Chapter 11, Clearing Zombies

Kristy looked around. "We're going to stay close together but maybe we should tie ourselves together to make Jumping back here easier?" Kristy suggested.

Matty pulled a wad of five fifty cord from his cargo pants pocket. He did prepare for the apocalypse; he just wasn't great at the weapon portion.

He walked around us leaving just enough slack to stay four inches off the floor and tied the string to everyone's belt loops on our pants. Brenda was not wearing Jeans so he made a belt of rope around her.

"This will work well." Richard commented picking two of the weapons he had chosen with straps and putting them on.

They had decided earlier they would switch weapons when they ran out of bullets from the first one. When they were out of bullets for the second they would give the code word red.

Once someone said they were red on bullets Kristy would pop them into the space and everyone would reload and take a drink or break before coming back out.

No one knew which of us would run out of bullets first. Red was used in case there are survivors in the apartment. they don't want to say space.

Hearing the word also let them stop firing if they still had bullets to not waste bullets firing them in the space.

They put ear prow in their ears to protect them, Kristy wished she had done so earlier. bullets were loud.

"Ready?" Richard asked.

"Ready." the others nodded and replied

Kristy counted off "3,2,1" and jumped out of the space.

Their configuration was a little skewed to make room for them all to fire at the zombies.

Bang, Bang, Bang.

"What about the doors?" Matty yelled to be heard.

"There could be living people in there." Brenda yelled back.

Bang, Bang. They continued to shoot the zombies coming into the hall from the stairs. While slowly advancing down the hall.

"But if there are zombies in there and they rip through the door we will have zombies coming up behind us." Matty yelled to talk over any possible gunshots. "It will be hard to cover our backs with this many coming from the front."

"We should not break into people's homes if they are using the door to keep the zombies out." Richard yelled.

"Knock on the door and ask them to say something if they are alive. Matty is right we don't have enough of us to secure our rear if we move down. And if we stay here the dead will pile up and make seeing our target harder." Kristy Yelled "if they talk leave the door alone if they don't talk there could be zombies in the bedrooms break the door down!"

Matty went to the first door from the roof access and knocked on the door loudly.

Bang, Bang!

"If anyone is living inside, please speak loudly!" Matty yelled.

With how loud they were speaking everyone living on this floor should have heard their conversation and know what they were planning and why.

"The living are in here." a yell came from behind the door Matty had knocked on.

"Thanks for responding." Brenda yelled. "To the next door."

They continued down the hallway. Knocked on the door. Before Matty could ask if there was someone living, the door started to shake with growling noises.

"The dead are behind this door." Matty yelled

"Back up, I'll blow up the door." Kristy yelled she is the only one with some knowledge of manna control.

Boom! Bang, Bang, Bang, Bang!

When the door went down three zombies had fallen over each other to get out and they were shot down.

"Three dead down, check bedrooms, clear the Apartment." Richerd called out.

"Living area and kitchen clear"

"First bedroom clear"

"Second bedroom is clear."

"The hall has zombies coming up, move a little quicker guys!" Kristy yelled. They had to move together because of the rope which slowed them down.

"Bathroom clear" they shuffled through the rooms a little clumsy due to the cord but adjusted to it as they went.

"Pantry clear." The apartment is all cleared. move, move, move." Richard gave the move out. They went back to the apartment door and into the hall. There were nine new zombies coming at them in the hallway.

Bang, bang, bang. the gunshots rang loudly through the hall.

"To the next door." Brenda yelled.

Brenda knocked on the door this time. "We're alive!" a yell came from the door.

"Thanks" Brenda yelled "to the next door."

Richard smiled as his kids were finding hunting zombies fun. Well shooting is not so bad when you don't know who they are.

They started to move down the hall to the next door and the door they just passed opened. Two men with nine-millimeter pistols came out the door and closed it behind them.

"We got your rear." they yelled over the fired bullets and took it upon themselves to fill the back line of their configuration.

This is where Kristy realized keeping her space secret would be impossible. These men would wonder how their weapons can hold so many bullets or that they're suddenly holding different weapons than they were before.

But they could use the help with the sheer number of zombies present here. And these men had good intentions.

