“Couldn’t hurt to look,” Doyle agreed.
They looked out over the store, checking through their night vision scopes, seeing lots of creatures, easily in the mid-dozens.
“This is gonna be a bitch,” Kowalski said with a sigh.
Doyle cocked his head. “You want me to stay up here and pick ‘em off?”
Kowalski contemplated for a moment and then nodded. “Yeah, get to the center of the catwalk,” he instructed. “You just follow my movement, hit what you can. Also keep watch and let me know if I'm walking into something bad.”
“How do I let you know?” Doyle asked.
Kowalski smirked. “Just yell,” he replied. “They can’t understand you, and if anything it’ll draw them away from me.
Doyle chuckled, shaking his head at his moment of stupidity. “Let’s do it,” he said, and extended his fist.
Kowalski bumped it and then began the climb down the ladder. He paused before he got to the bottom, using his scope to see where the door was. He had a hard time looking over the gun, so he removed it and slung his rifle over his shoulder, using the scope by itself.
He moved to the door, knife in hand, and took a deep breath. Okay, you got this, he thought to himself. It’s just like a Black Friday sale, only less chaotic.
Before he threw open the door, he looked down and spotted a couple of large tool bags. He gently and quietly removed the tools and then slung two bags over his shoulder. He gently opened the door and inched out into the back aisle. As he moved, a moan rumbled behind the door.
He darted away and then froze at the sight of a blurry figure moving towards him in the darkness. A booming shot echoed in the store, and the figure slumped to the ground.
Kowalski looked through the scope, seeing the zombie dead on the ground, and then raised his hand to give Doyle a thumbs up for the assist.
The shot excited the zombies in the store, starting up a dull roar of moans and shuffling as they tried to get a read on where their future meal was. Kowalski moved as quietly as he could, using the scope as a guide.
I know batteries are at the front of the store, he thought. So let’s start there. He looked around for a moment to get his bearings and then crept towards the front. A few aisle down, moans came from just around the next corner, and inched up to peek around it.
There were two ghouls there, shuffling dumbly, within striking distance. He motioned to Doyle, pointing to the far one, and then did a stabbing motion with the knife to show that he would be handling the closer one.
A second later, his guardian angel yelled out, “Okay!”
Kowalski counted down silently before striking. As soon as he lunged forward, a shot ripped through the far creature’s head, causing the closer one to whip around towards the noise.
He slammed the blade into the base of its skull, and as it dropped, he marveled at his skill in delivering a perfect strike in the dark. If I’m this good blind, no wonder I’m such a badass, he thought, chuckling to himself.
He continued to the front of the store, getting to the top of the aisle and looking through his scope. There were a dozen or so zombies around the cash registers, but he scanned past them to find the battery display.
With the target in sight, he checked past it to the front door, which had been completely obliterated under the sight of the horde outside. Most of the creatures were focused on the snipers on the roof, but one wrong noise inside could trigger a tsunami of death.
He plotted his course, so he could stay low and use the registers as cover from the zombies at the front. But that didn’t help him with the dozen between him and the batteries. He looked over at the shelf next to him, seeing some small bottles of bug spray. He picked one up, feeling the weight to it as well as a metal exterior.
Okay, so all I have to do is throw this close enough for the register zombies to hear, and far enough away that the mass at the front door doesn’t sweep over me, he thought, and shook his head. Yeah, I totally got this.
Kowalski broke from the top of the aisle, moving up towards the registers. He knelt down behind the end cap display, about ten yards away from the closest ghoul, a thirty-yard dash to the batteries.
This may be your last throw ever, so at least make it a good one, he urged himself, and lobbed the metal bottle towards the center of the store, arching it high over the top of the shelving. A second later, it clanged on the cement floor, rattling around loudly.
The zombies at the registers moaned loudly and began shuffling off in that direction.
Holy shit, did that work? He shook his head in disbelief. Really?
His excitement tempered when he heard moans coming from the front entrance. He peeked around the corner and his stomach sank at the sight of a dozen or so ghouls attracted by the noise.
Gotta move, he thought frantically, you gotta move! He psyched himself up and moved from cover, quickly and quietly going from register to register, pausing at each end cap.
The footsteps and moans got louder as he got closer to the battery display. As he took a knee at the last end cap just before it, a shot boomed from above, and a corpse crumbled a few feet away.
Kowalski dashed past it to the batteries. Fuck, what do these things take? He used the scope to check all the battery types, finally shaking his head and opening one of the tool bags. Fuck it, I’m taking everything. He tore the packages from the shelf, grabbing every
