by Anthology
Heads covered in white masks hovered over him with people yelling at one another.
Medical terms were being tossed around and in his foggy state he didn't understand what had happened to him. He tried to get up, but he couldn't move. His arms, neck and legs were strapped to something. A table?
He felt cold. No, wait, he was hot.
Odd.
It was like someone had placed an air-conditioner on his lower half and a heater on his upper half. He tried to move his head, but it wouldn't budge.
Talk, he thought. I need to talk, tell these people I'm okay, that they don't have to fuss over me so much.
He opened his mouth; only gargles came out. Then he coughed, blood shooting up from his mouth and falling back onto his face.
"I'm losing him!" a voice screamed from somewhere far away. Losing him? What did that mean? Was the voice talking about him? Was he dying? But how could that be? He tried to remember what he had done that day, but it was all a tangled mess.
Wait, I do remember, he thought. I had been driving home from work. It had been a little before five and I had snuck out early when the boss was in another office chewing some poor slob out about the week's financial report.
I took the Interstate home and then the off-ramp. I remember stopping at the local gas station for a pack of smokes and a gallon of milk. Susan had told me to get her some milk and some bread.
Oh great, I forgot the bread!
Maybe I could go out and get some later after I eat dinner.
So I left the gas station and then drove in the direction of that intersection everyone living in my city hated. It was a four-way intersection with a blinking red light in the middle that was about as good as that one bulb that always didn't work on the Christmas lights every year.
No one stopped at the four-way and it was always a free-for-all to get through it.
So I approached the intersection and . . .
And then it all goes blank.
"Give me a shot of adrenalin. Now, Nurse!" a voice screamed, but as his mind raced to remember what happened, Richard barely heard it.
Now what happened at that intersection that I can't remember? he thought.
Then he did remember and his breath caught in his throat.
He had waited at the intersection and when he thought he had a chance to go, he'd taken it, but there had been a cement truck coming way too fast on his left, and at the last instant, Richard realized the guy wasn't going to stop.
He was able to look out the driver's side window and see the man was talking on a cell phone and wasn't paying attention to where he was going.
In the flash, Richard remembered thinking it was the cigarettes he smoked that he thought were going to be the death of him, and not an overweight truck driver with too many cell minutes on his calling plan.
Then there was a crescendo of crashing glass and twisting metal and he was tossed across the car seat and pummeled by the air bag when it went off.
Nothing then; nothing but darkness.
Until now.
"I need the paddles now. Give me those paddles!" a voice screamed, the same one as before.
"Here, Doctor, take them. Ready when you are," a woman's voice said.
Was it Susan's? Was his wife here?
"Clear!" the doctor yelled.
Suddenly, Richard felt nothing but pain and his vision darkened as electricity shot through his body. His heart trip-hammered in his chest and he sucked in a breath, but then lost it.
There was a beeping sound coming from nearby, but then it went steady, like a low hum.
"He's not responding, Doctor." The woman's voice again.
"Up the juice. Let's hit 'im again!"
"But, Doctor . . ."
"Do as I say. I'm in charge in this trauma center, not you!"
"Yes, Doctor."
"Clear!" Voltage surged through Richard's limbs, feeling like acid coursing through his veins. "No, it's not working. His heart is too badly damaged!" the doctor yelled. "Nurse, get me the experimental drug!"
"What? But it's still in the trial stages. It hasn't even been tested on humans yet."
"I don't care. This man's dying and if I don't at least try then he's a goner. Do you want to tell his wife we didn't even try? She's right outside in the waiting room."
There was silence with the exception of people moving about. Then the nurse spoke again. "No, Doctor, I . . . I guess you're right."
Richard didn't know what was happening. He tried to talk but only garbled grunts came out.
Then he felt a piercing stab right where his heart was. There was a warmness that suffused his body as his heart pumped whatever the doctor had injected inside him.
