In reality, the parking lot had not changed from the previous day. However, my newly improved attitude gave the area a brighter appearance. As I hurried across the empty space, the idea that being involved in a relationship could still affect me, even in a world turned upside down, made me smile. From somewhere in my head came a variation of the words of Humphrey Bogart in Casablanca: “I'm no good at being noble, but it doesn't take much to see that the problems of two little people don't amount to a hill of beans in this crazy world.” I had to disagree with Bogey on this one. The problems and the connections and the joys of two people are the only thing that really matter in this crazy world.
My rumination on the importance of human relationships ended abruptly as I neared the cyclone fence at the edge of the parking lot.
A man running hard from across the alley startled me. His gray sweatpants and white t-shirt looked soaked with sweat or something else. He hit the fence at full speed and his pale face looked angry at whatever caused him to stop.
“I’ll be fine in the morning. A good night’s sleep is all I need,” the shell uttered as if disgusted by its own words.
As I stood there a few yards away, it continued pushing at the fence, trying to get at me. “I’ll be fine in the morning. A good night’s sleep is all I need.”
I wondered to whom these words had been spoken. My imagination took over, and I saw a tired-looking woman with light brown hair. Although she appeared overworked and under stress, it was easy to see that she had once been quite attractive.
“I’ll make you some lemon tea,” she said with concern in her shaky voice.
The man looked at her with clear irritation. “I’ll be fine in the morning. A good night’s sleep is all I need,” he spat the words out.
The woman reacted as one who had suffered the repetition of verbal assaults long enough to have formed a protective, durable layer of scar tissue.
“I only want to help you to get better, honey,” the woman pleaded. “So many people are sick with the cold right now.”
The man merely shook his head at her response.
The next thing I saw was the man launch himself at the woman. The movement caught the woman completely by surprise. She fell back against the wall, her scream smothered by the thing tearing into her throat.
I returned to the parking lot, looking through the cyclone fence at the shell shaking the metal with all its strength. The positive energy I had gotten from Kat had vanished. It had been replaced by the rage which had filled me since the shells had appeared and stolen my world.
“You’re a real prick, aren’t you?” I screamed at the shell.
The only reaction was that it shook the fence even harder and snapped at me. “I’ll be fine in the morning. A good night’s sleep is all I need!”
“Somehow I don’t believe sleep is going to take care of your problem, buddy,” I said as I moved closer to the fence. I brought the gun up to the shell’s forehead and pulled the trigger. Unfortunately, my confident attitude was no replacement for a lack of experience with guns. My ignorance was clear by my actions. I got knocked back a few steps and my arm ached as the bullet blew out the back of the shell’s head. It collapsed where it stood.
“Forget about getting the sleep, you don’t need it. And you won’t be afflicting your shitty attitude upon anyone else,” I said and a moment later saw the mob of shells coming down the alley.
I swore at myself for being stupid enough to use the gun when I didn’t need it. The sound must have drawn every shell within a quarter mile. Once again my uncontrollable temper had caused me to act without first considering the consequences. Now those consequences stared from the other side of the fence ready to rip me apart. I watched them shuffling along and nudging each other to get closer to the fence and me.
None of them spoke and they all moved slowly. Presumably, this meant that they had all changed some time ago.
I looked at the tattered clothing of the shell directly in front of me. From the tattered, bloody t-shirt and baggy old slacks on the shell of an old man, I guessed it had been one of the throngs of faceless and homeless roaming the streets. This may well have been the old guy who stood in the intersection in front of the newspaper building with a cardboard sign reading God bless you for helping. It may seem incredibly insensitive, but a question popped into my head: Is this thing better off now? I recalled the fear and dread and sorrow and hopelessness the homeless must experience on a daily basis. From what I had seen, the shells showed none of those emotions. This lack of emotion kept them from being human. On the other hand, did this absence of emotion make them superior to us? As I looked at the shells groping at me from the other side of the fence, I shook my head at the ridiculous notion of them being superior to humans. Still, I noted an absence of the limitations which would be presented by the modesty, fear, or anxiety afflicting people.
Whether the shells stood on a higher rung on the ladder of evolution would not help to get me to the van. I put it out of my mind and concentrated on finding a way through the fence and the mob of shells. As I moved along the fence, the shells moved with me. Clearly, I would have to distract them if I wanted to get past. Otherwise, the shells would simply continue to shadow my movements until they finally managed to get a hold of me. Even if I had the idea of climbing the fence, the barbed wire at the top of the fence would slow me enough so that the shells would be waiting for me before I reached the ground. I needed a way through the fence rather than over it.
I saw what I needed about two hundred feet down the fence. The small gate was wrapped by a chain to keep it closed. However, the gate appealed to me because there was no barbed wire above it. If I distracted the shells from that spot for a few minutes, it would give me the chance to get over the gate and on my way.
A way of coming up with a distraction did not immediately present itself. My only idea was to lead the shells down the fence away from the gate and then sprint back to it. I did not say that it was a good idea. But this was the only idea I had at the time.
