Deadlocked 8 (18 page)

The creature was backing away with Stubs in
its bloody maw, and it was growling at a zombie that was enticed by
the fresh blood. Stubs was already maimed, his flesh ripped and his
blood now tracing a path across the pavement from where his killer
had taken its first bite. I swerved to hit the dog, knocking over
another zombie in the process and sending the startled man tumbling
over my windshield, cracking it as he did.

“Take that, you fucker,” I said as I heard
the satisfying thump of the zombie dog hitting the Jeep’s
bumper.

I looked at the blood stain in the rear view
from where the zombie had ripped Stubs apart and crunched his tiny
bones in its jaws. The sight sickened me.

I’d seen plenty of deaths in my time, and
lost more friends than I dared recall. This world would snatch away
anyone, at any time, and barely give you a second to mourn them,
but losing that little dog broke my heart. For reasons I can’t
explain, having him ripped away from my grip felt like proof that I
could never be a good mother. I thought of my mom, and the things
she’d done to save Kim and me, and I was certain I could never be
as strong as her.

If I couldn’t save a dog…

Ben Watanabe

My back was against the side of the bed and
my feet were on the opposite wall. I was doing my best to keep the
horde from breaking in as Harrison stood on the bed above me,
chopping his forest axe at the arms of the creatures that were
reaching through. The upper left panel of the door had been broken
open, and the creatures were clawing and biting at the wood in an
attempt to widen the breach.

“We need a new plan,” said Harrison as he
panted. He’d been chopping at the zombies since Annie had left, but
they just kept coming. Each time he swung, another stream of black
blood splattered across the ceiling in a wide arc. Severed fingers
and hands flopped on the mattress, and I could hear Harrison’s feet
splashing in the muck as he kept up with the carnage. “They’re
getting in.”

My legs ached, and the bed posts were digging
grooves in the wood floor from the amount of times the horde had
nearly pushed their way in. I could look back over my shoulder at
the door and see that Harrison was right. The horde’s numbers
swelled, and they continued to press themselves against the door in
a desperate attempt to get in. They wouldn’t stop, no matter how
many times Harry chopped at their hands, and the door was beginning
to break apart.

I was already holding my pistol, and I
checked the chamber as I debated what to do next. I knew that
shooting would alert every zombie in the neighborhood that we were
here, but I wasn’t sure that mattered. The horde we’d already
managed to attract was already too large for us to handle. We were
nearing desperation.

That’s when we heard the Jeep start, and knew
that Annie had made it. Harrison looked down at me with a wide
smile and said, “You hear that? She did it.”

All we could do was listen as Annie struggled
outside. Harrison couldn’t leave his post at the door, because the
zombies in the hall wouldn’t give up their quest to devour us no
matter how much noise Annie made. Harry kept chopping at our
attackers as I tried to discern what was happening outside. I heard
the Jeep’s gears grinding, and the angry screams of a mob, then a
distinctive crash that I assumed was Annie driving over people.
Finally, the tires squealed on the road shortly before we heard her
honking to attract as much attention as possible.

“That kid’s a force of nature,” said Harrison
with a giddy chuckle before he swung down at another hand that had
sprung from the hole in the door.

“We’re going to have to jump out the window,”
I said as I looked up at Harry. “We’re not going to make it through
that hallway.”

“Yeah, I know,” said Harrison. “I ain’t
looking forward to the fall.”

“You should go first,” I said. “I’ll stay
here and keep the bed up against the door.”

“Yeah, yeah,” said Harrison. “But you need to
be right behind me. Okay? This door ain’t gonna hold.”

“Trust me, I’m not planning on hanging out
here for long.”

He cursed a few times, and then said, “I sure
hope this works.” After a final chop at the invaders at our door,
he leapt off the bed and headed for the window. He looked back at
me, but his attention was quickly drawn to the door as he started
to put one leg out of the window. “Ben, they’re getting in.”

