Territory of the Living Dead

I heard someone shout out in pain just on the other side of the door I'd just barricaded. It wasn't the moaning or gurgling of a zombie, but a swearing, angry person. Turning back, I yanked the door open to see a young man lying on the stairs, swinging wildly at the zombies marching up the stairs with a metal pipe. Running down, I grabbed his arm, barely ducking a swipe with the pipe,
"Oi mate!" I yelled, smacking the back of his head as I hauled him to his feet. He was obviously injured, "I'm here to help ya!" I yelled over the clamor of the zombies. The boy continued to swing at the oncoming horde as I drug him back up the stairs and through the doorway. Quickly, I let him go and barricaded the door, just in time for the undead to hit it with full force.
"Come on!" I said, helping him to his feet. He used his bloodied metal pipe as a cane and limped further up the stairs, "Get to the roof, I've got to go look for someone," I said, running off into the third floor corridor, screaming Sebastian's name.

"Thanks mate" I said fighting the hoard as the man helped me to my feet. I managed to walk fast. "Get to the roof I'm looking for someone" He said. "Okay" i said as I walked my fastest. I managed to get to the roof. I saw how many zombies were in the town. "Damn that sure is a lot of zombies, no wonder there's so little survivors" I said as I looked.

I noticed others. I sat on a metal contraption waiting for the man to come back.

I was hiding on the second floor, behind a overturned bed as the horde passed by the door, all heading to the upper floors. I had come down to grab some materials for my bombs when they had broken through the front door, spotting me as i rushed back up the stairs and ducked into he first open room. They had thought I'd continued up so had shuffled right past me ... Now I was trapped with the only way out a window and a short leap into the hungry hands of the horde outside.
I looked down at the materials I had collected, a rope, some cans of deodorant and thick heavy book, I couldn't make a bomb from these, but a new plan was forming in my head.
Quietly I walked to the window, opening it and looking out. Below me was a sea of rotting flesh and blood crusted mouths, gnashing and slobbering for flesh. I ignored them and looked up, all the windows above me were closed nd the roof was too far out of reach of the rope.
I ducked back inside and grabbed one of my air stadium horns, rushing back to the window I taped the button down and chucked it up two floors. My aim was true and it smashed through the window directly above me, landing on the fourth floor. I shot a glance back to the horde passing me by, all continuing past the door, following the sound. I lookedc back out the window and saw the third floor window above me opening and Mario sticking his head out.
"There you are" I waved up at him and pulled the rope out, showing it too him. "I'm going to tie a book to this and throw it up, think you can pull me up?

The zombies were still there. "F***ing hell, there is a lot of zombies." I said looking over at them from the roof.

"Go for it!" I said as quietly as I could. HE disappeared for a few seconds before sticking his head back out. Reeling back, he hurled the book up toward me. Reaching out, I snatched it from the air, taking it inside with me.
"Hang on tight," I said out the window before wrapping the line around a decorative pillar in what I assumed was at one time the love suite. Hauling back, I edged Sebastian up the wall, the scream of the air horn blaring in my ears. After what felt like ages of my muscles burning and heaving, Sebastian's head poked up over the window and he grabbed onto the ledge, hauling himself inside.
"Dang man," I said, wiping my forehead and leaning against the pillar.
"Come on! We gotta get back to the roof," he said quickly, running from the room and back to the stairs. The barricaded door bulging inward threateningly. We blocked off every door on our way to the roof and were soon seated next to the boy I'd found on the stairs.
"What's your name?" I asked, trying to catch my breath.

"My name's Ricky Tudor" I said. "What's yours?" I added. My ankle was still in pain but it was better. The zombie virus spread faster than I could imagine. My accent still strong, surprisingly nobody noticed it yet.

They were slow and that was our advantage but they weren't blind or stupid and that's were we lost the advantage. We had good weapons. I mean that man who saved me had a blunt bat. I had my pipe what else was there. The others must have some good weapons with them.

