The End: A Post Apocalyptic Thriller (25 page)

Behind the little girl and at the rear of the line, Victor focused on the task at hand, getting to the chopper. With his eyes wide and his mind sharp, Victor took each step forward with determination. He was going to make it out alive, and by God, so was his unborn son. Sure, he was quite a bit older than Kieta and they weren’t married, but none of that mattered anymore. Her spiteful parents weren’t alive anymore to tell him off, or to say other terrible things to him. They hated Victor and definitely didn’t approve of the situation, but who were they to get in his business? He was a grown-ass man and could very well take care of a kid and his girl. She could finish high school after the baby arrived. Her parents didn’t know anything and why should they? They were dead now, anyhow. With his pistol raised high, Victor did his best to push his thoughts aside and focus on the noises around him, or the lack there of.

Suddenly, Victor collided with Jenny. The instant thud shook him slightly. He almost lost the grip on his gun and nearly dropped it to the floor. He looked up, noticing that the line had stopped. Ashley was standing upright with one hand fist up. She was signaling them to halt. He had been so lost in thought that he hadn’t noticed.

Ashley stood at the edge of a small row of aisles filled with tools and hardware accessories. They had finally hit a solid wall of the building plastered with huge flat screen televisions.

“We take a right,” Victor whispered, pointing his finger.

Not making a single sound, Ashley instantly turned to face him with a finger over her lips. What had made her stop wasn’t the sudden need to make a directional choice, but something else.

Around the corner, only one aisle over, a single zombie stood just shifting back and forth in the same spot. After peeking around the corner, the light quickly catching a glimpse of the creature’s leg, she instinctively shut off the light and stepped back signaling the group to halt.

With the four civilians finally heeding the warning to quiet down and stay still, she poked her head back around the edge of the aisle to take a better look. Unless there was another zombie on the aisle right beside theirs, then this thing was definitely alone. She reached down, removing the large blade from its sheath which was attached to her ankle.

The four survivors watched as she crept forward toward the creature. Her intentions were clear, as she set her rifle aside. The idea was to keep quiet and stay close. If they did that, they just might stay alive.

The zombie was wearing a pair of light brown steel-toe boots and navy blue pants. The red vest he wore, with the large Sears emblem on the back of it, indicated the individual once worked at this store. Its hair was a mess, and its rather large beard was caked in dry blood. Chunks of muck and gore festered in its facial hair. The stench of urine and feces filled the air around the zombie as it swayed.

As Ashley moved in, she could tell that the creature had either soiled itself before death or had released its bowels after. The back of the ghoul’s pants were stained with its putrid waste. The tribal tattoo on the dead man’s upper arm peeked out beneath a blood-soaked shirt. The black ink popped against the pale, lifeless skin.

As quietly as she could, Ashley leapt from behind the creature with her blade in hand, the zombie unsuspectingly swayed away in place. Something caught under her foot and kicked away as she stepped, gliding across the cold floor; bouncing off of the corner of the shelf in front of her, it
tinked
, metal meeting metal.

The zombie flinched, then wildly slung itself around, meeting eye-to-eye with a startled Ashley Fox. Momentarily paralyzed, Ashley hesitated. The creature’s mouth and eyes went wide as its hands darted forward. Before she was able to make the blade collide with the zombie’s throat, it was too late; the zombie belched out a feverish moan. In mid-cry, before the ghoul had time to finish its howl, Ashley reached up, slicing deep and hard into its jugular. The moan instantly turned into a gurgling bubble as blood poured out from the open wound sliced across its neck.

Other than that silenced cry, the creature was unfazed. It lunged forward, pouncing down on her. Feeling her position already compromised, Ashley reached down pulling out her 9mm. With the zombie’s dead cold fingers gripping her arm and its mouth closing in, she pulled the trigger. A single loud crack echoed through the store alerting anything and everything within of their location. If the zombie’s outburst hadn’t given them away, the gunshot surely had.

