Before The Outbreak: Short Stories of the Apocalypse in the Z-Strain Universe

by Morris, SJ

  I opened my eyes just as Nathans blood-covered body limped out of the bathroom. He grunted at the sight of Mason barely moving on the floor, but it seemed to excite him. Nathan fell on top of Mason and began digging through his sides and pulling away chunks of flesh and organs.

  He brought the pieces to his mouth and began to devour them. I wanted to scream out in horror and rage, but I couldn’t move.

  I just closed my eyes and had a vision of Mason and I planting flowers in the back garden. The sun was shining and Mason was smiling brightly.

  That’s all I wanted to do today; spend time with my love.

  The End

  Before the

  Outbreak:

  Zhang Wei’s

  Story

  "Your dead shall live; their bodies shall rise. You who dwell in the dust, awake and sing for joy! For your dew is a dew of light, and the earth will give birth to the dead. Come, my people, enter your chambers, and shut your doors behind you; hide yourselves for a little while until the fury has passed by."

  ― Isaiah 26:19-20 ESV

  Chapter 1

  I awoke to the sound of my mother moving around in the kitchen. The pleasant smell of congee hit me. My mother always made congee sweet for me and added peanuts on top.

  I love peanuts. I was more awake than any eight-year-old kid should have been at five o’clock in the morning. My mother had told me the night before that we had to be up much earlier than usual to take a plane to see my grandmother in Beijing, China.

  My grandmother was ill, and I had heard my mother crying over the phone when she spoke to my aunt yesterday.

  I had a feeling that this would not be a pleasant trip, and my fears were confirmed when I saw my mother packing my black suit and dress shoes along with my pajamas and other clothes last night.

  I’m only eight, but I’ve experienced death before, and I understand it, for the most part, I think. My father passed away last year. He was on his way home from work when there was an accident, which is what my mother told me. I found out later from my friends at school that my father was on his way home from drinking with his friends when he crashed into a wall. My friends made fun of me for having a drunk for a father before, so it was nothing new. At least this time, once the jokes grew old, they would have no more to tell.

  My father was gone.

  Death was when people just couldn’t be with us anymore. Their bodies stopped working for whatever reason, and we have to burn them.

  Mother said we did this because China has minimal land left to live on, leaving no room to bury someone. When my father died, my aunt told me that the dead go somewhere and it’s forever, but we don’t know where and we will never see them again, even when we die. It made me sad, but it also made me understand that I had to do something meaningful with my life. I had to make sure my mother was proud of me. I also needed to take care of her, no matter what.

  After going to the bathroom, I ran into the kitchen, happily grabbing the yummy bowl of congee with peanuts my mother had prepared for me and rushing to the television.

  I wanted to watch my cartoons while I had the chance. If we were going to my grandmother’s house, there would be no television. She had a TV, but it was never plugged in, and when I had tried to use it before there was only static. My mother told me it was because my grandmother never had the cable turned on. Grandmother thought that television made you not have to think and was a waste of time.

  My father still bought her one, and that’s the only reason she had it.

  I started eating the peanuts off of the top of my porridge as I turned on the TV, but there were only news shows on; even on the channel my shows had always been on.

  I had never seen news on my stations before, so I left the channel where it was, hoping it would be a quick news story and my shows would then come on.

  I watched as the newswoman talked with a doctor of contagious diseases or something like that. They were talking about people getting sick all over the world and how they were working on finding out what it was and how to make everyone better. I stopped paying attention when my mother yelled from her room that I needed to shower before we left for the airport, so I shut the television off and quickly finished my food.

  I made sure to clean up my bowl because I didn’t want my mother to have anything else to worry about. I knew she was concerned enough about traveling on the airplane and how sick my grandmother was. I needed to help her as much as I could since I was the man of the house.

  I took my shower, brushed my teeth, and dressed in the clothes she laid out for me as quickly as I could. I grabbed my book bag and tossed in some of my comic books and my playing cards to keep me busy at the airport. I had only been to an airport once before, but I knew there was a lot of waiting. There was the waiting in line to give your tickets and have the security people look at your bags, only to have to wait for the plane to come. Then, you waited on the plane to take off, fly, and land.

  After all of that, once you arrived, you still had to wait for your big bags to come off the plane and finally, you waited for the car to take us to grandmothers. It was so much waiting, and I was not looking forward to it, but I had my new comic book, which I hadn’t read yet, so that was going to keep me busy and I would not be a bother.

  Soon enough, my mother had yelled that we had to leave for the airport. I grabbed all of my stuff and was waiting for her by the front door to our apartment patiently.

  “Thank you for being such a big help and getting ready this early, Zhang Wei. I know it is hard for you being pulled from school, but we must see your grandmother right away. Do you have everything?” my mother asked with a smile on her face but a pained look in her eyes.

  “Yes, mother. I have everything,” I replied, trying to not look worried for her.