I looked at how slowly the shells moved and wondered if I could move fast enough to make my way back to the gate and over before they got near. The only answer to that question was that I had to be. I picked up a board from the ground. It looked as though it had come from a crate. It was thin but would serve its purpose. That would be to make noise as I dragged it along the fence while I was running. I ran to the corner about a hundred yards from the gate. I yelled and drug the board along the fence to get the attention of the shells. They turned and after a moment began moving toward me.
“Come get me you dumb bastards!” I yelled. The sound of my voice seemed to speed them.
Once they got all bunched up in the corner near where I stood, I gave the fence a final slap with the board and set off toward the gate. It had been a long time since I had done the 100-yard dash, and it took a few strides before I got into a rhythm. The gate became my focus and the only thing I saw. I’m not sure how long it took before the shells began following me.
I got to the gate and began scrambling up as fast as possible. I had my leg thrown over the top of the gate when I looked down to see a group of shells approaching from the close end of the alley. Fortunately, they did not seem to be aware of me. As long as they were not, I did not want to do anything to change it. I did not move but simply observed the shells wandering around below me.
The group of shells that I had led to the other end of the alley now appeared to have forgotten about me. They wandered among the others seemingly without purpose.
After about five minutes, they shuffled down the alley except for a few that stayed along the fence a several yards away from the gate. The shells remained completely oblivious to my presence, so I dropped off the fence to the pavement. The sound drew their attention, but before they reacted I was sprinting down the alley.
I turned left as the alley emptied into a narrow side street with a few small shops. The area looked like it had been taken straight out of a telev
ision studio’s back lot.
I imagined the sidewalks filled with pedestrians as a few cars moved down the street. A smiling little bald-headed man could be seen in the large window of a shop. Above the window was a sign reading Like an Open Book. The man turned a small sign around to show it read OPEN. He looked out the window, smiled, and waved. In my head, a laugh track roared.
Once the mental television break ended, I saw that I was not alone on the street. A trio of shells shuffled along the sidewalk toward me. The fear I had experienced previously had gone. Instead, something more like curiosity combined with disgust filled my body.
I suppose it might have been like studying a bunch of cockroaches. On the one hand, they were repulsive creatures at the bottom of the evolutionary ladder. On the other hand, cockroaches existed worldwide and have done so for over 300 million years. This kind of durability deserved some respect. As strange as it seemed, I was developing a certain respect for the shells. They appeared to be driven by one thing only. It all came down to the need to feed. No complications to get in the way of meeting their sole motivation. In modern society, having a so-called one-track mind might be considered a negative trait. However, when it came to survival, such singular focus was admirable. Their eyes were blind to every distraction from the target.
Right now I served as the target, and they would keep coming after me as long as I stayed in sight. Therefore, the thing for me to do was get out of their sight. I did this by running away immediately.
Before I had time to consider my actions, my legs were carrying me down the street away from the shells. It all became a blur. The only goal I had was to be somewhere else. I ran and did not stop until I stopped in front of the Marin Gazette building. I am not quite sure exactly what caused me to stop there. Perhaps the sense of familiarity that brought me to a halt. Or it might have been the subconscious recognition of purpose. The only thing that really mattered was that I stopped where I needed to be.
I stood there looking at the building like some old friend. It had been part of my life back when life made some sense. The connection to the past made me smile even as it reminded me of a past that had been stolen. I wondered if that which had been stolen could ever be regained. Probably not, I decided. At least, it could not be regained by my wasting time standing in front of the building and not getting the van.
I ran down into the parking garage under the building and to the van. I pulled open the door and threw the baseball bat onto the seat. I reached into my pocket where I normally kept the car key and found only an empty pocket. I patted my other pocket and started to get frantic.
“How could I be so stupid to come all this way without making sure I had the key?” My brain screamed.
It must have been the motion and gasping for breath that jogged my memory. Feeling more than a little stupid, I yanked up the mat and grabbed the key.
The van started right up. The roar of the engine echoed through the parking garage. I let it warm for a minute before putting it in gear. As the van jumped forward, a number of shells appeared at the top of the driveway up to the street. I waited as they started down toward me. A twisted smile found its way to my lips, and I hit the accelerator to send the RV speeding up the driveway.
The first few shells slapped off the front of the van. After this, one slipped underneath the tire and caused the van to bounce wildly. There were thuds on the side of the RV, and I pictured shells slapping the van as it passed.
I took a left as soon as I got to the street. Not considering what I was driving, I took the turn too sharply. The way the thing tilted it seemed sure to flip over. Fortunately, it did not. I did, however, clip a big SUV parked on the street. The van bounced off without much problem. I looked down the street to see a problem about two hundred yards away. A mass of cars that appeared to have been driven into each other at high speed blocked my path.
That direction was clearly out of the question, so I looked for a place to make a U-turn. Most of the street proved too narrow for me to turn around due to the cars lining it. I found what I needed in the middle of the block. The driveway gave me just enough space to pull in and back up to make the turn. As I started back the other way, the shells poured out from all sides.
