The gore fell to the floor of the roof as Eric bushed at his jeans and sweatshirt with a scrap of blanket that someone had been willing to part with so long as the small group who’d freed the bus wiped themselves down thoroughly. Malcolm was grabbing the bits of flesh and bones that had caked the other mission participants and was throwing it over the side of the building at what seemed to be regular intervals. He had told Eric in excited bursts of speech that he thought that the smell of the dead might deter the still living zombies from getting too close to their hideout. Eric was entirely sure that it was working or if their plan to draw most of the active zombies away from the school and the rooftop hideout by using one of the trucks to lure them halfway across town was the real reason that their streets remained mostly zombie free.
Either way Eric was only getting a few minutes to get clean up and grab something to eat and drink. Malcolm was already pushing and prodding the smaller group of survivors that had agreed to assault the hospital to get going. Eric was handed a large bottle of water by Stephanie. He took a large mouthful his cheeks puffing out like a chipmunk as he filled his mouth with water. It took to swallows but he got down all the stale tasting water and grabbed a large hunk of jerky which he savored. It was the first bit of food he’d had all day.
He worked his shoulder a little swinging it forward a handful of times before swinging it backward a few times. The muscles in his right shoulder were already tightening and they screamed at him as he worked the muscles loose. Malcolm was running up and down the rooftop checking Morgan Street and the alley behind the store fronts. Robert had used his own truck to cut off the back end of the alley that was exposed to 6th St. and with the bus plugging up the alley from wall to wall there were no zombies lurking down there.
Malcolm made a stop in his circuit of the rooftop to put a hand against his sister’s forehead. He kept pulling his hand away from her forehead and putting it back every few seconds as if he didn’t trust his judgment. “We need to go now!” His words were caught halfway between a strong demand and a frantic plea. His sister’s worsening condition was tearing at his heart; his hysterical need to save her was driving him half mad with grief.
Eric handed the water bottle back to Stephanie who jammed it into her backpack and headed towards the ladder descending into the alley. Eric followed close behind at Don and Malcolm lined up behind Robert who was swinging his left leg over the side of the building and hooking it on the ladder. A few minutes later they were in the alley heading towards the two trucks at the front of the alley. Robert was going to pull out and Malcolm was going to run to his bike which was leaning against the wall just on the other side of the barrier. Once Malcolm was on his bike and Stephanie, Don, and Eric were in the second truck they’d take off for the hospital and Robert would reverse the truck back into position to block the alley. Robert climbed into his truck and fired up the engine. As he moved forward a few feet Malcolm bolted through the gap, hatchet in hand. A grunt echoed down the alleyway a second later and as Eric, Don, and Stephanie sprinted to the front of the alley they saw Malcolm plucking his hatchet out of the head of a single zombie that had wandered towards their barrier. Malcolm nodded to the small group and then grabbed the handlebar of his bike. He swung his right leg over the seat and rammed his foot down on the starter, the engine coughed to life.
Eric climbed in behind the wheel of the truck, Stephanie slid in first through the passenger door and then Don. The three were sandwiched tight against one another in the small cab truck. The rig had an extended cab which they planned to load with as many supplies as they could in as little time as possible. Stephanie was specifically along for the ride because she knew the kinds of medications and possible equipment that would be needed to keep Malcolm’s sister alive. Eric thought it was weird that Malcolm hadn’t bothered to share his sister’s name. Maybe in his mind it wasn’t important unless she lived, either way it bothered Eric that he was risking his life for a woman whose name he didn’t even know.
The most direct route to the hospital was East down Morgan St. They’d turn left when they hit 3rd St. and then drive straight to the hospital. Eric followed Malcolm’s bike as he moved down the street weaving in between the few stiff walking zombies that tottered down the near empty street. They came to the small car jam two blocks later and had to take their time and a few tries to thread in between the crashed cars. They were lucky; the cars were acting as a barrier to the zombies and had apparently over the last eight days driven most zombies into the neighboring streets. On the other side of the barrier somewhere between a half dozen and a dozen zombies were shuffling around in a directionless ambling. They turned to look at the angry whine of Malcolm’s dirty bike as he drove through them they started to fall inward like the Red Sea crashing down after Moses had parted it. A few bounced off the grill of the truck as Eric tried to skirt the cluster of bodies. By the time the truck broke free half the zombies were crippled by the heavy tires of the truck which had crushed limbs and torsos as they had continued down Morgan St.
Malcolm turned left two blocks up and Eric pushed a little harder on the gas to catch up. The guy was being drive to the edge of recklessness by his sick sister but his one gun and hatchet were not going to clear out the hospital alone. The quarter mile drive to the hospital was eventful in that they didn’t encounter a single zombie along the way.
