by James Barton
“Hey!” he responded with excitement. “It’s been a long time, what are you up to?”
“What would you say if I told you I just found out a patient of mine has something no one has ever seen before?”
Abby couldn’t sleep. She tossed and turned on the hospital mattress. She didn’t even try to go home. The police had called her earlier that day. They told her that there was no murder victim at the bottom of the chasm, nor a poor little deer. Abby knew that something was wrong and requested an officer to guard Adam’s room. They had reluctantly agreed, allowing the old security guard to head home early. She later drifted into an uneasy sleep.
Suddenly a gunshot rang out into the night. Abby leapt up from the bed and looked around the room dazed. Without hesitation, she headed to the one place she expected trouble. As she turned the hallway corner, the police officer pointed his gun at her.
“Say something!” he roared.
“Don’t shoot!”
He lowered his gun and waved her over. On the floor between them was the body of a teen girl. A bullet had exited cleanly through the back of her skull. As she lay motionless on the floor the contents of her head dribbled onto the cold hospital tiles. There was a flashback of when Abby had been a combat medic and she gritted her teeth trying to push away the dark memories.
“What happened!?” Abby cried out.
“She came at me. I tried to calm her down, but she was drugged up or something.” Abby gave the burly policeman a disapproving look. He was twice her size and armed, there was no need to …
“See!” he said as he showed her his forearm. There was a bite that cut right through the fabric of his uniform. He was bleeding profusely, and she wondered how she hadn’t noticed it sooner.
“What happened?” Adam asked as he approached the doorframe.
“Stay back!” the cop yelled and pointed his gun.
“Whoa, calm down.”
“I heard the rumors about you. You have some crazy disease. Did you cause this?”
“Disease? That’s terribly offensive.”
“Get back, now!” the cop yelled. He shoved the pistol in Adam’s direction, threatening him to back up.
There was a frantic cry of pain coming from down the hallway. The officer hesitated and looked at his bleeding wound.
“I need to patch that; you’re going to bleed to death.”
“Shit, I better hurry then,” he said and ran off in the direction of the scream.
With the cop gone, Adam gave Abby an odd look and shrugged his shoulders.
“Please stay in your room,” she begged.
“Of course, you used the magic words.”
Abby watched intently as the officer ran into a room. A few seconds passed, and the waiting became unbearable. Without warning, a patient sprinted into the room behind the officer. She was followed by a staggering line of drunken patients. There was a barrage of gunshots that rang down the hallway and then there was only silence. A single anguished yell cut through the silence and it made Abby step back defensively. A nurse stepped out of a room on the other side of the hallway. Her white outfit was smeared in fresh blood. The blood ran in tiny rivers from her chin down to her breast. She walked toward Abby with a jerky gait that looked utterly inhuman.
Abby was frozen in place; her mind was frantically reaching for actions and yet found none. Mr. Miller, a patient of Abby’s, turned the corner and walked with a choppy almost toddler-like walk. His hands were smeared with blood and dangling pieces of flesh. His eyes were cloudy, and they locked onto Abby. He let out a guttural howl and began to move faster toward her. Seeing into those eyes is what finally activated the ignition in her body. People have always trained themselves to make excuses for why things can’t hurt us. They tell themselves that the monsters aren’t real. It was when a previously wheelchair bound patient came walking toward her with bloody hands, that she accepted the truth. They started coming from every direction. Abby looked down the hallway, figures slowly poured from their rooms and it appeared that there was nowhere to run. She looked back at Adam. He pointed at the door.
“Might want to come inside, I promise I don’t bite,” he said with a smile.
For all she knew he was the cause of all this. The last thing she wanted was to be locked in the room with him. That was, until the police officer stumbled out of the room, his head swiveling loosely. His throat was torn to pieces and his head wobbled on a gory pedestal. He turned his head in her direction and she was forced to make a rash decision.
“Close it, close it!” she yelled to Adam. He slammed the heavy wooden door and put his back to it. He looked at her with the same look a child gives their mother after breaking her favorite vase.
“The military will be here any second. You won’t get away with this,” Abby said.
“Why would you call the military? They will just roll in, erase this and put me in some secret lab. They will do more damage than I ever could.”
“You don’t know how this will turn out.”
“Honey, I’ve seen the movies. Well, I mean, Adam did. They are going to make this look like an accidental gas leak and take me away.”
“Hardly. They are going to put you down and then I’ll help them patch things up here.”
“That is doubtful. You are a passive carrier now,” he said.
“What are you talking about?”
“The airborne component can only survive about one minute without a host. It’s dormant, doesn’t really kick in until your heart stops beating. I have to admit; this air conditioner thing is quite the invention.”
“You’re, you’re lying. All these people, so fast?” she questioned.
“Like I said, it’s dormant unless your heart stops, or maybe if you were deathly ill. Your people are reacting … poorly … to exposure. A lot of sick people were probably pushed over the edge. Can I also add that the results are yielding quite a high amount of failures?”
“Failures, you mean those cannibals? What the hell would you call a success then?”
