Anno Zombus Year 1 (Book 3): March by Dave Rowlands

stood on one corner, the sight of which excited Doctor and Nurse quite a bit.  They jabbered at one another in Japanese as they went over to peer in through the windows.  Our guide told them to go ahead and have a look inside, if they wanted, which of course they did.  Several kids ran around in the gloom, one of them coming up to me to ask if my sword was real.  I drew it to show him, and a bell rang out from the school while he stared at it in awe.  Another kid pulled him away, saying that they had better not be too late tonight or they'd get in trouble again.  The guide explained that the kids had a curfew, as occasionally a few Dead might break through one of the barricaded side streets.  They only had the chained Dead at their main entrance, to deter potential threats.  Other streets had varying degrees of defence, and defenders both.
     
    Just as I was about to sheathe my blade, a scream emanated from somewhere ahead of us, ending in a gurgle as the throat was torn from the victim.  “Dead inside the perimeter!”  Came the cry, and I rushed towards the sounds, not caring who followed.
     
    Several dozen Dead had broken down a chain-link fence at the end of an alley, many of them hunched over the still twitching corpse of their first victim, chewing away.  Far more had, by now, noticed that there were more possible meals around, and shuffled in our direction.  Charging into the Dead, Foreman at my side swinging his mighty hammer, I sliced and cut, removing a couple of Dead heads by accident, mostly hacking into their skulls.  In moments the Dead lay still, the barely living woman they had torn apart whispering for someone to kill her as she was taken away by a couple of volunteers, the rest jumping to work repairing the fence.
     
    Our guide told us that he had never seen as large a group of Dead as the one we had just put down, not since the first few days in the heart of the city.  He had managed to make it to the school, had broken in and was the first person to have had a conversation with The Principal.  They had made the first barricade themselves, a couple of locals coming out of the woodwork to help upon seeing some movement outside that was not Dead coming to eat them.  Usually only three or four at a time might make it in, or somebody from The School might die.  Apocalypse Girl told him that they'd likely be seeing a few more in the near future, citing that huge explosion from The Think Tank as a reason the Dead would likely investigate.  Noises meant food to the Dead, after all.
     
    The ten of us, Doctor and Nurse having rejoined us shortly after our encounter with the Dead, were led off to a pair of houses near to The School itself, which lay at the heart of this territory, five square blocks of peace in the heart of Dead Melbourne.

March 12Year 1 A.Z.
    morning
    Though we set a watch up overnight, it was hardly necessary.  It made getting to sleep easier, knowing that Redbeard and Firecracker were making sure we weren't going to be eaten or worse as we slumbered.  The watch that Apocalypse Girl and I had shared last night had been as uneventful as ever, other than hearing the sounds of copulating couples in the distance.  That in itself had been unusual.  On those rare occasions where Apocalypse Girl and I … well … let's just say that we had learned the value of silence.
     
    We gathered in the street, those few of us that had decided we were definitely moving on, and those who had come this far with us.  The Guide from the previous day, our captor, waved at us from across the street, gesturing at us to join him.  Breakfast this morning was canned fruit, not a wonderfully inspiring meal perhaps, but reasonably nutritious for all that.
     
    Shortly after our meal, as Firecracker was relating our flight from The Think Tank through thousands of hungry Dead, The Principal arrived, stepping lightly through the snow to greet us with a smile.  He asked me to walk with him a while,