Time of Death Book 2: Asylum (A Zombie Novel) (22 page)

The house was spectacular, so much so that
calling it a mere house was an insult. Our steps echoed on the
marble floor and bounced off the empty walls. There was no sign of
any personal touches, not even a single piece of furniture. This
palace of a home had been empty before the zombies and would likely
remain that way forever.

Knowing this, I still felt compelled to check
the cabinets, refrigerator, and pantry shelves for consumables.
Predictably, I struck out everywhere but the pantry. A half-full
case of supermarket-brand bottled water graced the center pantry
shelf. I pulled open the bi-fold doors to reveal the heavenly
liquid, envisioning the harmonious tenor of voices one would expect
to hear as the pearly gates parted. Then I thought to myself, you
are such a goober. Leaning just outside the pantry was a large
wooden broom, the only thing in the vacant home not a fixture.

I found Jake standing by an open sliding door
next to a wall made entirely of glass overlooking a large backyard
with the biggest pool I'd ever seen. Remembering the pool of the
last house we'd commandeered, I shuddered to think what horrors a
pool this size would hold.

When I wrapped my arms around him and nuzzled
my head into the crook of his neck, he responded by tilting his
down and covered my arms with his.

"Come back to me, baby," I whispered. "I need
you to be okay."

I felt more than heard his sigh, and he
turned around to engulf me in his arms. He kissed my forehead and
his lips lingered on my skin before he pulled back and peered down
at me.

"I'm trying," he admitted. "I feel so empty.
No, that's not exactly right. I feel hollow…and angry."

"Me too."

We stood together long enough that when I
pulled away from him the shadows had shifted up the wall. Night was
coming. Meg was bent over the kitchen counter, her eyes closed and
head resting on her hands. The image reminded me of her sleeping on
the card table inside the shipping container earlier that morning.
Jesus, was that only this morning?

Striker cleared his throat to get our
attention. "There's some broken glass doors on the ground floor.
And I don't know about you guys, but that wall of glass behind you
doesn't fill me with a sense of security."

"We could lock ourselves in one of the rooms
upstairs," suggested Meg.

Giving it only a moment's consideration,
Striker nixed the idea. "You saw what they did back at the
apartment. If they get in and manage to climb the stairs, we'd be
trapped with only a twenty-foot drop for escape."

"What about the attic? A big place like this
must have a huge storage space up there." Jake's suggestion filled
me with relief. Not only because it was a brilliant idea, but that
he was thinking clearly enough to offer an idea at all.

"Smart thinking, Rossi," praised Striker.
"Let's go see what's up there." He looked between me and Meg, like
he wanted to make sure we were on board with the plan. Just when I
think I have him pegged, he throws another random quirk at me, and
I end up back at square one, trying to figure this strange man
out.

"Meg, come out back with me and keep an eye
out so I can let the dog out for a few minutes."

"Be careful," urged Jake.

"Ditto," I replied, leaving him with a kiss
on the lips before walking out the door with my sister-in-law.

Daphne was liberated from the small confines
of the bag and made good use of her legs, zipping around the lawn.
Even though I believed she'd never run off, she was still a dog.
After seeing her charge the zombie back there, I was nervous she
would do it again. I didn't want to call out to her lest the sound
be heard by any nearby undead, so I bent down and splayed open my
hands in her direction after she'd finished her poop dance. A smile
formed as I watched the tiny dog dart back to me with her tongue
out.

"Pee-ew," I said to her after scooping her
up. "You're a stinky dog." She licked my face in response.
Apparently, she was okay with being stinky. Me though? Not so much.
A shower would be added to the list of things to do if we survived
another day. Meg gave a small laugh at me, making my smile grow to
include a warm spot in my tummy. The tiny sound indicated that she
was keeping it together, and that was music to my ears. One less
person to worry about.

