I nodded. “Okay. I like it. As long as they haven’t seen us, we might be okay,” I said, agreeing.
“Really?” Dave said.
“Really. You lead the way. You’ve done a good job so far,” I said.
“Okay,” he said, “follow me.”
Chapter Thirty-Eight
We bent forward while we ran. Staying low. Using the disabled vehicles for cover. We crossed the bridge that ran over I-390. Dave, Allison and I looked both ways before darting past the eastbound expressway exit ramp, and were in the woods. Best I could tell, undetected.
The leaves did crunch underfoot. A plus. There was all that rain to thank for that. The mush and mud wasn’t great. I felt the ground suck at my dress shoes. Didn’t care if they got dirty. Just didn’t want them pulled from my feet.
“Help, please. Help!”
We stopped. Looked at each other.
“Where’s that coming from?” Dave said.
“Not that close,” I said. The voice, clearly a female, echoed. “Other side of the trees?”
Allison kind of shrugged, shaking her head. “Could be.”
“We have to find her,” I said. I know it sounded heroic, chivalrous-like. And it was. I did care. But her yelling was going to get all of us in trouble, too. Whoever was yelling for help had no idea what kind of swarm was headed in our direction. “That way,” I said.
We cut diagonally through the trees, could see the end, only yards away. The Distillery parking lot was full. Just east of it were both an Applebees and Olive Garden. This small section of Greece was like restaurant central. And I was hungry. Very, very hungry.
It still seemed a bit funny to me that we stayed armed with garden tools. One would have thought we’d of come across weapons. Guns? Machetes? Harpoons? Anything. Guns had to be out there. It’s all that was in the news as of late. Civilians and their personal armory stashes.
I loved my shovel, felt good in my hands, and now I had one of Josh’s hand shovels in my back pocket, too. Dave’s pitchfork was tough. He had Josh’s other hand shovel. And Allison seemed to have mastered the multitude of hedge clipper uses.
We must have resembled crazed farmers scampering between trees and out into the back parking lot of the Distillery.
The woman still screamed. Not constant. Not always calling for help. She was clearly in trouble. Being chased, was my guess. We needed to hurry.
I chanced a look up at Ridge Road. We were at least a few hundred yards from the main street. Behind the restaurant was a Hampton Inn. Cars in the lot. From here, without the burst of cries and screaming, it looked peaceful. Not much different from the Marriott, just smaller.
“There she is.” Dave pointed.
The woman wore a grey knee-length skirt, what once must have been a nicely pressed white blouse. She carried heels in one hand as she ran in the grass, toward Hoover Drive. A fast zombie in a dark business suit, complete with a thin black tie, was right behind her. He reached for her, swiping passes with bloated blue hands. She serpentined. Left. Right. Doubling back. Good moves. She was like an over-dressed running back. Her shoes the ball.
We ran at her. At the businessman. Dave had his pitchfork tines out front, ready to thrust them through the zombie. The closer we got to them; I raised my shovel, ready to bat his head into the outfield. Allison just ran, her clippers in one hand, not worrying about readying her weapon until the last minute, less it slow down her approach.
Just feet from saving her, the businessman won.
He tackled her, and tried to bury his head onto her shoulder. She let out a blood-curdling scream and arched her back and bucked him off her.
Dave reached them first.
He drove the pitchfork into the guy’s back and hoisted him off the fallen woman as easily as bailing hay. Thick black blood oozed from the puncture wounds. Dave leaned his weight onto the fork, not letting the zombie roll over, stand up, or move at all.
Allison stood in front of Businessman’s head. She spread the clippers wide. She got into a stance, one foot by each of his shoulders. Almost like eyeing a putt, she dropped the teeth of the clippers low, a blade on either side of its neck, and chopped. Hard. It did not cut off his head. It did bite into his throat, severed arteries. She repeated the process, over and over and over.
I held out a hand.
The woman took it. Her other hand was pressed onto her upper chest, just below the shoulder. Blood stained the blouse, where before some bleach and cold water might have washed out the dirt and grass stains.
“Were you bit?”
“No. It’s not my blood. He didn’t bite me. I’ve been in there, in the back office, locked in the back office for days now. Days. I just wanted to sneak out. Get something to eat,” the woman said. She babbled. She shook. Shock, I thought. She’s going into shock. “The kitchen was close. I’d done it earlier. Should have grabbed more food. I just took what I could carry. I needed more. The monitors showed it was clear. No one was in the halls. I didn’t see anyone in the hallway.”
Her name-tag read, HELLO, I AM SUES MELIA.
“Sues?” I said. I pronounced it like zoos, with an “S.”
She stopped talking. Stared at me.
I pointed to my chest, and looked at where her name-tag was pinned to her blouse. She looked down, snorted out a laugh.
“Are you okay?” I said.
I heard it first. In the silence that surrounded us, it was like thunder.
“He almost bit me,” she said.
She pulled at her blouse.
I stuck my fingers into the holes of her blouse and tore the fabric, pulling the sleeve clear off. She gave me a harsh look, brows furrowed.
“That was an expensive blouse.”
“It was ruined, Sues. I just wanted to be sure your skin wasn’t broken.”
She opened her mouth to say something else. I held up a finger.
“I don’t care about the blouse. Really, I don’t. I just, you know what? I just don’t want to change. I don’t want to become one of those things. Because, you know, he almost bit me.”
“But he didn’t. I don’t see any broken skin. We’ll keep an eye on it. But I think you will be okay,” I said. I had no way of knowing. I made my hand into a fist. Stop. Listen.
“Should I cut my arm off? Will that--”
“Shhhh,” I said.
Dave looked around. Looked up.
Allison pointed. “There it is!”
It was the steady thump, thump, thump of a rotor blade. A white helicopter with a green stripe by the tail rotor. “Border patrol,” I said.
Dave raised his arms. I grabbed at his elbow, pulled them down.
“Wait,” I said.
As if on cue, gunfire erupted from the cockpit. In the darkness, the bullets were like Roman Candles spraying all over Ridge Road.
Someone let out a Hell Yeah. Might have been me. May have been all of us.
“We need to flag them down,” Allison shouted.
I shook my head. “Not a good idea. From up there, we probably don’t look much different than the zombies. We should find cover.”
No one moved, though.
It was awe-inspiring. The helicopter hovered just above the expressway ramp. Bullets rained down in glorious sprays that penetrated and obliterated the walking dead.
When the gunfire stopped, we whooped and hollered. There was a chance we’d beat this. Not just the four of us, but humanity. All was not lost. I swore I saw a rainbow arc over Ridge Road. Okay, it may have been imagined, but if one had appeared, it would have been as appropriate as hell.