Apocalyptic Beginnings Box Set

by M. D. Massey

  It grabs me again, this time by the throat, and rams me against the wall. My feet dangle off the ground, swinging back and forth like a little kid in a big chair. I throw a few punches in its face and try to break its hold, bringing down the point of my elbow hard into its flesh deprived arm. I think all I’m really doing is pissing this thing off more and more. Then again, the infected always seem to be pissed.

  Its cracked and bloody lips divide, its two rows of jagged teeth dripping with spit and whatever else is rolling around in its mouth. It lets out one deep growl like sound and stretches its mouth out wide, darting for the meaty part of my throat.

  “Stop!”

  The seemingly wild flesh-eater stops just at the nape of my neck and cuts its head back towards the woman who is now standing. I can’t believe my eyes even as a little sense of relief rushes through me.

  “Please put him down, Trenton,” Alice says in an endearing voice.

  Trenton, huffing and puffing from his disfigured nose that is loosely hanging by a thin piece of discolored flesh, looks my way. He shows his teeth again, like an animal does when it feels threatened, and releases my throat. I fall to the floor hard and clasp my neck, my head dangling like a noodle as I strain to get some air.

  “It’s ok, Trenton; he’s not going to hurt me,” Alice says as I hear her walk towards us.

  Trenton doesn’t seem too keen on leaving her alone with me for some reason, hesitating in place and not moving a single inch. I wish I knew what his deal was or what side of the life spectrum he is on. First he’s killing infecteds and the next he’s trying to rip my throat out. Hard to figure out some people, or things for that matter.

  “Trenton, it’s really ok.”

  I tilt my head up from the ground and peer at Trenton. He still looks distrusting of me, but walks away nonetheless, taking his place by the entrance and shutting the door.

  “Christ, what the hell is his problem?”

  “I’m really sorry. I’m not sure why he . . .”

  Gasp!

  Alice takes a few steps back and holds her hand over her mouth as I get to my feet. Her face instantly goes from an expression of relief to a saddened, sunken look of despair. Trenton must have picked up on her emotional swing because he moves toward me, growling under his breath. “Your face, it’s like . . . theirs.”

  I see the distrusting and near look of terror creep into Alice’s eyes, sending a shockwave of confusion throughout my body. For some reason or another, she thinks I’m one of them. It could be lack of sleep or eating that is distorting her view of what’s alive and what’s undead. I know I probably look like hell warmed over, but dang, give a guy a break.

  I glance at the monitors and find one that is turned off, seeing the bottom portion of my body reflecting back at me. I’m not sure what she thinks she’s seeing, but curiosity has gotten the better of me.

  I walk over to the small mono-colored screens and stop in front of one of the disabled units. Leaning over, I see my reflection for the first time in the grayish colored glass.

  WTF!

  I instantly stumble backwards and shake my head like a dog, thinking there’s cobwebs invading my brain and playing tricks on me.

  It’s not real, it’s not real! No fucking way is this real!

  I must be seeing stuff again. Messed up crap that is trying to do a number on what’s left of my sanity. Yeah, that’s it. Just another one of their illusions to make me lose what grasp I have left on this world. I tell myself over and over again that it’s nothing and that I’m perfectly fine, minus needing a shower and getting cleaned up.

  I vigorously ravage my eyes in hopes of clearing out the horrid sight, digging deep into the sockets. I’m doing it so hard I feel as if I could rip them from their home and toss them aside.

  Ok, get it together now. Everything’s fine. Don’t want to add to Alice’s apparent delusional state and up her anxiety.

  I take a deep breath and lower my hands, noticing that my palms and fingers are not that of a healthy grown man, but that of one of those things. Well, not yet all the way transformed. Almost like a between stage where they still resemble normal living tissue, but show rapid signs of the body dying. I flip my hands over and find the skin to be much paler, becoming a dingy, milky white. I can’t believe I hadn’t seen this until just now.