Eric watched through the windshield as the hospital grew across the horizon. The hospital was made up of three wings. Two of them were connected by a long hallway and had been the original hospital but over the years with the small but steady growth of the county they had built a third wing attached to the main building by a long glass hallway. There were over twenty cars in the parking lot as Eric pulled up to the front entrance of the hospital. An abandoned ambulance sat at the E.R. doors of the hospital the doors thrown open as if someone had blown them wide open from the inside. The floor and the walls of the treatment bay of the ambulance was splattered with coppery burst and spurts of dried blood.
Malcolm did a once over of the ambulance but finding only the evidence of a blood massacre inside the truck with no undead lurking inside he continued around the looped drive up for ambulances and circled back to the parking lot. Malcolm pulled his bike into a parking space next to a black Monte Carlo and waved the truck over.
As Eric steered the truck into a parking spot next to Malcolm the kid on the bike turned the hatchet around in his hands and swung at the passenger side window with the heavy metal flat of the miniature ax. He leaned his face in and looked around the car interior. After a half minute when nothing lunged out of the back seat and tried to chew off Malcolm’s face he grabbed the door handle from the inside of the car and opened the passenger door.
Malcolm let his backpack drop off his shoulders which clattered with the muffled sound of metal striking metal as it hit the asphalt. He unzipped the backpack and plucked out a brick and one of those extendable bars that people used to keep their cars from being stolen. Malcolm moved back into the car his legs dangling out the passenger side door as he fiddled with the steering wheel. A moment later the ghostly silence of the hospital was shattered by the banshee wail of the car’s horn crying in agony. Eric lowered his head to look into the car and saw that Malcolm had wedged the brick against the horn and locked it in place with the anti-theft bar.
Malcolm pushed his way backwards out of the car and getting back to his feet turned to look into the confused faces of the three people in the truck. “It's to get the zombies to come out. I have a theory about noise, when we make noise like gunshots they come towards the noise but when we’re relatively silent they leave us alone. It’ll be easier to kill them out here then have to worry about them lurking behind doors and in rooms in there waiting to take a chunk out of us.”
Eric wasn’t so sure that this was a great idea but decided that it was Malcolm’s show so he’d follow the kids lead. He recalled the earlier mission and how the zombies had left them pretty much alone until Robert had fired his gun and then they had come like moths to the flame.
The small group waited for ten minutes the car’s horn screaming the whole time as they waited for the zombies to start filtering out of the hospital, not a single one shuffled out of the hospital as they sat and waited. A few zombies who were entombed in the cars in the parking lot were riled up and were pressing their faces against the car windows straining to break out of their metal coffins and feed on the living just on the other side of the glass.
Malcolm grew increasing frustrated with each passing minute and had been reduced to agitated pacing as they hit the fifteen minute mark with no zombies. He was mumbling to himself as he paced snatches of his self talk filter through the open window of the truck as his route took him nearer the truck. “Should have worked…seen the results…poured out of the grocery store…need to check the hospital.”
From what Eric could hear it sounded like Malcolm had tested this out before and had seen the noise drawn out the zombies. It hadn’t worked this time and he was struggling to find the solution. Eric was starting to feel the itch to get moving. Either they’d have to go into the hospital or they’d have to leave. He knew what Malcolm’s decision would be and no sooner had the thought crossed his mind then Malcolm was speaking, “we have to go int. Alexis won’t make it another day.”
So the girl’s name was Alexis, at least Eric knew who he was risking his life for. “I’ll go with you to check out the door. Stephanie and Don you guys stay put in case we need to beat a quick retreat.
Eric pushed the driver’s door open with his shoulder his feet swinging down, his boots thudding against the asphalt. He checked his gun on his right hip and his hammer on his left. He unholstered the gun keeping it close to his leg as he followed Malcolm. They ran in a straight line towards the front doors of the hospital, a few zombies caged inside their cars growled as they passed but none managed to break free.
The two men stopped at the corner of the ambulance their backs pressed against the metal as Malcolm spied around the corner of the open door of the treatment bay. He waved a pointed finger twice and they both turned and sprinted around the ambulance and towards the entrance door. As they got closer a faint buzzing played in Eric’s just out of reach of his mind to pinpoint. He swatted with his left hand at his ears but there was no fly or bee to be shooed away, the buzzing continued and grew by small degrees as they got closer to the hospital doors.
Malcolm rushed towards the door abandoning any sense of controlled approach. He triggered the motion sensor connected to the sliding doors. As the glass shield of the E.R. doors slid back on motorized hinges the buzzing exploded in Eric’s ears. His mind flashed and he remembered where he’d heard the buzzing noise that had defied description just seconds earlier. The hospital fire alarm was screaming its earsplitting shriek into a desolate world. As the alarm cried and the emergency lights continued to spit out their bright flashes every few seconds Eric could see that the fire suppression sprinklers were on and still running. Through the twisted mockery of lightning flashes the emergency strobes gave off and the endless shower of rain from the sprinkler heads Eric could see the ghostly black outlines of bodies aimlessly swaying and lurching down the dark corridors of the hospital.