Murph grabbed his radio, pressed the button and said,"Chief, we got a problem out at the main gate."
"What kind of problem?" the Chief replied.
"There's been some sort of accident. Skinny Tom anda bunch of other people I don't know. I think they might be some of them."
"Alright, I'm checking it out."
"You want me to come down there?" Murph asked.
"No, you stay put. Don't leave that room fornothing."
"You got it." Murph punched up the loading dockand watched as the Chief ground out his cigarette and walked over to the cab ofhis own truck, a beat-up old Mazda, low to the ground and covered in rust. Heleaned into the cab of the open window, and pulled out a hunting rifle. Heflung it over his shoulder, pulled a cigarette out of his pocket, lit it, andtook off jogging down the road, leaving a trail of smoke behind him.
Murph switched the monitor to the front gate and tried tofigure out who was alive and who was dead. After a couple of seconds, it wasn'tso hard to figure out... because they were all dead, except for one, a teenageboy, his Chuck Taylor's kicking up dust as he looked for a way out of thecircle of dead that were closing in on him. He climbed onto the hood of thetruck, and kicked at their pawing hands.
The Chief appeared, his rifle in his hands, and his backto the camera, a cigarette still hanging out of his mouth. He raised the rifleto his eye, and there was a flash. Skinny Tom flinched and turned around, bloodrunning down the front of his chest. The Chief's first shot had entered hisback and erupted out of his chest, turning his shirt into a dark mess. His attentionwas now drawn to the Chief along with a couple other of the dead.
The Chief used the bolt action on his rifle to eject thespent shell casing and drive another round into the chamber. Then he lookeddown the sights of the gun. There was another flash, and this time Murph sawthe back of Skinny Tom's head explode, showering the dead behind him in moredark spots. Skinny Tom fell to the ground.
Murph felt relief as the Chief began putting the deaddown, one by one, the teenage boy still kicking and shoving them away from thehood of the truck. Murph's relief was short-lived however, as the boy slippedon a spot of blood on the truck's slick hood and fell to the ground. The Chiefworked feverishly, firing, operating the bolt on his gun, and firing again, allto no avail. The boy was gone, torn to shreds by the three remaining dead whohad pounced on him the moment he had fallen to the dusty ground.
The Chief sighted down his rifle one more time and pulledthe trigger, but this time there was no flash. He let the muzzle of the rifledroop to the ground, and then the Chief backed away. In the distance, Murphcould see more people approaching down the main road... slowly, ever so slowly.
Before the teenage boy in the Chuck Taylor's could risefrom the ground, the first of the walkers had arrived... he was just as dead asthe others.
Chapter 25: Take Two of These and Call Me in theMorning
The black man hovered over his friend, getting in the wayand asking questions whose answers he probably wouldn't understand. He wasdirtier than dirty, and Joan made him wash his hands before he could even stepfoot into the triage area. He had come in carrying a dazed white man with bloodleaking out of his ears. They were covered in filth, looked exhausted, andtheir skin was a patchwork of bruises that made her hurt just looking at them.
The white man sat before her, his eyes distant and dazed."What's your name?"
He looked at her, uncomprehending. She looked into hiseyes, pulling out a penlight she had snagged from the head medical officer. Sheshined them into his eyes, taking note of the dilation.
"Can you hear me?" she asked. She snapped herfingers next to his ear, and frowned at his lack of a reaction.
"His name is Blake. He saved me."
"Blake, can you hear anything I'm saying?" shesaid as loud as she could.
The man in front of her frowned and shook his head."I can't hear what you're saying," he said.
Joan pulled an otoscope from the wall, attached adisposable plastic tip to it, and leaned in to look at his ears. It wasn'tgood. Blake's eardrums were ruptured, far beyond what she could fix. Normally,they would heal with time or with the help of a little surgery, but this wasnot the place to be doing such a procedure. Joan pulled a notepad from herpocket and wrote on it.
She held the pad out to Blake, he focused his eyes on it,and then his head dropped.
"What does it say?" Mort asked.
She held the notepad out to him, and his lips moved as heread the words. "He's deaf? Is he going to get better? Will it heal?"
"Not on its own. The rupture is too large in bothears."
Mort let the words sink in. He couldn't imagine whatBlake must be feeling. This new world was not the type of world you wanted tobe living in without the ability to hear. Mort put his hand on Blake's shoulderas a sign of comfort. Blake looked up at him, smiled and shrugged. "Itain't all bad," he said. "Now I never have to hear the Dave MatthewsBand on the radio." Blake smiled at Mort.
Mort didn't know what to do, so he just smiled back.
Joan wrote more words on the notepad and handed it toBlake. He read the words solemnly, as she filled in his friend. "Yourfriend has a concussion. He needs to get plenty of rest, which I know is atough order to fill right now, but if he's going to survive, he's going to needplenty of rest." Joan opened a drawer and
