I pulled Tara down into a crouch behind a white van, then peeked around the corner. There were only two of them wandering around—their eyes clouded white and red, the skin on their faces torn and swollen. The policeman was already dead, and that kid from down the block looked like he was limping. By the time the creature caught up with him, we needed to be long gone.
“How’s your head?” I whispered, pushing Tara’s bangs away from her face. The hair was matted against her head, thick and dark and wet. “It looks like you’re still bleeding pretty bad.”
Tara handed me the baseball bat and grimaced. “Means I’m still alive.” She pushed back into the van and inched her way up till she could peer through the window. A trickle of blood ran down the side of her face, pooling along her collar.
“Jules, we should keep moving,” she whispered. “The one in the track jacket is almost finished eating the cop.” Tara slid back down and gritted her teeth. “My head is killing me.”
I took her sticky hand in mine and squeezed. Our rings shone gold through the blood. “The old library is only two blocks away. We’ll break in through the back and board it up behind us. Then we can fix up your head, okay?” I patted my bag, where our first aid kit was waiting.
Tara smiled. “I’ll race you.”
“On three,” I said, getting to my feet but staying low. “One. Two. Three.”
We took off running, our feet pounding the pavement as we skirted around abandoned cars and jumped over the rotting corpses that had once been our neighbors. The library was close, so close—we just had to hope we didn’t run into anything alive enough to chase us. I kept my eyes on the back of Tara’s head as we sped through the streets. I wasn’t letting her out of my sight, not again.
Something slammed into my shoulder, throwing me to the ground. I rolled sideways, feeling around for my bat. A foot away from me, the thing slowly righted itself, its single arm swinging back and forth. I caught sight of my bat just as it rolled under a car.
I tried to get to my feet, but it grabbed my foot and pulled me back down. It’s mouth opened wide enough that I could see it’s swollen, rotting tongue rolling toward the back of it’s throat. “Help me!” I screamed, kicking at its face. “The bat, get the bat!”
Tara spun around and ran back toward me. I kicked the thing in the forehead, cracking it’s skull, but it didn’t let go. It tightened its grip on my leg, it’s fingers edging between my ankle bones. “Fuck, Tara, grab it!”
Tara took hold of its legs and pulled. The thing slid away from me, finally releasing my leg. I jumped to my feet and ran toward it just in time for it to sit up and reach for Tara.
She screamed and jumped back. I searched the ground for something to use as a weapon, but for once the street was clear of debris. “Jules!”
I ran forward, picturing soccer balls and footballs and every other kind of kickable-thing. A moment later the zombie’s head collapsed in on itself and it’s went body limp on the ground. I pulled my foot out of it’s skull and shook it off like I’d just stepped in a brain-filled puddle.
“Holy shit,” Tara said, her face bright white against the blood in her hair. “Thank you. Let’s get the hell out of here.”
I kicked the body again for good measure and chased after her. That wasn’t the closest we’d come to one of those things, but it was enough to make my legs feel like wet paper.
A siren wailed in the distance. For a second I considered pulling her off course, but the last time we changed our plan in the middle of a relocation, Tara had ended up falling through a ceiling vent into a nest of zombies. We’d barely made it out alive. We couldn’t afford another mistake, especially now that she had a head injury.
