CHAPTER 8 - TOO MANY LEGS

We were out of time. I shouldered my bag and gave the mental command for the zombies to move out into the hallway. Nothing attacked them, so we were still clear for the moment, at least. The zombies coming this way were still a few minutes out. They weren’t coming at us too fast, so there was still time to make a getaway, but not a lot of it.

I glanced back at Kat, who was still shoving things in her bag. “Let’s go!”

“Coming!”

Crystals. She needed one. I had spares. When Kat came closer, I fished one of the clear crystals out of my pocket. “The monsters drop these. They give you powers, and you’re going to need something.”

“I’ll take it,” Kat replied. She picked the crystal from my palm.

Right away, it sank into her fingers, vanishing. She let out a gasp, staring at her hand, shaking her fingers.

“It’s okay. It sort of does that. You should have some new memories? What did the stone give you?”

“Stamina and endurance,” Kat replied. “I feel like I could walk for miles, which I sure couldn’t have done two minutes ago.”

That was probably a perfect find for her. Kat was a kind person, but she was heavy to the point that she started puffing going up a flight of stairs. I’d worried about her ability to escape a horde of zombies chasing us. Maybe the crystal would give her a shot. Now, where to go? Where could we go that would be safe? I set off toward the stairs while I was thinking.

“Shit!” I said.

“What?”

“Alfred,” I replied. I’d forgotten about him. “He’s from my class. Fought the zombies with me. He’s upstairs grabbing some things. Come on, let’s go get him quickly.”

Without waiting, I set off. More people would boost our odds of survival. I hadn’t stuck around to count the zombies outside, but there were at least a couple dozen of the things. I could kill a few, with the help of my zombies, but there was no way I could take out that many. Even with Kat and Alfred, it wasn’t going to happen, but three was better than two. We had to start somewhere. Getting more people together would only help.

I glanced back at Kat, who was throwing her backpack over her shoulder. “We need to hurry.”

“I know! I’m coming. Go ahead and I’ll catch up.”

“Anyone else still in their rooms on the floor?” I asked.

Kat shrugged. “I don’t know.”

Of course not. She’d been hiding in her room since all this went down. I felt a twinge of frustration at that, and wondered if I was making a serious mistake bringing her along. The stamina crystal would give her the ability to keep up, but I wondered if she had the mental wherewithal to survive the mess we’d found ourselves in.

I set off toward the stairs, watching for more axes, but not seeing any. I didn’t recall there being any fire axes in the dorm, which made a certain degree of sense. Graduate students were a bit less rowdy than the undergrads, but I still wouldn’t trust most of them enough to leave axes lying around where they could grab them.

I’d passed my zombies by the time I hit the stairs, leaving them trailing close behind. They weren’t too fast, and I hoped they wouldn’t end up being what slowed us down. The last thing I wanted to do was give up the advantage they represented. They followed behind me, working to keep up, and I darted up the stairs to the fourth floor.

Which room had Alfred said he was in? Was it 407 or 409? I remembered it was something like that, but not the precise door. Hopefully, he wouldn’t be too difficult to find. When I reached the top of the stairs I headed out into the hallway. First room was 401, then 402 and 403… Time was ticking away as I jogged toward the doors I thought he’d be behind.

Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.

“Alfred! We have to move, let’s go!’ I called out as I approached. My hope was he’d hear me shouting and come out to join me.

That worked, thank god. His head popped out of room 409 a few seconds after my shout. “What’s up?”

“Zombies headed this way. Lots of them.”

“Too many to fight?”

Well, look who’d grown himself a spine! Good—we were all going to need to step up in a big way. I nodded to him. “Way too many. By now they’re probably getting close to the front doors. We’re going to need to slip out the back or the sides.”

One of the things which made this dorm a poor one for defense was going to work in our favor now—too many entrances. There were at least four doors I could think of, and probably one or two I didn’t know about. Big building, lots of doors. Shitty for keeping monsters out, but really good when trying to flee without them spotting us.