The ghoul’s grip quickly loosened on Ashley. Blood poured from the side of its head. A large hole with brain and rancid matter violently exited the bullet wound as the gun went off at point blank range.

Wailing moans instantly filled the store from all directions. Howls and groans echoed throughout. Something fell from a shelf and skidded across the floor, something heavy. It was time to move.

“Let’s go,” Ashley shouted as she appeared back in sight of the four panic-filled civilians. She reached down, snatched up her rifle, and holstered her handgun all in one solid motion.

The four startled onlookers stood frozen and silent just looking at Ashley.

“Did you not hear me? I said let’s Move! Move… move… move…”

She grabbed Phillip by the shoulder, pushing him out of the aisle and over the zombie she had just executed. One by one, she shoved each of them on the shoulder shouting, “Move!”

Grabbing a hold of Victor last, she reached up with both hands, one of which still held her rifle. Shaking him on the shoulders, she looked deep into his eyes and calmly said in a slow and assertive tone, “You know the way. I need you up front. Move fast and just get us to the roof. I will do the covering… To the roof! Got it?”

Victor nodded and took off running past the others to get to the front.

With the idea of stealth thrown completely out the window at this point, Victor took the lead. In full sprint, he veered around a corner leading into the back of the building behind two large swinging doors. “This way, we’re real close,” he shouted, not looking back.

The others followed.

At the back of the group, Ashley had her rifle locked and loaded. A handful of zombies crept and shuffled from corners of aisles and refrigerators. Each of them with their own distinct flesh wound that painted the brutal way they met death. Ashley counted seven of them so far as she shimmied backward toward the double doors, the others already past them and hopefully well on their way up the staircase to the roof.

Ten, then thirteen, then eighteen. Zombie after zombie filled the large opening that led to where Ashley stood. With outstretched arms and mouths wide, she instantly thought of Chadwick, and a gut-wrenching pain of guilt and anguish flooded her stomach. She was going to be sick. She opened fire, the rifle jerking in her grip. With a wide birth of fire, she lit up the store. Bullets ripped through merchandise and zombies. Her shots were wild and unfocused.

Blood and gray fluids poured out in every direction. The dozen or so zombies shook upon being struck, but still pressed on. There were too many of them and they were closing in fast. She had to act, and quickly. She lowered the rifle, pulling out the pistol, aiming it at the nearest zombie. As it scrambled in her direction only a few paces away, she aimed and fired. The creature went down instantly. It was a clear and clean shot, taking off most of its ear and enough of its head to count.

As the one-eared zombie stumbled to the ground, Ashley Fox took two quick steps back and turned, breaking for the double doors. They swung open with ease.

Off in the not-so-distant path ahead of her, Victor stood, waving the others to follow him up the staircase. Ashley’s eyes followed his hand gesture and saw that Kieta and Jenny were steadily climbing the metal staircase leading up to where she and Chadwick had originally entered the building.

Phillip, where was Phillip? He wasn’t up at the top with Victor, and he wasn’t climbing the staircase with the girls. Ashley’s gaze went even wider trying to place the man’s whereabouts.

Nothing.

The large black double doors swung open shaking her out of her thoughts. A small mob of zombies followed behind her.

“Shit,” she said under her breath, looking back up at the people climbing the steps.

As she jogged across the room past the unopened boxes of merchandise nicely stacked in stalls and racks, she looked up, seeing that Victor’s gun was drawn and he was aiming it in her direction. She looked back and the doors were still wide open. A large cluster of zombies was making their way into the back of the store. There must have been over thirty of them.

A loud bang rang out from in front of her and a bullet whizzed past her ear. Victor was firing over her head! Not wanting to get killed by an idiot, she kicked into high gear, and reached the bottom of the steps in a matter of moments.

Climbing the first several steps, three steps per stride, she quickly caught up with the two girls. “What’s the hold up? Let’s go,” Ashley said.

