Dead Air (Book One of The Dead Series) (49 page)

These thoughts died
, along with any hope she had, as she watched Harrison raise the hammer while screaming, "You bitch, I know what you did. You told them."

In t
hat instant, Marcia saw that Harrison was insane and she knew her life was over. But even as she realized she was dead, the thought that filled her mind was that her life hadn't been wasted. She consoled herself that she had spent it trying to help others, to give of herself so that they could live their lives to the fullest, and she never asked for anything in return.

As she stood awaiting her fate, Marcia saw Harrison start to circle to his left, trying to force her into the
corner by the front doors. Standing in place, she noticed that as Harrison moved, he left a gap between her and the entry to the Galleria. The resolve to go out without a fight left her, as a will to live filled her heart. Marcia began edging slowly toward her right, and as she glanced back to her left she saw something that made her stop.

Marcia
knew she could make it to the Galleria and stay away from Harrison by circling around the Cinnabun kiosk, keeping it between them, but what if he went after the others? He would be free to kill them in their sleep if she didn't warn them. They’d never see it coming.

Looking toward the Galleria and safety
, and then back toward the very corner that Harrison was trying to herd her to her death, Marcia knew she had no choice. She had to warn the others. Without a moment's hesitation, she spun to her left and lunged at the object mounted on the wall.

As she reached it, Marcia could imagine in he
r mind’s eye as Harrison leaned back with the hammer to get a full swing at her head. It didn't matter now; she was doing the right thing.

With both hands, she pulled the fire alarm and heard it start to ring out its warning to the others even as she felt an impact on her skull and saw the final darkness envelope her.

Brian Harrison knew he had to move fast. He had killed the two thieves, but the food bringer had managed to set off an alarm to call the others.

Those bastards planned this out
well, he thought, but now I know what they're up to. I know. Running back through the Galleria, Harrison dropped down on all fours and crawled through the hole he’d made in the door to the bank. Moving quickly to the vault on his left, he turned the three combination dials to their correct numbers and spun the large steel wheel to unlock the heavy door. Wrenching it open, he was momentarily blinded when the automatic light came on inside. He squinted as he tried to find his treasure on the rows of shelves that filled the vault.

A banging and thumping coming from behind him interrupted his search
. Spinning and raising the hammer to defend his gold, Brian saw a mass of dim figures pawing at the windows that made up two walls of the bank. Even as he watched, more figures joined those already pressed against the glass.

His brain beat out
the warning that it was more thieves. The alarm brought them to try and take his gold. In this thought, Brain Harrison was half right. The ringing alarm had attracted the dead, but they weren't trying to steal the gold. They were attracted to him as food.

Watching
the thieves pounding on the glass, Harrison was filled with a blind rage that so many people who were beneath his contempt were vexing him. Tilting his head back, he screamed, "You can't have it, its mine! I'll kill you all!"

He noticed
the bloody hammer in his hand and knew it wouldn't be enough to protect his gold. Spotting what he needed, he dropped the hammer and rushed forward. After unhooking the velvet ropes that guided customers in a line from the waist high, weighted post, with a strength born of madness he slung the bludgeon over his shoulder.

Looking at the distorted faces pressed against a window a dozen feet away,
he let out a scream of triumph as he ran forward, swinging the guidepost at the glass.

The dead weight of dozens of bodies pushing against the window
, combined with the blow dealt by Harrison, caused a six-foot square panel of glass to bulge out and then flex in. With a sharp crack, it split down the middle and popped free of its frame leaving a gaping hole.

The first
three dead things to enter were smashed down by the pole-wielding lunatic, but others staggered in to take their place. Harrison found himself forced back into the bank lobby as it filled with stinking, whining creatures bent on his consumption.

Harrison smashed heads, arms
and legs, but the tide of walking dead was relentless. For every two he smashed down, at least one, if not both, got back up to come at him again. Soon the horde was added to when another pane of glass gave way on the opposite side of the bank and even more dead poured in.

Tiring, and seeing that he was about to be flanked by the new group of thieves coming at him from
his left, Harrison dropped the gore covered pole. He looked around wildly at the zombies that almost had him surrounded, his brain flashed that he needed to be with the thing he needed to keep safe. The thing he cherished above all else.

His only thought was to protect the gold.

Breathing in gulps, he dodged around two filthy, shrieking creatures and bolted into the vault. He turned around and grabbed the edge of the heavy door, pulling it closed with a bang as dozens of the things tried to follow him inside.

Dead hands clawed at the outside of the closed vault door,
as he spun its combination dials and the spoked-wheel on its front that drove the bolts into place to secure them.

Harrison heard the locks
click home and for the moment felt safe. He knew he never would have been able to hold the door closed by his strength alone. Taking a deep breath, he saw that he had protected himself, and the gold, with his last ditch effort. Now he could enjoy his new wealth. Spinning, he went in search of his treasure. His eyes roamed the empty shelves and open lock boxes on both sides of the vault as he felt himself grow frantic.

The huge safe was empty. Everything was gone.

"Someone beat me to it," Harrison said incredulously to the empty room. And indeed he was right. On the Friday afternoon before Halloween, the entire contents of the safe had been transported to the Federal Reserve in Miami.

A steely resolve flowed through Harrison as he vowed to find where the gold
was taken. And find who had stolen from him and kill them.

"Take my gold back,"
he screamed.

Spinning toward the vault door to exit and make good his oath, in a moment of clarity and sanity, Brian Harrison realized exactly what he had done when he shut himself in
.

