I thought back to the gruel I had eaten with the survivors at the Walmart. I would pretty much kill for a bowl of that right now.
Inspecting the cage took Scott and me all of two minutes. It was tall, rounded on top, but covered in a plastic material to keep some rain out. I stuck my hand out the bars by the metal door, but I couldn’t tell what kind of lock held us. I stretched and cranked my wrist around. It was no use. Whatever held us in was out of reach, which made me stomp the ground in frustration.
“I tried that the first day. The lock must be in the center of the door. I couldn’t reach it,” the girl informed us, then went back to staring at nothing. I scowled at that.
Scott and I went over the entire cage again, but we could find no easy way out. Maybe if we had some kind of torch or a hacksaw. Sadly, all we had was some rancid human flesh.
Later in the day, we sat together but didn’t speak. Rain drizzled down, and the sky was dark gray. One of the ghouls walked to our cage and tossed a couple of chunks of meat inside. I eyed him—make that her—but refused to look at the meat.
She was tall and thin, with hands that hung like emaciated sticks. Her fingers were long, and some were missing fingernails. Her skin was the same mottled off-color of the other ghouls. Her eyes glowed green just as those of the other ghouls I had seen, and she was a nightmare. Her skin was sunken, her cheeks barely existent, for her cheekbones were so sharp they looked like they could be used for weapons.
She didn’t speak; just shook as if she were laughing, and then walked away. The zombie wore a faded t-shirt with Elton John’s face on it, which was a strange contrast to her nightmare visage. A pair of canvas-style pants hung around her bony waist.
“Come back with some Wendy’s next time,” Scott called out and flipped her the bird, but she didn’t acknowledge him.
I snickered at his comment.
“Goddamn that woman is butt ugly.” Haley giggled at Scott’s joke this time.
“She was probably a bouncer before the world changed.”
“Nah, man.” Scott shot back. “She was a porn star. I bet she used to shoot three or four movies a week.”
I laughed at the image of that ugly thing ever being attractive. Then I worried that we may have crossed a line by discussing porn in front of the girl, but she didn’t even blink.
“I think she used to be a barista. At a Starbucks or Tully’s,” Haley offered.
“She’d scare off the customers.” Scott scoffed, turned his head, and spit out of the cage. It sailed through the bars and smacked a passing zombie in the leg.
“You’re making an art out of it,” I told him, half expected him to start throwing feces at the zombies, which would be just about the ultimate in irony. Look at the humans in a cage throwing their shit at a bunch of undead.
“I might run out of spit soon. Hope it rains.”
“We’re going to die in here, aren’t we?” Haley whispered.
I went to her side and draped my arm over her shoulder, wanting to tell her that everything was going to be okay and that I had a plan. The problem was, I had nothing. Not only was I out of ideas, I was so hungry there was no way we would have the strength to fight the undead off if we did get free. All they had to do was wait outside for us to eat the rancid zombie meat or die of starvation.
“You’re a brave kid. I respect that you have survived this long, so I’m not gonna bullshit you.” I took a breath. “I don’t know. I honestly don’t know. They never open the cage, so there is no way we can attack or run. We don’t have any sort of tools to get through those bars.”
To make my point, I walked up to the bars and struck one with the meaty part of my hand. They rang hollow, which made the girl’s face drop. I hated to be the bearer of bad news, but I truly saw no hope in our situation.
The bars were thick, at least an inch around. They must have originally housed some sort of small animals, maybe even monkeys.
“There has to be a way.” She sighed and stared out, up at the clouds. They had grown thicker, making the day even darker. Now a crackle sounded from far away, and a blast of lightning lit the sky. It was a full twelve seconds before we heard the thunder. I watched my two companions, and sure enough, they had both been counting.
The rain started coming down harder. Sticking my hand out, I let some run over my palm in an attempt to clean it. I rubbed it against the inside of one pant leg, then stuck it out again and caught enough to sip.
Haley and Scott joined me, and for the next hour, we drank our fill. After the negative turn our conversation had taken, all at my doing, it was pleasant to return to happier thoughts.
We passed the night in silence, huddled together, shivering from the cold as rain pelted down. It ran into the caged area and soaked the ground, wetting our clothes making sleep impossible. We kept the girl between us, but it was only for warmth. The last thing I was thinking about was the fact that I had a female pressed against my body. I needed her and Scott just for warmth.
Lightning continued to blast the air around us. I may have dozed a few times, but not for long. Somehow Scott slipped into sleep and even snored.
I was so hungry. It was at least three days since I’d last had food, and I was starting to daydream about every meal I had ever eaten. I remembered a day when Allison and I went to the city and stopped at a burger joint. I had a fish sandwich that dripped tartar sauce all over the plate, so I dipped my onion rings into the stuff. How I wanted that meal again. I would even settle for one of the poorly cooked deer steaks from the cabin. The thought of the cabin made me wonder how Katherine was doing.
Kicking the cage in frustration, the lashing blow made me fall on my ass. I was weak, but the force of trying to put my foot through a metal bar was oddly therapeutic.
For a long time, I sat staring at the dark clouds. The rain grew heavier, and I didn’t have anything to do but watch it. Rain. Wet ground. I followed the tiny rivers of water that were forming. They rushed in every direction, but some were coming at the cage. I knew that if the rain didn’t let up soon, we would be sitting in a puddle.
Water flowed around the bars of the cage, and that was what caught my eye. I got to my feet and walked to the place I had kicked. The bars went deep into the ground, and I suspected they had some sort of thick cap to hold them in. But the mud around them told a different story.
I grabbed hold of the bars and lifted straight up. I almost broke into tears when they budged. It wasn’t much, but I could tell that we had a chance. Why didn’t I think of this before?
After waking Scott, I furiously whispered my plan into his ear. He was sluggish, but after he stood and stretched, we took a shot at the cage. He was out of it, judging by the way he came awake, rising slowly and shaking his head. I’m sure he felt the way I did, which was exhausted. But how else would we ever get out of this place if we didn’t try to move the cage?
We both squatted down and lifted, but the cage was very heavy. We kept looking over our shoulders and peering into the night, expecting the zombies to take notice of us at any time, but luck was on our side. The ghouls were doing whatever they did at night. They were always scarce after dark. In fact, I didn’t remember seeing any of them in the dark while we were locked up. Their oddly glowing eyes didn’t seek us out.
We stood and lifted and had better luck. The cage gave a sucking sound as the bars came out of the mud. The bars came up about an inch, but we set it back down. We could lift the cage, but not high enough for either of us to get out.
“Lift it higher and I can fit. I’ll figure out the lock and go get keys if I have to,” Haley said.