Dead Stop - Dead Stop Part 20
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Dead Stop Part 20

She didn't have time to think beyond that.

The dead thing rose to its feet, the long strip of skin still hanging from its jaws, and Marisa tried not to look at the bloody wreck of her coworker at its feet. At the same time, Harley started to run towards the ghoul.

"Marisa!" he yelled, "The side door! You're going to have to close it!"

The monster charged, and Harley met it in a flying tackle just as it started to come over the wreckage of the counter. His greater mass drove the dead thing backwards and the two of them tumbled back over the mess, gripping and tearing at each other.

This left Marisa with a straight shot at the side door...other than for the savaged body of the store's last customer...the door still blocked open where Gladys used to enjoy her smokes.

She hesitated, torn between running for the door or rushing over to help the man fighting the dead thing on the floor. She knew he hadn't originally intended to get into a clinch with the horror. It had been forced on him by circumstances. Whatever advantages his fighting skills gave him on his feet might not translate into a wrestling match on the ground...especially with an unnaturally strong monster that bit, clawed, and didn't feel pain.

She raised her bat and took a couple of steps towards the struggling pair.

"No, Marisa! The door! The things outside are going to hear this noise and come back! Hurry!"

A quick glance at the front window confirmed this. Several snarling shapes were already visible coming between the cars of the parking lot in a headlong run towards the store. They would be there in seconds.

"Shit!" Marisa sprinted for the open door.

It stood propped open by a cracked cinder block Gladys used to prop her foot on while taking her breaks. She could see it swing away from the block even further at times as the wind caught it and pushed it wider. The driving rain flooded in, creating a reddened puddle that surrounded the corpse of Gladys's last customer and covered about a third of the store.

Marisa didn't dare take the time to negotiate around the body so she jumped it while at a dead run in the puddle. That didn't end up working out very well. She landed skidding towards the door, completely out of control. The tall girl fought to maintain her balance, then had her feet fly out from under her just as her hand closed on the metal handle.

"Goddammit!" she shrieked as she grasped the handle in a death grip and flailed to get her legs back under her as she continued to slide forward. Her momentum threatened to carry her out the door, and she realized there now existed the very real danger of the monsters coming around the corner of the store to find her sitting on her ass outside waiting for them.

No. She absolutely refused to die like that.

Water flew from where she splashed and slid in the open door. A heavy blast of rain hit her in the face, blinding her as she fought to stand. Things were getting worse by the second. Time was running out and if she didn't get this done fast then both her and Harley were dead. The struggling waitress realized she needed to forget about regaining her feet and just focus on getting the damn door closed.

Marisa lashed out in an effort to kick away Gladys's door prop and her sneakered foot flared with pain as it connected badly, but with enough force to knock the heavy brick over. It felt like she had broken at least one toe...maybe more. She pulled herself to her knees, biting back tears, then leaned backwards in a final effort to use her weight to drag the door shut.

It shut with a squeaky hiss, cutting off the noise of the storm outside.

She was safe...almost.

Marisa rammed the key into the lock and twisted it, just as the faint sounds of splashing footsteps announced the arrival of the predators outside. The bedraggled young woman didn't even look up, not wanting to see what would be glaring in through the door at her. Besides, she realized her problems weren't over yet.

A thunderous crash announced that Harley and the monster still fought behind the broken counter. At the same time, the slap of dead palms against glass drove home the fact that both her and the battle were visible to the monsters outside, and it was exciting the hell out of them. If she didn't do something damn quick, they were going to be in here...door or no door.

Marisa pulled herself to her feet with a whimper.

Her foot hurt like the devil itself, and in the process of getting up she discovered her hip hurt as well. She had no doubt she was going to be sporting a major league bruise there, probably acquired when she initially slipped and hit the floor. The fact her clothes were now sopping wet was just icing on the cake.

She scooped the bat up from where she had dropped it when she lost her balance, and tried to use it as a makeshift cane as she tottered away from the door. It wasn't really the right size for the job and she decided it would be faster to just hobble in misery.

"Hang on, Harley," she groaned, "I've got to knock those lights out and then I'll be back."

"Good idea," he gasped. "I'll be right here."

