Infamy: A Zombie Novel (3 page)

“No.”

“Just be quiet.”

We step up to the railing and
lean over the center of the staircase. People on the ground level are swaying back and forth like some kind of mass Kumbaya.

“What the hell?” Rob whispers.

“I don’t know. Maybe they’re from the party last night.”

As we watch
, something cold and slimy splats against my shoulder.

“Oh that’s gross dude,
” Rob says. “Where did it come from?”

We both
look up.

Straight above us
on the stairwell a guy stares. His eyes have a yellowish glaze like they’re soapy and bubbly, like they’re about to fall out of his head. He looks a little punk rock too. Great haircut. A bit of a faux hawk.

“That dude isn’t blinking,” Rob says.

“I know.”

Punk-rock dude’s
teeth are bloodstained and he’s dribbling green goo out his mouth. His right ear has nearly been bitten off.

“What the fuck?
Look at his ear,” Rob says. “It’s dangling.”

“That shit’s defying gravity. Should we run?”

“I don’t know.”

The
punk rocker disappears but we know he’s coming our way. He flails his arms in a failed attempt to rush down the stairs grab us.

“Now we run. Move your fucking feet,
” Rob says.

We both
throw ourselves against the wall as the man falls down the stairs and hits his head against the railing right in front of us. He’s so awkward he’s half hanging over the rail.

“Fuck this,” Rob says, rushing over and
shoving the punker off the stairs.

The
dude flips through the air, colliding with other sections of the staircase. He smashes into people below like a failed stage diver at a rock concert.

Death fluid sprays in every direction
and no one seems to notice that a man just splattered against the floor next to them.

“
Direct hit,” Rob says a little too loudly.

One of the people
is bald and fat and gazes up at the two of us. His shriek alerts the others as he bumbles his way to the stairs.

“Shit! Shit! S
hit! Come on Rob we need to go!” I start to take off down the stairs.

Rob
grabs my arm. “Why are we going down?”

“We’
ll be stuck in here if we go up. Let’s go down a few floors. In case we need to jump to something.”

“God I hope you’re
right.”

 
           We crash onto the fourth floor, slamming the door hard against the wall. By the time we hit the middle of the hall where the elevator is located, the door to the staircase slams open once more, releasing a
Zombageddon
flood of bloodthirsty undead, knocking against walls and pushing each other to the ground.

             
Rob starts running like crazy but doesn’t really know where to go. “What are we going to do, man?”

“
There’s got to be a utility closet,” I say, running down a hallway.

Rob follows me as I pull on doors.

I find one with the words, JANITORIAL SERVICES, yank it open and we pop inside.

I grab a push
broom and break the head off.

Rob grabs a dirty bucket of
mop water, opens the door and wheels the water into the hall.

“What are you doing? Close it,” I say.

After pulling out the mop, he kicks the bucket over, spilling soapy water onto the carpet between us and the undead.

“The zombies will slip a
nd fall when they come after us,” he says, still holding the mop.

“
On carpet?” I say. “Never mind. Let’s try to find an open room.”

No good.

Finding an open door in a hotel with automatic locks is an epic fail. We reach the end of the hall where a window overlooks the highway. Nothing but asphalt to jump down to.

The hall
fills fast with undead creepers. Some of them, freshly turned, start chewing on each other as they make they’re way toward us. Slower ones scream as they get trampled. Others trip and fall.

“We’re fucked,
” Rob says.

Every part of my body fills with
goosebumps. Then I remember the crash I heard that scared the shit out of me in the bathroom upstairs and realize the walls are paper thin.

“Rob, try and
hold them back.”

“Hold them back?
With a mop?”

“Yeah. I’m going to kick through one of these walls.”

“I don’t know if I can. There’s about a million of those creepy shitfucks and I just pissed myself.”

“T
hink back to your high school football days. Don’t let anything through the line. I’ll get us a way out.”