Kieta was having contractions. The pain was too great, and she was stuck in her tracks. Halfway up the stairs, she just froze, holding her stomach and heaving heavily in pain. Wincing and gritting her teeth, a loud and long grunt exited her mouth. Still, gripping her belt loop, Jenny stood behind her one step lower waiting to move along.

“What’s the holdup here?” Ashley shouted shoving the two girls.

“The…ba…bby...” Kieta’s words came crashing out in one long breath between closed teeth and closed eyes.

“You’ve got to be kidding me. Now?” Ashley looked up to see the worried look on Victor’s face as he looked down from the rooftop exit, gun still drawn. She took a deep breath while in disbelief, then turned to face the horde that headed toward them. Pulling up her rifle, she sighted the closest zombie lurching its way across the shipping area.

Dried blood filled the open fissures on the skin of the creature’s cracking face. As it opened its mouth, most of its bottom teeth were missing, and blood poured out and down its pale chin. It’s ragged and tattered clothes were dust and dirt caked.

She pulled the trigger. Four or five shots littered the creature’s head before she panned the rifle out and into the rest of the oncoming crowd.

Many of the zombies instantly fell with fatal headshots, but most of them keep their persistent pursuit. Victor followed Ashley’s initiative with a steady flow of single shot after single shot. He was no expert marksmen, but a damn good shot at least. Every other shot that rang out hit a zombie in the head, sending it to the floor for good. Still, it wasn’t enough to turn the odds. The zombies crept closer, too close.

Ashley broke her concentration away from the horde below for a second toward Kieta. She was still gripping the railing, knuckles pressed white. With that same pain-filled expression, she kept heaving and huffing.

“Pull it together, Kieta! We need to move,” Ashley said, who instantly went back to rifle fire.

The weapon looked large in her feminine grip, shaking the woman up and down as an onslaught of fire exited the barrel tearing into chests and necks. Above her, the single rifle ceased. Over the loud bursts, she thought she heard something. Then suddenly, she watched as a handgun flew across the room into the crowd below, hitting one of the undead in the chest. The creature shuffled back for a moment, but it did no real damage. They were only feet away from the bottom of the steps now and more were still entering the room from the large open doors.

“I’m out of ammo,” Victor shouted, holding both hands in the air empty.

Ashley decided to make a choice and sure as shit hoped that Kieta would comply. She threw her hot rifle around one shoulder and started up the steps, grabbing Jenny with one hand, lifting the girl up off of her feet.

“It’s time to move whether you’re ready or not,” Ashley grunted, heaving the little girl in one arm.

She reached up with a free hand and shoved Kieta forward. The very pregnant woman fell landing on one knee, catching herself with one hand on the step ahead of her.

“Get up!”

Ashley passed the woman by, jogging up the steps to the top. She dropped Jenny to her feet, then turned to get Kieta, who was still on one knee as Ashley had left her. Eyeing Victor with a nonverbal agreement, the two made it down the steps after her. They both lifted the pregnant woman to her feet, one person under each arm with a shoulder. The width of the staircase was confining, but the two steadied the soon-to-be mother, working to get her up each step.

It wasn’t easy, and she wasn’t the lightest of people to be toting around.
Definitely not Jenny
, Ashley thought as they made it up one step at a time. Below them, the first of several zombies broke the second step, making their way up. With the weight of the pregnant woman and the lack of space to move, the zombies made their way up each step with more ease than that of the rescuers trying to get Kieta to safety.

Suddenly, Kieta kicked into gear. The debilitating contractions had stopped, and she was back in action. They started to make some solid ground. At the top of the steps, Ashley opened the door leading to the roof, and with a large grin, could see that the pilot was ready to go. The large blades were alive and the engine in full swing. Just from the quick glance before sending Jenny out, then turning to help Victor with his girlfriend, she thought she could see someone else out there with the pilot.