Fort Supermart Chapter 2: Panic

 

Panic

The Supermart was packed. More so than any Black Friday I’d ever seen. People were going crazy, and the lines at the registered stretched for dozens of people.

I had a plan. The people who were smart would make themselves known by staying out of the fray.

I drove around to the store’s back and parked at the edge of the empty lot behind the Supermart. I got a coworker named William to open the door for me and let me through.

A gunshot went off inside the shop floor and everyone began to panic even more. I could hear it through the locked employee only doors.

“How are the people operating the registers?” I asked.

William shook his head. “Not good,” he said. “They’re being swamped. One more push and everyone will start rioting.”

The push came two minutes later. A loud rumble began throughout the shop and people began to scream.

There was a knock at the employee door and William unlocked it for a split second to pull a coworker in. He closed it two seconds later, just before the shoppers pushed through.

The coworker was a woman named Harriot. She had several cuts on her face.

“It’s mayhem out there,” she said. “There’s some people who I think have African Rabies. They’re attacking the shoppers.”

“Barricade the door,” I said. I went to the storage room and hopped onto the forklift, using it to bring two pallets full of soda boxes against the doors.

“What about the workers still out there?” said Harriot, clearly distressed.

“They’ll have to survive,” I said. “Once everyone loots this place, we’ll see if they’re still alive.”

“Harsh,” said William. But it was clear that he agreed with me.

“We need to keep stock of all the food we have back here,” I said.

“Wait, why?” said Harriot. “The government will help us out before things get too crazy.”

I shook my head. “We shouldn’t trust that they will,” I said. “This African Rabies thing may be more than the government can handle.”

“I’ve never seen anything like it,” said William. “Not in movies, not in books. I can’t believe this is real.”

I looked out the small glass panel between soda can pallets and watched the chaos on the shop floor.

“We’re going to survive,” I said.

More gunshots went off. There was a knock on the back garage door.

“Mark!” said a familiar voice.

“Open the garage doors,” I said. “Just enough to let someone in.”

William opened the doors with the control button, and Zach, the old man from last night, entered. He was carrying a golf bag full of guns. “I have food in my car,” he said.

“No time,” I said. “Close the door. We can get the food later when things calm down.”

Zach took a pistol out and handed it to me, grip first. “Take this,” he said.

“I don’t know how to use these,” I said.

“Point and shoot,” said Zach. “No, really. This is an easy-to-use beginner’s gun. It has very little recoil and doesn’t need much maintenance.”

I took the gun, examining it. “Okay?” I said.

William came up to us. “Who’s this?” he said.

“The name is Zachariah,” said Zach. “You may call me Zach.”

“You have guns,” said William. “I think that’s good.”

More gunshots went off in the front. I looked nervously at the pallets blocking the employee entrance.

“They’re rioting out there,” said Harriot. “People are dying.”

“What do you suggest we do?” said William. “If we go out there, they’re going to kill us too.”

Zach brought out a small handheld radio.

William brought out his smartphone. “This will work better, old man,” he said.

Zach held up his hand. “Trust me,” he said. He dialed the radio to a news channel.

“It looks like there are thousands of people on the run,” said the announcer. “They’re filling the interstate. Guns everywhere. Whoa, was that a gasoline explosion?”

“Looks like we’re not the only ones experiencing panic,” said Zach.

“It looks like everyone wants out!” said the announcer. “People are calling this the “great panic.” I don’t know anything about African Rabies, but I do know a riot when I see one!” There was a pause. “Is that—is that man eating another person? I see it! There are two—ten—is that a hundred? It looks like there are a hundred of them! They’re staggering like they’re drunk! Is this African Rabies? God help us all!”

Zach frowned. “You were right, Mark,” he said. “Everything really is going to shit.”

“Get us in closer!” said the announcer. “My god. They‘re eating other people. They’re monsters! Wait, wait! I just saw one take a bullet to the chest! It didn’t react! Holy ***!”  There was only the noise of a helicopter. “I’m just a traffic reporter,” said the man. “I’m not qualified for this.”

Zach turned the radio off. “I think I’ve heard everything I need to,” he said. “For now, it’s best we save its battery.”

William showed me something on YouTube. “Look,” he said. It was a closeup of one of the infected eating another person. It was disgusting and horrifying. “They’re monsters.” The next video showed an infected getting shot several times by police officers but not going down.

“This is the strangest thing I’ve ever seen,” said Zach, who was also watching the smartphone. “I wouldn’t trust this device in a pinch, but it does do wonders.”

“Yeah,” said William. “My battery’s only at a quarter.”

“Charge it now,” I said. “I don’t know how much electricity we’ll have in the near future.”

William nodded, and plugged his charger in.

“This won’t be much use to us for long,” I said. I looked around. “We’re going to stay here until things calm down out there. What do you say?”

“We’re already doing it,” said William. “I won’t argue with you. You obviously know what you’re doing.”

“Right,” I said. “I’ve been daydreaming about this happening forever.”

“Daydreams?” said William.

“Which is what all people should be doing,” said Zach. “Daydreaming about the apocalypse will help you when it does happen.”

