Ground Zero: A Zombie Apocalypse

by Nicholas Ryan

Samantha was standing at the sink wearing a long t-shirt that covered the tops of her legs – and nothing else. Cutter could clearly see the perky shape of her breasts under the thin material as she turned to him, and morning light through the narrow window behind her cast the shadow of her thighs in tantalizing silhouette. Her hair was a messy, sleepy tumble and she smiled at him shyly.

  “Sorry,” she said. “I didn’t mean to wake you.” She pushed at her hair self consciously. “I was just getting organized.”

  There was a big canvas carry bag on the kitchen counter, and an assortment of canned food beside it. Cutter nodded. “Don’t forget a can opener,” he said.

  Samantha smiled. “It’s already packed.”

  Cutter stepped closer and looked inside the bag. Samantha stood beside him, watching his face as he applied himself to the challenge of deciding what supplies to take, and what must be left behind.

  “We’ll need water,” Cutter said. “Lots of it.”

  Samantha nodded. “I have bottles ready,” she said. “I thought I’d pack the soup first because it’s condensed. “One can will make a meal for all three of us.”

  Cutter thought for a moment. The logic made sense. “Good idea,” he said. “But remember one of us has to carry this bag, plus we’ll have weapons. So weight is important.”

  She leaned across the kitchen counter, and for one brief second her shoulder brushed his, and he saw a glimpse of the soft pale flesh of her breast through a gape in the fabric of her nightie. Samantha picked up a can of stewed beef and another one of spaghetti. “Do you have any preferences?”

  Cutter shook his head. He heard footsteps behind him and turned to see Father Bob standing in the open doorway. The man looked sick. His face was ashen, his features somehow blurred and worn down. Behind the strained smile, Cutter saw agonizing pain in the man’s expression.

  Cutter said nothing.

  “Good morning,” Father Bob muttered. He unscrewed the top off a plastic bottle of water and swallowed a handful of assorted tablets.

  Samantha went to her father and hugged him. The big man wrapped an arm around her shoulder and stared over the top of her head directly at Cutter.

  “We must go soon,” he silently mouthed the words. Cutter understood. He nodded.

  * * *

  Father Bob and Cutter leaned out through the apartment’s living room window and stared at the street below. The big man sighed heavily. “How do we do this?”

  The area looked like a battlefield. The wrecked and burned out cars down on the road were now just charred blackened shells, strewn across every lane of traffic, amongst dozens of other dead abandoned vehicles. The road was streaked with oil and blood.

  The sky was clear and blue, the buildings across the street casting long shadows. Smoke still drifted lazily from the shop fronts that had burned through the night, and glass littered the blacktop.

  The corpse of the zombie in the business suit Cutter had shot through the head was still laying stretched out on the blacktop near one of the dumpsters. During the night vermin had mutilated the body. There were other undead still lying in the street, and the stench rose on the air until it became a black oily taste in the back of Cutter’s throat.

  He saw the new red SUV he had led the women towards just twenty-four hours earlier. He pointed.

  “The red Durango,” he said. “That was the car I was trying for yesterday,” he explained. “See how it’s been left just a few rows back from the lights?”

  The pastor nodded, and Cutter went on quickly. “It’s on this side of the street, and there is a clear run if we can get past the pick-up in front of it.” He drew a route in the air with his finger. “If we can get up onto the sidewalk and past that set of bench seats on the other side of the alley, we can make it round the corner and escape.”

  The pastor frowned. “But… yesterday…”

  Cutter nodded. “When we got the doors open there was a zombie on the back seat eating a rat. The zombie dragged one of the women I was with into the car. I couldn’t save her…”

  “They could still be there. In the car.”

  Cutter nodded again. “They could be – but we’ll have to take the chance. There’s nothing else down on the road that isn’t blocked by too much traffic to be useful.”

  The pastor pointed to a blue pick up that was about a dozen rows back from the lights. It had big off-road tires and a solid nudge bar welded in front of the grille. “What about that one?”