He and his opponent came into view as she limped further into the store. Harley had solved the biting problem by somehow stuffing a leather bank pouch from the busted cash register into the creature's mouth while holding its head against the floor with one forearm. He had his legs wrapped around its middle and one arm, and was struggling to keep the other from grabbing him. A ragged gash ran down his forearm and blood covered his shirt.

"The doc wasn't kidding," he continued through gritted teeth. "These bastards are hellaciously strong! I'll hold this guy, but you might want to make it quick."

Marisa nodded and turned to head up the aisle towards the lights...

...when the store went dark again.

"What the hell?" Harley's strained voice cut through the dark.

"Mierde!" Marisa snapped. "Now what?"

Then the obvious explanation hit her...Stacey must have turned off the alarm. The main control panel for it was in the back hallway next to the storeroom. Both of them knew how to reset it since at least once a month a kid or some drunk would push open the fire door by mistake. It was just another exciting feature of the job.

This time, the surprising new development wasn't a disaster in the making.

On the other hand, that meant it was time for her to join the fight with the man-eating, killer corpse.

The question was, what could she do?

Marisa was no wilting wallflower, but her mother had not raised an idiot. She had no illusions of jumping into a fracas between a deadly monster and a trained fighter.

She had done it with Deke because she hadn't had time to think about it, and Deke was losing the fight anyway. But this was different. Harley had fought the thing to a standstill, and she was scared of doing anything that might put him at a disadvantage again. At the same time, she remembered Deke and Stacey both talking about how these things didn't tire and realized a standstill already put Harley in trouble. She needed to do something, but she didn't know what.

In the end, she opted on asking the expert.

"Harley?" She squinted at the dark shape of the two combatants struggling on the floor. Without the light, she didn't dare swing for fear of hitting him instead of the creature. "How can I help? Just tell me what to do. Should I go get the others?"

"Nope," he grunted. "That wouldn't do much but risk getting the others hurt...and it ain't necessary."

"You sure?"

"Yep. I'm sure. You still got the bat?"

"Yeah, but it's hard for me to see. I'm scared of hitting you by mistake."

"Good," he gasped. "You're using your head. What I need you to do is lean the bat against the end of the shelves right there, and then step away."

"Right here?" She wondered what in the hell he could be planning.

"Yes. Right there. Just lean it, handle up, against the end of the shelf. Then I want you to go back over to the door to the restaurant."

"Harley..."

"I need you by the door," The strain in his voice left no room for argument. "I'm going to try something but I'm going to need room to maneuver. And if it doesn't work I'm going to need you holding the door for me."

"Got it," she replied. She carefully leaned the bat where he said and took a step back. "Is that good?"

"That's fine. Now go ahead and get clear."

Marisa understood he was about to attempt something extremely risky. At the same time, she also knew he didn't have a choice.

When you had a tiger by the tail, the most dangerous part was letting go.

"Harley, be careful."

There just wasn't anything else left to say.

The waitress turned and hobbled for the doorway as fast as she could. She figured it was just as well he sent her all the way to the door before doing whatever it was he was going to do. In her current shape, she wasn't going to be outrunning anything. It only occurred to her as she reached for the handle that he had probably been thinking exactly along those lines.

"Okay, I'm here," She grasped the handle. "Whatever you're goi..."

There was a grunt and a crash from the darkened area.

It was hard to tell what was happening, but she detected a flurry of motion on the floor. Then the awful figure of the walking corpse rose up against the window. Its ghastly head turned to focus on her, where she stood visible in the light from the parking lot. A split second later Harley came up out of the darkness at the end of the shelves where she had laid the bat.

He didn't hesitate.

The weapon blurred in the dim light as the big man closed and attacked in one fast, viciously savage motion. The monster had just started its attack posture when the bat connected against the side of its head with a sickening crack. It staggered and fell back against the little counter behind the register. Harley didn't wait to see if it would recover. He spun the bat and brought it straight down on the monster's head in three powerful, consecutive swings.

He hammered the thing to the floor...each impact marked by a sodden crunch that left little to the imagination. It was violent, brutish, and the last blow sounded with a meaty finality that convinced Marisa the monster would not be rising again.

