The sounds of the zombies above us didn't subside once we were out of their sight. I couldn't believe we had ended up stuck underground again after just escaping from the death subway, at least this sewer wasn't littered with bodies. I was actually surprised by how spacious this place was, it didn't really smell too bad either, I guess zombies didn't use toilets, who knew? It was tough to imagine us getting to the surface without getting swarmed, that explosion seemed to have brought every infected out of hiding, which wasn't ideal to say the least.
Me and my two companions have been through so much, and it was about to be all for nothing thanks to this random biker dude who lived in a sewer. The three of us stared at him expecting answers, but he didn't really look like he was in a sharing type of mood.
"Nice place you got here." I could tell Louis was trying to break the tension with that remark, the biker dude looked like he didn't really want to give an explanation but Louis's remark was enough to make him at least speak up.
"You wouldn't catch me living in a dingy hole like this poindexter." The fact that Francis's first impression of Louis was that of a nerd almost made me laugh out loud. "And as for you princess, quit staring, I'm not interested!" He jabbed a finger in my direction.
My smile faded and I felt the sudden urge to uppercut this guy in the jaw, "Hey tough guy, how about you tell us why you've been down here in this sewer playing with shit before you try to get cute with us!"
I could hear Bill mutter, "Oh Jesus," across from me.
"You really think I'm cute?" Francis asked in a mock flattered tone.
"Okay can we focus people?!" Bill shouted before I could retort, Louis was standing next to me barely able to contain his laughter. Clearly this biker was trying to mess with me, but I was going to make sure he learned real quick who was in charge here (after Bill of course).
Francis cleared his throat and rubbed his shoulder which had been carrying the weight of two large duffel bags this whole time. "If you really wanna know, I came here looking for some people I got separated from, me and two others drove in from out of town looking for our friends and families." He paused as though he forgot where in the story he was, "Uhh we couldn't find them, but when we saw the helicopter flying by we thought we'd find them at the hospital with other survivors."
Louis interrupted, "Wait a second, you and your friends drove after this helicopter together?"
"Nah, we were in seperate cars we found out by the edge of the city, two military vehicles were sitting out in the middle of the street surrounded by bodies, but they were full of awesome gear!" Francis rifled through one of the bags like a kid opening his Christmas presents. He pulled out another assault rifle and a huge looking pistol. "There's a badass shotgun in the other, along with some grenades, plus plenty of ammo!"
Bill's eyes lit up when he saw the guns, he tried to keep his face stoic but his eyes couldn't hide how giddy he must have felt. "Holy mother of god." He stammered, "This is enough ammo to clear out a city block!"
Francis grinned, "I got what I could before I destroyed the car."
"Yeah, and why exactly did you do that?" I asked. "And where are your friends?"
The biker's face fell at the mention of his friends, "I have no idea, we were supposed to meet up at the hospital but they haven't shown up in hours, I'm starting to think they left me to rot in this city while they booked it outta here. I had to ditch the car because there were too many zombies in the hospital and they wouldn't leave me the hell alone while I was in it."
"So you blew it up?" I marveled at the logic this guy was using.
"When I noticed the sewer I decided I would make as much noise as I could over by the gas station and use the distraction to get into the hospital while it was zombie free!" Francis crossed his arm and had a smug smile on his face like he'd just described the most genius plan ever concocted.
Bill and I smacked our faces in disbelief while Louis voiced what we were all thinking. "So you blew up your only mode of transportation to bring all the zombies outside… while not having a plan for when they actually went outside?!"
Francis shot finger guns at Louis, "Exactly, see this guy gets it!"
"All right son let's just start coming up with a new plan," Bill walked up to the idiot while rubbing his temples, "Show me all the supplies you have in those bags…"
Louis pulled me to the side while the other two men talked. "Zoey can I have a word?" I couldn't tell what his expression was in the low light of the sewer
"Hehe, sure thing poindexter." I grinned as I finally found a good nickname for Louis. The two of us walked out of earshot of the others.
"Does anything in Francis's story seem strange to you?" Louis's voice sounded deadly serious.
My facial expression changed when I realized he wasn't joking around, "Umm, you mean other than basically everything? The guy's an idiot but he doesn't sound like a threat Louis."
"He said they were in more than one vehicle, chasing a helicopter when one of them went missing, that remind you of anything?"
My eyes widened, how could I have missed it? "Holy shit, his group was the one that crashed into the apartment!"
"We need to tell him." Louis lowered his voice and he put a hand on my shoulder, "It's the right thing to do."
I won't lie, the idea of telling someone that they lost their friends in an accident really stressed me out, especially since we probably could have done something to help. Setting fire to the apartment probably sealed their fate too. Could we have helped them if we had just fought our way to the vehicle instead of running away? When the car rang its horn it distracted the zombies long enough for us to escape, maybe that wasn't an accident… I really shouldn't be overthinking this.
"We need to get Bill's input first!" I blurted out when I realized I've been too quiet, "We don't know if we can trust this guy yet, who knows how he'd react to this news out of nowhere?"
Louis raised an eyebrow, I think he knew how full of shit I was, I really didn't know how to break it to him that I just wasn't comfortable giving such horrible information to someone we just met. While I tried coming up with a better explanation I hadn't noticed I was just staring him down, he couldn't possibly tell what I was thinking so he must have thought I was just being stubborn.
Louis sighed and lowered his head, "If it bothers you that much I could just tell him myself."
I noticed Bill and Francis's lights coming towards us, I made a 'shush' sign with my hands telling Louis to drop it for now. Bill now had one of the gun bags slung over his shoulder and he was holding one of the rifles as though it were one of his children. Louis took note of their approach and greeted the two of them. "Hey guys, you wouldn't happen to have come up with a new plan by any chance?"
