The Dead Walk The Earth II (2 page)

Christopher threw all of his weight against the door but it was locked tight. The thick steel barely acknowledged his efforts as his rounded shoulder slammed against it. Again and again, he threw his body into the impenetrable barrier, but to no avail.

“It’s no use,” he whined between assaults. “It won’t budge.”

A crowd of withered bodies and grotesque faces had appeared above them at the top of the slope. They instantly caught sight of the two people battering their bodies at the fire exit and raced down the hill towards them. Luckily, they did not have the intelligence to look for the gap that had allowed Christopher and Tina to pass through the perimeter, and instead, they launched themselves at the parts of the fence that was still very much intact. They screamed and gnashed their teeth as they gripped onto the wire netting with their bony fingers. They shook and tugged at the barrier in frustration as it kept them at bay and allowed Tina the time to decide on a new course of action.

The door was not going to open, but in a moment of clarity, her panic seemed to lift and clear her thoughts. If the door were strong enough to withstand their efforts, then maybe it would mean that the building would be secure enough for them to use as a hiding place.

“It’s no use, Chris. It’s not going to give,” she said as she grabbed him by the arm and turned to run. “Come on, this way.”

She began to follow the pathway to the right along the side of the building. The infected on the other side of the fence followed and matched their course, all the time pounding at the trellis of wire that separated them from their meal. There were more of them arriving from the surrounding land and hurling themselves down the hill to join in on the hunt. The noise coming from them was deafening and haunting, and their foul stink filled the air all around them. The reek of decaying bodies was so powerful within the narrow gap around the perimeter that Tina began to gag as she ran.

At the far end of the pathway, she turned the corner and continued to drag her brother behind her. Now that the pressure had eased slightly, he was back to being non-responsive and having to be hauled along.

Tina paused at the end of the wall and watched the area in front of the building for a moment. She could see a wide open space with a number of parked cars scattered here and there, and looking up to her left along the front of the structure, it became apparent that they had stumbled into some kind of industrial complex. On the far side of the parking area, she could see more buildings identical to the one they hid beside and on the nearest of them she could read the logos emblazoned across their fronts.

One was a household appliance warehouse and another was a stationary supply headquarters. There were others too, but she was not there to shop and paid them no further attention. They needed to find somewhere to hide and the main thing that she noticed was that there was no trace of the infected. The area was deserted.

“This way,” she hissed and began to inch her way out into the open.

“I need to rest, Tina. I can’t breathe.”

“We’ll rest when we…”

A loud crunching noise accompanied by the sound of groaning metal beyond the corner where they had just come from, indicated that the fence had collapsed. The sounds of feet trampling over the broken rails and pounding along the concrete confirmed to her that the infected were back in pursuit.

“Run, Chris, they’re coming,” she exclaimed and began to sprint along the front of the grey building towards what she presumed was the main entrance.

Christopher staggered along and managed to keep pace with her. Thirty metres further on, she dragged him into a doorway that led into a spacious reception area. As he fell inside and crashed against the heavy desk sitting in the centre of the room, Tina slammed the door shut and slid a number of bolts into place to secure it. She stepped back and crouched in the shadows beside the entrance, and signalled to her brother to do the same and remain out of sight.

The rampaging infected were running in all directions out in the car park as they hunted for the two living people. Some stalked between the cars, peering through the windows and pounding on the glass, while others raced across the expanse of the parking lot and towards the other buildings. Directly outside the door where Tina and Christopher had taken shelter, a large group of them crept along the wall until they reached the thick glass panes that separated them from the dark interior.

Just centimetres to her right, the dead faces of dozens of the infected pressed themselves up against the glass and stared into the gloomy reception. Tina saw the haunting shadows of the numerous heads and shoulders stretching across the carpet by her feet as they clambered at the entrance. The door juddered lightly as they pushed their putrid bodies up against it and searched for any sign of their prey, but the way in to the room remained tightly sealed from within.

Tina screwed her eyes tight and prayed that they had not been seen entering the building, and that the infected would soon lose interest and move on in their search. She remained pressed to the wall, as she listened to the nerve wrenching snarls of the monsters that were lurking just beyond the glass.

Christopher was beside her. His chest was heaving rapidly and his breath came in sharp painful gasps. She knew that if they were discovered, they would not get very far. Her brother was incapable of going any further. He was ready to collapse and his knees trembled uncontrollably. With each grunt from the crowd outside or thud against the door, he flinched involuntarily and let out a stifled yelp. He was physically and emotionally exhausted.

It was fifteen minutes before she could breathe easily again and pluck up the courage to move. She gingerly crept towards the doorframe and looked out through the thick reinforced panes. She was careful not to expose too much of herself and kept most of her body hidden in the shadows.

Out in front of the building, she could see a tribe of the infected lurching about in the bright sunlight. They were no longer running about and shrieking with excitement. Instead, they were aimlessly shuffling around and bumping into one another and the cars dispersed throughout the expanse in front of the warehouses.

They were trapped but safe for now. Tina just hoped that there were no other entrances leading into the building that their hunters could exploit. She looked at her brother who had slid to the floor. He was sitting with his back to the wall; his legs sprawled out in front of him, and his chin resting upon his chest. She quickly realised that he was asleep when she heard the grumbling snorts that emitted from his mucus-filled nostrils, and saw the drool that cascaded from his quivering lips.

She stared at him for a moment then shook her head. She knew that she had to check and secure the area, but she now realised that she would be doing it alone. Her brother was beyond help right now and was of no use to her or himself. She decided to let him sleep.

