Chapter 13
Shoulder to shoulder, the zombies crammed along the entire length of the huge staircase leading up to the second floor of the police station, fighting and clawing their way upward. The hallway at the top of the stairs, overlooking the waiting area on the main floor, was blocked off with anything the remaining police officers could find. Benches, broken doors, large potted plants, a couch from one of the detective’s offices. Everything was piled up like a Jenga tower, the stacked furniture reaching all the way to the ceiling. Zombies crawled up the pile, their bloody mouths snapping open and closed, their bleeding fingers trying to break though the makeshift barrier. Arms reached through gaps in the precarious pile, grabbing and reaching for the officers on the other side.
Half a dozen officers braced themselves beyond the barricade, trying to conserve what little ammunition remained. Occasional gunshots rang out, and zombies tumbled over the railing down to the main floor. There was a pile of dead zombies there, already six feet high. More undead wandered around the main floor, making their way to the stairs.
Chief Brian Irons stood in the middle of the hallway and wiped his sweating forehead with his sleeve. His breath came in ragged gasps, his lungs burning like a furnace. This was only one of several such barricades scattered across the police station, trying to keep the raving hordes of zombies limited to the first floor. But the barricades were going to fail, Irons knew. He knew it because it was already starting to happen.
“I’m out of ammo!” one of the cops shouted, waving his empty gun.
Another cop grabbed Irons’ arm. “We need more ammunition! We can’t fight them off if we don’t have bullets!”
“Then go find some!” Irons shouted. “Most of our ammunition is downstairs in the armory! Do you want to go down there and get it?”
“We must have more somewhere! What about the temporary storage lockers?”
Irons had forgotten all about the temporary weapon storage room, which was located conveniently here on the second floor. “I don’t know,” Irons said, shaking his head. “Maybe there’s something there we can use.”
“I’ll go and check.”
Irons swallowed hard and nodded. “All right. But get back here as fast as –”
An office chair propped up at the top of the barricade came loose and tumbled over the railing, leaving a gap for a zombie to climb through. As if waiting for the chance, a male zombie wearing a blood-soaked chef’s apron crawled over the top of the barricade and fell off, landing on the floor a few feet from the police officers. One of them screamed in dismay and ran off. The zombie got onto his hands and knees, and another officer ran up and shot him right in the temple. Even as he did so, another zombie crawled through the opening and fell down right on top of the officer. He jumped away as the zombie bit down on his foot, and swung up his pistol to shoot the zombie in the eye.
“He didn’t bite me!” the cop shouted. “I’m okay! He didn’t get me!”
“Block that goddamn hole!” Irons shouted.
The zombies surged forward and the whole massive pile of furniture buckled. A door broke loose and crashed down, and a dozen zombies climbed up, pushing a desk right out of their way. It crashed to the floor, and the cops backed away, opening fire with whatever bullets they had left. Zombies jerked and fell aside, but more filled the space before the officers could even reload their guns. The zombies flooded through the barricade like a swarm of insects.
Irons did not wait. He turned and ran. Behind him, he heard more desperate gunshots and screams, but he did not look back to see if anyone was following him.
He moved as fast as he could to a side hallway that led to a narrow staircase to the third floor, where his office was. There was a door at the top of the stairs, held open with a rubber doorstop. When he reached the top of the stairs, panting for breath, Irons kicked away the doorstop and slammed the door closed. The foyer split off into a few other hallways, leading to other offices. Irons pushed a desk from the nearest office in front of the door to block it. He didn’t think it would hold for long.
He heard a foot scrape against the old tile floor and turned to see a zombie coming at him from the side hallway. It was one of the administrative secretaries, a young woman named Melinda. Irons knew her name although he did not know her personally.
The bottom of her modest red skirt was ripped up, and her leg was a mass of bloody bite marks. Her blouse was dotted with blood as well, and a bloody handprint was smeared across her pretty face.
Irons pulled a small revolver from the worn leather holster strapped at his back. He shook his head again, knowing how few bullets he had. The revolver only held six shots, and two of those were already spent.
Melinda stepped forward, and Irons put a bullet between her eyes. She hit the floor and sprawled out, her arms spread out at her sides.
One more victim. One more death on his conscience.
Irons did not encounter any more zombies on his way up to his office, but he knew they were there. At first, his fellow officers thought they had succeeded in keeping the zombies at bay on the ground floor, but that victory was doomed to be short-lived. The entire station was full of zombies now. Some of the refugees who had escaped to the second floor and higher were infected, and so many of them found places to hide that no one knew exactly how many people were even there. Some of the supply closets and bathrooms and small offices were now crowded with survivors, but they were sitting ducks for the zombies wandering through the station. The police could offer them no help. There was no safety here.
Irons went to his office and closed the door. Three bullets left. Sooner or later the zombies would make their way to his office and try to get inside, and he would use two bullets, at most, to defend himself. But when it came down to it, the last bullet would be for himself.