Francis grinned, "Yeah, while you two ladies were getting all chummy back here we figured out how we could get into the hospital from here!"
I crossed my arms and pretended to listen to them talk while I tried to hide the guilt on my face. I couldn't help but shift my weight from one foot to another in anxiety. I wrestled with the idea of just telling Francis what happened right now and getting it over with when they stopped talking, I hadn't heard what they were talking about either.
"Hey kid!" Bill knocked on my head like it was hollow, "Plan ain't that complicated, you got any objections?"
My eyes widened as I stuttered the first thing that came to mind, "O-of course not! Just lead the way!" Man, I was such an idiot. The subway must have done something to my mental state because I was just overthinking everything now.
"You sure this was the same girl you were telling me about?" Francis gestured towards me while talking to Bill, "She doesn't sound like the type of badass that could blow up a subway entrance like you said." I punched him. I was surprised Bill was talking about our journey to him, and in such high detail, or maybe he was talking about how reliable me and Louis could be… If the old man had convinced Francis that I was some kind of badass then I might as well try living up to that expectation.
"I said lead the way, or are we gonna keep standing around with our thumbs up our asses?" I tried to sound as assertive as I could, and if it meant getting out of this sewer sooner then it wasn't hard to fake it.
Francis whistled like he was pretending to sound impressed. Louis chimed in after witnessing the bizarre exchange, "It should be this way right? Let's not waste any more time."
Our new and improved group of four made our way down a couple of tunnels until we found a dead end. Now that I thought about it our group was looking a lot more intimidating with one more person, it wasn't just because Francis had the whole 'biker dude' schtick, with every new member of the group it was just going to be that much easier to defend ourselves from the hordes of infected.
We had stopped at a ladder that seemed to lead to the surface, looking up we noticed the manhole was missing its cover. "You think someone's already in there?" Louis asked Bill in a hushed tone.
Bill rubbed his beard as he squinted up the ladder, "No point in wasting our time worrying," He said calmly, "Let's just get to the roof." The war vet motioned for Francis to give him the bag he was holding. Bill already had one of the rifles in hand, I noticed Francis had equipped a military grade shotgun and was holding it with pride. Bill pulled out two other weapons for me and Louis, he handed Louis the other assault rifle which Louis picked up gingerly like he was afraid it was going to explode.
"Umm, I'm not sure I'm ready for this kind of gun." He said to Bill.
"Oh you'll learn real quick once we're in the thick of it." Bill replied. The old man then pulled out the pistol I had seen before. This thing was huge, it looked like it could pierce through all of the textbooks I had used in college. Bill admired it for a second before handing it over to me, I stared at the gun in his hand while placing a hand on one of my pistols. This gun was my father's, there was no way I was going to replace it. In my mind every infected this gun killed was revenge for what happened to my father.
"I'm fine with the sniper and my two pistols, I think they suit me better anyway." It was a lame excuse but the others didn't seem to care. Bill just shrugged and kept the gun for himself.
"Well then? Let's get moving people!" Francis was already halfway up the ladder before Bill finished speaking. Louis followed behind him and I was next, since Louis was still injured it took him a little longer to move up the ladder. Bill took up the rear since he was preoccupied with his new badass looking weapon.
Once I had made it up the ladder I was confused by where I was. We found ourselves in a big room full of generators and equipment. "Where the hell are we?" I thought out loud.
Louis looked at me with confusion, "Didn't you hear what Bill was talking about? We're under the hospital."
Well, at least it wasn't Bill or Francis who had found out I wasn't paying attention, they would have probably called me an idiot. I needed to get my head in the game, any distractions while we were in here could result in something much worse than a simple misunderstanding. Once Bill had made it up the ladder he motioned for us to follow him up the stairs to the main building. So far it didn't look like we'd meet too much resistance down here, I assumed it was because the infected didn't like the underground or something, we soon came across a huge metal door at the top of the stairs which looked pretty damn sturdy. A dead body was sitting in a pool of dried up blood near the door, he was wearing medical scrubs which meant he must have worked here. We could see through the small window on the door, it looked like the door led to a storage area of sorts, it was too dark in there to really make out more than that. Bill tried opening the door but it seemed to be locked on both sides, requiring a key to open it. Francis pushed Bill aside and cracked his knuckles while he walked up to the door.
"You might wanna step back ladies." He grinned as he got ready to kick down the metal door. Right before his foot connected a face popped up behind the glass with an unusual expression on its face. Francis fell backwards in surprise while he let out a very unmanly scream, me and Louis started to laugh at him but we were quick to stop when the infected noticed us. The sounds it had started to make reminded me of the laughter of a hyena, but it almost sounded forced to me. Was it the infection forcing it to laugh, or was it something related to the host's mental state?
All we could see was its head, and after hearing the laughter I realized that the face it was making was a contorted smile which stretched its lips painfully thin. Francis got up and pounded on the glass ignoring the fact that this thing would tear him apart the second the door opened. "Hey you fucking vampire, you better watch who you're messing with!" Francis started cussing out the creepy looking zombie as it got more and more agitated by the noise he was making. The laughter got more and more manic as it pulled its head back as though it was laughing at the sky. This caused Francis to back up a step, he seemed to have realized yelling at an insane zombie wasn't the best idea.
Suddenly the thing swung forward and bashed its head into the glass, a small splotch of blood covered the door from the other side which the monster smeared onto the glass with its face. I didn't like that there were no other zombies in there with this thing, if it was strong enough to take down other infected then I prayed that the glass wouldn't break. The insane thing kept slamming its head against the glass over and over again until we were basically seeing through red stained glass, thankfully there were no cracks in the window, but that didn't stop us from hearing every second of laughter.
"Maybe we should turn back…" Louis suggested.