Harrison started to abandon his escape to
come back and help, but I yelled, “Go!”

The horde at our door began to rattle the
small hole they’d already broken, and one of them was pulling his
way through. The jagged wood stabbed at his midsection, but he was
driven by bloodlust and continued to try and force his way inside.
His fervor and the madness of the ones behind him caused his
stomach to tear against the wood, spilling his guts out over the
bed as he flailed at the comforter.

I turned in time to see Harrison drop down
from the window, but I didn’t hear him hit the ground. The clamor
of the creatures at my door drowned out nearly all other sound. I
knew my chance of escape was fleeting at best, but every second I
waited expounded the danger.

“Let’s get this over with,” I said just
before bounding up from my position between the bed and the wall.
The horde broke in the second that I moved. The bed was light and
weak, and its legs squealed on the wood floor as it was pushed out.
The door opened wide enough for the zombies to get in, and they
wasted no time in their desperate search for food. I grabbed the
gym bag of supplies off the bed and headed for the window. I sat on
the ledge awkwardly and swung one leg out without even peering out
to make sure the drop was safe. For all I knew, Harrison was in a
bloody heap below being devoured.

The gym bag’s straps were over my right
shoulder as I swiveled my other leg out of the window and then,
without a moment’s hesitation, I dropped. Hands caught me as I
fell, and I knew that the zombies in the room had reached the
window. One of them had grabbed the bag, and as I fell the strap
jerked at my shoulder, spinning me as the straps slipped out of my
arm.

My fall was anything but graceful.

I hit the gravel on my side, and my head
smashed down just after. I heard Harrison curse and ask, “You all
right?” That, at least, was a comfort since I was fairly certain it
meant he wasn’t being eaten by zombies that had been waiting below
our window.

My only answer was, “Fuck.”

That’s when a hammer fell down and struck my
knee, followed by nails that clinked against the stones beside me.
I looked up and saw a zombie dangling from the window I’d fallen
from, and my bag of supplies was now hanging from his side, the
contents dropping down on top of me. Harrison grabbed my arm to
help me up, cursing in a whisper the whole time.

As I stood, I grabbed the clawed hammer.

“Annie’s got a big group of them chasing
her,” said Harrison as he helped me stand and walk towards the
street.

It was getting dark out now, and I could see
the Jeep down at the end of the street. Annie was there, honking to
attract the horde, and at least twenty of the bastards had been
enticed to follow her. The problem that faced us now was that the
zombies in the house were beginning to leap from the window, and
would be on our heels in moments. Ahead, the zombies that were
chasing after Annie would likely see us soon. This was only a
temporary reprieve.

Annie was stopped at a ‘T’ section ahead, and
she was facing east. I pointed west and said, “Let’s head out that
way. Hopefully she can draw the horde away from us and then come
back around.”

“Surfing on maybes,” said Harrison. He was
covered in the blood of the victims he’d chopped apart in that
house and he looked ghastly even when he was smiling – especially
when he was smiling.

We ran down to the end of the street, headed
in the opposite direction that Annie’s Jeep was facing. She
continued to honk and rev the engine, drawing the horde her way,
and Harrison and I tried to sneak past. We rounded the corner and I
waved my arms in the air, hoping Annie was watching, and then
pointed down the street where I hoped she would come back around to
pick us up.

Unfortunately, we weren’t safe yet. The horde
that had been in our house were now on our trail, following behind
slowly but at a steady pace. I looked back at them and saw that
even the creatures that had been downstairs were now leaving the
house behind. I knew that we could keep moving and avoid the horde,
but whether or not Annie would be able to find her way back to us
in a reasonable amount of time was uncertain. We were outside in
the dark in an unknown area.

That’s when I saw more of the dogs appear at
the door of the home. They’d been upstairs with the horde minutes
earlier, but couldn’t chase us through the window. Instead, they’d
gone back downstairs to try and find us, and they would be on our
trail in seconds.

