I turned viciously. “Do you think that’s helping?” I barked. She wanted out and so did I, but I wasn’t leaving the big kid unless I had to, although I think we had passed that point a minute ago.
“Tommy!” Justin called. “Come on man, there’s no time to figure it out, they’re up there, let’s go.”
Bill’s distant screams finally subsided, and I don’t think it was because he got away. That steeled Tommy’s resolve. He began to swing his huge bulk over the edge, still gripping the pellet gun. Images of the little girl clutching her doll welled up inside me.
“Let go of the pellet gun, Tommy!” I snapped, more for me than him in all likelihood. “It isn’t going to do you any good down here and you’re going to need both hands to hold onto the ladder.”
I didn’t think anybody but the man of steel himself was going to be able to stop that bulk once it got in motion. The more I began to think it through the less I liked the idea. The odds were good that Justin and I were about to become human pancakes, sandwiched under the enormous bulk of Tommy. I was about to grab Justin and have him abandon his post, no sense in both of us dying in this vain attempt, when the ladder vibrated slightly. I looked up. Tommy had grabbed the first rung and was beginning his descent. ‘Holy Crap’ was all I could mutter. My amazement was short-lived however. The zombies that broke through the door on the roof were looking over the edge. I wanted to shout at them triumphantly that they had lost, ‘no more dinner for you, nyah nyah nyah,’ when the first of them simply walked off the roof, followed by a second and a third and then a half dozen. The snapping of multiple bones ricocheted off the Wal-Mart wall, sounding like small arms fire. It was deafening. It was sickening.
Tommy made it down the ladder and the three of us just stared at the horror that was unfolding in front of us. Most of the zombies had landed on legs that were now shattered beyond any use. Some had ended in a swan dive, never to rise again. The ones with the shattered legs and spinal columns started to pull themselves along with their arms or used their chins on the ground in a vain attempt to move. Whatever locomotion was available to them they used to try to get to us. It was like watching the ‘Terminator.’ Sadly, we were the Sarah Connors in this remake. Tracy’s horn blared again. Travis had finished reloading and was firing again. Our reverie broken, we ran for the car.
“Get in!” I yelled, as if anyone needed the instruction.
Tracy scooted over so I could drive. Tommy’s enormous bulk ended up on the hump seat in the back; he looked like a huge bowling bowl, and my boys unhappily looked like two bowling pins pushed up against the windows.
“Sorry,” Tommy said as he tried his best to reduce the crushing effect of his immensity.
We were staring down thirty or so advancing zombies and had fifteen or so mostly disabled zombies to our rear. Tommy extended his ring-ding glazed hand to me.
“I’m Tommy,” he said with a beaming smile, mostly white teeth except for the chocolate stuck up on his gum line.
I sent my hand back, this wasn’t the time but it was a conditioned response and besides I didn’t see any reason to dispense with civility. “I’m Dad…I mean Mr. Tal…oh forget it, you can just call me Mike,” I said.
“Mr. Tal, what’s that smell?” Tommy said as he still gripped my hand. I pulled back and grunted.
“Dad stepped in Henry crap!” Travis smiled.
“Great, just great,” I mumbled as I put the car in gear and gunned the engine.
I know Jeeps are tough, but how many bodies can I hit before I do irreparable damage? I’m sure the Chrysler Corporation never planned for this. I did my best to go around the edges of the oncoming horde, but with only twelve feet of width I only had so many options. Tracy ducked down under the dash as best she could. I could tell she was glaring at me in response to the damage I was about to inflict on her car. She’d have to wait, I could only deal with one deadly problem at a time.
Justin yelled, “Look out Dad, I think you’re going to hit them!”
I honestly wanted to stop the car and thank Captain Obvious. If he hadn’t forewarned me, I might just have gone and hit the zombies without ever realizing I was going to.
The impact was more jarring than I think any of us were prepared for. I didn’t know a human body would have that much effect on a two-ton SUV. I guess it was because it was deadweight, and yes, even in my head I got the rim shot sound effect. By the time I’d plowed through the fourth or fifth zombie it looked like we had gone through a car wash designed by Stephen King. Pieces of bone, flesh and congealed blood littered the hood and the windshield. At some point in this zombie smash up derby I had the wherewithal to turn on the windshield wipers and the washers. Even I was impressed with myself until Tracy let the wind out of my sails; I saw her hand pulling back into the relative safety under the dashboard.
I was feeling good that we would make it out of the parking lot, but I didn’t think Tracy’s car was going to make it much further than that. The radiator was shot, and steam was pouring out of the front of the car. I could hear the serpentine belt whining as it was being shredded against some foreign object. The car was bucking wildly like we were on an unbroken horse. It felt like either the engine or the transmission was about to drop onto the ground. In all likelihood it was going to be both. But even at the blistering fifteen mph that I was making I was still putting distance between ourselves and the pack that followed. The car made it halfway home before it just plain died.
CHAPTER 5 
Journal Entry - 5
Any semblance of a chance I thought I had of getting to Nicole’s had vanished. After the damage from the second or third zombie hit, and with the addition of Tommy to our load, I didn’t know how we would have fit her and Brendon in the car. But still my heart sank. Sure I’d saved one of my kids, but one was still out there. And to top it off I wasn’t completely sure about the saving part. We were a good mile and a half away from sanctuary and there were still a bunch of zombies on the loose. I tried the ignition a couple of times with no success. I would have kept at it if it weren’t for the fact that the sound would be attracting some undesirables and we had to leave. We could hear sirens and some small arms fire off in the distance, even some small explosions. Homemade bombs, I mused, I should have thought of that. I got out of the car quickly. Motioning everyone else to do the same, I opened the trunk to a yawning and stretching Henry.