I was in complete agreement with him but Bill signaled for us to wait, I knew that this hospital was our best bet at getting out but I could think of a few better ways to die than being mauled to death by something like that. Me and Louis waited though, I suppose if it did manage to break the door down we could just gun it down, consequently alerting any zombies that are outside that dinner was served in the hospital food court.
Eventually the laughter of the infected got so loud its voice turned hoarse and raspy, after losing its voice it gave up on trying to break down the door and ran back into the darkness of the hallway behind it. "Wait guys, it's leaving!" I said as I noticed its head disappear.
Louis walked up to the window cautiously and looked through, since he was the tallest he could get a better view of it as it left the door. "Wait… that can't be right…." He mumbled.
"What is it?" Bill asked as he tried opening the door again. "It left didn't it?"
"The vampire just scared the shit outta him is all." Francis snickered.
"That's big talk coming from someone who just pissed their pants after trying to act tough." I told the biker.
Francis checked his pants with surprise before realizing I was joking around, "Listen here princess-"
"Hold on guys," Louis interrupted, "Am I going crazy or did that thing not have any arms?" Me and Francis looked at him at the same time, even Bill glanced up at him while he tried picking the lock.
"I could've sworn that's what I saw as it ran away, the window was too blurry to know for sure." Louis kept glancing at the red glass while he spoke.
"Okay… Laughing, insane, and now armless… This is getting creepier by the second." I muttered.
Bill cursed and stopped trying to pick the lock, he then glanced at the dead body on the floor and seemed to think of something. He rustled through its pockets and eventually pulled a set of keys out of its chest pocket. "Well I'll be goddamned." He proudly stated.
He got up and looked the three of us in the eyes, "Now… be on high alert, don't let anything sneak up on ya." He looked at Francis, "We move in pairs if we have to separate, Francis you're with me, and Louis goes with the kid."
"Umm, I'm twenty actually." I tried clarifying to Bill but he ignored me as he turned the key and opened the door into the hospital.
The quiet was an awful reminder of the subway, the only source of light other than our flashlights was a single lamp lighting the short hallway. There were closed doors on either side of us marked "storage." This place was giving me the creeps, I was just hoping that we wouldn't run into the bizarre laughing infected from before. With four of us here I was more confident that we could take out anything that tried jumping at us, with that said could they just attack us now and get it over with? My mind was so jumbled up that I didn't even know what I expected to happen.
Bill and Francis each had a light of their own so they didn't need to stay as close as I was to Louis. This was just unfair, we traveled halfway across the city to get here and I still couldn't find a single damn flashlight for myself, this was getting ridiculous. Not that I minded Louis's company, but maybe I could convince him that I should hold the light next time.
We reached a corner of the hall and Bill motioned for us to wait until he could confirm the coast was clear. The veteran had his gun aimed at the corner the whole time as he made slow steps toward it. With one motion he swiftly rounded the corner with his gun raised, he relaxed slightly and waved us over.
"This is getting outta hand." Louis sighed in exasperation, "I don't know how much my heart can take."
"I hear ya." Francis replied, "Why can't those sissies just come out and face us?"
A few days ago I would have called him insane, but after everything I've seen today I'd definitely take a fight out in the open over not knowing where these things are. Bill and Francis were sweeping their lights ahead of us while Louis and I were shining our light into every open door to check if the coast was clear.
Something in the ceiling seemed to have caught Bill's attention, he stopped and pointed his light directly above him while he squinted. The rest of us noticed he was looking at an open air vent, there were pieces of metal on the floor underneath it.
"Son of a bitch must be hiding in the vents." Bill grumbled.
Francis looked around nervously while me and Louis huddled close together in fear. "Y-you've got my back if it sneaks up on me right?" I whispered to Louis. The nod he gave me wasn't reassuring at all.
"Oh man up you three!" Bill called back to us. "Ain't much your pussyfooting is gonna do when they attack us!" He looked up again as though he heard something moving above us.
"I bet it's watching us, you coward!" Francis yelled up at the vent while he was at a conveniently far distance from it.
We could hear the sounds of something navigating the tunnels above us, that shut Francis up real quick. "So no one is going to object when I say let's get the fuck outta this hallway right?!" I said as the sounds above us rang out. The three of them shook their heads at the same time.
"Follow me, this door should lead us into the next stairwell." We all stayed close as the infected continued to navigate the tunnels directly above us. I would occasionally hear the sounds of teeth grinding and hoarse laughter, I'm surprised it was able to use its vocal chords after it yelled so loudly for as long as it did. Once we were at the end of the hall we made our way through a door which took us to a set of stairs. They didn't go too far up much to my dismay, I guess I was hoping that there would be a stairwell which could take us to the very top of the building, but of course that would've been too easy. Francis made sure to close the door behind us, as soon as he shut it the sounds of the vent crawler ceased.
"Maybe we could barricade the door?" Louis suggested.
"Soon as you find something to block that door with, you're more than welcome." Bill said dryly. With that remark the old man and the biker headed up the stairs, I hurried Louis up the stairs too so we could get as far away from that hallway as possible. Thankfully the stairs weren't as dark as the previous area, still I decided to follow through with Bill's plan of sticking in pairs, and Louis was the most comforting to be around anyway. I could tell Francis was putting up a tough guy front from how he reacted to the laughing zombie, it made me wonder how he'd react in a life and death situation in the future. Bill seemed to have one mindset; keep moving forward no matter what, this thought process is what got us this far after the apartment was destroyed so I tried not to complain. My only concern was what he would do if he had to choose between escaping or saving us. Louis might get nervous in dangerous situations, but that made him the most relatable. I've been keeping it together because of how I kept associating this apocalypse with the horror movies me and Chloe would stay up watching every other night in college. But after navigating through the subway tunnels I could tell this situation was unlike anything any horror movie could've dreamt up, these zombies were alive, and they were changing in ways we might not be able to handle in the future.
