Alex nodded at him. “Nose-plugs too, if you got ‘em.”
Alex could see only darkness at the bottom as the three of them walked downstairs. All of the windows and doors had been boarded up by David and Nicole after they had arrived. It was also musty smelling, though that must have just been the smell of the wood as the centre had only been closed up for a few days.
A few days? How much longer will it go on?
One of the boards covering the window could be moved to look out; everything they had done to protect themselves inside the building would have been pointless if they walked right into the middle of a crowd of mudmen. A ray of light shone straight through as David peeked out.
After a few seconds of craning to see as much as he could, David gave the thumbs up. The three of them agreed to talk as little as possible—limiting the noise meant less chance of anything hearing them. Thumbs up meant that the coast was clear.
Their plan was simple: Alex and David—dressed in long, thick coats from the centre’s Lost and Found and thick rubber gloves David had found in the basement—would pry the mudmen off the spikes with a rake and a long gardening hoe. Then, they would shove or roll or somehow get them to the dumpsters across the lot. The whole thing should only take a few minutes. Nicole would stay by the door to act as a look-out and keep the door open in case they had to make a run for it. All three were glad that David had found a package of thin, white painters’ masks to lessen the smell from the dangling bodies.
When they opened the door, because it recessed about five feet into the building, everything looked so normal. The lawn across the street was thick and green, leaves were scattered around, blowing in the breeze. Birds chirped nearby.
Reality crashed back down as they walked out and saw the mudmen on the pikes. Nicole stayed behind and gave both boys a thumbs-up and a nod. David and Alex looked at each other. Neither wanted to go first, so they stood nodding at each other to go ahead.
When neither did, Nicole grew impatient. “Just go!”
Alex heard the venom in her low voice.
Neither moved.
“David! Go!”
David shook his head, wide-eyed at the idea of going any nearer to the dead mudmen.
Suddenly Alex raised his hand; he had an idea. He made a fist and shook it three times. David nodded. The leader would be decided by rock/paper/scissors.
One. Two. Three.
Alex’s rock beat David’s scissors.
David gave Alex his best pleading look. He put up two fingers: Best two out of three?
Alex shook his head. Fate had decided. Rock/paper/scissors was not to be argued with.
David sighed, looking at the row of limp but still standing bodies. He closed his eyes, took a deep breath, and stepped forward. Alex followed directly behind him.
Large flies circled the mudmens’ heads. Blood and some other goopy fluid (for a moment Alex thought maybe it was mud) splattered them, dripped out of them, and had pooled at their feet. They all had large wounds on their faces, arms, legs, torsos, everywhere. They had been through something pretty rough, all before getting impaled on seven-foot pikes and baked in the sun for hours.
They were a mess.
The closer the boys got, the more details they took in. The patterns on their clothes. The brands of shoes they wore. Each step told them a little more about who these four had been before they turned.
When they got about five feet from the spikes, David stopped abruptly. Alex, with his eyes on the mudmen, almost walked right into him.
The most vivid fact about the creatures was that they were dead. Flies landed on their eyes, in their mouths, everywhere. Not a flinch. They weren’t breathing. They weren’t moving. Their clothes, matted down with filth, barely even moved in the breeze. They were dead as dead could be.
David let out a heavy sigh of relief, just as the closest one turned its head and looked right at him. One of its eyes was milky white, the other, just a pulpy hole. It let out a low moan, raised its arms toward the boys and took a ‘step,’ pushing the pike further into its own body.
“Jesus crap!” David blurted out, trying to scramble away, but falling into Alex instead. Both boys hit the ground, trying desperately to get to their feet. The things weren’t dead. Or they were, but they could still move. They could still get them and eat them.
Helpless, with David clambering on top of him, Alex thought of the mudmen he had seen over the past few days. Some had been burned. Some had lost limbs. Some had bled out. They all kept going.
They can’t be killed.
David finally got to his feet, unconsciously pulling Alex up with him. The two boys ran back to the door, screaming.
NICOLE
Nicole was able to take in the entire scene; all of its players and setting. She screamed when she saw the things—now two of them—moving. She desperately wanted to run back into the building, but she had to wait for the boys. It seemed like they were taking forever, but they finally got there. Once she, Alex, and David were back inside, she slammed the door.
The would-be clean-up crew stood in the lobby, leaning solidly against the door, panting. David crumpled to the floor, hyperventilating.
After gaining some control over herself, Nicole felt the need to ask, “They did move, right?” Another gasp of breath. “Like, I didn’t just imagine that, right? They actually moved?”
Alex, still focusing on the floor, nodded. “Yeah.” Gasp of breath. “One did, anyway.”
“I saw two of them move, definitely,” Nicole said. “Maybe all of them.”
“Oh my God, oh my God, oh my God,” David said between breaths. “It almost got me! They’re all alive, and they’re going to get us! Sooner or
