Dead World (Book 2): Headed North Read Free

subsides. There is another metal door that has a table pushed in front of it. The sound of moaning comes from that back room as well as the scrapping of fingers against the door.
    If there is food, it will be in a dry storage area. And if there is a dry storage area then it must be back there.
    He moves to the door slowly trying to avoid making any noise. He isn’t sure if the dead will be able to see him because of the flashlight but he is not going to risk it in the dark.
    When he is close enough he puts his ear to the door. The moaning increases a little but it’s weak. It sounds like there is only one, or maybe two on the other side of the door and Daniel considers risking it. He knows they need the food and they are probably not going to find any unless they take risks. With a deep breath he steels himself before he puts his hands on the table.
    The cold metal braces his skin and his heart races as he prepares to push it aside. With a shove he sends the heavy metal table scrapping across the floor. The sound is ungodly loud and he is terrified that he just made enough noise to draw more of them.
    Now or never, he thinks as he steps aside letting the metal door swing out. A decaying middle aged woman steps through the door.  She is wearing a stained white apron, her jaw is visible through a torn cheek. The midsection of the apron has been ripped open and her intestines trail behind her body in ropy contrails. The thing reaches dead hands up and throws herself forward hungrily, her dead eyes locking onto Daniel.
    Daniel expects this and sidesteps allowing the momentum of the creature to carry it into the wall of stoves right behind him. The woman slams into them bodily and struggles to recover. Daniel brings the axe down into the side of her head before she can move. The woman falls to the floor with a thud but squirms still. It was not enough to put her out but the axe is lodged in and Daniel loses his grip as the woman falls away.
    “Oh shit” Daniel says backpedaling. The woman writhes on the floor trying to lunge at him. Daniel grabs a heavy cleaver hanging on the wall and spins around just as the late chef raises to its feet. Daniel steps forward putting all his weight behind the blow. The cleaver comes down square in the woman’s face. He can feel the cartilage and bone breaking and the snap of tendons and muscles as it cleaves through her face and lodges into the brain.
    The woman falls with a heavy thud and stop moving.
    Daniel’s heart is racing and his breath comes in quick gasps. He puts his foot on the crook of the woman’s neck and heaves the axe free before he steps over the body and into the dry room.
    “Hey are you ok?” Isaiah calls from the entry way. His body framed in the shadows.
    “Yeah, Yeah, it was just one of them. I’m alright though,” Daniel replies.
    “Maybe we should talk about staying in groups. You know just to be safe,” Isaiah says, “We’re going to have to be doing this a lot before we make it all the way up there.”
    “You’re right,” Daniel replies. He knows he should not have gone alone but the thought didn’t even occur to him. There is safety in numbers, but unfortunately it also means more people will be put at risk too.  “We will talk about it when we get back on the road OK man?” Daniel offers.
    “Alright sounds good,” Isaiah says, “Be careful.” He turns and disappears back outside.
    The back room is a mess. Boxes are broken everywhere. Food wasted uselessly on the floor and the shelving overturned.  There are scratch marks along the inside of the walls where the woman had been trying to find a way out.
    Daniel scans the flashlight back and forth again hoping to get something out of all of this. At last his beam falls upon a few unbroken boxes and he gives a sigh of relief. It’s not much, a box of breakfast cereals, powdered creamer for the coffees, and sugars. At least it’s food. He stuffs it all into his back pack.
    As he stands up the