I pushed Wells' corpse off of me as Allison offered me a hand. It wasn't hers, but instead the plasticine arm of a manakin, held in her hand.
"I thought you’d died when he started shooting at me," I said as she helped me up. She held up the arm.
"I realized that in a case as small as these cameras have, they probably couldn't fit both a nine millimeter gun and a high-resolution camera." She said, dropping the manakin's arm, I figured I could put the rest of the puzzle together myself.
"So now what?" I asked.
Allison grabbed the radio from her hip and turned the volume back up.
"...ny chance that we might be able to get out next?" came Paul's voice.
"Dunno," Arthur said, replying to some unheard questions "Most of our men are out, how many are still at north?"
"Just me," Paul said "I've been fighting to shut it down again, but I think, whoever is doing this, they're getting better at locking me out."
"It's me and Sam here," Arthur said, "Maggie's running about as well, keeping the zombies off of us, any sign of Allison and Peterson?"
Allison lifted the radio to her mouth, but another broadcast cut her off.
"I haven't heard anything, there were a lot of gun shots, and I think maybe they were both shot."
Allison took a breath to start, but Arthur cut in.
"Not sure why we thought we would be saved by the new guy and Doctor..."
Allison dropped the radio and turned to the mouthpiece on the desk.
"Attention Walton's Associates," She said "And dick heads, but I repeat myself. Wells is down."
"Oh!" came Paul over the radio "You're alive!"
"Never doubted you." Arthur added.
"You said pretty much everyone is out?" Allison said, setting the radio by the PA.
"Pretty much," Paul said, "I think it's just the six of us now."
"Okay," Allison said, "Now to deal with the zombies."
"Yeah, about that." Sam said, "There are more of them now, when did that happen?"
"They can take over bodies and turn them into more of them."
"Oh, okay." Sam said, "Well, that explains what's happening at South Tower."
My blood froze.
"What's happening at South Tower?" Allison demanded.
"Oh, the day shift managers were gathering up the bodies from the initial attack, and uhm, the monster was...doing something... and then sticking them onto the wall, anyway, then she ate the day shift, and stuck them to the wall, and now the wall is moving."
Allison fell back onto the overturned chair.
"So they can raise the dead as well?" I asked.
"I think, once you become one of those things, you're basically already dead." Allison said, "If any of them get out, there'll be no stopping them."
"Yeah, we came to that conclusion ourselves as well." Arthur said over the radio.
An idea sprang to my mind.
"Arthur," I said, "Has anyone managed to kill any of the zombies?"
"Oh sure." Arthur said, "Maggie's killed three."
"She's been putting those family member bumper stickers on the back of her mobility scooter to mark each kill." Sam said
"How?" I asked over the PA.
A chime played over the intercom.
"Ran over one, blew up another with fireworks, strangled another with a phone cord." She sighed pleasantly, "Reminds me of my second husband."
"Okay," I said "So they can be strangled, Arthur, you said the refrigerator gas replaced oxygen and was a suffocation hazard, right?"
"Sure," he said.
"What if we just vented the gas when we left?" I said, "Smoother than and make sure they can't leave?"
I beamed with pride, but Allison shook her head, deflating my enthusiasm.
"There isn't enough gas in there to replace all the oxygen in the building, it might make someone nauseous if they were stuck in here, but not kill them."
"Yeah, Arthur said, There's no way we could use the refrigerators to kill every living thing in the building..."
He paused, in a manner that heavily implied an incoming 'unless'.
"Unless we set the gas on fire." He said.
"Phosgene!" I said, pumping my fist, then whimpering from the pain.
"That would pump highly toxic gas across the entire community." Allison said.
"Yes, I have to protest," Paul said "Walton's has an explicit policy against the use of banned chemical weapons on anyone who hasn't signed a liability waiver."
"We could put the store back into Riot Mode when we do it," Allison said, "It was designed to keep poison gas out, it'll certainly keep poison gas in."
Allison taped her fingers onto the table.
"Arthur, let's do it, I can close the air vents from Well's tablet to keep the R12 in the building. We'll shut off the fans, unlock the store, everyone will clear out, and once we're all outside, lock down the store and put the heaters on, they're connected to an open flame, that'll convert it to phosgene, and blow it around the store, even in small concentrations, it'll be lethal." Allison said.
"Excellent." Paul said "One problem, how do we make sure that the zombies don't leave the building when we unlock everything?"
I leaned forward and grabbed the PA Speaker.
"Attention Walton's shoppers." I said in my customer service voice, "In celebration of the fourth of July, all inventory in our seasonal section is marked down by ninety percent, thank you for shopping at Walton's."
Across the store, a cry went up, and a chorus of screams followed by the patter of sensible shoes began to grow louder.
"That did it!" Paul said, "I can see it from here, they're closing in!" he paused "Maggie is driving at full speed towards you, I think she'll meet you at the western exit! Hurry!"
Maggie slid the cart to a stop in front of the opening to the seasonal department as the roar of the zombie hoard grew around her. We 'stepped' out of the seasonal department, as in, Allison sat in the chair and navigated, slowing us down and steering with her good leg, while I stood on the back and gave us power, my eyesight reduced by my covered left eye, so the whole "depth perception" thing was becoming more and more negotiable.
"Oh, hi you two." Maggie said "How're things?"
