100-Days-in-Deadland(41)

“No,” Clutch replied.

I watched him. More glass behind me shattered. “I won’t let you die for me.” After a quick glance at the newcomers, I went for the only door that I knew would be unlocked.

“Cash!”

I pushed open the glass door with my left hand, and swung the machete at the first zed with my right. The kid went right down. The hallway was not nearly as congested as the classrooms, which I noticed nearly all had their doors closed.

I jogged down the hallway, shoving zed kids out of my way, thankful for the thick gloves and jacket I’d worn. A zed could bite through it eventually, but at least it’d have to work at it.

I turned the corner into the main hallway and froze. A couple dozen three-and four-foot tall zeds with three adult zeds turned to face me. One growled, and the groans began. They lurched forward.

I spun around to backtrack, but the hall had filled in behind me as well, with a zed wearing a tag reading HALL MONITOR leading the group. I lunged for the double door to my left and jumped inside. After making sure the door was shut tight, I spun on my heel.

“Fuck me.”

I’d found the school cafeteria. Food trays were scattered across the floors. The buffet line had been ravaged. Several bodies, with most of their skin and muscle gone, were sprawled on the floor, covered in writhing maggots. And now, the large room was full of food-stained, bloodied zeds, and every single one of the bastards were focused on me.

They staggered toward me with outreached arms, and I jumped up onto a table, then onto the next table, sliding through spaghetti sauce that I knew wasn’t really spaghetti sauce.

I slid the machete in my belt and leapt, grabbing the fluorescent light hanging from the ceiling. Surprisingly, it held. Miraculously, my adrenaline helped me pull myself up, safely out of reach of the small arms. But larger arms connected to zeds in lunch lady uniforms reached perilously close.

“I’m not going to die,” I muttered and punched up at the ceiling. The white panel moved, and I realized this was one of those drop-down ceilings that allowed space for wiring and cables.

Gripping the metal frame, I swung and kicked up, knocking out another white panel, catching my foot on the frame. Using the strength of my legs, I was able to pull myself up and above the frame.

A sea of jaundiced dead faces looked up at me, growling, reaching, and chomping. I moved carefully and slowly onto the next frame, careful to distribute my weight over two rows of metal framing. I had no idea how much weight these ceilings were meant to hold, but they sure as hell couldn’t have been built for human travel.

I crawled over one panel to the next, pausing every few panels to catch my breath. My directions were jumbled in the darkness. I had no idea if I was heading toward the parking lot, back to the playground, or if I was going in circles. I lifted the edge of the panel to find that I was still in the cafeteria. Zeds stood under the opening I’d made in the ceiling in the opposite side of the room, still looking up, sniffing the air, reaching, mouths opening and closing like baby birds.

A crack of light filtered in through the corner I’d lifted and lit up the wall of concrete blocks in front of me. Shit. The ceiling ended where the wall separated the cafeteria from the hallway. My arms and legs were already shaking. I had to figure out something or else I’d fall right down into the cafeteria again. Except this time, I’d never have the strength to get back up here.

But there was nothing up here except space, wiring, and…air ducts. My attention shot to the large duct leading straight through the center of the cafeteria and through the concrete wall. Many smaller ducts ran off it like a spider’s legs. Ducts looked so much bigger in the movies, but I prayed that this one would be big enough. It had to be.

I made my way toward the metal duct. Sweat burned my eyes and tickled my neck as rivulets ran down to soak my shirt. By the time I reached the duct, I was exhausted and clumsy, nearly tumbling off the ceiling grid twice. I moved alongside the duct until I found where one section ended and another began. Both were held together by screws. I pulled out my tanto and used the tip to unscrew the first screw, and then the next. It was a painfully slow process to take out the six screws on the sides I could reach.

I pushed against the duct but it didn’t budge. Trading my knife for the axe, I pulled back a few measly inches and swung. The metal clanged and dented, echoed by moaning and shuffling below. A couple dozen hits later, the duct broke open. I slid the axe inside and shoved myself through. Sharp metal from the axe’s damage dug into me, but I continued to squeeze into the tiny boxed-in darkness until I filled up the area of the duct.