It looked like they were trained. probably police officers as these were standard issued weapons.

"No need to go in each apartment any more, clear the hall down to the parking lot, we can clear individual apartments later." Richard yelled to the kids.

"Thanks for joining." Matty yelled to the new guys.

They could move down the hall faster now.

Brenda gave a look to Kristy, who nodded at her in response. Brenda understood they couldn't hide the space and Kristy was ok with that.

Making it to the end of the hallway they entered the stairwell down.

BANG! BANG! BANG!

They could hear the zombies roaring up the stairwell, the shooting attracting more as the zombies pushed each other up. The group moved forward at a slightly slower pace.

Reaching the fifth floor they chose to stay on the stairwell, as the zombies from that hall, and the zombies from the stairs were both forcing their way closer.

Kristy asked Matty "you have stairs on both sides?"

"Yes, people bring groceries up here, they need stairs on both ends" Matty retorted.

"If the zombies go up the stairwell and over to our side we have a problem." Kristy spoke.

"I guess we will have to move faster than them in that case." Richard responded.

"We're going to have to double clear, down one side up the other." the guy in the blue shirt, a suspected police officer, responded.

BANG, BANG, BANG, BANG!

They shot faster, Kristy walking before the others, kicking zombies into her space. Clearly not trying to hide it from the new comrades.

Removing the dead zombies made it easier to walk safely down the steps, the stairway seemed to open up the closer they got to the fifth-floor hallway.

"Red" Matty shouted, catching the attention of the two newcomers. The two not knowing what that meant.

"The new guys aren't connected!" Kristy yelled, Brenda fixing the situation as she reached out and grabbed both men by their shirts.

"Ready!" she yelled, the men looking even more confused.

Kristy popped them all into the garage, as she didn't want to expose her sanctuary. Mentally thinking of all the ammo and guns laid out from earlier, making them appear in the garage. The two newcomers looked around confused and shocked.

"What the hell is this? Where are we?" The one newcomer with a white t-shirt seemed outwardly bothered.

"A space, where time outside doesn't move." Matty stated.

"We can take a break to reload." Richard stated, grabbing the ammo to reload his own weapon.

Kristy opened the box with 9 mil ammo, passing it to the newcomers, who hesitantly took the box.

"So, you two officers?" Brenda asked, making small talk.

"Yes, so this space just stops time?" the blue shirted officer asked.

"Yes, some people have woken up with powers." Richard provided them with information, well handing them a bottle of water.

 "We should take a breath and reload." Kristy said.

Matty pulled out the end of the 550 cord, "lets attach you" he spoke, passing them the cord to tie it around themselves.

"Make sure to leave slack so you can move freely." Brenda piped up.

"Oh, before I forget. Red means you're out of ammo." Kristy stated. "When you hear someone shout that stop firing, we don't want to shoot things in the space."

After 5 more minutes, Kristy started counting down, before they all popped back on the end of the staircase.

BANG, BANG, BANG!

The firing started again.

"This is convenient!" John, the guy in the white shirt, shouted.

"It's also a very important secret!" Kristy shouted.

"What kind of secret do you tell everyone?" Sam, the guy in the blue, asked.

"The kind that's hard to hide!" Brenda responded.

'Kristy wondered if she was even able to keep it a secret. She didn't want people calling her a thief again and humiliating her but there were a lot of people out there and using her space was a part of who she was. Someone was bound to see her while gathering supplies, right?'

Going down the stairwell to the fourth floor. They continued in this fashion. Once they hit the fourth-floor zombies showed up above them on the stairwell. They must have come up the other set of stars before moving to this stairwell and heading down, Sam and John started shooting upwards. They were securing the Back as promised.

Five minutes later Sam was the first to yell Red and they popped into the space to reload.

Kristy loved how quickly these new helpers adapted to the situation and that they didn't ask unnecessary questions.

This was quick and efficient. The group of six continued to the ground floor in this fashion.

Kristy supplied Sam and John with more ammo but did not offer them a different weapon and they didn't ask for one.

When they got to the first floor the zombies had broken open the front door and were streaming through from outside. Well, the noise travels.

"Change of plans." Richerd yelled. "Move to the parking lot. Make the zombies come to us from the higher floors. Going up and down could take too long with a fresh stream coming in."

