Katie fell upon Vivian the same way she’d fallen upon Sarah dozens of times when they’d stagger back from some party at Andrews Court, both giggling and missing their steps on the cobbled parking lot. Katie had never bitten Sarah, except for that one time, but Sarah had been okay with it. So Katie’s teeth sinking into Vivian’s shoulder came as a surprise to Sarah as much as it did to Vivian. They both screamed.
Sam, who had previously been holding Sarah back while his tiny green-haired friend sliced up Sarah’s best and recently undead friend as some murderous show of skill, now pushed Sarah aside and leapt to Vivian’s rescue. Katie had always been remarkably resilient and, despite the recent severing of nearly all her major tendons, was putting up a good fight. Sarah, with little clue as to what the appropriate protocol for such a situation would be, decided it was best to do nothing. She felt utterly useless and conflicted as Sam pried Katie off Vivian, who lay shaking on the floor, blood gushing from her neck, and tossed her down.
The Black Squirrel, packed with nearly every survivor in Bates, was in an uproar. People were shouting and shoving. Some were fleeing toward the door, certain that shit had just hit the proverbial fan – which it had – while others stood transfixed, watching as the meeting quickly shifted gears from a student club-type gathering to the sort of chaos generally reserved for a question and answer session with a controversial political artist.
Rachel seemed to be just as paralyzed as Sarah. She kept looking between the mob of students and Sam and Vivian. Her jaw hung open and she could only stutter “No.”
Sam was crouched over Vivian’s writhing body, his hand resting on her forehead. Sarah wished she could comfort him, but apparently a sudden zombie apocalypse had done nothing for the old Sarah Lawrence tradition of all the most desirable guys harboring feelings for people who weren’t there. Vivian stopped writhing and Sam stood up, his face pale. It wasn’t until he was nearly on top of Katie’s prostrate body that Sarah saw he had Vivian’s knife clenched in his hand. Katie moaned and sputtered up blood. Sam, his face shrouded, drove the knife deep into her eye and Katie moved no more.
Sarah shrieked. Then Rachel shrieked, but it wasn’t at the brutal way zombie-Katie had just been dispatched. Vivian, foaming at the mouth, had just grabbed onto Sam’s ankle.
Rachel ran forward and locked her hands around Vivian’s boot, pulling hard while Sam kicked at Vivian’s face and tried to reach the knife, still imbedded in Katie’s skull.
“Vivian’s turned!” some guy in camouflage jacket shouted. More people dashed for the door. In fact, now they were shoving each other out of the way, while those on the outside tried to keep it closed.
“Sarah, get the knife!” Sam called, his attention focused entirely on staying out of the biting range of voracious Vivian.
But Sarah couldn’t. She stood over Katie’s corpse and had to avert her eyes. Tears welled up and ran stinging down her cheeks.
“The knife, damn it!”
It was then that Vivian’s boot came off and Rachel fell to the floor with a thud. Vivian, free from Rachel’s insistent pull, lunged towards Sam’s shin and sank her teeth in.
Sam’s scream could have shattered glass. He collapsed as Vivian clawed her way up his body in a brutal twist on PDA.
“Someone do something!” was all Sarah could think to say.
Rachel was on her feet again and backed into a corner, her face twisted in horror as she watched one friend tear into the other. For Sarah, it was like reliving a nightmare version of the first amorous half of first year. This thought was all she could stand.
With her eyes averted, Sarah grabbed the handle of the knife protruding from Katie’s mutilated face. She pulled hard and the blade slid out with sickening gurgle. The knife held high, she approached Vivian, who now had her face buried in Sam’s stomach. When she was close enough she plunged it into Vivian’s back.
Someone shouted, “No, you idiot! You have to destroy the brain!” but it was too late. Vivian was much faster than the zombies Sarah had encountered before, and she’d turned to snarl at her attacker before Sarah could recover the weapon.
“Help!” Sarah squeaked as Vivian crawled off Sam and toward her.
Rachel seemed to have shaken off her shock. She took a couple steps toward them, but paused as a few other students approached, having found weapons of their own. One had a broken pool cue, another, a coffee pot, and the third, inexplicably, a gardening spade.
Pool Cue Girl attacked first. She tried to impale Vivian’s head but missed, which caused her to stumble right into Vivian’s path.
Sarah was standing on top of the couch in the corner, one eye on the events unfolding before her and the other desperately searching the board game shelf for something with which to defend herself.
Vivian bore down on Pool Cue Girl, blood dripping from her snarling mouth, but Gardening Spade Girl was right behind her. She drove the pointed end of her spade into the back of Vivian’s neck. She moaned and rolled off her victim. Gardening Spade Girl stood over Vivian and raised the spade for the killing blow.
Before she could, though, there was the sound of glass shattering and a cry of pain. Sarah tossed Trivial Pursuit aside. She felt numb. The glass that had broken was the coffee pot. The guy who had been holding the coffee pot was now clutching a bleeding foot as Sam, his guts hanging out of his stomach, groped at him and moaned.
Gardening Spade Girl wailed and lowered her spade at the sight of Coffee Pot Dude, which gave Vivian enough time to bite her in the thigh. She cursed and kicked at Vivian, which only gave Vivian more flesh to sink her teeth into.
Sarah grabbed for another game, but only came across Trouble.
Pool Cue Girl was back on her feet. She ripped the knife out of Vivian’s back and began stabbing wildly, yelling some kind of war cry. This only made Vivian turn on her with renewed rage.
In the span of a few seconds they’d gone from two infected students to five, and there were still so many people in the room. Those who were already outside the Black Squirrel seemed to have conspired hold the door shut, as there was a mass of students trying and failing to force their way out.
Sarah noticed that Rachel had taken a pool cue from her corner, but instead of joining the fight was inching towards the other side of the room. They made eye contact and Rachel jerked her head to one side, a gesture Sarah associated with the wordless communication of “check out this douche” in seminar. She furrowed her eyebrows at Rachel, who then pointed discreetly to the stairs leading up to the film loft. Sarah thought this odd as well, as now seemed like no time for a quickie.
Sarah took Risk in both hands and bashed Gardening Spade Girl in the face with it, forgetting that the girl wasn’t yet a zombie.
“Sorry!” she said, dashing across the room.
“Watch out!” Rachel said as Sarah approached.
Sarah turned just in time to see Vivian bounding toward her. She took another swing with Risk. The box connected with a satisfying thwack and Vivian was knocked back – right into the crowd of people trying to escape the carnage.
They screamed and fought, but soon the rest of the zombie gang was bearing down on them and the gang’s numbers were growing.
“Come on!” Rachel said, grabbing Sarah’s hand. “We have to hide.”
She pulled Sarah up the stairs and into the film loft. They barricaded the door with bean bag chairs and then sank down against them.
From below the screams of their fellow students were dwindling. In their place rose moans.
“I should have gone to school in Texas,” Rachel said. “At least then we’d have guns.”
Next Week: Bates is open for dinner.