by Brian Keene
"But there's this girl at school. Anne Marie Locasio. She won't leave me alone."
"What does she do?"
"She's always picking on me and taking my book bag and chasing me around. The fifth graders laugh at me when she does it."
Jim had smiled at this. The fifth graders, they who ruled the elementary school playground. He'd felt a sudden pang of age when he realized that Danny himself would join those ranks the following year.
"Well, you just have to ignore those guys," he answered. "And if Anne Marie won't leave you alone, just ignore her too. You're a pretty big guy. I'm sure you can get away from her if you want."
"But she won't leave me alone," Danny insisted. "She pulls my hair and..."
"What?"
Danny's voice was a whisper now. He obviously didn't want his mother or stepfather to hear this.
"She tries to kiss me!"
Jim smiled, valiantly struggling to keep from laughing. He then explained to Danny how that meant that she liked him, and what steps Danny should take to protect himself from further torment without hurting Anne Marie or her feelings.
"Know what, Daddy?"
"What, Squirt?"
"I'm glad that I can ask you stuff like this. You're my best friend."
"You're my best friend too," Jim said around the lump in his throat.
In the background, Tammy had hollered something. Jim winced at the sound of her voice.
"Mommy needs to use the phone so I have to get going. Will you call me next week?"
"I promise, cross my heart and hope to die."
"Love you more than Spider Man."
"Love you more than Godzilla," Jim replied, playing the familiar game.
"I love you more than 'finity," Danny answered, winning for the thousandth time.
"I love you more than infinity too, buddy." Then there was an empty click and a dial tone, and that was the last time he had ever spoken with his son.
Through his tears, Jim glanced down at the smiling boy in the photograph. He hadn't been there. He hadn't been there when his son had gone to sleep every night, when he constructed epic Star Wars vs. X-Men battles with his action figures, when he played ball in the backyard, or when he learned to ride a bike.
He hadn't been there to save him.
Jim closed his eyes.
Carrie dug at the earth and called to him, hungry.
His finger tightened.
The cell phone rang shrilly.
Jim jumped, dropping the pistol onto the bed. The phone shrieked again.
The green digital readout glowed eerily in the soft light of the lantern.
Jim didn't move. He couldn't swallow, couldn't breathe. It felt like someone had hit him in the chest, kicked him in the groin. Consumed with dread, he tried to move his arms and found them frozen.
A third ring, then a fourth. He was insane, of course. That could be the only explanation. The world was dead. Yes, the power was still on and the satellites still kept a silent and mournful watch over its remains, but the world was dead. There was no way someone could be calling him now, here underground, beneath the remains of Lewisburg.
The fifth ring brought a whimper from his throat. Fighting off the emotional malaise that held him, Jim sprang to his feet.
The phone buzzed again, insistent. He reached for it with a trembling hand.
Don't pick it up! It's Carrie or one of the others. Or maybe something worse. Pick up that phone and they'll pour themselves through it and ...
It stopped. The silence was deafening.
The display blinked at him. Someone had left a message.
"Oh fuck."
He grasped the phone as if he were holding a live rattlesnake. He brought it to his ear and dialed "o."
"You have one new message," said a mechanical female voice. The canned inflections were the sweetest sound he had ever heard. "To hear the message, press one. To erase your message, press the pound key. If you need assistance, dial zero and an operator will assist you."
He jabbed the button and there was a distant, mechanical whir.
"Saturday, September first, nine p.m.," the recording told him. Jim let out a breath he hadn't realized he'd been holding. Then he heard a new voice.
"Daddy..."
Jim gasped, his pulse jack-hammering. The room was spinning again.
"Daddy, I'm scared. I'm in the attic. I..."
A burst of static interrupted. Then Danny's voice drifted back, sounding very small and afraid.
"I 'membered your phone number but I couldn't make Rick's cell phone work right. Mommy was asleep for a long time but then she woke up and made it work for me. Now she's asleep again. She's been sleeping since... since they got Rick."
Jim closed his eyes, the strength vanishing from his legs. Knees buckling, he collapsed to the floor.
"I'm scared Daddy. I know we shouldn't leave the attic, but Mommy's sick and I don't know how to make her better. I hear things outside the house. Sometimes they just go by and other times I think they're trying to get in. I think Rick is with them."
Danny was crying and Jim wailed along with him.
"Daddy, you promised to call me! I'm scared and I don't know what to do.
..." More static, and Jim reached out to keep himself from sprawling facedown.
"...and I love you more than Spider Man and more than Pikachu and more than Michael Jordan and more than 'finity, Daddy. I love you more than infinity."
The phone went dead in his hand, the battery using its last spark of life.
Above him, Carrie howled into the night.
