Plague Town

by Dana Fredsti

  “Tuck...?”

  Still no answer.

  Hudson turned to find Tucker slouched on the opposite end of the roof, face planted against the roof edge, his M-4 lying next to him.

  A chill went up Hudson’s spine. There was black gunk trickling out of Tucker’s left ear.

  “Oh, shit.”

  Hudson reached for his walkie-talkie, hands suddenly clumsy as he tried to unhook it from the carbiner on his belt. As he fumbled with it, Tuck’s body suddenly twitched as if it had been hit with a taser.

  Once.

  Then again.

  Hudson froze those crucial few seconds as what used to be Tucker rose unsteadily to its feet, eyeballs filmed over, a milky white bleeding into bloodshot yellow. It looked like he’d vomited up oil, black shit drizzling down his mouth, out of his eyes, nose, and ears.

  “Fuck!”

  Hudson forgot about the walkie and wrestled with his M-4 as his buddy lurched across the roof toward him, closing the distance between them even as Hudson fired.

  He missed.

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  * * *

  Simone hadn’t been kidding about the whole “working up an appetite” thing.

  We started with basic hand-to-hand, what Gabriel called “methods of disabling without grappling.” In other words, how to not let the ravenous ghouls get a hold on you. And if they did, how to disengage without being bitten or otherwise mauled.

  He also stressed the importance of maintaining an awareness of our surroundings, the better to keep any eye out for escape routes, objects that could be used offensively or defensively, and more damned zombies. Sure, wild cards didn’t have to worry about infection, but we could still have our necks ripped out or our limbs torn off.

  Our corpses wouldn’t reanimate, but we’d still be dead.

  We spent two full hours just learning how to fall, roll, and deflect an opponent’s energy. Lots of blocks, throws, joint locks, and shit like that.

  I’d never done anything like it, yet it was weird—the skills came easily. Kind of like being turned into a vampire in the Buffy-verse, where you’re suddenly given martial arts skills even if you were a total nerd before the bite.

  Our newfound strength helped us perform the things Gabriel demanded of us, and the enhanced senses were amazing. We all discovered that our coordination and muscle memory were seriously amped. But it didn’t always jive with what we’d known before. It took a lot of repetition to overcome ingrained fear based on years of physical and emotional limitations. But once we got it?

  It was sweet.

  “Excuse me,” I said.

  I was in the process of jerking on Kai’s arm while knocking his legs out from under him with my foot, sending him to the mat. It was a move I’d latched onto pretty quickly. I still didn’t like being on the receiving end of it, though. I hated falling.

  Gabriel paused, one arm wrapped around Mack’s throat, the other pinning an arm behind his back.

  “Won’t some of this stuff just, like, rip off a limb or two?” I asked. “I mean, we’re talking rotting corpses.”

  Gabriel shrugged.

  “It could happen,” he admitted.

  “Schweet,” Tony said in a passable Eric Cartman.

  “So if we can’t really hurt them or hold them, won’t they just keep trying to snack on us?” I persisted.

  “If you rip off an arm,” Gabriel replied, “that’s one less limb your opponent has to grab you with. A leg? It can’t run after you. And where most people would run the risk of infection from the splatter, you don’t have that problem.

  “So all of this gives you more time to take the brain out of action. No brain, no zombie.”

  I nodded, wondering if I could beat a zombie’s brains out with its own leg.

  Probably not, I decided. Too squishy.

  “Nice take down, by the way.” Gabriel nodded.

  “I’ll say,” Kai groaned, lurching slowly to his feet.

  “Um...” Mack raised his unpinned hand, neck still gripped in Gabriel’s chokehold. “Is this going somewhere? ’cause this isn’t a comfortable position.”

  * * *

  When we finally stopped for dinner, I was dripping with sweat, exhausted, and so ravenous I didn’t care that there wasn’t time to shower. We were pretty much all sweaty and smelly. Really smelly. I could detect the acrid odor wafting off myself and my fellow wild cards with a clarity that made me regret the enhanced senses.

