Dead and Forsaken

by West, J. D.

  “MUNCH!”

  The jagged razor like teeth sank into his skin. The patient clenched his teeth and cried out in pain.

  “Uhhhooowww!”

  Even if he survived he would be permanently disfigured. He was bitten multiple times until a hunk of skin peeled off. The man begged for us to help him but soon a pack of stragglers boxed him in. The new arrivals attacked the wounded man like a pack of hyenas.

  “GRRRRRRR! GRRRRRR! GRRRRRR!”

  He was quickly overpowered when a creature punctured his jugular inflicting a fatal wound. A stream of blood spurted in the air every time his heart pumped. He was bleeding to death. His intestines were pulled from his body by the handful as the forsaken fought over the leftover scraps and meaty parts. It was too late to help this patient so I put him out his misery so he wouldn’t change.

  “POP!”

  A single shot from my gun made his skull erupt and sent a light shower of blood, bones and brain across the floor. Carlos took care of the bastards that killed him.

  “POP! POP! POP! POP!”

  The moans coming from around the corner let us know we were just getting started.

  “GRRRRRRR! GRRRRRR! GRRRRRR!”

  “Holy shit!” said Carlos as he stared in disbelief. ”Why are there so many?”

  “What are you waiting for?” I screamed. “Fire!”

  Carlos and I shot our way through the first wave of ghouls. Most of them were not that agile and could be knocked down or pushed out of the way if they got too close.

  “Aim for the head!” Carlos explained. “That’s their weak spot!”

  My Glock and his Beretta did the talking as we gave out head shots leaving a red mist of blood, and brains. We saved several horrified victims but many others never made it out the ambush.

  “Get the hell out of here!” Carlos told two other people.

  A woman stumbled toward me trying to keep her guts from falling out the hole one of those things carved into her abdomen.

  “Help me please!” she said with a whimper. “GROOOWWWL!”

  She turned around and looked at the monster that was following her.

  “It's me!” she pleaded. “Lisa it's me!”

  She begged her former friend not to hurt her but it was no use. “GROOOWWWL!”

  There was no reasoning with the dead because they only saw her as was a meal. She tried to protect her face by covering it with her arm.

  “GNAAAW!”

  Her dead friends’ teeth sank into her arm causing her to wail in pain.

  “Stooooooooop!”

  “BANG!”

  I blew her friends head off before the thing could do more damage. Next I put her out of her misery. The fast paced projectile went through her upper jaw and then severed her brain stem.

  “I am sorry this happened to you!” I told her as I pulled the trigger. “BANG!”

  As we were preparing to leave several adults and children with bite wounds came towards us.

  “Let me help you!” shouted Dr. Black. “I can make you better!”

  When the doctor tried to go help them someone tried to bite him.

  “GRRRRRRR!”

  That’s when he realized they were already dead.

  “Don't just stand there run!” yelled Carlos. The doctor took off and ran through the dark hall but tripped on something.

  “CRASH!”

  He tried to get back up but a small forsaken child sprang onto his back.

  “It’s got me!” he screamed. “Kill it! Kill it!”

  “CHOMP!”

  The demon child quickly ripped a plug out his throat.

  “Eeeeiiiiaaaaaahhh!”

  Dr. Black was hurt badly in the attack but wasn’t dead yet. Blood sprang from the wound like it was a lawn sprinkler. Several precious pints of his blood splashed against the wall and flowed onto the tile floor. The doctor managed to crawl several feet before dying. The pint sized monster didn't let his body go to waste. Carlos tapped me on the shoulder as we backed up and took an alternate route.

  ******

  On the other side of the ER Dr. Okonkwo was fighting back tears as he searched for a safe hiding place. He had seen all types of horror while working in the ER but he never feared for his own life. He had witnessed the evil that men are capable of growing up as a child soldier in Ethiopia. Rebels in his village forced him to be a child soldier. He was able to escape thanks to a family of Mormon missionaries. He went from the front line of a bloody war in Africa to the suburbs of Salt Lake City Utah. A young childless couple adopted him and he adjusted to his new life. Dr. Okonkwo was a good student in high school and excelled in college. His adoptive parents loved him and were proud of his accomplishments. He was examining a patient complaining about back pain when several ghouls barged into the room. He tried to protect his patient but her fate was out of his hands.

  “Get away from her!” He shouted while waving a scalpel. “GRRRRRRR!”

  One of the forsaken grabbed the young woman by the hair and pulled her towards its jaws!

  “Help me doctor!” she pleaded. “Nooooooooooo!” “CRUNCH!”

  The woman had a large chunk of her chest ripped out by a dead patient. Blood squirted upward in an arc and splashed onto Okonkwo’s lab coat and face.

  “Aaahhh!” She screamed in agony.

  Having his face splattered blood freaked Okonkwo out. Then the grotesque decaying corpse of a forsaken homeless man bit her on the arm.

  “CHOMP!”

  He lost his grip on her as she screamed again in anguish.

  “Yeaahhhhhh!”