She gave silent thanks she hadn't seen much but silhouettes.

Harley's figure stood there, breathing heavily, then stooped down into the darkness of the floor. A couple of seconds later a small flare of yellow light came to life. She realized he must have grabbed a loose cigarette lighter from the debris of the wrecked counter. Now he had bent down to examine the corpse.

"Harley? Are you okay?"

"Yeah, I'm a little scratched up, but I'll be okay. You?"

She had seen the blood on his shirt earlier, and knew the thing had at least clawed him pretty good a couple of times. Still, he didn't seem very concerned about it so she figured that was between him and the doc.

"I hurt my toe, but I'll live. What are you doing?"

"I'm looking at something," he muttered, then spoke up. "Something weird."

"Something weird?" her laugh had no humor in it whatsoever. "What could possibly be weird on a night like this?"

"Something you probably don't want to see," Harley replied in a bemused tone. "As a matter of fact, it's something you definitely don't want to see...but the doc definitely should."

Rising Waters - Holly.

Damn you, Gerald! Damn you! Damn you! And damn me too!

They hadn't thought of the fire alarm.

Only two minutes earlier she had been sitting in an enclosed building with all the bad things that wanted to eat her outside.

Only two minutes earlier she had been at least somewhat safe, comfortably dry, and of all the things she had been questioning...none of them had been her sanity.

Only two minutes earlier.

Then Gerald had raised his pale, blood smeared face from the table, and stood up in an effort to see the carnage outside. He squinted at the retreating figures in the storm, looked over at the small group of locals huddled under the tables near the doorway, then brought his now wide-eyed gaze back to her.

His eyes locked with hers, yet he didn't really seem to see her because the half grin that spread across his face was in response to some thought within. His hand emerged from beneath the table with his car keys. He pointed the electronic door opener at the window beside them and pushed the button.

"Look, Holly." He nodded out the window, and she followed his gesture to see the parking lights on his BMW flash in the rain. "The big yahoo was right. They've all run for the gas pumps."

"Gerald, what are you thinking?" She didn't trust where this observation was leading. Gerald wasn't exactly the risk taking sort, especially if discomfort or actual bodily harm was a potential outcome. But something was different here. She noticed something about his eyes were off.

His pupils were contracted to pinpoints, and when he refocused on her she got the chilling suspicion that the Gerald she knew had taken a back seat to something else for the moment. This was Gerald "distilled."

"It's a straight shot," he smiled. "Nothing between it and us but rain."

Was he kidding? There were people dying out there.

"Gerald," she whispered, "that's insane. Just drop it."

"No." He didn't even take umbrage at her disagreement. "It's not. I knew parking away from these clod kickers was a good idea at the time, and now it just worked in our favor. The beamer is at an angle away from the gas pumps, so we wouldn't be running straight at those monsters."

"Gerald, stop it."

He didn't even slow down...just kept speaking in a low, intense monotone.

"We can make it to the car in five seconds. And those things won't even know we're out there until we're safe in the beamer. Then we can wave bye-bye to these filthy creatures and be back in Austin in three hours."

In a depressing flash of intuition, she understood that the "filthy creatures" he referred to weren't just the ones out in the storm. She may not have been "small town" but she still came from way out on the country edge of South Houston. It made her wonder how much higher on the "evolutionary scale" she rated in his eyes. At least he was still talking in terms of "we" in his current state."

"Gerald, we can't," she pleaded. "It's suicide. Besides, you'll ruin your beret out there in the rain."

Holly knew how stupid that sounded, but it was exactly the kind of trivial thing that Gerald usually cared about when more important matters were at hand. It was a forlorn hope, but she prayed it might get through to him.

It didn't.

"We can," he continued in an eerily calm voice, "and I will. On the count of five, I'm getting out of here and going home. You are free to come with me. Five..."

"Gerald, no!" she hissed. This was completely unlike him.

"Four."

What the hell was she going to do? This was lunacy! Between the stress of being out of his element, the horror of the past few hours, and now the punch in the face from the smaller local boy, Gerald had apparently snapped.

"Three."

She regarded him with despair.

He meant it. He was going to do this, and now she had to make a choice. Either go with him, or get left behind.