I focused on the shell of a black teenage girl with long pigtails tied by yellow ribbons near the end. The face was smeared with some dark liquid that had dried. It was barefoot and wearing a long yellow t-shirt over light grey flannel pajama pants.
I imagined the teenage girl going to bed last night suffering from the cold, hoping only that she would wake up better this morning. Of course that didn’t happen. She had awoken in the middle of the night, but she somehow was not the same. Everything seemed numb. Her skin felt cold. Her mind fixed solely upon feeding. The body of the teenager shuffled from her bedroom into the living room of the apartment.
The big yellow cat lie curled up on the couch. It hissed, howled, and scratched the hand that grabbed its head. The feline was yanked from the couch and bitten in the stomach. It fought and twisted frantically and slipped from the grip of the hand. The cat hit the carpet with a thud. It pulled itself a little way, howling and leaving a smear of blood. The shell of the teenage girl stood above the cat, staring with cat hair and cat flesh hanging from its mouth.
“Sherrise, what’s all the racket about?” An older black woman in a nightgown yelled from the hallway. As she entered the living room, the shell sprang toward her. For a moment, it looked as though the two were embracing. A moment later, the woman began squirming to free herself from the arms wrapped around her.
“Let go of me, Sher—” Her words got cut off by the shell biting into her throat.
“Momma!” A high-pitched voice screamed from behind the shell.
The shell turned, letting the woman crumble to the floor. A few feet away stood a boy of about seven. He looked from his mother on the floor to his big sister looking at him with blood covering her face. He started to cry, and a second later the shell landed on top of him.
A thud on the side of the van brought me back to the moment. The shell of the teenage girl had not moved, but several other shells had come to surround the van. As they slid their hands along the sides searching for a grip on anything to let them inside, I listened to the scratching sound of their fingernails on the metal. The grating noise sent shivers through my body and made me want to scream. Instead I stomped the accelerator to the floor.
The campervan did not exactly jump forward. Even in a world in which the dead attacked the living, it remained a campervan. It took a little time and space before it picked up speed.
Despite the rate at which I moved, everything around appeared in slow motion. As the front bumper of the van neared the shell of the black teenage girl, we stared at each other. Rather, I stared at her blank eyes and face, searching for some sign of alarm as the car approached to run her down. There appeared to be no change in the glassy eyes and lifeless expression. An instant later, the shell disappeared beneath the van, resulting only in a couple of bumps.
With the van moving along, the shells posed no threat. The only problem would be if I had to stop, and the only thing that could stop me would be if something blocked the street. Nothing blocked the street until I rounded the next corner. Several cars and a bus had met in the middle of an intersection to prevent anything from passing. I had gotten a bit turned around since leaving the newspaper building but was pretty sure that this would be my best choice for getting back to the store. I slowed to a near stop in front of the cars blocking the street. There did not seem to be any shells around, but I waited and watched to be sure. After a moment, I opened the door a little. I left the engine running as I trotted over to the cars blocking the street. My idea was to try to simply push one of the cars to the side of the street and drive through.
The cars looked as if they had simply coasted up against one another rather than having had any sort of high-speed collision. I wondered if the drivers had died prior to hitting one another. The n
otion made me pause.
If the drivers had died behind the wheel, it meant they might still be inside the cars and more than ready to get out and eat whoever or whatever came by. Since I fell into that category, I crept up extremely carefully on the cars.
Nearest me sat a dark green mid-size sedan, the sort of car driven by someone who cared more about reliable transportation than appearances. I wondered if the driver cared about appearances now. I peered through a dirty window and saw no one inside. However, I did see a huge dark stain covering the driver’s end of the bench seat.
I kept moving and came to the side of a white SUV that had slammed into the back of an old yellow taxi. About to continue on, my eye caught sight of something which stopped me in my tracks. A clear suction cup held a little yellow sign on the back window that read Baby on Board.
My stomach fell and then pitched forward. My vision blurred, and it seemed as if the world was spinning. After a moment, things slowed and my eyes cleared enough for me to see the black plastic of a child’s car seat in the back of the car. I kept my eyes on the car seat as I stumbled a few more feet along the side of the car. From this new angle, the contents of the car seat could be seen. It was not a sight which should ever be witnessed by any pair of eyes.
The car seat held strapped a small something. It did not seem human. This looked more like a bundle of twitching flesh. Perhaps it had once been an infant. That may have been a possibility, but the thing before me now couldn’t be identified as such. I did not see any eyes. If it sensed me, it might have been by smell. Something had clearly gotten it riled up.
Through the car window, I could hear the high-pitched shrieks of the little creature. I stared at it for a moment, considering whether or not I would be showing mercy by killing it. I realized that the concept of mercy did not enter into my decision. The truth was I felt sick at the idea of getting close enough to the thing to kill it. I simply turned away from it and continued along the side of the car as the shrieking stabbed my ears.
The Most Uncommon Cold (Book 5): Surviving Beyond the Zombie Apocalypse Page 6
