Zombies Can Go To Hell!

"Welcome To California"

The sun was shining brightly, cars were fighting to get decent parking in the lot, and the mall quickly filled with customers, some in a hurry, others wanting to check out the latest items. Even though the mall opened up at ten in the morning, today was a special day. It was the grand opening, the first day that the mall would welcome people through its doors.
Craig and Rhomello turned into the parking lot and parked in lot C. Rhomello looked over at Craig as he turned the wheel left and right and maneuvered the car into a parking space. They exited the car and looked over at the huge, five story, mall to the left of them.
"We're gonna need to make at least five trips," Rhomello said, shutting the car door.
Craig nodded, closed his door, and hit the alarm button on his keychain.
They had just moved into their college dorm and needed to buy a few things. Bed sheets, a small refridgerator, school supplies, and lots of junk food. They also needed to buy new clothes. The drive from New Jersey to California had taken forty three hours. They had checked into their dorms, unpacked whatever they had brought with them, and decided to hit the mall to buy the extra things that they needed so that they could relax for the rest of the day.
"Where should we hit first?" Craig asked, shoving his keys into his back pocket.
Rhomello shrugged. "We could get the bed sheets first," he said and led the way.
Inside of the mall was spectacular. They could smell the fesh paint and plastic as if they had just unwrapped a new toy. There were people doing giveaways near the entrance, raffle tickets were wrapped around their hands and they were super friendly and welcoming.
Craig looked at the directory, found the linen store, and then stepped onto the escalator, Rhomello keeping up with his every move. When they made it to the bedding section, they quickly chose what they wanted and picked up new towels, two each.
"We should get those also," Craig said, pointing to some shower curtains. The ones in their dorm had looked used and dirty.
They were lucky to be roommates. They had been friends for years, grew up together, went to school together, even fought like brothers. Even though they were both majoring in different things, they learned from one another.
After purchasing their items, they had to make their first run to the car. There was no way they were going to finish getting everything that they needed with all those bags in their hands.
Entering the mall again, a woman rushed past them. Her hands were bloody and she was breathing heavily. "I need help!" she yelled. People turned in every direction to look at her curiously as a security officer headed in her direction.
"What the hell?" Rhomello frowned.
"You have some blood on your shirt," Craig observed, pointing to his left side.
"Shit," muttered Rhomello. He pulled his shirt around to have a better look. The woman must have bumped into him by mistake.
They looked over at the woman again. She was pointing at the entrance and speaking quickly, her eyes wide with fear. Rhomello could have sworn he could see her shaking. She looked so afraid in her yellow t-shirt and blue jeans. Her hair was up in a high ponytail and her dark complexion gave away the fact that she tanned often.
Everyone watched as the security officer walked to the front door, look outside, squinted to see something in the distance and walk back to the woman. He said something to her and she shook her head viciously. A crowd of people surrounded them, so Craig and Rhomello followed. The woman had blood on her hands, what if she needed help, they thought. As they got closer, she was heard saying, "He just attacked me." She broke down crying and some of the women around her tried to console her the best they could.
The security guard decided to go out into the parking lot and check it out himself. He pushed past some patrons entering the mall and spoke into his radio.
The woman used her back to press against the wall and slid her body down to the floor. She continued to cry as someone handed her some sanitized wipes to clean herself up.
"So, this guy came out of nowhere and just attacked you?" asked an older woman.
The other woman nodded as she sniffled and tried to clean the blood from her hands.
"Did he really try to bite you?" another person asked.
She woman looked up at the people surrounding her and nodded. "At first, I thought he was about to rape me or something. But his teeth were bare and he was making this horrible sound, like he was hissing or something." She tried to shake the image from her mind but couldn't. Tears welled up even more in her eyes.
"Let's give her some room to breath guys," said an eldery man.
Craig looked around at the people. Some of them had their cell phones out and were recording the scene before them. He shook his head. It was sad to see how careless some humans were.
"I had stopped at a red light near here," the woman was answering someone else's question now. "When he approched my car, I was waiting for the light to change to green. My window was down and he grabbed my arm and tried to pull me out of the car. Something didn't look right about him, so I tried rolling up my window. He kept trying to pull my arm and that's when the window broke and cut me."
"Did it look as if he was trying to bite you?" asked a small boy who looked about eight years old.
The injured woman frowned. "Now that I think about it, yes," she said.
Rhomello's head jerked towards his friend. Craig gave him a puzzled look and pulled him aside, away from the crowd of people.
"Do you think she's telling the truth?" Craig asked.
