by West, J. D.
All evacuees are subjected to a strip search and bite check. Anyone that doesn't agree to the search is turned away. The military will euthanize anyone sick or diseased in a humanitarian manner. They were easy to spot with their glossy eyes and washed out skin tones. The soldiers killed them by causing blunt force trauma to their brains. They were rounded up and then herded at gun point to a field next to the air strip. The infected civilians were then lined up one by one. The entire group was forced down to their knees and told to bend their heads down. Then one soldier was chosen to walk down the line and shoot a single shot from his rifle into their skulls. The rest of the soldiers rounded up the infected remains and burned them. Some people already infected or bitten refused to go through the military checkpoint. A group of them tried to bypass security and run the blockade but were……”
The TV flashed for a second and then went to the emergency broadcasting signal. That’s when the supply of power from the city failed. The TVs in the patients' rooms and the staff computers all switched off. Right at that moment the lights went out in the room and then the hall. A wall of darkness fell over the city. People all around us began to cry out in fear. They were desperately trying to locate their family and friends. Staff members tried to encourage everyone that things were okay. I went into the main hall and yelled out to everyone.
“Everybody please stay where you are. Do not try to move around in the dark. Stay against the wall and we will come to you.”
The only light inside the ER came from the exit signs and flashing emergency lights at the end of each hall. The life support monitors and ventilators only had a half hour of battery power. Since we had no power it took only seconds for the air conditioning exhaust fans to come to a halt. With the temperature in the triple digits the loss of our air cooling system could prove deadly. The generator would not change that. It only powered the emergency lights and red emergency outlets. The sound of crying broke the eerie silence. The darkness only exacerbated the commotion. It created fear and triggered an uneasy anticipation of what could happen next.
******
Even though we lost power news reports continued to come out about a horrible chain of events taking place. The Governor ordered Arizona National Guard troops preparing to deploy to the Middle East be diverted to the Valley. The rest of the military already on the ground converged on south Phoenix and hit back with all the firepower and resources they had in place. Additional troops and military hardware were also been deployed. They put up a noble effort but that section of the city was lost after only 40 minutes. When it was reported to military command hundreds of Guard soldiers and non commissioned officers began leaving their bases and going home. They felt that training only two days a month was not enough time to deal with this particular crisis. They talked the talk but didn't walk the walk. Underneath all that bravado they were scared shirtless. The whole scale desertion and evacuation helped to spread the epidemic further. No one stood in the forsakens way. State officials admitted that they knew what was going on but wasted precious time doing anything about it.
******
I heard the sounds of nervousness from everyone in the room. The survivors grasped the enormity of what was happening around them. The faceless voices of the survivors came from every dark corner and dim hallway.
“Why is this happening to us?”
“This is the end of the world. We are all going to die!”
“Please do not let me die. I am not ready!”
“Let me out of here. I can’t take it anymore.”
“The cops are going to come. I know it. They have to come!”
“We are not going to make it are we?”
The darkness was a confessional box and they all had something to say. I moved around in the quietly trying to calm everyone down. Most of the survivors felt stress, anxiety, and grief. After a night like this it was easy understand. Dr. Sanchez and the rest of the staff tried to treat their physical and emotional wounds.
“Our only hope to live through the death, doom, and darkness of this night is to ask Jesus Christ to come into our lives.” proclaimed the pastor.
A nurse fell down to her knees and sat on the floor. She cried out and started praying in Spanish. Then she went back to English.
“God please don't let me die like this.” cried Carmen. “Grant us protection and deliver us from this evil.”
Her accent was thick but she was a lot more intelligent than she let on. Maria knelt down next to her and gave her a hug. In the past I had seen them eat lunch together and they seemed close. She tried to comfort her friend and ease her pain. The generator finally kicked in after twenty one minutes with a reassuringly hum. The essential emergency functions also came back on line. We plugged one of the TV’s into an emergency outlet to see what had caused the black out. Fox was off the air so we watched ABC. The terrified newscaster tried to hold it together emotionally while he gave his report.
“A large passenger plane was en route from Tucson when the pilot reported a crazy man attacking other passengers and the flight attendants. The man bit and scratched them like a wild animal until blood squirted and flowed from their wounds. His words were muffled and unintelligible. Most of the passengers retreated to the back of the plane while several other courageous people tried to help subdue the man. He broke free from them and started pounding on the cockpit door. Screams and shouts could be heard by the tower over the radio right before they lost contact with them.
A short time later the plane shot over the runway and destroyed more than a dozen power lines and utility poles as it descended nose first into the heart of the city. Pieces of concrete, steel, and glass flew through the air. The crash occurred just outside the Fox 10 news station. Most of the people inside did not make it out alive. The buildings walls were blown outward and the ceiling pan caked inward. The Phoenix police headquarters was also completely destroyed. A fire roared through the structure leaving several hundred officers inside dead.
