Zomb-Pocalypse 2 Read Free

an umbrella.
    We sit for a moment in silence, well…not real silence. All I can hear is the pounding of rain on the tarp and the groans and growls of the undead. I tuck my legs up to my chest a little tighter, trying to keep them out of the rain.
    “This is pointless,” I mutter, and Silas looks over at me.
    “It’s better than nothing,” he argues, but I’m too cold to fight with him.
    Silas digs in his backpack and pulls out a crushed Twinkie, still in the plastic wrapper. I watch with wide eyes as he opens it and wolfs it down in two large bites.
    “How can you even eat right now?” I ask him. The stench of the zombies is enough to have a normal person vomiting, never mind the sight of the ugly bastards.
    “More calories will help me stay warm. You should eat too.” I shake my head. I can’t.
    I lean my head down on Ryan’s shoulder and stare out at the sea of death before us.
    “How are we going to get out of here?” I ask, and I feel Ryan shrug helplessly. He doesn’t know either.
    I look over at Silas, who is staring out at the crowd with narrowed eyes. He feels my gaze and shrugs too.
    “I dunno,” he says, and it’s worse than Ryan’s answer because I’ve come to rely on Silas to be the crazy redneck with the fix-it ideas for any situation. “We can’t get ‘em with the knives because they’ll start to pile up and be like stairs for the rest.” I shiver worse at the thought and press my face back into Ryan’s shoulder. He reaches out and grabs my hand, and his fingers are like blocks of ice.
    Silas sits up suddenly and looks like he’s focussing really hard on something.
    “Did you get an idea?” I press, and he shakes his head.
    “Nah, I thought I heard something,” he admits, and I shake my head. I don’t know how he could hear anything with all this racket.
    Then it’s my turn to pause. I could swear I heard the faintest whisper of a voice on the wind.
    Silas is watching me. “You heard it too,” he says, and it’s not really a question. Silas stands up, shedding the blue tarp, and I follow him on shaky legs. He’s scanning the horizon, out past the zombies for any sign of human life, any chance we could be rescued.
    I look too, but I don’t see anything.
    “Hey!” The voice is female, and it’s much louder this time. We spin in all directions, but again we see nothing.
    “Up here.”
    I feel foolish, but I look up, squinting against the icy rain that’s practically blinding me.
    “Silas,” I whisper and prod him with my elbow. Both of the guys look up, and we all stand there in shock.
    “I’ll be damned,” Silas murmurs, and I agree. That about sums up what I’m thinking too as I look at the faces of the five people who are hanging over the ledge of the roof to stare down at us.
    “Hang on,” they tell us, before disappearing back over the edge.

Chapter Two
    Somehow sensing more warm, fleshly bodies in the area, the moans of the dead grow even louder as they surge up against the dumpster, making it rock like crazy.
    Above us, the people on the roof are struggling to lower a long aluminum ladder. Silas reaches up when the ladder gets close enough to grab, and he guides it down so that the legs rest on the dumpster lid. The ladder isn’t quite tall enough to reach the top.
    “Jane, you go first!” Ryan yells to be heard over the moans and growls. My stomach clenches; I am not a fan of heights. It isn’t that I’m necessarily afraid of them, but this ladder doesn’t seem the least bit safe and I’m terrified of nosediving fifteen feet down into a crowd of hungry zombies.
    “Not so fast,” Silas says, putting his hand up to block my shaky steps towards the ladder.
    “What are you doing?” Ryan demands with an angry look on his face.
    “Have you even thought about this?” Silas challenges. “We don’t know who these people are. We can’t just send Jane up the ladder first. How do we know they won’t throw the ladder off the roof and keep her for God