I took one look at Ricky, said a few words of greetings, then threw my duffel bag on the ground and pulled out a handful of PVC piping, two cans of deodorant, a few pipe bombs wrapped in electric tape, a spark plug and a bag of potatoes
I assembled the contraption of the three of them started talking behind me [Can't forget Drag]. I kept looking up from building to see the horde gathered down below, swelling with every second.
I finished building and pulled open the bag of potatoes, cutting out a hole in the top and inserting the pipe bombs. "Sebastian! What Are You Doing Now!" I handed Mario the bag of now modified potatoes and loaded one into the shoulder mounted potato cannon.
"Thinning out the crowd" I said, about to pull the trigger when I saw something go flying out over the air, a red petrol container, spilling the yellowish brown transparent liquid. I turned and saw John handed another can to Ricky as he pulled the lid on a third and tossed it over the edge.
"You might as well take out as many as you can with what little you got" I smiled and raised the cannon again, staring down the home made sights.
"You know I don't want to destroy ALL the buildings Right" I said, pulling the trigger

He dropped the bomb out the window. It plummeted down, spiralling until it hit the ground. Then only the air horn sounded. The infected shuffled over to it. Boom! The explosion threw most of the zombies far away and blew them to pieces. I ran over with the petrol pouring it down. It caught the ones that were left on fire.

"That should clear them up for a while." I said dropping the can. "We should get down the fire escape while we can. There is a cabin in the woods not far from here we can hide in, most of the rotters should be distracted with this mess for a while."

"Great" I said, grabbing my duffel bag and loaded another pipe bomb potato into my cannon "Lead the way" firing the home made contraption one handed without turning into the burning, thinning cowd

I ran over to the fire escape, unlatching the lock. We watched the stairs fall into place. Scurrying down we went behind the diner we were in before to avoid the Rotters.

"Its about morning now, so we will be able to see trouble coming our way." I said as I jogged. Suddenly, as if it was a miracle from god, a lumber shop appeared in my view.

"We will be able to build a fortress with that much wood!" I said skipping toward the store.

"Ricky, take a look inside that window." I chose him because he was ahead of the rest of the group. "We don't want to walk in and find ourselves surrounded."

I hung back a bit, aiming my home made rocket launcher every right and left, ready on a hairline trigger. The others slowly advanced towards the mill store, weapons ready. The new guy Ricky was peeking through the windows, looking for some infected.
"Think it's abandoned?" He asked looking around.
"One way to find out" I said as I pulled out the potato and loaded a modified air stadium horn into the tube, hooking the pin onto a nail at the end. "Soon as I say, Hide. I'm going to climb that pile of wood and fire this as far as I can. Don't come out till it's absolutely safe" I didn't wait for there answer, climbing the pile of wood before they could say anything. I crouched down, aiming towards the burning book store. God that seemed like years ago now I thought as I eased my finger onto the trigger.
"Ok, we ready?"

"Go for it," I said. He fired. The scream of the horn echoed off of the buildings, tossing its noise clear across town. Nothing came out of the carpenter shop. I figured there wasn't much to eat in there, so they didn't bother with it. I hopped down from the dumpster I'd been hiding in and went inside, my new weapon, a letter opener, at the ready, my shower curtain rod in my other hand.

The commotion had started some time ago now, explosions and crashes and screaming, altogether something I hadn't heard since I'd made my home in the mall.
I'd climbed all the stairs and was observing everything from the roof. I couldn't tell how many were down there, but I knew by the size of the horde that it wasn't looking good. there was no way for me to get their attention without also alerting those.. things!
"Of course!" It hit me and I bolted, running down the stairs, I went down to the 2nd floor and ran straight to the first toy store I could find. I grabbed a large flying helicopter toy, batteries and some paper. I set up the toy, wrote a quick note, telling them where to go and tied it to the helicopter.
Back up the stairs, back to the roof I placed the toy on the ground and turned on the remote.
I closed my eyes and silently thank my Mum for having bought my one of these when I was young... This was gonna be a piece of cake!

