Jenni was dead because she had killed her, but it had been the right thing to do. Lydia had told her the truth. This is what she was supposed to do, but it did not make it any easier.
Bette rushed the children Jenni had saved to the nearby vehicles as Travis ran with Katie across the parking lot. People scrambled to get into trucks or buses that weren’t already filled. Kevin ran to the lead truck as Arnold motioned Katie and Travis to another one.
“We’re almost out of here,” Travis exclaimed. “We’re going to be okay.” Nothing could be okay. Jenni was dead. But Katie ran with him, her hand slick with sweat.
The back of the National Guard truck was full of people, so the driver shouted at them to get into the cab. It was so far off the ground, it was hard for Katie to get in. Her stomach felt awkward and heavy as she tried to heave herself up into the cab. Travis grabbed her hips and helped her in, then climbed in next to her. The seat was horribly uncomfortable, but Katie squirmed until it felt better.
Black smoke billowed out of the mall. The helicopters continued to try to corral the zombies away from one of the gates, taking turns gliding over the crowd of zombies as one brave soldier hung out the side waving. Travis’ hand held Katie’s firmly. Already bruises were showing on her flesh from where he had gripped her so tightly during their escape. He gazed down at her hand. She could see his concern, but the physical pain was nothing compared to her broken heart.
Arnold motioned to the drivers. Slowly, the buses and trucks began to move forward. Soon, they were moving in a huge circle around the parking lot building speed for their departure. The redheaded soldier dove into a big Ford truck just as the gate blew wide open. Immediately, the secondary bombs went off.
Katie realized Arnold must have triggered them. Fire and smoke filled the street outside the mall as the first truck barreled out of the parking lot at a quick clip. One by one, the trucks, both military and civilian, and several metro buses and one school bus, roared out into the town of Madison.
Overhead the helicopters swooped in an attempt to distract the zombie throng. The mall doors shattered from the heat of the fire within, and burning zombies staggered out into the abandoned parking lot as the last bus rolled out. Katie held onto the dash for dear life as the truck roared through the town. Zombies rushed them, but the vehicles smashed them or hurled them into the nearby buildings. Their salvation from being overwhelmed was that most of the zombie crowd outside the mall had managed to find its way inside the structure. That meant fewer zombies in the street, therefore, their escape was not as fraught with danger as it could have been.
At last, the convoy broke free of the city limits and climbed into the countryside.
Left behind, the zombies staggered, hands outstretched in desperate hunger, toward the escaping vehicles. Slowly, they began to walk determinedly after them. The driver of the truck Katie and Travis were in looked very grim. When the radio cackled, he picked it up with a shaking hand.
“We’re clear,” he reported in. Katie sank into Travis’ arms. He kissed her brow, rubbing her shoulders. She cried as the truck rumbled on.
A few minutes later the word came over the radio. All the vehicles that had left the parking lot were accounted for.
The survivors of Madison Mall, overwhelmed by the morning events, rode into the hills toward their new home.
2. Long Road Through Hell
The sky was gray and low as the convoy wound through the barren hills away from Madison. The country road swerved and dove through the hills, the cracks in the asphalt already thick with gnarled weeds. The juniper and cedar trees stretched twisted limbs up toward the sky.
Staring out the window, watching the bare trees slide by, Katie wondered if the trees were praying for those in the convoy to get back to the fort safely. Her bible school days had instilled a lot of verses in her head and she remembered one about trees praying or dancing or something when no one else had a voice. She certainly felt like she could not utter a word without sobbing. She rubbed her brow and snuggled deeper into Travis’ arms as she watched the landscape slipping past the window.
The convoy had taken a long roundabout way to make sure that any zombies trying to follow from Madison would end up wandering in a direction opposite of the fort. Now the convoy was maneuvering through back roads that led them past long dead farmhouses and ranches. Occasionally, a zombie struggled toward the convoy from one of the long abandoned structures. They seemed pitiful in their slowness. In the first days they had been so fast but now they were so slow Katie was sure that they could be easily circumvented as long as there weren’t that many.
Of course, the mall had flooded with them.
She closed her eyes and fresh tears slipped down her cheeks. Travis tenderly wiped a tear away and stroked her hair.
There had been so many zombies it had been overwhelming. Running with Travis’ and Jenni’s hands clutched in her own had been the most terrifying event of her life. The moans and screams of the dead and living had been a mind shattering cacophony. Then the most horrible moment had come. Jenni’s hand had slipped from her own.
As long as she lived, she would never forget the despair that filled her when Jenni’s fingers slid so easily from her grip.
Of course, she would never forget what followed either. Katie remembered looking down from the stairs and seeing the sea of dead looking up at Jenni. For a crazed second, she thought Jenni could maybe jump into the water and somehow make it to the stairs. But then that fast zombie had barreled up the stairs that led up the side of the waterfall, pushing aside the slower ones. Katie remembered that horrible moment when she had watched Jenni swing the gun at the zombie and it had been empty. She hadn’t breathed as she watched Jenni bash the zombie’s brains out with her gun then fling its brains across the crowd below. Foolishly, Katie had thought Jenni was safe. But as she watched Jenni wash her hands, dread had overwhelmed her. Then Jenni had raised her hand and shown the bloody gash on her hand and Katie had known the terrible truth: Jenni was dead.
All that followed…taking the gun from Kevin…sighting Jenni through the scope…pulling the trigger…was just a ritual for the dead. As Jenni stood there, her hand over her head, smiling, triumphant over the undead growling and moaning below her, Katie had understood as well as Jenni that it was over. And then she had pulled the trigger…
Thankfully, Jenni’s body had fallen where the zombies would never reach her.
Katie wiped another tear away. Lydia had been right. She had been at the mall for more than just a confrontation with the Senator. She had gone there to lay Jenni to rest. Katie had thought her destiny was something totally other than what it had turned out to be. Yes, she had stood up against the Senator, but in the end, she had freed Jenni from Lydia’s fate. She had also laid her to rest in a way she never could do for Lydia.