It had become airborne.
And Garcia’s faulty hazmat suit had allowed the virus entry.
It took the plane over an hour to reach Fort Bragg in North Carolina. In the hours between Garcia’s initial infection, his subsequent exposure to the team, and the long flight; the entire team had been infected, and began tearing each other to shreds. The pilot and co-pilot themselves were dragged screaming from their seats, torn to pieces and fed upon by what was once the tactical team. The plane, on autopilot, returned to Fort Bragg, but then simply flew in programmed circles.
For several tense hours, the control tower tried to contact the plane, but it would only occasionally get crackling static or the more disturbing sound of snarls and growls and screams. They could do nothing, only watch as the plane circled about the base, waiting for the inevitable. When the unavoidable happened and the plane ran out of gas, it plummeted to the ground carrying its howling, gibbering, deadly cargo.
The crash, unfortunately, did not kill all of the occupants. Two of the former Special Ops team; Garcia, and a corporal named Braddick; crawled from the wreckage just as the Search and Rescue teams arrived. Braddick tried to attack the emergency teams and was just as quickly shot and killed.
Garcia, however, slunk away through tall grass and kudzu covered undergrowth, wincing at the bright searchlights that were even now being poured over the crash sight. Being farther gone, and more driven by the urge to mate, Garcia went seeking a different prey.
His skin had long since fallen off and his bones had warped and twisted so much that he was unrecognizable as anything human. His teeth, had elongated and sharpened and his exposed muscles oozed a constant blood and pus. The virus had so twisted his mind that his thoughts were no longer even thoughts. He was an evil, instinct driven monster that might have crawled from the nearest hell of one’s preferred religion. The blood that oozed off of him, like his entire body, teamed with the Walker X virus. His very breath was an invisible, steamy cloud of pathogens and infection.
None of this mattered to the creature that was once Garcia. All it cared about was the smell of women that arose from the town before it.
He loped into the town, infection following behind him like some dark, evil cape.
As the dawn of September 18th rose over the town of some 15,000 people, the infection caught and spread. Those who weren’t killed or eaten were themselves infected. The horrifying work of Doctor Byron Walker spread across the countryside like a cancer, growing and metastasizing.
A police officer, who had killed a disease victim on his front lawn, passed the infection to several people he later stopped at a CDC roadblock.
Those people drove on, infecting several others at a rest area.
Those people took the infection with them on the road.
Soon, two towns were infected, then three, and then counties, and then entire states.
A businessman, having drank infected water, boarded a plane to Germany. The plane, like the military transport that had killed Captain Woods’ team, crash-landed outside of Berlin.
The infection then began its march across Europe.
It all happened so quickly that no medical, law enforcement, or government agency could move quick enough to stop it. There efforts to do so were as ineffectual as shouting into the swirling, black winds of chaos.
And so began the end of the world…
Sarah’s Date
Sarah’s Date is another flash fiction piece. I love the economy flash fiction forces on a writer, especially one such as myself who constantly fights the urge to be wordy. I don’t always win that fight and, much like Sarah in this story, the urge is sometimes too much to overcome! - DAC.
Sarah was suddenly gripped by the realization that she was going to - undoubtedly - need therapy.
'How the hell did I get here?' she thought as she wiped a shaky hand across her mouth. The nervous gesture spread the blood on her lips like a smear of heavy, red, clotted lipstick.
She looked down at the man who, only an hour ago, she had invited up to her apartment after a wondrous date that had included dinner, dancing, and a chaste kiss on her doorstep. She had bit her lip, suddenly shy, when she asked him to stay for a while longer and he had looked at her with those dark, brown eyes and cocked his head.
“Are you sure,” he asked, a little surprised, but still a gentleman. He followed her up the steps, and she let him in, intoxicated by her own forwardness, the provocative gesture on her part.
The decision to invite him up had been impulsive, and she knew she would regret it in the morning; but he had been so nice, and he was so pretty.
And his smell!
She had spent the early part of the night luxuriating in the clean, manly scent of him. She remembered leaning close to him when they'd danced just to smell his white shirt and the irresistibly male scent that he exuded. It was a heady mix of cologne and sweat and strength, if strength could have a smell.
She looked down to where he now lay naked on her bed, his eyes open and staring vacantly at the ceiling.
She could smell his scent on her even now, but it was now different, mixed as it was with the coppery, wet, earthy smell of blood.
She sat back, lying across the pillows on her bed, her own sweat and his smeared blood cooling on her bare skin. Outside the open window, a horn blared angrily and - somewhere in the distance - she could hear music playing.
"Yes," she said to the boy's dead body, "I'm going to need therapy someday..."
She sat up once again and leaned over, licking one of the jagged wounds on his body, and she smiled -- surprised at herself.
She wasn't surprised that she'd killed her unsuspecting suitor... she was surprised that she'd done it so soon again after promising herself she'd show more restraint. She’d relished the taste of his flesh. It had tasted exactly like she’d expected.
So manly, so much like the way he’d smelled.
So delicious.
She sighed, "I'm going to need therapy to help me understand why I can never stay on a diet!"