  Cutter shook his head. The truck was east of the building. That meant running back towards the bookstore. “We would be running right into them,” Cutter said. “And I don’t see how we could reach the lights. Even with the nudge bar, we’re going to be moving too slowly, and making a hell of a lot of noise. The zombies would be swarming all over us.”

  Father Bob looked back down at the Durango. It was almost directly below where they stood, the paintwork covered in a dull blanket of ash and soot. “Okay,” he said grimly. “We go for the Durango.”

  There was a dozen undead wandering aimlessly along the street, shambling like lost aimless wraiths in the shadows. Cutter’s eyes searched the surrounding buildings, looking for more movement.

  “We can’t just make a run for it,” he said. “The undead will be faster. Yesterday they were shambling, but I heard a news report that said they get faster as the virus courses through to the extremities of their bodies. They’ll be running today. They’ll be quicker than us because we’re loaded down – and there will be hundreds of them.”

  Father Bob made a face. “Maybe they’ve drifted out of the city,” he said. “There are a few down there… but not many. Not enough that we can’t handle. If we go through the front doors it’s only about twenty feet to the SUV.”

  Cutter turned away from the window. He shook his head. “They’re down there – somewhere,” he insisted. “There was a swarm of them around those doors yesterday, and more at the entrance to the alley. You saw them. They haven’t all just drifted away in the night. And even if some of them have, there is still going to be too many for us to deal with. We need to rely on speed and surprise. It’s our only chance.”

  He looked up and realized Samantha was standing in the hallway, staring at him. She had changed into denim jeans and a long sleeve shirt. She had the heavy padded jacket she had worn the day before draped over her arm. She sensed the tension between her father and Cutter, and she came towards the men uncertainly. Father Bob turned and saw his daughter. He drew her towards the window.

  “We’re going to make a break for it this morning, honey. See the red SUV? That’s what we’re going to try to reach.”

  Samantha looked out across the street. She nodded, and then turned back to Cutter. “Do you have a plan?” she asked.

  Cutter shook his head. “Not yet,” he admitted. “We’re going to be a slow moving target. “Between the bag of supplies, the weapons and ….” he cut himself off abruptly, but not before Father Bob sensed what he was about to say.

  “I won’t slow you down, Cutter,” the man said. He drew himself upright, but the pain was still there, burning behind the man’s steady eyes. “I know what my priorities are.”

  There was an unspoken moment of tension, and then Samantha turned back to the window and stared along the street again. When she faced Cutter, her expression was suddenly clouded with thought.

  “What if we create a diversion?” she offered, speaking slowly as the plan formulated itself. “If you were downstairs, and you suddenly rattled and opened the front doors of the apartment – let the zombies know you were there… they’d come for you. They’d all come from wherever they are hiding. You’d be the bait,” she said. Then she turned to her father. “And if daddy was out on the fire escape, and I was waiting for you at the fire escape door, you could lead them into the building. Then we run down the fire escape, and get to the SUV through the alley.”

  Cutter sat down on the sofa and thought hard. In his mind he visualized the response of
the undead. Samantha was right. If he showed himself, they would come like a wave of death for him. He realized he would have to be quick. He would have to get up the three flights of stairs and then slip out through the fire door before any of the undead reached him. Maybe they could wedge the fire door shut from the outside just in case...

  He thought then about clambering down the iron stairs and landings, and scurrying over the dumpsters blockading the entrance to the alley. If Samantha’s idea worked, the undead would be surging though the apartment block. They might just make it.

  If they were lucky.

  He went back to the window and took one long final look at the scene of devastation and death down on the street. Somewhere in the morning sky – blocked from view by the buildings – he could hear the distant sound of a helicopter. Cutter made up his mind.

  “Okay,” he said. “Let’s do it.”