  The doctor impaled the scalpel into her attackers back but it did not die! He repeated it several more times but got the same result. Then he backed away from them quickly and wiped the excess blood off his face with his sleeve. By the time the beast pulled her down on the ground it was too late for him to save her. More of the creatures entered the room.

  “Don’t leave me!” she begged.

  “GROOOWWWL!”

  “I am sorry!” he told her. “I have to go!”

  “Aaahhh!”

  “GNAAAW!”

  While the forsaken focused on their fresh kill Okonkwo dashed pass them. His hands shook nervously as he pushed open the door and closed it behind him. The corridor wall and tile floor were splattered with blood. The doctor twisted his ankle and fell face down on the floor awkwardly. “Shit!” he blurted out. “Of all the days I picked today to wear dress shoes!”

  He used a door knob to get back to his feet. Okonkwo slowly limped his way down the hall. The ankle began to swell up and continued to throb. Soon he could not put any weight on it without cringing in pain. Suddenly he heard the moaning behind him and walked on it anyway.

  “GRRRRRRR!”

  “You bastards!” he shouted in his heavy accent. “You’re going to have to try harder than that.” Growing up in war he had learned that it is better to be in a little pain than to be dead. He concentrated on just moving fast enough to not be caught. The forsaken continued to pursue him and never were that far behind. He could hear them grunting and shambling as they inched closer. It became a slow speed game of cat and mouse.

  ******

  About the same time we were doing our best to take out as many forsaken bastards as we could. Bullets darted threw the air in bunches.

  “Stay close together man!” I stressed. “Don't let them box us in or get behind us!”

  “I know hommie! You don't have to remind me!” said Carlos. “Take care of the ones on your side and I'll get the ones on the right!”

  We worked our way down the hall to the nurse’s station. We disposed of several dead creatures as they feasted on the bodies of survivors.

 
“BANG! BANG! BANG!”

  Some of the shots ricocheted off the wall tearing away pieces of concrete and dry wall. The other shots lacerated dead skin and crushed weakened bones. An injured woman came out of one of the rooms crying for help. She passed out after drinking too much the night before and woke up during the chaos. After a while she managed to regain her senses but she was pulled back into the room before we could help her. One of the forsaken tossed the young woman to the ground and attacked her. He had been lurking in the darkness. I walked up to them and shot the disease infested walking corpse in the face.

  “Go back to hell you piece of filth!” I shouted.

  We helped the girl up and told her to run. I noticed she was bleeding from the wound on her hand. The bite was her death sentence. She winched from the pain and then ran away. I aimed my gun at the back of her head but Carlos told me to let her go. She disappeared out of sight and we kept moving. The windowless corridors were dim in the daylight.

  “You ready to go?” I asked.

  “As ready as I will be.” he responded.

  ******

  In another part of the ER two kids were with their mother when the undead killers attacked.

  “I love you babies!” she told them.

  “We love you too mommy!” they answered.

  “I know you’re scared but everything is going to be OK!” she said reassuringly.

  The attackers moved through the crowd killing men, women, and children. Many of them had peeling skin covered in bite marks and sores.

  “GROOOWWWL!”

  The two children Latia and Alex ended up separated from their mother. They attempted to hide under an examination table as the bodies fell around them. It was never easy to see someone murdered especially when you are young.

  From their hiding place they also saw their mother attacked by a large forsaken mans. In seconds she was in a world of hurt as the biting frenzy began. Her eyes bulged out as she clutched her fists in agony. He peeled the skin off her skull as if it was an orange. Then he feasted hungrily on her flesh. A nasty looking drool ran down its chin as the ghouls teeth sank in.

  “MUNCH!”

  Their mothers’ body convulsed and contorted as the blood flowed. She met a horrific and grisly end. Some of her blood splashed on Alex’s face. He started to scream but Latia put her hand over his mouth. Stranded Latia tried in vain to get another adults attention but no one noticed them. Then they ripped through the mom’s ribcage to get at her internal organs. As the forsaken continued to search for victims Latia grew more frantic. Maria heard the commotion and passed a small group of people as she approached the room. She could barely make out the faint sound of crying coming from inside. The floor just inside the door was slick with blood. When she peered through the opened door no one was inside. She found the kids hiding under the table huddled together. It was a miracle they were still alive.

  Maria was very emotional when she looked down to see the face of twelve year’s old Latia and her six year’s old little brother. She didn't have kids but it was hard for her imagine how they felt seeing their mother torn to pieces.

  “Come with me!” she told Latia. “You can’t stay here!”

  “A bad man knocked my mommy down and hurt her!” Alex told her as he starred into space. They both were clearly distressed and in shock by the massacre unfolding around them.

  “I know baby! It’s OK!” she told him with a smile. “Don’t worry I’m not going to let anyone hurt you!”