  We ate in a small cafeteria adjacent to the gym, where Simone joined us. I wondered how much of this underground space lay directly beneath Patterson Hall, and if any of it spread out further.

  Medical staff, soldiers, and clerical types drifted in. They’d load their trays with food and scarf it down before heading back out. A few nodded at Gabriel, but for the most part our little bunch was treated as if we didn’t exist.

  Wow. Zero popularity points for being zombie retardant superheroes.

  “Is it just me,” I whispered to Lily, who was sitting to my right, “or are they acting like we just farted on their pillows?”

  She giggled, and tucked her hair behind one ear so half of her face was visible.

  Progress!

  “Don’t worry,” Simone said, overhearing us from the other side of the table. “It’s natural for people to be intimidated by things they don’t understand. They’ll get over it.”

  “Since we’ll be putting our asses on the line for them, I sure hope so.” I stabbed a piece of steak with my fork.

  “Here, here.” Mack raised his glass of milk. I picked up my water glass and clinked against it. Lily followed suit, along with Kai, Simone, and Gabriel.

  “Jeez, that’s gay,” Tony said. But he lifted his soda and waved it in our direction.

  Kaitlyn ignored us, huddled in her own little world at the end of the table. She’d done the work during training, but always reluctantly, as though it pained her to have to touch any of us. And she hardly made a sound. I wanted to feel sorry for her but she pretty much made it impossible.

  Bitch with a capital B.

  “Hey, everyone.”

  Speaking of bitches, Jamie—Miss Hot Topic herself—stepped up to our table dressed in black and fuchsia striped tights, a short black tattered skirt, a sparkly fuchsia T-shirt, and some truly amazing black platform boots that would have been appropriate on a ’70s pimp. She looked like Tinker Bell’s evil twin.

  Wonderful. Another person who didn’t like me.

  She set a tray of food on the table and inserted herself between Simone and Mack. She didn’t quite do a hip check on him, but close enough. Mack raised his eyebrows and shrugged, then moved aside with good grace.

  “Are you a wild card, too?” Kai asked, looking Jamie up and down. I could have told him he was wasting his time, but he’d figure it out for himself. Or not.

  Jamie flicked him a brief glance.

  “No, I’m Professor Fraser’s assistant.” Her gaze went back to Simone as if drawn by a gravitational pull. I wondered if Simone had any idea just how gargantuan a crush Jamie had on her, or if it was even a blip on her gaydar.

  At least Jamie didn’t have the hots for Gabriel.

  “Hello, Jamie,” Simone said, smiling. “You remember Ashley, from Pandemics in History?”

  “Yes,” Jamie responded, giving me a laser stare of death.

  Oh, well. What’s one more?

  After dinner we had a welcome break from kicking each other’s butts, and focused on a more esoteric form of training: watching zombie movies. We’re talking the good, the bad, and the really shitty.

  The campus was closed down by the quarantine, so Patterson Hall was empty. We sat in one of the lecture halls—room 217, in fact. Jamie ran the DVD player while Simone and Gabriel did a running commentary, pointing out the facts and fallacies.

  “OMG,” I whispered to Lily, “we’re in the film class from hell.”

  Lily giggled, then immediately shushed when Jamie shot a dirty look our way. I s
tuck my tongue out at her and grinned as she turned away.

  Childish, I know, but satisfying.

  “Killer...”

  “Yeah, dude!”

  Tony and Kai gave each other a high five as a zombie got its head taken off with a scythe, and special effects blood spurted everywhere. Personally, if I saw one more rotting ghoul doing the taffy pull with someone’s intestines...

  “Fast-moving zombies such as the ones portrayed here,” Simone commented as the heroes slammed a mall door in the face of a really creepy one-armed ghoul, “are products of the MTV generation of filmmakers. Short attention span.”

  I raised my hand and she nodded.

  “So you’re saying there’s no such thing as a zombie who can run?”

  Simone opened her mouth to answer, then paused and exchanged an indecipherable look with Gabriel.