“Okay, okay
,” Rob says, puffing himself up, readying himself to body slam cannibals. “I can do this. You guys better really be dead because I’m bringing the pain! Aaahhh! Aaahhh!”

Rob pounds
his chest like some kind of scraggly white gorilla and mashes his feet on the carpet for traction, then takes off running toward the horde.

I start kicking the wall.

“This is Sparta, motherfuckers!” Rob smashes the mop head into the face of the first zombie he reaches, knocking it into some of the others.

I
drive my leg through a portion of drywall. Using the broomstick as a crowbar, I pry a huge chunk out of the way.

Rob
smashes zombies in the head. As each tries to grab him, he pokes, stabs and smashes.

Z
ombies fall on top of each other.

“
I’m almost done,” I say. “Get over here.”

Rob
snaps his mop over his knee to create a jagged edge. He drives it into the eye of a dark-haired, creeper-woman wearing a WELCOME TO SAN DIEGO t-shirt.

I step through the hole
into a bathtub.

Rob
follows and we barricade the bathroom with a dresser. Doesn’t take long and we hear fingernails scratching the walls.

“I
gotta get some air,” I say.

Rob slides open the door
to the balcony and we step outside. We’re high above the hotel pool.

“
This shit is crazy man,” he says. “How we gonna to get out of here?”

I point to the pool.

“Jump?”

“
What else are we going to do? This building isn’t secure.”

“Maybe no place is safe.”

“It’s safe somewhere,” I say. “We just have to get through these bastards and find our way to some safe buildings. We need weapons. We need a plan of attack.”

“
Ain’t no plan when it’s all chaos.”

“Look, Rob. I want to panic too. But
we can’t give up. We have to survive.”

“What’s there to survive?”

“You’re just freaking out. You need to calm down. That pool isn’t so far down.”

“It’s not lan
ding in the pool that scares me,” he says. “It’s all the space in between.”

“
We don’t have a choice. We hit the pool then we get the hell out and fight our way to some weapons, food and safety.”

“Shit,” Rob says. He hears the crash the same time I do.

The top part of the bathroom door breaks open. Arms pop through. Hands rip away wood. Screeches and growls bellow into the room.

“Cheap fucking hotel doors,” I say
.

We both step onto the railing as
zombies crawl over the dresser we used as a barrier.

             
“I don’t like this,” Rob says. “I just want answers. Will one of you fucking zombie bitches tell me what’s going on?”

My
“fuck this” switch flicks on and I jump first, feeling like a bird. Within three seconds I smash into the deep end of the pool. The water welcomes me with a painfully wet hello and I crash to the bottom. I’m not sure if I’m hurt, alive or dead.

C
old water sends chills through my torso, legs and arms, numbing any remainder of a drug hangover. I look for Rob as soon as I hit the surface. He hasn’t jumped yet.

I wave my arms
as I get out of the pool, trying to get him to come down. I don’t yell because I don’t want to attract attention.

“What if I miss?” he yells from the ledge.

He wants to jump but continues to hesitate.

I
check for zombies around the pool. I don’t see any and look back up.

Rob is
taking too long. Somehow in his desperation he can’t leap and the zombies are on him. He turns and kicks at faces and arms as they grab at his legs. There’s not enough room on the ledge and he loses his footing.

“No!”

Rob’s body is falling backwards in a trajectory to slap the concrete four stories below. But he’s still EdgeCrusher—one badass son of a bitch. I don’t know how he does it—he straightens his body out in mid-air. The fucker manages to grab the rail of the balcony one floor below, crashing his body hard, but holds on and pulls himself up.

As he slips
up and over the railing, the zombies after him from above start tumbling off the balcony. Some land in the pool. Others splat against cement, lawn chairs and tables.

I’m
dodging falling corpses when the pool doors burst open. Three hungry zombie women stumble into the pool area. One of them slips on the bloody concrete next to a sign that reads NO RUNNING IN POOL AREA and smashes her head against the concrete. The dumbass moans and twitches.