Rhomello made a face as if he didn't know what to believe. "I mean, she is bleeding at the hands," he said.
"Let's go get the refrigerator," said Craig and headed off. He wasn't sure what was going on, but they still had things to do and he was tired. He could feel his entire body getting ready to crash from lack of decent sleep, in an actual bed.
When they purchased their items from the ground floor, they rolled their carts out into the parking lot to the car. Thankfully, the mini fridge fit into the backseat without a problem.
"Let's go get something to eat at the food court," said Rhomello. He was hungry and his stomach had been singing a tune to him for the last half an hour.
On their way back towards the entrance, they saw someone running to the same door with great speed. It was the security guard. Things were dropping from his pockets as he ran and his radio swung side to side. They watched as he made it to the door before them and disappeared from sight. When they finally entered the building again, they could see the security guard dashing through some doors. He emerged with two other officers and they were making their way toward the crowd again.
"I saw him," said the security guard, still out of breath from running. He had sweat all over his forehead and he looked as if he had seen a ghost. "He is still out there, attacking people."
"Attacking people?" a woman mimicked.
"Yes," he said with a serious expression. "he is out there acting bat-shit crazy!"
A young girl grabbed onto her mother and she held her child close. Other people gasped. "Did you guys call the police?" someone asked.
"We called for them, yes, and backup," said the security guard. He motioned for his help to follow him back outside. This time, they had weapons, real guns, not the taser guns that they usually carried. They exited through the front doors again and everyone watched them leave.
"Let's go get something to eat," said Craig. He figured whatever was happening outside would be handled. There were three guards and they probably could take the guy down with just one gun anyway.
They left the crowd and the injured woman and headed towards the food court, which was located on the top floor. They took the elevator and when it opened up and they stepped out, they were greeted by people who were unaware of what was going on downstairs. They were all busy eating and chatting amongst themselves. They made their way towards the food stores that were set up in a circle around them. There were so many things to choose from that it took them a while to agree on something healthy. They needed energy. Nothing beats a good healthy shake, something green was always good.
Craig ordered a chicken wrap to go with his shake and Rhomello ordered a salad with chicken bits sprinkled all over the top. They found empty seats near the elevator and sat down to dig in.
"This place is fricken huge!" Rhomello said through a bit of his food.
Craig nodded and drank half of his shake in three huge gulps. It tasted great, fresh.
"Do you think that guy attacking people out there is high?" Rhomello asked. He was curious about the entire situation. The way the security guard had ran back to the mall had reminded him of when he took track in high school. It was a fun sport, and he missed it a little. He had found his passion for computers a year later and he wanted to major in something that had a future. Track had been fun, but he knew it wasn't something he wanted to do for the rest of his life. Computers made him feel powerful in a way.
"I hope not. I feel sorry for the poor guy. They're gonna shoot him with three tasers if he doesn't cooperate," Craig said. He scarfed down the rest of his meal and finished his drink.
"How about we pick up a music system for the room?" Rhomello asked. "I'll go half with you," he added, just in case his friend needed a little persuading.
Craig chuckled and nodded. He usually listened to music when he studied anyway, it was a great idea. They both had the same taste in music. They definitely should buy one if they were going to throw awesome college parties their first year of college.
They checked the directory and located the electronics store. They headed back down. When the door opened again, there was a commotion on the second floor.
"He came back all bloody!" a teenage girl was yellinging to her friend.
"Now, it's not just the guy who is attacking people," said a guy walking with them, "there are others."
Rhomello frowned and gave Craig curious eyes. "Are they talking about the crackhead?" he said.
Craig walked to the railing that looked below and searched for the crowd of people. He spotted them towards the left and he went to get a closer look. Rhomello followed. When they got closer, there were screams coming from the people below. "Shut the door, lock it!" someone was yelling.
Craig and Rhomello's eyes went wide and they rushed to the escalators. They excused themselves as they maneuvered past the people on the steps and ran back to where the crowd had been. This time, the crowd was bigger. They had to weed through them to get to where the middle was. On the ground, the woman who was injured lay still. At first they thought that she was dead, but her breathing was shallow. She looked sickly, and her eyes had become red, as if she had smoked some very strong weed. She was foaming at the mouth, it was white, and she made slow gargling sounds.
"What the hell?!" Rhomello cringed.
There was a loud bang, and everyone turned to see what it was. Craig and Rhomello pushed through the crowd again and looked at the front door. A man bumped into the front door, blood was all over him and his clothes were ripped in parts. A few people backed up and the secuirty guard who had left stepped out from nearby holding his elbow. It was bleeding and he didn't look so good either. "It's locked up tight," he reassured everyone.
