Kyle came up beside me, his gaze following mine. We could see boats moving up and down the river. One of them appeared to be docking and taking up passengers.
“There can’t possibly be a ferry service still running,” Kyle muttered in disbelief. My thoughts exactly.
We watched as the barely visible drivers jumped off the ferry and set up a small perimeter at the water’s edge. As people rushed for the boat, the drivers would provide coverage with short bursts of gunfire until they were on board safely.
So close, but so far away, I thought, looking down at the street as more zombies emerged. Chauffer caught my attention.
“If this thing is bigger than just New York, we gotta head for the country. Less populated, means less of these things.”
Nodding in agreement, I said, “Yeah. We just have to find a way to get there. Lots of populated ground to cover before we hit Sticksville, USA.”
Kyle lifted his chin a little, not committing either way. He asked me to give them a hand, and prodded me to stand below the small metal tower. He and Chauffer would lower it to me. Catching it at the top, I was surprised to feel how light it was. Probably some sort of titanium metal. It was a foot and a half wide at my end, a little wider on the opposite end, with a ladder running up the entire length.
Chauffer snorted sharply, “Is this thing going to be sturdy enough?”
His question was an echo of my own. I hoped we wouldn’t have to find out.
“Finally, a lucky break,” Kyle said as we slid the tower in place. It was just long enough to fit between the rooftop and the parking garage.
Admiring our work, I reached down for a hammer that was in the tool kit. It had a traditional wood handle, with an over-sized metal head. Clearly, it had seen its fair share of nails. It felt comfortable, as if specifically made for my hand. I hung it in my belt.
Little did I know that the hammer would save my ass more than once.
Chapter 4
The enemy of my enemy isn’t always my friend.
The gunfire had gotten louder, drawing our attention back to it. The army had pulled out the heavy artillery. Immediate booms followed sharp cracks. Dust and fire were visible in the air above the war zone. Kyle was staring in that direction. I scrutinized his expression, hoping to learn what plan he might be conjuring.
We all spun around at the racket in the building across the street from us. One of the windows on a floor a few stories up was cracked, spider-webbing like ice. Suddenly, a chair flew through it and crashed to the street below. My heart raced wildly as a woman rushed to the window ledge. Her screams were audible even as she turned back into the room.
Seconds later, she turned and leaped. Her black dress flapped in the air as she fell to a certain death. Two of those things followed her. Their arms waved frantically as they plummeted to the earth, landing with three consecutive thumps. No pause, no care for their own lives; these were the creatures that we faced in the streets below. I felt the vomit in the back of my throat as we watched a group of the undead crawl through the splattered remains.
My thoughts went back to watching the news on 9/11. People trapped in the towers were jumping from the windows and rooftops of the burning buildings. When faced with certain death, people will do anything to escape, while the whores of network television will show anything to get a bump in the ratings.
Chauffer began pacing around the rooftop, glancing over at our makeshift bridge. What was that bastard up to?
The artillery fire was closer, almost deafening. Kyle was muttering about the army boys finishing them off as they made their valiant last stand against the abominations. We watched in utter silence as one of the larger buildings several streets away begin to shift.
“Oh my God,” Chauffer squeaked, wringing his hands. I barely heard him. No doubt weakened by shellfire, the skyscraper swayed back and forth a few times before we saw dust and debris shoot up all around it. The rumbling shook our entire building, shook us to our very cores. The entire thing came crashing down in slow motion, reverberating and ricocheting off the surrounding buildings. The dust cloud was carried away from us but it still left the air thick.
Then silence. The firefight was over.
Reaching into my pocket, I clutched my phone with my cold, clammy hand. I could hear my heart thudding in my eardrums. Taking a deep exaggerated breath, I finally pulled out the cellphone and turned it on. Still zero bars. Was it over? Did we win? The thoughts plagued me.
We continued to stare in the direction of the ruins for what seemed like an eternity. Then we saw them. They were dressed in military gear, heading our way. Chauffer let out a whoop in relief.
“We won!” he yelled. I was a bit slower to share his enthusiasm, but let the grip on my phone ease ever so slightly.
Kyle was the first to notice it.
“Wait a minute. Wait a minute!” he snapped, still glaring down at them. Chauffer and I quieted and turned to see what he was going on about. The uniformed soldiers were moving erratically. There was no gunfire at the monsters still below us either. As they moved through the streets, nobody put up a fight. We watched in disbelief as the dead soldiers simply absorbed the rest of the creatures, adding them to their ranks of this literal army of the dead.
We would later learn that that good ol’ Uncle Sam had descended into Manhattan with a vengeance. Newspaper reporters, television crews, all followed along as the Army boys took out wave after wave of those things. Almost ten hours worth of filling them full of holes.
Funny thing about these dead, however, they didn’t drop down for good very easily. You had to have precise aim to take them out, hitting them in the head. Machine guns, grenades, mortar shots, all effective deterrents against man, but almost useless on the undead hordes. These creatures had no fear either. In modern warfare, the whole goal is to put enough of a hurt on your enemy so that they eventually give up. These things would never give up. The whole thing was a total clusterfuck.
With the persistence you would expect from a mindless horde of dead beings, they eventually overran our modern defenses, and all of it was caught on tape and broadcast across the globe.
Chauffer dropped to his knees and looked up at the sky, begging God for help.
Even those who haven’t spent a day in church their whole lives, suddenly let their inner choirboy out when they think their number is up. I went to school with a guy who was a real bad ass. You name it, he would smoke it or shoot it, yet the girls loved him. One night, he got too fucked up to drive, but he decided to jump in his pickup and take his girlfriend home all the same. I remember her saying that his last words were, “Dear God,” as his truck hit the tree and launched him fifty feet across a parking lot. She made it, but wound up in a wheelchair for the rest of her life.
She was probably one of the first poor bastards to be eaten.
Chauffer was pleading to the Lord Almighty when we heard a thumping noise from the door to the stairwell. He scrambled to his feet, falling silent. What first started as a knock had turned into a loud pounding that was rattling the door. We started backing away, when the splinters from Chauffer’s makeshift door lock shot out toward us like missiles. From out of the darkness, charged the six-foot-seven goliath that had pounded Josh to death downstairs outside the lobby.
Chauffer let out a scream, and started running. The movement caught the creature’s attention and it started to chase him around the top of the building. The zombie was clearly moving slower than yesterday, but it was only a matter of time before it caught its prey.