“Copy, what’s your status?” No Name’s voice came through the radio.
Grace leaned on the counter as Hawk puttered around behind it and held the speaker to her mouth. “We couldn’t get the doors closed,” she reported. “Hawk and I are holed up in a cafe past the department store. I think Troy and Aaron are in the sporting goods store, and somebody from the decoy team is playing the electric guitar somewhere down the way. We can still hear it.”
“That is not good,” No Name said dryly. “What about the other two civilians that were with you?”
Grace rubbed her forehead. “Aly’s dead, Joseph ran away as soon as we got to the doors.” She sighed. “I don’t know if he’s alive or not. He ran towards the decoy team.”
No Name grunted on the other end with dissatisfaction. “So the doors are still open, and all of you are trapped?” he asked. “Is that what you’re telling me?”
“Maybe if we had proper preparation, and a team that was actually trained to do this kind of shit, then I wouldn’t have to tell you shit like this,” she snarled. “Or, you know, maybe if we weren’t slaves to a—”
“That’s enough,” No Name cut in sharply. “Let me talk to some of the guys on the roof and we’ll see what we can do.”
CHAPTER EIGHT
“Hey!” Troy cried as Joseph ran towards them, pumping his legs hard with what looked like a lot of effort. “Hey!” He fumbled with the lock on the metal gate, hoping he could get it open in time so that the man could come inside to safety.
Joseph completely ignored them, spurred by fear, and ran past them towards the decoy team.
“Is he stupid?!” Aaron blurted, pressing his hands to his head. “The noise is where the zombies are gonna be!”
“Asshole coward,” Troy snapped, shaking his head. “I’m not going out there and risking my neck to get him back.”
He turned to stare at the department store, where the others were struggling to hold the second set of doors shut. Before he could unlatch the grate to go and help them, they dove out of the way, letting the floodgates open.
“Get back!” he hissed as the department store zombies tore towards them. He shoved Aaron around the corner from the metal gate, pressing them both against the wall. The ghouls thundered past, towards the still-wailing guitar, and Troy peeked out, trying to see what was happening at the store.
A woman’s scream pierced the air, and he winced, spotting a cluster of ghouls bearing down on the floor. Guilt twisted his guts when relief washed over him that it was Aly and not Grace who’d fallen. The latter running for the cafe on the other side with Hawk.
“Who was that?” Aaron moaned, sounding near tears. “What’s going on out there?”
“Shh,” Troy replied. He wanted to make sure that the zombies eating Aly were going to steer clear of them. When they finished their meal, they took off towards the cafe instead of the guitar, slamming into the plexiglass barrier protecting Grace and Hawk.
He sighed heavily at the sight of the department store door still open. Every once in a while a zombie would come tearing out, catching wind of noise from the mall. The zombies banging on the cafe were loud enough that two more headed that way, including Aly as she reanimated, peeling her half-eaten corpse from the floor.
“Aly’s dead,” he murmured, and Aaron took in a ragged breath behind them. “Hawk and Grace are trapped in the cafe.”
“We’re fucked,” he groaned. “What are we going to do now? They’re just going to let us die in here, QXR bastards!”
Troy shook his head. “Just stay quiet,” he instructed. “If we get an opening, we can go close the doors and then kill the zombies outside of the cafe.”
“No way, no way we’re going to do that,” Aaron argued shrilly. “They said there are hundreds of those things in that store! Our job was to secure this spot, and we did it, and that’s all we’re doing!”
Troy turned to him, eyes blazing. “How do you go from crying about us being left to die in here, to standing by our job?” he hissed. “Clearly the plan didn’t work, so we have to change it. Grace and Hawk aren’t going to be able to get out of there by themselves, and we don’t know how long Eddie and Leo are going to be able to keep up the distraction down there. Not to mention how screwed we’ll be if all of the hundreds of those things get into the mall and are drawn to that noise. If they get too packed in here, we’ll really be trapped. We need to get those doors closed.”
“I’m staying right here,” Aaron said, swallowing hard.
“You realize if those of us that are useful die in here, and you’re the only one left, they’re just going to leave you in here, right?” Troy asked, voice low and menacing. “You realize that Grace is the only one who can get us out of this alive, right? No Name gave her a gun. You want to stick with her.”
“She wasn’t able to do her job!” Aaron protested. “They’re trapped too! What we should do is get down the escalator and back to the exit while all of the zombies are distracted!”
Troy rolled his eyes. “Oh yeah, and those guys won’t just shoot us as soon as we come out, huh?” he asked, poking the man in the chest. “If we walk out that door, tell them that we abandoned what we were supposed to do and left four able-bodied slaves in here to die instead of completing the mission, they’re not going to put bullets right into our foreheads.”
Aaron’s resolve seemed to be slipping, but it was being quickly replaced by blind fear, and Troy was seriously starting to think there was no