“
I’m not jumping now,” Rob yells. “Those bitches look mean. I’ll stay up here a while.”

“Barricade
the door,” I say. “And help yourself the mini-bar.”

I jump up on
to the wall that surrounds the pool. The zombie bitches can’t reach me.

Rob laughs. “You can’t climb for shit, Seth.”

“Rob!”
I shout a warning. Two hands grab his shoulders pulling him out of sight.

“What the fuck!” I hear him scream.

There’s no time to clear a path to run back in the hotel. Hell, there isn’t even time to stay on this ledge. I jump to the other side of the wall into the parking lot.

Fuck. M
y car isn’t in the lot where I left it before the party. It’s three spaces over, smashed to hell with a newly added Astro Van accessory attached to my driver’s side door.

Eve
n if it was running, there’s no use. A pile of cars blocks the driveway. My only option is to take to the streets.

Doesn’t matter that I’m leaving Rob, A.K.A.
EdgeCrusher. If anyone will find a way to stay alive, he will. Though I can’t say I have much hope for either of us right now.

Chapter 3

Left 4 Dead

The sun tears away the night sky. Smoke and anarchy fill the streets. Many buildings, cars and people have been left to burn, pouring a cloudy haze over the city.

The constant stench of
burning flesh and rot is inescapable. Panicked citizens consumed by blinding fear continue to open fire on any living or dead who come within range.

I try not to be seen.

I move along the street, keeping low, running from car to car. A constant thunder rumbles. Is it more gunfire? Voices?

The thunder is a
mob of survivors spanning the width of the street. They run toward me like a herd of spooked cattle.

I don’t want to run
but jump into the mix and start jogging alongside the pack. My lungs fill with spit. My legs cramp. I cough like an aging smoker. Of all the times to think about when Coach made me run the mile back in high school, why now? Asshole. I only finished two complete miles in my life. Had I known I’d be chased by flesh-eating zombies this week I would have run my ass off every day for the man. I doubt I’ll finish this race.

Survival of the fit
test is no fucking joke.

“No, no, no!” I
whisper as a group of zombies flood out of an alley. The survivors running ahead of the pack have no time to dodge the undead. They collide like the frontline of a football team. Only, their faces and necks are bitten into. Some raise their hands defensively. Those are bit off right away. Why don’t these people have weapons? Who am I to complain? I don’t have shit either. No time to pick anything up from the gun shop.

I start
jumping over survivors and zombies like a quarterback going for it on fourth and goal. There’s no real time to think how awful I am for stepping on the back of a man who’s just fallen. It’s bad enough the guy is sporting a comb-over. One of the creatures tears into his leg. He can’t escape. Zombies fucking dogpile him.

I’m a dick,
but the only ass I’m looking to save right now is my own.

I made
a similar move at a Korn concert to get onstage. I flew out of the fucking mosh pit. Now I’m clamoring over a mountain of living and dead, jumping and scrambling as more zombies flood out of another alley, tearing apart the people on the ground and giving chase to those of us still running.

My legs beg
in to give out. That last jump through a group of infected hipsters with bloody beards ripping into two soccer moms took a lot out of me. I’m left with nothing to go on. Even my breathing is too hard to control. I stumble into a side alley and lean against a black Toyota four-door.

This is it, there’s just no way to continue.

I’m thinking about climbing on top of
the hood and just setting myself on fire when I hear a voice.

“
Get in!”

What the hell? There’s a guy inside the car
? This is a really dumb move on his part to risk the attention of panicky civilians (like me) and zombies (what else am I going to call them at this point? They eat people. They’re fucking crazy). If anyone hears, everyone and everything will storm this car. By the looks of other vehicles down the street this has happened quite often. Car doors hang open. Blood is splattered everywhere as if drivers and passengers were sacrificed in desperate attempts to commandeer vehicles.

Luckily
no one besides me takes notice. The fight continues down the street.

