It did feel like a coffin. I felt claustrophobic. Tried to control my breathing. Unless these things got bored, we were literally trapped. Stuck in place. Making a run for it would never work. There were too many. And they held the advantage being on the opposite side of the door.
A loud bang sound. Not like a gunshot, but as if something crashed, fell over. I snuck a peak, kneeling. “Well, that got their attention,” I said, sliding back beside Allison.
“What’s that mean?”
“The things, they all looked to see what the commotion was, too. Some even wandered toward the sound.”
Alley smiled. “They did?”
“Don’t get all happy. A few left. The rest--they’re still right outside this office.”
“Nah. I got an idea. Watch this.” Allison crawled toward the counter, reached up and came back with a microphone on a stand. She held down the button on the base, and started shouting. Her voice echoed throughout speakers hung in the mall. “Anything?”
I looked at the window. “You’ve got their attention. Thing is, there’s a speaker right outside here. Think there’s a way to isolate what part of the mall gets the transmission?”
“The switchboard?”
I went to where she had retrieved the microphone. The small switchboard had levers that were labeled. There were stores, and sections--north, south, west, and east. This might work, I realized. J.C. Penny was the biggest store, opposite the food court. I toggled the switch, and nodded at Allison.
When she yelled, it was too loud. The creatures outside the security office banged on the glass, and walls. “A little softer,” I said. The things weren’t going to investigate noise far away, when she made enough noise to hold their interest right here.
Allison turned her back, hovered over the microphone, and tried again. It was perfect. While I heard her voice out in the mall, I barely heard her, and I sat right next to her. I looked at the switchboard, and found the volume knob. I turned it up. “Keep going,” I said.
I turned to look at our visitors. Most were gone. Not all. But most. I tried not to make any eye contact. I felt like that might engage them. I don’t know if that mattered, or if they just smelled our life. I wanted to do as little as possible to have them attracted to us. Right now, avoiding eye contact was about all I could think to stop.
“They leaving?” Allison said.
“Yeah. Don’t stop.” I closed my eyes. Kept them shut and didn’t move at all. I tried to control my breathing, taking slow shallow breaths. Inside my head, I counted to sixty. When I opened my eyes, they were gone. The remaining few zombies had left. “I think we’re clear. Don’t stop. Not yet.”
I chanced a look. The last of the zombies left the area, entering the food court, a compound fracture at the ankle left the foot dragging behind with each pull of its leg.
We had the two radios, the flashlight, my hockey stick, but no keys. No guns. It was not what I had hoped for, but it was what it was. We’d have to make the best of it. Staying inside the security office was the worst thing we could do. The mall was clearly not a safe haven. Running outside the emergency exits might not prove any better, or safer. And yet, that was our only choice. Making a run for it.
“We’re going to do this. As soon as you stop transmitting, we’re going to bolt for the exit and just keep running. Okay?”
She nodded, but never stopped talking into the microphone.
I gave her a three count. I knew she liked them, and then she stood. I stood, and pulled open the office door. I tried to be quiet about it. We didn’t seem to gain any attention. We rounded the office. The emergency exit was a mere twenty feet away. Just had to run past the restrooms.
I ran, hit the bar across the door and pushed it open. Lights flashed. Sirens blared, and above it all, I heard Allison scream.
Chapter Seventeen
I stood at the threshold. One foot out of the mall, one inside. The cool night air was a blast of refreshment after working up a sweat traipsing through the mall like S.W.A.T. and then being trapped inside the tiny security office for the last hour.
One of the things had come out of the bathroom. It had Allison by the arm. She struggled against its hold. Squirming, and wriggling her body trying to pull free.
This one was a mess. Over three hundred pounds, it appeared he must have turned while on the toilet. His khaki trousers were down around his ankles. Decaying white legs were mixed with hair, throbbing veins, and puss oozing from open wounds around his thighs. His Canary yellow dress shirt was buttoned as if a blind man had assisted. The mismatch of buttons to holes made the front tails lopsided around a pair of whitey-tighties that looked so tight they had to be cutting of blood supply to the creature’s brain -- if blood still flowed through its bulbous body.
“Allison!”
She stopped struggling. Must have realized what I was about to say. Before I could yell, she swung a backhand. The handle of the flashlight cracked square against the bridge of the zombie’s nose. Perhaps it was the pants tangled around its feet, but stumbling back a step, the fat monster lost his balance and went down, backward. Hard. Its head smashed into tile. Blood sprayed from underneath.
It hadn’t let go of Allison, pulling her down as well. She was able to wretch her harm free. Back on her feet, she delivered a kick into the fallen zombie’s exposed gut. Then another. And despite the other zombies now drawn to the excitement down the corridor, and our window for escape narrowing, she dropped to her knees by its head and beat its skull with the butt of her flashlight until blood coated the metal and it slipped from her hands. Crying, one forearm pressed to her face, Allison picked up her weapon and pushed off the ground to stand back up.
“Allison, we need to go.” I held out my hand.
She looked down at the man she’d killed. Only it wasn’t a man. Not at all.
“Allison,” I said.
Blood smeared tears stained her cheeks. She huffed, gaining control, and walked toward me. It was a big moment for her, a life altering one. The converging zombies were close, getting closer. “We need to . . . run. Now.”
She chanced a look back, saw what I saw, and snapped out of whatever mode she was stuck in. She ran. I pushed open the door, and we were outside in a heartbeat.
Headlights shined in our eyes. The sound of a motor running. We stopped as the door closed behind us. There was nothing to block it with. The zombies could exit the mall as easily as we did.
“Who’s in the truck?” I yelled. “We just want to get somewhere safe!”
No one answered.
Allison and I circled around the vehicle. She went toward the passenger side. I went around to the driver’s. No one was inside the pickup truck.
“Get in,” I said just as the emergency door opened and out came a flock of slow moving zombies. “Get in, Allison!”
“It’s locked,” she shouted, as I opened the driver-side door. I looked around for the button to unlock the doors, checking the inside panel. I couldn’t find any.
“Chase!”
I leaned across the seat, grabbed the handle and pushed open the passenger door. Allison scrambled in, slamming the door closed before any of the zombies reached her. “Too close,” she said.
I sat up, set my foot on the break, and shifted it into reverse.
“You should plow right into them,” Allison suggested.
Instead, I checked the mirror, looked behind me and backed up. There wasn’t time to run over zombies that weren’t able to harm us. This wasn’t a search and destroy mission. The goal was getting to my kids. Same as it has been all night.
I spun the wheel and floored it, heading toward the exit onto West Ridge Road; thankfully the parking lot was mostly empty. I only needed to swerve around a Prius and a Beamer. The rest of the road was clear.
The streetlights were on, flashing reds and yellows. Power issues, no doubt. There would be no one to fix them. They would stay that way until the city lost juice and Rochester was drowned in darkness. My guess, it wouldn’t be long. Not with no one manning the utility companies.