Alexander Death(101)

Seth stared at him. “My relatives? You brought up my dead ancestors?”

“Don't be so offended,” Alexander said. “They are my family, too. Oh, here's a special treat, just for you.” Alexander stood aside, and another zombie stepped forward. The embalming fluid had done its work—Jenny could recognize the partially decayed face of Carter, Seth's dead brother, from pictures around Seth's house.

“You fucking bastard!” Seth leaped toward Alexander, and Jenny grabbed his arm to stop him. Fortunately, Heather followed suit, grabbing his other arm, and together they managed to restrain Seth from diving into the crowd of zombies to get at Alexander.

“Seth, no!” Jenny shouted. “Don't let him get to you.”

“I'm afraid I've already gotten to all of you,” Alexander said. “I'm going to watch your friends and family tear you apart, Seth, Jenny...whoever you are.” He was looking at Heather.

“She knows who I am.” Heather pointed to Ashleigh. “Does the Homeland Security Committee know you're here?”

“She's a CDC doctor,” Ashleigh told Alexander. “The one who's been studying Jenny.”

“That's very interesting.” Alexander yawned. “Now, if you don't mind, we all have our lives to get back to. Well, some of us do.” He made a gesture like he was throwing a ball.

The zombies charged forward from both sides, the football team leading the attack from one end, Seth's dead relatives leading from the other.

“Come on!” Jenny screamed, pulling Seth's arm. She opened the door to third-floor staircase and pulled Seth in with her. Nobody had to tell Heather to get moving. She followed them through, then slammed and locked the door, while fists pounded on the other side.

They picked up Louisville Sluggers that were waiting on the third step. After much discussion, they had determined that a baseball bat would be the most effective and convenient tool for bashing back a horde of zombies at close range, once Jenny explained that guns were essentially useless against them.

The door cracked and splintered, and then two sledge hammers crashed through it. Dr. and Mrs. Goodling broke down the doors and then charged up the steps gripping the large hammers, their eyes blank. The football players followed them through the shattered door.

Seth cracked his bat into Dr. Goodling's arm, then into Mrs. Goodling's, breaking their arm bones so that they dropped the sledge hammers.

Jenny, Seth and Heather backed up the staircase while beating the horde back. The idea was to lead them up into the third floor, which Seth's grandfather had redesigned as a maze of narrow hallways to trick his great-grandfather's ghost. It would ensure they would only have to confront a few zombies at a time, and hopefully a number of zombies would get lost or distracted down some of the dead-end corridors.

Seth's grandfather had long ago nailed shut and walled over all the windows on the third floor. Several hours ago, Seth and Jenny's dad had broken a hole in one of these walls with a hammer and pried the window open. That window would be the escape route for Seth, Jenny, and Heather, but they had to cross the maze first, trapping the zombie horde inside.

They reached the stop of the stairs and backed through the maze while the zombies pressed forward. Seth led the way, down one narrow, dim passage and back up another.

Jenny pounded at the zombies, even taking the head off of Seth's dead grandfather.

Then the roar of a motor sounded, and a chainsaw ripped out through the wall next to Jenny, barely missing her head. She cried out and reeled back. Seth caught her.

The chainsaw ripped a diagonal slash through the maze wall. Another chainsaw carved through the wall farther down, shattering mirrors along the wall.

“Hey, zombies can't use chainsaws!” Seth protested.

Axes and sledgehammers brought down the carved wall in a crash of plaster and dust, and zombie cheerleaders swarmed forward, swinging their tools. Jenny, Seth and Heather barely made it around the next corner. Some of the zombies followed, but more of them were focused on destroying the maze, wall by wall.

Seth led them up the next hall, but seven or eight of the football players had gotten ahead of them through a hole in one wall or another, and now charged towards them. Alexander had them trapped.

“This way!” Seth led them through a door into his great-grandfather's bedroom, which got them out of the most immediate danger, but it was the worst place to be. There was no other door in the room. When Seth's grandfather had rebuilt the third floor, he'd shrunk this bedroom to make sure it didn't touch any exterior walls, so that there was no easy exit for the ghost. The room was surrounded by the maze on all sides.

Then one wall of the bedroom came down, and the zombies flooded the room. Alexander and Ashleigh strolled in with them, Alexander looking with an amused smile at the spartan bed, the yellowed photographs, the antique adding machine with the gold and silver coins beside it.