Without electricity, furniture, or food, the
home was pretty boring. There was absolutely nothing to do, and it
was still too early to hide ourselves away in the attic for the
night. Striker had found the broom and was using his machete to
shave the end into a sharp tip. Daphne was having a fit, lunging
and growling at the bristled broom head that Striker discarded in
the corner. I lay flat on my back on the marble floor, looking up
at the high ceiling while Jake and Meg sat with their backs against
the wall in silence.

I rolled onto my side and propped my head up
on the palm of my hand. "What exactly are you doing?" I asked
Striker.

"What does it look like I'm doing?" he
retorted, not bothering to look up or stop his whittling.

"It looks like you're about to join the cast
of Lord of the Flies," I replied.

That got his attention, and he finally looked
up at me, confused. The machete hung suspended in place, ready to
take another swipe at the handle.

"You know, the movie where the boys go all
tribal on a deserted island? Start killing each other and turn into
animals."

"Nope."

"Oh, for fuck sake, just tell me what you're
doing," I snapped.

"I'm sharpening the tip of a broom into a
spear. Unless you want to see if there's a movie playing and have a
night out on the town." A joke! Did he just crack a fucking
joke?

The broom handle ended up coming in handy
when we finally made for the attic. The sun had set and we couldn't
see outside anymore, leaving me jittery. Striker used the handle to
snag the access string and pulled down the stairs. Musty, old, air
hit my nose the moment my head breached the entrance of the dark
space. I flipped my flashlight on and swept the area before
continuing up.

This was the difference between the
one-percenters and us average folk. In my house, the attic was a
tiny area with enough space to crawl on the beams. And there was no
floor at all, just lines of insulation between the exposed beams.
Rich folk, though, their attics were the size of bonus rooms. The
only thing keeping this classified as an attic was the ceiling
access hatch. Other than that, the room had a sub-floor and
finished walls. There was even a window on the far end and, lucky
for us, it opened to let in fresh air.

Try as I might, I just couldn't stop my brain
from working overtime. It kept analyzing our current circumstances.
We'd started that morning with eight, and now we ended it with
four. We'd watched half of our group die in the course of a single
day. The worst part, besides the obvious loss of people we cared
about, was that we'd had to kill them with our own hands. What does
it say about the world when murdering your loved one is the only
acceptable option?

I looked over at Striker's sleeping form. The
moonlight from the small window illuminated the hot space just
enough so that I could see the steady rise and fall of his
breathing, but not enough to make out his features. For all I know,
he could have been staring back at me. Was I really mad at him for
what he said about Jake? Or was I mad that he was abandoning us? I
couldn't decide, and what's more, I didn't know why I even cared if
he stayed.

Jake had fallen asleep fairly quickly after I
gave him a protein bar. Of course, the fact that I'd crushed a
Xanax and mushed it into the gooey center of the bar probably
helped. I wasn't afraid he'd taste the bitter powder because the
bar tasted like shit to begin with. I considered doing the same
with Meg, but all things considered, she was holding herself
together pretty well.

I punched my backpack in an effort to shift
the contents enough to make it a softer pillow, but that was just
useless, and all it did was cause Daphne to stir. More than
anything, I wanted to let loose with a scream. Sometimes the only
cure for frustration is a full-on tantrum. Not wanting to wake the
dead, literally, I settled for walking to the window and leaning my
face against the cold pane. Soon enough, tears streamed down my
cheeks, transferring to the glass and leaving trails in the
dust.

* * *

The smell of something rotten stirred me
awake. My back was stiff from having fallen asleep sitting up
against the wall under the window. I blinked a few times to clear
my hazy vision, and I saw that Striker was still lying on the
floor, but now he was staring at me. Meg and Jake had yet to wake.
I wrinkled my nose from the suffocating stench and pulled the band
of my tee shirt up in an attempt to filter it out.

Stretching my muscles, I whispered to
Striker, "They're in the house, aren't they?"

He nodded back at me.

Meg rolled over, grumbling about the hard
floor. "What time is it?"

"Time to do some housecleaning," I replied in
a flat voice. I just couldn't approach the morning with zeal
knowing it was about to start with zombies.

