Surviving in Chaos

Rescue

Nuru drove the car in silence as I set in the passenger seat next to her and stared out the window, worrying frantically about Blake. A mere fifteen minutes later, we had reached the school. We parked the car a distance away to prevent drawing any attention from the zombies. The alarms had stopped ringing so the chaos the school had been in had slowed down. More importantly, the air had no hint of fresh blood, just the usual smell of rotting flesh that accompanied zombies.  

The zombies were wandering around the school, walking and limping aimlessly. We had to figure out a way to get in unnoticed. We decided to enter through the side gate, from the bus stop as it was relatively free of zombies. Our arrival went unnoticed as we walked into the school building. Nimbly, we raced along the corridors, hiding whenever we heard footsteps. It was a good thing that these zombies seemed to be unable to smell us. He was nowhere to be found. We searched the rooftop, the labs but nothing, not even a clue that he may been there. A sick feeling started to churn in my stomach.

As I started to lose hope, we heard sounds coming from the back yard, like zombies moaning and scratching at something. We followed the sounds and hid behind the wall as we saw a hoard of 30 zombies clawing at the tree base of the school’s tree house. Some were trying to crawl up by getting up on each other, unsuccessfully. My heart gave a start and steadied as I saw the strong lean figure of Blake was pacing up and down the length of the small treehouse. In exasperation, he threw open the windows and looked out from the window, probably contemplating a way out. This made the zombies moan louder and he looked down, his face full of fear. He stared at them a while, before he seemed to come to a resolution. Blake closed the windows, turned off the all the appliances in the tree house, and curled into the corner of the room.

Many plans went through my head. He could flying fox across to us from a distance but the gate was damaged and the zombies could easily catch up. We could drive a car away and use it to distract them but we would not be able to tell where Blake would go after or if he would be able to escape. “I think you should drive a car in”, Nuru suggested. “I will distract them with the other car and you drive in to save him.”

 “But I don’t know how to drive!” I pleaded with her. “We have no other choice.” I gulped. In Singapore, owning a car was so expensive, to get a driver license would cost at least $2000 alone, not to mention the additional costs of Certificate of Entitlement (COE) etc. I have always expressed an interest to learn but I supposed that the interest was never enough to make me actually take up driving. Blake taught me a few things in the days that we were searching for my parents and I even had some opportunities to drive with him. He often feigned heart attacks, so that I would be concerned for him. Remembering those fun times, my heart lurched in pain, I nodded resolutely.

Nuru helped me to hack into a car, a skill apparently most of the group had but I did not. I swore I would get Blake to teach me after this. She patted my shoulder, “Good Luck”, she wished and walked off to get into a car. I sat onto the leather seats, took a deep breath. Blake, I am so sorry that I was so distant before, and I promise you that I will get you out. I pulled the clutch, released the break and drove forward.

Nuru started playing loud music, and the zombies started running towards her direction. She spun the car around in a smooth move but rolled away slowly, so that the zombies could chase her from behind. Now there were about 10 zombies standing around the tree with most running towards the car. Blake had noticed what was going on and had opened the tree house door. I could not control turns very well and I went over the curb and got stuck a few times, swivelling wildly around the back yard before I finally rolled over most of the remaining zombies and was below the tree.

I reached down and slipped the knives out of boots that I was wearing. I slammed the door open, knocking a zombie that was clawing at my door backwards. I pushed a knife hard into his neck and pulled it out, sputtering blood out once again. I dodged as a zombie tried to bite me from behind and swung my leg around on the ground, making him trip and fall backwards. The last one that was heading my way, fell onto me so I grabbed his shoulders to stop him from biting me. I scissor my legs over the zombie’s and switched our positions, plunging a knife into his neck. The one that had fallen earlier was up and grabbed my free hand to sink his teeth into. Blake slashed the zombies arm off and plunged a knife in the middle of its forehead.

I looked up at him breathing hard, then reached out to pat him and see if he was alright. He had scratches over his arm and a lost shoe but he seemed to be okay. “I was not bitten, let’s go.” He grabbed my arm and pushed me into the car, with him taking the wheel. “Where to?” He asked as he drove out onto the main road.