by Powell, Lora
The open tent door flapped in the breeze. Belongings were scattered around and tipped over. One door to the truck stood open. I could see blood splattered on the interior, and a large pool had congealed on the ground.
The fine hairs on my arms started to prickle. Whoever these people had been, they had thought that it was safe to stop here, and paid with their lives. I hoped we weren’t going to make the same mistake somewhere along the road.
THIRTY-SIX
DAY 20
We stayed in the van for several minutes. Bill had stopped it in the middle of the highway, giving us enough room to be able to look all around the abandoned camp. We needed to be sure that the zombies were gone before we all climbed out of the safety of the van.
My eyes kept going back to the dry blood that had sprayed the interior of the truck. It looked like someone had been so close to survival, only to have their life snatched away from them at the last second. It was a disconcerting thought.
Bill was the first to open his door, with the rest of us following him. Maya pulled out the length of hose that she had cut back in the garage, and a gas can. She went to work siphoning gas from the pickup while the rest of us fanned out.
Rex darted into the tall grass and began vigorously sniffing the area. I still wasn’t sure that he wouldn’t run off, so I kept an eye on him as I wandered over to the open tent. It only made sense to check for anything we may want to take with us.
A couple of sleeping bags lay in a heap on the floor of the tent, looking like whoever had been using them had gotten up in a hurry. The empty wrappers from a few candy bars were tossed into a corner. Other than that, the tent was empty. Pulling my head back out of the opening, I looked around to see what the rest of the group was doing.
While Maya stole the gas, Bill stood watch, making sure that nothing was able to sneak up on her. Devon leaned against the side of the van, keeping his weight off of his injured leg. The others all poked through the scattered belongings left in the grass, but it didn’t look like they were finding much of use.
Rex had wandered close to the tree line that started a dozen yards off of the pavement; his nose to the wind, as he sniffed intently at the breeze.
“Rex, come here boy,” I called him back to me. If he took off after something, I wouldn’t be able to go look for him, and I was already attached to the dog. I didn’t want to lose him.
When he trotted back to my side, I walked nearer to where everyone else had congregated at the back of the abandoned SUV. Maya was just finishing pouring the gas into our own tank.
“We should fill the can back up with whatever is left in this one. Who knows when we’ll be able to stop again.” Carrie patted the side of the SUV as she looked to Maya.
Maya and Bill walked over and Maya set up to finish taking whatever gas was left in the SUV. Looking over the top of the vehicle, Bill wondered out loud. “Do you think we should take the tent?”
Looking in the direction of the tent, I contemplated on the question. Did we need a tent? Or, more accurately, was it safe to use a tent? The previous people who had tried it hadn’t fared so well.
“I think I’d feel safer sleeping in the van.”
Echoes of agreement sounded around me. Those flimsy panels of fabric wouldn’t do much to keep a zombie out.
“Yeah, you’re right.”
Muttering about making space for the now half full gas can, Bill went to open the back of the van. Devon hopped to the open door and climbed back into the back seat. I watched him worriedly, and I wasn’t the only one. We were all staring after the teen when a hair-raising snarl from the dog made us look in the direction he was staring.
A zombie had broken from the tree line and was hobbling toward us as fast as its mangled body could manage. Even from a bit of a distance, the damage that had been inflicted on it was apparent. Bites to its face and neck had removed chunks of flesh. One arm had been gnawed until bone showed through. Likewise, the missing muscle that had been removed from its thigh was deep, and was what was causing the relatively fresh zombie’s slower pace.
Decomposition hadn’t had much of a chance to set in yet, and without the damage, this zombie would have still been frightening for its speed.
“I got it.” Carrie pulled her knife from her belt and walked steadily forward to meet the zombie.
It was just one zombie, but that didn’t mean that more wouldn’t come. Grabbing onto Rex’s collar to keep the still growling dog from attacking, I watched as Carrie calmly approached the zombie. The creature lurched toward her with mouth open, and she allowed its own momentum to drive her knife through its eye. When she bent down to retrieve her knife, I hustled the dog over to the van and put him inside.
“Watch him, please. I don’t want him to run off,” I told Devon before sliding the door shut. We were just about ready to leave, and having the dog shut in the van would make me feel better.
I was turning back around when I heard the scream.
Whirling, I watched in horror as two more zombies charged from the trees. Fast ones.
Carrie was still midway between the trees and the vehicles. What was worse, she wasn’t alone.
Somehow, in the scant seconds it had taken me to shut the dog in the van, Maya and Shawn had made it to Carrie’s side. I bolted in their direction.
I wasn’t going to make it to my friends before the zombies. And they stood no chance of outrunning them and making it inside the van. In my peripheral vision, I saw that Bill was also running toward them. We would have to hope that, between the five of us, we could kill two fresh zombies. And that the three of them could manage to not get bitten until we got there to help.
The tall grass impeded me as I tried to make my legs run faster. I had never cursed being shorter than average as much as I was at that moment. Pulling ahead of me, Bill held his own knife out.