He wasn't sure how long he'd stayed crouched there, with Danny's pleas echoing through his head. Finally, the strength came rushing into his numb limbs and he staggered to his feet.
"I love you, Danny," he said aloud. "I love you more than infinity."
The anguish vanished, replaced by resolve. He grasped the periscope and peered into the darkness. He saw nothing, only a jagged sliver of moonlight. Then a baleful, sunken eyeball glared back at him in hideous magnification. He jumped away from the portcullis, realizing that a zombie was looking back through it. He forced himself to peek again and slowly, the zombie moved away.
Carrie's corpse stood bathed in moonlight, radiant in her putrescence.
Her bloated abdomen was horribly distended; the malignant pregnancy still lurking within her, hidden beneath the tatters of the silken robe he'd buried her in. Frayed ribbons fluttered against her gray skin.
He thought about the night that she'd told him she was pregnant. Carrie was lying next to him, the fine sheen of sweat from their lovemaking cooling on their bodies. His head against her stomach, his cheek pressed against her warm, soft curves; the luxuriant feel of skin on skin. Her scent, and the tiny, almost invisible hairs on her belly swaying gently as he breathed. Inside her, their baby grew. Jim didn't want to think about what was squirming there now.
He rotated the periscope full circle. Life after death had been kind to old Mr. Thompson from next door. His face held a pallor that, although the color of oatmeal, was still brighter than the one that adorned it when he'd been alive. The persistent stiffness of joints that had plagued the elderly neighbor was apparent as he gripped the shovel, except that now, rather than with the throes of arthritis, his fingers swelled with the slow rot of decay. Knuckles poked through leathery skin the texture of parchment, as Mr. Thompson raised the shovel and thrust it into the ground.
The fact that the zombies could use tools didn't surprise Jim. During the siege, he'd watched in horror, listening helplessly to the creature's efforts to dig into the stronghold. Clumsily, but with slow and steady success, the things had managed to remove the sod, revealing the concrete slab beneath the dirt. That slab had been the only thing that had saved him.
Could they get bored, he wondered. Indeed, could they reason at all? He didn't know. Obviously, the thing that had once been his wife was drawn to this place. But was it because she remembered it from before, or mere instinct? T
he fact that they clawed at the ground seemed to indicate that they knew. That they remembered. If that theory were true...
Jim shuddered at the implications.
He was nothing more than a sardine, waiting in the silence of a darkened can. Sooner or later, the things above would find the correct can opener and would consume him.
"...more than 'finity, Daddy," Danny's frantic cries echoed in his mind.
"I love you more than infinity."
He swiveled back to Carrie and noticed that she was smiling, her blackened lips pulled back against stained teeth. The plump end of an earthworm disappeared between them. She raised her head and laughed.
Were there words buried within that ghoulish howl? He couldn't be sure. There had been times over the past few weeks when he could have sworn the things were talking to each other.
Another worm vanished down her decomposing gullet. Horrified, Jim thought of her eating spaghetti on their first date.
Sudden movement caught his eye. The zombies had noticed the periscope turning and now lurched toward it. He glimpsed more of them in the distance, attracted by the commotion. Soon they would be swarming the grounds, searching once again for an entrance into his stronghold. The chance of escaping without a fight had just vanished. They knew now that he was still alive. Although it was unclear what the zombie's reasoning capabilities were, it was obvious they sensed their prey below.
Fifty or more. Not good odds.
He lowered the view-piece.
With his son's pleas for help still haunting him, Jim began to prepare.
"Hang on squirt. Daddy's coming."
Mount Rushmore was speaking in tongues. That was the first thing Baker noticed. The second thing was the baleful red glare coming from the granite eyes, pulling the chopper towards the rock face.
Struggling with the controls, Baker screamed as George Washington whispered obscenities in a multitude of languages.
The voice continued when he awoke, jerking upright from where he'd slumped at the desk. Saliva had pooled on his blotter, pulling at his skin as he sat up. He listened.
The blasphemies came from down the hall.
From the thing in Observation Room Number Six.
He blinked; still unsure of what was happening. He always experienced a moment of confusion upon waking from a dream. He glanced around, letting the familiar settings settle into reality.
He was in his office, half a mile beneath Havenbrook. Above him, the gates of Hell had been opened wide.
And he had helped to turn the key.
The room bore a strong resemblance to Afghanistan, the cumulative effects of three months without janitorial service. Dingy ceramic mugs, encrusted with the fossilized remains of freeze-dried coffee. Papers, books, and diagrams strewn haphazardly about the room. A trashcan long past the point of overflowing, its contents now spilling onto the floor. In the far corner, a dark stain where the fish tank had spewed onto the carpet.
