900 Miles: A Zombie Novel (3 page)

We stood silently on the roof for what seemed like an eternity, watching the mayhem below. Things would be quiet, and then all of a sudden, there would be an eruption of screams and crashes as the dead found their next victims.

Mr. Cul-de-sac was standing near the door when we heard what sounded like large artillery fire. It was in the distance, as if it was coming from the middle of the city. Flashes from the streets were lighting up buildings. It was surreal. The army boys were putting up a good fight. We could see four helicopters flying above the war zone. A couple of them looked like green military choppers; the other two looked more like news helicopters.

Kyle was commenting about the caliber of the bullets when we noticed that the streets were beginning to clear. Like mice following the scent of cheese, the mindless creatures began moving in the direction of the noise. While the fight raged on, Mr. Cul-de-sac mentioned something about waiting for
help, a slightly different tactic than he was talking about in the lobby.

Kyle speculated about what the army was doing. Something about laying down a steady stream of munitions fire. Pausing for a bit, waiting for the streets to fill back up with zombies, then lighting them up again. Made sense, but it was all a guess.

It was getting darker out, the sun low behind the buildings. We decided to sit tight on ours. None of us wanted to go wandering around in the dark.

I don’t know if part of the power grid was down, or if people were too afraid to turn on their lights. Were there even any people left to turn them on? With the exception of the stoplights rhythmically changing colors, there
were really no other electric lights running in the area. However, the army’s constant barrage of artillery and the fires blazing rampantly down below created plenty of visibility.

Slipping my hand into my pocket, I decided to turn off my phone. I needed to conserve as much battery power as possible. I turned and slid my back down the wall to the stairwell. I was still numb, not wanting to think about what might lie ahead. Kyle joined me, making a comment
about needing a break. I glanced up as Mr. Cul-de-sac was wandering hesitantly over. Reluctantly moving, making room for him, I realized we might have safety in numbers.

As the three of us sat there, I learned that Mr. Cul-de-sac's name was actually Ron Chauffer. He was a CEO of an insurance company that dealt in catastrophic events like hurricanes and earthquakes. He made some snide remarks about how his company wouldn’t be covering this event when the claims came flooding in.

Lucky us, I thought repulsively. Stuck on this roof with a real special son of a bitch.

Chauffer eventually fell asleep, curled up with his chair leg. Kyle and I stayed awake, watching the glow from the streets.

His thoughts were on his military service. He explained to me how he decided to enlist as soon as he was able. He didn’t have any family to speak of, except for an estranged father who lived somewhere in San Francisco. He seemed indifferent about whether he was alive or dead. I didn’t know whether the indifference was toward his father, or himself. And I didn’t press for a reason.

Jersey
was his home because it was too expensive to live in the city. Not anymore, I thought to myself, as I glanced out towards the glow from the firefight.

Deciding not to share too much about myself at that point, I exchanged the basic story about how I was up in
New York on business. Talked a little about my wife, Jenn, still in Atlanta, and that I needed to figure out how to get back to her.

When I mentioned Atlanta, Kyle turned toward me and said that he spent six months stationed at Fort Gordon in Augusta, a city on the Georgia and South Carolina borders, about two hours east of Atlanta. They would fly out of the
Hartsfield-Jackson Airport in Atlanta from time to time, and some of his best buddies were still stationed down there.

He told me a
story about how one year; three of them went to Atlanta to watch the peach drop during New Year’s Eve. Too much celebrating, and a shit ton of drinks later, landed one of the guys in bed with three prostitutes. According to Kyle, it was the best night of the guy’s life.

It gave us a good laugh,
and helped break the tension and fear of the day. We both sat in silence for a while, watching and listening to the firefight raging several blocks away.

I just
lay there, nervously playing with my wedding ring.  My wife would always yell at me for fidgeting with the thing. I tended to play with it when things got tense. I’d say the last few days or so counted. Facing the sky in and out of consciousness for most of the night, I noticed a mask of dark smog covered the stars. From time to time, the cloud cover would pass by just right, revealing a nearly full moon. I finally fell into a deep sleep in the early morning hours, the dead were still roaming around in my dreams.

When the sun began to
peek through the buildings, it became evident what we had to work with on the roof. Chauffer had stumbled across a red toolbox while taking a piss in the middle of the night, and pulled it over to where we were sleeping. We figured someone had abandoned it while fixing the nearby satellite tower, which stood roughly ten feet tall at the peak of the roof, when the carnage started below.

In the early morning, Kyle had worked out a plan to use the tools to unbolt the tower, and use it to bridge the gap between the office building we sat on and the parking garage next door. Between the three of us, we were confident that we’d be able to pull it down. While it would be close, it looked just long enough to reach all the way to the other side of the alley.

While Kyle and Chauffer started to work the screws, I took a survey of the streets. The sun was fully over the horizon, making it easy to see the destruction. We could still hear the gunshots in the distance, reminding us of the battle raging just blocks away.

There were still creatures in the streets. For the most part, they were unorganized, and seemed to be scavenging. I noticed that they didn’t appear to be moving terribly fast, certainly not running
as we had seen yesterday afternoon. I figured that the majority of the undead were still drawn to the noise of the firefight.

To the south, I could see the waterfront of Battery Park, where tourists could catch the ferry to go see the Statue of Liberty and
Ellis Island. Chauffer was right; we really were not that far away. Once past those couple of blocks of car-filled streets, it’s nothing but an open grassy park.

Kyle came up beside me, his gaze following mine. We could see boats moving up and down the river. One of them appeared to be docking and taking up passengers.

“There can’t possibly be a ferry service still running,” Kyle muttered in disbelief. My thoughts exactly.