I was pushing a heavy cart full of lumber, we were planning on building some sort of bunker. We were having some arguments on where and how though. I thought a treehouse or taking over the old water tower would be a great plan, since the zombies hadn't tried to climb any ladders yet, and even if they did, it would take only a poke to knock them back down.
I came to the base of the tower, the others behind me. We'd agreed to take a look at each others' locations before deciding anything. I climbed the ladder quickly, leaving my shower rod on the ground. The huge structure was made of thick metal, forming a tall blue tank reaching into the sky. I was almost to the top when a small flying thing caught my eye. It wasn't a bird, and with my bad depth perception, it appeared to be a helicopter off in the distance. I soon realized however, that it was a model, remote control toy. It flew straight up to me as I hung from the rusty ladder. It hovered in front of me for a second, the small camera on the bottom of it pointed directly at my face. I reached out and grabbed the piece of paper hanging from the bottom of it.
'I'm a survivor in the mall, I'm trapped by the horde,' was all it said. The heli turned around and flew away, over the roofs of the town.
"Guys! We've got another survivor!" I yelled down to the others as I slid down the ladder.

[I hope no one minds me being the guy that pulls things from my bag such as maps and matches]

"Another survivor?" I drop the bucket of limber I was carrying and reached into my duffel bag, pulling out a folded piece of paper. I unfolded it and placed the map of Knox county on the ground, also pulling out a battered pencil case.
"Ok, so I was here, Mario and John found me here" I was talking to myself as I marked out the locations of where we all met on the map. The other's crowded around me as I finished circling the apartments.
"This survivor's in the Mall" Mario said, showing me the note and taking the fine-linner from me. I read the message quickly and passed it to John, "That's like around the corner if I remember right" I say as I pick up the map, Mario getting back to his feet
"How do you know that anyway? I thought you were from Australia?"
"I've been in this town for like three weeks" I say offhandedly, studying the map, thinking away.
"Uhm, I'm not the leader here, and I don't want to be. But I suggest two of us go get this person and two go build the shelter" I roll up the map and look at our small group, taking into consideration everything I've seen about them.
"I think me and Mario should go, I have the sword and my home made explosives and he has his shower rod. John I think you and Ricky should go find a good place to bunker down, cause you'd probably find a better place then me" my suggestion had been somewhere with not allot of entrances and a large space, like my old high-school Gym.
"Is that a good idea guys?"

We dashed through the town, dodging small groups of undead as well as we could, but cutting them down as we needed to. It appeared we'd drawn quite a crowd of the shambling dead, and the group was still growing. The helicopter was making dive bombing runs onto their heads, distracting some, but just angering others further. At long last, we made it to the mall. I glanced around, the doors were boarded and solid, and the undead were right behind us. I dashed at the wall next to the door, angling a bit before jumping, kicking off of the wall to get some more height, and grabbing a small ledge above the door. Sebastian did the same, clambering up next to me onto the thin ledge. John and Ricky though, were both stranded, John made a jump at it, but missed and fell hard to the ground. I reached down and grabbed Ricky's outstretched hand, hauling the younger boy up next to me. I did the same for John, only Sebastian had to help, as John was a bit heavier. One of the undead reached up, clawing at the backs of John's legs as I hauled him up, taking one of his shoes.
With a heave, we pulled him free of the undead and seated him next to us on the six inch ledge.
"Now what?" I asked, staring down at the writhing mass of undead. Sebastian's duffel bag was laying a ways away, as he couldn't have made the jump carrying it, and all I had was a shard of glass I'd picked up. My curtain rod lay discarded, being trampled by the feet of the zombies.

Watching from the helicopters point of view, I tried to figure out exactly where they were... I smirked. They seemed to be directly on top of the main entrance, I ran to a window and threw it open.
Looking down I could see them on the ledge, just out of reach for the creatures. Tying it quickly in place I unfurled a rope ladder, praying it wouldn't actually hit anyone, it didn't and I sighed a breath of relief.
They jumped as it come up next to them, one of them nearly falling off, I saw them look up and waved.
"Ahoy, mates!" I yelled, motioning them up the ladder.