Without conscious thought, I found the machete that I had discovered in the garage and claimed in my hand. I was near to where my friends had turned to face their attackers when the zombies reached them first.
Swinging hard with his bat, Shawn attempted to take out the first zombie, but it jerked to the side, and his blow bounced off of its shoulder instead. The creature kept coming, and with no time to recover, he was unable to stop it from running straight into him. Shawn and the zombie went down in a tangle of limbs, and the tall grass hid them from my frantic sight.
Just feet away from where Shawn had gone down, Maya was struggling to keep the other zombie at bay, while Carrie attempted to stab it. But the zombie wasn’t exactly an easy target as it fought with Maya, and she had to be careful not to hit Maya instead of the zombie. None of Carrie’s stabs had the desired effect.
I could see the desperation on their faces as the zombie inched closer to taking a bite out of Maya. Just when I thought that it was too late, Bill reached them, and charged straight into the zombie, ripping it away from the women tumbling into the grass.
I bounded the last few steps to where Shawn had disappeared, heart beating like it wanted to escape from my chest. I couldn’t have found family, for the first time in my life, only to have that family taken away so soon. I refused to believe that fate could be so cruel.
Just as I spotted the familiar color of his shirt, Shawn staggered to his feet, breathing harshly. A smear of blood coated his cheek, and more of it was on his hands. And the knife he held.
The zombie lay unmoving in the grass.
“Are you ok?”
He saw me running toward him and a panicked look crossed his face. “What are you doing?! Get to the van!” He swung around, checking for any more zombies.
The zombies lay still while Maya was helping her husband get to his feet and Carrie looking wildly around. The five of us bolted for the van, where Fallon and Devon were standing, looking unsure if they should try to help or not.
“Get in the van!” Bill’s loud order made up their minds, and the two scrambled to climb into the back seat.
When I ran away
from the van to help the other, I felt like an eternity for me, and going back toward its safety wasn’t any better. I kept waiting for more screams and sounds of pursuit to come from behind us. But, thankfully, they never came. Reaching the vehicle as one group, we piled inside and slammed the doors closed.
I was still clutching the machete when Rex almost cut himself on the blade in his exuberance at greeting me. I tucked it away and buried my hands in his hair in an attempt to stop the trembling that had started.
“Has anyone been bitten?” Maya’s low question came from the back seat.
“No.”
“I’m ok.”
Carrie hesitated before answering, “I’m good. It’s not a bite.” She held up her hand that she had wrapped in her outer shirt. Red was starting to bleed through the material. “Think I’m gonna need stitches though. That knife is sharp.”
“Ok.” Bill cleared his throat. “Let’s get out of here. Carrie, we’ll look for a better place to stop and get your hand taken care of. Hang in there.”
It was a relief when he started the van and left the abandoned campsite behind.
Finding a place to stop proved to be harder than expected. We had been traveling a long stretch of highway that was bordered on both sides by endless trees. It was nearly an hour later before we took an off-ramp that led to a tiny gas station in the middle of nowhere.
The front door to the gas station had already been forced open by someone else. The food, drinks, and anything else remotely useful that had been stocked on the shelves was gone. Fortunately, we had enough of those things for now. What we needed were four walls and a roof. The little gas station would work well enough.
Carrie had started to look a little green by the time I sat her down and began rooting through our medical supplies. I hoped she wasn’t squeamish about needles. Having to stitch her hand up was going to test the fortitude of my own stomach. The last thing I needed was her getting sick all over me.
“Ok, Carrie. Let’s take a look.” I grabbed for her hand but pulled away like it was too hot.
Because it was.
THIRTY-SEVEN
DAY 20
This could not be happening. I shouldn’t have been able to feel the heat of Carrie’s hand through the shirt wrapped around it. That just wasn’t normal, and it could only mean one thing: Carrie was running one very, very high fever.
I hesitated for a brief moment before I reached out to touch the back of my fingers on the exposed skin of her arm. I needed to be sure.
My heart fell. She was too hot.
“Um, Carrie? You feeling ok?”
She shook her head. “Honestly, no. I think I might be coming down with flu or something.”
“Ok.” I tried to keep my tone light. “Let’s take care of your hand and then I’ll see if we have anything else that might help in the bag.”
I dug until I found a couple of our remaining latex gloves and put them on. Steadying myself with a big breath, I unwound the shirt, afraid of what I was going to find. Carrie had said that she didn’t get bitten, but maybe she had been mistaken. I had only ever felt a fever like that once before, and it had been coming from Evie just a few hours before she died.
I hoped that I was wrong, but to be honest, I was completely expecting a bite or maybe some deep scratches when I finally uncovered her wound.
The wound was clearly a deep cut made by something very sharp. Like a knife. I moved her hand to look for the feared marks, but they weren’t there. Just one long gash to the palm of her hand. Maybe luck was with us and Carrie really was just coming down with a bad case of the flu. She certainly hadn’t had one of the tainted vaccines, and she appeared to not be bitten, so that seemed to rule out zombie infection.
“I’ve uh…I’ve never given anyone stitches before, so…” I trailed off.
