Dead Last (Vol. 1): Dead Last

by Quaranta, Marc

  "That son of a bitch," my voice crackled.

  I gently put down Elyse's arm and put my hand on Emily's shoulder. I didn't say anything else. I stood up and quickly walked down the hallway. I couldn't hear anything, but noise. My mind was fluttered and it sounded like I was driving 100 miles per hour on the highway with my windows down. My mind was a ticking time bomb and the clock was about to strike zero.

  I came around the corner and, I think, they were still talking about the zombies, but I didn't know. I made a bee line straight to Scott. By the look on his face, he had no idea why I was coming to him. I could see that Kurt and the others were nervous. Kurt and Nick took some steps toward me afraid of what I was doing while the girls all took steps back.

  I didn't say a word. I swung.

  My right fist connected to Scott's face. He didn't go down, but it did back him up. I crouched down and wrapped my arms around his waist. In one fluid motion, I picked his entire body off the ground, turned to where I could see one of the tables in the kitchen, and slammed him down through it. The legs of the table shot out from under the table like they were fired from a gun. Everything on the table was smashed.

  I hopped on top of Scott and started to hit his face like it was a punching bag. Right. Right. Right. I didn't stop. I could feel one of my knuckles in my hand break, but it didn't stop me. Every time I connected another punch, the pain shot through my hand and wrist, but I kept punching.

  My hand didn't leave much breathing room for Scott, but I could see his face getting bloodier every time. I felt his cheekbone crack and it gave me more energy to keep punching.

  I reached back for another blow, but I felt a couple strong bodies grab me and pull me away. I had completely forgotten about the other people in the room. Kurt and Nick were both hooked under my arms pulling me away.

  If only they knew about what that monster did. They wouldn't stop. I wasn't going to stop. I wasn't going to let him get away with that. I wasn't okay with the little damage I did to his face. I felt adrenaline give me the strength of ten men and I flew my arms back and knocked both Kurt and Nick back a few feet. I heard Nick fall to the ground.

  I quickly ran back to Scott and picked his head up off the ground. He looked like he had been in a serious car accident. Like a telephone pole shot through the front window and smashed his face into the seat. It wasn't enough.

  I hit him again. Again. Again, and again. I started screaming at the top of my lungs and then I stopped.

  I stopped and felt my breathing move in and out quicker than it ever had before. Scott's eyes were closed. His left eye was swollen and was going to be closed for a long time, but his right one was also closed. He wasn't dead, though, because I could feel his breathing as I was crouched on top of him.

  I stood up and looked around at everybody. I looked at the legs of the table, the top to the table, and the lifeless body lying on top of that. The damage I had just done could never be duplicated. I would never be able to summon that kind of strength again. It was one of those moments you hear about when a terrified mother lifts a car off her trapped baby or a trapped worker is able to move a thousand-pound boulder so they don't die underground.

  "Tie him up," I said to them.

  Nobody said anything, but, more importantly, nobody argued with me. I don't think it was because they were scared of me, either. They just witnessed me beat a man half to death, and some of them knew I was a killer, but they could see in my eyes that Scott deserved it. They didn't know why I did what I did, but they trusted me to have a good reason.

  So, I told them. I told everyone and then watched as Kurt and Nick tied him up.

  LXII

  May 10th 2013, 7:39p.m. 26 Days After First Report of Airborne Outbreak

  A fter the group tied Scott up, they sat around and figured out their next move. It was no longer safe to go driving around looking for supplies like they had before. They had to be more careful. They had to look out for each other and learn to trust each other. Not everyone in the group was going to be friends, but they were going to have to learn to respect one another and get along for the good of the group...for the hope to survive.

  They decided that people were no longer the enemy. There were going to be some out there that they couldn't trust, sure, but zombies were the real enemy now. They weren't sure if everybody knew about them and wanted to spread the word so that everybody could be prepared.

  Dan's idea to spread messages on Facebook came back into play, but Kurt decided to go one step further. They decided to put a plan into action that came up before, but was quickly dismissed.

  They were going to broadcast a live news report to anybody that was watching.

  While some of the group was helping with the broadcast, others were taking care of themselves and their loved ones. Emily sat with Elyse who was traumatized from what had happened earlier. They sat outside of Sam's office because Emily didn't want him to know about it. He was already in so much pain and agony and learning that Elyse was raped was only going to add to his pain or, worse, kill him.

  Jack went and sat by himself. Heather gave him some ice to put on his hand and he decided it was best to go and cool off and relax.

  "How many people is this going to reach?" Kurt asked as he walked up. He placed his gun down on a table behind him.

  "I can patch it so that it covers all of our company’s stations around the country," Nick responded.

  "Do it."

  Nick started pulling cords from one slot and plugging them into another. Haylea was positioning her seat in front of the camera. She wiped her tears away...she was crying after hearing what had happened to Elyse. Heather was also crying while trying to type up a statement on the teleprompter for Haylea to read.

