Dying Time
By
Daniel Clarke
http://danclarkewriting.wordpress.com
Many thanks to my Mother,
who put up with my stories while I
lived at home.
And thanks to my wife,
who has helped me achieve
my dreams.
Table of Contents
Daycare
Pray
Hero
The Lonely Road
Santa Vs. The Zombies
Daycare
Rebecca fell to the floor. So tired, so bloody tired, she thought. Her body shook as she cried, all the tears she’d been holding since that morning were released in violent convulsive sobs. She wrapped her arms around herself, and let it all out. It was too much for her, it would be too much for anyone. Why did it happen? What had they done to deserve this?
What had she done to deserve this?
“Miss Anthony,” a tired, high pitched voice said. “Miss Anthony, are you all right.”
Rebecca looked up wiping her face on her filthy sleeve. “Yes Angela, I’m all right,” she answered the young girl. “I just fell, and gave myself a bobo,” she was talking like a five year old now. “Do you need anything?”
“Can I have a glass of water?”
“I’m sorry, Angela but we ne-” she stopped herself. Why shouldn’t she give the girl a glass of water. They were nearly out, one glass wouldn’t matter now. “I’ll get you a small glass.”
Angela smiled, and watched as Rebecca grabbed the last of the small bottles of water. Only a half full, five litre jug remained now. “Thank you Miss Anthony,” she said as she drank.
Rebecca took the glass from her, and walked her back to her blanket in the middle of the play room floor. Kissing Angela’s cheek she looked over the nine children still in her care. None older then eight, no one under four. A nice mix of boys and girls. Everyone from a nice middle class families. Every single one an orphan.
She stepped over the sleeping children. She had looked after them for two weeks, all alone. Trying to keep their minds off the lose of their parents. Keeping them entertained when they couldn’t go outside. Trying to keep them clean. Trying to keep them fed. She wished it was different.
If only their parents had survived to pick them up. If only her co-workers had stayed around. If only the police, or the military had helped. If only the zombies hadn’t risen up and eaten everyone. If only she had been willing to abandon them all on the slim hope of getting to somewhere safe.
If only.
Tiffany had left in the first hour, followed by Aby, Debra and Paloma leaving together five hours later. Parents had streamed in the entire day grabbing their children. By the end only John, a maintenance man for the building, and eleven children were left. Before John left he had helped her barricade the stairway leading downstairs, and made sure the fire escape ladder wouldn’t fall down. He’d asked her to go with him, but she couldn’t. He had only a small car, and the children wouldn’t fit. By that time the zombies were almost surrounding the building. They’d have caught the children easily.
She had nearly gone with him. Seeing the dozens of dead people walking slowly for the building, moaning and screaming as they came closer. She had been so ready to just grab her coat and run away with John. The children had all been asleep, it would have been so easy. But she had stayed. Someone had needed to protect the children.
A sign on the roof called for help. More signs, written by the children on the second day, hung from all the windows telling parents or rescuers to head to the back of the building where the fire escape was. She’d sent two children down it into a waiting mini-van on the second day. The mini-van couldn’t take anymore, they were full, and the zombies had circled them. But they had promised to return. She didn’t know the people, but she thought it was the safest option. The van never returned. She still woke up screaming at night dreaming about what might have happened to the two boys.
She walked back into the kitchen, taking stock of what they had. She’d stretched the small amount of food they had over two weeks. Everyone was hungry, but no one was starving, yet. The only food they had left was a five pound bag of oatmeal, a box of twenty chocolate chip cookies, a bag of white sugar, and a large bag of peppermint candies they would be out of food soon. Since the water stopped running six days ago they’d been surviving off of bottled water. There was a half filled, five litre jug sitting on the counter before her. There were plenty of drink mixes in the cupboard but they weren’t any good, except as a treat.
She wished a radio station, or news station was still on the air. She hadn’t gotten a signal in the last twelve days. The electricity worked though, so the kids had all the movies they could stand. But Rebecca wanted to know if help was coming.
She laid down on the kitchen floor, using her jacket as a pillow and tried to sleep.
**
She woke up to darkness. Her eyes felt like sandpaper as she blinked. Looking at the clock she realized she had slept for four hours. A new record. She laid her head back down willing herself to sleep. When she closed her eyes though, the faces of the children sleeping next door surrounded her, with hollow cheeks and sunken eyes they moaned like the zombies outside. She opened her eyes.
Ricky and Todd, the two boys she sent into the unknown, sat in front of her. Todd was licking his hand. No his hand wasn’t there. He was licking a bloody stump. His skin was grey like a zombie. he just looked at her, and took a bite of his own flesh.
Rebecca bite her lip to stifle a scream, and looked at Ricky. His face was bloody as if someone had been beating him. She could barely see his eyes beneath the bruises. “They hurt me, Miss Anthony,” he slurred. Blood welled out of his mouth, his teeth were broken.