Once we made it to the top of the staircase we found another long hallway, we followed the signs to the next set of stairs near the emergency rooms… Oh god the emergency rooms… It hit me as soon as we turned the corner, this was where it all started. I could even see the room where my father had died.
'You shot him.' An inner voice told me.
'You had no choice!' Another voice responded.
These two voices were having a back and forth in my head, Bill must have noticed me staring down the hall because his facial expression softened a bit. "You can go pay your respects if you want, kid." He suggested in a kindly voice I didn't recognize from him. Louis and Francis looked at each other in confusion, but Louis quickly understood as he saw the expression on my face. He and Bill pulled Francis towards the other rooms to get rid of any infected wandering in the hallway. Thankfully there was a barricade keeping the infected in the main lobby from seeing us in here.
I took a small step towards the room, every step bringing me closer to that day. The way he convulsed on the floor still kept me up sometimes, it frightened me so much to see him looking so vulnerable and afraid. My whole life my father was an icon of strength and love, he was there to pick me up whenever I felt down, he would scare off boys who would get too close to me, I hated him for it at the time but as I grew older I knew he only did it because he wanted what was best for his daughter. I fought back tears and finally made it into the room.
He was gone… I could see the dried up blood on the floor from where I shot him… but his body was nowhere to be found! There wasn't a trace of him left other than the blood, had something eaten him? That didn't make sense though since there were still so many bodies piled up at the front of the hospital and in some of the nearby rooms. I walked out of the room with wide eyes as I tried to think of a reason for why his body could be gone. Francis noticed me walking out and waved over the other two who were clearing out rooms with their assorted melee weapons. "The others told me what happened, for what it's worth I'm sorry for your loss." I barely paid attention to Francis though as I was lost in thought. Louis and Bill walked up to us and Francis shrugged as I ignored him.
"He's gone." I finally said. "You don't think he could've-"
"Hold on a second." Bill cut me off, "What do you mean he's gone? Are you sayin' his body wasn't there? Oh Jesus, that can't be good."
"We don't know if that means he turned!" Louis said in an annoyed tone. "We don't know anything Bill, for all we know his body was just moved by other survivors!"
While what he was saying wasn't completely out of the realm of possibility it still didn't add up to me. "Whatever it means we won't find out by standing around here." I said, "We have to keep moving, I've already said goodbye. My father would want me to reach that helicopter, so that's what we're going to do." I really wanted to stay behind to search a little longer, but this was what was best for the group, and even if we did find him all it would accomplish would be making me relive his death again in my head.
Bill nodded with respect and moved with me to the next flight of stairs. Louis called Francis over to him, he seemed to have started talking about something serious so I decided to walk with Bill for a bit. As we walked I could hear certain words in the two men's discussion behind us like "chopper" and "car." Whatever they were talking about I decided to stay out of it, no need to eavesdrop, just focus on what's ahead of us like Bill would.
"Shooting someone is never easy." Bill mumbled next to me, for a second I thought he was talking to himself until I realized he was acknowledging me.
"Wha- huh?" I could only respond with confused noises, I guess the last thing I expected was for Bill to try starting a personal conversation with me after I found out my dad's corpse was missing.
"You know, I served in Vietnam as a part of the Army's 1st Special Forces Group, most unforgettable four years of my life. I got shot at almost every day and had to watch my back every time I set foot outside my camp…" Bill sighed as he recalled his time at war. "I lost many good friends, I even fucked up my ankle, to me this apocalypse was no different than another war."
I paid close attention to every word Bill was saying, I never imagined he would share his thoughts like this. His words were genuine as well, he made sure not to come off as grumpy like he usually did, in return he had my undivided attention. Bill continued his story, "Pulling the trigger was simple when it was just the enemy, but then those bastards had the audacity to use child soldiers…" His voice broke momentarily. "Little boys and girls, hell they even used the elderly… When we were ambushed by VietCong soldiers disguised as farmers, you couldn't imagine my surprise when I saw a little boy… around twelve years old, throwing a grenade at me and my troop…"
I looked down as I tried to imagine the horrors of war, killing zombies couldn't possibly take as much of an emotional toll as killing people. "I'm sorry you had to go through that Bill." I said in a gentle voice.
Bill wasn't done yet though, "You should have seen the look on the kids face Zoey, I've seen grown men crack when they experienced war firsthand, the kids face was filled with pure terror." The war veterans voice got shaky as he talked about what happened next. "I hesitated, and the shrapnel from the grenade got one of the troops in my unit and hit me in the knee, so I had to…" Bill couldn't finish the sentence but the implication was clear to me, in the heat of the moment he had to do the unthinkable. I didn't know what to say in response to what he told me, I considered hugging him but couldn't bring myself to do it. Bill didn't cry, but he did wipe his eye as he steeled his nerves. "I think about that moment every day, and I thought nothing could top that horrible situation until I watched you shoot your father." The old man looked me dead in the eyes this time, "You're a strong kid, don't let this damn apocalypse take you down. Your father would want you to move on, I could see it in his eyes when he was lying in that bed, he knows you're a survivor."
I put a hand on the holster which carried my father's gun, despite all of my self doubt I knew in my heart Bill was right, I wasn't going down without a fight. "You know Bill, this is the first time I've been able to talk to you without wanting to drop dead."
Bill smiled and started to chuckle, if there was one thing I learned about the old man, it's that he appreciated a good insult. We made it to a dead end in the staircase, the only way to get further up seemed to be an elevator somewhere on the fourth floor which looked to be the hospital's intensive care unit. Louis and Francis made it to the top of the stairs, the biker looked upset about something, Louis had his hand on Francis's shoulder while he was talking to him. "I'm sorry man, but there was nothing we could do."
