The Zombie Chronicles - Book 5 - Undead Nightmare (Apocalypse Infection Unleashed Series) (13 page)

“Shut the door and lock it!” Val yelled. “Can’t have any zombies sneaking up on us.”

I closed the door, but there was no lock. As I swung my gaze around, I saw another door, one secured with a small padlock. “There’s a locked door back here. Maybe it’s a closet or storage area or something with extra meds in it. I’m gonna get this door open and check it out.”

“Not without me, you’re not,” Val said, rushing over.

Kate tugged at a drawer in a large, horizontal, metal filing cabinet. “I’m going to check out the bagged orders that were supposed to go to customers. Surely someone had a prescription for antibiotics around here.”

“You keep working on that, and I’ll give Dean a hand,” Val said. She moved closer to the door and jiggled the lock. “Hmm.”

“I’ve got a bat, or Kate has a crowbar if that would work better,” I chimed in.

“Nah, that’s okay. I got it.” Using her hammer, Val smashed the lock to bits. “That’s how it’s done, little brother,” she said proudly as the door swung open.

I smirked, but not for long, because a zombie in a white lab coat, with teeth as sharp as the hypodermic needles that were lying around, lunged for my carotid. My stomach lurched, and Kate screamed, but with lightning-fast reflexes and a surge of adrenaline, I whacked its head and knocked it over.

Val slammed the door shut. “What the heck?” she said.

I tried to calm my racing heart. “Talk about a mad scientist,” I joked, but no one really found it funny.

Kate began pounding on the filing cabinet, trying to get it open. “Let’s find this medicine and hurry outta here. We should have taken all those dead bodies as an omen, a warning or something.”

“It doesn’t pay to be superstitious anymore,” I said.

She pounded on the cabinet, to no avail.

“Can you get it or not?” I asked her impatiently.

“No. Who would have thought it’d be so hard to break into a darn filing cabinet. The thing must be made out of titanium or something.”

Val blew out a breath. “Looks like it’s hammer time again,” Val said. “Look out.”

“Not so quick with the war-hammer, Thor,” I said, stopping her. “If you bang around on that thing and dent it or smash the lock, we’ll never get the door open,” I said. “We’ve gotta find the keys.”

“My guess is that the keys are in the pharmacist’s pocket,” Val said, “and he didn’t look like he’d be willing to just hand them over.”

“Did Dean kill him?” Kate asked.

“I smacked the good doctor into next week,” I said, stepping closer and raising my bat, “but just in case, I’m ready to smash him into next month.”

Kate’s eyes widened as she stood next to me. “How about next year?”

I met her gaze. “Just open the door. When I get done, this guy’s gonna need to take a whole lot more than two aspirin to get rid of his headache.” I took up my home-run stance as a trickle of sweat ran down my back.

Kate slowly opened the door and stared down at the corpse. “He isn’t moving, Dean. I think he’s dead.”

“They all are,” I said. “Question is, for how long?”

“You know what I mean. Just hurry up and grab the keys.”

I cringed as I stepped closer to the body and reached into the large hip pocket and felt around. The creature didn’t stir or move, which was quite a relief, and as I looked up at his decayed face, I wondered just how long he’d been locked in that supply closet.

“Anything?” Val asked.

“Scissors and, uh—”

The zombie apparently wasn’t too fond of being pick-pocketed, because he suddenly grabbed my wrist, and a shudder ripped through my body. I grabbed the scissors and thrust the sharp blades through his left eye socket, and he fell backward, gone for good. I then reached into his pants pocket and was thrilled to feel keys.

Kate immediately grabbed them and tried the smallest ones in the filing cabinet drawer. A little silver key turned with a
click
, and we began looking through the prescription orders. I really didn’t have any idea what we were looking for, but Val grabbed about seven bags and stuffed them into her backpack that was slung over her shoulder.

“Aren’t these painkillers?” Kate asked, holding up a bag of Vicodin. “Says here it was prescribed for a pulled tooth.”

“It’ll work for a hurt shoulder, too, though it will make Lucas a little…loopy.”

“Like that’ll be anything new,” I joked.