“I like to think of myself as a success. Maybe you. I would say anyone that doesn’t bite people is a good start, that is quite barbaric and not at all acceptable behavior.”
Abby was completely stunned. She didn’t know what to say, think, or do. Finding out that she could be infected, that she could possibly even spread it to her patients made her question everything that she had worked for. In one fell swoop her ability to fix people had been tainted and shattered.
“Don’t look so sad. It isn’t the end; it is merely the…”
“Shut up.”
“You’re right, too clichéd I suppose.”
The door seemed to stop shaking and there was an eerie silence.
“So, what happens now? Are you just going to kill me?” Abby asked with a shaky voice.
Adam furrowed his brow in offense. “I was just about to ask you how you wanted to escape. Seems the patients outside are drawn to you. I can promise, they will be far rougher on you than I will.”
“So, I can transmit this just by breathing on people?” Abby asked.
“Maybe yes, maybe no. It’s complicated.”
“Complicated?”
“Now might not be the best time for a science lesson,” Adam said.
“I mean, I will turn into one of those things. Eventually, right?”
“When it’s all said and done … maybe. Think of it as a no interest loan. You get your whole life before it happens, no need to perform some heroic sacrifice. I’ll be honest though, things aren’t happening the way they used to,” he said.
“How so?”
“It has been awhile since I’ve been around people. I must admit that the whole cannibalism thing is new to me. The last time things went this poorly they called it the Black Plague,” he said. As he finished his sentence, there was a roar of engines outside their window. Abby ran over and looked down at the parking lot. Below her a convoy of heavily armed military vehicles began to surround the hospit
al. As the troops exited the vehicles they were clearly prepared for a possible contagion. They had black hoods that wrapped into their suits and gas masks. They formed small groups and began to make hand gestures toward the building.
“I have a plan for you. Believe me that they are not going to save you and bring you home,” Adam said calmly.
“Why should I trust you?” Abby asked. Deep down she knew that he was right. Her stomach made a flip as she wondered if she had made the right decision in calling her old military contact. She had hoped that they would just take Adam away and keep things discrete. The CDC would have put them on the news; it would’ve caused panic. She never once thought they would come and get Adam and erase everyone else in the process. She wanted to kick herself, how could she have been so stupid?
Abby looked out the window and a nurse ran full speed toward the convoy, looking back as she ran. There was a small staggering group of infected individuals chasing her. Without hesitation the troops got into position and fired their rifles. The nurse tumbled onto the ground, as bullets exploded out of the back of her uniform. Then, as she fell lifeless on the ground, they continued to take down the infected. The infected took bullet after bullet, before finally falling to the ground in a ragged heap. As the soldiers began to break off into small groups, the nurse started to shudder and shake. She clumsily began to rise to her feet. One of the soldiers walked up to her and put a bullet into her brain, putting her down for good. The small groups began to go straight for the front door while others circled around the building.
“Shit, I think you’re right,” Abby whispered.
“Well, are you leaving?”
“They aren’t going to just let us escape, they have us surrounded.”
“I’ll help you escape, but I’m going to stay. They came all this way; I might as well meet them.”
“What, why?”
“I’ve spent a long time restrained; a few weeks in a laboratory won’t bother me. Plus, I’d love to hear my diagnosis,” he said. As he spoke the sound of gunshots began to echo through the building. The squads had entered the hospital and were putting people down. From what Abby had seen, they were not here to rescue anyone. The worst part was, she understood why.
“Ugh! How could I be so stupid?”
“You can kick yourself later, but we need to leave now if you want to live.”
“Where the hell are we going to go?”
“I was using the internet on my phone earlier today to find layouts of this building. Such a great invention, your people have access to limitless information, in your pocket! The collective intelligence is astounding.”
“I don’t think many people are using it to get wiser. What did you find?” As the conversation lingered gunshots continued to ring outside the door.
“In the basement there is a sewage tunnel that leads far away from here.”
“Sewage tunnel?”
“Don’t worry, in 1974 the hospital upgraded their pipes and it isn’t used anymore. The tunnel itself was sealed up at the entrance, but it wasn’t filled in or destroyed because it still has storm drains attached to it to help prevent flooding.”
“How the hell did you find all that out with your phone?”
“I’ve had a few hours to study it. My original goal was to find an exit I could use without causing a ruckus. I didn’t want all of this to happen. At least … not like this,” he said with an eerily pleasant smile.
“I can’t believe I’m agreeing to any of this, but yes, help me escape.” It was a statement that sounded like bargaining with the devil.
“The human spirit!” he said as he forcefully swung the door open.
As the door flew open, a few infected patients and hospital workers were knocked to the ground; a few others were sent staggering back. With a fluid, dancer-like motion he proceeded to stomp the heads of some of the floored infected. He made a quick jab to the forehead on the others that seemed to cave their skulls in by shear force alone. Abby didn’t know if she should be impressed or terrified. To be honest, she was both. He cleared a small path and when she stepped out into the hallway it was very apparent that whatever was affecting these people had turned them into mindless cannibals. There were small pockets of infected tearing apart corpses on the floor and even some of the fallen seemed to jitter and thrash, dead, but still somehow responding to stimuli.