She screamed.
**
“Miss Anthony, wake up!” someone screamed at her. Hands grabbed her shaking her hard. “Wake up please! You’re scaring us!”
Rebecca swung out blindly, in terror. Her arm hit something, children cried out in pain. She woke up and looked around. All the children were in the kitchen around her, Angela and Michael were on the floor rubbing their heads crying. The rest were scrambling away in fear.
Rebecca reached out to the two children she had hit. Embracing them she said, “I’m so sorry. I was having a bad dream. I didn’t mean to knock you down,” the sobbing slowed down, but didn’t stop. “You didn’t do anything wrong. You did a good job of waking me up. I’m sorry.”
The younger children came up and hugged her. “Its all right,” one of them said “We forgive you,” a little boy whispered in her ear.
They sat like that for a long while. The children cried into her shirt and hugged each other, letting all of the pain, loneliness and fear they had suffered for the last two weeks out of their systems. Finally Rebecca looked at the clock. It was still five hours till dawn.
“Its time for everyone to go back to bed,” she told them in a strict voice. “We have lots to do tomorrow.”
They slowly filed out of the kitchen back into the play room. She watched from the doorway until they were all laying down. Closing the door she went, and closed the blinds to the window that overlooked the play room beside the fridge.
Turning on the light she looked at herself in a small mirror. She looked terrible. Her eyes were black from lack of sleep, almost like someone had punched her. The blouse she was wearing was soaked with tears and snot from the crying children. She went to the cupboard and pulled out a spare t-shirt she always brought to work. It was nearly as dirty as the blouse, but at least it was dry.
Hanging the blouse over the cupboard door she thought about what to do. There was barely any food left. The water might be stretched for another two weeks, if everyone only ha
d a single small glass a day. The problem was Rebecca didn’t think she would last that long. Maybe if someone was there to help her she could handle it. But for all she knew they were the last living people left. She wasn’t sleeping at night, that last nightmare was mild compared to her usual ones. During the day she was keeping the children alive. If she had some goal rather then just sitting down waiting for help it might be different. If a single song played on the radio, she could have persevered. But there was nothing. Just static.
She thought of the problem to herself as she tried to sleep. They didn’t have enough food or water to last much longer. They were going to the bathroom in buckets. Possibly everyone in the world was dead. If anyone alive could help, they weren’t here yet. She wasn’t sleeping more then two hours a day. The children were barely holding it together. They were screwed.
Turning off the light she opened the curtain. All of the children were sitting up and talking. She wondered what they were talking about. Rebecca turned the light back on and went to the cupboard.
**
Rebecca opened the door and walked out backwards with a little wheeled table. The children looked up worried that they’d be punished for being awake.
“Hey kids who wants some juice and cookies?” she asked with a huge smile.
The kids swarmed her, grabbing the plastic cups and holding them up to her as she poured the juice. After they all had a drink she passed them each two cookies. The children drank it down savouring every drop of the juice. Rebecca ate her own cookies and drank sitting on the floor with two of the youngest children on her lap. She sang to them, lullabies, songs from a dozen different kid shows, and their favourite singers. When her throat got sore she had them sing to her. Within an hour, everyone had cheered up, and she was able to turn off the light. She also turned the heat up.
Rebecca stepped out of the room taking her coat and a spare blanket with her. Walking along the hallway she made her way up to the roof. She stopped to look at the stars, they were so bright now that the city was dead. She had never stopped to just look up at them before. But then she had hardly left the city. For maybe the tenth time in her life she saw the big dipper.
She decided that she had waited long enough and took off her coat. It took only a bit of pushing to get it and the blanket in place. She went back inside.
**
Three hours later Rebecca was sitting on her blankets with her back to the wall. She was tired, but didn’t want to risk falling asleep yet, there was still things to be done soon. Some of the children coughed in the other room, but none of them seemed to be waking up.
She sat up straight, someone was moving around. She went to the door and looked out, it was Angela. “What’s wrong Angela?” Rebecca asked.
“My belly hurts,” Angela groaned, clutching her stomach.
“Well you come in here and I’ll give you some pink stuff honey,” she replied, gently clutching Angela’s shoulder.
Angela took the medicine and made a face at the taste. “Can I sleep with you tonight?” she asked sleepily.
“Well alright, but just tonight,” Rebecca said.
Rebecca sat on the blanket with Angela resting her head on her lap. Rebecca ran her long fingers through Angela’s blonde hair, and sang to her.
Angela closed her eyes and cried a little, thinking of her Mom and Dad singing to her like this. She grabbed hold of Rebecca’s hand and just held it to her face, remembering the happier times.
Rebecca kept singing using her other hand to stroke Angela’s hair. She felt the tears fall from Angela’s eyes. Even as she tired she continued singing, willing herself to stay awake. Angela’s tears finally stopped, and Rebecca heard a last, tired sigh escape Angela’s lips.
