Dead Series (Book 3): A Little More Alive by Sean Thomas Fisher

down on him, his shadow falling over Calvin like a cold
black wind. “This isn’t a game, Calvin, and it sure as hell isn’t a movie. A
screwdriver isn’t going to do shit to those things out there!”
    Calvin held his
hands out and backed against the wall, an uneasy smile shaping his lips.
“Actually, it’s a TV show but yeah, man, totally. I hear you, fo sho.”
    Paul pointed to
the locked double doors without taking his hardened eyes from Calvin. “Things
will happen out there that will change you forever and there is no taking it
back. There is no reset button.”
    “I’m not afraid.”
    Tipping his chin
down, Paul’s voice fell to a grave whisper. “You will be, Calvin.”
    Calvin shrunk
against the wall and swallowed dryly. “We just want to do the right thing and
be of some help, but this Billy guy is a flat-out…”
    “Bees!”
    Maria’s voice was
high-pitched and laced with panic, cutting the room in two. Paul’s head snapped
around to the two men in bloody fatigues standing in the open double doorway
leading to the restrooms down the hall. Heart jerking, his eyes located the M4
on a table all the way across the room. Sinuously peeling the Beretta from the leg
holster strapped to his thigh, he stomped closer to the skinny corpses, coming
to a standstill when three more appeared behind them. Taking out the first two
with pinpoint accuracy, he backpedaled when a half a dozen cadavers stumbled from
the hallway and entered the cafeteria. A high-pitched shriek rang out behind
the pack of undead, hurting Paul’s ears over the chorus of gunfire and screams going
off around him. Widening his stance, he brought three more flesh-eaters to the
floor, clearing a path for the fat woman standing behind them. Sprinting from
the hall, she blazed past Paul and tackled Maria onto a table. Sliding across
the smooth surface, it tipped, sending them careening into a wall. Calvin
screamed out his wife’s name and took off running, handgun pumping in his fist.
    Paul turned just
in time to deflect a gray-haired man wearing stripes on his sleeves,
redirecting the officer’s momentum into a table and chairs with a quick kick to
the face. The man’s legs tangled with some chair legs, giving Paul plenty of
time to blow the back of his head out through his mouth. On the other side of
the room, a soldier pulled Rebecca’s arm to his pointy teeth. She screamed and
tried to yank away. Wendy took aim at the man’s head but didn’t fire, swinging
the gun back to the peeling mob shuffling closer instead. A burst of heavy gunfire
peppered the air and Calvin released a painful sounding cry. Paul barely heard
him over Rebecca’s screams as the man tore a chunk of flesh from her wrist.
Veins dangled over his lips like Ramen noodles and Paul put a long-distance slug
through his neck that left his head hanging by a thread. Calvin screamed Why? over and over and over again, pulling
Paul’s panic-stricken gaze to the fat woman lying on top of Maria. He dashed over,
terrified of what he would find.
    “I shot her! I
shot her!”
    For a moment, he
wasn’t sure who Calvin was referring to until he rolled the heavyset corpse off
Maria. Recoiling, his eyes drew to the bullet hole in Maria’s left cheek.
    “Shit!” Calvin
turned and opened fire on the stream of undead funneling in from the restrooms,
his entire body pulsating with each punishing round. “You fuckers!”
    Paul noticed two
stragglers in uniform disappear into the kitchen and heard Billy’s subsequent
cries for help. “Shit,” he breathed, darting around the metal lunch line to
find Billy backing away with his hands cuffed behind him. The man and woman
limped closer, moaning like they were in constant pain and backing Billy up against
a wire shelf stocked with pots and pans. Running to find an angle that wouldn’t
get Billy killed with an errant shot like Maria, Paul wasted four rounds and
dropped them at Billy’s feet.
    Billy looked up, eyes
bulging. “Holy fucking