Rescue

After Nelda had cooked us all a big dinner, we decided to sit around and swap stories. There was a family of four, who had escaped a Church full of zombies from Parowan, Nelda escaped a retirement home. She did not strike me as one who would have needed to have been in an old folks home. She could cook, she could move, she was still sharp as a tack. "Nelda, if you don't mind me asking, why were you in a retirement home?" I asked after a short pause. "Well, I couldn't take care of my husband by myself anymore, he had Alzheimer disease." She looked down for a moment, "He passed away this morning, almost everyone did." The man who had escaped the church put his hand on Nelda's shoulder giving it a reassuring squeeze. "Thanks Bother Todd." Nelda smiled sadly at the ceiling trying to hold tears back. "God still has work for you, don't give up yet Sister Nelda." He responded getting up and grabbing his scriptures, "Anyone, who wishes to pray with me, you are welcome to join me." He knelt in a quiet corner and began to pray. His wife and two young daughters joined him, kneeling in a circle and holding hands.Nelda pulled her chair into the circle, smiling apologetically. "I can't kneel anymore, but I would still like to pray."
There were seven survivors who spent the first night of the zombie Apocalypse in the very first safe house. We had all suffered a loss, or many losses. Even though we came from seemingly different worlds, we were all thrown together, but by what? I couldn't get that thought out of my mind. I couldn't sleep not knowing the cause for the dead coming back to life. Was it judgement day as Brother Todd had put it in his prayers? I finally gave up trying to sleep and headed for the computer, maybe there was some news of how this outbreak started.
I had left the youtube page up where we had uploaded our safehouse announcement. It was up to 1800 views all across the world. Was the entire world overrun with zombies? And if it was, how are we supposed to survive 8.5 billion dead people who all want to kill us? I had begun to feel hopeless as I browsed morbid stories of how Americans all across the U.S were fighting for their lives, and losing. The comments on my video were almost 3 pages long, but one stood out to me like a beacon of flashing red lights, it read:
"If you get this in time we need HELP We are stuck in the Armory on Bulldog Rd. They are all pounding on the doors and windows, I don't know how much longer our barracads will hold...Please Help us"
They had sent this message 15 times since 9pm, I glanced at the clock it was only 11pm we might still have time. As I was thinking this they sent another comment letting me know for sure that they were still there. I carefully made my way back through the sleeping bodies of the survivors who had made it to the saferoom. I shook James gently, whispering in his ear, "We have a rescue mission on our hands, are you in?" I could see the small night light, we had found for Brother and Sister Todd's girls shinning off his eyes. He nodded and began getting up quietly. We carefully picked our way back out to the main area of the Saferoom. "So whats this about a rescue mission?" James asked yawning slightly as he began lacing his combat boots up. I pulled up the page with the Help notes, showing James. He nodded again and grabbed his weapons readying  his weapons for the upcoming battle. "You are going to need the van." We both jumped at Brother Todd's sudden break into our silence. "I can't promise to come with you, my wife would have my head." He handed me a set of Ford keys. "Just be ready to let us back in." James stood up, and threw his belt on. Looking at me now he asked, "Are you ready?" I took a deep breath and nodded "ready as I will ever be."  We walked to the door and said our goodbyes to Brother Todd, in case we didn't make it back. I handed my keys to him, "Here for just in case, but we should be back in an hour or less." He nodded taking the keys and shutting the door to the safehouse. We headed out front where Todd's Van was parked next to my car. It had a little bit of a lift to it, and a large push bar on the front. James walked around it exclaiming "Now this is a vehicle for a rescue! Can I drive?" I threw him the keys and jumped in the passenger side. He whooped and jumped in the front seat, starting the van, he backed over some zombies that had started shuffling our way. "Ok where are we going?" He asked slowing down a little, to swerve towards a few zombies who would get too close. I gave him directions to the Armory and we set off to go rescue some survivors. Most of the businesses along the way, were either catching on fire, or already burned to the ground. The bowling alley, I had grown up going to was nothing more than a smoldering pile of rubble and ashes. There were a few zombies stumbling around the rubble as if they were just as shocked as I was, that it was gone. It took us about 20 minutes to arrive at the surrounded armory. We stopped a little ways back, we needed a plan. We ran a few plans around like drive by shooting till they were gone, or perhaps park against the door and load the survivors up that way. We were still running some ideas around in our heads, when in the fences off yard connected to the building, someone flicked the lights of a hummer on then off. We looked at each other for a moment and began rolling up to the gate at the fence. James turned his headlights off then on. The fence began to open. I grabbed my shotgun and rolled my window down. "Get us in, I will keep them out." I nodded towards the zombies that had been alerted by the scraping of the gate against the gravel. I climbed through my window and to the top of the van. I picked the closest zombies off, and kept them at a safe distance while we waited for the gate to finish opening. As soon as it was open enough for James to fit through. As soon as we were in, he jumped out of the van and took out the remaining zombies with a rifle that Brother Todd had traded him for his shotgun.
As soon as the gate shut we headed for the hummer, that had flashed its lights at us, but whomever was inside had left for safer ground when they opened the gate for us. James sat on the running board of a large transport vehicle and reloaded his weapons, I paced around the yard, looking for weak spots in the chain link, or for any signs of life. Ten minutes passed, I headed back where James had sat himself. He was sharpening his machetti, while looking around. "Someone had to have opened the gate for us." He spit on his wetstone, and ran it the length of the blade as if he were creating art. "Found this wetstone on the floor board of this truck." He explained shrugging as he ran it along the length of his blade again. I headed towards the building looking for some sort of door. There was a yellow ladder suspending from the roof of the building. "Hey I'm gonna go check it out." I called back to James as I yanked on the ladder to test its stability. I hate ladders, not because heights scare me, but because I know it will hurt if I fall down. As I climbed I looked over the yard looking for any possable signs of zombies learning how to hop fences. I heard a loud click as I was doing so, and it seemed for a moment that the fence had light up. I looked down at James, he was looking around at the fence as well now. He pocketed the wetstone, and headed for the ladder. "Hey hurry up and get up there, I don't wanna be in the yard alone too long." He was looking up at me with a worried look now. If the people we had come to save, were zombies or almost zombies, this electric fence would stop us from escaping. I hurried the rest of the way up the ladder. Pulling myself onto the outer ledge of the roof, someone or something grabbed me and flung me to the ground. The only thing I saw was the sadistic glint of the barrel of a gun in my face. I raised my hands slowly, "Um...Hi we got your message, we are here to help." There was a pause, then a deep cold voice said, "We?" At that moment James clambered over the side of the building, cursing under his breath. "Yea we, now show your rescuer a little more respect than that Sterling."
I looked between the man who was holding a gun to my head, and James. The cold voice responded "How do I know you aren't infected?" "Well, for one, we drove here, I haven't seen any zombies who can drive yet." He put his hand on the barrel of the gun, and pushed it down. Helping me up, I asked "You know him?" Laughing he responded "Yea, we served in Iraq together." I was a little dumbstruck, I had no idea James had been military. "I'm Amber." I held my hand out for Sterling to shake, he looked at it coldly then turned and walked through a door. "Well he's just a ray of sunshine isn't he." I looked at James as I said this, I could see his eyes twinkle with amusement, but all he did was nod his head and follow him inside.