There was no more coughing, moaning, or movement from the other room. Rebecca wanted to go and look in on the children, to make sure everything was done properly. But she couldn’t bear to move Angela. Instead she kept singing even as her eyes closed, and her muscles relaxed from the carbon monoxide.
Her last thought was how cold Angela had gotten.
Pray
It was the moaning she couldn’t stand. She didn’t mind the stench. Febreeze every half hour, plus the air fresheners she’d put in every room, kept it from getting too bad. As for the sight of them, she didn’t mind it all that much. Sure the ones with their entrails still hanging out made her feel a little nauseous. But it was merely the Lords way of showing the righteous what all the sinners looked like on the inside. The moans of the Damned though, it went straight through her head. She hadn’t had a proper sleep since the whole thing had happened. But that was alright, when she couldn’t sleep she prayed.
She prayed regularly. She had to, her soul wasn’t pure enough, obviously. Otherwise she would have been one of the truly pious people who went up to Heaven at the start of the Second Coming. So she kneeled in front of the crucifix in the living room and prayed. It was uncomfortable, but her soul had to be cleansed by every means she had. So when she wasn’t keeping her home clean, getting supplies from her store downstairs, or keeping herself alive, she prayed.
Today she had just finished her meal of bread with a touch of butter, and a small glass of apple juice. She wasn’t fasting today, so she thought she could indulge herself a little. She had just finished her meal when there was a racket coming from the street. She carefully got out of her seat, her knees were stiff, and went to the second story window.
Coming down the street was large truck. She thought it was an APC. Her late husband, God rest his soul, had been fond of war movies. So she knew a little bit about the military, horrid ungodly organization that it was. They were charging down the street with the largest speakers she had ever seen on top. Rock and roll music was blaring from them, yelling about sex. The Damned were running after it.
She felt the need to pray, even listening to that noise must be sinful. But maybe, she thought, this was a test from God. She watched, and promised to begin fasting again for the entire week this time, with no water until the fifth day.
The APC went past, and over a hundred of the Damned followed it, staggering and jerking as they ran. It was almost like they were dancing to the music. She nodded to herself approving of the thought. It fired occasionally, when one of the Damned got too close. She saw evil looking machine guns sticking out the various slots.
She looked back the way it had come, they wouldn’t be attracting all of those Damned without a good reason. She waited, singing a few bible hymns to herself to help cleanse her ears of the filth.
She finally saw a gleam off in the distance. She waited and saw another APC coming down the street. As it came closer people jumped off in pairs, and began entering the shops and houses on either side. They all had guns, and looked like they were covered in thick clothes from head to toe.
They were kicking down doors and breaking windows. Well she couldn’t let that happen to her store. She had kept so neat and clean she wasn’t going to let some sinners just break everything. Putting on her boots, she looked herself over in the mirror. She straightened her bangs, and went down to open the door.
**
Bob and Chuck jumped down from the slow moving APC. They ran to the small convenience store. If they were really lucky, it would be intact. They could use anything they found in it. Food was getting scarce back at the base, and fights were breaking out over books.
Bob went to the barred windows and looked in, checking for zombies. He waved to Chuck at the door signaling it was looked clear. Chuck holstered his pistol, and grabbed his sledge hammer with both hands. The door was probably locked, and they couldn’t risk shooting the lock out. The noise would draw ever remaining zombie for five blocks.
Chuck jumped back from the door, and signaled that a person was inside. Bob jogged over to him, his Glock 18, a 9mm, at the ready. He pointed it at the young woman who was walking to the doorway only to point it slightly away from her, she was obviously human from the way she moved.
He lowered h
is gun, as she smiled and waved at them. Both her hands were in view, so he wasn’t to worried about any weapons she might have. She unlocked the door and opened it standing aside to let them in.
“Hello, sirs,” she said.
“Uh, hello ma’am,” Bob replied, confused. He’d met a few lone survivors, none of them had ever reacted quite so formally. She had probably been alone for five weeks, he tightened his grip on the Glock.
“Please come in. What I have I’m willing to share, just as God wishes us to.”
“Thank you ma’am,” Bob said again. Chuck grunted in acknowledgment. Bob suppressed a sigh, Chuck refused to talk unless absolutely necessary during raids. “I’m Bob, and this is Chuck.”
She smiled and nodded at each of them, “I’m Mrs. Adams, pleased to meet you.”
He looked around quickly inventorying the entire store. Very little had actually been taken it looked like. Mrs. Adams must have been rationing everything, the shelves were too full of food if she had been eating regularly. Considering how thin the lady was, she looked like she was starving herself. He couldn’t make out much of her body, her dress looked more like a potato sack with flowers on it then a dress. But her hands and face were thin. She looked like some of the hungriest people back at base.
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