J
ust as the interior light reached the end of its timer and shut off.

With the main power to the bank out and no compressors to ventilate the safe, Brian Harrison, money market specialist, asshole, murderer
and Fat Football Fuck screamed unheard for hours before the air ran out.

***

Deprived of their meal, the dead already inside spread out in the bank. More of their number, attracted by the sound of the fire alarm, followed and poured into the building by the hundreds.

The dead near the back of the bank could smell the alluring scent of fresh meat
, and it wasn't long before they found the section of glass missing from the door leading into the Galleria. As they crawled through the opening, the smell of food became stronger, causing them to spread out and search the stores for its source. A few entered the foyer and one, perhaps acting on a long forgotten memory, moved over to the elevators and started pressing the call button.

With fumbling hands, another managed to open the door to the stairway
, while a few of the less finicky eaters fought over the remains of Jonny and Marcia. As soon as the fresh smell of humans wafted out from the stairwell this all changed. With a focus to their search for food now at hand, the dead crowded the doorway, bumping into one another and creating a jam in the opening. The force of those pushing from behind quickly relieved this.

Like a cork from a bottle, popping and spewing out its torrent of champagne, the dead flowed into the stairway.

And upward.

CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

Clearwater, Florida:

Steve and Heather bolted out of bed and hurriedly dressed when the fire alarm woke them. Arming themselves, and taking along the extra M-4 they kept in their suite, they made their way by flashlight down to the twelfth floor. Neither of them could smell smoke and the sprinkler system hadn’t gone off, so they were anxious to find the reason for the warning bell. They didn't believe it was a fire, because when the city water had dropped down to a trickle the week after they locked down the building, Steve had switched the building's system over to the storage tank on the roof, ensuring they had water to drink and bathe with. Additionally, if a fire did break out, it would be quickly extinguished by the sprinkler system. Although they would use up their available supply of water, Steve's reasoning was that if the building burned down, then the water on the roof wouldn't do them any good. They could find more water, but they only had one refuge.

Entering the station, Steve and Heather found Brain and Susan coming out of the door to Steve's old office that Tick-Tock had taken over.

"Where's Tick-Tock?" Brain asked before Steve could pose the same question. "He’s gone and so is Jonny and Marcia."

From the office next to them
, Mary called out, "Turn that damn alarm off, I'm trying to sleep."

Instead of answering her, Steve gave orders to the others, "Brain, give your pistol to Susan." Handing over the extra M-4's to the tech
, he said, "Take this, and both of you follow me.” He spun on his heel and went back out into the hall with Heather close behind.

Brain caught up with them by the stairs and asked, "What's going on?"

"I don't know," Steve replied.

"Is it a fire?" Susan asked worriedly.

"We don't think so or we'd be drenched." Heather answered as she pointed up to a sprinkler head in the ceiling. "Might be a short in the system."

"But where'd everyone go?" Brain asked. "I was in my office and I know Tick-Tock and Marcia were asleep. Jonny was in the studio, but when the ala
rm went off, I found everyone gone except Mary and Susan."'

"What about Meat?" Heather asked as she stopped behind Steve at the door to the stairs.

"He moved down to the fourth floor a few days ago," Susan answered. "He said he needed some space.”

Opening the door to the stairs, Steve halted as he suddenly heard the sharp crack of an M-4 rifle echoing in the enclosed space.

"I think we just found Tick-Tock," he said. "Come on."

Running down the stairs two at a time, the group heard almost constant firing coming from below. Steve passed the fourth floor door and
was rounding the corner when he spotted his second in command crouched on the intermediate landing as he fired down at something unseen. Deafened by the noise of the rifle, Tick-Tock didn't hear them until they were right on top of him. He started as he caught sight of them out of the corner of his eye and began to bring the rifle around but stopped when he recognized Steve.

Tick-Tock turned to fire another burst of rounds down the stairwell
and yelled, "Zombies, a whole shit load of them. I' m almost out of ammo. Give me a spare clip."

"What happened?" Steve asked as he handed over a loaded magazine and looked down
at where Tick-Tock was firing.

"What?" Tick-Tock yelled back.

Realizing Tick-Tock was deafened from firing his rifle in the close space of the stairwell, Steve yelled, "What happened?"

Pulling the rifle tight to his shoulder, Tick-Tock fired at two
of the walking dead who showed themselves. One went down but the other was only struck in the jaw and kept coming.

"Son of a bitch
!" Tick-Tock screamed before firing again, this time hitting the zombie in the forehead and spraying brains and black pus against the wall behind it.

The assault over, Tick-Tock answered Steve's question with a yelled, "Don't know, I jumped up and headed down to the first floor to check the warning board in maintenance as soon as the alarm went off. Ran into these shitheads on two and I've been losing ground ever since."

A large group of zombies rounded the corner. Heather and Steve joined Tick-Tock in firing down on them. The wave kept coming through the hail of bullets, and they found themselves pushed up above the fourth floor landing before the assault slowed.

Steve turned to Brain
, who had been helping by firing into the horde whenever someone stopped to reload, and shouted, "Where's Susan?"

"She went to wake Mary up. She
’s going to try and find the others too," he screamed back.

"Go up to the station," Steve
hollered to Brain. "Grab the box of ammunition just inside TickTock's door and bring it here. Then go back up and pack a bag with clothes and whatever else you need, but make it fast. Tell everyone else you see on the way to do the same, and they should dress for a boat ride."