Last Resort. A Walking Dead fan fiction

Chapter 6

Glenn's point of view

Glenn stared at the body of the old woman. Of all the people on this bus, she had been one of his favorite. The rest of the people on this bus were weak, incapable idiots in comparison to her. As he started to pick her up, a gun fell out of her hand. Her old hands hadn't been fast enough, but by God, she had tried. Glenn left the gun where it lay and carried her to the back door. He set her down and just as he turned to the open the door, bloody hands slammed against the glass, making him jump. Several walkers had gathered around the back of the bus, attracted by the noise of the idling engine. Spider web cracks spread across the lower pane of glass as they beat mercilessly at the door. Glenn took a stumbling step backwards as the glass shattered. Hands reached through the opening, grabbing for anything they could reach. 

Suddenly screams started coming from the front of the bus. More walkers had assaulted the door, cracking the glass there as well. Glenn ran to the front, reaching the drivers seat just as the first walker squeezed its way through the broken doorway. With a grunt, Glenn buried his knife in its skull and shoved it, sending it stumbling down the steps. It landed in a heap at the bottom as another one clawed its way in and stumbled towards him. Glenn kicked it in the mouth, knocking it sprawling and effectively blocking the door. It's neck snapped as it landed, making it more difficult for the others to gain entry. The jaws snapped as it lay there, but the broken neck had paralyzed it. Two more managed to climb over the blockade and Glenn quickly relieved them of their desire for human flesh. A few minutes later, the bodies of the dead walker had completely blocked the door. Wiping sweat from his brow, he quickly made his way to the back of the bus. 

None of the walkers had managed to get completely in, but one had stuck its head through and was snapping at the legs he could see several rows in front of him. Glenn ended the walkers mad scrambling to get in by smashing its head with his boot. Five arms were still sticking in, reaching for things they couldn't see. Using his knife, Glenn cut tendons in the arms, leaving them useless, only moving when the bodies outside moved. When the bus was relatively safe from immediate attack, Glenn turned back to the problem of disposing of the two bodies that were laying in the seats. All the doors were blocked, so he couldn't throw them out there. The windows were too small. Suddenly Glenn's eyes roamed to the roof-top emergency exits. He reached up and pulled the latch. The bus alarm went off, a horrible, high-pitched wail. He quickly latched it again. In the time it would take him to get the bodies on the roof and off the side they would have attracted even more walkers. He walked to the front and turned the bus off, then tried the hatch again. This time it opened silently. He quickly found two men who looked strong enough to help and had them drag the bodies to the hatch.  When they were ready, he hoisted himself up through the hatch and onto the roof. The two men lifted the old man, and Glenn dragged him through the hatch. Then they hoisted up the old woman. Her limp hand flopped to her side and smacked one of the men in the face. He immediately let go and started screaming. Glenn felt a jerk as the full weight of the body was suddenly dropped in his hand. He grunted and strained and finally pulled her up onto the roof. Below him, the man was still yelling and carrying on. Upset and worried that all the yelling would attract more walkers, he dropped  back into the bus and clamped his hand over the man's mouth. Struggling in confusion, the man bit down on Glenn's hand. Glenn jerked back and held his bleeding hand to his stomach, his eyes watering. The other man was still yelling at the top of his lungs. Fed up with all the noise, Glenn pulled back and delivered a powerful right hook to the man's temple. The noise stopped immediately. The man's eyes rolled back and he collapsed in a heap on the seat.

People stared silently at him. He looked at his hand, then shook the blood off. It wasn't nearly as bad as he had been afraid. The people were still staring at him. 

"Noise... Attracts... Walkers." He said finally.

He turned his back on the unconscious man and climbed back on to the roof. As he dragged the old man to the back, he could hear people talking in urgent whispers in the bus underneath him. The walkers behind the bus were still slamming themselves against the door. Glenn gave the body a hard shove and it fell over the edge. It flopped grotesquely as it landed on top of the group of walkers. Slowly, they realized that something new was available. They turned away from the bus and began to devour the old man's corpse. Glenn turned away, his stomach turning. If a dead body would clear the walkers away from the back door, then it should do the same for the front. He dragged the old woman to the front, where the second group was busy trying to claw their way through the blockade of dead walkers. Most of them had given up and gone to the back, where there was more noise, but there was still enough that the bus couldn't move. Glenn shoved the old woman off the roof, and turned away. He hadn't known the old man, so it hadn't bothered him as much, but he felt terrible feeding the poor old woman to a herd of walkers. 

With his job done, he walked back to the hatch and lowered himself into the bus. The seat where the incident had occurred was sprayed with blood, guts and brain matter. He reached down and picked up the Beretta that the old woman had dropped. It was still mostly clean so he tucked it in the back of his waist band and slowly walked to the front of the bus. Everyone was silent as he passed. As he reached the front, a fat balding man in his mid fifties stood up and cleared his throat. In the old world he had been an accomplished lawyer, winning cases for big corporations across the country. Glenn had never liked the man and had thought him to be a self-entitled pompous ass. 

"Uh, Mr. Glenn, ahh, the good folks of this bus are a little concerned, and they've chosen me to be their spokesman.  Now, uhh..." Glenn interrupted him.

"What? You pampered fucks upset that I killed two people? Are you mad that I kept a walker from rampaging through this bus and eating you? Or that I killed an old woman that was about to turn? Are you mad that I put that poor old woman out of her misery?"

"Now mister..." The fat man stuttered.

"Don't you mister me! Do you think I enjoyed that? Do you think I wanted to kill that old woman? Hell, she even asked me to! Because she has been out there in this shit and she knows what happens when someone gets bit. Or how about this? Do you know what attracts walkers? At least three things that we know of. The first is movement. I've seen a group of at least fifty chasing a balloon down the street. The second, if they're close enough, is smell. Ever wonder why they don't eat each other? Because they can smell their own. They know by smell that you are alive. And the third, and most important, is sound! Like some fuck tard yelling his fool head off because a dead woman's arm smacked him! Maybe in the old world I might understand your concern. But this is a different place, a different world. You can cling to the ways of your past lives, but it will only make you weaker. You aren't lawyers or dentists or electronic engineers, or teachers, or salesmen or anything you used to be. You are whatever it takes to keep yourself alive. And stupid shit like getting mad at me for saving your asses is the kind of thing that gets you killed. Now sit down and shut up until we get to town or I'll use you to distract the walkers like I did with the last two."

Then he sat down and put the bus in gear.