“Right,” Val said with a smile. “Nice find, Kate.” She stuffed it into her bag. “Now let’s get outta here.”

I hopped over the counter and swung the flashlight beam down so I could avoid stepping on any dead bodies or heads. When we finally made it to the door and I opened it, natural light flooded in, along with green arms and long black nails reaching for me.

Val and Kate slammed the door shut.

“Crap!” I yelled. “We have to find a back door.”

“Quick! Back to the other side of the store!” Kate yelled and led the way.

Chapter 10

We had found the pharmacy and had gotten Lucas the precious antibiotics he needed for his infected wound. The only problem was that we couldn’t get out the front door. Dozens of zombies were waiting outside for us, and there was no way the three of us could take them all on. The pharmacy was a relatively strong fortress, with a locked steel door and bulletproof windows, but we couldn’t stay in there forever.

“What about those stairs Dean saw?” Kate suggested.

Val nodded. “We can see what’s up there. If it’s clear, we can look out the windows and find the best escape route.”

“I like it,” I said, shining my flashlight around the room, dodging and stepping over dead bodies. “Let’s go.” I hopped the marble counter and made my way to the door I’d discovered. Kate slowly opened it, and I held my bat at the ready. Nothing jumped out at us, and I let out the breath that was frozen in my throat.

“I’m going first,” Val said. “I can see better than you two.”

We agreed and followed her up the creaking stairs, shining our flashlights around. As we ventured farther, one step at a time, my nerves were on edge. The smell of dust was overwhelming, but I would have taken that any day over the stink of death that we’d walked through downstairs. The walls slanted steeply upward into a narrow ceiling, and miscellaneous supplies, shrink wrap, bubble wrap, and boxes were stored in messy, unorganized piles. Everything was draped with spider webs, and I wiped the sticky threads on my pants.

We walked to the window and looked down. From that vantage point, we could see that there was no possible way we were going to get out through the front door; the street was crowded with zombies, the dead shuffling around in every direction, looking for their next meal.

Kate pushed the curtains aside and peered out. “There are hordes of them out there. Why are there so many?”

“And to think, we were just out there walking those very streets,” Val said, her voice cracking with tension. “Maybe we shoulda taken Mary and George up on their offer for a ride.”

“You know as well as I do that we couldn’t leave the others behind,” I said. I hoped the others were okay, and I worried that they might have the same idea as we did and head for the pharmacy. “If Nick and the girls come here, they’ll be eaten alive in a matter of seconds,” I said.

We walked to the other side of the attic and glanced out through the dusty, threadbare curtains. There were only about three dozen zombies out there, far fewer than in front of the drugstore.

Val nervously ran a hand through her hair. “Think, people. How are we gonna get out of here?”

I leaned back against the boxes behind me so she could look out the window and see what we were up against.

“We can’t take them all on, no matter which direction we go,” Kate said. “I say we wait it out. When they realize they can’t get in to eat us, they’ll move on and look for food elsewhere.”

“Yeah, but the others will think something happened to us,” Val responded. “They’ll come looking for us and walk right into a trap.”

“I’m not staying the night here, and I won’t sit here and act like bait to get Nick, Jackie, and Asia killed,” I said. “Besides, Lucas won’t survive that long. There’s gotta be a way out.”

“And how do you plan to fight them all off?” Val said. “Look, Dean, Nick is my brother, too, and I care about Lucas and the others as much as you do, but I’ve already buried enough people I loved. I won’t bury you too. I just won’t.”

The emotion in my sister’s voice was undeniable, and I was moved by the sad look in her eyes. My sister hadn’t really known me that long, but she loved me and would do anything to protect me, even from myself. Tears welled up, and I took a moment to compose myself. My hand trembled as I rubbed my face, my brain still circling around Val’s words. “I get it, Val, but why can’t we just—”

All of a sudden, a green arm sprung out from the boxes and wrapped around my throat. The attic was somehow populated with a terrible trio of zombies. A woman with messy, long white hair and milky, dead eyes moaned as she lumbered toward me. I kicked her in the chest and simultaneously whacked the zombie behind me with my bat; it crashed into a heap of boxes. The white-haired woman came back for more, along with a lanky man. I got into proper stance, moved my arms, wrists, and shoulders into position, and aimed for direct contact with the zombie’s skull. I swung with as much force as possible in such a tight space, sending the woman flying, and then I turned and hit the man, killing him with one whack.

