I could hear them outside banging on the tank still as the radio continued to crackle. "Hey are you alive in there?" I jumped up, hitting my head in the process, rushing over to the radio, "Hello Hello." It sounded like this mysterious man let out a sigh of relief, "There you are. You had me wondering." How did he know I was here? "Where are you? Outside? Can you see me right now?" "Yeah I can see you. You're surrounded by walkers. That's the bad news."
"There's good news?" "No." Of course not, but I needed to get out over here. "Listen, whoever you are, I don't mind telling you I'm a little concerned in here." The radio cracked as he replied, "Oh man. You should see it from over here. You'd be having a major freak-out." "Got any advice for me?" Not really an answer I was looking for but he said, "Yeah I'd say make a run for it." "That's it? 'Make a run for it'?" I looked around, letting him reply. "My way's not as dumb as it sounds. You've got eyes on the outside here. There's one geek still up on the tank but the others have climbed down and joined the feeding frenzy where the horse went down...With me so far?" "So far." "Okay the street on the other side of the tank is less crowded. If you move now, while they're distracted, you stand a chance."— "Got ammo?" "In that duffel bag I dropped out there, and guns. Can I get to it?" "Forget the bag, okay? It's not an option." Not an option? You've got to be kidding me, just what I needed. "What do you have on you?" I looked around for ammo and looked inside the clip of the pistol. I then saw a grenade and clipped it to my belt loop, "I've got a beretta with one clip, 15 rounds." "Make 'em count. Jump off the right side of the tank, keep going in that direction. There's an alley up the street, maybe 50 yards. Be there." I took in all of the information as I asked, "Hey, what's your name?" Sadly I didn't get the response I wanted, "Have you been listening? You're running out of time." "Right." I shut off the radio and got my things, opening the latch. I punched the walker that was on top, making it fall back. I ran as I was shooting, creating a clear enough path. I lifted my gun as I came to a fence, "Woah! Not dead, not dead! Come on! Come on!" It was a small, cute, Asian man. "Come on!" I followed him through the alley as those things chased after us. He led us to a ladder as he began to climb it. I used my last shot and was out. "What're you doing?! Come on!" I looked behind me then back up, beginning to climb up the ladder. "Come on, get up." Once we made it to the top we were panting, as we overlooked the walkers beneath us. "Nice moves there, Clint Eastwood." I looked up at the man, "You're the new sheriff, come riding in to clean up the town?" I shook my head, "It wasn't my intention." "Yeah, whatever. Yeehaw. You're still a dumbass." I turned to him, holding out my hand, "Rick. Thanks." He looked at it then back up at me, taking my hand, "Glenn. You're welcome." "Oh no." The began to climb up on top of each other, getting up the ladder. Is there anything that these things couldn't do.
Glenn looked up at the roof, "Bright side: it'll be the fall that kills us. I'm a glass-half-full kind of guy." How lovely. We climbed up the ladder and walked across the roof. "Are you the one that barricaded the alley?" "Somebody did— I guess when the city got overrun. Whoever did it was thinking not many geeks would get through." We began to sprint. "Back at the tank, why'd you stick your neck out for me?" Glenn opened a latch on the roof, and threw his bag in, "call it foolish, naive hope that if I'm ever that far up shit creek, somebody might do the same for me. Guess I'm an even bigger dumbass than you." I almost laughed. He really liked to call me that huh?
We arrived inside and went back through the exit door to some stairs. Glenn spoke through a walkie-talkie to an unknown source. Heads turned as we heard growls as a few of those things were roaming the area. Suddenly, to figures busted through a door, killing the "geeks" in front of us. I followed Glenn into the same door, glancing at him before getting grabbed by a blonde woman. "Son of a bitch, we ought to kill you!" A pistol, pointed at my face. I just couldn't catch a break it seemed. "Just back off Andrea, chill out." The woman identified as Andrea scoffed, "Really? We're dead because of this asshole." "Andrea I said back the hell off." She kept her hold a moment more before pulling away, her eyes lightly brimming with tears. "We're dead, all of us — all because of you." I spoke, trying to catch my breath, "I.. don't understand." The man, Morales pushed me forward, leading me into an opening as the others followed behind. He explained how we're meant to survive in this world, and shooting shots in the street wasn't helping. We stopped at a glass door, tons of those things banging against it wanting to get in. "Get the picture now?" Andrea then spoke, "you just rang the dinner bell." The grass slowly cracked as we backed away. Andrea turned to me, "what the hell were you doing out there anyway?" I glanced at her, "trying to flag the helicopter." The black man spoke up, "a helicopter? There's no damn helicopter out there." The black woman then spoke up, "you were chasing a hallucination. It happens." Couldn't they hear it? I spoke firmly, "I saw it." I didn't hallucinate anything. The black man, identified as T-Dog dialed up the walkie-talkie. "Can you contact the others T-Dog?" I perked up as I heard this. "Others? The Refugee Center?" T-Dog instructed that we head to the roof as he didn't receive any signal. We heard gunshots as the group began to panic a bit. "Oh no, is that Dixon?" So much was happening in so little time for me, could I keep up?