  As they got up to move one of them bumped the table and the sound caught the attention of one of the forsaken. When the ghoul entered the room his arms were outreached and bent at the elbow. From the side he looked like a normal person but fresh blood and filth caked his body from head to toe. That’s when everyone caught a whiff of his putrid odor. A pair of scissors was protruding out his chest. The stinky bastard quickly dropped to his knees and began to feed on the dead man in the corners corpse. Maria quietly moved the kids across the room and they hid behind a laundry cart filled with gowns and bed linens. The dead man turned his head in their direction for a second revealing that the other side of its face had been gnawed off exposing its teeth and gums.

  When the coast was clear Maria got them up and they all scrambled outside. The shadowy corridor seemed to go on forever. Luckily surroundings were vaguely familiar even in the dark. Visceral images of mutilated corpses were everywhere. They ran into Joe and a small group of people looking for a way out the ER.

  “Dr. Sanchez like my daddy use to say if everything is coming at you then you’re going the wrong way!” said Joe.

  “What are you talking about? Is that direction blocked?” Maria asked.

  “You got to excuse my redneck friend!” Dr. Green responded. “He is trying to tell you that the exit is blocked with a bunch of dead people eating everyone in sight!”

  “Well we can’t go that way either!” said Maria. “The only ones left alive back that way are me and these kids!”

  With nowhere else to go they all moved down the corridor and barricaded themselves in the x-ray room.

  ******

  Further down the hall a group of survivors hid out in one of the rooms. “I will check it out.” he said. “Just stay here!” We reloaded our guns and looked around. I stood guard at the door while Carlos cleared the other rooms. He came back a few minutes later. The people were under the bed and behind medical equipment. We waited until the coast was clear and motioned for the survivors to run in the other direction. Carlos peaked around the next corner towards the nurses' station. We slowly moved across the floor. We had just missed a bloodbath. A thick layer of blood and other body fluids covered the floor in front of the station. More blood splattered across the counter top. I heard a noise and we looked behind the counter.

  “GNAAAW!”

  A couple of last night’s bite victims were eating Dr. Khan’s body. We each took aim at one each and put them down with a single shot.

  “BANG! BANG!”

  Carlos shot his gun one more time to make sure the female was dead. “BANG!”

  “What the fuck was that?” I asked.

  “I hit that bitch one more time for being ugly!” he said with a grin.

  I knew Dr. Khan wouldn't want to come back as one of those things so I took care of him. In order to save bullets I bashed his head in with a computer tower. His head ruptured open like an egg hitting the floor sending brain goo and skull fragments all over the place.

  By the time I was done we heard screaming in the hall by the nurse’s station.

  “Get away from me!” yelled the voice.

  When we went to investigate we saw one of the forsaken. The beast was soiled and dripping with blood. He had a noticeable limp and swayed side to side as he walked. Suddenly he went barreling across the room and plowed its body into an empty bed in the hall. Some poor souls severed arm was still stuck on a bed rail with its hands in a death grip. The overweight ghoul had torn the rest of the body to pieces and left the remains scattered on the floor. The female under the gurney was kicking hard and yelling at the top of her lungs.

  “No! Don't touch me!” she shouted. All you could see was her attacker’s lower torso and chubby legs. The thing was trying to work its obese dead body under the low bottom to get at her. Carlos was surprised to see that the girl was Blair the pretty blonde girl he met earlier that morning. She had been swept up in the surging crowd as people tried to escape. At some point she couldn’t control the direction she was going and was knocked down as they rushed forward. One of the forsaken was trying to get to her so she hid under a gurney. Blair had turned pale white like a ghost but was still able to use her brains to stay alive. She stuffed the cast covering her arm into the creatures open mouth when it tried
to bite down.

  Luckily the plaster held its form. Carlos and I flipped the gurney over on its side.

  “Get off her motherfucker!” yelled Carlos.

  He kicked the son of a bitch in the head and it fell off her. He stood over top of the greedy ghoul and stuffed the hot barrel of his Beretta in his mouth. Then the hungry forsaken monster growled at us and gnashed its teeth around the steel.

  “You want something to eat?” he told the forsaken. “Well eat this puto!”

  Carlos squeezed the trigger and tossed its body backwards with a loud shot.

  “BANG!”

  Blood and brains showered the wall behind him. I helped Blair to her feet and she immediately ran to Carlos and wrapped her arms around him.

  “Thank you! I thought I was dead!” she told him with tears in her eyes.

  “Your one crazy son of a bitch you know that?” I teased. “Takes one to know one right!” he countered.

  At first it seemed like we were managing well. I smelled an odor and heard something shuffling behind us and cut the conversation short.

  Visibility was low so the first indication they were close was the smell followed by moaning.

  “Hold on be quiet! What the hell is that?” I asked. “It seems like it's getting louder. “GROOOWWWL!”

  First there was nothing then we turned around to see twelve more carnivorous forsaken stumbling down the corridor. They were members of the dead horde from the parking lot. The lead forsaken was an old Asian man. He was doubled over to one side and missing one of his eyes and his right hand. A stream of yellow pus and blood leaked from his eye socket. A cloud of stale deathly funk trailed behind him. I just glared at him trying to find the right words but Carlos said it best.