The man outside had lost all color in his eyes. It had bled to all white and he actually looked like a zombie. "I don't fucking believe this," someone said behind them, but no one dared to take their eyes away from the sight outside of the door.
"Is this real?" Craig said. He looked around to see if there were any cameras set up anywhere. He felt as if someone was playing a prank on them and at any moment they would step out from the shadows and announce, "You got punked!"
They watched the zombie bump into the door a few more times and a few people started crying. "I wanna go home," said a child clinging to her mom's leg.
Craig's eyes followed the man's movements. The man was slow, but it was clear, he saw them all looking back at him. According to zombie law, they wanted to feed. The first thing that popped into his head was, how the hell did this happen? What idiot created this monstrosity? What idiot decided to sit in his lab and come up with something that could wipe the human race off of the face of the earth? Him and Rhomello had watched many zombie movies together. They knew that when something like this happened, it never ended well. 
"What the actual fuck?" Rhomello said in disbelief. He turned on his heel and headed for the stairs again.
"Where are you going?" Craig asked, following him hurriedly.
"You know what this means don't you?!" Rhomello yelled over his shoulder. He stopped in his tracks to look at his friend.
Craig gave him a blank face.
Rhomello rolled his eyes. "This means we have to prepare ourselves!"
Craig's eyes went wide, realization kicked in, and he nodded. "Yes! We have to arm ourselves!"
They headed into the sports store and picked up wooden bats. Craig gave his a swing with one hand and Rhomello hefted his own in between his hands. They made their purchases and headed to the hardware section on the lower level. "Can I help you fellas find something?" asked the sales rep.
"Where are your nails?" Craig asked. They followed the man and he pointed them to the larger nails as if he knew what they wanted. He looked the bats in their hands, but asked no questions.
"Is there any way you can spike the bat with the nails for us?" Rhomello asked hopeful.
The man eyed them both with one of those, are-you-serious looks and led the way to the counter. "It'll cost you," he said.
"Man, what's coming is gonna be far more worse than worrying about how much you're gonna charge us to do this," said Craig.
The guy looked at them as if to say, I-don't-care. "How many nails do you want in it?" he asked.
"Half the box," instructed Rhomello.
They handed the man their bats and he used the nail gun on them. He handed it back to them when he was done and they marveled at his handy work.
"Now we head back downstairs and see what's happened so far," Rhomello said.
"What's happening downstairs?" asked the man, but they were already heading toward the exit. He shook his head and added, "Kids."
When they made it back to the entrance, they witnessed the police officers outside. They were slowly approaching the man. "Put your hands above your head," said the officer on the left, cautiously taking a step closer to the perpetrator.
Rhomello spotted the the security guards and headed towards them. "You have to shut down the mall," he said to the one who had gotten hurt.
The security guard looked down at the bat in his hands and frowned. "What the hell do you two think you're gonna do?" he asked.
Craig ignored him and repeated what his friend had just said, this time with more authority in his voice.
"The cops can handle this. You two can go home," he said to them dismissively.
"Listen!" Craig shouted. "This is only gonna get worse. That zombie out there has probably infected a lot more people out there. The woman who got bitten earlier is turning as we speak. We need to secure the building or it's gonna get ugly real fast."
The security guard turned his head to look outside. He purposely ignored them now.
Two loud shots rang out and they jumped. Everyone turned to see the cops put more bullets into the man's chest. He had lunged at the officers and they defended themselves. The man's body switched left and right with each hit, but he kept advancing.
"They have to shoot him in the head," Craig said under his breath. A woman standing nearby heard him and he turned to see her back away. She grabbed her friend's arm and they headed in another direction.
The zombie moved quicker and grabbed the officer on the right. He bit down into his arm and the officer screamed out in a panic. The zombie ripped the flesh from his arm. The other officer fired more shots into the side of the man's body, but he bit down again, unfazed by what was happening to him.
Rhomello and Craig ran up to the doors and banged on the glass, yelling out, "Shoot him in the head!" over and over again. The officer finally realized what they were trying to say when Craig mimed shooting for the head.
The officer aimed down his sight and pulled the trigger. Bang! The bullet hit its mark and down went the zombie. The entire mall was silent. Not a single person spoke. They were all too horrified at what had just happened.
"Zombies can go to hell," Craig said, pleased with the outcome. They had been right. Zombies were real and out there!
"Yeah, straight to hell," said Rhomello, "do not pass go, do not collect two hundred dollars."