Witnesses confirmed that a massive wall of fire swept through the wreckage illuminating the sky and engulfed the surrounding neighborhoods. The large amount of jet fuel contributed to the spreading fire. Clusters of city blocks have lost power placing more than twenty thousand Phoenix residents in the dark. Many of the displaced residents had nowhere else to go they just held their faces in their hands and cried. There was little or nothing that could be done to save them. Trapped residents were suffocated by a thick cloud of toxic smoke or turned into ashes by the scorching fire.”
After the broadcast Dr. Black suggested we were now in survival mode and some of us were not going to make it. It was a cruel thing to say but it was true. We had to figure out how 0to get all the patients out of here alive.
“What if we just left them here and save ourselves? They are just dead weight anyway. What type of quality of life can they expect to have anyway? We can get away while those things attack the patient’s.” Dr. Green proclaimed. “So far we have been lucky but we have to make smart decisions!”
“We can’t do that! We have an obligation to take care of them!” Dr. Black declared.
“That was before tonight sir. Now my only job is to stay alive and if I can do that by using a couple of welfare recipients as bait then that’s what I am going to do!” responded Dr. Green.
“Those so called welfare patients pay our salary!” said Dr. Okonkwo. “Don’t be so shallow!”
“The patients don’t pay for shit! Their insurance does. And most of these free loaders get free health care.” yelled Dr. Green.
“Regardless of how we get paid these people are our responsibility.” declared Carmen.
“It is survival of the fittest and the responsible thing would be to put them out of their misery!” Dr. Green responded.
<
br /> “That would be murder! I got into medicine to save lives not take them!” yelled Dr. Okonkwo.
“We make life or death decisions every day and sometimes people die. What makes tonight different?” boasted Dr. Green. “Doctor I know what triage is but what you are talking about is playing God.” said Dr. Sanchez. “The nature of our job requires that we make a series of ethical choices with the patient’s best interest in mind.”
“I am an O.R. surgeon!” explained Dr. Green. “People come to me dead and lifeless and I pull them back from the light. So yes I am God!”
“You're not God! What you are is a pompous son of a bitch!” screamed Carmen. “Shallow cowards like you are only concerned with your own well-being!”
“You can believe what you want to believe!” he shot back. “But when people are looking for a miracle I'm the only show in town! All these poor degenerate assholes are probably waiting on the government to come hand out a rescue just like they do welfare checks!”
Carmen was so upset she started to cry. The doctor's open mocking of God made her distraught and ashamed. She was a Christian but she felt herself hating him. The pastor walked past her and rubbed her back. He reminded her where true strength and healing comes from.
“It is okay my child. Do not be upset. As for you my son the laws of man will send you to prison if you break them but if you sin and break the laws of God then you will burn in hell. John 7:18 says that a man who speaks about himself seeks only his own glory. If he speaks only about the glory of God he speaks the truth.”
“Listen here whatever you call yourself. I don’t believe in God or that crap your spitting!” said Dr. Green. “I have seen people beg him to save their life or the lives of their loved ones and they still died.”
“You may not believe in God but He believes in you my son. Every knee shall bow and every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is the Lord! You can experience His love or taste His wrath.” shouted pastor Harrell.
Dr. Green threw his hands up in the air and walked off. Meanwhile I was thinking that if we could get to communications I could get more ammo and raid the confiscated weapons locker for more weapons. So many people in Arizona carry guns and knives that confiscated weapons are going to end up at the hospital. They would check in and still have weapons on them. The weapons in that cabinet might give us a fighting chance to get out of here. We just needed a group of volunteers willing to make the trip. I pulled out my radio to call Hernandez and let him know what I was thinking. Right on cue the radio chirped into action and I heard him yell.
“Kevin I can hear them! They're right outside the door!”
“How many are we talking about?” I asked.
“I don't know for sure. All my monitors were knocked offline and have not rebooted yet. There are too many of them out there to count!” he answered. “Don't worry! The walls are concrete and the glass is bulletproof.”
That was true but I knew the door was wood just like the rest of offices on the first floor. The hospitals first floor was just remodeled and some dumb-ass pencil pusher decided to take out the thirty year old rock solid steel doors to each room and put in some imitation oak knock offs. The old doors were ugly but they were secure. The new doors were supposed to help clean up the hospitals public image. Never mind the fact that doors are supposed to keep people out. The decorative doors were located every few feet along the now brightly painted hallway. Hernandez grabbed a flashlight and shined it through the bulletproof glass.
“What the fuck?”
He jumped back as the light revealed the gruesome disfigured faces of a large forsaken horde. He stared at faces that were scared, pale and bruised. Some of them were missing eyes, ears, noses, and lips. The flashlight caused their mutated milky white eyes to glow. They wore filthy scrubs and hospital gowns dripping with blood. Crimson smears stained every part of the glass they touched.