The Dark Heirloom
I will forever argue that HP Lovecraft was one of the greatest writers of horror to have ever lived. Second only to Edgar Allan Poe, Lovecraft spent his life dreaming of the cold, uncaring void of outer space and nameless, unforgiving evil creatures that lurk both outside and in the spaces between time and reality. As a student of the master, I was shocked to find that he had family that lived in Toledo, OH. In fact, his protagonist from the classic The Shadow over Innsmouth was from Toledo. Additionally, after his short marriage to a New York artist and business woman, he returned to his home in Providence while his now ex-wife moved to Cleveland to live with family. I am tickled pink that Lovecraft, a famous recluse, had a tie to my hometown. The Dark Heirloom is a Lovecraftian-style story that supposes that Providence’s favorite son may have been telling the truth in his stories, as discovered by his Toledo-born nephew. - DAC
Miles Richard Whitcomb peered about the thick fog of the docks, shivering in the damp sea air. He sighed in frustration as he tried to find his way through the thickest fog he had ever encountered. It swirled and drifted about him like thick, muslin gauze.
Suddenly, he jumped in fright as a drunken sailor lurched unannounced out of the gloom. The drunken sailor staggered passed Miles, cursing and stumbling before disappearing into the ether again. Just as quickly as he had appeared, the drunk was swallowed up by the night; a smell of gin and his unwashed body the only evidence of his passing.
‘That’s quite enough,’ Miles thought, primly. ‘Enough is enough!’
He was about to turn around and return to his automobile when he saw a sign appear out of the swirling gloom before him. He squinted at it and saw, with no small amount of disappointment, that it bore the picture of a misshapen black bird perched upon a gravestone. Below it, written in faded and peeling paint, was a name; The Shunned Crow.
He had found his destination, although he was at something of a loss to explain
how. For that matter, he wondered how on earth he had been convinced to come to this out of the way seaside pub at this time of night in the first place. After all, Miles did consider himself a reasonably smart man, and this conviction made this current lapse in judgment all the harder to understand. In fact, he now felt slightly foolish that he had even agreed to this meeting at all.
He thought back to the first letter he had received from the man he was coming to meet. Mr. Otep was, as he claimed, a representative of the Egyptian government and he had first corresponded with Miles a little over six months ago. Mr. Otep had contacted Miles as a result of a search for some pieces of missing antiquities. Now, nearly a half year later, Miles regretted his casual mention to the Egyptian that he was going to be in Boston for business. His correspondent was overjoyed at the news and had insisted on a face to face meet. Before he could object, and despite his initial misgivings, Miles suddenly found himself agreeing. He was damned if he knew how it had all transpired, but that was how he now found himself on a dark, foggy, dock in upstate Massachusetts.
He was not pleased and, had his upbringing allowed him to somehow honorably break his word, he would have uncaringly stood up Otep. Unfortunately, he was not capable of such rudeness.
And yet, despite his resolve to stand by his word, the hour drive from Boston to Kingsport alone had almost convinced Miles to turn around. Even still, a strident inner voice clamored at him to leave – to turn around and drive as fast as he could back to Boston. In fact, the voice was worse now that he was at the rendezvous point.
Steeling himself against his urge to flee, he pulled his coat tighter about himself and readjusted the leather satchel that was slung over his shoulder.
Miles spied a flight of three steep steps that led down to the bar’s entrance. He descended and reached for the scarred and black pub door, pushing it open and stepping across the threshold. As he did so, billowing tendrils of cloying sea fog followed him into the dimly lit room.
He paused uncertainly at the entrance; struck by the age of the room and bar before him. Shaking off the cold and his own chilling apprehension, he ducked and entered beneath a low slung ceiling, its exposed beams supporting the floor of the building above. Nailed at random spots to the ancient beams were oil lamps that threw a dim and unfriendly light over tables set about the room. An ancient brick fireplace in the far left corner threw yet more light, but that light too seemed somehow pale and unnatural.
The pub looked like it had been around, and changed very little, since the 1700’s when Kingsport was established as a shipping port. Miles could easily imagine generations of sailors, pirates, and privateers reveling in rum-soaked debauchery. The room was redolent with the stink of bad alcohol and bad tempers; a stink that stretched back like a passed storm cloud over the last 300 or so years.
A quick survey showed him that it was a slow night at the Shunned Crow. Besides himself, Miles saw that the pub’s only other occupants were a bartender and two sailors near the fireplace. The sailors were either passed out from drink or dead.
If Miles had felt uneasy about this rendezvous before, he now felt doubly unsure.
Making his way across the sawdust coated floor, Miles cautiously approached the bar. The bartender barely looked up from a newspaper spread before him on the dented and gouged bar top.
As he drew closer, Miles felt his unease grow. There was something odd about the bartended and it wasn’t until he drew closer that he saw what it was. Miles was certain that the bartender was one of the ugliest men he had ever laid eyes upon. The bartender had large, protruding, unblinking eyes and his ugly and angular face had an unhealthy pallor, made more so by the dimly lit ambience of the bar. Additionally, his chin was almost nonexistent and, Miles noted with some revulsion, he had a slightly fishy smell to his clothes or skin.