"Thanks for coming back for us, Maggie." I said
"Hm?" She said "Oh, I didn't come back for you, I'm here to loot!" she said, as she stepped over to a tower filled with brightly decorated fireworks. She picked up a rather irresponsibly sized specimen and laid it on the cart.
"Ninty percent off, can't miss that." She said.
"You're stealing them." Allison replied.
"Yes, but now I'm stealing them at a discount, which means you can grab more of it until it becomes a felony."
She lay another package on the scooter.
"Besides, Walton's has all the good shit, most of these are just Army Surplus munitions that are past their shelf life." She held up a box "Once upon a time this was an M142 HIMAR rocket, now they just take the metal pieces off and replace them with paper and fuses."
"I..." I began.
"No time." Allison said, hopping out of the chair and sitting in the front basket, moving beside something that had "CBU-59" scratched out and the words "FUnSanctioned Cluster Munitions" written on it towards the back of the scooter. I ditched the office chair and climbed back into the nice familiar cooler I'd started this adventure being dragged around in.
Another roar came up, this one earth shatteringly close.
"Maggie, drive, I'll get the exits open," Allison said, tapping at the tablet, she frowned, then tapped at the tablet again in disbelief.
"Oh god damnit!" She yelled. dropping the tablet to the ground.
"What?" I said, frantically glancing around.
"The breaker for the heaters is still tripped." She said, "We can't convert the gas without an open flame."
"I don't think we can risk flipping the breakers," I said.
"Do we need an open flame?" Maggie said.
"Yes," Allison said, "But we also need..."
Maggie picked up the tube labeled "Post Traumatic Freedom Disorder", lit the fuse, and jammed it back into the shelf of fireworks.
"...To be outside when it happens!" Allison yelled.
"Oh, Sorry, senior moment."
Maggie jumped back onto the cart as Allison and I were still scrambling onto the basket and towed cooler respectively. Maggie gunned the engine, peeling out, and charged down the main thoroughfare towards the emergency exits as the firework erupted, shooting yellow sparks across the floor as the zombies closed in.
"Allison, come in!" Arthur yelled. "There's enough R12 in the vents to bring the planet up to a boil, where the hell are you guys? What's that sound?"
The fireworks on the same shelf exploded, a loud whistle and a thunderous flash was accompanied by an entire roll of firecrackers cooking off at once. Smoke and flames were starting to rise from the shelves as the canopy smoldered.
"We're heading toward the exits now!" Allison yelled "Change of plan, Seasonal's going up in flames, get out now!"
"We're already outside!" Sam yelled "Paul's with us too."
Allison tapped the tablet computer as the fire alarms began to blare.
The cart sped past rows and rows of clothing, the towering shelves of the grocery were looming ahead. Behind us, the fireworks display finally reached criticality. A thunderous blast tore the display apart. The massive canopy fired into the air and enveloped the duct work overhead as rockets and shells fired off, sending at least one burning zombie hurdling into apparel, lighting fires as it rolled which joined up the larger firestorm that was brewing around the storm as fireworks landed near poorly fireproofed cardboard displays. As the canopy drifted back down, burning all the way, a rapidly expanding green cloud could be poured from the vents and onto the flames, the flames lost some of their ferocity as the gas replaced the oxygen fueling the inferno. Another round of blasts projected the gas, and the cloud began to expand out from the center at an accelerating pace.
"Faster!" I said, tapping the sides of the cooler and rocking back and forth as we passed from burning racks of clothing to burning towers of dry cereal.
"Allison!" Arthur said, "There's a lotta green right behind you!"
I glanced forward and saw the first rays of the morning sun peering through the rectangular slit that marked the emergency door. Arthur stood in the light, a faint shadow against the morning sun.
"Arthur," Allison yelled into the radio "Clear the doorway!"
Arthur backed away from the door, the light cast a path of salvation before us, flanked by discounted chest freezers.
"We're not gonna make it!" I yelled, tapping the sides of the cooler as the air started to gain a spicy quality.
Allison stared forward as smoke and ash began falling from the burning packaging overhead. The shelves began to groan and sag as the fires raged.
Allison looked up, then at the door, then back at the gas cloud. She stared down at the tablet and tapped a button.
The lights turned red.
A loud siren blared, and a flashing light appeared above the doorway. We were only feet away when the shutter began to unroll. I screamed Maggie let loose a barbaric yop, and Allison closed her eyes as the bright light of morning began to disappear behind the falling shutter.
Allison ducked just in time to avoid decapitation. Maggie leaned forward, the carefully maintained bun on the back of her hair losing a few grey strands to the door. The shutter carved through the backrest. I ducked, tucked my head into the cooler as best I could, and prayed to a god I hadn't spoken with since my dad kicked me out of the house.
The door slammed into the cooler. It tore a chunk of it away, and I was dumped onto the concrete pavers in a mess of fiberglass and plastic. I rolled onto my side, screaming all the way. Finally, I stopped moving and waited for either the gas or the fire to take me first. I could feel the warmth all over my back, the sirens filled my ears, and the cold breeze on my neck.
Breeze?
I opened my eyes.
Then immediately closed them as the sunlight nearly blinded me.
I opened my good, unpatched eye, and from my vantage point, I could see the emergency exit door, the field of debris left over from our escape, and a row of over-watered rose bushes blowing in the wind. I tried to stand up, and suddenly found myself in the grip of two larger men.
"Easy there, pal." One of them said, "We're county fire and rescue, are you injured?"
I proceeded to throw up all over the jacket of a very hunky firefighter.
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