  “Let’s pause the film here, shall we?” she said, and then she stepped up to the podium. For just a moment, things almost seemed normal. “Some of these movies are fictionalized versions of incidents that couldn’t entirely be suppressed, while others have been planted in order to relegate zombies to popular culture, thus obscuring the existence of the walking dead behind a celluloid smokescreen.

  “Based on the records compiled through the centuries, fast-moving zombies do not exist. They may be ambulatory, but their bodies are rotting. Zombies shamble, stumble, lurch, and crawl. They do not run.”

  “Yes!” Tony punched the air in a victory sign. We all looked at him. “I had a bet with Manny. If he wasn’t dead, he’d totally owe me twenty bucks.”

  Kai raised his hand.

  “What about the smart zombies?”

  “We’re looking for a zombie no one’s ever seen before,” Tony explained.

  “I think you’ve both already had your brains sucked out,” I growled. “Now would you shut up so Simone can finish?”

  Simone smiled and shook her head.

  “Actually, it’s a valid question,” she said. “But aside from the rudimentary motor functions, nothing remains from when they were alive. So no, no smart zombies.”

  Mack interrupted the proceedings with a huge, jaw-cracking yawn.

  “I’m sorry,” he said sheepishly.

  “Let’s call it a day, shall we?” Simone gestured to the back of the room. “On the table are a variety of fiction and fictionalized reference books on zombie apocalypses. Some are survival techniques, others—much like these movies—are works of fiction with kernels of useful information tucked into unexpected places. Consider them homework.”

  “You mean the shit in all these books is real?” Tony looked skeptical.

  “Not all of it,” Simone replied. “Like the movies, some were written by people who know—or knew—that the threat is real. Some are meant to warn and teach, others to veil the truth. The rest are simply entertainment.

  “They’re rated from one to ten as far as accuracy and efficacy go. I’d particularly recommend Zombie Survival Guide and Zombie Combat Manual. The combat techniques in both have been field tested and the historical accounts in the survival guide will give you an idea of how previous outbreaks were contained.”

  If my mind hadn’t already been blown, I think that would have done it.

  Yes, Virginia, there really is a zombie apocalypse.

  Two armed soldiers escorted Lily and me to a room on the same floor as the cafeteria and gym, thankfully above the med ward and the lab. It was very much like a college dorm room, with two twin beds and—joy of joys—our own bathroom.

  “I am so glad we don’t have to share a toilet with everyone else,” I said as I collapsed onto one of the beds.

  “Me, too.” Lily smiled at me shyly. “I wonder who has to share a room with Kaitlyn.”

  I grinned, relieved that I wouldn’t have to hide my inner bitch with my new roomie. And a happy thought occurred to me.

  “Bet she and Jamie have to share. Maybe they’ll cancel each other out.” I stretched, feeling aches and knots in muscles and joints I hadn’t known I possessed. “Is it okay with you if I take a shower? I promise I’ll be quick.”

  She nodded, and I sprinted for the bathroom. I forced myself out of the hot water in record time and pulled on a pair of sweats and a tank top I’d found in the little dresser between the beds. The bathroom medicine cabinet held basics like soap, deodorant, toothpaste, and toothbrushes, as well as a few luxury items—face cleanser, moisturizing cream, and lip balm. The balm had a slight rose tint to it.

  Even the hint of color made me feel more human. I looked like death without lipstick.

  That thought reminded me of Zara, and once again I wondered what had happened to her. Had she recovered from Walker’s, only to be torn apart? Or had she caught whatever was turning people into the walking dead? All I could do was hope for the best.

  Crawling between the sheets, I skimmed over the Zombie Survival Guide while Lily showered. By the time she came out of the bathroom, clad in green scrubs, I’d learned that plate armor is a bad choice for zombie combat and chain mail—while slightly preferable—would hamper you just as much unless you’d trained in it for years. Go SCA!

  Lily jumped onto her bed, burrowing under the covers like a little kid hiding from the bogeyman.

  “Do you want to read some more?” she asked.

  “Nah.” I put the ZSG on the dresser next to a little banker’s lamp. “Lights out?”