  I walk forward once more and look into the disabled monitor, finding a hideous and disgusting thing staring back at me. My eyes are as black as Trenton’s, and my face shows the same signs of decay—skin sagging and losing it’s wonderful living glow, leaving behind the lighter look of something without a soul.

  A simple and complex thought burrows inside my brain. I don’t crave or feel the uncontrollable hunger for human meat, nor do I desire that of my flesh-eating brethren. To be perfectly honest, I don’t feel hungry at all. I know I haven’t had a meal in God knows how long, but there’s nothing there. A hollow void that doesn’t need to be filled.

  “Are you . . . ok?”

  My head falls lifeless towards the switch board below as I place my hands on the screens to prop me up. I close my eyes and think of the amazing life I once had—now burned to ash. Even if I get out of here alive, where would I go? What would I do looking like this? Any hopes of being with Becky now are a sick joke.

  The thought of my world crumbling before my black eyes boils over and sends me up, my body tense with rage and all of my muscles teaming with pure violence. I snap hard and clinch my teeth together like a steel trap. I throw my right fist at one of the monitors, cracking the glass with ease and sending shards exploding all around me. Sparks fly like the fourth of July and puffs of smoke bellow out.

  I pull my pin cushion of a fist back, feeling my inner turmoil lowering back down to a less volatile state. Pieces of the screen jet up and out of my hand, blood oozing out in a thick paste. I don’t even bleed normally.

  Sometimes it’s hard to accept certain realties, whether we’re given the chance or it’s just rammed down our throat. But right now, my pity party is of no use to me and will only slow me down.

  I smack my hand against my pant leg hard, dislodging the jagged glass, then turn to face Alice and Trenton.

  I guess Trenton doesn’t find me a threat anymore. He stands next to Alice who is looking at me with a mixed expression. I’m not sure what she’s thinking, but I can see the wheels turning for sure.

  Penny for your thoughts?

  “Sorry about that,” I say as I try to keep a solid stare with her, my eyes wanting to dart in any direction other than right at her. “Kind of a sobering moment when you find out that you’re actually dead, well deadish.”

  Alice doesn’t say a single word. She just stands there with her arms folded and her eyes looking me over. Can’t say I blame her, surrounded by dead flesh-eating monsters and her being the only living person among them could make anyone paranoid.

  Trenton is still eyeballing me hard too, watching my every move with such an eager pose it makes me feel like I could be jumped at any moment. It seems as if he has lost any tethered touch with being human, yet he’s protecting what’s his.

  Maybe I can look over what I need on the monitors and be on my way. I seem to do better on my own, without having the extra weight of people bringing me down.

  “Give me just enough time to look over what I need to and I’ll be out of your hair,” I say, finally holding my own and looking Alice directly in the eyes. “If I look like I’m going south or anything like that, then Trenton can have a snack.”

  After a short pause with her mouth ajar, Alice finally breaks her silence. “It’s ok, you don’t have to leave if you don’t want to. It’s just kind of hard knowing who to trust given what’s happening.”

  Alice lets her guard down some and relaxes a bit, which in turn makes Trenton less edgy. He’s still watching my every move, but for the meantime, he seems to be less inclined to rip my heart out—literally. “How did you get away from them? You could barely stand and move.”
/>   “I have no clue. I guess it was divine intervention or just good old fashioned luck.” I pull out the small, black chair from under the control counter. “In either case, I’m still kicking so that’s all I care about.”

  I sit down in the chair and relax for a moment, something I haven’t been able to do in a long while. I’m not really relaxed, just getting a breather while I collect my thoughts and figure out what my next move is.

  Alice plops back down on the beat up couch and leans back, her head resting against the split cushion and her dirty blonde hair flowing over the edge. Her face looks long, and the bags under her eyes look to be growing by the second.

  I can’t say that I feel tired as I sit still and let my brain take a break so I can make a somewhat informed decision. Hopefully, these monitors will give me some good news, or at least make me think I’ve got a chance in hell of getting out of here.

