“We’ll check these cars up here for . . .”

“For, what?”

“Shhhh,” I said. The streetlights worked shining round domes of light onto the roads, but did little to battle the darkness that surrounded us. “I hear people.”

People had to be a loose term. Sounded more like animals. Grunts and groans. Moaning and yelping. What the hell were we going to do?

“Now what?” Allison had her Iron out. The belt loop had not infringed the weapon from coming free. Her other hand clutched at my forearm.

“We need to hide. See what’s going on.”

“Hide? Where?”

We were under the I-390 bridge. I backed us up to the stonewall. Slowly we crept forward, bent forward, staying low to the ground. It was difficult to see clearly. Ahead, I saw four, no five zombies. They looked lost, meandering about on a house’s front lawn. A sixth was on the front porch.

We got closer, on the opposite side of the street, and stopped between a hedge and a parked mini-van.

“Is he knocking on the door?”

“Scratching at it, I think,” I said. The guy on the porch mindlessly raked fingernails on the screen mesh. I could hear it.

I also heard a siren. It wailed, not far off. The sound brought hope. Not all was lost. Felt like it. If responders were still responding, it wasn’t the end.

“What do we do?”

I didn’t want to stay here, hidden on our bellies in someone’s driveway. That didn’t really mean we were safe. Just meant we hadn’t been spotted by the small horde gathered across the way. “We can’t move. Not yet. What if they see us?”

“We can’t just stay here.” Allison raised her head, looking left and right. “We should get closer to this house behind us. Stay low, and close, and keep moving.”

“What if they hear us?”

“We run.” She had a point. One that beat the hell out of mine.

Maybe I was tired too. Walking four miles had been a challenge, despite being focused, despite needing to get to my kids. Like Allison had said, I couldn’t remember the last time I’d walked this far.

It was nearly midnight. I now had three things on my mind. Getting to the mall for weapons. Saving my kids from being eaten. Finding a cold beer.

Chapter Thirteen

Allison and I came up on the backside of the mall. From where we crouched in the bushes, we could see the loading dock side of Target. Beyond that, Sears and Penny’s. The sporting goods store sandwiched between them. The mall had front entrances to all the stores. The back also had direct store entrances, as well.

The lot had parked cars, which was good. We’d need them. They provided cover. The roaming mass of zombies looked a bit overwhelming.

“There’s a lot of them.” Allison knelt beside me, one hand on my shoulder. “Look at ‘em all.”

“I can’t shake how it’s just like every stupid zombie movie I’d ever seen. They’re just, just roaming around. Like they are hungry for brains.”

“Don’t say that,” she said.

I didn’t need to say it. We’d seen it. Watched as people we worked with, attacked other employees. We’d barely escaped work. A hard fought walk to the mall. These things, although maybe not craving brains, did seem interested in biting non-infected people to death. Bad enough in my book.

“We need to get to the mall. Can’t imagine the doors are locked,” I said. I looked around the lit lot. There was no visible clear path. If we did a serpentine between vehicles, we stood a chance.

“Bound to be more inside the mall, too.” Allison merely pointed out the obvious.

“We get in, and weapons are all to the left.”

“Just got to get across the parking lot.”

“It’s what I’m thinking.”

I watched what could be a group of four meander toward a Lexus. Couldn’t be more than a hundred, maybe a hundred and fifty yards to the left. They didn’t appear distracted, however, they all seemed to lumber forward in the same general direction. That direction was away from us.

On the right, zombies weren’t as congested, but scattered. It was the same kind of slow and sluggish . . . gait. I counted ten, no . . . eleven. Twelve. Yes. I saw twelve.

“Look at him.” I followed Allison’s finger. Straight ahead. Just past a light pole. A guy ran toward us. He was a ways out, but running in our general direction. “Sick?”

“Looks it,” I said. The guy’s arms flailed, pin wheeled. He looked like someone trapped in the midst of a swarm of bees. “What is going--”

He wasn’t sick. Not a zombie. This became obvious as he screamed for help. Although my exposure to the infected was limited, I had not heard a single one of the creatures talk. They moaned. They grunted. They bit. They ate. That I’d witnessed. Talking, not so much.

“Help! Please! Please, God, help me!”

I didn’t know where he thought help might come from. I did know his screaming sure as shit attracted the unwanted attention. The creatures that had reached the Lexus turned, almost as one, and faced the running man. The expensive sedan forgotten, they moved -- a bit quicker, as if with more purpose -- toward the screamer. The other twelve also seemed to zero in on the man.

“What do we do?” Allison had a hand on her iron.

“What do you mean?”

“How do we help him?”

This time I planted my hand on her shoulder. “We’re going to the sporting goods store. He’s created a perfect diversion for us.”

Allison stared at me, eyebrows furrowed. “Chase, he’s a person. Not a diversion.”

“He’s an asshole. Why the hell was he screaming, why was he running--?”

Then I saw it. Them. No other way to classify it other than a herd. Not like cattle. Maybe a pack was a better description. Like wolves. Another fifteen, I don’t know, could have been as many as twenty zombies, rounded the corner by the Sears building. Rounded that corner like a New York Yankee rounding first, sprinting for second.

“Are you shitting me?” I said out loud. “This asshole's going to get all three of us killed. He’s running right for us.”

And closing the distance fast.

“Okay. Okay,” Allison stumbled. “So now what do we do?

Where do we go? We need to hide.”

I didn’t remind her that a mere second ago she was trying to get me to help the madman. Didn’t blame her. Maybe we could have saved him from a handful. The zombies in the parking lot had been slow movers. Everything changed with the new . . . pack added to the equation.

Hated to admit it, but part of me hoped the guy was taken down. It was a heartless thought, possibly a chicken shit thought, but there it was, swimming around in my brain. I needed to get to my kids. I needed weapons. I didn’t know this guy. He meant nothing to me. It was not much different from the training I’d received at work. One call at a time. Enter the job and don’t look back. Go on to the next call.

“Chase?”

I opened my mouth, about to suggest a solution, when they got him. One zombie from the pack leaped forward. It was a great tackle. Arms wrapped the running man’s waist, and legs, while its shoulder drove into the back, and down the two went.

The group was on them instantaneously. A genuine dog pile.

“We have to go,” I said. “Diversion or not, this is our chance.”

Allison stared at the unfolding feast. Eyes wide. She didn’t respond, but followed behind me. We stayed low and ran as fast, and as quietly, as we could. We skirted the parking lot, staying out of the spray of lights.

I kept one eye on the massacre. Aside from the fast zombies, the slow moving ones were closing in. Couldn’t imagine there would be much meat left for sharing.

God, did I just think that?

What was wrong with me? There wasn’t much meat left. I shook my head. I needed to stop. Allison was right. That had been a man, someone probably with a family. I had wanted to use his . . . screaming, as a chance for us to escape. That was terrible enough. I didn’t need to think of him as mere meat, too.