16: Self-Defence
Just a few short weeks ago, Lisa and Jack would not have been in the least bit worried about walking through the centre of Raccoon City. Now the familiar streets seemed darker, narrower, filled with menace and shadows, and they found themselves instinctively walking a little closer together.
"You scared?" said Jack.
Lisa nodded silently. She thought she'd scream if she opened her mouth to speak. Her thoughts kept slipping back to her parents; where were they? Were they alive? Dead? Or both? She didn't know, and part of her was afraid of finding out what had happened to them.
"I be scared too," said Jack. "I get the feelin' we gonna run into more zombies soon. You think I oughta get more bullets, case we do?"
"Yes," said Lisa. "Where can we get them?"
"I think there be a gun shop somewhere near here," said Jack. "Yeah – look."
Lisa looked. Tucked in between a general store and a boutique was a little shop with its barred windows displaying a variety of lethal-looking replica shotguns. The sign above the door read: "Abel's Ammo – Est. 1952 - We Aim To Please."
"Sounds good," said Lisa. "Come to think of it, I'd like to have my own gun. I'd feel better knowing I can defend myself. I don't want you to have to watch my back as well as your own."
"Okay," said Jack. "We can grab a few things for you if you want."
When they went inside, however, it turned out that other people had grabbed a few things of their own – or to be more precise, they'd ransacked the place. Every one of the glass display cases had been smashed open and the shelves of the shop were bare save for a few empty boxes of bullets.
"Oh, man," groaned Jack. "Damn looters already trash the place! Now what we gonna do?"
"Try the back room," suggested Lisa.
"Right," agreed Jack.
He tried the door handle; as he'd expected, the door was locked.
"There should be a key round here somewhere," said Lisa, going round to the other side of the counter and searching the drawers.
She found a set of keys in the bottom drawer, and was about to tell Jack when she heard a loud crash – Jack had shoulder-charged his way through the door.
"Jack! What do you think keys are for?" she said.
"I think they be for other people," Jack replied, going into the back room.
Lisa shook her head.
"Well, the charges sure are piling up against us," she said to the world in general. "Homicide, illegal possession of firearms, attempted theft, criminal damage… the police are going to love us. I just hope my mom doesn't find out about this."
"Lise, we be in a city full of flesh-eatin' zombies," called Jack from the other room. "Somehow I dunt think normal rules apply any more. Come help me look through these boxes, yeah?"
Lisa nodded, and went into the back room to help Jack search through the piles of crates and boxes. Most of them were empty, but one of the large piles yielded a nasty surprise – underneath the boxes was the still-warm body of the storekeeper, with a bullet wound in his head.
"Whoa!" yelled Jack, backing away. "Get away from him, Lise! He could be a zombie!"
To Jack's horror, Lisa prodded the corpse with her foot, and then kicked it as hard as she dared. The body didn't move.
"No, it's all right," said Lisa after a moment's silence. "He's dead. Really dead. Looks like he blew his brains out. Which means that there has to be a gun around here somewhere..."
There was a handgun lying on the ground a few feet away from the body. Lisa picked it up, and examined it.
"Hmm," she said. "It's loaded, anyway. Do you think I should take it? I mean, this isn't, like, corpse-robbing or anything, is it?"
"Nah," said Jack. "I dunt think so. B'sides, he ain't gonna use it no more. You might as well take it. It no like he gonna miss it, right? Hell, he prob'ly be pleased to think he be able to help someone after he be dead."
"I still don't like it," said Lisa uncertainly.
"You keep thinkin' like that, Lise, you never gonna survive," said Jack. "You wanna get outta town alive? You gotta be more ruthless. You be a real sweet girl, but you gotta learn how to be cold-hearted so you can escape."
"The old "kill or be killed" thing, right?" said Lisa.
"Exactly," said Jack.
Further searching turned up two more boxes of bullets, and nothing else.
"I think that's it," said Lisa.
"You be right. C'mon, we gotta go. It be half past two already, an' I wanna be outta Raccoon City b'fore it get dark."
"You and me both," Lisa agreed. "Those zombies are bad enough in daylight – can you imagine running into one of those things at night? I'd never be able to sleep again."
"Me? I be content if I stay alive long enough to worry 'bout bad dreams," said Jack.
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Glass crunched underfoot as Jack and Lisa made their way up Main Street. The centre of Raccoon City was in ruins; windows smashed, doors ripped violently from doorframes, cars wrecked, and fires blazing everywhere. It looked as though an angry mob had marched through the city centre, destroying everything in its path.
"What happened here?" said Lisa in amazement, as they looked at the devastation all around them.
"Zombies, I think," said Jack, pointing to a corpse lying in the gutter.
"Zombies don't start fires," said Lisa. "And I'm pretty sure they don't carry off the television sets from the electrical goods store, either. I guess people were looting here, too."