I looked up the ladder, and saw a girl waving at us to climb the ladder.
Ricky goes first, being the smallest and youngest. I volunteer to go last but John practically throws me up the ladder.
When I reach the top I look down on the zombies, trying to see if I could see my duffel bag in there. Ricky joins me, looking for it even though I'm sure he didn't know what he was looking for.
As Mario and John join us a Zombie falls over and I see it, just at the edge of the footpath, a fair distance from the mall
Perfect
I dig into my pocket and pull out a stripped down toy car remote control with a key and a big red button attached to it. The other's see what I';m holding and freeze, the girl just looks between us confused.
"Sebastian, what is that?"
"Remote detonator"
"Ok, put the detonator down. We've had enough explosions from -" I turn the key and press the big red button, stepping away from the edge casually.
Inside my bag a toy model or the Halo M12 LRV 'Warthog' comes to life and starts to drive forward, not going anywhere. 3 seconds later the explosive me and my friend from back home strapped to the battery of the toy goes off, setting off all the other explosives in my bag.
It wasn't a particularly big explosion, big enough to knock us over and sent zombies flying (None landing alive or moving on the roof) but not big enough to damages the mall in anyway besides blowing out a few windows.
I get to my feet and go to see the damage I wrought. The foot path and part of the road are now a crater, burning bodies lie everywhere, some still moving. Zombies start pouring in to fill in the gap, only to fall into the hole and into the sewer line I accidently opened.
I'm smiling when it begins to rain burnt shred of paper and I remember. "I LEFT MY BOOKS IN MY BAG!"

Looking up, I watch the flaming shreds floating down all over, then at the stupid smile on that idiots face.
"What the hell were you thinking?" I yell, practically jumping the guy "You could have blown a hole in the mall! You could have let them all in! Do you have any idea how long it took me to make this place safe?"
At this point I had him pinned to the floor, arms above his head, and I was straddling his hips.
"What the hell were you thinking?" I repeat, this time more as a growl.
"Hi, I'm Sebastian..." he muttered, in shock. I stare at him a moment before letting out a small scream of frustration, scrambling to get off him.
"I'm Hayley"

"Hayley? Hey Lee?" I burst out laughing, hysterically. The stress must have gotten the best of me, I didn't usually laugh at names, unless they were really funny.
"Why is my name funny!" I look up at the girl, still smiling, tears starting to run down my face. I must have looked insane to her, smiling and starting to cry in the middle of a zombie outbreak. Definatly the stress.
"Laughter is the best medicine, and given the 'situation'. I think I'm entitled to a laugh"

I backhand the guy and he instantly goes quiet, hand on his face where I'd struck and a confused expression.
"Get a hold of yourself" I yell, and his face remains blank and he didn't even breath "A zombie apocalypse is no time to loose your mind!"
He lets out a breath and looks up at me "S-sorry..." he mutters getting to his feet.
"Ok, we settled?" I ask, looking around at everyone, they nod quickly, and I have a feeling they were scared of me, I didn't care "Good! Let's go inside"

[Hello? Anyone alive out there?]

[No! Noone is alive, its a zombie apocalypse.
Anyways, let's not let Drag's RP die, shall we?]

We followed the girl into the mall, an empty, wrecked shell of what it used to be. People must have ransacked it when the virus spread and panic arose. I twirled my shower curtain rod behind me as I walked along behind the group, scanning the darkened stores.
"Name's Mario," I said, deciding it was time I introduced myself.
"Hayley," She replied, not glancing back, even though I'd already heard her name when she was flirting with Seb.

[Flirting? You consider slapping and tackling flirting? LOL!]
I continued on, walking manually down a broken elevator to the underground level (5 leveled Mall... Roof, level 3, level 2, ground level, underground level which is not parking), there wasn't much down here except a food court, the bottom level of Meyers, some pop culture store and the furniture store I'd been sleeping in.
I lead them to the corner of said furniture store where I'd set up over time. I'd dragged a TV from JB-HIFI on the ground level, something I hadn't thought through since the TV channels had all dropped out, so I'd grabbed a DVD player and DVD's, and Xbox and games to keep myself entertained.
I start pushing aside clothes, soft drink bottles, bags of chips off the surrounding beds then plonked myself down on mine.
"So, you guys hungry?"