"Push through to the open area to give us more room to fire." Sam added

"We have to fire faster too because nothing will be blocking them from getting to us out there as well." Kristy was worried about too many zombies coming at them from all angels.

"We can form a circle." John suggested easing the burden.

"Not all of us are trained at shooting." Brenda piped up worried the area she was guarding would get overrun.

"We will form a slow circulating circle this way we're still technically moving and will make up for those who can't fire as quickly or accurately." Richard thought of a moving pattern while staying in place. They could not spread out too far to begin with since they were connected.

"Like a fan blade?" Matty asked to make sure he understood the plan.

"Yes!" Richard replied. "Move out!"

They got to the driveway and pushed forward "not this many people live here where did all these zombies come from?" Sam Questioned.

"It is the middle of the night and the sound of a gunshot can be heard from half a block away. There are two other apartments in this half a block, not to mention the roads and residential housing nearby." Kristy explained why there were so many zombies.

"Where not just clearing this complex, we are clearing half a block." Richard commented "every one of those things that can hear us are slowly coming our way and have been walking here since we started firing on the sixth floor."

"They are pretty slow." John acknowledged

"I just didn't think their sense of hearing was so strong." Sam admitted. They had been talking in their apartment and nothing had burst in but now they were coming from all around.

"This is why Bradly was surrounded when he left his house." John acknowledged their fellow officer that left his home to help people in the road he didn't make it back.

They had tried to contact the other officers when they had gotten up and noticed from the noises outside the apartment, and the media that the world had gone to shit.

Bradley's wife answered his phone and they were told he was torn apart in the street. The wife was too scared to leave the house so they were waiting for the military.

America has many people who own weapons and we are sure they went out to fight in this situation but can they measure up to these odds.

In the first few hours they could still hear screaming and cars driving by and gunshots but it had been hours since then it was dark out and the living were hunkered down somewhere quietly waiting out the night.

'Except these crazy people blowing up the roof door and clearing the apartment in the middle of the night.' If there were not so many of them with weapons John and Sam might not have chosen to help.

They fanned out a little as they were still tied together and made a good circle. Where they walked sideways pretending to be a fan aiming for anything they could see.

"Red." Brenda yelled they stopped firing and went into the space.

"Are we out of .44 mil ammo?" Matty asked as his box was getting low.

"Yes, it looks like that's the last of it. Want a different weapon?" Kristy asked "the shotgun is good for crowd control, aim for the chest, the kick back will shoot the beads to the head but it will get tiring and the ammo would need to be reloaded often."

"No, hand me the m16 and a couple of clips. Rapid shots are better." Matty said.

"I will switch to the shotgun." Brenda said. "I feel like I'm wasting far more bullets than I'm helping with. My aim is not good. I might fire less with the shotgun but I can get more zombies with the spray."

"Just remember to brace yourself before firing and keep the gun firmly on your shoulder or you will get a nasty bruise." Kristy told her handing her the new weapon she filled her jacket pocket with ammo.

"Can I use the M4?" Sam asked for Brenda's abandoned weapon; it was the same type that Kristy was using.

Brenda handed it to him and he happily reloaded the magazine.

"Pass me the extra 9 mil." John said to Sam. "I'm more comfortable with this weapon." Sam handed his gun to John who loaded both and placed one in his holster.

Richard was using an AR 15 with an extended bullet mod. so, he was going through ammo at a steady pace. But appeared to be happy with his weapon.

They went out to continue clearing. when the zombies stopped coming to the parking lot it would mean they cleared almost half a block. They were looking forward to finishing this. as it was past midnight, and adrenaline can only keep you not tired for a short while.

Kristy was not sure if she should be irritated or not but she knows these are police officers. This is not the world filled with mistrust that she has grown accustomed to. where everyone stabs each other in the back. These people were fresh from a civilized world. They had not gone months without good food. It had been less than a whole day of hell for them; they had not changed yet as she had.

Kristy wondered if she could trust people again or if she should even try.

15 minutes later the zombies stopped coming. "Finally!" Brenda yelled, rubbing her shoulder that was starting to bruise from failing to brace herself a few times.

