Laughing, he spread his arms out. “What?”
* * * * * * *
The teacher’s lounge was packed with people, everyone standing shoulder to shoulder around the IKEA table and chairs.
“Our priorities need to shift,” Luna said, folding her arms. “We got cocky thinking we’d have enough heads up to handle any rotters that came through. Today could have been a massacre.”
Steve frowned. “The ground is too frozen to dig post holes for the fence repairs. We tried a few weeks ago and it took us hours to make it only an inch.”
“Y’all got other materials though,” Booker said, looking over at the man. “Bricks, plywood—”
“Not enough to build a wall,” Trish cut in. “And we don’t have concrete to secure it. We’d just be making a very heavy Jenga stack ready to topple over the second a rotter wants to push in.”
“Well something is better than nothing,” Nathaniel said. “We could scavenge the hardware supply warehouse a few towns over and hope they have things we could use.”
“That’ll take a lot of time and fuel,” Max said. “None of our vehicles are large enough to carry that kind of load in one go.”
Caitlin bit the inside of her lip, waiting for the fence talk to wind down.
Their faulty perimeter was a concern, but it wasn’t the main issue.
How did a herd that large find the one gap in their defenses?
They’d only seen a few Geeks at a time since moving into the school. Caitlin remembered seeing a cluster of ten on the road once, on their way back from a trip.
She and Booker had taken them out easily, the cold seeming to stiffen their undead joints.
But the herd of over seventy, that moved much faster than any they’d come across that winter were an anomaly even then.
Nicole’s voice brought her attention back.
“We don’t have to fix the fence right away,” she said. “We have enough corpses to circle the whole building.”
The stunned silence and owlish stares were nearly comical.
“I’m sorry…” Nathaniel started. “Are you suggesting…”
Nicole glanced around the group. “You guys didn’t realize?” Her stare darted to Caitlin and Booker. “The smell of zombie corpses deters other zombies. They aren’t attracted to the flesh of their own rotting dead—it’s why they don’t eat each other. If you lay out the bodies, the smell will keep other zombies away.”
Mildly horrified, Scott leaned closer. “Do I want to know how you figured that out?”
“The first group I was with found out,” she said. “We’d put a few dead ones around whatever place we’d holed up in for the night to keep from getting attacked in our sleep.”
Booker nodded. “We cleared a farmhouse in Mississippi and dumped the groaners around the outside. Prob’ly what kept us safe when a huge herd came shufflin’ down the road.”
“You’re saying we just have to leave a ring of corpses around the place and we shouldn’t have another attack like today?” Trish asked, furrowing her brow.
“I’d still suggest patching the fence,” Nicole said. “But until we can, yes. The bodies should do the trick.”
“Isn’t anyone curious how they got here?” Caitlin blurted out. “A herd that large, when the biggest group we’ve seen since getting here was only ten or twelve strong? And they zeroed in on the hole in the fence. Geeks aren’t that smart. They don’t rationalize.”
“There were people in the yard,” Nathaniel said. “The rotters must’ve seen movement and B-lined for us.”
“Okay, sure, maybe,” she conceded. “But those Geeks weren’t out in the freezing temps for months. They moved too fast and easy. And they weren’t covered in frost—”
“Well they weren’t just dropped on our doorstep,” Steve said. “They must’ve broken out of somewhere. Remember the Walmart with hundreds of rotters inside?”
Several of the others mumbled in agreement, remembering the day vividly.
Caitlin pressed her lips into a line.
Shifting closer, Booker whispered to her, “What’re you sayin’, Cae?”
And that was the problem. She didn’t know.
She couldn’t accuse someone of doing anything nefarious without first being certain said nefarious thing occurred.
“I think…” She took a deep breath. “I think we need to take a look for ourselves.”
Booker made a noise at the back of his throat—a barely audible grunt of approval—and nodded once.
“T’night,” he whispered.
“Definitely.”
The group continued to discuss patrolling tactics, the necessary additions of more people and the weapons needed. They debated whether to find more ammunition before the end of the next day or if they should wait until the next supply run.
Caitlin simply listened, digging her thumbnail into the side of her middle finger deeper and deeper, trying to quell the urge to bolt.
* * * * * * *
“Y’sure you don’t wanna wait until mornin’?” Booker asked, sweeping the beam of his flashlight over the uneven ground in front of them.
“We might lose evidence if we wait,” she said, glancing over her shoulder. “And if my hunch is right, we’ll want evidence.”
Keeping her own flashlight steady, Caitlin led them from the outside of the fence through the weeds and tall grass the herd had stumbled through only hours before.
Most of the corpses had been moved, per Nicole’s instructions, but a few particularly crushed and mangled bodies were left strewn across the ground.
“So, what weren’t you sayin’ in that meetin’?” Booker asked, staying as close as possible without crowding her.
Caitlin moved her light to search the surrounding grass.
“I think someone led those Geeks right to us,” she said. “I don’t know who, but someone made sure to lure a herd to the one weak spot in our fence.”
Booker was quiet a moment.
“Y’don’t think Nathaniel’s right? They might’ve seen movement in the yard…”
She tilted her head, considering the option.
“Maybe. But that doesn’t explain