With great control, Miles stopped himself from wrinkling his noise in distaste.
“Excuse me,” Miles said, “I’m supposed to be meeting somebody. Has a Mister Otep been in this evening?”
The bartender did not speak. He simply pointed back the way Miles had come. Miles followed the gesture and realized that there was a small alcove near the fireplace that had been hidden from his view by the door. Sitting there, his face cloaked by shadows, sat a man in dark clothing.
“Thank you,” Miles said to the bartender. After a second of consideration, he added, “May I have a beer, please?”
The bartender again said nothing as he moved to get a glass. He turned and began filling the dark mug from a keg behind the bar. As he waited, Miles found himself uncomfortably drawn again and again to the bartender’s strange eyes. It seemed to Miles as though the man was incapable of blinking. It took a moment before Miles realized that he himself was blinking rapidly, his own eyes suddenly and sympathetically dry. He had to force himself to stop blinking as the bartender returned.
Miles picked up his glass and laid two quarters on the bar.
“Keep the change,” he said, turning away. The bartender still said nothing as Miles made his way to the table.
“Mr. Otep?” he asked when he reached the dark alcove.
“Yes, Mr. Whitcomb,” the dark man said, leaning forward, “Please, sit down.”
Miles hesitated before he sat, and when he did he looked at the strange man he had inexplicably come to meet at this sinister and out of the way pub.
Mr. Otep was a tall, muscular man, as was apparent by the fit of his clothes. He wore a dark pea coat and leather gloves over hands that seemed unusually broad. Otep also wore a black turban. And - as Miles had expected and as befitted a man of Middle Eastern origin - Otep had dark skin and a swarthy look. What Miles had not expected was the severity and sharp angles of the Egyptian’s features. The Egyptian might have been described as handsome, but his handsomeness was somehow marred by the coldness of his black eyes.
Miles took a sip of his beer to hide the sudden shiver that he felt race up his spine and down his arms and legs.
“It’s so nice to meet you after all of this time,” Otep said, smiling.
“Yes, and it is nice to meet you also, Mr. Otep,” Miles replied.
“Have you brought the item, Miles? I can call you Miles, can’t I?”
“Yes, quite fine, Mr. Otep,” Miles felt himself relaxing. There was something disarming about the dark man’s quiet politeness.
“I must say I envy you, Miles. You are fortunate to have had such a famous relative.”
“It’s really not what you would think, Mr. Otep,” Miles replied dismissively, “There are few who would call my Uncle Howard famous, and certainly not those who read mainstream literature. Sadly, my Uncle was a writer of a small sub-genre that few people seriously read once they reach adulthood.”
“Oh, I must politely disagree, Miles,” Otep purred, “Your uncle was an amazing man who will undoubtedly live on through his works. Howard Phillips Lovecraft was a visionary, Miles; a literary visionary!”
“If you say so, Mr. Otep,” Miles said, not really believing it. For his part, he had found his late uncle’s writings rather wordy and somewhat anachronistic. Miles said as much.
“Anachronistic? Please explain this word, Miles. English is not my first language” Otep apologized.
“My Uncle Howard always fancied himself a Victorian English gentleman who had had the misfortune of being born on the wrong continent. His writings reflected the style of a bygone era. ”
“Ah!” Otep breathed, “I understand, Mr. Whitcomb. But, I expect that much of what you say is most likely tainted by your Midwestern values and upbringing. Please don’t take that as an insult or sleight. In fact I almost envy you your provincial American attitude.
“Thank you, Miles said, unsure of the compliment.
“I’ve just realized,” Otep said, “that I’ve never asked you what is it you do for a living, Miles?”
“I am an engineer for the Willy’s Overland Motor Company, in Toledo. I was born and raised there, in fact.”
“That, I suspect, may have something to do with your evaluation of your uncle’s works. Do you feel that your mechanical tendencies affect your appreciation of art?” “I wouldn’t say that, Mr. Otep. I enjoy art as much as the next man. I just never really developed a taste for the medium in which my uncle wrote. Let’s just say that my tastes run to the more realistic and less fantastic.”
“Toledo?” Otep asked, his brow furrowing in thought, “Isn’t that where the protagonists from one of your uncle’s more celebrated works came from?”
“I believe it was called The Shadow Over something or other. Yes. He wrote that story after my mother and I visited him one summer. He told me later that he had used me as a basis for that story’s main character. It is somewhat flattering.”
“Yes, I imagine it would be, Miles. But, enough small talk. Let us, as you American’s say, get down to business.”
Otep leaned forward expectantly as Miles reached into his satchel, retrieving the object that had brought him to this dark, seaside pub. It was a wooden case, the size of a cigar box and made of a polished, rich mahogany. Carved upon it was a strange symbol that looked much like a misshapen star with a flaming eye at its center. It was an exquisitely crafted piece that showed a remarkable level of workmanship.
By his manner, it was apparent to Miles that Otep was not concerned with the box so much as with what it held.
Disturbed Graves: Tales of Terror and the Undead Page 8