  13

  I’m not sure how much time has passed or what time it really is. Being here, it’s as if I’ve entered some kind of vortex that has stopped time and kept me in a constant loop of terror. Think of the worst nightmare you’ve ever had and multiply it by infinity. That is my current reality.

  My mind is now stuck in overdrive and all I’m focused on is getting out of here and finding out who’s behind this madness. Sitting in this worn, broken down chair, staring at the dingy and dull screens, I’m finding that a good portion of the cameras appear to be disabled. They show nothing but snow moving up and down the CCTVs.

  I’ve managed to stumble my way through the learning curve of the control board, locating active cameras and getting a better lay of the land. It’s not much and I’m still left in the dark about what I’m really facing, but some insight is better than being completely blind.

  I glance back over my left shoulder at Alice, lying on the couch with that TGP jacket draped over her upper body again. She looks to be sleeping sound, her deep and consistent breathing filling the silent room. Trenton still stands by the door, his black eyes full of distrust and a blank, steadfast stare covering his grotesque face as he peers at me. Man, I hope my condition doesn’t deteriorate to the point where I look like that.

  I turn my attention back to the monitors and scan over them again, suddenly startled by a sight that damn near floors me. My pulse instantly shoots through the roof and my heart skips a beat. I feel every minute inch of my flesh crawl with excitement; my sense of purpose is renewed.

  I bolt for the door, not caring less about what might lay beyond these brick walls. A novel and yet profound thought hammers my brain.

  Why would she be here?

  I pause and sit back down, the notion planting my butt firmly back in the chair and sending my mind reeling for the billionth time. Questions galore race through my head, pounding me relentlessly over and over again. She’s not really here; it’s just another one of their ploys to distract me.

  I peer back at the screen, finding it empty and barren as if it had never happened. Even though I know it’s probably just a mind trick or something like that, my heart sinks and I’m right back where I started.

  I rewind the digital feed and find nothing—just an empty grayscale corridor with nothing and no one stirring, not even the dead. But not all is lost. I spot a set of double steel doors that have the words “AUTHORIZED PERSONNEL ONLY” painted across the middle in bold red letters.

  I pan the camera down both stretches of hallway, finding it to be mostly clear and untouched by the hell plaguing this facility. It doesn’t appear to be derelict like everything else here—no exposed wires crawling out of the ceilings and no scorches or bullet holes riddling the walls. Actually, it almost looks like it still has full power, too.

  I can see the lights running along the ceiling, keeping a steady glow. No shorts or intermittent burst of blackness. Good thing too, as I might have missed the set of numbers that are engraved along the walls.

  S-2.

  I don’t recall coming across these while looking over the schematic, then again, I wasn’t looking for this particular set. I close my eyes and look over the layout again, scanning for the S-2 insignia. At first, I get zilch, finding nothing with that pattern, but I must have caught a lucky break or something because when I go over it again I find an access shaft in one of the corridors not far from here that looks to be running down into . . . nothing. It could be something or it could be a hornet’s nest chalk full of dead. Without having some better insight, I’d be going in blind.

  Alice moves about on the couch, the worn springs popping and squeaking in a rhythmic fashion. I open my eyes and find S-2 to be nothing more than the gray snow falling down in a repetitive pattern on the monitor. I glance over all the screens, thinking that maybe it was in a different place and that I just lost my bearings a bit.

  “Any luck? Did you find a way out of here?” Alice asks in a soft and disoriented tone. She must be really tired, sleeping as hard as she did with two dead people shacking up in the same room as her.

  “Uh . . . yeah, I think I found a way out that might work.” My voice skips a little and my thoughts play elsewhere. I’m not sure if I dreamed the whole thing or if someone tracked the feed down and severed it.

  “What about the surface? Is it overrun with those things?”

  “I’m not sure. The feed for the surface has been cut, disabled, or there isn’t one. For all I know, there could be hundreds of them wandering around out there.”

  “I just want to be done with this,” Alice mutters under her breath, tossing the jacket to the side and getting off the couch.