  Chapter 2

  We got off of the elevator in the lobby of our apartment building, and there were so many people rushing about, it frightened me a little. It was only six-thirty in the morning. There should not be this many people out. I looked around at everyone, and it seemed to me like they were all going to the airport too since everyone had luggage with them. They all had paper masks on for the most part also.

  Masks were nothing out of the ordinary here in China. People were always worried about the bird flu or some other sickness that was going around, but it seemed like instead of one or two people wearing them, almost everyone I saw had one on.

  I looked at my mother, and I saw the concern on her face as well. She surprised me and pulled a paper face mask out of her purse. She handed it to me as she put one on herself. She said nothing but I took the hint from her actions and put mine on as well.

  Outside, there were even more people rushing about, and no one was nice about anything. I held my mother’s hand tightly, but people continued to push through us as if we weren’t even there. We were separated a few times by people pushing their way to get at the cabs, waiting in the street, but my mother found me quickly each time. Maybe everyone was going on vacation, and that was the rush.

  My mother grabbed a door handle to a yellow cab, and as soon as she opened it, a man yelling into his phone jumped into the car, slamming the door without even looking at us. My mother started yelling at him, but before she could get more than a few words out, the cab took off, and another one took its place.

  My mother looked at me with a stern face and pulled me close to her with one hand and our large suitcase with the other. She grabbed the next taxi’s door, opened it quickly almost throwing me inside and then herself with the suitcase on her lap. The luggage should have gone in the back of the cab, but there was no way that was going to happen with the number of people trying to get a car. My mother told the driver to take us to the airport, and we were quickly off.

  The airport was busier than the street in front of our apartment had been. This did not seem normal, and my mother was still worried, but it was a different worry now. She looked at me and clung to my hand tightly like she refused to
ever let it go. The loudspeaker at the airport was talking about making sure that if you were feeling sick that you should report your symptoms to either one of the airport staff or a police officer.

  I looked around, and the officers that were there all had massive guns with them, positioned at their sides, which made me very scared.

  My mother ran to a large television screen that told us where our flight would be boarding and every few seconds the screen flashed and showed the word ‘canceled’ in big red letters on almost all of the flights that were going to other countries. The ones flying to other cities within China seemed to be okay, and I saw the look of relief on my mother’s face as she realized this as well.

  She grabbed me again tightly in her right hand and the suitcase in her left as she took off towards the security line. The line was long, and many people were complaining that they had been here too long. They wanted to get on the planes they had come here for before the flight was canceled. My mother looked around constantly but patted my hand, whispering that it was going to be okay, we were going to get to grandmother’s house and it would not be so crowded there. After a while, I didn’t think she was telling me anymore. It seemed like she was telling herself, as she repeated it over and over.

  There was a man in front of us in line who was complaining into his phone that his flight to the United States had already been canceled, but he was able to book another flight to the Beijing Capital International Airport in China where they were rumored to still have outgoing flights to the US. I looked up at him and told him that was the airport we were flying to and I asked him if he was on our flight.

  My mother pulled my hand, telling me not to talk to strangers.

  The man looked at me, then my mother and shook his head disgustedly.

  He told his phone that he, “Couldn’t wait to be out of this mongrel-infested, shit country.”

  I wasn’t allowed to curse, but I knew what the word meant, and I knew he was not a nice man for saying those things.

  A few moments later, that same man started coughing, and the women in front of him began to yell that he was infected.

  Police officers showed up immediately and pulled the man out of the line, dragging him away as he yelled that he just had a cough, but he wasn’t sick. I didn’t know why the police would want to take someone who was coughing away, but I watched, and they took him to a white tent that had been put up near the security line. The officers who were standing guard in front of the tent unzipped the plastic flaps quickly and opened them enough for the other officers to disappear with the man.

  With the few seconds, the flaps were open I could see other people inside the white tent with yellow suits on that covered them from head to toe. They had funny white boots and face masks covering their entire head, but I couldn’t see anything else. The doors were zipped back up just as fast as they were opened and the officers at the front of the tent who were standing guard looked as if nothing had happened.

  I glanced up at my mother, and she looked down at me with concern on her face.

  “Make sure to keep your mask on, Zhang Wei. Do not take it off for any reason, unless a police officer or I tell you to. Do you understand?” she asked me.

  “Yes, Mother. Is something happening? Why did they take that man away?” I asked, beginning to worry that all the craziness was for something other than everyone trying to leave for vacation.

  “Some people have been getting sick, and they aren’t sure with what, so they are being very cautious as to not spread the sickness,” she replied, looking around at the crowd of people surrounding us again.

  “That man was right next to me, should I have a doctor look at me to make sure he did not make me sick?” I asked, starting to become scared the police were going to take me away.

  “No, Zhang Wei. You are not sick and don’t say that to anyone. If you do not feel well, only tell me, and I will take care of you.”