“It’s ok. Do what you can.” She gave me a tight smile.
I got busy cleaning the cut. Around us, the rest of our group had done their best to secure the gas station and search it. When Shawn wandered over to where Carrie and I sat, I shot him a meaningful look while Carrie was distracted by something that Bill was saying to Maya. Catching my look, Shawn came closer and hovered over my shoulder to watch. I didn’t want to cause panic, not until we knew for sure at least, but I needed to tell someone else about my concerns. If Carrie really was infected, she was going to die, and then she was going to become a very real danger.
The feeling of the needle and thread pulling through flesh was nauseating. The experience had to be even worse for Carrie. She did her best to hold her hand steady, but she couldn’t help the involuntary twitches. By the time I had finished closing the wound, sweat was trickling from her forehead. I couldn’t help but wonder if it was a result of my stitching her hand or the zombie virus. Digging for some pain killers, I handed her a hefty dose.
“Thanks. We should start calling you Doc.” She smiled weakly at me and swallowed the pills.
“You should rest a while.” I did my best to smile at her attempt at humor. Even I could feel that the expression fell flat on my face.
“I think I will.”
Carrie got up stiffly and wandered over to where the others had piled a few blankets. The gas station didn’t exactly offer any sort of comfort, but they had done their best to make a soft spot to rest. I watched her go while Shawn dropped down to sit next to me.
“What’s wrong?”
I leaned closer to whisper, “I think Carrie might be infected.”
“What!”
His voice was too loud, and I scowled at him. “She is running a really high fever, and she says she feels like she is coming down with something. I didn’t see any bites, but I’ve only felt a fever like that one time before.”
He stayed quiet, watching Carrie for several seconds. The woman’s long hair had fallen to cover her face from view, but even way across the room, we could clearly see the trembling that had started to shake her. “We have to tell everyone else.”
He was right, and I didn’t stop him when he waved for the others to join us.
“What is it?” Fallon asked.
When I repeated what I had already told Shawn, everyone focused their worried eyes on the woman huddled into the blankets.
“You’re sure it wasn’t a bite?” Bill asked me. He looked troubled.
“I didn’t see anything that looked like a bite.” I looked at directly at him. “Yeah, I’m sure. Like she said, she cut herself on her knife.” As soon as the words left my mouth, I knew what had happened. “Crap.”
“What?”
I had their undivided attention.
“Her knife. She used it to stab that zombie right before she cut herself. She would have gotten blood from the zombie into the cut.”
Silence fell as we thought about the implications of what I’d said. It made sense. Fresh, infected blood coming in contact with an open wound would surely spread the infection. Why hadn’t we seen it before?
“But, that zombie at the camp scratched me, and I practically showered in its blood. I didn’t get sick.” Shawn brought up a good point.
“Wait. You were scratched?” Fallon asked the question that it looked like everyone else was thinking.
Shawn nodded. “Yeah. If it wasn’t for Bri, I’d have gotten bitten for sure too.” He pulled his shirt aside to show everyone the mostly healed scratches.
“We wondered if it was transferred through a scratch or not.” Maya glanced at Bill. “I guess we have our answer.”
I thought about the scratches that I had cleaned like a crazy person not so long ago. “You had zombie blood everywhere except those scratches.”
He nodded slowly. “Yeah. I think you are right. I think that shoulder stayed clean, somehow. You also insisted on treating it right away.” He didn’t add what we all were thinking. Carrie had been cut for a while before we were able to treat her hand.
“What do we do now?” Devon asked the tough question.
“If she is infected, there�
�s only one way it will end,” Maya’s voice cracked on the last word. Bill reached over to rub her back soothingly.
I had forgotten for a minute that Carrie and the couple had been friends before all of this went down. It wouldn’t be easy for any of us to watch our friend die, but for them, it would be worse.
Bill spoke up, “We don’t have to make any decisions right now. Let’s let her rest for a while and see. Maybe she won’t get any worse.”
THIRTY-EIGHT
DAY 21
The moon had tracked its way past the halfway point in the sky. Leaning against each other, Shawn and I had watched its progress through the big windows at the front of the gas station. Neither of us had been able to sleep. Instead, we sat on the tiled floor and waited to find out if we were going to lose a friend today.
Rex lay with his head propped on my knee. Absentmindedly running my fingers through the dog’s fur, I turned to look at Carrie who was still asleep across the room.
I felt guilt gnaw at me though it wasn’t for the first time that night. I wished fervently that I could take back being mad at Carrie for the past couple of days.
When I stitched up her hand earlier, that had been the first time I’d said more than two words to her since my own close call with a zombie. Now, it felt petty of me to have been so upset with her for something so simple.
Carrie was the only one sleeping. The rest of us had been keeping a grim vigil, hoping for a miracle. But as the hours wore on, it became more and more apparent that our fears were coming true.
Carrie was infected.
She had shivered her way through most of the night, despite the warm temperature. Her hair stuck to her clammy skin, skin that had taken on an unhealthy color that could be seen even in the dim light. Now, her breathing had become labored, and she tossed restlessly upon the pile of blankets.
