Genesis by Michaelbrent Collings Page B

them.
     

35
     
     
     
     
    It was a man in blue jeans.  He was wearing a Boise State U. baseball cap and matching blue and orange t-shirt.  No blood on him, other than a single spot on his hand where he must have been bitten.
     
    He saw Ken and Dorcas and snarled.  Swerved to run at them.
     
    Ken ran.  He knew Dorcas was right behind.
     
    They ran in the only direction open to them: the thin bit of asphalt between the homeless shelter and the building beside it.  The slap/crash of ten thousand feet pounded into the area after them.
     
    Ahead was a chain-link fence that enclosed the back of the shelter as well as some other structure that looked like a supply building or maybe a large disconnected garage.  Either way, it looked like it was closed up tight, and was certainly too tall to get on top of.
     
    Beyond the chain-link fence – almost irrelevant information for Ken’s brain to process since there was no way they could climb over the twenty foot fence before they were overwhelmed by the horde behind them – there was just a blank wall of concrete.  A huge footing of the I-84, an unbroken length of concrete where the freeway lowered to within thirty feet of the ground.
     
    Dorcas started to slow.  Ken could tell she had seen the same things he had.  The fact that they were running into a dead end.
     
    “Come on ,” he barked, grabbing her arm and yanking it.
     
    “Why?” she muttered, but ran on.
     
    He felt like she was right.  But felt like he couldn’t just stop.  He owed it to his family to try.
     
    All the way to the end.
     
    Then he saw something.  Tossed the lug wrench away.  Dorcas veered as though to grab it.
     
    “Leave it!” he shouted.  And grabbed what he had seen.
     
    Dorcas gasped as though realizing what he was going to do.  She grabbed it as well.
     
    The zombies were only fifty feet behind them.
     
    And now he realized that they were in front of him, too: filtering into the space on the other side of the fence, between the shelter property and the freeway footing.
     
    “We can’t go over,” panted Dorcas .
     
    “I know.”  He veered to the sturdy structure on their right.  “Change of plans.”
     
    As he turned, he saw the zombies that had followed them into the funnel between the shelter and the other building, a concrete block of a place with a sign proclaiming, “Get fit for the rest of your life!  Free introductory YOGA classes!”
     
    The things were thirty feet away.
     
    He ran the last feet to the disconnected concrete building behind the homeless shelter.  Threw what he was holding against the side.  Dorcas helped him, adjusting the tall ladder that had been laying against the side of the shelter until it cleared the roof of the storage building.
     
    Twenty feet.  The growling hit him hard, worse even than it had in the school.  It felt like he was being punched by someone who had a roll of nickels wrapped in his fist.
     
    He shoved Dorcas up the ladder ahead of him.  She started moving, faster than he would have thought someone could climb one-handed.
     
    He was up an instant later.
     
    The zombies were ten feet away.
     
    Dorcas cleared the ladder.  On the roof.
     
    Five feet.
     
    Ken jumped up the last few rungs.  Onto the roof.
     
    Two feet.
     
    The zombies, led by the blue-jeaned BSU fan, reached for the ladder.
     
    Ken grabbed the ladder and pulled it up after him.  He felt it shudder in his hands as some of the zombies’ fingers brushed it, but none managed to grasp it or pull it down.  He didn’t know if they could use it, but he didn’t want to find out.
     
    He flipped the ladder up over the edge of the building.
     
    It hit the roof with a clank.
     
    Safe.
     
    Then he felt Dorcas ’ hand on his shoulder, tight and slick against his still-bare skin.  She squeezed convulsively.
     
    Ken looked down.  His breath caught painfully in his throat.
     
    The zombies didn’t need a