White Flag of the Dead Read Online Free PDF Page B

anyone in the cars. I moved through my neighborhood without incident, although I swear I could see something moving in the backyard of the guy who lived at the end of the block. I pulled into my garage and quickly closed the door. I pulled a now-sleeping Jacob from his car seat and moved him quickly inside. I carried him upstairs and laid him in his crib, then went downstairs to close the blinds and drapes on the ground floor. I didn’t want to announce my presence to anything unfriendly, not until I had taken some precautions. As I closed my front drapes, I noticed a dark figure moving down the street towards my house. My heart skipped as I thought, He knows someone’s here . I ran to my ammo store and reloaded the empty magazine in my SIG. I went to the pantry and retrieved the .22, checking the magazine and making sure a round was in the chamber. I went back to the window and surreptitiously watched the dark figure slowly become more recognizable. It was a man, roughly my age, limping slowly down the middle of the street. His mouth hung open and his hands were swinging at his sides. He walked with an almost hypnotic gait, edging ever closer to my house.
    Suddenly, Jake started crying. I ran to his room and picked him up, trying to get him to go back to sleep. His cries were unusually loud, and as I peeked out the window I saw the man move closer and closer to the house.
    “Please, baby, please be quiet.” I whispered as I bounced Jake gently. “Sleepy time, daddy’s here.” I wondered if he had a nightmare about that horrible face trying to get through the back window of the car.
    I looked out again and the man was closer, his head cocked to the side as if he was locking in on my home. Christ, if he started pounding on the doors he was going to attract more of them.
    “Jakey, sleep honey, sleep.” I tried to sound as calm as possible, but an edge was getting into my voice. We’re so dead . I thought.
    Jake finally quieted down to subdued whimpering and I snuck a look outside. As the dead man came within ten yards of the front of my house, out of the east came a kid on a bike, pedaling like the very demons of hell were on his tail. He swerved away from the corpse on the street and headed west, dodging an outstretched hand and groaning mouth. The corpse turned to follow the biker, completely losing interest in my house. I nearly fell over in relief.
    That was interesting. They follow what they want until distracted, then they follow that. Might be useful to remember. I stayed at the window, looking out and managed to see what the kid on the bike was running from. A crowd of about twenty of those things came shambling down the street, in various states of decay and disrepair. Several had large amounts of blood down the front of their clothing, others were missing fingers and eyes and pieces of flesh. One particularly gruesome specimen had his lower jaw ripped off, and his tongue lolled around in the air under his face. Where were they all coming from? Why wasn’t the news reporting this? I had to resist the urge to run out and hose down the mob. I knew I would be overwhelmed and killed, and what would happen to Jake then? No, caution was better. Besides, I needed to think about reinforcing my windows.
    Where was I going to find enough wood to build a barrier? I certainly was not going back to the home improvement store, and I sure wasn’t going to leave Jacob. What to do? I pondered this as I looked out my back window at the bike path that ran along the power line easement behind my house. The condominiums across the way looked peaceful enough, but part of me wondered what nightmares awaited in the halls. I hoped I would never have to find out. For a moment I considered my fence as a source of lumber, but dismissed that as foolish. I might need that seven-foot barrier if for nothing more than to be able to move unseen in my yard. I was never so glad that I insisted on reinforced support posts than I was right