Euphoria-Z (12 page)

Mary endured all this when in truth she was simply using birth control. She never wanted to have a child with Bill.

Ron’s wife, Donna, was an attractive woman with an athletic build. She was a marathon runner and trained virtually every day, or used to.

“So this is the place.” She wasn’t skeptical; she knew her husband was capable of great things.

“I think so,” Ron said. “Given the experiences we’ve had with our fellow man recently, it seems like the right thing to do.”

Bill leaned over the edge to look straight down. “We have our work cut out for us. Sal, you ready to tackle this?”

Sal nodded and grunted in the affirmative. He’d heard some of Ron’s ideas and was glad he met up with a nice group of people. He was really thrilled to have such a large and positive project to occupy him. Maybe this was why he was saved. He felt needed here, useful.

On the way to the parking structure, the van had attracted a group of followers. About fifty slow walkers from the business park nearby were headed over to the structure, and they had to be the first order of business. The four men drove down the ramps to meet them in the parking lot well before they made it to the structure.

They left the van a few yards from the approaching dead, and as they walked toward them Ron was talking to Sal. “We’ve never fought together, but basically the three of us have a few simple rules. Don’t split up, don’t get cornered, and…”

“Don’t take it personally if you get bit and we bash your skull in,” Jeff finished.

“I was going to say, most importantly, always go for the head.”

Bill chimed in with, “Don’t forget, you can push them down too. Makes ’em easier to deal with sometimes.”

“Sorry if you know all this already. I still get nervous.” Ron tightened his grip on the poker.

“No, that’s good stuff.” Sweat made the ax handle slippery, and Sal was worried he might drop it. “I’ve never done this before.”

“Never? You have to explain that to me later. Oh, and Bill thinks he’s playing golf, so give him a lot of room. He almost took my head off once.” Ron wasn’t smiling, in fact he looked angry. With that comment they met the dead.

Bill advanced first with his club, a Callaway Big Bertha. “This was a five-hundred-dollar club. I just got it a few weeks before everything went to shit and never got to use it.” He took a golfer’s stance as if he were at a driving range. He made a show of spreading his legs, bending over the club, looking at his goal, and even taking a practice swing. He looked foolish.

The first of the dead arrived. It was an odd group, as they all came together in one clump from the office park. They were all nude and of various races and sexes. Some had a few scraps of clothes left, uniforms of some sort as if they worked in the area or were hiding out here.

Each of the men had a unique fighting style that reflected his personality. Ron chose a target by observing the perceived threat level and advanced quickly, delivering a well-placed blow that always dropped a deadhead. Then he’d back off momentarily to choose his next target.

Jeff used a crowbar, bashing one handed to keep his other hand free. He tended to move slowly backward as they dropped, space permitting. This allowed the more formidable zombies to come to the front, where he could dispatch them while he was fresh. The slower ones, the ground crawlers, the armless, and the less formidable ones were easier to take out. It was easy to take care of them after the bigger threats were gone.

Sal had an axe and had yet to brain one of the dead. It was a tense moment for him as he saw humans advancing on him, not monsters. They were dead and scary humans, but they were still humans. He questioned himself.
Can I really hit one with this ax and crush its skull?

“Use the back of the ax. The blade tends to get stuck,” Ron said as they closed in.

Ron struck first and hit a tall, obese white man in the eye. When he fell, Ron was already stepping back. Another tall man was coming at him, a black man with lips ripped off and teeth exposed. The corpse bit and chomped the air in anticipation of fresh meat. Ron cringed as the man’s teeth gnashed together, chipping and cracking enamel, exposing dentin and root. In the back of his mind, Ron the dentist was assessing the damage and what might be required to fix it.

And the eyes. Ron tried hard not to look in their eyes. It was always disturbing. The color and expression freaked him out and distracted him—scared the crap out of him. He was sizing up a small white woman as the giant black man fell. The woman tripped on her newly fallen pal, and Ron turned his attention to a bald Latino man with almost no skin on his arms and chest.