We watched as the barely visible drivers jumped
off the ferry and set up a small perimeter at the water’s edge. As people rushed for the boat, the drivers would provide coverage with short bursts of gunfire until they were on board safely.

So
close, but so far away, I thought, looking down at the street as more zombies emerged. Chauffer caught my attention.

“If this thing is bigger than just
New York, we gotta head for the country. Less populated, means less of these things.”

Nodding in agreement, I said, “Yeah. We just have to find a way to get there. Lots of populated ground to cover before we hit
Sticksville, USA.”

Kyle lifted his chin a little, not committing either way. He asked me to give them a hand, and prodded me to stand below the small metal tower. He and Chauffer would lower it to me. Catching it at the top, I was surprised to feel how light it was. Probably some sort of titanium metal. It was a foot
and a half wide at my end, a little wider on the opposite end, with a ladder running up the entire length.

Chauffer snorted sharply
, “Is this thing going to be sturdy enough?”

His question was an echo
of my own. I hoped we wouldn’t have to find out.

“Finally, a lucky break
,” Kyle said as we slid the tower in place. It was just long enough to fit between the rooftop and the parking garage.

Admiring our work, I reached down for a hammer that was in the tool kit. It had a traditional wood handle, with an over-sized metal head. Clearly, it had seen its fair share of nails. It felt comfortable, as if specifically made for my hand. I hung it in my belt.

Little did I know that the hammer would save my ass more than once.

The enemy of my enemy isn’t always my friend.

The
gunfire had gotten louder, drawing our attention back to it. The army had pulled out the heavy artillery. Immediate booms followed sharp cracks. Dust and fire were visible in the air above the war zone. Kyle was staring in that direction. I scrutinized his expression, hoping to learn what plan he might be conjuring.

We all spun around at the racket in the building across the street from us. One of the windows on a floor a few stories up
was cracked, spider webbing like ice. Suddenly, a chair flew through it and crashed to the street below. My heart raced wildly as a woman rushed to the window ledge. Her screams were audible even as she turned back into the room.

Seconds
later, she turned and leaped. Her black dress flapped in the air as she fell to a certain death. Two of those things followed her. Their arms waved frantically as they plummeted to the earth, landing with three consecutive thumps. No pause, no care for their own lives; these were the creatures that we faced in the streets below. I felt the vomit in the back of my throat as we watched a group of the undead crawl through the splattered remains.

My thoughts went back to watching the news on 9/11. People trapped in the towers were jumping from the windows and rooftops of the burning buildings. When faced with certain death, people will do anything to escape
, while the whores of network television will show anything to get a bump in the ratings.

Chauffer began pacing around the rooftop, glancing over at our
makeshift bridge. What was that bastard up to?

The artillery fire was closer, almost deafening. Kyle was muttering about the army boys finishing them off as they made their valiant last stand against the abominations. We watched in utter silence as one of the larger buildings several streets away begin to shift.

“Oh my God,” Chauffer squeaked, wringing his hands. I barely heard him. No doubt weakened by shellfire, the skyscraper swayed back and forth a few times before we saw dust and debris shoot up all around it. The rumbling shook our entire building, shook
us
to our very cores. The entire thing came crashing down in slow motion, reverberating and ricocheting off the surrounding buildings. The dust cloud was carried away from us but it still left the air thick.

Then silence. The firefight was over.

Reaching into my pocket, I clutched my phone with my cold, clammy hand. I could hear my heart thudding in my eardrums. Taking a deep exaggerated breath, I finally pulled out the cell phone and turned it on. Still zero bars. Was it over? Did we win? The thoughts plagued me.

We continued to stare in the direction of the ruins for what seemed like an eternity. Then we saw them. They were dressed in military gear, heading our way. Chauffer let out a whoop in relief.

“We won!” he yelled. I was a bit slower to share his enthusiasm, but let the grip on my phone ease ever so slightly.

Kyle was the first to notice it.

“Wait a minute.
Wait
a minute!” he snapped, still glaring down at them. Chauffer and I quieted and turned to see what he was going on about. The uniformed soldiers were moving erratically. There was no gunfire at the monsters still below us either. As they moved through the streets, nobody put up a fight. We watched in disbelief as the dead soldiers simply absorbed the rest of the creatures, adding them to their ranks of this literal army of the dead.

We would later learn that that good ol’ Uncle Sam had descended into
Manhattan with a vengeance. Newspaper reporters, television crews, all followed along as the Army boys took out wave after wave of those things. Almost ten hours worth of filling them full of holes.

Funny thing about these
dead, however, they didn’t drop down for good very easily. You had to have precise aim to take them out, hitting them in the head. Machine guns, grenades, mortar shots, all effective deterrents against man, but almost useless on the undead hordes. These creatures had no fear either. In modern warfare, the whole goal is to put enough of a hurt on your enemy so that they eventually give up. These things would never give up. The whole thing was a total cluster fuck.

With the
persistence you would expect from a mindless horde of dead beings, they eventually overran our modern defenses, and all of it was caught on tape and broadcast across the globe.

Chauffer dropped to his knees and looked up at the sky, begging God for help.

Even those who haven’t spent a day in church their whole lives, suddenly let their inner choirboy out when they think their number is up. I went to school with a guy who was a real bad ass. You name it, he would smoke it or shoot it, yet the girls loved him. One night, he got too fucked up to drive, but he decided to jump in his pickup and take his girlfriend home all the same. I remember her saying that his last words were, “Dear God,” as his truck hit the tree and launched him fifty feet across a parking lot. She made it, but wound up in a wheelchair for the rest of her life.