I jump in the back seat
next to an attractive woman in an SDSU sweater. She has bloodshot eyes and is scared shitless. Two guys in the front seats wear ballcaps from the same school. The driver is the larger of the two guys and has a tattoo on his neck that disappears into his shirt. He puts his foot on the gas before I can reach out to close my door. I nearly fall out but get a hold and slam it shut.

H
undreds of reanimated corpses move through the streets. Most continue chasing the mob. Others turn toward the car as we speed a way. I make a mental note: They’re not fast movers. Seems like the fresher they are (the more recent they’ve turned zombie) the quicker they move.

The guy in the passenger seat turns around.
He’s got reddish hair and a cut on his lower lip. I wonder who punched him.

“
You don’t look like you’re bit,” he says. “If you are you better jump out now.”

“N
o,” I say. “I was pretty lucky. A lot of people just died I think.”

“That’s happening everywhere.”

“Not just in San Diego?”

“
Don’t know about the rest of the country. I’m Mike. That’s Jason,” he says. He doesn’t introduce the girl.

“What’s your name?” I ask the girl.

She doesn’t answer. Tears run down her face.

“She hasn’t said a wo
rd since she jumped in the car,” Mike says.

Jason whips the car back and forth, dodging
wreckage and broken police barricades. We’ve been on the road for maybe five minutes when we turn east around a corner where a small group of undead feast on corpses in the middle of the road.

“Ram those fuckers
!” Mike yells.

Jason
slams his foot on the gas.

Now I’ve see
n Cars vs. Zombies countless times in movies. Shitty CGI. Movie props launched into the air. Fake blood everywhere. I rammed a few zombies in video games too. When not exploding into a bloody mess they bounce like pieces of rubber tire or become a pile of goo beneath peeling tires. Makes the driver look like a badass.

N
one of that is remotely close to what happens in real life.

Take right now for an example.
The Toyota smashes into a zombie, sends some doofus ex-office IT professional (what I imagine he was) rolling onto the hood into the windshield before sliding off. Glass smashes inwards, only caving when we hit our eighth zombie, a skinny dude with rockabilly sideburns. He crashes into the laps of Jason and Mike, along with a shitload of glass.

Jason jerks the steering wheel in panic
, tipping the car onto the driver’s side. The momentum sends us down the street sideways. Time slows. My heart races. It’s like I’m able to see every little detail as it unfolds, yet I’m unable to do anything except watch and die.

The
seatbelt digs in to my hip as my weight shifts from the sideways gravitational pull. I slam my hands against the top off the car to keep my upper body from flopping down toward the girl. I don’t think she’s wearing a seatbelt, not the way she’s twisted against the door and glass.

Before I can offer
any help, the glass breaks beneath her and she’s sucked out of the car. My eyes shut as the car tips onto the hood and slides to a stop.

I’m still hanging upside-down when a
zombie that looks just like the pizza guy I skipped out on a tip last week tries to climb through the broken side window. The dude has tattoos all over his head and open sores. It’s all ink and blood.

I want to
piss myself as the undead’s shoulder hits against the side of the door stopping him from fully coming in. He crawls back a bit as if confused, giving me just enough time to hit the latch on my seatbelt and nearly fall on my head.

             
I twist around to face the broken window just in time. Tat-head zombie comes for another try. He makes it through the window screaming and biting. I greet his face with the bottom of my shoe, smashing the dude’s nose into his head. Cartilage and weakened veins pop, pouring blackened blood from the fresh hole in his face.

For the record, smashed
noses don’t faze zombies. He continues to come at me. I push my back against the door, fall out of the car and scramble to my feet.

Mike and Jason dangle motionless
as more zombies start chewing and ripping. It’s hopeless to try and help. They don’t scream for long.

The only pl
us I can think of about my short car ride is having the chance to catch my breath. I sprint away, leaving a buffet of car-crash victims.

I’m
near the Plaza, ducking behind a Mazda when a couple of undead pass. I hope these fuckers can’t smell me. One is an obese son of a bitch. Probably walks better now than he did when alive. He looks extra hungry. His jaws keep snapping.

