In Hiding: A Survivors Journal of the Great Outbreak (17 page)

Tanya
shouted and pointed out a zombie that was moving closer to us. I fired a shot
and blew half of the damn things neck away. It fell to the ground but quickly
started getting back up to one knee. Two others behind it pushed the woman
zombie back to the ground as they stepped over her in order to get to Tanya and
I. That was when one of those two took a shotgun blast right in the stomach
that hadn’t come from me. It fell to the ground and then just as I raised my
shotgun to take out the last one in front of me I heard what sounded like a
firework go off in my left ear.

Tanya
had fired her gun, but what she didn’t realize was that she had held the gun
too close to my ear. It was that same disorientated feeling that I had in that
washroom, and it took me a few seconds just to gather myself only to realize
that he had shot that Zed in the shoulder and had accomplished nothing other then
damaging my hearing. But there was no time to be angry with her, I regrouped
and fired a shot into its chest.

Now I know that you had to shoot
them in the head. But that’s a small target and seeing how I wasn’t the
greatest shot in the world and under a ton of stress, I was usually just happy
to hit one of them. Besides, the shotgun was forgiving and its stopping power
was usually enough to at least knock them to the ground. The more of them on
the ground meant more obstacles for the other Zeds who had shown that they
weren’t the most co-coordinated of creatures.

That
was when Tanya walked up to that Zed on the ground holding the gun only about
two feet away from its head and pulled the trigger. The back of its head
spilled out on the garage floor and then she turned to her right and executed
another one that was still moving on the ground. I grabbed her shoulder and
tried to point out to her where we needed to get too. It was too loud to talk
and we needed to get to that button before it was too late to close the door.

I
looked over to check on the progress of the other group on the far side of the
garage. They were doing worse then we were. There were about a dozen bodies on
the ground and as more and more Zeds pushed their way into the garage they were
tripping and falling all over each other. A large group of them had ended up on
that side of the garage and were blocking their path. Anne, Paul and Derrick
were firing into that crowd, trying to help them get to the door, but there
were just too many of them. Cody and Jacob were swinging into the crowd just
trying to hold them back. Trevor was driving his axe into the heads of any
zombie that was still moving on the floor. I could barely hear Anne and Paul
screaming to close the doors while Derrick screamed about getting out of the
way.

Through
all of that I could hear Tanya shouting about a Zed that was approaching us,
but struggling to get past a body on the floor. It tripped and fell flat on its
face but started getting back up immediately. I stepped forward and lined up my
shot from only a few feet away. I remember closing my eyes as I pulled the
trigger. Its head exploded right in front of me and sprayed blood and chunks of
brain matter all over the floor. I turned away from that mess just in time to
see the Zed on my left stepping towards me from the middle of the garage.
Luckily for me the oil pit was between us and as it stepped forward it fell to
the bottom.

While
I was busy watching that I didn’t see the woman in a business suit reaching her
arms out for me on my right. I heard Tanya fire her weapon and I saw the impact
of the bullet as it hit her in the shoulder. She fired again and missed
completely. I froze for that split second and even though I knew I had to do
something my body just didn’t move. I thought I was done for.

That
was when I saw her head quickly snap back as the bullet entered her head. The
shot had come from Anne. I tried to look back and thank her, but she had
already reloading and was trying to find her next target.

The
horde of zombies was tightly packed together on the far side of the garage and
right at the opening. The pile of dead on the floor was growing and more and
more of them were being funneled to the other side of the garage. The side I
was on. I fired a shot into a crowd of about four or five of them with little
concern for what I hit. I was just trying to keep them at a distance.

That
was when I heard someone yelling louder then anyone of us. It was Adam, and he
had come running into the garage carrying all the ammo he could hold and the
last shotgun. He stopped to hand out ammo to Anne and Derrick. He exchanged his
fully loaded shotgun with Paul’s and started reloading it with the shells from
his pocket. Then I saw him run over to where Tanya and I were and asked what we
needed. He helped Tanya reload her weapon and in all honesty I couldn’t
remember how many shots I had taken or how many bullets my gun actually held so
I waved him off.

But
I realized with the other group stalled on the far side and Adam now with us I
knew that we needed to push forward and fast. On my left I saw Derrick moving
forward walking right towards the horde as he walked between the two oil pits.
As he did that he managed to draw some of the Zeds that were blocking Cody, Trevor
and Jacob’s path to the door away from them. A few of the Zeds actually turned
to see Derrick and started walking towards him only to step right into the pits
and go crashing down to the bottom. It also drew away a few that were blocking
our path and they stepped right into the pits trying to reach him, smashing
into the sides and unable to grab onto the ledge as they fell in.

I
looked down into the pit closest to me and couldn’t believe what I saw. The
Zeds were packed in there tight. The ones that were still moving were reaching
up and their hands and arms just cleared the top of the pit. But they were
stumbling over the bodies that were on the bottom. Some of them down there on
the ground were still moving and trying to get back to their feet, but had
broken arms and legs or worse and were only inhibiting the others from finding
their footing.

Everything
was happening so quickly and chaotically that it was almost impossible to keep
track of what was going on around me. My head was on a swivel trying to see who
was doing what and what was coming from where. But I saw Derrick had pushed
forward and almost made it too the door. He had drawn most of the attention to
him and that’s when I noticed that we had an opening along our wall.

We
tried to move and we tried to move as quickly as possible. I stepped over one
of the dead on the ground, checking to make sure that it was indeed dead and
kept on moving forward. That was when I saw two Zeds that were heading our way.
I heard the shot and knew that it had come from behind me. It had hit one of
them in the hip area causing it to spin around on its way to the ground. When I
looked back I could see Adam on the floor holding his shoulder in agony.
Without seeing what happened I assumed that it had to be the recoil of the
shotgun that was the cause. I checked to make sure that he was okay and checked
that he hadn’t been bit.