We arrived on the roof to find a man shooting a sniper. Morales sounded perplexed as he spoke, "Dixon are you crazy?!" Dixon spoke with a chuckle, "you ought to be more polite to a man with a gun, only common sense." He jumped down from his position and smiled. T-Dog ranted about wasting bullets and making sound as the two got close. Dixon made a comment about Morales and T-Dog which triggered a response. "T-Dog it's okay.. Merle just calm down.. guys." Merle started spewing slurs and T-Dog snapped, throwing a punch before Merle knocked him back with the gun. I tried to intervene, getting punched myself. It really just wasn't my day today. Merle kept throwing punches, beating T-Dog to the ground. Merle held a gun to T-Dog's face as he whimpered. Who the hell did this man think he was? Merle stood up angrily, "yeah! Let's talk about who's in charge. I vote me, anybody else?" They all slowly raised their hands. "Yeah that makes me the boss right? Anybody else." What a prick. I stood behind him as I spoke, "yeah me." I threw a punch at him, pushing him to the ground and cuffing him to a metal pipe. "Who the hell are you man?!" "Officer Friendly." Merle mouthed off a bit before I pointed a gun to his head, "you wouldn't. You're a cop." "I wouldn't be too sure. All am I now is a man looking for his wife and son. Anyone that gets in the way of that is gonna lose...let that soak in." I walked to the edge of the roof, exchanging a few words with Morales before looking down at all of the walkers on the street. T-Dog continued to try for a signal but nothing.
We discussed plans before going down to the tunnels into the sewers. We assigned roles before sending Glenn down there. I could tell he was nervous, but I stopped myself before saying anything. Andrea and I made our way back up, walking around and scouting the area. She apologized about the situation when I first arrived. I chuckled a bit at her naivety, "It's fine, just remember to turn the safety off next time." I taught her how to turn the safety off of her gun, poor thing. I looked around a bit more before she caught my attention again. "Oh.." She was looking down at some jewelry. "See something you like?" "Not me... but I know someone who would — my sister." She spoke fondly of her, I allowed her to take the necklace, not like it mattered anyways right? We smiled a bit before we heard a crash. We turned to see the glass door shattering before our eyes. We regrouped with the others as the walkers made their way to the second set of doors.
I devised a plan before grabbing everyone coats, dragging a dead walker inside from the street. I chopped at the walker a bit before handing it off to Morales. "Everybody got gloves? Don't get any on your skin or in your eyes." Glenn and I rubbed the guts all over ourselves to make our smell. I gave the key to the handcuffs to T-Dog before heading out. We slowly walked through the hoard as the others watched us from the roof. The thunder rumbled above us as we continued to walk. It slowly began to rain and suddenly it began to pour. All of the guts began to wash away and the attention was on us. Glenn began to freak out. "The smell- it's washing off isn't it? Is it?!" "No. It's not. Well... maybe." Walkers charged at us, "RUN!" We were so close, we couldn't let this be the end. They were on our tails as we hopped the fence. We grabbed the keys and started the trucked, hauling ass out of there. I turned to Glenn thinking quickly. "We need to draw them away. I need the front clear. Get your friends ready." "I-I missed that part, how am I supposed to draw them away?" "Noise."
I had found an area with an abandoned car and smashed the window, setting off the alarm and starting it. Glenn began to lure away the walkers, clearing out a space for us. Once the walkers were cleared from the doors, I drove to the draw up doors, ready to pick up Glenn's friends. The doors opened quickly as the walkers began to rush through. We began to drive down the road, "where's Glenn." I hope he made it out okay, I'm sure he did. We were headed to our destination, the base camp.
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Yoooooo. I'm back from the dead, sorry. I've been swamped with class and work. Now I'm bored with all of that, so Imma invest my time into some writing 😎 this is a book I'm still interested in finishing and working on because I've had the plan and story written out for it, for sooo long. I'm not ready to give up yet. I did have a bit published before, but I scrapped the whole thing because as I aged, my writing improved. That being said, I can conduct a piece that, if I was a reader, I would highly enjoy. :)