Alfred had wrapped gauze around his wounded hand and packed a backpack, which was slung over both his shoulders. In his right hand he carried the fire axe he’d picked up, and I saw the goblin knife wrapped with strips of torn t-shirt and tucked into his belt. He looked like someone cosplaying a zombie apocalypse survivor, which was pretty appropriate, if you thought about it.

We ran back toward the stairs, running into Kat as she climbed up to join us. I did quick introductions, and we were on our way back down. Kat was huffing and puffing before we hit the bottom, but she was still moving, which was more than she’d have been able to do yesterday. I still worried about her, but so far, so good.

I moved down the hall slowly, watching for movement. If the zombies had made it to the dorm, some of them might have already slipped inside through the busted windows. I didn’t see anything, but without power the halls were pretty dark. If I wasn’t careful I might stumble into one of the damned things.

We reached the point to turn toward the rear exit and headed that way with more speed. If we hadn’t run into zombies yet, they probably hadn’t made it this far. The passage stopped at the dining hall—get through there to the kitchen, and we could make a quick exit out the back, avoiding any chance of being seen. But the doors were locked.

“My turn to help,” Alfred said.

I was going to ask what he had in mind, but before I could he stepped forward, axe in hand, and brought the blade down heavily on the double doors right where they met, right at the lock. There was a booming sound as he brought the blade down, cutting deeper into the wood than I’d expected from a spindly twenty-something kid.

But he’d absorbed a Strength crystal. That must be boosting him a lot, to have that sort of power. A second blow sent chips of wood flying. A third shattered the locking mechanism entirely, breaking it apart and letting us into the dimly-lit dining hall.

“Nice work,” I told him. “Let’s let my zombies lead?”

“You go it,” he replied, gesturing for me to send them on.

Crashing glass from somewhere down the hall behind us told me that we were out of time. The zombies were breaking through and coming into the building. There was no turning back now.

I sent Rosencrantz and Guildenstern ahead, moving toward the kitchen. The room was darker than I liked, but there was enough light coming through the big windows lining one side of the room to allow us to see okay. That wasn’t going to be the case once we reached the kitchen. I doubted there would be much light there at all.

We reached the doors into the cooking area and hesitated while I peered through the round windows. No movement within, but I’d been right—there was very little light in there. It would be super easy for something to sneak up on us.

On the plus side, I could see the door to get out, too. It was only about thirty feet away.

“Okay,” I told the others. “We’ve got about thirty feet to reach the doors to outside, but the room is dark. It would be easy for something to hide in there. We need to be careful.”

Alfred nodded. Kat looked scared, but after a pause she nodded as well. I figured that was as good as I was going to get and turned back toward the kitchen doors, sending Guildenstern inside. He barged through the doors, smacking them aside, and waddled his way toward the center of the room.

Nothing came rushing out at him. That was a good sign.

I sent Rosie in as well, then gestured for the others to come along and followed my zombies in.

The kitchen was every bit as dark as it looked from outside. I moved forward, taking in the scene. Light splashed across the space from a single small window on the far wall. It didn’t cast nearly enough illumination, but it showed clear signs of a struggle. A knife block had been tipped over, knives scattered across a counter. It looked like a couple were missing. Dark stains marred the floor; it looked like blood to me, but in the darkness I couldn’t be certain. Dropped pans, overturned bins, and food scattered across the floor all told a similar tale.

Something had come through this place, and it probably wasn’t friendly. The less time we spent here, the better. I sent my zombies toward the door, following close on their heels.

Before I’d gone ten steps, Kat hissed and grabbed my shoulder. I turned and saw her pointing at one corner of the room.

At first I wasn’t sure what it was she’d seen. It looked like a weird pile of paper, or maybe packing material. Then as my eyes continued to adjust to the dim light, I saw forms that looked a lot like bodies. Bodies wrapped up in something, like a cocoon.

Oh, no. No no no. SHIT, no.

Movement near one of the cocoons caught my eye as something with too many legs and eyes scuttled out into view. A second one followed it, then a third.