I suddenly realized what he was talking about, he must have spilled the beans about what happened to Francis's friend's. "How is he?" I mouthed to Louis so Francis wouldn't hear.
Louis pointed to the biker like it was obvious, I noticed from Francis's slumped shoulders and posture that he wasn't taking it very well. "Alright you can quit feeling sorry for me, I had a feeling… just gimme a minute." Francis took a deep breath and slapped himself in the face with both hands. "Let's just get the hell out of this place."
We were in the middle of the hospital now with fresh emotional scars and a beaten team. Stepping out into the hall of the ICU it was already looking like this was where we would see the most activity. The walls were lined with all kinds of bodily fluids and the floor was caked in blood and vomit. Thinking about it more clearly it made sense to me that there would be so much death and decay here, if any infected people lasted long enough to get to the hospital before turning it would have already sealed the fates of the doctors here. Those poor medical workers were just trying to help, and what they got for their efforts was being mauled to death by their own patients. Every room we walked past had at least one dead body, but still no infected. I wondered where they could be, I mean this was a huge hospital but I still expected some zombies to be up here with us. We got to the front desk without resistance, a dead body was slumped behind the desk, still sitting as though he was waiting for people to check into the ICU. Past the body we could see a set of doors which led to the laboratories and patient rooms.
"This is too easy." Bill murmured, "I don't like it, but we can't stop now."
Francis was gripping his shotgun like he was itching to use it, maybe learning about the fate of his friends made him anxious to see some action to let off steam. Louis stared at the body of the medical worker behind the desk and stopped to pay his respects.
Louis put his hand on the shoulder of the body. "I'm sorry this happened to you, but it must have been a quick death if you're still sitting in that chair." My eye caught a glimpse of something on the floor by my feet. It was a pistol, and it was close enough to the body for me to be able to piece together what it could have been meant for. Although the body was mangled there was a wound on his head which could have come from a bullet. I picked up the gun and nudged Bill so he could take the gun, I figured I'd spare Louis the idea that this death was a suicide. I know he's a grown man, but I didn't want to drag the group down even further with such a realization. He left the body and joined us at the set of doors.
I could see through the windows of the two doors, there seemed to be a pile of bodies at the intersection of the hallways, nothing else indicated that there could be activity here so we opened the doors carefully. The second I stepped through the doors the temperature seemed to drop, I could tell the others were feeling it too.
"Power is still on, probably means the AC is still on to prevent the spread of bacteria." Louis observed.
"Okay poindexter, thanks for the fun fact." Francis grumbled.
"Hey man, how about you loosen up?" Louis replied.
Our group wasn't at its best to say the least. The tension between us was uncomfortable, I felt like maybe we shouldn't have aired out our dirty laundry right when we were in the middle of an important mission. "Come on you guys, let's save the smartass attitudes for when we're actually on the helicopter okay?" I said with a sigh.
Bill stopped at the intersecting hallways and knelt down near the bodies, he inspected them and was focused on the wounds. "We've seen this before." He said with clear worry in the tone of his voice, "This can't be good."
We heard something off to our right and pointed our guns in the direction of the sound. It sounded almost like someone inhaling, I was surprised it took us so long to find a zombie in this place. I looked to Bill and he nodded, together we made our way to the room where the sound seemed to have come from while Francis and Louis trailed close behind us. The room was the last one on the right side of the hall. Walking past the other rooms we could see early attempts to stop the infection which all ended the same. One of the rooms had an infected body strapped to a chair, the wounds on its arms and chest showed how it tried to escape its binds until it eventually died from the wounds it made from struggling. These things were so far gone they would literally tear themselves apart just for a kill.
Right before we got to the room where the sound came from we passed by another room. It was on the left of us, the thing that caught my eye was the huge hole on the side farthest from us. Whatever made that hole couldn't have been a zombie, hopefully it wasn't a sign of things to come.
Finally, we came across a room with a glass wall that was still intact, the door was opened and we could make out something inside. "Is that a person?" I asked with confusion.
The figure inside of the room looked female, she was in a sitting/kneeling position and was barely moving as she faced the floor in front of her. Her arms were in front of her too, like she was holding on to something, but I couldn't see her hands. She was dressed in dirty tattered clothes and her skin looked pale, she was also unnaturally thin, borderline anorexic. Bill reached out to tap on the glass but was interrupted when the person in the room started moving. When we heard the sobs we instantly froze, this wasn't the first time we've heard this siren of dread. Was this the thing that was able to shred through a whole subway full of infected/uninfected people? This woman looked light enough to lift with a sheet of paper!
Bill whispered his suggestion to me. "Alright kid, I say we sneak past without disturbing her. I don't know about you but that thing doesn't seem human."
I was about to agree with him until I heard a sound that snapped me back to my childhood. The woman started to choke up something that almost sounded like words, words that sounded like they came from a familiar voice.
My eyes widened with realization. Instinctively I opened the door to the room and made my way inside. Taking slow steps I started recognizing features as I got closer to the woman, she had a mole on her left bicep and had traces of the same clothes my mother had on when I last saw her on video chat. "Mom?" My voice cracked as I called out to her. I could hear a gasp as the crying stopped, slowly she turned her head towards me, I was right, it was my mother.
I could hear Bill yelling something in the distance, Louis and Francis joined him once they noticed the commotion but I didn't care, their voices were faint and sounded a million miles away. I never expected to find her here, my mother was pale and sickly but other than that I could tell it was her. I smiled with tears in my eyes, I saw her start to get up, for some reason she was frowning though. "Mom? It's me… it's Zoey, I'm okay!" My smile faded when she raised her arms, she had long blood stained claws, each about a foot long. As she stood something fell on the floor next to her, but I was too stunned by what I was seeing to look at it. I stood frozen in fear as I was faced with a situation I was dangerously unprepared for. My mother was as tall as I was, but it felt like she was towering above me as she held her arms up like a cornered animal trying to scare off predators, her claws making her look nothing short of intimidating. I came to my senses a second too late, I fumbled for my gun desperately as she rushed at me slashing her long claws sideways in an attempt to decapitate me.