  “Yes,” she said. “Please.”

  I reached out and pulled the switch. The room was immediately cast into pitch black, no ambient light at all. Suddenly I realized how much my eyes took in when there was light. The absence of all of that detail was shocking.

  This must be what it’s like to be blind. It only took a minute or so, however, before I could make out shapes and outlines.

  Cool. My very own low-budget night-vision goggles.

  We lay there in our respective beds for a few minutes, one of those thick, aware silences meant to be broken. Lily sniffled.

  “You okay?” I asked.

  For a moment she didn’t answer. She moved slightly, and I heard every crinkle of the sheets.

  “Yeah,” she said finally. “I’m just worried about Binkey and Doodle.”

  “Er... are they your roommates?” And if so, who the hell named them Binkey and Doodle?

  “No,” she answered. “They’re my cats.”

  “Are they outside cats?”

  “No, they’re locked in my apartment.”

  “Do they have food?”

  Another pause, accompanied by a sniffle.

  “I have a feeder, but it won’t last too long. They like to eat a lot. I bought a bag of dry food a couple days ago, but I didn’t refill the feeder.”

  “Is the bag out where they can get it? Because if they’re anything like my parents’ cats, they’ll have ripped that puppy wide open by now.”

  “You think so?” Lily sounded distinctly hopeful.

  “I know so,” I said, trying to sound certain.

  Another pause.

  “They had a bowl of water, but they go through it fast.”

  I thought about that one for a moment.

  “Can they get into the bathroom?” I asked. “Do you leave the seat up?”

  “Um... I don’t, but my roommate boyfriend does. Or did. Casey was crashing there while Mom was out of town, until he found his own place.” Then guiltily, “My mom doesn’t know.”

  “Hey, be thankful she was out of town when the shit hit the fan,” I said. “Hopefully he did the guy thing and left the seat up, so they’ll have plenty of food and water for now.”

  “You think?”

  I could tell Lily wanted to believe what I said.

  “I think,” I said. “I also think we should get some sleep, ’cause you know Gabriel’s gonna kick our asses tomorrow.”

  “Yeah...”

  I heard her yawn, followed by another long pause.

  “Thanks, Ashley,” she said. “You make me feel like thing
s are going to be okay.”

  She must have fallen asleep right after her last sentence from the way her breathing evened out and lengthened into the gentlest of snores. They still sounded like thunder in my ears, though. Earplugs were in order, at least until I learned how to dial down my enhanced senses.

  I lay awake for a few more minutes, feeling an unaccustomed warm glow. I’d calmed Lily down, and that felt as if I’d made a small difference in what had suddenly become a very bleak world.

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  * * *

  The researchers and support staff weren’t expected to see combat, but they were required to take part in training with weapons and combat techniques, just in case. Even the medical staff had to participate.

  This meant—joy of joys—that Jamie joined us while we learned the basics of handling firearms, edged weapons, and pretty much anything you could use effectively against the walking dead. I did my best to ignore her, and she returned the favor.

  I loved the edged weapons training. Both Kai and I pretty much kicked butt at it. I’d studied theatrical combat and fencing beginning in high school, and he and I discovered that we’d had the same instructor, a thirty-something wannabe swashbuckler with an age inappropriate soul patch and carefully cultivated mustache. Kind of pretentious, but a good teacher.

  If I ever saw him again, I’d thank him.

  Honestly, you would not believe the things you can do with wooden kabob skewers if you know where to shove them. And if all you’ve got is a book? Shove it in the attacker’s mouth and reduce the risk of being chomped.

  Basically anything can help you survive if you use your brains and don’t panic. That’s what a lot of the training was about—keeping your cool when facing off against a horde of carnivorous corpses. To panic is to die, whether you bolt or you freeze.

  To give in to sentimental attachment will kill you, too. If your loved one has been turned, they will not recognize you. They will try to have you for dinner.

  We learned these things and more through a combination of training techniques. After the edged weapons, my favorite sessions were with the firearms.