“Damn it,” I said in frustration.
We had more guns, food and ammo than we were going to be able to carry. Add that to the fact I would have to lug Henry because he couldn’t walk more than two hundred yards before he would begin panting like a sex offender at a cheerleader convention. I know to everyone else he’s just a dog, and right now it’s survival of the fittest, but I would no sooner leave him to die than I would one of my kids. Tommy had finally gotten his immeasurable bulk out of the car to look in the trunk.
“What’s the matter Mr. T?” he asked with a huge grin, the smile broadening when he noticed the boxes labeled MRE’s.
I wanted to yell at him but he just seemed so damn happy, so instead I answered him dejectedly. “Well Tommy, we just have too much stuff to carry plus the dog, and I have to figure out what to leave behind.”
Leaving most of the ammo seemed the logical thing to do. It was by far the heaviest; no food meant starvation. We could leave the 2.5 gallon water jug too. I figured we’d still be able to get water through the pipes at least for a little while longer. So it was Henry, the firearms, whatever ammo we could carry in our pockets and the MRE’s.
“Could you take the slings off the rifles, Mr. T?” Tommy said, his infectious grin never leaving his face.
I should have known how strong the kid was just by the way he caught his bulk on the ladder. I shook my head in disbelief as we walked away from the car. He had fashioned a couple of crude carrying devices with the slings. He had the three boxes of MRE’s strapped to his back, off to his sides he hefted the four cases of ammo, and in his arms lay a slumbering Henry. He probably could have carried me too and not even have lost a step.
It would have been a beautiful fall night; the crispness in the air always harkened me back to my youth and the start of school. But the smell, the fetid odor of the dead and the living dead blended together to create one humongous wave of putrid stink. It pervaded everything. Only Tommy seemed to be immune as he walked on, seemingly unencumbered by the undead bouquet. The first mile or so went by unremarkably; we heard things (mostly screams) in the distance but never anything too close.
Things got radically difficult once we had about a half mile to go. I was asking Tommy for the tenth time if he wanted some help. He was telling me for the tenth time that he was fine, but he stopped short and the smile melted from his face. I followed his line of sight, and IF I had been smiling I would have stopped too. It didn’t look like an ambush, it looked more like a convergence. The problem being, we were the attraction upon which they were converging. We were almost entirely surrounded. The only breaks in the zombie lines were caused by either natural occurrences like the fast running stream on our left, or the large block wall that surrounded the Isuzu dealership parking lot on our right. Otherwise this looked like a textbook besieging. We were outnumbered easily 50 to 1. Good thing they didn’t know how to shoot.
“There’s no way they pulled this off without some communication,” I said out loud just to hear my thoughts manifest themselves.
“Mr. T, do you want me to put Henry down so I can shoot?” Tommy asked.
“Not yet Tommy, we’re not going to stay and fight. Justin, I want you on my right side a step or two back. Travis, I want you on my left the same step or two behind me. Tracy, Tommy, you two stay close in behind us.” Again with the superfluous directions, both of them were already close enough to tell if I was wearing boxers or briefs.
“Okay boys, we’re not going to worry too much about what’s coming behind and to the sides of us, we’re going to concentrate our shots to the front and slightly to our left and right. Understood?” I asked, looking both of them in the eyes to make sure we were on the same page and to gauge their readiness.
They were both scared but they knew what had to be done. When the zombies were within fifty yards, I gave the signal. The signal involved me shooting. The frontline of the zombies crumpled under our withering fire, acrid smoke filled the air. Heads burst, limbs were blown apart, a river of thickening blood flowed in our direction, and hair fluttered down. But still they came, fearless, relentless but most disturbing of all, quietly. There was no battle cry, no gallant speeches, just the slow steady mindless march of the zombies. Kill or be killed, we fired on. The barrel of my M-16 shone a dull red. I knew I was moments away from making a deadly looking paperweight. We were making headway but it was much too slow. Our frontal assault was nearly complete, but to our sides and rear the zombies had halved their distance, some even closer than that. Our break towards freedom was close but not close enough. I slung my M-16 over my shoulder, the barrel grazing my cheek on the way. The smell of my burning flesh seemed to excite our opposition more.
I pulled out my 9 mm Glock and began to shoot zombies that had closed to within fifty feet. I motioned for the boys to keep shooting to the front. We had to have dropped half of them, most of those fatally, but the survivors still pressed in. I then noticed something strange; some of the zombies started to leave the fray. It was in ones and twos at first and then it was in fives and tens, and just like that we found ourselves alone in the road. The tattered remnants of what attacked us were now heading for new quarry. I watched as two men emerged from a small copse of trees about one hundred yards to our right. They started running for all they were worth towards a nearby golf course, the zombies in pursuit, not hot pursuit mind you, but definitely trailing them. Sweat was pouring off my body, “Sweatin’ to the Zombies.” It could be the next big workout fad. Maybe I’ll run it by Richard Simmons. One of these days I was going to get a psych eval.
“Dad, what just happened?” Travis asked.
Justin was hopped up on beer and adrenaline. “We’re just too bad assed for them!” he cheered just a little too loudly.
