Hell Bound (Book 2): A World Apart (8 page)

A storm is threatening my Very life today, If I don't get some Shelter lord, I’m gonna fade away. ~Rolling Stones~

A zombie jumps onto the roof of the SUV. Feet, hands, scratching around on the top of the roof. The sound of fingernails scratching on top of the roof, making me cringe. It starts banging on the roof, making little dents, it bangs harder forming bigger dents. Hunching down into my seat I pull out my knife, holding the only source of weapon I have tightly in my hand.

“Jake, swerve to the left,” Devlin yells.

The SUV swerves to the left than to the right. The zombie manages to hold on and starts banging on the roof again. Jake swerves the SUV from left to right again, but the zombie has a death grip on the bike racks on top.

Regretting ever buying a vehicle with bike racks. Jake swerves again and again, making me fly on top of Mathew and Mathew on top of Devlin, like a domino effect. Devlin hit’s his head against the window. Jake swerves again sending our bodies slamming against the other side, falling all over each other.

The zombie on the roof keeps banging its strong fist on the roof. Jake tries to swerve again making the tires squeal and lift off of the ground. Almost losing control he manages to straighten the car.

The SUV lands on all four wheels with a hard thump. The zombie on the roof finally manages to form a small crack. I scream and slouch in my seat some more, Mathew pulls me further away from the crack, he's almost sitting on top of Devlin. My eyes are big with terror, with nothing but a hunting knife to protect myself with. More and more banging forming a bigger crack until it’s big enough for the zombie to fit into. A man sticks his half eaten, bloody head into the new hole. I scream again, making the zombie snatch his head towards us. Licking his lips almost as if he can taste my fear, a long string of drool falls from his mouth and lands on top of my legs.

“Hold on!” Jake screams as he swerves the SUV from left to

right again.

Making the zombie lose his grip on the sides of the roof and fall. He disappears from the hole, hitting the other side of the roof. Jake swerves again, but the zombie manages to hold onto the side of the SUV. Instead of sticking his head through the hole he manages to fit his body into the hole. Falling right next to me. I scream again as I pull my knife from my side and try to slam the blade into his head. He catching my hand midair and smiles, spitting brown slobbery drool out of the sides of his mouth. Breathing his horrible rotting breath into my face.

Athena jumps from the very back of the seat onto the zombie. Making him lose his grip on my hand. She clamps her jaw against his head. The zombie slams his fist against Athena’s stomach, making her yelp in pain but never losing her grip on his head. She clamps down even harder. Crushing bones, oozing blood from the side of her mouth. Swinging my knife into the side of the zombie’s head ending its worthless disgusting life. The zombie falls to the seat, Athena’s mouth still holds the dead zombie, she finally lets go of the zombie and lays back against the other side of the seat. Pushing the zombie off of the seat, blood smears on the once gray leather cushion. Now turning it a reddish brown color.

“Good girl, “I say, rubbing Athena's head.

She whines as she struggles to lie down next to me. I Hold onto her as the SUV is jerked to the left and right again, making me almost fall on top of Athena. I grab the handle on the roof and manage to keep myself from falling on top of her. Athena yelps again as the force of the car shove her against the car door. Gunshots ring out from the truck in front of us. The truck pulls to the side, signaling us to pull into a small strip Mall parking structure.

Jake pulls into the parking structure, it’s completely lit up with spotlights. A group of people stand by an elevator waving for us to park in a parking space in front of them. Jake follows their instruction’s parking the SUV and turning off the engine. Each of us quiet, taking in our new found shelter. Not sure if we should get out or just take a breath. Looking at the group in front of us. A man and three women walk towards us with smiles on their faces.

“What do we do?” I whisper questioning the people in front of us.

“We Get out,” Mathew says.

“We stick together,” Devlin adds opening up the car door and getting out.