"Don't get too excited." Richard said. "Those were the zombies that could move freely around and those strong enough to break doors down. Where not done."

"Are we going to keep going tonight?" Kristy asked them knowing they were tired.

"Zombies wonder, should we finish the trapped zombies while we can still make noise?" Matty asked. Thinking of this problem again tomorrow, having more zombies in this area.

"The rest of the zombies should not be in large groups or they would have broken doors to get here." Kristy said. "I suggest finishing after sleeping. We can use the stragglers and what is left to increase our combat skills. We won't always have ammo and in most cases, it is not smart to use a gun."

We disconnected the string that was typing us together occasionally shooting a wandering lone zombie.

"Let's get some sleep." Brenda agreed with Kristy's opinion.

They walked inside to see some living people started peaking their heads out of the door.

The group had been loud enough, and the parking lot could be seen from a window clearly. many people unable to sleep from fear or the noise had watched them take out the zombies.

"And so, it begins." Kristy said as they were walking.

"What begins?" Brenda asked.

"The scariest thing about the apocalypse is not the zombies, we know they want to eat us. It's the people, and how they respond to fear. Order has crashed too quickly. We will start to see the ugly dark side of people. Now they are not as scared to come out of their homes." Kristy said.

"I would like to think there is more to humanity than the panicked masses from a zombie movie. This is real life." John commented as they went up the stairs.

"If you're worried about your secret, don't be. when we got up, my wife had all the dirt from her potted plants floating around our dinner table." Sam comforted Kristy thinking she was worried that it was weird.

No one else had used powers in front of them.

This is why they didn't ask. they had experienced something weird already, and it was not the time to talk about it then.

"This is our floor." Matty said walking to his apartment door.

Sam handed Kristy the M4. "Ok, want to clear with us in the morning?" He asked them.

"Sure." Richard responded. "We will be at your door at 7:30. Do you think you can catch enough sleep by then or should we make it later?"

"7:30 is good even if we sleep. I doubt it will be restful enough to sleep in." John replied, nodding. John handed Sam back his weapon and the two continued up to the sixth floor.

Richard followed Matty into the house. "Shower and bed." he gave the order.

"I dib shower first." Brenda said and ran to the bathroom.

Richard sat on the carpet in the living room and tried to meditate back what he had used of his power during practice earlier.

Matty grabbed Kristy and started pointing at things to put in her space. He kept a change of clothes for everyone, mostly sweat pants because his clothes were still too big for the girls, and a towel for each of them.

Laughing at how his sister jumped in without a towel or fresh clothes.

When Brenda finished in the shower, she peeked her head out of the bathroom door to ask for a towel and clothes. Kristy handed them to her.

When she came out uncle Richard went into the shower. He had finished meditating and most of the apartment had been moved to the space.

"We should meditate too." Kristy told Matty who was double checking the now almost empty apartment, and Brenda who was using the towel to dry her hair. They sat down with her to meditate. Uncle Richard came out of the shower pretty quickly.

"Do you want to use a twin bed in the jet with Serenity, Matty's bed or the couch?" Kristy asked where he wanted to be sent in the space.

"The twin works fine." Uncle Richard picked. Kristy, handed him an extra blanket Matty had in his house and popped him into the space to sleep.

"I'll take a twin too." Brenda said standing up from meditating.

When both of them were settled in the space Matty said "Ladies first." suggesting she shower first.

"I'm not done meditating. I have three cores to fill. I need more time, you go ahead." Kristy was thankful for the thought he must have had to keep some warm water for her but she has fire manna, so she is not concerned about cold water.

Kristy may have been playing with the baby while they were practicing with their powers but she was also kicking dead zombies into her space as they walked and burning them up when she went in the space to refill ammo. The space used her time manna to spit them back out at the same time they went in. She had used a lot of manna between the three powers.

Not as bad as clearing the highway but uncle Richard only took like ten minutes to shower, this was not enough time for Kristy.

She finished meditating shortly after Matty got out of the shower he was drying his hair. "My Bed please." Matty asked to be sent to his bed. His dad had laid on it when he was hallucinating but it was not too messed up.

Kristy sent him in the space and went to shower herself. Finally, a change of clothes to wear.