Big boy
and the tiny woman with him pass but are followed by two children who look to have been dead for some time. Skin from their hands and faces have peeled away and their movements are very slow.

             
I place my hand on the bumper, which turns out to be a huge mistake.

Honk! Honk!
Honk!

“No fucking way,
” I say as the car alarm blasts.

F
lashing headlights and the screaming car horn not only alerts Big Boy, his woman and the meatsack children, but also a shitload more zombies from the Plaza. They all start to make their way over.

Ca
n’t help but think I brought this upon myself after complaining about running.

             
I’m starting to lose my motivation to even attempt to get past this latest crowd of undead. Then through all the alarms, growls and burning machinery I somehow hear engines rumbling.

A
couple of Army Hummers pull around the corner.

It’s hard to see them through the smoke
, but I catch a glimpse. How is it that a man can suddenly gain motivation? All you need is a little hope. And hope is what I suddenly have in the U.S. Army.

I know I can get through this crowd.
How hard is it to avoid a few snapping jaws, right? I start to plot my course. I’m ready to run. But what’s that? A new sound? It’s not a growl or a whine, a cat or a dog.

There’s a
baby crying.

Is
my mind playing tricks on me? My brain lacks oxygen. I know this. But there it is again. A cry . . .

Do the
undead hear the baby too?

Shit.
They do. Some of them take to the sidewalk, heading for the noise.

I spot a
baby stroller in front of Starbucks. I should just keep going. It would probably be better to reach the Hummers first then tell the soldiers. They’re better equipped for a rescue. Fucknuts. What am I thinking? Zombies will kill the baby before the soldiers ever make it back.

A shirtless zombie in flip-flops is about to reach the stroller
. The idiot steps on the back of his left flip-flop and stumbles. He falls into the back of the stroller, sending it rolling my direction. I move after it. Pure reflex. I don’t know what’s more bizarre, me going after a baby during the apocalypse, or the fact that now a douchebag attorney zombie in a purple tie and grey blazer just grabbed the handlebars of the stroller. What the fuck’s he going to do, push it down the burning street? This ugly bastard’s jaw is completely ripped off. His mouth meat flaps above his bloody purple tie like he has two tongues.

I grab the side of the stroller
, kick the jawless freak to the ground and take off running with the stroller.

“You’re lucky that you happen to be on the way kid
,” I say. “Just know that once we get to the Hummers you become the property of the U.S. Army.”

Suddenly
my left foot connects with a crack in the cement. I’m a dumbass and lose my grip on the stroller. My palms scrape the ground before my chest slaps asphalt. The stroller hits a small, decorative tree in the middle of the sidewalk.

I’ve just missed my chance to enlist this baby in the U.S. Army. Lying on the cement, I
watch as the Hummers flip around and start to drive away.

“No, wait. I have a baby!” I yell
.

They
turn a corner and are gone.

“Fucking stupid fuckers.”
Up until now I’ve been able to keep my cool. Sure, stepping on a man to help secure my own safety and probably guarantee his demise affects me. Even leaving a possible dying Rob disheartens me (Not to mention, watching those people fall to their deaths. That put a knot in my stomach). This new reality hits me full force. It’s no longer my ass I’m looking after. I have the ass of a baby.

Karma
truly is a bitch. The way my life has been you would think a bus full of San Diego Chargers cheerleaders would rescue me. Not even. I’m stuck running for my life with someone else’s annoying shit.

W
ho the fuck just leaves a baby anyways?

I get up and check the stroller. One of the
front wheels has broken off. I’ve got no time to fix this. I sling the diaper bag over my shoulder and unstrap the baby. This kid is dressed in so much pink it causes my eyes to blink. The first zombie is the jawless bastard who was left tonguing the ground moments ago.

“I’m naming you,” I say
to the zombie, keeping the stroller between me and it. “Lick My Balls sounds like a good name.”

I kick
the stroller toward him.

They collide.