He shuddered when he looked at it.
Experimenting with the fish tank had been Powell's idea. At that point, they'd lacked a specimen, their research amounting to only speculation without anything to actually study. The three of them, Powell, Harding, and Baker, had closed themselves off from the rest of the complex after the few remaining staff members had fled. They gathered together in Baker's office, venting their frustration and wondering if it was safe to go above even without the all-clear message.
Powell had suggested, jokingly at first, that they try it out on one of Baker's prized tropical fish. Laughter and derision had quickly turned to scientific seriousness when Baker agreed. They netted one of the brightly colored pets, watching with cool detachment as it flopped and gulped in the smothering oxygen. Baker held it in his palm until it stopped quivering. Then they placed it back in the tank, where it floated on top of the briny water just as a dead fish was supposed to.
Its behavior was surprisingly-and depressingly- normal.
It wasn't until ten minutes later, after the other scientists had retired to the common room for their tenth viewing of old Jeopardy reruns on video, that the fish started swimming again.
Baker was only dimly aware of the splashing at first; his attention focused on the game of solitaire laid out before him on the desk. When the splashing became louder, he looked up.
The water had begun to turn red; tiny scarlet clouds swirling amidst the brightly colored pebbles and plastic castle, as the dead fish began to hunt and devour its brethren. At first, Baker could only stare in amazement. Then, gathering his wits, he dashed down the empty corridor and burst into the common room, gasping for breath.
The slaughter was over by the time they crowded into the office. In the few minutes it had taken him to summon the others, the fish had killed every living thing in the tank. Innards and scales floated amidst the carnage.
"My God," Harding gasped.
"God," Baker spat, "had nothing to do with this!" He thrust a finger at the tank. "This was mankind, Stephen. This was us!"
Harding stared at him in silence, his mouth working noiselessly, just as the fish had done. Powell sat in the corner, softly crying.
The fish noticed them. It stopped swimming and stared at them with clear contempt.
Baker had been fascinated at the intelligence the fish displayed.
"Look at that. It's studying us, just as we study it."
"What have we done?" sobbed Powell. "Jesus fucking Christ, what have we done?"
Harding snapped. "Get it together, Powell! We need to learn as much as we can from this thing if we expect to undo-"
His reprimand was cut short by another splash. The fish thrashed around, stirring up the muck on the bottom of the tank; obscuring their view. It vanished, hidden by a swirling cloud of blood and feces and slime.
"Somebody get the camcorder," Baker shouted. "We need to be documenting this!"
Before they could, the entire tank stand moved. Water spilled over the top, running down the sides in crimson rivulets.
The fish retreated and then burst forward again, slamming itself into the front of the tank. Again and again it charged the glass, heedless of the damage it was doing to itself.
Baker noted the calculating malevolence that filled its dead eyes.
A network of cracks spread throughout the glass, spider-webbing up the sides. The stand toppled over, crashing to the floor. Glass exploded, showering them all with glittering shards and brackish water.
The fish flopped onto the carpet and began to wriggle towards them.
Shoving his books aside, Baker leaped onto the desk while Harding retreated into the hall. Powell collapsed, shrieking and clawing at the carpet while the thing closed the gap between them.
Above Powell's terrified cries, Baker heard the noises the fish was making as it neared the scientist's outstretched legs.
The fish was talking.
He couldn't understand what was said, but the patterns were definitely intelligent speech.
The thing shot towards Powell's groin. He screamed as it brushed his khakis.
Baker leaped to the floor, slamming the computer monitor down on it.
Blow after repeated blow, he smashed the creature until there was nothing left but a viscous smear among the shattered glass.
He'd been unaware that he was yelling until he felt Harding's hand on his shoulder. They looked at each other, the full enormity of what they had unleashed upon the world bearing down on them like an airplane.
That night, Powell hacked his wrists open with a butter knife from the cafeteria. They'd found him a few minutes later, when they stopped in to administer a sedative.
Baker looked away from the stain on the rug and closed his eyes. Slowly, he ran a hand through his graying hair and quietly wept.
Down the hall, the thing in Observation Room Six continued ranting.
Baker fumbled in the congested ashtray, finding a partially smoked cigarette. Still weeping, he brought his lighter up to the ragged butt and thumbed it.
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Nothing. No flame. Not even a spark. The nearest lighter fluid was a half-mile above him in a world belonging to the dead.
He threw the useless lighter across the room, where it struck a glass frame hanging on the wall. The newspaper that had been so proudly displayed inside fluttered to the floor.
Wearily, Baker walked over and brushed away the broken glass. Shaking the paper in his hands, he began to laugh. The article was dated from earlier in the year.