“Which is now, I suppose,” said William.

“Do you really think so?” asked Harriot.

“Of course, we can’t really tell at the moment,” said William. “But my gut says it. Things are going to get bad.”

We sat for two hours. After half an hour, Zach turned the radio back on. Things had gotten worse, even in that short of a time. The announcer had a clear tone of panic in his voice. We listened for ten minutes before Zach turned it back off.

Zach was a bastion of serenity. While Harriot and William were beginning to panic, Zach brought the whole group an amount of security. I spent the time deep in thought, imagining how I would defend against a horde of deranged cat people.

Or African Rabies patients. I didn’t really understand why I was thinking like that, but it helped me stay calm and concentrate. We needed to find a way to move the trucks that were perpetually parked in the Supermart parking lot. We needed a fort, and that was the easiest way I could think of building one.

The chaos inside the store reached a fever pitch three hours after I arrived for my shift. The manager, Kyle, was scheduled to be at the store an hour previous. He hadn’t shown up.

What with the chaos in the streets, it wasn’t a surprise. I had gotten lucky to miss the major panic as I drove here. I hoped that Devin was doing all right. He had decided to stay home, after all.

The chaos began to quiet down two hours later. An hour after that, the store was silent. I approached the barricaded door.

“Let’s move the pallets,” I said. “Make sure you’re able to put them back as soon as possible.” I held the gun that Zach had given me.

The pallets were removed. I pushed my way through the doors and found a barren, trash-covered wasteland. The shelves had been ravaged. Barely anything was left of value. Blood stains were splashed against every third shelf. I caught sight of several bodies.

Three figures were meandering about the checkout counters. I approached them, holding my gun close.

They noticed me and turned. One of them had its arm shot off. The other two were obviously in a state of decay.

I aimed my gun as I continued to approach. “Hello?” I said.

One of the people opened their mouth and groaned. It began to stagger towards me. The other two heard him and also began to stagger near.

“Hold it,” I heard Zach say, as a gunshot rang out. The first person took a bullet to the stomach and didn’t even flinch. It continued to approach, as if nothing had happened.

“Shoot!” yelled Zach. “Shoot!”

I fired off three shots in quick succession. Two missed, the third hit a person in the neck. Again, not as much as a flinch.

“Back up!” said Zach.

We began backing away from the staggering beasts. Eventually I broke and ran back towards the doors. Zach was not far behind.

We entered the back.

“Barricade the door!” yelled Zach. “Now!”

William used the forklift to barricade the doors like before. Zach and I sat on the ground, heaving. I threw up. Zach looked pale, as if he had seen a ghost.

Well, what we had seen was worse than ghosts. They were people, yes, but they hadn’t reacted to being shot in their vitals.

Zach wiped his mouth. “What the hell do you think those things were?”

“That’s African Rabies,” said William. “I looked up more vids. Apparently they don’t react to being shot or stabbed. They’re invincible.”

“They can’t be!” said Zach. “They have to have a weakness. Quick, son, use your smart device thingy and figure out a way to kill them.”

“Kill them?” said Harriot. “Why would we do that?”

“You didn’t see them,” said Zach. “They were clearly possessed. Maybe already dead. The undead.” Zach shivered. “I’ve never heard of anything like it.”

“Voodoo,” said William. “There’s a concept in voodoo, where a human is raised from the dead. They call it, a, um, I think it was …”

“Zombie,” said Harriot. “That’s what it was.”

“Yeah, Zombie,” said William. “That’s it.”

“And now these zombies are real?” said Zach.

“You saw it,” said William.

“Clear enough,” said Zach. “They have to have a weakness.”

“But we can’t go back out there until we know what it is,” I said.

There was a thump against the barricaded door.

“They’re here,” said William. “Maybe they followed you.”

“How smart do you think they are?” said Harriot.

“They didn’t look too intelligent,” said Zach. He scratched his chin, a move that was clearly an anxious tick. “They looked blank. Like there was nothing inside those heads.”

“Then maybe they really aren’t alive,” said William.

Another knock sounded against the door. William jumped. “Shit,” he said. “They’re scaring me now.”

“As they should,” said Zach. “Apparently African Rabies is transmitted through bites.”

“Bites?” said William. “Not blood? Not coughing?”

“Blood, yes, maybe also,” said Zach. “But there’s something we’re missing here. Something critical. Something that could cause our deaths if we don’t find out what it is.”

“You’re just theorizing, old man,” said William. “They’re just people who have, um, taken too much PCP.”

“It’s not that,” I said. “Like I told you. They took bullets to their vitals and didn’t slow down.”

“Exactly!” said William. “You know that happens with PCP and bath salts, right?”

I sighed, rubbing my forehead. “Look,” I said. “I know exactly as much as you do about those people out there. But I saw them. They aren’t high on drugs. They may already be dead. They may be undead.”

William frowned. “I don’t know either. I’m sorry. I can’t help you.”

“We’re going to have to fight them eventually,” said Zach. He cocked his gun. “So let’s try and see if we can do anything about it.”