The Rot: Book 2

Chapter 13

I heard the popping sound of Carter's assault rifle and the chain and lock of the front gates clattered around on the ground. Carter had shot off the lock and the front gates of the warehouse were now open.

The group and I ran back into the warehouse. Mick and Phil moved the heavy stack of cardboard in front of the back door. Angela ran to the front of the warehouse and tried to look outside and see what was happening.

"See anything, Angie?" I asked.

"No," Angie replied. "Reid, I don't have a weapon. What do I do?"

"Stick close to your sister or Janice, or my sorry ass."

Ang nodded. "Okay."

The garage door at the front of the warehouse began to shake. We didn't know if it was the camper group outside, or f it was the stenches.

"Get away from that door!" Mick yelled to Ang and I.

The whole group gathered around the center of the warehouse. I was staring at the garage door as it moved back and forth, hoping that the thing didn't give way. It did. Shit.

The garage door started to buckle inward. Lucky for us, it was held in place by the van being parked up against it. I could see from the rotted hands reaching inside of the warehouse that it wasn't the campers, it was the undead.

Then we heard the pushing and pounding on the back door of the warehouse. At least that door wasn't budging at all.

"Guys, we're trapped in here!" Angie shouted. She was starting to panic.

"Calm down, Ang," Cynthia told her sister.

"That's not too easy right about now."

"I know. But freaking the hell out isn't going to help matters."

The garage door came crashing down . The dead things pulled the door from its frame and it fell atop the van.

"Shit!" Mick yelled.

The corpses started to climb over the top of the van.

Janice and I broke from the group and ran over to the open doorway to deal with the eaters that were trying to get inside.

The first biter that made it over the van had the front of his face caved in by a shot from Janice's pipe wrench. The next biter that was still trying to crawl over the top of the van, reached out and he grabbed Janice by the top of her head. The dead thing had a whole handful of Janice's red hair, too.

"Reid!" Janice yelled.

I swung my axe at the undead creature's elbow, slicing its arm off. The dead guy flipped over the top of the van and landed on his back inside the warehouse. Before I could finish the dead thing off, Janice swung her wrench onto the top of the biter's head, cracking open its skull.

"Were these two the only ones out front?" Janice asked.

"Let me look," I responded. I jumped onto the side of the van and looked over the top of the vehicle. There were a few more dead things entering the lot, and of course, they saw me peering over the top of the van like Kilroy.

"There's more on the way," I said to Janice. Looking just beyond the open front gates, I could see into the vacant lot across the road from the warehouse. Carter and his lackeys were just standing there, watching the dead things get inside our hideout. "Son of a bitch," I muttered as I hopped down off of the van.

The dead things started to climb over the van again. This time, Mick joined Janice and myself in taking care of the eaters. For a weapon, Mick was using a large, silver chain with a padlock at the end that formed a loop. When one of the eaters made it over the van, Mick swung the looped chain and landed a shot on the side of the creature's head with the padlock. The undead guy fell face-first on the roof of the van and I finished it off with an axe blow to the back of its head.