Undead Menagerie by A.M. Geever

Author:A.M. Geever [Geever, A.M.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: ZBZ-1 Press

CHAPTER 26

MIKE

“What do we do now?” Imogen said.

That’s the million-dollar question, Mike thought.

Imogen’s words hung in the silence. The bodies of Jennifer and the other woman were gone, locked in a room off the main clinic. Apart from those in the room, only Erick, one of the two surviving police officers still at the zoo besides Sandy, and Imogen’s friend Zach, knew what had happened.

Zach hovered near Imogen in a way that Mike approved of, but first he’d organized cleaning up. The rest of them had been too out of it to get their collective act together. Zach had sent Mike, Imogen, and Peter to get showers in the locker room down the hall, for all of them had been covered in the red-black blood. Clean scrubs had been waiting for them. Shoes, too, and a row of paper coffee cups filled with steaming instant cocoa that he’d insisted everyone drink. Something about sugar helping after a shock.

They huddled together near the doorway to the hall, as far as they could get from where they’d killed Jennifer and the nameless woman and still be inside the clinic; they didn’t want to be overheard should someone come down. Kevin kept glancing over his shoulder, as if to confirm that no more dead people were going to attack. Jay paced back and forth. Every so often Sandy snapped at him to stop it.

“I don’t know about the rest of you, but I’m getting the elephants and getting out of here,” Peter said.

Sandy raked her fingers through her hair and tugged on the ends. “Are you sure, with what’s out there?”

Peter shrugged. “The only thing different about our situation is we know they’re dead and the bites are doing it. The trip isn’t any more dangerous… I just understand the consequences better. There still isn’t enough food here for my elephant in the long term. I’m not watching her starve.”

“What if you don’t make it?” Sandy persisted.

Peter started patting at his scrubs for a pocket with cigarettes that weren’t there. “I’m not worse off, and neither is Cammy. I’ll tell ya one thing for free,” he added, abandoning the fruitless cigarette search. “It’s not gonna get better here. Stay or go, you’re gonna need more food and supplies. There’s not enough at the zoo for the long term. It’ll be dangerous to get to what’s left in houses and apartments with the number of people there were before this started. You might as well try to get somewhere that had less people to begin with.”

Sandy nodded, but her mouth formed a moue that showed she didn’t like the idea. “The city only—” A bitter laugh burst from her. “Only has a population of three hundred thousand, but the metro area is at least a million.”

“More like two,” Jay said, pacing again.

“It’s getting out of here that’ll be the hardest part,” Peter said. “Too many narrow two-lane roads and the bridges will be jammed for sure. If Allegheny River Boulevard is clear up to the pumping station at Nadine Road, we might get to Monroeville and get on the Turnpike there.

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