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disbelief. He turns and shakes his head and moves himself to the other side of the room. A long moment passes before I lower the gun. Even though I avoid making eye contact, I can feel the nervous stares from everyone in the room as I walk over to the desk. I really don’t want anything to do with these people. The only thing I want to do is keep them from doing something stupid that gets me killed.
    “I know we all have people out there that we want to get to. I do too,” I admit. “This is the last place on earth I want to be right now. But Marco, the cop, he told me this is happening all over the city. We don’t have a chance if we go running around out there right now. We have to be smart. We have to have a plan.”
    “So, what, are you going to hold us here at gunpoint?” the blonde woman gripes. She stamps out her cigarette in the ashtray, squishing the filter like an accordion, then drops the butt on the floor and flattens it with her foot.
    “No,” I sigh. “I am not holding anyone hostage. If anyone wants to leave now, go ahead. Otherwise, we wait until it’s safe. The gates are electric, and the power is out so the only way to get the truck out is to crash through somewhere and then those things are going to be all over here, and there’ll be no going back.”
    For a long minute, everyone looks around at each other, saying nothing.
    “This is bullshit!” the tattooed guy yells. “If you all want to wait to die here, fine. I’m getting the fuck out, though.” He heads toward the door, muttering as he passes me. He reaches for the handle, then turns to see if anyone is going with him. When he realizes no one is following he says, “I’m not going to wait all day for you idiots to make up your minds.” His voice quavers slightly. It seems pretty obvious he is afraid to go out alone, but the man is too arrogant to turn back now. He shakes his head and leaves without closing the door behind him.
    When it’s clear he won’t be coming back, the black guy walks over and closes the door and slides the deadbolt. I am relieved not to be dealing with the tattooed guy anymore, even though I am certain he has no real chance out there.
    From the windows, we can see the tattooed guy running over to the gate and watch as he struggles to climb. He drops down into the street and twists an ankle as he lands. He collapses on his back, gritting his teeth and clutching his leg.
    “Oh no,” cries Danielle. She turns toward the door, but the black guy latches onto her arm and shakes his head. Joey and the blonde woman hurry over to the window now to see what is happening too.
    While the tattoo guy struggles to get to his feet, several corpses stumble into view from the edges of the pavement. He notices the dead body in a slate gray suit and tie coming at him from his right. The tattooed guy punches it in the face, then grabs it by the tie, pulls his fist back to hit it again. He doesn’t see the corpse approaching from behind him until the zombie grabs his arm and bites down on his bicep.
    “We can’t leave him out there,” says Danielle. She shrugs her arm free, but the black guy moves in between her and the door.
    “You can’t help him now,” he says.
    “Yes, I can,” Danielle insists. She steps around the tall black man, but he puts a hand against the door to keep her from opening it.
    “If you go out there,” he says. “They’ll know we’re in here.”
    Danielle looks back at me, her eyes pleading with me to do the right thing. I don’t know what that means right now. As horrible as it is, we watch the tattooed guy screaming for help, and we do nothing as they fall on him less than fifty feet away. The corpses rip out pieces of his face with their teeth. His eyes open wide with terror, as he kicks and swats at them with his limbs. He twists his body away from their grasp and nearly makes it to his feet before they bring him to the ground again. A dark-haired corpse in a blood-stained flower-print