My infected mother would have succeeded had Bill not made his move. "Get down!" Bill shouted. He grabbed me and spun me around in a protective manner, exposing his back to my mother in an attempt to shield me. I could feel his grip on me loosen briefly before the loud blast of a shotgun rang out above me.
"Shit, I was too slow!" I could hear Francis curse from behind us.
When I heard the shot I got up without thinking. I could see my mother behind Bill lying in a pool of her own blood, the sight caused me to rush to her side. She was still alive, but barely.
"No…" I started to tear up as I grabbed her and laid her on my lap. Her expression hadn't changed from the vicious snarl she had when she attacked, but I could see something else in her eyes. She was still alive in there, as she bled out I could almost see a glaze in her eyes as she looked at me. It was her… it was my mother. She slowly raised an arm, looking at this from a distance one could make the argument that she was trying to claw at me one last time but was too weak from the shotgun blast, but as she placed the palm of her hand on my cheek all I could feel her, the real her. I grabbed her hand and squeezed it until it went limp. I stared into her eyes and could almost see her saying goodbye to me one final time as she died. I didn't move and stared at her corpse expecting her to move, but I knew it was over. I stood up and my eye caught sight of something on the floor. I remembered that my mother had been holding something before she'd attacked me, I walked up to it and as soon as I recognized it I covered my mouth and turned away.
It was my father's missing hand. I recalled that his arm had been missing when I found him after he'd been attacked by my mom. This wasn't his whole arm though, it was just his hand. I looked at it again to confirm, it was unmistakable though, his hand still had his wedding ring on. My mind started racing as I tried to wrap my head around what was happening, my mother was a zombie, but she was so much stronger than the other's for some reason… and she retained enough of her humanity to hold on to a piece of my father?!
I could hear Bill coughing behind me and I snapped back to reality. I turned and was shocked to see Bill being helped by the other two men. He was bleeding from his back, a long set of claw marks had made a rip in his military jacket. I suddenly realized what Francis meant by too late…
"Bill!" I cried out as I ran by his side. Too much was happening at once for me to sit and process events calmly, I watched as Louis ran in with disinfectant and poured it on to the wound in an attempt to clean it. Bill grunted as he felt the alcohol burning his back, none of us were medical workers so we didn't know what else to do but cover the wound.
"It doesn't look like a deep cut, but I doubt it'll feel good." Louis concluded, "I really wish we had a doctor with us."
I stayed by Bill the whole time, he'd done this to himself in an effort to protect me, this whole time I doubted he would risk his life for us, yet here I am watching him in pain because I was too reckless. "Bill, I'm sorry… I should have been thinking more clearly-"
Bill cut me off, "This ain't nothing kid, the fact that you still saw your mother in that thing means you're not too far gone yet." The old man started coughing and winced in pain after every movement. "I can keep going, someone help me get to the elevator."
"Are you crazy you old fart?" Francis asked, "In case you haven't noticed you've been clawed up to hell, we'll keep watch while you rest up."
Bill looked like he was ready to fight to prove he was fine but cried out in pain as soon as he moved. "He's right Bill, I think we all need a break after all that." Louis looked at me after he said that, he made it clear he wanted to talk about what just happened to me as well. Bill didn't say anything after that, he just grumbled something I couldn't understand and leaned on the glass wall.
After all that pressure and pain I finally relaxed a bit, with all the adrenaline gone I felt weary but didn't want to rest until I took care of something first. I looked at my mothers still body and my fathers hand. I knew there was no way to properly bury them in this hospital, but I still had to try, I didn't want to let them go yet. Louis walked up to me and was about to say something before he changed his mind, instead he looked at the body of my mom.
Eventually I spoke up, "I wanted to save her." I struggled to say each word since acknowledging what happened made my chest tighten more and more. "When she was dying in my arms I would have given anything so she could live, even as a zombie. Does that make me crazy Louis?"
Louis shook his head sadly and looked at the corpse of my mother. "I couldn't bring myself to shoot her either, you know." He knelt down beside her and sighed. "I can't imagine the feeling, having to watch both of your parents die like this? This world really has gone to hell."
"They were both infected, and I couldn't do anything to prevent it because I was stuck halfway across the state, wasting my time watching stupid movies every night instead of making them proud." My eyes welled up but I didn't cry. "She looked right at me like she didn't care about all of that though, in the end we're still family..."
"And that's all that matters." Louis finished my sentence.
We sat there in silence for a few minutes, the soft hum of the hospital air conditioning was the only sound that rang out while we mourned my parents. What broke us out of our silence was the sound of Francis tripping and falling down the hall, his reaction involved a lot of cursing and shouting. I stifled a laugh, we just met Francis but I could already tell he was going to be fun to have around. I stood up straight and took a deep breath, maybe this wasn't so bad after all. I already knew my mother was infected after my father had told me, at the very least I was able to put her out of her misery before she could suffer any more changes to her body and mind. Bill wasn't too badly injured either, I bet he could move with some help and after a bit of recovery time. After this encounter it couldn't possibly get any worse, four people with guns and freedom within our reach, there were worse odds than that as far as I was concerned.
"She's at peace now." I said to Louis as he noticed me getting up.
"What should we do with her body, you and I both know we can't stay here long." Louis said with concern in his voice.