  "Are you ready?" Nick asked.

  Haylea nodded.

  "You ready, baby?" Kurt asked his fiancé.

  "I'm ready."

  "Here we go...in 5, 4, 3, 2, 1."

  The light on the camera turned a bright red and Haylea's face popped up on the "on-air" monitor.

  She took a deep breath and then...

  "My name is Haylea Meyers and I am a survivor of the horrible airborne virus that hit the world a few weeks ago. I am not the only survivor, though. There are more of us. In the beginning, we were afraid to go public. We didn't know who we could trust. Some of our people have been killed, but we fight each day so that we stay alive."

  Emily and Elyse sat in front of Sam's door listening to Haylea. Emily kissed her daughter on the top of her head several times and was trying to fight back the tears. She looked at Elyse, whose eyes were closed, and gently moved out of the way so that Elyse could lay down. Emily looked over to the group that was controlling the broadcast and then focused in another direction...at an object lying on a table.

  "We've decided to broadcast now because we are no longer each other's worst enemy. Humans are not our enemy anymore. By now most of you probably already know this, but for those of you that don't, I'm going to tell you something that you may not believe," Haylea continued. "Indiana, and I'm sure the rest of the world, is being overrun by zombies. This is not a joke. These are real life zombies."

  Jack found a bandage in one of the desk drawers of a former WTIX employee. He dropped the bag of ice on the table and started tightening the brace around his wrist and hand. His face scrunched up in pain as he wrapped his knuckles. He groaned and pushed through the rest of the way. He tucked the end under the brace and made sure it was secured.

  He put the ice back on his hand and when he looked up he connected eyes with a distraught girl. Elyse, her eyes still red and puffy, was standing in front of him a few feet away. They didn't say anything to each other. Elyse tried to smile, but wasn't able to force herself to do it. Jack understood that. He didn't expect her to smile.

  She took a step forward. Carefully, she took another. Jack stayed where he was because he didn't want to make any movements that would frighten her. He wanted her to do this by herself.

&n
bsp; When she was only inches away from him, she started to cry more. Somehow, after all the crying she'd already done, there were more tears inside. They trickled down her face, on her shirt, and fell onto the ground.

  Jack reached out and pulled her into him. She wrapped her arms around him so tightly like she had to hang on to him to stay alive. She cried loudly into his shirt and he held her head against his chest.

  Tears began falling from Jack's eye.

  Haylea continued on air, "We are coming to you now because strength in numbers may be our only hope. Myself and thirteen others have taken shelter inside the WTIX building just outside of Indianapolis. In a few weeks, we are going to have to leave this place, but for now, we invite anybody who is scared or alone to come find us."

  Kurt and Heather nodded their head along with everything Haylea was saying. Nick was controlling the camera making sure it was squared up on Haylea. As the whole group watched her speak, nobody realized that the gun Kurt put down was missing.

  Emily made her way down the hallway toward the master control area. She pushed open the door slowly, without making a noise, and walked around to where Scott was tied up. He was still groggy from the beating that he took. His chin was to his chest, but when she pulled back the hammer, he slowly lifted his head and looked at Emily with his one good eye. He didn't do anything. He didn't panic or beg. He just stared into her eyes. He watched as she raised the gun and pointed the barrel straight at his head.

  "We can offer food and shelter and protection, so please, come find us. These things are not hard to kill. Shoot them or stab them through the head, the brain. They are not hard to kill but there are hundreds, if not thousands of them. Stay with people. Be on the lookout and good luck everyone."

  BANG!!!!

  Everybody in the studio turned to the direction that the gun was fired. Kurt looked down and his eyes got big when he saw that his gun was missing.

  Jack and Elyse looked up, too. Elyse squeezed Jack's waist tighter when she heard the noise. Nobody knew where the gunshot came from. Everybody was frozen and stiff. They weren't ready for any more problems. They weren't ready to deal with what was coming.

  While the group was preparing for their future, the sun began to set in the distance. A once bright future for the people that worked at WTIX was quickly fading and darkness was taking over.

  The survivors of WTIX worked together to survive the outbreak thinking the biggest problem they had to deal with was the air. The scouted for food and supplies, they kept the building running, they kept fresh water and A/C running at all times so that they could survive. They had fired gunshots at intruders and warning shots in the air or to break the windows.

  One more gunshot had gone off in WTIX that day when Emily pointed the gun at Scott. It was only a matter of time before the people inside the building learned of what Emily had done, but what they didn't know was that their problems were just getting worse.

  What they had forgotten was that loud noises draw the attention of the living dead.

  What they would soon find out, though, was that hundreds of zombies were only a few hundred feet away from WTIX...

  ...But headed straight towards them.

  END OF VOLUME 1