“BANG! BANG! BANG!” They had made it to the door and were now trying to force their way in.
“Kevin I don't think this door is going to hold!”
“Find something to brace against it man!” I pleaded.
The mob pounded on the wood door causing dents and clawed on it leaving scratch marks and broken finger nails. Others hurled their rotting frames against the door over and over again.
“I already did bro but the door is still shaking loose from its hinges.”
“You can't give up man! You have to fight!” I told him.
“Face it man. I'm not getting out of this room alive.” Hernandez stood in front of the door feeling understandably uneasy. Then he asked me to tell his wife and kids that he loved them. I told him he could tell them himself. Suddenly the noise in the background changed.
“Dammit!” I yelled. We both knew what had happened.
“BLAM! BLAM! CRASH!”
The horde had smashed in the cheap wood door! A piece of wood the size of a dinner plate was dislodged. Various size splinters flew through the air. Then one arm slipped inside followed by another and another. Their arms swung wildly searching for a meal just out of reach. Soon larger sections of the door were violently pried and shoved aside as the first creature entered the room. He had long dirty blonde hair with cuts and bruises on his face. Fresh blood was soaked up in his beard like a sponge. The smell of his decomposing body was horrible and sickening. The rest of the weakened door offered little resistance as all of his friends shamble in behind him.
“Their everywhere man!” cried Hernandez.
“GRRRRRR! GRRRRRR! GRRRRRR!”
“Oh yeah bitch I got something for your ass right here!” he boasted.
I heard shooting for almost a minute mixed in with cuss words and some Spanish. The next thing I heard were my friend's tortured screams.
“No! No! Noooooo!” “GROOOWWWL! GROOOWWWL! GROOOWWWL!”
At least thirty of the soulless forsaken creatures poured into the room moaning and falling over each other. Most of them were in various states of decomposition. A pungent stale odor followed them. Outstretched hands and open mouths formed a deadly roadblock. The monsters ransacked the room as they lunged at him and hurled themselves forward.
“POP! POP! POP!”
Hernandez was overwhelmed by bites but could still fire his gun.
“POP! POP! POP!”
He was bleeding severely after losing so many chunks of flesh.
“There are too many man!” he cried. “There are too many!”
He popped in another magazine and continued to fire.
“POP! POP! POP!”
Every ghoul he killed fell to the ground and created a mound of dead flesh but the mob continued to push through the doorway. “GROOOWWWL!”
The rest of them climbed over their friends and attacked Hernandez. One beast latched onto his arm then bit down hard on his hand. It began twisting its head back and forth throwing him around like a rag doll. Several fingers were severed off just below the knuckle.
“CHOMP”
“Ahh! Get off me!”
Ruptured blood vessels sent blood flying. He fell backwards on the desk while scrambling to reach more ammunition and fractured his arm. The back of his head also caught the corner of his chair and cut into his skin.
“Uhhooowww!” Hernandez's body was covered in a blanket of hands and teeth that tore at his flesh.
“GNAAAW”
Seconds later I heard the last screams of my friend echo over the radio.
“Aaaiiihhheee!”
He screamed in agony as their knife-like fingers cut into his back and drool coated teeth ate him alive. His death was painful and grotesque. The pain pushed him toward unconsciousness as the beasts pealed patches of skin from his body. Then they pul
led part of his spine out his back. He laid there paralyzed but still alive. His blood sprayed across the room as he watched his own organs consumed. The last thing I heard was a gurgling sound before the radio died. I yelled out his name one more time then threw my radio against the wall in frustration when he didn’t answer.
CHAPTER 13:
The Night Shift
Even before reanimated corpses started rising from the dead just walking around the hospital in the dark was creepy. Now the rising dead forced us to stay locked up and hunkered down inside without any air conditioning or lights. I asked Sandoval to round up several people to sit close to each barricaded door. Everyone couldn’t go to sleep somebody had to stay up. We placed two men at each door. They would warn us if the undead attacked during the night. Sandoval and I took care of the double glass ambulance doors. The rest of the survivors waited in the moon lit hallway to get some sheets and pillows. Most of them just breathed a collective sigh of relief at being alive. Everyone that could not find a bed found a spot on the floor. Strangers and families bedded down together for the night.
With all those people cramped in a small space we were surprised there were no fights. It was over hundred degrees outside so inside the hospital felt like a boiling hot oven. The added heat made the patients miserable and their medical conditions worst. The heat was paralyzing. Just moving from one room to the other created sweat puddles under your arms. The irritating conditions made it hard for some people to fall asleep. People left rings of sweat in their beds. Everyone kept the doors to their rooms open. Most of the survivors tried to get comfortable in the halls. At least they were a few degrees cooler than the rooms. Complaining about it was useless because there was nowhere else to go. Every neighborhood outside this hospital had become a bloody war zone. We needed to get some sleep and regroup. I urged them to hang on till the morning then we would figure out our next move at first light.