Jake rolled onto his back, flopping his hand
on the floor and groaning. He looked at me with an expression of
accusation. "You roofied me, didn't you?"

I held up my hands and smiled nervously,
revealing way too many teeth. "Guilty," I admitted in a sing-song
tone, hoping it would lessen the blowup we were likely to have.

"That's just wrong," he said, fighting the
lingering sedation while trying to sit up. He looked over to
Striker and huffed. "You see what I'm working with?"

I exhaled an anxious giggle, the others
joining in. Maybe Jake wasn't as lost as I thought. Maybe all he
needed was a good night's sleep.

Striker hefted the broom, newly sharpened
spearhead facing the floor, and approached the hatch. "Bet your
glad I went all William Golding yesterday, aren't you?"

My jaw dropped. Not only did the shit know
what Lord of the Flies was, he was familiar enough with it to know
the author's name. That weasel!

"Better close that mouth before you catch
some flies," he said, smiling at his pun. I was speechless, so I
responded the only logical way I could think. I flipped him the
bird, causing him to brandish another grin of pride my way.

Jake stood by the hatch, ready to lower it on
Striker's word, and I scrambled to get Daphne into the carrier,
despite her growing protests, before they opened it. Striker
assumed his position, flat on his stomach, and Jake pushed down the
door to reveal the milling corpses below. Five disgusting faces
turned up to us at once, and we made an ew sound of revulsion from
our perch. We'd all crowded the little opening in the floor to see
what awaited us, and judging by everyone's response, we pretty much
wished we hadn't.

Gripping the wooden shaft with two hands,
Striker began making stabbing motions into the upturned faces. Each
time the sharpened tip slid through flesh it made a slurping sound,
followed by a second slurp and a clunk as the now-dead zombie hit
the tiled floor. Slurp, slurp, clunk sounded three times before
Striker swore.

One of the zombie's reaching hands connected
with the lowered hatch and caught between the lowest rungs of the
attached ladder. When he pulled his arm back, the latch holding the
ladder in place broke and the rungs lowered to the ground, taking
the zombie with it. The awkward movement of the undead combined
with the motion of the hatch messed with Striker's aim and the
broom missed its head and embedded in its shoulder. When the
offending undead fell, Striker lost his grip on the weapon and now
it and the zombie were on the floor, the creature impaled through
its abdomen beneath the bottom step. It may have been down, but it
certainly was not out. It continued to reach for us and snapped its
jaws while the remaining undead began to claw his way up the
ladder.

There was a bone-splitting crunch as the very
large male zombie stepped on the face of the other, effectively
making our job that much easier. This guy looked like he'd enjoyed
a lifetime of steroids before being infected and now resembled an
undead linebacker going for the quarterback. If there was any
question, I should clarify that Striker was the quarterback.
Fritz—the zombie just felt like a Fritz to me—had him locked in his
sights and was making good progress on the ladder.

"Shit!" exclaimed Striker, finding his
machete sheath empty. He began to scramble back from the opening
but was too slow. Fritz reached his meaty hand up and caught his
shirt. Striker slid forward under its grasp, and I ran to his legs
and pulled. From my position at Striker's feet, I couldn't see down
the hole, but I definitely saw when Fritz's head breached the
opening and got in biting range.

"Pull!" I shrieked to Meg, who'd joined me at
Striker's feet. Even with both of us working in tandem, we were no
match for the huge man's strength and his legs were jerked out of
my grip, sending me sprawling on my ass.

An angry cry erupted from Jake as he brought
something down on Fritz's head. Vinny's Ka-Bar was buried to the
hilt, pommel sticking straight up. With its grip now slack, Striker
was able to pull himself back from the opening and stopped when he
met resistance. I was smushed between him and the wall, and I don't
think he even noticed.

"Uh," I said. "Is it stuck on something?" I
meant the zombie, not the knife. Its head was still in the opening,
which was baffling because I expected it to fall. It was either
suspended in mid-air or it was still alive. Well, dead-alive.
Un-alive? Fuck it. Now wasn't the time to be straining my brain
with this stuff.