“Dean!” Val called. “Are you okay?”

“I’m fine.”

“Where did they come from?” Kate asked, wiping blood off her face.

“I don’t know, but now we’ve really gotta get out of here.” As I looked out the window again, an idea struck me. “If we can make it to that U-Haul truck out there, Val can hotwire it.”

“There’s a low gable roof,” Kate said. “Maybe we can shimmy down it and hop on top of the U-Haul.”

“We can break a window and open the door,” I said. “I’ll spray ‘em with the fire extinguisher so they don’t scratch Val through the broken window while she’s hotwiring the truck.”

“No need,” Val reminded me. “I’m immune, remember? I’m more worried about something taking a healthy bite out of my neck.” Her face brightened. “It’s a great plan, Dean, but we’ll have to be quick. As soon as they catch our scent, they’ll be all over us like ants on a picnic.”

Terror was written all over Kate’s face. “Uh, guys…can we go over this in a little more detail?” She was brave when it came to small battles with a few zombies, but the thought of an epic war against hordes of them freaked her out more than a little, and the thought of heading straight into masses of them wasn’t doing her nerves any favors.

Val nodded and tried to reassure her. “Look, it’s really simple. The second this window is opened, we have to scoot down the gable. We’ll get into position and jump onto the truck, slide down the hood, get on the ground, break into the truck via the window, and hop in. While I’m hotwiring the thing, you two spray the heck out of the zombies so they don’t make Swiss cheese of me through the window.”

“It sounds crazy,” Kate said.

“Kate, insanity might be all we’ve got right now,” I said, nodding out the window to the savages.

“What if the truck doesn’t work or there isn’t any gas in it? It’s quite a gamble.”

I heard the popping and snapping of bubble wrap, and my stomach clenched. I was sure more zombies were approaching, but when I spun around, I saw that it was only a rat. I whacked it like a golf ball, and there was one less rodent in the world. “It’s a gamble to stay in here too,” I said.

“Why’d you kill it?” Kate said, ever the animal lover. “You oughtta save all that deadly force for the zombies, not helpless animals.”

“You don’t get it, do you?” I said.

She shook her head. “You love saying that to me.”

“Zombies love rats like we love chocolate. I was able to escape from a barn of zombies by tossing dead rats.”

Val smiled. “Fantastic. We can use rats to lure them away from the U-Haul door to give us time to break through the window.”

“Maybe the door won’t be locked,” Kate said.

“With our luck? I wouldn’t be surprised if it was welded shut,” Val said.

“You really think we can pull this off?” Kate asked.

“I dunno,” Val said, releasing a long breath, “but it’s the best plan we’ve got. Dean, you keep killing rats or even mice if you see any. Kate and I will go grab the fire extinguishers from downstairs.”

“I saw a toolbox under the counter,” I informed her. “You’ll need a screwdriver to hotwire the truck, right?”

“Right.” She smiled at me and took off with Kate right behind her.

With the crackers Lucas had packed, I lured out the starving rodents. I killed so many rats and mice that I lost count, and I gathered up their furry little corpses and placed them in a plastic bag. “Aw, rats,” I joked when I dropped one. Just as I scooped it up, I heard a loud crash downstairs, and a tingle shot down my spine. “What the…?”

Chapter 11

I grabbed my bag of rats and my trusty Louisville Slugger. Groans and shouts were coming from downstairs, and I knew the girls had to be under attack by zombies, but I wasn’t prepared for what I was about to see. As soon as I exited the attic stairs, my eyes flew wide open and my mouth fell agape. A large group of the infected had flooded the room. I immediately started throwing rats off to the side, and zombies began fighting and piling on top of one another, trying to get to the easy meal. I started swinging my bat and smacking any remaining corpses to clear a pathway to Val and Kate.