Dying Days 6 Page 6

  The locker wasn't filled with shotguns and bulletproof vests. It was where the security guards had stored their lunches, which were now mold and rot, and their personal items. Tosha sorted through three wallets, a ripped open carton of cigarettes and two small flashlights. She took the flashlights and the smokes. Maybe she could trade them at a later date. Everything was worth something.

  Back into the mall offices and she found a map of the entire mall, as well as the location of two ladders to get to the roof. One of them was on the outside and the other in the nearest department store stockroom.

  Tosha didn't want to go out of the mall unless it was standing on the roof so she made her way to the department store, moving slowly as she passed through dark areas of the main hallway.

  Someone had tried to close the entry doors to the mall but the gate on one side wasn't all the way down and a severed rotting body was sprawled across the floor. Tosha imagined a rush of zombies crowding the entrance while associates and customers fought for their lives.

  She was expecting an attack at any moment. The mall was big enough a survivor could be hiding anywhere and watching and she'd never be the wiser. If she got down on her hands and knees and crawled under the fence, she'd be vulnerable, but lifting the metal gate might make way too much noise.

  Tosha turned suddenly, spinning on her heels with a .22 leading the way.

  She was still alone.

  Paranoid much? Calm it down, she thought. There was nothing sneaking up behind her and she couldn't tell if the noises were real or imagined. It was too quiet all the time. Even the damn zombies didn't moan like they were supposed to.

  Tosha slid under the gate as quickly as she could and got into a shooting stance on one knee on the other side. Nothing was out of place. It looked like every other store she'd visited in the past few months: blood coating the floors, everything of value gone or smashed, and way too many dark corners to hide an undead army.

  She needed to find the stockroom and the ladder before her mind played so many tricks on her she'd curl up in the fetal position and lose her shit.

  The shoe department was virtually untouched, tucked into a corner of the store. Tosha shined her light on the displays and saw a few really cute high heels she would've tried to wear when she went clubbing. She smiled when she thought of all the trips to the mall with her sister when Mathyu would roll her eyes at the latest fashions, preferring ugly old lady sneakers or men's work boots and never worrying about how she looked.

  Tosha stopped and checked out the sneaker racks, finding another pair in her size of the same ones she had on. In this new world, she needed a backup pair or two with all the walking she knew she'd be doing.

  The stockroom was dark but neat. There wasn't any blood on the floor and nothing looked out of place. A thin layer of dust covered everything, which was a good sign. Zombies hadn't gotten back here, at least from this doorway.

  A pile of unopened boxes were stacked against the wall near a back door, product that would never get to the sales floor.

  The footwear department stockroom led into the men's department one, and racks of suits were the first thing she saw, dust covering the material as it hung. The air was filled with dust as she moved, stirring up from the clothing and shelves.

  Tosha went to a door in the last row of the stockroom and opened it, waiting for an attack. Her shoulders were hurting from the anxiety of never knowing what was around the next corner.

  It was another stockroom, filled with baby items on all four walls and a pallet of boxes in the center. The room was no more than twenty feet by twenty feet.

  Tosha took a peek out, making sure she hadn't been followed by anyone, before closing the door behind her to reduce the noise. She opened one of the large boxes and smiled.

  It contained baby comforters. Maybe a dozen. Tosha pulled one out and ripped open the plastic, smelling the fabric as she pushed it against her face. This was wonderful. She couldn't remember the last time she'd smelled anything clean, free of filth and wear and blood.

  She explored the shelves, peeking in unopened boxes and seeing if anything was worth saving.

  All of it, she thought. This might be the last place to find baby clothes and bottles and rattles and sheets.

  Tosha thought about finding Darlene's baby. What was her game plan once she found it? She wasn't a mother and had no real experience other than taking care of her sister.

  What if she rescued the kid but could never find Darlene again, or what if she didn't want to find Darlene and kept the baby for her own, and...

  Tosha shook her head. She was on a mission even if it made no sense. Survival should be the only thing worth worrying about, not some fucking baby that was probably dead by now anyway.

  Mathyu was in the room, standing in the corner, and Tosha jumped as usual.

  "Stop fucking doing that. I know it's on purpose, you bitch. You're always messing with me. I swear, you were probably trying to scare me in mom's womb," Tosha said.

  The sisters stared at one another for a long moment before Tosha looked away.

  "I'll never win a staring contest with you, alive or dead. I love and hate you, sis," Tosha said and began pulling baby comforters out of the box, unwrapping and placing them on the floor away from the door and with the pallet of boxes blocking the view.

  Tosha looked back at her sister and shrugged. "I'll find the ladder to the roof later. I'm tired and I'm going to take a damn nap. Do me a favor and stand guard? Shout if anyone is coming."

  It was ironic how quiet her sister had been since dying, especially considering all the noise she made when she played videogames. Mathyu would jump up and down in her seat as if the action on the TV screen was coming to life and she'd be drawn into it. She yelled on her headset for idiots all over the world to get in line and stop screwing up her mission. She yelled when she got a great kill or was killed. Their neighbors in the apartment building had often banged on the walls or called the landlord to shut her up.

