Race to Refuge

Chapter Seven: Mallory

 I figured I should use GPS to try to get to my friend's place in the country. At least, that I should try to use GPS while I still had it. I had a terrible feeling that it wouldn't be long before we lost the internet and wireless data. There were actual people who kept electrical grids going and cell towers working through electricity. I could remember the first leg of the journey, but wasn't really sure about how to get the rest of the way there. I hoped when I finally got out of the city a little way that I could pull safely over, GPS the location, jot down the directions, and continue on my way.

The catch in that plan was the word safely. Because it seemed to me that, even though I hadn't spent much time at all at the apartment moving out, conditions in Raleigh were quickly getting worse. Traffic was badly backed up to my right, and glancing over I saw that there was an ambulance that had crashed into a firetruck. There were so many emergency vehicles flying down the road that it was probably unavoidable.

But when I peered closer I saw that the two vehicles appeared to have been abandoned. Abandoned? Or were the occupants chased out? I felt a shudder up my spine and kept driving as quickly as I could. Which wasn't very fast.

I was still in the city when the sirens got even louder and traffic slower. My breath caught in my throat. There were those creatures...those zombies...lunging through the streets and attacking policemen and rescue workers. The policemen were shooting them, using their weapons right out in the street, and the zombies continued pushing forward, arms outstretched and mouths agape.

Down a side street, traffic was at a standstill due to an accident or some other jam. I saw a woman dressed in business clothes abandon her car. She'd taken off her shoes and was weaving through the stopped cars and running away, two or three of those creatures following her. The only good thing seemed to be that the zombies weren't as fast as uninfected people.

I was moving slowly away when I noticed an old man with white hair and a neatly-trimmed beard who was limping as quickly as he could away from a crowd of infected people that was moving toward him. I recognized him as a homeless man that I had seen for years on my way to work and home. Every day I'd seen him and felt a twinge of guilt. I felt bad every day for not helping him, for not at least smiling and looking him in the eye. Despite his situation, he always looked strangely dignified. He always took care with his appearance, wearing threadbare but clean clothes, his white hair usually getting the best of him as it stood up in a halo effect.

I'd tell myself that I was a single woman and didn't need to get personally involved in helping him. I'd remind myself that I gave money to charitable institutions that helped the homeless. But I always still felt that twinge.

Now here he was, desperately hobbling away from these creatures, his possessions still in the small backpack he always carried. His gaze met mine—frightened, questioning. And I immediately pushed open the passenger door for him.

He stumbled in, swinging in his bad leg with some trouble. He pulled the door shut and I hit the door lock as the zombies reached the car. I pressed my foot hard on the accelerator and the car jerked forward. "Hang on," I muttered to him. Now was the time to speed. I didn't think anyone would be handing out tickets. And clearly, we needed to get the heck out of town.

"Thank you," he said quietly as he set the backpack on the floor of the front seat.

Somehow this made me feel even worse about not helping him in the past. Let's face it, I'd gotten him out of there to assuage my own guilt for passing him by, for totally ignoring him in the past.

"It's okay," I said, sounding somehow irritable. I pressed my lips shut as I sped down the road. Fifteen minutes later, I felt myself relax a little as I saw a relatively clear path out of town. We weren't going to get stuck in any traffic jams. We were going to be able to escape the city.