"Okay, now give me the paddles again," the doctor said. "The juice on top of the drug should be enough to repair his heart."
"But, you don't know that," the nurse said.
"Listen, unless you know something about nanites, you need to keep your fool mouth shut and do as I say or I swear you'll be cleaning bedpans for the rest of the year by end of shift tonight. Do I make myself clear?"
"Yes, Doctor," the nurse replied, her answer now more confident.
"All right. Charge the paddles now!"
A whining sound filled the room.
"Clear!"
Richard's body jumped off the gurney and he felt a pain so great he thought he was going to die. The voltage shot through his heart. The drug coursed through his system. He gasped for air. Still semi-conscious, he heard the beeping stop and the fateful steady drone of its tone filled his ears.
It was the last sound he heard.
* * * *
"Call it, Nurse: 6:22 p.m. I can't believe we lost him. I really thought he had a chance."
"It's not your fault, Doctor. He'd simply suffered too much trauma. There was really no chance," she said. "He looked like he'd gone through a meat grinder as it was."
The doctor tossed his bloody gloves on top of the table next to the corpse and shrugged out of his once-white lab coat, which was now a bright scarlet, as though tie-dyed.
"Well, I might as well go tell his wife," he said. "Have this room cleaned up and get the body to the morgue."
"Yes, Doctor. I'll see it's done immediately."
Nodding curtly, the doctor left the room, his heart weary. He was now going to do what he hated most about his job.
He had to tell a grieving family member their loved one was gone forever.
* * * *
Richard opened his eyes and looked around, seeing nothing.
He was cold, really cold.
It was utterly quiet, not as much as a cough or a footstep to break the silence.
Quite a change of pace to where he was a few seconds ago.
Or so it seemed.
He didn't know how he could have gotten to where he was so fast, but he was here so he might as well deal with it.
Moving his head, he could hear the soft rub of material and he realized there was a sheet over him. Reaching up, he pulled the sheet off his face. It was still dark.
With a choice of lying in the dark or getting up, he chose the latter, so with slow, jerky movements he did just that.
His feet hung off the side of the table, and in the total blackness it felt like if he slid off whatever he was sitting on, he would fall into a black hole. But of course that was ridiculous. If there was a void below him, then how could the table or bed or whatever he was on be there at all?
He slid off the table and his bare feet slapped against the floor.
He stumbled forward, hands out in front of him as he tried to find his way around like a blind man. He bumped into something and it moved with him, so he pushed it out of the way, whatever it was rolling across the floor.
It was so dark he couldn't see his hand in front of his face.
He reached a wall, slapped it, not feeling the cold surface of the metal. In fact, he felt nothing at all. It was like he was in one of those temperature-controlled mediation chambers.
His head was foggy, too, and he couldn't think straight.
He moved about the room some more and bumped into another obstacle. Was this one the same one as before?
He reached out and felt what it was. Though his sense of touch was almost gone, he was just able to detect the curves and softness of what had to be an animal or a body.
A body?
But if that was so, then that could only mean . . .
No, impossible, hospitals didn't make mistakes like that.
Suddenly, there was the sound of a latch being pulled and then bright, white light flooded into the room, temporarily blinding him.
He blinked multiple times before his eyes focused. Turning around, he saw the obstacles were bodies on gurneys, each one with a sheet over the face and torsos and a small tag on each of their left toes.
He glanced down at his own left toe and saw a tag there as well. And he was naked.
None of this made sense. He wasn't dead. He was standing here feeling fine. Sure, he was not at his peak, but who would be after what he'd just been through?
Someone was gonna pay and pay big, he thought. Maybe a big lawsuit or, better yet, a large cash settlement. After all, what hospital would want it getting out they had placed a living patient in the morgue and left him alone, right down to placing a toe tag on his foot?
For the first time he realized he wasn't alone in the room. A man wearing a security guard uniform stood in the doorway.
An armed security guard.