"Who be loco enough to bother stealin' stuff when there be zombies all over town?" said Jack.
"Makes you wonder, doesn't it?" said Lisa. "Come on, let's keep moving."
They passed the smouldering, burnt-out wreck of what had once been Fiorelli's Ice-Cream Parlour.
"Oh, no," said Lisa, dismayed. "I loved that place. Fiorelli's made the best toffee nut sundaes in the world. Charlotte and I used to go there all the time when we were kids."
"Yeah, I go there once," said Jack. "For Aunt Rosa's birthday. We both have banana splits an' then she take me to the movies."
He smiled briefly.
"Well, we ain't got time to reminisce," he said. "C'mon – we gotta move, or we never gonna get to Umbrella."
"You're right," said Lisa, with a sigh.
With one last look at what remained of her favourite ice-cream parlour, Lisa turned away and followed Jack. As they moved away from the muted roar of the fires consuming most of Main Street, they were met with an eerie silence; everything seemed unnaturally still and quiet.
"Is it me, or is it far too quiet?" said Lisa after a while.
"Yeah," said Jack darkly. "I dunt like it. When I run through here on my way to you house, the place be crawlin' with zombies. Where they all go?"
There was a loud thud, and they both jumped. There was another thud, then another, accompanied by the aimless groaning sounds that they now identified as the cries of zombies. It was coming from one of the barricades, just feet away from them, and the makeshift fence was swaying alarmingly as the zombies on the other side hurled themselves at it.
"Why can I no just keep my mouth shut?" said Jack.
Lisa's eyes widened.
"Uh, Jack?" she said, starting to back away from the fence. "I think you should get away from there…"
"What?"
Without warning, the barricade gave way. Jack looked up, yelped, and dived out of the way just in time as the wooden fence came crashing down, just where he'd been standing.
"Jack, look out!" shrieked Lisa, as one of the zombies made a grab for Jack.
Rotting hands snatched at empty air as Jack scrambled to his feet and rushed over to Lisa, away from the shuffling, putrefying things that had once been people.
Jack fumbled in the pockets of his cargo pants for his gun, then remembered – too late – that he'd put it in his backpack. He cursed his stupidity; why, when he needed to keep it close at all times, had he put his only means of effective defence in his backpack?
As he dropped to his knees, threw the backpack on the ground and started scrabbling frantically inside it for the gun, he heard shots; Lisa was putting her own gun to good use. A zombie that looked a little like Antonio caught three bullets in the chest, and staggered slightly, but recovered and kept stumbling towards him.
"That's three times I shot it!" yelled Lisa. "It should be on the floor by now! Why won't they stop? Why won't they die?"
"They already be dead," said Jack distantly.
One of the zombies hit the floor, blood pouring from a bullet-wound in its head; Lisa had finally succeeded in killing one.
"Yes!" whooped Lisa.
It was a small victory – there were four more zombies to deal with – but Lisa didn't feel so frightened any more. Whatever these things were, at least they weren't invulnerable; they could be killed.
"Jack, we can beat these things!" Lisa cried. "Look, I got one of them!"
But her triumph soon turned to horror and disbelief as the zombie she'd shot abruptly raised its head, got up, and started moving towards them again.
"No!" Lisa yelled. "No! That's impossible! I killed it! I shot it dead!"
"No dead enough!" said Jack.
He finally found the gun, caught up in one of his spare shirts, and pointed it at the zombie that Lisa had been trying to kill.
"Eat this, zombie boy!" Jack snarled, and fired.
The bullet hissed past the zombie's ear and hit a red barrel that had until recently been part of the barricade.
"Oh sh - " began Jack, and then everything went white as an explosion rocked the street.
Coughing, Jack got to his feet again, just in time to see body parts rain down from the sky. The explosion had obliterated the zombies – the question was, had it obliterated Lisa too?
"Lise!" he yelled.
As the smoke from the explosion cleared, he saw Lisa half-sitting, half-lying on the ground several feet away from where she'd originally been standing. She was shaking, but mercifully uninjured by the blast.
"My God, Jack, what did you do?" she said at last.
"I dunt know," said Jack. "I try an' hit a zombie, I hit a barrel instead – next thin' I know, boom! Half the street blow up."
"Almost taking us with it," said Lisa.
"Sorry, Lise. You no be hurt?" Jack asked.
"No, I'm not hurt, although I may require therapy for this in later life," said Lisa, as Jack helped her to her feet. "That is, if I last long enough to have any later life."
"Listen, I already say I be sorry," said Jack. "How I know it gonna blow up? I no even be aimin' for the barrel!"
"Forget it," said Lisa. "We're both fine, and the zombies are dead. End of story, as far as I'm concerned. Just don't shoot any more barrels."
"Believe me, I ain't gonna," said Jack fervently.