Dismemberment - Book One: The World We Once Knew

Chapter 7: Silence

While Monique and Cait were in the auditorium, Ben made his way toward the cafeteria. As he walked through the halls, he thought to himself about the abuse he had taken in previous years. He thought about the time that Brad cornered him in the locker room and pissed on his face. He thought about the time that the cheerleaders spray-painted the word “faggot” on his locker. He thought about his dad’s gun currently holstered at his hip. He thought about the people back at the lounge. “These were the first people to treat me with some sort of humanity. Well, it was more from Cait than the others, but still. I now have people I want to protect,” he thought to himself.
    The school was absolutely silent for the first time in forever for Ben. The only other people in the hallways with him were dead. Ben stepped over the bloodied bodies, and if any of them were to move, they would get stabbed through the eye by Ben’s javelin spear. Ben focused his attention to the lockers. Large dents and blood stains littered them. Ben stopped when he came across his locker. The faded spray paint was now completely covered in someone else’s blood. The person that the blood belonged to lay on the floor next to the locker. His entrails were torn out of his stomach, leaving his intestines strewn about. Numerous bite marks could be seen on his skin and organs. Ben shuddered at the horrid sight, and kept moving.
    After two more minutes of walking, Ben at last reached the cafeteria. The glass doors to the large room were completely smashed out, which littered the floor in broken, bloody glass. Ben stepped into the cafeteria to find that most of the tables were absent, leaving a large, open floor. A sedan had driven through the window earlier in the day, leaving a large opening for the zombies to enter through. Dozens of zombies were crowded around the car, and as soon as one saw Ben, the rest did too. The growling and snarling grew louder as the undead inched closer and closer to Ben. He readied his spear in an attacking stance. Before the zombies could get any closer, Ben heard a voice coming from the kitchen. “Hey, you! Get in here if you don’t want to get eaten!” the voice said. Ben turned around and ran toward the kitchen door, before entering the kitchen and locking it.
    Ben backed away from the door as soon as he heard banging from the other side. “Don’t worry. The door will hold,” the person said. Ben turned around to see an Asian boy around his age carrying a large knife. He had jet black hair, wore a white dress shirt, black khakis, and running shoes. The Asian boy extended his hand out to Ben. “My name is Kato. Nice to meet you,” he said calmly. Ben shook his hand. “My name’s Ben,” he replied. Kato put his knife away and sat down on a wooden chair. “The good things about the cafeteria are that there is a lot of food and a lot of sharp shit to defend yourself with,” he said while cracking open a soda and pulling up another chair.
Ben sat down and Kato handed him a drink. Ben opened it and took a sip, only for the carbonation of the drink to burn his throat and make him gag. Kato laughed as he saw this. “Don’t drink soda often?” he asked in a joking manner. Ben shook his head from side to side before setting the drink down. “Is there another exit in this kitchen?” he asked. “Nope,” Kato replied. “All barricaded.” Ben started to get nervous. “So how do you expect to get out of here exactly?” he interrogated. Kato drank the last of his soda and crushed the can, before throwing it into the recycling bin. “Wait for them to forget that we are here, man,” Kato replied nonchalantly. “In the meantime, why don’t you tell me your story?” Kato asked Ben. Ben looked to the floor and scratched his head. “Y-you first,” Ben responded.
Kato put his feet up on a pizza oven. “Well, I moved here from China a month back. I was taught English alongside Chinese because my parents wanted to escape the Communist dictatorship. We fled to America last month, and they are trying to become citizens. That is, if they’re still alive. I’m worried about them. They have my little sister too. I really hope that they’re okay,” Kato rambled. “How old is your sister?” Ben inquired. “She’s thirteen. Three years younger than me. Her name is Mia,” Kato brings his knife out and looks at his reflection through the steel. “I’ve sworn on my grandfather’s grave that I would always protect her. I need to get out of this school as soon as possible,” he said.