  * * *

  They filled up on cans of cold spaghetti and drank as much water as they could. As they ate, they re-worked Samantha’s plan – adding to, and altering the basic plot as new thoughts came to them and initial ideas were discarded. While they schemed, Father Bob sat – his brow furrowed in concentration – and reloaded the Glock they had found in Walker’s apartment, and the one Cutter had brought with him. There was still half a box of ammunition remaining. He stowed it in the canvas bag alongside the ammunition he had for his revolver. He handed one of the Glock’s to Cutter and the other to Samantha.

  When they all were in agreement – and armed – Cutter led them downstairs to the foyer.

  The ground floor apartments were still being renovated. Cutter broke into 1B and 1C, ransacking the units for anything useful. There wasn’t much. He found a saw, some builder’s plaster – and a plastic bottle of paint thinners. He took the bottle with him and went to stare out through the main entry doors.

  When the terror had begun, Father Bob and Samantha had locked the doors and barricaded part of the foyer with chairs, bookcases and tables. Cutter left the blockade in place and went up the stairs to the first floor.

  He broke into the apartment closest to the stairwell and dragged a two-seat sofa through the doorway. Samantha lent a hand and together they positioned the piece of furniture at the top of the stairs.

  “Just in case,” Cutter explained. “If they come after me and they get too close, I’ll use the thinners and set the sofa on fire. I can push it across the stairs to block the route, and buy me a little time.”

  Father Bob nodded. The trio went up the next flight of stairs and found a bookcase in one of the deserted units. They heaved it into position beside the stairwell and then retreated to the top floor.

  Cutter went into the apartment and retrieved the bag. It was heavy. Beside food, water, and ammunition, Samantha had packed candles and a blanket. He carried it out into the passageway towards the fire-door.

  “I’ll take this outside and down to the first floor landing,” Cutter said. He looked at Father Bob. “Your job is to be ready. When Sam and I come down those stairs, you need to be set to go.” The pastor nodded. By taking the canvas bag down to the jump-off point, Cutter was saving himself a few precious seconds of time.

  When he came back up the fire escape, Cutter was beginning to sweat. The morning was warm and sunny. He dragged his hand across his brow. Samantha was waiting for him. She had a couple of dinner knifes in her hand. Cutter looked alarmed.

  “I don’t want them to get that close,” he said in horror. “And I don’t know how much harm I can do with a butter knife!”

  Samantha shook her head. “I was thinking they might be a way of wedging the fire door closed after we start down the escape,” she explained. “It might hold them for a few seconds – if they get that close.”

  Cutter thought for a moment and then nodded. He doubted they would be an effective door-jam – but he couldn’t think of a better alternative. “Okay,” he said. “Just make sure you keep this door open once I step out onto the sidewalk,” he said.

  Samantha nodded gravely. ‘How will I know where you are, or how close they are to you once they chase you into the building?”

  “You’ll know,” Cutter said, sounding like a man condemned. “Because you’ll hear me screaming.”

  * * *

  Cutter went down to the foyer and pulled two chairs away from the barricaded furniture to clear a narrow path to the door. Then he doused everything in paint thinners – emptying half the bottle’s contents over sofas, cabinets, desks, tables and bookcases. The fumes hung in the air, rippling like a heat haze.

  He crossed to the foot of the stairwell and left the bottle of thinners on the bottom step. Then he went back to the front doors and stared out through the tinted glass. The street seemed deserted.

  There were bolts in each door at the top and bottom. He unfastened them and finally unlocked the door.

  Cutter snatched the Glock from his jeans and fumbled the cigarette lighter from his pocket. He went out onto the sidewalk, into the warm morning sunlight and stood staring.

  The Durango’s rear windows were splattered with dry blood. He couldn’t tell whether anything moved inside the vehicle, but somehow he doubted it. Then he looked back towards the bookstore. There were bodies on the ground, scattered across the road like discarded litter, and the only movement was the dark shapes of rats, scampering from one corpse to the next in evil delight. Cutter turned and glanced towards the traffic lights.

