Phil was running, running for his life. His legs churned as he raced down the sidewalk. "Gotta make it. Gotta make it", he panted as he ran. Being a policeman, he was in excellent shape but he had been running non stop of almost twenty minutes. Finally, he saw a building ahead of him. It had lights on. It was one of the only buildings on the entire block that had lights on. He began sprinting towards the building. It was some sort of office building. He reached the building and grabbed the door handle. He turned the handle, hoping and praying that it was unlocked. It was. He opened the door and was about to go in when he heard a man screaming for help. He looked over and saw a man dressed in a blue suit and wearing black rimmed glasses running towards him. The man's feet were pounding on the sidewalk and his arms pumped frantically as he ran. There were half a dozen of those things chasing him.
"Here", Phil yelled. "Over here".
The man reached Phil and shot through the door, panting and gasping for breath. Phil followed him in and slammed the door shut, locking it.
"You okay?" Phil asked the man. "You didn't get bit, did you?"
The man was still gasping for breath but he was able to shake his head no. "You?" he choked out.
Phil shook his head. "No, I'm fine", he said.
Just then, Phil raised his police revolver and seemed to point it at the other man. "Hey, I said I'm okay", the man cried out just as Phil shot past him, bringing down a zombie that was right behind the other man.
The man jumped and then sagged in relief. "Thanks", he muttered.
Phil nodded and held out his hand. "Phil", he said. "You?"
"Doug", the other man said, shaking Phil's hand.
"Let's check the place out", Phil said. "Make sure there's not another one around".
Doug nodded and the two men began to go carefully through the room to make sure there were no more zombies.
When they were done with that room, they looked at the three doors towards the back. The middle one had a restroom sign over it. The door to the left had a sign that said supply closet but the door to the right didn't have a sign. "Let's check that one first", Phil suggested, pointing to the door on the right. Doug nodded and went to open the door. Phil watched him and raised his gun, ready to shoot whatever was on the other side.
It was an office and slumped over face down on the desk was a man. Near him lay a gun, the gun he had used to shoot himself.
Doug swallowed a little thickly. "Damn", he muttered and then he turned to a nearby trashcan and threw up. Phil walked over to Doug and put a hand on his shoulder and squeezed it gently. "Hey, at least he's not being chased by those things".
Doug nodded and walked to the desk, he picked up the gun and then looked around. He saw a box of tissues on the desk and pulled a few out so he could get to the ones not splattered with blood. He used some of those to clean off the gun and then he tucked it into his belt.
After that, he pushed the dead man out of the way and looked through the desk til he found a box of bullets. He put those into the pocket of his suit jacket.
"Know how to use one of those?" Phil asked, gesturing to the gun.
Doug smiled grimly and nodded. "I spend my weekends at the gun range. Well, I used to", he muttered. "Now my guns are at home and this is all I've got".
Phil nodded in agreement. "I already have one so you might as well take it", he agreed.
Doug looked out the door and into the outer office, where several desks sat. "We should check the desks", he said and Phil agreed. "We might find something we could use", Phil said.
They left the blood covered office and began going through the desks. "Hey, sweet", Phil said as he held up a handful of energy bars, two packs of cigarettes and a pack of AA batteries.
"Nice", Doug said as he moved to the supply closet. He opened it cautiously and found no one in there. It was dusty and filled with odds and ends of junk. Doug dug a little bit into the closet and found a gift wrapped box. He opened it up and groaned. "This has to be the ugliest back pack ever", he said as he held up a dirt gray back pack with green and purple dots on it.
"It might be ugly but it's your ugly back pack now", Phil smirked.
Doug sighed and took it over to one of the desks and took off the price tag and then went through the desk to see if there was anything worth taking. "Look at this", he exclaimed and held up a silver flask filled with whiskey. A minute later, he pulled out a playboy magazine and laughed.
"Looks like you got the porn addicts desk", Phil chuckled as he walked back to the desk he had gone through and gathered up the energy bars and batteries and set them near Doug. Then, he returned to the supply closet and began poking around some more. He looked on a shelf and found another back pack. This one was scuffed from use but it was still serviceable. It was filled with books from the local college. Phil sat it aside and looked in the closet again. "I found water", Phil said as he drug out a 12 pack of water bottles.
"Nice, bring it over here and we can divide them up between you and me", Doug suggested.
Phil nodded and brought the water bottles over and ripped open the pack. He took six out and gave them to Doug and then he went back and grabbed the back pack full of books and brought it back to where Doug was and he began cleaning it out. He took out all the books and tossed them aside and then began going through the small, front pocket of the back pack. He found a set of keys and a student ID. Phil studied the ID for a minute and then he went back into the inner office.
"What are doing?" Doug asked as he followed Phil into the office. "I'm thinking we can look for this guy's file and find out what kind of car he drove", Phil said as he reached the filing cabinet. "If we can find it, we can take it. We have the keys after all".
"Isn't that illegal?" Doug asked. "I mean, you are a cop after all".
Phil turned a frown on Doug. "There is no law anymore", he growled. "Just like I'm not a cop anymore and you're not a...whatever you were before anymore. It's not going to matter if we take the car or not".
"An accountant", Doug muttered.
Phil looked up, frowning impatiently. "What?" he said abruptly.
"An accountant", Doug said again. "That's what I was before".
Phil's shoulders slumped a little. "Oh", was all he could think to say. He tried to open the filing cabinet and it was locked. "Damn", he grumbled.
Doug sighed and picked up a heavy, glass paperweight from the desk. "Stand back", he said. Then he brought the paperweight down on the lock on the filing cabinet. It took two more good smacks with the paperweight before the lock broke and the cabinet could be opened. Phil pulled it open and began going through the files, looking for the one that matched the idea. He found the file and pulled it out. He read it quietly for a few minutes and then grinned at Doug. He drives a 2010, red fiat", he announced.
"He drove it", Doug said.
Phil looked up from the file. "Huh?"
"He drove it", Doug said quietly. "He doesn't anymore".
Phil hesitated and then nodded. "Yeah", he said softly. He folded up the paper in his hands and stuffed it in his pocket. He followed Doug out into the outer office and the two of them split up the energy bars and packed them into the back packs along with the water. When they were done, Phil grinned at Doug. "Wanna go for a joy ride in a hot car?" he joked.
Doug looked at Phil in surprise and then laughed and nodded. "Let's go", he said.
They went to the door and looked carefully out the window. "It's clear", Doug said.
Phil looked across the street from the office building and gave a quiet cheer. "Look across the street", Phil said happily.
Doug looked and then grinned. "There's a red car in that car park across the street", he cheered.
"Let's go", Phil said as he eased the door open quietly. He started out but then he glanced back at Doug and snickered softly. "An accountant?" he chuckled.
Doug grinned. "It paid the bills".