Turning around I tell Athena to sit and stay, not wanting the dog to walk around right now. If she has a bruised rib she needs to sleep. If she has a cracked rib she could make it worse by walking around. Mathew and I scoot out of the SUV and stand awkwardly by each other. Jake grabs John and Kat and holds onto their hands. My body still shaken up, my legs feeling like Jello. I grab onto Mathew for support.

“Hello,” Mathew says, sounding so calm like we haven't just got attacked by a horde of undead people.

“Sounds like you guys ran into some trouble out there,” the women says.

“I'm Emily, that's Julia, Chelsea and her husband Mike, Johnny is inside with Julia’s bratty daughter,” She introduces them to us sounding irritated.

“The two men in the truck pulling in now are Bob and Greg.”

“I’m Mathew, my wife Sam, Devlin, Kat, John,” Mathew introduces us back.

“How did they know where we were?” I question.

Emily huffs out “They were scrambling

for supplies and heard gunshots.” Emily says sounding irritated with my question.

“Is it just you guys here?” Mathew questions.

“Yeah other than my daughter inside.

She's nine.” Julie says as she looks at John sucking his thumb.

“What’s your name handsome?”

“He doesn’t really speak,” Kat answers for John as she drape’s her arm over John’s head pulling him closer to her.

“Are you his mother?” Julie asks Kat.

“No, umm it’s a long story I don't want to talk about it in front of John. If you don't mind.”

“Of course. Are you guy’s hungry?” Julie asks changing the subject.

“Umm, yeah I guess, just tired mostly. We've been on the run for almost a week now,” Mathew says.

“Come on in and we can make you something to eat and you guys can rest. I'm sure you need it.” Emily says, staring at Jake.

Giving him a flirtatious smile. Kat shoots daggers at her. Jake doesn't miss a thing as he gives a flirtatious smile back at Emily. Enjoying the attention of both women he hugs Kat as he flirts with Emily. I see a cat fight happening by the time we have to leave this place. Before following the others inside the elevator, Mathew leans into the car to grab Athena.

“You have a dog?” Emily says sounding surprised. “I hate dogs, they smell,” she adds with a flip of her hair and walks towards the elevator.

I already hate this woman and I have only just met her. Julia shakes her head and pets Athena

“She's beautiful, my daughter will love to play with her. Is she ok?” Julie say’s ignoring Emily's rudeness.

“I’m not completely sure. I was hoping I

can take a look at her once we get inside,” I say rubbing Athena. Walking inside of the elevator with the group of people.

“You guys have power?” I question amazed at the working elevator.

“Well, backup generators,” Julia answers.

The elevator goes up stopping at floor two, the doors slowly sliding open. The floor is made into a big living room, black leather couches are placed together with a matching black coffee table in the middle.

There's a pizza joint across from the seating area. A big water fountain next to the pizza place that has been empty for some time, a little green ring of mold grows along the insides of it.  Julia falls back and starts showing us around.

“We made this little place into our own private fortress about two days ago. Surprisingly there weren’t many zombies inside so it was easy for us to take over. I ran into this place with my daughter, four days ago. We ran out of gas and I didn’t know where to go so we ran inside and luckily ran into this group,” she says pointing towards the group of people around us.

A blonde hair, blue eyed man comes out of an arts and craft shop holding a little girl’s hand. The little girl giggles and skips alongside him.

“Momma, look what Johnny did for me,” the little girl says happily as she skips to her mom holding a paper airplane.

”Aww, I use to love making paper airplanes baby girl,” Julia says cheerfully to her daughter. Johnny walks up to us holding out his hand.

“You’re the group that was in trouble. You guys okay?” We take his hand, shaking it and introducing each of us again.

Emily starts complaining about something to Chelsea and Mike. Mike snaps at her and walks away.

“Ignore Emily, as you can tell she loves attention and complains about everything,” Julia says walking up to Johnny and us.

“Among other things,” Kat spits out.

I elbow Kat in her side to shut her up.

Julia giggles “Ain’t that the truth.”

Kat smiles and tangles her arm through Jakes arm leaning her head against his shoulder.

“Let’s get you guys some food,” Johnny say’s motioning with his hand for us to follow him.