"I wish we could bury her… maybe we could find a body bag or something, it doesn't feel right to just leave her here exposed." As I said this I noticed something strange, my eyes narrowed as the cold air got a bit warmer, it was a subtle change but it was enough to make me look at the vent above me. I was met with a pair of red eyes staring back at me through the ventilation grate.
"What the-?!" Was all I could say as an infected dropped on me from above, breaking through the metal bars and landing on me feet first. I was caught off guard by its speed, it caused me to fall on my back as it stood above me, it had also knocked the breath out of me when it landed on me. The first thing I noticed about it was what it was wearing. It had tattered jeans on and was bound by a straight jacket, the infected's long dark hair reached its forehead, which was red and dripping with blood.
"I-it's the thing from earlier!" I could hear Louis shout at the others. "It's got Zoey!"
Louis got his new rifle out and aimed it at the restrained zombie, the thing kept its focus on me though as it began to kick me repeatedly. I tried to get up but it wouldn't give me a chance, its kicks were so painful I instead decided to curl up into a ball and brace myself. I could hear Louis fire a few shots, but the thing ignored it as it continued its assault. Eventually Bill had his gun drawn and Francis had arrived from down the hall. The three of them started opening fire on the thing, the gunfire was able to stop it from kicking me, but it was still standing somehow. I looked up hoping the infected was at least dead, instead I saw a bloodied husk standing above me. It staggered a bit as it tried to move, it looked like it could hardly stand anymore, yet it didn't seem to want to budge. The infected looked at the three men, they were standing with their weapons trained on it, ready to shoot if it made a sudden move, then it looked down at me. Its face was more or less intact since most of the bullets were aimed for the body, its eyes reflected the hysteria it showed when we first saw it in the storage room, it made a couple of weak sounds which sounded almost like it was giggling, then it looked up and let out a scream which almost deafened me more than the gunshots from earlier. It must have been a last act meant to draw in other infected, because it was screaming despite having lost its voice earlier, blood spewed out of its mouth as it kept forcing itself to scream.
I looked at Bill who was shouting something to the others which I couldn't hear, it must have been an order to shoot because they emptied their weapons in an attempt to silence the thing, but it was too late since the damage had been done. As the zombie finally collapsed we could hear its last call wasn't falling on deaf ears. It turns out my mother couldn't deter all of the zombies in this hospital, because the roar of the infected which were hiding previously now surrounded us like we were in the middle of an echo chamber.
"We've got to find that elevator NOW!" Bill shouted as he tried to get up, he struggled with his wounds, he was having trouble moving with such little time to rest.
"Come on tough guy let's get you on your feet." Louis and Francis both helped Bill get up and let him lean on the biker for support.
"Zoey, do you need any help?!" Louis ran back to me as he extended an arm to me. I took it since I was still struggling to breathe after getting the wind knocked out of me from the infected dropping on me. "Come on, we need to find that elevator before the zombies find us!"
I agreed with Louis but stumbled a bit as my vision got blurry, "Shit, I think he did more damage than I thought…" I told him.
Louis offered me his right shoulder to lean on since his left arm was still injured from the subway. Together we moved as fast as we could down a long hall full of rooms, we could hear the infected closing in behind us while we followed the signs to the elevator. Bill and Francis were slightly ahead of us but we were able to catch up due to Bill's injuries slowing him down. Looking at the back of Bill's jacket I could see the mark where my mother scratched him, it looked a lot worse than it actually was, but it didn't stop me from grimacing as I thought about how much it must have hurt to run. We turned a corner at the end of the hall and came across the elevator doors.
"This god damn thing better work." Francis grumbled as he slammed his fist down on the 'up' button. For a second we stared at the elevator dreading that it wouldn't move, but eventually breathed a sigh of relief once the number started counting down to our floor.
"Twenty-eight floors." Louis said in disbelief as he stared at the number counting down, "How are we gonna hold them off for that long?"
My breathing slowly returned to normal as I started to fight the pain from the previous attack. Bill also forced himself to stand alone, this adrenaline rush must have been helping him fight the pain. "We can take em', there's only one direction they can come from after all." He reloaded his gun and handed Louis and Francis some extra ammo, hopefully with the extra ammo Francis brought we could hold them off.
We stared down the long hallway as the sounds got closer, we were at the end of the hall with a door to our left and a wall to our right, as long as we could focus on what was in front us they shouldn't get through.
"Here they come!" Louis said as the sounds caught up to us.
The first few zombies that rounded the corner ran straight into our bullets, strangely enough there were less than we expected, the sounds were still coming from all around us but only a few were attacking. I then remembered something and looked through the vent above us, paying closer attention I could hear the sounds echoing in the ceiling.
In a panic I opened the door to our left and waved to the others, "They're above us, MOVE!"
Bill and Louis eyed the vents as Francis kept shooting the infected who were still pouring in from the front. It didn't take long for them to take note of the threat approaching from above, Louis and Bill made a dash for the door leaving Francis standing in front of the elevator.
"Francis get back here!" Louis called out to the biker.
Francis looked to his left and glanced at a stretcher which was next to the doorway. "Give me a sec!" He called back to us. Francis rushed towards the stretcher with his shotgun letting off round after round of punishment. One infected got too close and he smacked it in the jaw with enough force to unhinge its jaw. "Goddamnit there's too many of these damn vampires!"
I stood at the doorway doing my best to shoot down zombies while Francis moved forward, eventually he made it to the stretcher and rolled it over to me. I was so caught off guard it nearly toppled me over, Francis moved back towards the door and flipped the stretcher so it would block off the doorway from the bottom. Me and the biker dived over the stretcher and took cover behind it while Louis and Bill rained down punishment from behind us. I could hear all of the vents in the vicinity erupt as dozens of infected from throughout the hospital poured out. I could feel blood soaking my jacket as the zombies made it to the stretcher but were stopped by the concentrated fire of the two assault rifles.
