"Come on," Mort said, "be the one."
Blake ran to the third car, certain that it must be theone. He skidded to a stop and held the keys out to the vehicle, jamming on theunlock button. There was still no response. He pulled on the door handle of thecar, but it wouldn't open. He even went so far as to try and jam the keys inthe lock, but they wouldn't fit.
He threw the keys down to the ground and unslung hisrifle, his back against the car. Lou finally caught up to him and they turnedto look at the mass that was following them. The dead, sensing live prey withintheir grasp were spilling out of the Teller & Associates building, andthere was now a solid wall of rotting bodies between the survivors and theirtwo lost lambs.
"Run!" Mort yelled, hoping that Lou could hearhim, and knowing that Blake could not. "Get out of there!" The othersurvivors echoed his pleas.
Lou looked back up at them, regret on his face. He pulledBlake by the shirt, an ancient white T-shirt that was more brown than anythingelse these days. Blake shrugged him off and started firing into the mass of thedead. Lou grabbed Blake again and pulled him away. Blake looked up at thesurvivors, and Mort liked what he saw there. The look on his face said,"I'll be back." Then they were off, scrambling across the parking lotand picking their way among the dead.
He hoped he would see them again... and soon.
****
"Well that was a giant clusterfuck," Chloesaid, drawing a dirty look from Mort.
"Do you think they'll make it?" Amanda asked.
No one said anything. There wasn't anything to say, notanything that people would want to hear. They stepped back inside, away fromthe windows, where the dead, having been thwarted in their chase of Blake andLou, now turned their attention back to the survivors in the building. Theywere trapped. They were slower. They would be easier to eat.
Now the building was thoroughly encircled by the dead.Initially, the majority of the dead had crowded around the front of the Teller& Associates building, around the entrance that the survivors had used tocome in. They had all taken careful looks by hanging out of the broken windowand looking down. Now, they were more evenly distributed. It was perhaps theonly positive development of the entire ordeal. If they had to run, if they hadto get out, they would have a better chance now.
"My only questions is are they going to come backfor us?" Katie said. It was a dark thought, but one that they had to startthinking of. Food was already an issue. They were living on candy bars. Theywere fine with whiskey and water, but sooner or later, they were going to haveto find some more food. They could spend days waiting for Lou and Blake toreturn, if they actually managed to survive.
"Blake's not the type of guy to leave us strandedhere. I don't really know about Lou," Mort said.
Chloe looked at Mort. It might have been the first timeshe had ever actually looked at him, he thought. "Yeah, but how well doyou know any of those people? Two weeks? I've had partners that I thought wereangels turn into demons after two weeks. They could be gone already, and wecan't afford to wait around here on the odd chance that they somehow find a wayback. We might as well sit around waiting for God to miracle us out of here."
Rudy shook his head, as if making up his own mind."She's right. Even if they wanted to come back, there's a chance that theydon't make it. We should plan for the worst and hope for the best."
Andy, his voice shaking with fear said, "Goodlord... what is the worst?"
"The worst? The worst is those barricades break downin the middle of the night, and we have to jump out the damn window,"Clara said.
"I don't think I can jump out the window," Andysaid.
"Then I guess you'll be one of them."
"This is getting us nowhere," Joan said.
Katie knew what to do. It was dangerous, but it wassomething they should have done to begin with. "Let's check out the upperfloors."
The group groaned at her request. "Why would we golooking for trouble?" Joan asked.
"Are you crazy?" Rudy added.
"What could we possibly hope to find?" Amandawondered.
In the end, none of them wanted to jump out the damnwindow, and rather than sit around, wasting what little resources they had,they decided to go on the hunt. But first, they would need weapons thatwouldn't attract every dead being within a half-mile radius.
Chapter 7: Scoring a Ride
"Shit, shit, shit!" Lou yelled. He yelled tohimself for the most part, although he was sure that Blake was filled with thesame sentiment. Neither of them had wanted to ditch the others, but they onlyhad two options, turn tail and run or take the moral high ground and become fastfood for the dead. There were easily two to three hundred of those dead fucksmilling around the building. They didn't have that kind of ammo on them.
They ran through the streets, and Lou felt a peculiarfeeling of déjà vu. It was only a couple of weeks ago when Lou and Zeke hadmade their dreaded waterfront run to what they thought would be their escapeplan, a boat on the Willamette River... but there were no boats this time, juststreets filled with abominations that all wanted a piece of him and Blake.
Once they had put some distance between themselves andthe main horde, they slowed to a walk. Blake slung his rifle over his shoulderand pulled one of the many notepads he had stashed on his person out. He handedit to Lou, along with a pencil, and then said, "What's the plan?"
Lou just looked down at the notepad in his hand. Hewaited for something to pop into his mind, anything, but there was nothingthere. Where was his leadership now? He looked at Blake with fear in his eyes.Now Blake would know that he was useless.