“We’ve got trouble,” I said as I readied the
hammer.

“What?” asked Harrison. He hadn’t seen the
dogs yet, and I pointed them out to him. “Oh shit.”

Annie was driving away, honking as she went
to attract the zombies that were still unaware we were behind them.
I looked back at the dogs and saw that they’d already covered half
the distance between us and the house. There were two of them, and
they were both sleek and fast.

“Get behind me,” I said.

“Fuck that, kid.” Harrison stood at my side,
bravery masking any lack of confidence. He had his axe still, and
spun it in his bloody hands. “Let’s do this.”

The dogs snarled as they approached, and I
prepared myself for their attack. One of them focused on me as the
other went for Harrison. I stepped to the side to get out of
Harrison’s radius if he chose to swing that axe wide. “Come and get
me,” I said as the dogs bore down on us.

The pinscher launched itself into the air and
I tried to catch its throat, but missed. The creature’s jaws
snapped inches from my face with my forearm pressed to its throat.
I pushed it away and fell back a step before swinging the hammer.
Either my aim was off or the dog managed to dodge because my swing
only grazed the top of its head. The creature lurched, its hind
legs high and its head low, and then bounded back at me. I barely
had time to catch it with a backswing, and the clawed end of the
hammer smacked its yellowed teeth.

I was about to try and swing again when I saw
Harrison’s axe come down fast and hard on the dog’s back, nearly
splitting the creature in two. He stood above it and pressed his
foot down onto the dog’s ribcage as the creature continued to bite
at the air. Then he used the flat edge of the axe head to smash its
cranium, silencing it for good.

“Thanks,” I said in admiration.

“Don’t mention it,” said Harrison as he wiped
blood off his face with his arm. He didn’t do much more than smear
the blood in the process.

Light illuminated the road and I looked off
in the direction we’d been headed. A car was coming our way and all
we could do was hope that it was Annie.

“Get in,” she screamed out to us as she came
our way. Apparently she’d been able to loop back around to pick us
up after drawing the horde away.

I laughed with joy and relief as she pulled
up next to us. Harrison got in the front seat and I opened up the
back, ready to get the hell out of this neighborhood.

“I can’t believe it,” I said as I slammed the
door shut. “We did it!”

“God damn right we did,” said Harrison,
equally cheerful. He slapped his knee and said, “That was a close
one. That was too damn close.”

“Get us out of here,” I said to Annie as I
settled in my seat.

“Gladly,” she said as we took off.

I glanced around and my smiled faded.

“Where’s Stubs?”

Annie Conrad

There was nowhere to go; nowhere to hide. At
least nowhere that felt safe.

We drove through midnight streets, unwilling
to stop until we navigated the maze of roads that drew a puzzle of
the landscape. We had old maps, but they did little good as we
continued to be detoured by wreckage and crumbling pavement. It was
shocking just how many streets were interrupted by bridges that had
disintegrated. We expected to be able to predict where bridges
would be by keeping an eye on the map for scant streams and rivers
that carved their way through this arid land, but that doesn’t
account for the multiple ditches that had sucked the roads down as
if it had been built on quicksand. The Jeep was formidable, but it
couldn’t teleport us away from this suburban sprawl.

“Left here,” said Ben. His demeanor had
hardened since learning of Stubs’ death, and I was positive he
hated me. To his credit, he didn’t blame me. He was calm and
collected as he tried to help guide us to safety.

“Where’s this go?” asked Harrison as he
peered ahead.

The Jeep’s headlights carved through the
night, revealing a thin stretch of road ahead that was overgrown by
trees and bushes that had sprouted along its edge. The leafless
limbs hung over the road like skeletal fingers, wavering with every
gust of wind as if beckoning us in.

“A nature preserve,” said Ben.

There was a rusted gate barring our way. It
had been yellow once, though only a scant few flakes of paint
remained on its triangular shape.