"Gotta reload!" Louis called out to us, "We need to switch!"
I looked at Francis and he nodded with a grin on his face, I supposed he was actually enjoying this near death situation a little too much. "Let's do this!" He shouted over the roar of the infected crowd.
Me and Francis dashed to the left while Bill and Louis switched places with us behind the stretcher, the room was so small we couldn't do much more than this while we waited for the elevator. I got both of my pistols out while Francis started letting loose with his shotgun with wild laughter. "This is for Maggie and Trent, you sons a bitches!" Francis must have been using his pent up aggression to fuel his rage. I was fine with it as long as it wasn't directed at any of us, plus I needed to let out a little steam too after the day I've had. I heard a sound off to my left which sounded like it was coming from the other side of the wall. I looked over and noticed something frightening, the wall seemed to be losing its structural integrity. I looked at the elevator's screen and cursed when it indicated it was ten floors away. We had been holding out for less than a minute but it felt like an eternity, and with all these infected around us I wasn't even sure the walls could hold out for long.
I could see fingers poking through holes made in the wall, but I was too worried about what was in front of us to focus fire. Fortunately Bill noticed the problem as soon as I did. "Shit!" He yelled out, the old man pulled out his new pistol and fired a few shots at the hand that was trying to reach us through the wall, unfortunately it didn't budge. Bill also noticed every shot was making the hole wider so he stopped, "How much longer to that elevator!" He called to me.
"Nearly there!" I shouted back as I stared impatiently at the numbers counting down. "7… 6… 5… 4! Let's go you guys!" The elevator doors opened, our escape was just a couple feet away from us, the only problem was that an endless stream of zombies stood between us and the way out.
"Zoey! You and Bill hold them off while me and Louis push the bed!" I was surprised that Francis was calling the shots, but I wasn't complaining that he was suddenly taking this seriously. I pulled out my scoped rifle and Bill got his fully loaded gun out as he started firing into the crowd. As soon as we got to work pushing through the mob I heard a rumble next to me and saw the wall next to us fall, revealing a couple of infected. Two of them looked regular but the one in the middle looked like a roided out bodybuilder, not much taller than the others but his muscles seemed to be on the level of an olympic athlete. 'Shit' I thought. Bill and the others seemed preoccupied so I decided to confront the zombies alone without making the others lose focus. I shot at the two on either side and they fell easily, I then focused on the muscular zombie, it moved like an animal with rabies, biting and swatting at the air while it slowly approached me. I fired a round into its shoulder which made it flinch but otherwise didn't affect it. I tried to focus since this was my last shot, we couldn't find any more ammo for this particular rifle so it was all or nothing. I waited for it to take a step closer, then I fired a shot into its neck. I silently congratulated myself for a second before I realized it hadn't done anything.
"Holy shit!" I shouted as the buff zombie swung at me. I was aware enough to see the punch coming, I ducked underneath it as I tried reloading my pistols. The infected cracked the wall behind me, leaving a hole where my head used to be. I gasped and crawled to the side as the zombie pounded on the floor in an attempt to crush me, dust flew from the ground and caused the various items on the shelves near us to rattle from the force of its punch. The three guys looked behind them and noticed me fighting off the zombie. They were nearly to the elevator but stopped in order to help me. Louis and Francis continued to fight off the main horde while Bill got out his huge pistol.
"Get over here kid!" Bill called out.
I took the opportunity to scramble over to the three of them, Bill fired at the muscular zombie but it seemed to be able to take a lot of punishment. "Shit, we can't stop it!" I realized.
"We don't have to, we just need to get to the elevator before it can get us!" Louis rationalized. `
I helped Bill push the stretcher until we were right beside the elevator, all we needed to do now was run into it past the waterfall of zombies which were coming from the vent in front of us. I looked back at the musclebound zombie, it was trying to reach us but was moving slower after being shot at so many times, it also didn't help that its muscles were bulky enough to make it very slow. It pushed forward slowly and angrily, "We need to do something now!" I shouted as I pushed back zombies with the butt of my gun.
Bill looked at Francis and gave him a thumbs up, the biker's eyes widened as he reached into his gun bag excitedly. When I saw what he pulled out I pulled Louis down with me as we took cover behind the bed. Francis took a step back as he pulled the pin of the grenade he just grabbed, then he watched the vent for an opening, every second filled with anxiety. When he chucked the grenade he dove behind the bed with us and looked up, I could see the grenade make it inside the vent in front of the elevator, apparently Francis had good aim. "Hell yeah!" Francis cheered as he watched the bomb fly into the hole.
The grenade exploded after a second of baited breath, and as soon as it did the four of us pushed the stretcher into the remaining crowd and jumped into the elevator. I desperately tapped on the top buttons and nearly had a heart attack due to how long the damn door took to close. We kept shooting into the crowd, thankfully now that the vent had been blown up the zombies couldn't jump at us from directly in front of the elevator. As the doors finally started to close a hand reached out and tried to hold it open.
"Oh no you don't you son of a bitch." Bill said as he grabbed Francis's shotgun and blew the hand away from the door with a single well aimed blast. Finally, like a gift from God himself, the doors closed… and we were safe.
The four of us looked at each other from opposite sides of the elevator, when we noticed it starting to go up, we relaxed. When I mean relaxed, I mean my body went numb from soreness and three of us collapsed on the floor. Only Francis stayed standing, having taken the least amount of punishment he simply sat down against the wall of the elevator as he watched us groan in pain on the floor. Bill had his back to worry about, Louis's shoulder probably hurt like hell since it hadn't even come close to fully healing yet, and I hadn't noticed my soreness from being kicked around until now. All four of us were scratched up and miserable, but we were at the final stretch, once these doors opened we couldn't take another break, we had to make it to that helicopter, we've come too far to slow down now.