  Her twin was still staring as Tosha dropped onto the soft comforters. She'd go through the other boxes when she woke from a power nap and then find the roof ladder.

  "Go wander around the mall and see if you can find me a good book to read or cheese. I'm really in the mood for crackers, too," Tosha said and closed her eyes.

  Chapter Eleven

  Bernie couldn't get the images out of her head and she feared it would drive her mad. She was shaking so much the car was moving and the zombies around her would hear it and try to get inside the trunk where she was hiding.

  She closed her eyes as tightly as she could like she'd do as a scared child. The monsters were under the bed or in the closet and daddy would have to investigate, driving all the bad things away into the night.

  Now the bad things were real and looking for Bernie in the daylight, no longer content with making a few noises underneath the bed.

  Everyone was dead.

  Bernie wanted to cry so she covered her mouth. Any noise would alert the monsters.

  She didn't remember all of their names, even though only a few hours had passed since the attack. Since the slaughtering.

  He'd been one of the smart ones, acting like a hurt human who only needed a place to crash. The gray eyes had finally given him away but by then it was too late. His laughter as he began ripping people apart with insanely strong hands still echoed in Bernie's head.

  She felt responsible in part for their deaths, too. She'd convinced Ted and everyone else to not follow Darlene. If she was a smombie, she was too dangerous to hunt. What would it prove, anyway? If they killed her, they'd be no better off. In fact, by trying to track her, they were putting themselves in danger. Bernie had argued they'd dodged a bullet. Better to let her go her own way and double the guard in case she had any ideas to come back and catch them unaware.

  Bernie knew in her heart Darlene wasn't a monster. Ted thought she was wearing colored contacts to hide the gray, but Bernie knew Darlene was something else comple
tely.

  If Darlene had been with us she would've defeated the smombie, Bernie thought. Maybe Darlene was a protector. Wasn't there always a good faction of the monsters in every TV show and movie? The old guard opposing the creatures even though they were also the same species? They'd changed their wicked ways and wanted to help mankind. Maybe that was the deal with Darlene.

  Bernie decided she'd find Darlene and ask her. Worst-case scenario Darlene killed her. Best-case she had a guardian angel watching over her. It was worth a shot. As soon as she could get safely out of this trunk.

  In the TV shows and movies, the zombies groaned as they shuffled along, making it easy to hear them coming. The reality was more horrific, as they never made a sound.

  Could she chance opening the trunk and seeing if the coast was clear? She had a horrible thought of the trunk popping open and ten zombies surrounding the trunk, all those rotting hands reaching for her. She'd be unable to close the trunk again, dying a horrific death inside a car.

  She tried to remain calm and think reasonably. If she stayed in the hot trunk, she'd eventually die of dehydration, hunger or fear.

  It was time to move.

  Bernie opened the trunk a crack, the sound of the latch disengaging like an air horn. She was sure every zombie within fifty miles had heard it.

  When she pushed it open a bit so she could peek around, she didn't see zombies in her vicinity, but the view was obstructed because of how little she could see from the trunk.

  Bernie threw caution to the wind and opened the trunk, fighting against fatigue and cramped legs to get out as quickly as she could.

  A zombie, about twenty feet to her right, was walking the other way and somehow hadn't heard her.

  There were so many zombies walking in random directions but none had turned in her direction so far as Bernie stretched her legs, fearing she'd get a cramp if she started to move.

  Which way had Darlene actually gone? The obvious choice was her taking I-95 north, which was only a few feet away. If she followed the main road she could hopefully see any zombies coming at her like they'd done when they moved south, looking for a sanctuary that didn't really exist.

  Darlene had told her about Daytona Beach and the smart zombie ruling over the people. She didn't want to be a slave even if it meant protection. Or did she?

  She wondered why she needed to find Darlene anyway. What if she was wrong and Darlene was a wolf in sheep's clothing? Bernie would be powerless against such a creature.

  A nearby zombie turned and started to head in Bernie's direction without making a sound. If she hadn't been paying attention, the zombie might've gotten on top of her and taken her down.

  Bernie began to walk quickly. She needed to pace herself even though her heart was hammering and her instinct was to flee as quickly as her feet would let her.

  I can out-walk a zombie, she thought. I just can't get around too many of them or I'm in trouble.

  The ramp heading south was packed with zombies, all being funneled through the abandoned cars. She could see more up the onramp and over the bridge. There was no way she'd be heading south from this point.

  Bernie turned, gauging how far away the approaching zombie was and seeing with dismay several of his friends had now joined in, and decided to head back to the corner of Route 1 and take it south instead. The path would go through business areas with more chance of zombies and being ambushed but maybe she'd get a few miles down the road and I-95 would reconnect and she could use the major highway.

  Even a city controlled by a zombie was better than being out here in this. Every step you never knew which way to run or if the enemy was at the next intersection. And they were always there, waiting to rip you apart.

  Bernie knew she had a few hours to go before it would be too dark to continue so she wasted no time, jogging to her left and away from the zombies beginning to crowd the street.