“Aren’t you killing your own people?”
“These are as much my people as a child molester is yours.” Abby was taken back by the quickness and certainty of his response.
As they made their way to the service elevator, they passed another woman, Doctor Edwin, on the floor. Her face had been chewed from its skull; the only thing that remained was a bleached white bone mask. The top portion of her head was crumpled in to reveal tiny fragments of brain matter clinging to an almost empty cavity.
“Oh, God,” Abby muttered.
Adam stopped in his tracks and looked down at her and then back at Abby. An evil smile came across his face and he reached out and ripped Abby’s coat. She flailed backwards slightly, but tried not to touch Adam directly. Her white coat now had a fist sized portion of fabric missing. Adam extended his arm to show her something. In his hand was the blue plastic name badge, BAXTER. He knelt down and pinned it to the deceased woman’s coat.
“They know your face, but this could buy you some time.”
“Why are you helping me?” she asked. She was interrupted by gunshots that sounded even closer than before. They made it to the elevator a few steps away and mashed the button. For the first time ever it seemed, the elevator was parked on their current floor. Without wasting any time, they both shuffled inside. Abby consciously tried to stay out of reach of Adam.
As the elevator began its descent into the basement, Adam looked at her.
“Why am I helping you? The same reason you would swerve your car to avoid hitting a stray dog. I do not enjoy seeing anyone suffer, nor do I have a reason to hurt you. Plus, it’s in my best interest that you make it out of here.”
She felt a cold wave of sweat as he spoke. The way he was so straightforward about all this made her feel … wrong. It was almost as if he knew her drive to survive would overwrite her morality. As much as she tried to convince herself that she needed to go back to the room and wait for the military, she simply couldn’t.
The elevator hummed silently down toward the basement, an area of the hospital she had honestly never been to. As the “1” lit up she cringed, expecting it to stop and open to a heavily armed firing squad. It didn’t stop, but as it continued past the first floor, she heard voices shouting. While she couldn’t make out the exact words it sounded like they were giving commands into a radio.
“They could be down there right now waiting for us!” she whispered to Adam.
“For their sake, I hope not,” he reassured her.
“What will you do?”
“I said I’d get you out of here, that’s what I’m going to do.”
As the elevator came to a halt, her knees wanted to give out on her. She braced herself and there was a loud bung. As the doors opened, Adam charged forward aggressively. Standing directly in front of them were three armed soldiers. They began to fire wildly toward the elevator as Adam waded through the hail of bullets. Adam moved unflinching through the storm of gunfire. There was a quick tussle as Adam ripped the mask from one man and punched him in the chest. It sent him sailing a few feet before landing on the dusty concrete floor below. Adam punched the second soldier in the throat and he hobbled backward gasping for air. He effortlessly snapped the man’s mask off his face and turned to the final soldier.
The soldier pulled the trigger frantically, but only a soft click was emitted. After realizing he was out of ammo he stepped back, one hand raised in submission. Adam lunged forward and grabbed the man by his vest. He yanked the man like a kid’s stuffed animal, even though the soldier was nearly twice his size.
“Call your team, tell them you dealt
with the basement and are going to look around for anyone else. Then I won’t have to kill you.”
“I, I won’t,” the man stuttered through the rebreather.
Adam’s eyes turned black like two small oily gems. His face began to contort into an animalistic sneer. His features began to pull back into sharp contours.
Adam wrapped his fingers, which looked more like talons than anything, around the man’s mask. “Call them,” Adam said and cocked his head to the side with a sneer.
Reluctantly the man reached down and raised his black radio to his head. “Bravo team, Bravo team, this is Charlie.” There was a slight pause as the man contemplated. “The basement has been cleared; we are going to search for others.”
“Copy that,” the radio replied.
Adam’s features returned to his soft, somewhat chubby state.
“When you wake up, keep the mask on,” he said as he spun the man around and put him in a chokehold. A few moments later the man collapsed onto the ground, his mask still clinging to his face.
Adam stepped over to the elevator to call Abby over and she was lying slumped in the corner. Two bullet holes were seeping blood from her stomach. Her hands were stained as she applied pressure.
“Abby!” he shouted with a surprising amount of concern.
“Don’t touch me,” she said and extended her arm. “So much for me making the choice to survive,” she said in a low raspy voice. She struggled to her feet and waved her arm for him to back up. “Where is this exit?”
“You aren’t going to make it like that. You of all people know that,” Adam said with genuine concern.
“I said, where is the exit?” she said with a slow deliberate tone.
Adam began surveying the room and seemed to try to get his bearings. For the first time his demeanor was shaken. “It should beeee … over there!” he said as he pointed to a shelf full of tools. Abby limped behind him and he pulled the corner of the shelves away from the wall. “There she is,” he said and pointed to the wall.
Behind the shelf of tools was a pasty spot of concrete work. Its color didn’t match the remainder of the wall. “Are you ready?”
