She rolls her eyes, flushes and looks away. I shake my head with a smirk as Theo chuckles. Even Rhys manages to summon a small smile. But the amusement in the room turns to ash as something heavy slams against the door, causing the entire thing to groan and creak.
Rhys grimaces beside me. “I think we need to keep conversation to a minimum, at least until the sun rises,” he whispers.
Everyone nods in agreement.
Theo moves over to Ollie, takes her arm and pulls her to the other side of the room. She goes with him, her eyes wide with fear, and aslight tremor in her hands. Harlow sticks by her side, pressing her weight against her owner in a sweet attempt to calm her.
Once on the other side of the room, Theo pulls out his sleeping bag and places it on the ground. He indicates for her to sit, then rifles through his bag again until he finds a protein bar. He whispers something to her and it doesn’t take a genius to guess that he’s telling her to eat as he hands her the bar. Ollie hesitates for a moment before taking it while Theo finds his own food.
Following his lead, I go through my bag until I come up with a few protein bars and some jerky. I’ll save the food I was cooking earlier for tomorrow. If we survive. I hand over half of the food to Rhys before digging into the rest.
The silence is heavy in the room, a thick cloud of fear and dread that only gets worse with each moan, bang and scrape from the zombies on the other side of the door. It’s difficult to eat since my stomach is a mess of knots, but I force myself to finish the protein bar.
Once done, I shift to get comfortable on the hard tiled floor and settle in for what I’m sure is going to be a long night.
I’m not sure how,but I must fall asleep because the next thing I know, Theo’s shaking my shoulder.
“Hey, I think we’re good to go, mate,” he says as I blink up at him blearily.
On the other side of the room, Ollie packs away her stuff while Rhys stands next to Theo and checks his rifle. The moans and bangs from thenight before are gone and a faint trickle of light shines from beneath the door. Somehow, we survived the night.
I stagger to my feet and groan as the muscles in my neck and back protest the movement. Bloody hell, I feel like I got run over by a lorry.
“You okay?” Ollie asks as she sidles up to me, her green eyes creased with worry.
“Yeah, just sore. I’ll be fine.” I place a hand on her shoulder and give it a reassuring squeeze.
She bites her lip and nods.
Wincing, I stretch the muscles out before grabbing my supplies. By the time I’m slinging my bag onto my back, everyone else is ready and waiting.
“How do we want to do this?” Ollie asks as she peers at Rhys.
“Let me go first, with Theo following. Once I give the all clear, Ollie, you follow with Alex in the rear.”
Rhys turns to the door and glances at Theo before counting under his breath. On one, he unlocks and peers around the door, rifle ready. There’s no sound of movement, so he opens the door further and steps through. Theo follows behind, pistol drawn and ready.
I close the door behind him and wait. There’s a tense few seconds of no sound before it flies open and Theo beckons us forward.
Ollie steps out first, then stops and sucks in a sharp breath. I push her forward, needing to get out of the stiflingly small room and immediately do the same thing.
Because the supermarket is a complete mess.
The destruction a zombie horde can wreak shouldn’t surprise me, but I never expected it to be this bad. The toilet door is gouged with long claw marks and covered in blood and gore. Every window is destroyed,the shards of glass littering the ground glinting in the early morning sunlight. Every shelf from every aisle is in some kind of disarray, most having fallen on top of one another with food spilling out across the floor. Some shelves are nothing but splinters of wood and plastic covered in a thick layer of black and red gore. In fact, there’s gore everywhere, and the stench is enough to have my eyes watering and my stomach roiling with nausea.
Looking at the state of the supermarket, I’m stunned we survived the night.
“Come on, you two, we need to get moving. I want to get as far from this place and the horde as possible before nightfall,” Rhys barks at Ollie and me, since we’re both still gawking at the carnage.
I shake myself out of my shock and press my hand against Ollie’s back. “Let’s go get Bean.”
That rouses her from the stupor. “Shit, Bean.” She races off toward the front of the shop, glass and debris crunching beneath her boots. Rhys curses as he and Theo chase after her.
Before she can follow, I grab Harlow and pick her up. Much to the dog’s annoyance, as she grumbles at me and squirms. I chuckle as I stride through the broken glass and toward the exit. “Sorry, girl, but I don’t think you or your owner would appreciate glass in your paws.” She grumbles again but stops squirming, realising that there’s no way I’m letting her down.
Once out of the shop and away from the glass, I place her back down and she sprints toward Ollie. I jog after her, just as eager to put this nightmare of a place behind me.
After last night, I’m never going to look at a supermarket the same way again.