So
I turned back around and started back for the garage doors. I walked over to
the one that Adam had wounded, placed the barrel of the gun against the head of
the injured monster and went to pull the trigger and remove its head clean from
its shoulders. Nothing happened. That was when I realized that I had run out of
ammo. Tanya had seen what happened and stepped in front of me and fired a shot
right into its head. I ran back to Adam asking for more bullets and I could see
that he was in a fair amount of pain. I dropped my empty gun in front of him
and grabbed his shotgun from him and simply gave him a look. He nodded in
approval and I ran back to join Tanya.

She
fired a few shots into the group in front of us. One grazed the head of the Zed
nearest to us, but it wasn’t enough to keep it down. I took aim with the
shotgun and fired blowing away half of its face. That garage had become a war
zone. It stunk of death and gun smoke and the walls were covered in blood and
guts. Smoke lingered in the air and the terrible sounds of guns and zombies
echoed throughout the entire garage. There was yelling, most of which I
couldn’t make out due to damage done to my hearing from all the gunshots.

I
had seen Derrick pushing forward towards the door. He was firing into the crowd
that had formed just outside of it. He didn’t take much time to line up his
shots, not that it mattered there were plenty of targets to choose from. I saw
Paul move up behind Trevor and that group to give them some extra firepower as
they pushed forward to close the door. Anne was still hanging back and using
her hunting rifle to eliminate select targets that posed the greatest threat.

It
was around that time when the few Zeds that were in our way turned their
attention to Derrick and started to head in his direction. Anne fired a bullet
through the head of the first one and Derrick took out the other. Then in all
the chaos I noticed that we had a clear path to one of the switches that
controlled the garage doors. Tanya bolted for the button, being careful as she
stepped over several bodies on the floor. She pressed the button that closed
the door and it started to lower. But just as I started to let out a sigh of
relief the door stopped and then retracted back up. Tanya looked shock and hit
the button again only to have the same thing happen over and over again.

It
was the pile of dead bodies on the ground that was preventing the door from
closing. They were setting off some safety detector that prevented the door
from closing on anyone or anything. The barricade of bodies that had at the
very least slowed the Zed advance was now preventing us from closing the door.
Paul started screaming that we needed to get them out of the way. Well, that
was at least what I thought he had screamed. It didn’t matter. I knew I had to
do something.

I
ran over and grabbed a hold of one of the many corpses that was underneath the
garage door and started to pull it by the shirt. It was disgusting. I quickly
let go once I realized what I was touching and the possibility of infection
that came with it. That was when I saw a zombie come stumbling through the
crowd and reach out for me while I was still bent over debating how to move the
body out of the way.

I
panicked and fumbled the shotgun around trying to protect myself. That was when
its head exploded right in front of me. Pieces of its head and blood splattered
all over my shirt. It makes me sick even today when I think about it. Paul had
seen that I was in trouble and turned around just in time to put a bullet in
the back of that zombies head.

So I unbuttoned my shirt as fast
as I could and used it as a rag to grab onto the arm of the corpse and started
to pull it inside the garage and out of the way. Then I went back and grabbed
another, and then another, and then I saw Adam next to me pulling away a few of
the bodies as well. He only had one good shoulder and was struggling just to
drag the body a few feet. Thing was I had started to pay closer attention to
his struggles and not on what I was doing or what was around me. My grip
slipped on the body I was pulling and I fell backwards and almost put my hand
into the oil pit as I went to steady myself.
 
My hand landed inches away from the out
reached arms of the Zeds trapped inside.

I quickly pulled my hand away and
got back to my feet to go and grab another body. I saw Trevor drive his axe
into the head of another zombie while Cody fought off two more. Jacob ran over
and began helping Adam and I try and clear the base of the garage entrance.
There was too much happening to keep track of it all. My focus had to stay on
clearing the bodies and not on what everyone else was doing at the time.

But it was hard to stay focused.
The gunshots were coming from every angle and the Zeds at the door seemed to be
surrounding the others as they tried to keep them outside. Anne was still
shooting from the back wall and as good of a shot as she was, there were still
too many of them to put down. I pulled another body back away from the entrance
and just as I did that Cody killed another one that took its place on the
floor. I could still hear the door rocking above me as it refused to close.

I ran back to grab another Zed by
the pant leg and started to pull. I saw Paul fire a shot into the quad of a
nearby zombie and it fell to the ground, tripping several others on its way
down. Anne dropped another that had just entered the garage and that meant
there was another body that needed to be moved. Derrick fired his shotgun right
into the chest of another and it fell back into the crowd knocking a few more
of them down. But that was when Derrick started to yell that he was out of
bullets. We were losing the battle.

The
bodies were piling up and we were running low on ammo. As quickly as they could
eliminate one threat, another seemingly just took its place. I saw Adam had
given up on helping me and had moved on to help Tanya find another way of
closing the door. I knew I needed to work faster so I ran over and handed
Derrick my shotgun and then grabbed a hold of a zombie with each hand and
started to pull two at a time. I saw Derrick fire two shots only to realize
that he was out of ammo again. Things were going south fast.

I
ran back and grabbed two more and started dragging them away. That was when the
one in my right hand started to move. He tried to pull his arm back and began
to roll onto his side. That was when he looked up at me. In an instant I let go
and continued to pull the other away. Once I had cleared that body I took a few
steps back and saw that he was still crawling in my direction. I shouted for someone
to help me but they were too busy fighting for their own lives or maybe they
never heard me. I started backing away right in-between the two oil pits as it
followed. I looked around, hoping to find something that I could use as a
weapon. I walked slowly, trying not to slip on the blood-covered floor.