Ben shifted his position in his seat. “Well, I’ve got a group of people in the teacher’s lounge who are rounding up survivors. We plan on getting out of here. Want to come along?” Ben asked, extending his hand out. Kato raised his eyebrow and gave Ben a stern look. “How do I know I can trust you? I barely know you,” Kato stated bluntly. Ben put his hand down. “What’s it going to take for you to trust me then?” Ben asked. Kato thought about it for a little. “Well, you could tell me your story now, since I told you mine,” Kato said. Ben took a deep breath. “Very well,” he muttered.
“I’ve lived in this town my whole life. Despite this, I never had any actual friends. Most people avoided interacting with me. The first half of my schooling was lonely. However, had I known what was in store next, I would have taken the loneliness again in a heartbeat. The ostracization turned into bullying. Since the seventh grade, I’ve been bullied relentlessly. I’ve been beaten up, spit on, called horrible names, been stolen from. Hell, even the fucking teachers ignored my cries for help! So yesterday morning, I made a dark plan. I stayed up all night planning it out. I plotted to take my dad’s gun to school and shoot as many people as possible, before killing myself,” Ben said, starting to cry. Upon hearing this, Kato’s eyes widened. “However, that isn’t the end of the story,” Ben continued. “I brought my dad’s pistol in. Snuck it in my bookbag. When the homeroom bell rang was when I planned on doing it. But I fell asleep. When I woke up, that’s when I saw that everything was destroyed and corpses were walking around. I didn’t understand it at first. I looked around the room to see if anyone else was there. There was one other person there, and that person was my main bully. He was one of them, but I didn’t know it yet. When he lunged at me, I put him down like a sick dog!” At this point, Ben sobbed uncontrollably. His own story was getting to be too much for him. After three minutes, he tried his best to collect himself. “After that, I went into the hallways and saw that these monsters once called students were trying to kill me. I ran and ran until I reached the teacher’s lounge, where I found the other survivors. Now, we’re trying to help people out of here.” Ben wiped the tears away from his face and stood up from his chair. Kato stood up as well and put his hand on Ben’s shoulder. “I’m so sorry, man. You’ve had it pretty rough from the sound of it,” he said. Ben chuckled. “Coming from the guy who fled Communist China?” They both shared a laugh.
Kato walked over to the corner of the room and grabbed a gym bag. He proceeded to load it with as many cans of food as possible. When it was full, he zipped it up and threw it over his shoulder. “Can’t wait to meet your people, Ben,” Kato said. “Let’s get going.” Ben nodded and readied his spear in case any zombies were still at the door. Kato readied his knife in a chopping position and unlocked the door. He slowly opened it and peeked out at the cafeteria. The zombies were once again crowded around the car. Kato motioned to Ben to follow him, and the two silently snuck out of the kitchen.
They kept low kneeling to the ground. They made it halfway before Ben tripped on a divot in the floor. A zombie noticed the noise of Ben tripping, and alerted other zombies with a roar. “Oh shit!” Ben exclaimed. “What do we do now?” As Ben looked to Kato, they both noticed a trail of gasoline leading from the car to their current spot. At that moment, an idea manifested in Kato’s head. He opened his gym bag and pulled out a knife sharpener. As he slid his knife against the stone, it produced sparks. He held the sharpener low to the ground, and sparked a flame in the gas. “Haul ass!” Kato screamed. The two boys ran out of the cafeteria as a trail of flames led to the car. Once the fire reached the vehicle, it promptly exploded.
The boys covered their ears upon hearing the loud noise. They looked back at the car to find that every zombie near it was blown to pieces. “Hell yeah, that was badass!” Ben exclaimed. The flaming car caused the sprinklers to go off along with the fire alarm. Loud blaring could be heard throughout the halls, stirring every zombie from their perceived slumber. Kato turned to Ben. “We have to turn that alarm off!” Kato yelled. “Don’t worry,” Ben said. “I have people going to the main office. They’ll take care of it. Let’s just get back to the teacher’s lounge.” As they decided their next move, zombies turned the corner of the hallway. “Shit, that’s our only route back,” Ben stated, pulling out his gun. “We’ll have to fight our way through. There’s not too many of them anyway. We can take them.” Kato readied his knife and gave off a smirk. “Let’s do this.”