We follow him to the pizza joint. The smell of fresh pepperoni pizza fills my nostril, making my mouth water.

“You guys can make pizza?” I question happily.

He laughs “Yes and we have cold soda and beer too!”

“Fuck no!” Jake says, almost jumping for joy.

“See for yourself.” Johnny points toward the refrigerator full of Millers light, Blue Moon, Coors, Coca cola, Sprite and several other kinds of drinks. Each of us with our eyes wide open and our jaws on the floor as we stare at the fully stocked refrigerator.

“Go ahead grab something,” Johnny adds.

We're all in the same game: just different levels. Dealing with the same hell: just different devils.

Each of us grabs our drink of poison. Snapping the lid off of my Blue Moon, It fizzes all over my hand. Not wasting any time I start chugging down my ice cold beer. Enjoying the frizz that goes down my throat. Finishing my beer within seconds, some spilling out of the corner of my mouth, I swipe it away with the back of my hand. After the night, we just had a beer in the morning taste wonderful.

“Well, I see the new people, made themselves comfortable. Someone says, walking up to us.

Turning around and seeing a tall man with dark brown hair. A tooth pick sticking out of his mouth.

“Hi, I’m Bob and that scruffy old man is Greg.” Shaking their hands and introducing each of us again to them.

We make small talk on the couch as we wait for our meal to be ready. Devlin is quiet and looks worried. I didn’t see him grab a beer.

Whispering to Mathew, “What’s wrong with Devlin?”

“I don't know. I've noticed he hasn't said a word since we got here. I’ll go talk to him,” Mathew says as he gets up from the couch and walks over to Devlin.

He pulls him to a side as I sit worriedly next to Kat and Jake. Devlin shakes his head and looks down. Mathew waves me over. I walk to them, worried about what they are going to tell me.

“What's wrong?”

“The zombie that jumped on him scratched his arm pretty bad.”

“It hurts like a bitch,” Devlin says holding his arm close to his side.

“I’ll take a look at it. I’ll ask if these guys have a first aid kit.”

“Should we tell them? They may make us leave,” Devlin adds.

“If they want us to leave, then we leave,” Mathew adds.

“Okay,” Devlin says.

“Do you have a first aid kit?” I ask out loud.

“Why? What’s wrong?” Emily says rudely.

“Devlin got scratch back there,” Mathew adds.

“Of course we have one. Hold on I’ll get it,” Chelsea says as she's stands and is about to walk away.

“No, wait!” Emily whines. “What happens if he's infected?”

“I haven't heard of anyone getting infected by a scratch, but we can keep tabs on him?” I add.

“Okay,” Greg says.

“I’ll get you a First aid kit,” Chelsea says again as she walks off.

Devlin sits on the couch holding his arm. Knee

Leaning down in front of him I take a look at the scratch on his arm. The scratch is more of a gash than a scratch. It’s deep and will need stitches.

“You’re going to need stitches.”

Devlin doesn't say anything as he stares down at the big gash on his arm. Blood oozes out of the side of the cut. A very horrible, rotting smell comes out of the open wound. Trying not to show how disgusted and worried I am, I try my best to ignore the smell. Chelsea runs back and hands me the first aid kit.

“While you’re doing that I’ll go help make the pizza,” Chelsea says disgusted as she walks off to help in the kitchen.

Opening up the first aid kit I rummage through the square red box for rubbing alcohol and bandages. Pulling out a couple of cotton balls and dabbing each of them with rubbing alcohol. Devlin lets out a hiss as I press the cotton ball against the open cut.

“Sorry,” I say sympathetically.

“Don’t worry your pretty little head about me. I can handle it.”  I finish wrapping his arm with gauze

“There! As good as new. Old timer,” I say, patting his good arm.

“I’m tired, do you think I can lay down?”

“Of course, I’ll show you your room,” Mike says.

“Thank you,” Devlin says as he walks away, swerving from side to side like a drunk person.

“Okay, I’ll come by in a little bit to check on you.”