  An abandoned Dunkin Donuts, glass shattered and drive-thru window on the ground, gave her somewhere to circle behind and out of sight. Most zombies gave up when they didn't see you anymore, continuing on their path.

  Ted had been a master at leading the zombies away from their group, putting them on another path. Bernie remembered someone questioning the logic of it in the beginning. Why not take the time to put the zombies down instead of letting them continue their quest for the living? Were they potentially shoving the zombies in a new direction, right in the path of another group?

  Ted's argument was simple: they didn't have enough ammo to put down every zombie in their way. There were too many, and one slip and you'd be dead. The risk wasn't worth the reward. Besides, how did anyone know if another group hadn't put these zombies in their path to begin with? They were just paying it forward for the next survivors. With any luck, no one down the line would die, or they'd have the resources to kill the zombies.

  By the time Bernie got around the Dunkin Donuts and through high weeds in the field behind the building, most of the zombies had seemed to forget about her.

  She had to move slowly and stop every few feet to make sure a zombie wasn't wandering in the field, which had weeds higher than her head in spots.

  Maybe she could circle back to the office and gather the group's gear. It was a morbid thought but, if she didn't do it, someone else would. She was heading back to it, anyway. A quick detour and she'd be there and then on her way. She'd only managed to run a quarter of a mile before she'd gotten into the trunk of the car.

  Zombies were heavy as she walked across the parking lot and onto Route 1 but they were far enough apart to not be a problem. Bernie hurried across the road so she didn't attract any more than she needed and kept jogging until she rounded the corner of the building.

  She stopped to catch her breath before peeking around.

  Two members of her group were ripped apart outside, body parts littering the sidewalk in front of the office space.

  It was three doors down but there was nothing to hide behind. What if the zombie was still inside? It hadn't been that long since the massacre.

  Bernie moved to the other side of the road to get a better angle. If he was still around, hopefully she'd see him before he was alerted to her presence.

  The parking lot also gave nothing to hide behind, which was frustrating.

  Bernie tried to make as little sound as possible as she walked, careful not to kick or step on anything. The weeds were slowly taking over the parking lot, the grass growing a few feet into the asphalt and between multitudes of cracks.

  She positioned herself so she could look inside the office. The front door was wide open and the glass had finally been shattered. She could see the blood covering the rest of the windows, handprints streaking and someone pressed against it on the other side.

  Bernie couldn't move.

  It was too dark inside for her liking. The zombie could be only a few feet in and she wouldn't be able to see him until she crossed the parking lot. The glare of the sun overhead wasn't helping, either.

  A strong laugh resonated from inside the building.

  The zombie who'd snuck into their midst and killed everyone stepped outside and laughed again.

  "I'll make this easy on you, pretty lady. Yes, I'm still here. No, everyone else is dead. Yes, you're next," the zombie said and began strolling towards Bernie.

  Chapter Twelve

  Darlene didn't know if it was motherly instinct, the Lich Lord blood in her body or something else, but she knew she was on the right track and getting closer to her son.

  She didn't know how many months ago she'd followed this same path heading south, but it looked like it hadn't been serviceable in a hundred years. The trees on either side of I-95 had begun their slow crawl to join in the middle, with small trees sprouting between the cracks in the asphalt and the medians choked with weeds so high Darlene could barely see on the other side.

  Even if she had a vehicle, there was no way to drive further than a few feet, with so many potholes and abandoned cars in the r
oad.

  There was a body in front of her, an older man with a torso ripped apart and scattered across three lanes. His one attached hand still held a pistol. Darlene pried it from finger bones covered with a thin layer of cracking flesh but it was empty. She put it in her back pocket. You never knew when you'd find ammo, and she could always use it to barter or fake her way out of a fight.

  She remembered once hearing a statistic about there being more guns than people in the United States, like one hundred fifteen guns per one hundred people. Something crazy like that. Obviously, not everyone was walking around with a gun or two and she figured Texas and a few other places had more per capita, but Florida should have some. So far ammo and weapons were still tough to find, and the obvious places like gun shops and Walmart were cleaned out early.

  Darlene wondered how other countries had fared. Was this a worldwide epidemic, or had other countries simply closed their borders and written the United States off? What if North Korea was even now attacking the West Coast and taking over chunks of our land? Foreigners might be killing the remaining Americans and taking all of the resources that were left.

  She needed ammo and food.

  Her backpacks had been left in the office park and the group had already split up her things. She supposed none of it was really hers anymore. Finders keepers was the way of the world now. As long as she had her Desert Eagle, she'd make due.

  Zombies wandering in the area ignored her and she didn't have the energy anymore to take the time to destroy each of them. Could she really make a dent in the zombie population? It seemed like the smarter zombies were doing the job for her anyway.

  Her focus needed to be on moving forward and finding her baby.

  Darlene wondered when the last real meal she'd had was. The snacks in the office had been great but she hadn't eaten much more lately. Her fear was she didn't need food anymore, or sleep, and she was even now turning into a monster. As much as the power and the talents would do her well, all she wanted to be was human. What if she turned into something akin to The Lich Lord and gained not only superhuman strength and crazy powers but his bloodlust and megalomaniacal mindset?