Bill took a wild swing and hit one in the head, but the club glanced off the skull and a large flap of scalp peeled up. “Fat!” He yelled the term for taking a chunk out of the green with a bad swing. The woman was now too close to play golf with. The flap of scalp lay over her ear, white skull exposed. Bill hadn’t taken her down, so now he had to face her with the light club. Her hands reached out toward him. Several of the nails were missing. A few jagged nails remained and stood up from the ends of her fingers, only bits of skin holding them on. More of the dead advanced right behind her.

Bill had to resort to an ungraceful downward blow in order to drop her. It looked like more swarmed him than the others, but in reality the others dropped theirs much quicker. They almost always had to help Bill finish up because he wasted so much time showboating instead of just getting the job done.

It all went quicker with Sal there. Bill was still frantically clubbing at a few of the dead, walking quickly backward. Ron and Jeff finished them off. Ron didn’t want to start trouble with Bill, but he didn’t like his approach. He thought it was dangerous, immature, and disrespectful.

Ron, Jeff, and Bill ended up together as the last deadhead fell. Sal was off on his own and had twenty-two of the total forty-eight corpses at his feet. He was wide eyed and breathing hard. He wasn’t winded or worn out; he was reacting to the adrenaline in his system.

No one relished the job. It was dangerous, messy, and very disturbing to bash a fellow human in the head, no matter what the circumstance. More disturbingly, they were getting used to it. It was Sal’s first time, but he would be used to it soon enough. He had to be if he wanted to survive.

As they walked back to the parking structure, Ron gave Sal the quick overview of his idea, his vision. He wanted to turn the parking garage into a highly secure structure, a fortress. A place where they could actually live and not have to flee from hole to hole just to survive. As they all discussed it, their plans evolved and they were excited to get started.

Sal asked the question every person did when first hearing Ron’s idea: “Why don’t we just take over a building?”

“A building has limited visibility because of all the buildings around it. We couldn’t see a threat coming until it was right on us.”

Sal was nodding. “What about…”

Ron cut Sal off; he was on a roll. He’d thought a lot about this. “A building would be a miserable place to live long-term. Halls and rooms are cramped and closed in and dark even during the day. One thing I like about a parking garage is that we could turn it into a fortress by removing access to the upper floors.”

“I like it.” Sal agreed with Ron’s points and didn’t know if he would have thought of any of them.

“We have to be careful.” Jeff walked behind everyone. “I think we need to keep a low profile, even disguise the place. I don’t know if we should attract anyone until the place is secure.”

“Agreed,” Bill said, siding with Jeff to both Ron’s and Jeff’s surprise.

“Ultimately,” Ron said, “we don’t just need a house or a fort. We need a town, a place we can live and not just survive.”

The first thing he wanted to do was remove access to the upper floors. Everyone gathered together to discuss the project. Jeff had several ideas, but Bill cut him off; he was immediately dismissive of the younger man before he got a sentence out. Jeff didn’t like conflict, so he shut down. Bill’s idea was to fetch a large backhoe they’d spotted about a quarter mile away to do the job. He could drive one and could see no other way to take the stairs and ramps down from the massive structure.

Sal and Ron were to take the van out for supplies: lumber, nails, paint, and anything they could find and fit into the van. Mary and Donna were starting to survey the area from the roof and take notes. They used Ron’s binoculars to create a map of the area, taking notes of anything they saw that might be significant such as a fire, an important store or building, and any activity from the living or dead. Eventually they would get a real map so they could improve the process.

As Bill was bestowing his opinion upon the group, Jeff got up and left. Ron tried to ask a question, but Bill just threw his hands up and left the discussion.

“I don’t need your permission, Ronny.” Bill was defensive and hostile for no apparent reason.

Ron sighed. “This isn’t going to work if everyone just takes off like this.”

§

Almost forty minutes later, the backhoe came rumbling up to the parking structure. The structure was very large and located on a broad piece of land, far from the airport. The interior of the parking structure had two elevators in the center and two ramps, as well as several sets of stairs. In order to accommodate tour buses, shuttles, and mobile homes, the height of the first floor was almost twice as high of the upper floors, being at least fifteen feet high.