  Stillness.

  And silence.

  No earthly sound, and no sign of movement.

  He stood for a moment longer, and then took a deep breath. He raised the Glock into the air – and fired.

  The sound of the shot was deafeningly loud in the oppressive silence, ripping apart the eerie stillness, and echoing between the tall buildings. Cutter counted to three.

  Nothing happened.

  For a split-second he considered making a dash for the Durango. It was right there! Not twenty feet away from where he stood. The temptation was almost irresistible.

  But what then?

  He knew the silence couldn’t last. He knew it must be shattered in the next few seconds by screaming, wailing undead. How would he rescue Father Bob and Samantha? How could he get them to the car safely?

  He shook his head. It was folly – and as if to confirm his decision, suddenly three dark shambling shapes appeared on the opposite side of the street, drawn to the crashing sound of the gunshot.

  There were two women and a man. They were dirty, filthy apparitions, their bodies covered in torn tatters of material, their hair wild and stiff with gore. Their faces were streaked with blood, and they came into the sunlight with their mouths agape, their eyes wide and feral. Cutter stared at the undead.

  They stared back, unmoving.

  Cutter pointed the pistol at one of the women. She was standing on the opposite sidewalk, swaying mindlessly from side to side. Cutter had a shot between the abandoned cars. He took careful aim and fired.

  He missed. The bullet went well wide, smashing a shop front window.

  Cutter swore. He adjusted his aim and took another long breath. He could feel his arm wavering, unused to the weight of the weapon. He closed one eye… and then suddenly the entire sidewalk around the undead filled with a swarm of similar dark shapes, like an army appearing from the morning mist on an ancient battlefield.

  They came from the buildings. They came from the shadows into the glaring warm sunlight – and they came at a run.

  The street suddenly filled with the demented wail of hundreds of undead voices, clamoring and screeching in hideous fury. Cutter turned back for the open doors of the building and ran.

  More dark shapes came from his left, moving to intercept him. They spilled onto the sidewalk and burst towards him, their arms and legs flailing as they closed on their prey.

  Cutter crashed back through the doors and leaped the barricade. He dropped to his knees and flicked the lighter, focusing all his attention on the task. It wouldn�
�t light.

  He heard the sound, like a storm surging closer. He glanced up and the glass façade of the building was suddenly enveloped in shadow as the undead filled the sidewalk.

  “Concentrate!”

  He flicked the lighter again – and a table and sofa erupted into flames with a sudden ‘whoosh!’

  Cutter didn’t pause. He scrambled to his feet and threw himself at the stairs. Behind him he could hear the crackling sound of the fire as it leaped across the entrance. He could feel the intense heat on his back. And he could hear the sudden sounds of glass smashing and the shrieks of the zombies as they spilled into the foyer and were confronted with a solid wall of flame.

  He snatched up the bottle of thinners and took the stairs two-at-a-time. The noise behind him rose to a crescendo. He reached the top of the stairwell and glanced over his shoulder.

  The zombies were surging into the foyer, moving like a dark wave. The press of their momentum was impossible to stop, forcing the first ones through the doorway onto the wall of flames. Their clothes and hair caught alight and they spun and flailed their wretched burning bodies in wild confusion. Some fell into the barricade and became part of the erupting blaze. Other crashed through and staggered like fiery torches into the ransacked ground floor apartments. The whole foyer became filled with flame – and still the press of the demented filled the sidewalk beyond.

  Then they saw Cutter through the fire and billowing smoke – and a hundred undead voices suddenly shrieked with malevolent fury. They hurled themselves at the flames, driven by insane madness, and the barricade blew apart in an explosion of shattering timbers and burning embers.

  Cutter leaped the final steps onto the landing and splashed lighter fluid over the sofa that he and Samantha had prepared. The fabric burst into sudden flames and he heaved at it with his foot until it reached the point of balance, and began to slide down the stairwell.

  He turned and ran.