BT was looking over Brian’s head at me.
‘No clue.’ I mouthed.
Jack slowly turned over, his mouth full of blood. “Bufsted a few teef,” he said as he gingerly pulled himself to a sitting position.
“No biggie, buddy,” Brian said. “Don’t need them to drink beer.”
Jack gave him the thumbs up, but his head was hanging down.
From my elevated perch I watched as a path began to form from the front of the store right to Jack. I lifted my rifle. Something wicked this way came and I was going to blow it back to the corner of hell it had been let out of.
“Hi asshole!” Durgan yelled as he approached. “And put the damn gun down, you shoot me and Eliza sends zombies onto the roof, and you know what happens then. Friends get eaten, blood spurts everywhere, it’s a mess!” he shouted gleefully. “Oh, what’s the matter? You look like someone just dropped a big smelly log i n your Cheerios! Bet you didn’t know my Mistress was here, did you?” I still hadn’t said anything.
“Shoot him! If you don’t, I will!” Paul yelled from the roof. “We’ll take care of ourselves!” Durgan hesitated, he hadn’t been expecting that.
I loved Paul for that, but I’d been shooting with him before. If the target wasn’t the size of an elephant and stationary, he would have a difficult time putting a bullet in it.
“Don’t you dare!” Durgan shouted at me. I pulled the muzzle up just to see the asshole sweat a little.
“O mi dios!” I heard Marta scream.
“Zombies are banging on the door,” Alex explained.
Durgan smiled. I lowered my gun, not willing to let the bluff get out of hand.
“Oh, and shithead, Eliza says if you try to leave on that fancy truck of yours, she will let me bust down that door and kill your friends.” That was of course if I even thought the truck could roll over this many deaders.
Paul picked up his rifle and started to pepper Durgan’s general location. Zombies fell as bellies erupted and heads splintered. Zombies closed around Durgan like a shield, I could see the small bubble of protection as it weaved its way back to the safety of the store.
“Not a great idea!” I yelled to Paul.
“Screw him. Do you think they’re really just going to let us go? I could have at least had the satisfaction of watching him die!” Paul yelled angrily back.
“I guess you’ve got a point there.”
“How’s he doing?” Paul asked of Jack.
“My heaf if killing me,” Jack said as he shakily got to his feet.
I started firing into the zombies that began to tighten their circle back around Jack. His time on earth had come to an unmerciful end. Perla started running up the ladder which began to swing from the effort.
“I love you Perla!” Jack yelled just as the first of the zombies tore into his flesh. It came out more as ‘I wove woo’ but the man was about to die and I let him have his dignity back at least in this journal.
I kept firing into them long after his screams had died down. What was once Jack O’Donnell would now fit snugly in a lunch box with room for a thermos. Perla nearly pitched in after him, wrapped up in her grief as she was. Brian wasn’t much better.
I slowly descended, bringing Perla with me so that Cindy could try and console her. The guilt that dropped onto my frame would weigh heavily for a long time.
BT met me at the controls to the ladder as I handed Perla off.
“You still going to try this?” he asked me.
“Got nothing better going on,” I told him.
“Mike, come on man, its suicide,” BT said seriously.
“It’s only suicide if I take my own life, not if they do it.”
“You know what I mean.”
“I know what you mean, I just think I’d rather die up there than down here.”
“Why don’t we just run the squishy turds over and get out of here?” “Eliza is not one for idle threats, we leave, they’re dead.” I said pointing up towards the roof.
“Mike, we stay, they’re dead AND we’re dead.”
“Man, I know it, you know it, they know it,” I said pointing to the front of the store.
“But you’re still going to try, aren’t you,” BT stated in amazement.
“It’s what I do man, I’m a helper.”
“Durgan was right, you are an asswipe,” “That hurts man, now help me get another ladder.”
Tracy watched BT cover me as I reached down to unfasten another ladder. “What are you doing, Mike?” she asked, although she already knew. “You are not going to try that again,” she said, pointing her finger to Jack’s last perch.
I stood back up with the prize in my hands. The zombies watched me with a predatory gaze but they never made a move for me. I had been within reach as I bent down to retrieve the ladder but they had remained fairly civil.
“Mighty decent of them,” BT said echoing my thoughts.
“I thought so. Maybe we could take a few of them out for drinks when this is all over,” I told him.
“Don’t you dare say it!” Tracy snapped.
“What?” BT asked in bewilderment.
“Fine, tell him,” she said, turning towards me.
“We could get Zombies!” I said with a small smile.
BT still looked confused.
“Oh, you’re ruining it, man. A Zombie is a drink we used to get at Chinese food restaurants,” I explained.
“That’s not a good joke, Mike,” BT said seriously.
“It sounded way better in my head.”
“What color are they?” he asked.
“Huh?”
“The drinks, what color are they?”
“Green,” I told him.
“Man, they don’t even sound good,”
“Well, they’re not really. They’re just really strong, supposed to make you feel like a zombie.” “Maybe we should just move on to the whole ladder thing,” BT said, grabbing it from my hands.
“Mike, no,” Tracy entreated me.
“Need some help?” Gary asked.
“Are all you Talbots insane?” Tracy asked.
“I’m not a Talbot,” BT said indignantly.
“Oh, that makes it all better then!” Tracy yelled at him.
BT shrugged his shoulders and went back to his climb. I followed close behind.
Gary stayed down as the ladder began to dip under the added weight of BT and myself. In fairness, the downward slant of the ladder had more to do with BT’s bulk than my own, although I’d never tell him that.
“What’s the plan?” BT asked once we reached the top.
“You know how I feel about plans.”
“Okay, what’s your idea then?”
“Well, let’s extend this bad boy as far as it will go, straight up, and then we’ll try to do a controlled fall so that it hits the roof.” “And if it doesn’t?”
“Then make sure you let it go before it falls into the crowd.”
“Seems sane enough.”
“Yeah, most of my ideas start off with great expectations, only to decay rapidly into…”
“Devastation,” BT concluded.
“Well, I wasn’t going to go that far, but whatever. Let’s do this.”
By the time we had the ladder fully extended, it looked about as sturdy as a pipe cleaner. The swaying of the main ladder and the resultant swinging of the one we were holding had my confidence ebbing faster than