Ron was frustrated. First Jeff had left; then Bill stomped out. He didn’t want to make himself a leader or act like he was the one in charge. But this was ridiculous. Someone needed to step in and organize things, direct things. He sighed and turned to Sal.

“Do you mind if I take the lead on things? Just so there is a consistent direction and clear communication.”

Sal shrugged. “No, that would be great. I think we need it.”

“Thanks. I’m worried Bill might be trouble, and it will fall to you and me to deal with him. I want to be on the same page if that happens. And he should never have treated Jeff that way. I would’ve stopped it, but it happened so fast.” He was looking out over the lot.

“I agree.” Sal didn’t like Bill; he thought he was a dick.

The noise of the backhoe concerned both Ron and Sal. Ron wished Bill wasn’t using it and he was hesitant to confront him. But suddenly a loud boom vibrated through the structure. The engine started revving louder, and there were several more booms. Ron shot an alarmed glance at Sal.

“We have to stop him.” He was already running down the stairs. He and Sal were on the roof of the structure. There was no covering on this level, but cars could drive up to it and park. They called it the roof.

Sal followed and told Ron about what he saw right before they took off. A massive number of the dead were already moving toward them from office/commercial area opposite the airport side of the structure.

When Sal last looked, huge numbers of the dead were swarming from between the buildings. The rumble and roar of the backhoe, the crashes as Bill pulled concrete down, were terrifyingly loud in this new noiseless world.

Sal and Ron had to walk the length of the structure once they were on the bottom floor. Sal asked, “I don’t want to be offensive, but has he always been like this? You know, hardheaded and unpleasant?”

“Not as bad as he is acting now. I think maybe the stress of everything that has happened is really weighing on him.”

“We might have to physically subdue him, and that could get ugly.” Sal was watching Ron for a reaction. Was he going to worry more about upsetting Bill than endangering their lives?

But Ron didn’t look offended or angry at the suggestion. “Maybe we can just disable the backhoe. He might be mad at us, but at least we can stop this.”

Sal was happy with that reaction. He and Ron jogged the rest of the way.

§

Bill had started by tearing out one of the two rear stairwells. The work was quick and easy using the backhoe. It had an attachment called a breaker, basically a large impact hammer that easily broke concrete into small pieces. The stairs were metal and bolted to the structure, so he could use the breaker to hook them and rip them off. The work went fast. He had both rear stairwells out and dragged several yards away by the time Ron and Sal reached him.

The work was also noisy. He knew he would attract some of the slow walkers, but the job needed to be done. Talking about it all day would get them nowhere. Besides, he was perfectly safe, as the cab was enclosed, locked, and eight feet off the ground. In addition, there were massive tank-like treads on both sides of the cab.

When Sal and Ron reached the bottom of the structure, the swarm was crossing the distance between the office park and the garage but was still many minutes away. The two men ran, waving their hands to get Bill’s attention. He looked pissed as he shut off the engine.

“You have to stop!” Ron yelled.

“You and your big friend going to stop me?” Bill said in defiance.

“Come on, Bill. You’re attracting all of the dead in the city. You have to stop.”

“If you let me finish, it won’t be a problem.” Bill bent over to start the backhoe again.

Sal stepped forward. “Hey, you think you can possibly finish in time?” He was pointing at the approaching swarm.

Bill looked up briefly. “Yes.” He tried to start the backhoe.

“Bill wait!” Ron was pleading. “You can’t finish in time, and you know it. If you do, then what? We’re in an ocean of the dead. You left the van far away. What do we do if we’re trapped in the garage? They can walk up the ramps if they have a reason to.”

Bill wasn’t moving. He didn’t start the backhoe, but he didn’t leave the cab either. Ron was worried that he and Sal would have to subdue him.

§

Jeff wasn’t mad, but he had no patience for Bill’s brand of stupidity. Bill thought he was smart and would go to irrational and dangerous lengths to try to prove it. Jeff knew the type.