  I adjusted my mask to make sure it was tight to my face and hugged my mother’s arm tightly. I needed to make sure we both did not get sick.

  Chapter 3

  It was a very long time before we made it to the security booth where we had to take our shoes off and put all of our things in buckets that went through the machine. I remembered this from the last time I was at the airport. This time they were also checking people’s temperature with something that looked like a funny gun. Each time someone’s temperature was over 99 degrees, the security guard would motion the police over, and they would take them out of line to another white tent just outside of the security area.

  The police officers explained to those they took out of line that they just needed to have a doctor look at them before they were allowed to get on their plane. The faces of the people that were taken were full of fear, and I was now worried that I would be taken away from my mother.

  My mother and I were allowed to go through the scanner together, and they pointed the funny gun at my head as I held my breath and squeezed my mother’s hand tightly.

  Thankfully, we were both 98 degrees, and I was thrilled to be out of that line.

  We put our shoes back on and grabbed our bags as quickly as we could, and we were off, practically running through the hallways. We ran past another one of the white tents with two police officers standing guard, and I heard crying from inside. I did not have time to listen anymore because my mother was dragging me swiftly along behind her. There were so many people in the halls, but my mother held me tightly, and we made our way to the gate.

  The gate was filled with people yelling at the airport workers behind the counter. Many people were saying that they were sent here when their other flights were canceled, and they needed to get to the airport we were going to. My mother pushed us as close to the door by the gate we needed to be at, and we stood to wait, again. I listened to all of the angry people around us, and then someone screamed. The police surrounded the desk where the workers were and yelled for everyone to stand still where they were and for everyone to be silent. The angry people did not settle down quick enough, and a siren blared from a megaphone one of the officers had. The room then fell silent.

  My mother hugged me tightly as I tried to see what the police were doing. It looked like someone had fallen, trying to get to the desk, and others may have stepped on her. The police helped her up and took her away. Then they were gone, but the room remained silent.

  There was an announcement over the loudspeaker that they were going to begin boarding for the flight we were on, and my mother patted my shoulder, telling me to stay close to her.

  Mother had our tickets out in-hand and began pushing through the other people to get to the doors. We made it to the door, and a woman took our tickets, rushing us past her into the hall for the plane.

  When we got on the plane, there was almost a calmness.

  The people that had gotten on before us were sitting in their seats quietly. Some people even appeared to be praying. It was much different than the craziness inside the airport.

  I was happy to finally sit down in my seat, and Mother hugged me tightly as we put our seat belts on.

  “When we get to your grandmother’s it will not be this busy, I promise you. We will get there safe, and you can see your cousins and your grandmother. Won’t that be nice?” my mother said, forcing a smile.

  “Yes, Mother, I’m happy to see my cousins and Grandmother. Will we be staying with Grandmother or with Aunt Kue Ching?” I asked, hoping to stay with my cousins.

  They had a television.

  “We might have to stay with Grandmother if she is still very sick. I must be able to take care of her, but I will make sure you get to stay at least one night with your cousins. I know how much you miss spending time with them,” she said, genuinely smiling now.

  I gave my mother a hug and told her I loved her because I did. I saw tears pooling in her eyes, but she quickly wiped them away and squeezed my hand again tightly.

  I was amazed that the plane filled with peo
ple so quickly and that we were pulling away from the gate almost immediately after.

  Before I knew it, we were in the air, and everyone was clapping that we had taken off. I guessed everyone was happy to be out of that crazy airport too.

  Mother and I lived in Hangzhou, so the flight to Beijing was about an hour and a half.

  I read my comic, and Mother rested.

  The flight was quiet, and it wasn’t bumpy like I remembered my last plane ride being.

  Eventually, the captain spoke over the loudspeaker to tell us that we would begin making our descent into Beijing. He also said that there was a significant police presence in the capital city so we should not be alarmed when we got off the plane.

  There were whispers between the flight attendants and some of the passengers that they were taking everyone’s temperatures when they got off the planes again to be sure no one was sick.

  They insisted that if you had a fever, you were to be quarantined right away.

  “Mother, what does quarantined mean?” I asked, hoping it wasn’t as bad as it sounded.

  “Where did you hear that Zhang Wei?” she asked, looking worried.

  “I heard one of the ladies that work on the plane tell someone if anyone has a fever who gets off the plane that they are to be quarantined straight away. Should we be worried?”

  “No, let me feel you,” she said quietly as she put her wrist to my forehead. “You are fine, no fever,” she said as she felt her own face.

  She didn’t look worried about herself either, so I took that as a good sign, but she never answered my question.

  She was now looking up and over the seat behind us to the other passengers, so I dared not bother her with my question again.

  The captain came over the loudspeaker again saying there had been a delay and we had to circle the airport for another few minutes before we were allowed to land but that we would be doing so as quickly as possible. Mother looked worried again, and other passengers started turning on their phones even while the women who worked for the airplane told them they had to still keep them off.