diverted, making it easier for Johnny to steer the raft. He spots several maintenance ladders along the way and waits for an opportunity to grab onto one.
“I’m going to get us to that mound of junk over there,” he says, pointing toward the wall of the canal. “We’ll take one of those ladders up.”
“They’re going to be everywhere,” she says with a look of alarm.
“We’re going to have to make a run for it,” he replies, pushing the raft onto the mound of debris. “Follow me closely and don’t look back. If this is going to work, we’re going to have to run like hell.”
“Out of the kitchen and into the fire,” she comments.
“Yeah, something like that,” he affirms, spitting the rain from his mouth.
He guides her to the ladder as water rips into the makeshift island, dislodging pieces of junk and taking it into the current where it spirals off into the distance. Checking his waistline, he’s relieved to find the pistol still firmly tucked into his belt. He moves it from the small of his back to the front of his waist and gives it a small tap before following April up the ladder.
Above, they hide behind a cropping of bushes adjacent to the street and survey the area. Between crashes of thunder, lightning strikes guide the way, sending flashes out into the city streets. The dead are everywhere, shambling through the rain like derelicts lost in perdition.
“This isn’t going to be easy,” he whispers as he watches the bodies shuffle along.
“I didn’t think it was going to be,” she replies.
He plans out a route in his mind, paying heed to the dead as they wander and change directions. “Up along the street there.” He points. “And through the alleyway that leads out back. There’s a service tunnel that should get us in.”
“We’re just going to stay the night, right?” she asks.
“Just for the night,” he answers.
“I think we should keep going,” she says, glaring at the bodies. “I mean, I can almost smell the ocean from here.”
“It’s at least another eight miles, April,” he says. “We need to get some rest if we’re going to make it. And there’s food and water there.”
“But we have food and water,” she protests. “I don’t see why we don’t keep moving. We could be on the beach in a little over an hour.”
“Damn it, I’m beat,” he says, keeping his voice down. “We’ll sleep for the rest of the night and get up with the dawn. Maybe by then the storm will have passed.”
She stares at his face, looking at his tired eyes and drops the subject. “Okay, fine. But first thing in the morning, we’re out of here.”
“Exactly,” he replies. “On my mark, run as fast as you can.”
“All right,” she gives a little shake of her head.
“Now,” he says and stands, hitting the pavement with intent.
At the first sign of movement, the dead twist their heads. A great shuffling wall of bodies move, drawn to the sound of wet, slapping feet. The sound of wet clothes and rigid bones stomp out through the storm like an army marching toward attack. Deafening howls pierce the air when the corpses emerge from the shadowed nooks as bees from their hive. The buzzing hymn of rot and decay shakes the ground, followed by a clap of thunder as April and Johnny tear off through the street.
“Holy shit!” he stammers as the dead ooze out from every crevice. “This way, hurry!” he shouts.
A corpse lashes out from beneath a parked car as Johnny passes, grazing the cuff of his pants, nearly making him stumble as he dodges the hand. The rasping creature hisses as April vaults over its arm and lands on the curb a couple of feet away and glances back at the rotting thing as it scurries out onto the asphalt.
The night sky crashes with electricity, sending a bolt of lightning across the tops of the high-rises. April can taste the ozone in the air, mingling with the damp smell of mildew and moist earth that bombard her senses. Through the flow of water along the alley, she sprints, splashing up that which the drains refuse to take away.
She’s right at Johnny’s back when he takes a quick turn into a small alcove between two buildings. Her shoes slop and squish as the soles slip on the concrete when she turns in to follow him. They descend along a narrow pathway under the high-rise and into a dark tunnel, inches deep as it begins to flood.
“Through here,” Johnny says as he pulls open an iron gate.
April runs through and turns back in time to see countless bodies stacking up in the narrow corridor. Shoulder to shoulder, the dead squeeze their way through. As one body falls, another takes its place, swallowing up the straggler with the sheer mass of death from the numbering horde.
Johnny pulls at the gate and closes it, holding on tight until the bodies rush against the obstruction. There are too many faces to count as they slam into one another, pressing weight against the strength of the bars. Wide eyed, Johnny steps back as arms flail through the gaps in the gate.
“We need to secure it with something,” April Shouts.
Johnny breathes deeply and smiles, “I think they’re doing a pretty good job of that, themselves.”
She steps back and suddenly grins, looking over the first row of corpses, up toward the alley, and sees countless others fighting their way toward the front. With their numbers, the dead press firmly against the gate, securing it better than any lock.
·10
“This should lead up to the first floor,” Johnny says, guiding the way up the stairs.
Waiting to Die ~ A Zombie Novel Page 9