  I’m not sure if she is trying to vent some of her frustration without showing it, or if the overwhelming strain of repetitive bad news forced the gruff response out of her mouth. Whatever the case may be, it will probably serve her well. To have a fighting chance at escaping this maze of terror, she’ll need every ounce of hatred and outright fury she can muster to survive.

  “What do you think we should do then?”

  “You can do whatever you like, but I’m not leaving just yet?” I reply bluntly. “I’ll tell you how to get to the hatch that leads outside if you want, but from this point on, you’re on your own.”

  “You’re not leaving yet? What could possibly make you want to stay here any longer?” Alice asks, confused and stunned.

  “If you haven’t noticed there are D.E.A.D. M.U.T.A.T.E.D. P.E.O.P.L.E. walking around here and your husband and I don’t quite look right,” I reply sarcastically. I mean, I wouldn’t have her understand what we’re going through, but Alice still looks part of the living and not a rotting fucking corpse.

  “Exactly, more the reason to get the hell out of here. We’ll figure everything else out later.”

  “Look at your husband, do you really think you’re going to run him into the local hospital and they’re just going to not freak the heck out and patch him right up? Maybe they’ll give him a couple of shots in the arm, place a bandage or two on his cuts, and send him on his way. Yeah, that might work!”

  Alice’s face fills with rage and her lips are straight as a freaking arrow. I can see her point of just wanting to escape Satan’s playground first and then actually address everything later, but I don’t want to go that route. I don’t have her luxury; time could be slipping away from me. From my Becky.

  “Listen, I’m sorry for flipping out there and flying off the handle,” I say sincerely, hearing Becky’s disapproving sighing ringing in the back of my mind. I always hated it when she did that. “I’m not sure how much longer I have before I completely lose what’s left of my sanity and become one of them.”

  I guess my soppy apology hit the spot; Alice’s angered face changes to a look of compassion and understanding. Her eyes become enlarged and glassy, and she glances at Trenton. She places her hand on his rotting, sagging face, peering deep into his black voids. I don’t think he even grasps what’s going on anymore; he just has that most primitive of directives that tells him to protect Alice at any cost.

&
nbsp; “So, what is it that you’re looking for then?”

  “I think I’ve come across something that isn’t on the blueprints. Some sort of subsection to this facility that I don’t think were supposed to-”

  Bam! A sharp, searing pain rears up in my stomach, twisting it like a pretzel. I feel like my insides are being pulled to the point of being ripped from my body. It hurts like hell, sending me doubling over in the chair and sealing my eyelids shut. I taste the horrid bite of what’s lurking in my system in the back of my throat.

  Demented delusions manifest out of nowhere and pour into my skull like acid, drowning my brain in an endless nightmare of the infected killing and ravaging anything that has a pulse. I can hear their screams and moans and smell their rotting flesh, adding to my already gut-wrenching feeling.

  I lift my dangling head up and crack my eyes open, my vision blurry, but clear enough to see the crowd of dead gathering in front of me. I rotate my head around, glancing at all of the decaying skin that is exposing discolored bones and patches of flesh that have been stained with the juices of the living.

  I bring my glassy eyes straight and center and spot Deacon in the middle. Half of his face has been ripped clean off and he’s staring at me with a grin that steals my soul, his jagged teeth protruding out his upper and lower lips. It’s completely messed up. I keep telling myself that it’s just a hallucination brought on by whatever is crawling up my stomach like a salmon upstream. The walls on all sides fade to human flesh and bleed uncontrollably, the thickest, reddest blood gushing down like Niagara Falls. I close my eyes once more before the tidal wave of blood engulfs me.

  It’s not real. Get it together, Mike. Come on now!

  Silence. Pure silence now. Almost to the point where I can hear crickets getting busy inside the walls. I convulse and burp up some god awful bile that has been lining my insides like static cling. It burns for a moment as it makes for freedom out of my mouth, trickling out and down to my tattered shirt.