He would only be a hindrance anyway
, she thought. At least he would be out of the way and she would know exactly where he was.

Remaining conscious of the bright light that shone through the glass panes of the door and illuminated a large rectangle on the floor, she carefully moved around the edges of the room and kept herself hidden within the shadows. In the centre of the reception area was a large desk with a dust covered computer, printer, and a number of files and books. It was all still neatly placed and stacked on the desktop and showed no indication that there had ever been any trouble there.

She knew that it was an exercise in futility, but she could not resist the urge to lift up the receiver from the telephone and hold it to her ear. As she expected, the line was completely dead, but from years of living with a mild form of Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, she knew that if she had not followed the impulse then it would have niggled at her until the desire had been satisfied. She could not afford to have such a trivial matter endlessly playing on her mind at that moment.

The doors leading off to the left and right towards what she presumed to be the offices, held no indication of having been forced open or barricaded shut. The place looked untouched and abandoned. She considered it as a good sign and she began to feel more comfortable in her new surroundings.

Something caught her eye as she walked around to the opposite side of the desk. It was an identification holder hanging from a hook on the wall. She reached up, removed it, and tilted it towards the bright sunlight filtering through the glass door. The photograph showed the smiling face of a young blonde haired woman, and beneath the picture, was a name stencilled in thick black lettering.

“Michelle Potts,” Tina read aloud as she rubbed her thumb over the image. “Where are you now, Michelle?”

In the top right hand corner of the identification card, she was able to read the company name and it caused her eyes to widen as she realised where they had stumbled into. It was a supply depot for a large supermarket chain.

For the past four months, Tina and Christopher had been surviving hand-to-mouth and looting anything that they could find. They had been living on a small riverboat and making their way from one village to the next and treating the canals and rivers as moats, anchoring their cramped vessel away from the banks and separating themselves from the land that swarmed with the plague’s victims. Almost every shop and store that they came across had either already been ransacked and was completely empty, or was teeming with the infected and impossible to get near. Pickings were always meagre. Now, stumbling upon a warehouse that supplied goods to a popular supermarket and so far seemed untouched, there was hope once again.

She needed to see for herself. With a final check on her brother and satisfied that he was completely oblivious to his surroundings, she entered through one of the doors that led off to the right of the reception.

She found herself at the head of a long narrow corridor. On her left was a solid wall and all along the right was a row of small, semi-private office cubicles that were separated by thin partition walls. The area was well lit from the sunlight that flowed in through the large windows overlooking the parking area, and filtered through the blinds of each cubicle and reflected from the brightly painted walls.

She silently made her way along to the end, pausing at the edge of each booth and listening for any sounds from within. Then she would carefully poke her head inside. Most of the offices were just empty space, but there were a couple that were furnished with desks, cabinets, and chairs. All of them remained unscathed by the panic and chaos that had engulfed most buildings and businesses. Most importantly, the windows for each office were unbroken. 

She reached another door at the end of the narrow walkway. The door was thick and solid and she had to push hard in order to open it. Inside, a wall of blackness greeted her. With no windows allowing the natural light to enter, she remained at the doorway and listened into the darkness. She could smell the distinct scent of ash and as her eyes began to adjust, she could see a number of doors on either side of the passageway. In the light that managed to filter in from the windows behind her, she saw faint clouds of charred, microscopic dust rising into the air as the atmosphere in the room changed.

A fire had raged through that part of the building, and somehow it had been stopped from engulfing the entire structure. She was unsure if it had been due to the heavy fire doors or whether it had happened earlier on in the crisis before the power failed, and the sprinkler systems still worked. It did not matter but it was something she could not help but wonder about.

Eventually, she plucked up the nerve to step forward. The odour of burnt wood and melted plastic was strong in the air, and as the door slowly closed behind her, a faint draft sent up clouds of tiny cinders all around her that immediately began to obstruct her nostrils. She remained still and concentrated on controlling her breathing and listening for the minutest of sounds. Eventually, her eyes began to adjust to the gloom and she inched her way forward to begin checking the other doors.

The walls were black with soot and deformed from the heat that had ravaged the corridor. Her feet crunched against the brittle floor tiles that had cracked and shattered under the intense heat and their echoes through the darkness caused her to cringe with each step.

The first doorway revealed what she believed to be a small storeroom and after the initial fright of feeling something bristly against her fingertips, and then realising it was a broom, she moved onto the next.

Inside, she could see nothing but from the stink of the murky space she surmised that it was the staff toilets. Beyond the smell of burned wood and scorched concrete, she detected the distinct mixture of old urine and bleach, and she felt relieved at the absence of the foul stench of decaying human beings. She had experienced that particular smell all too often, and as revolting as it was to her senses, it terrified her mind more. She closed the door and continued into the dark corridor.

At the second to last doorway, she could see a sliver of light through the small gap at the bottom. Without a sound, she turned the handle and was greeted with a brilliant whiteness. After a few minutes of being unable to see and relying on her sense of smell and hearing, the brightly lit room was blinding. She squinted and shielded her eyes with one hand, and raised her crowbar in the other.

It was a cafeteria. At least it had been once. Chairs and tables that were neatly placed filled every space of the floor. All of them were blackened and misshapen from the smoke and heat that had virtually incinerated the room. The walls that had once been painted white were now streaked with the dark artwork left behind by the licking flames. Black smears reached up towards the ceiling where the foam tiles had melted and now hung from their frames like synthetic stalactites.