Zombified (Book 1): Hudson Place by Char Robinson Page B

take him,” he said briskly, and not waiting for a reply he moved over to Jake’s other side and grabbed him around the waist. They began moving again, more quickly this time. Charlie saw Jake grimace with pain, but he had to get them to the building as fast as possible.
     
    “ Sorry,” he murmured apologetically. “But as you can see, we don’t have time to waste.”
     
    Gasping in pain, Jake nodded. He had seen them too. “No problem, I can handle it.”
     
    “ You’ll have to,” Charlie said grimly as he picked up the pace. There were now at least five of the things heading straight for them. To his dismay, they were moving faster than his group.
     
    “ Dexter...” he said in what he hoped was a loud but calm voice.
     
    “ We got ‘em Charlie,” Dexter said without turning around. “Just keep movin’.”
     
    They crossed the street and were halfway up the grassy yard before Dexter and the other men with him opened fire. Charlie could see the wisdom in Dexter waiting, the sound of gunfire could draw more of the zombies to them, but by then they’d be safely inside. Practically dragging Jake, he finally made it to the door and stepped inside with Jenny right on his heels.
     
    ****
     
    An hour and a half later, Charlie was sitting with Dexter, Darrell, Gordon, and a few others in one of the second floor apartments. After getting everyone fed and settled into their respective apartments for the night, they were discussing their next moves. Charlie noticed that someone had boarded up the basement, which he thought was a good idea, considering what had occurred down there.
     
    Before securing it though, Dexter told Charlie they’d found some old storm shutters and they’d used those to board up the bottom floor windows. The doors had been re-hung and reinforced. Charlie was quite impressed; they’d done a lot of work in a short amount of time.
     
    Gordon was writing down all the suggestions and ideas. He glanced up at the group of men. “Ok, this is what we have so far,” he said while absently running a hand over the bandage on his cheek. Charlie thought Gordon didn’t look so good, his skin had a pasty sheen and his bandage already needed changing. “After breakfast tomorrow, we go out in groups of two and start checking all the surrounding homes. We’ll keep in touch with the walkies, and if there’s anything one group can’t handle, the other group will come in to help.” He looked up from the paper. “Does that sound right so far?”
     
    At their nods he continued. “Each group should be able to do a block a day. We’re not only looking for zombies, but for people who may be trapped in their homes, so be careful and don’t get trigger-happy.” He looked over the paper again. “We’ve estimated it will take us anywhere from two weeks to a month to clean up the town, it all depends on how many zombies or wild dogs we run into, and any other factors we haven’t taken into consideration.”
     
    “ Sounds about right,” Dexter said as he leaned back in his chair, belched, and patted his fleshy stomach. “Then we need to get Smitty to work on those turbines and windmills he was telling us about. Once we have electricity without having to run a lot of generators we’ll be in a lot better shape. At least we don’t have to worry about the water situation yet.”
     
    Charlie had been surprised to find out the water was still flowing, Gordon told them that the town got its water from an aquifer two miles up on the mountain and that it was a gravity-fed system. The water plant itself was directly below the mountain.
     
    Smitty was retired but had once been the town’s engineer, he was certain he could scrounge up the material to get several turbines and windmills going to produce enough electricity for their needs. In the meantime, they would look for generators and the fuel needed to run them. For the first time since arriving in Shady Oaks, he was optimistic that their plan