The man shook as he screamed and pointed at Richard. Richard tried to speak, to tell the man he was all right, that this was all a big mistake.
Then Richard watched the security guard do something he would never have believed possible, at least not to him.
The man pulled his gun and aimed it at him.
Richard tried to speak again, but only garbled noises came out. He reached for the man, trying to calm him down, not wanting him to do anything rash. He took a few steps toward the man while still trying to speak.
* * * *
Hal Stevenson stood at the door to the morgue. His eyes widened, his jaw went slack. The guy they had brought in two hours ago was walking around! And he was buck naked! That was impossible. He had seen the guy with his own eyes when they rolled him into the freezer. Half his face had been bashed in and the body had a massive hole in its abdomen from where a piece of metal had impaled the man when he'd been struck by the cement truck.
Hal knew all about Richard's accident. He loved hearing about the really gory cases in all their glorious details. He was a big horror fan and this was the best he could get for action in his quiet job at the hospital. But what was standing in front of him was way more than he bargained for. Hal had seen enough horror movies, zombie movies in particular, to know one when he saw one. And the naked corpse was doing exactly what a zombie should being doing.
The creature stumbled around, moaning and groaning, then even raised its arms in the air like Frankenstein as it came at him.
Well, Hal wasn't gonna be lunch for a zombie, that was for sure.
So pulling his gun---one he had never fired before---he flicked off the safety and screamed at the creature.
"Stay back, you . . . you thing! I'll shoot, so help me, I'll shoot!"
But the zombie ignored the warning and continued forward.
Hal closed his eyes and fired his revolver three times, each shot striking the zombie in the chest and torso.
When he opened his eyes, he screamed. The zombie hadn't stopped moving and had now reached him. Hal dropped the gun in sheer terror, wet himself and, panicking, tried to run away.
The zombie held him firm.
* * * *
Richard had felt the bullets strike him and he grunted with each impact, but the odd thing was they didn't hurt.
Glancing down at his chest, he noticed there was no blood either, only three round holes like someone had poked their finger into a mound of clay.
The security guard was yelling at him and Richard found himself growing angry, and then more angry than he could ever remember being.
This man had shot him!
He was a patient and he had just been shot!
He held the guard tighter and . . . something happened to him, something he couldn't explain.
Hunger.
Not just a little peckish, like he could go for a salad, but so hungry it was like he had been lost in the woods for three days and hadn't had eaten a thing.
As he stared at the security guard, he saw the veins pulsing on the man's neck, each pulse equal to the fellow's beating heart, and it was like someone had rung the dinner bell.
What Richard did next happened so fast he couldn't have stopped himself if he'd wanted to. He grabbed the security guard by the arms and leaned into the man's neck, his teeth opening wide as his jaws bit deep.
Blood flowed down his throat and the guard screamed, but Richard's grip was like iron. He chewed like a homeless man eating a free turkey leg on Thanksgiving, tearing hunks of the man's flesh out with each bite. The guard's arms jerked; blood gushed from his wound in pints.
Richard continued feeding. He let the body drop to the floor then knelt down and began gnawing on the guard's right arm.
He did this for more than ten minutes until the guard began to stir again.
Richard didn't know why, but for some reason the instant the guard stirred, the man's flesh became unappetizing. Standing up and backing away, he watched the guard stand on wobbly legs. His head was at a slight angle thanks to all the muscles and flesh Richard had eaten, but the man could function well enough.
Richard was hungry, the feeling of starvation still there. Though he had quelled it for a short span of time while munching on the security guard, the hunger was already coming back worse than before.
Turning to head down the hallway, he walked in plodding steps, not really knowing where he was going.
The security guard followed.
At the end of the hallway was an elevator.
When Richard approached the elevator doors, they cycled open.
Whether it was coincidence or some remaining intelligence from when he was alive, he stepped inside the car. The security guard followed like a lost puppy and when they were both inside the car, the elevator doors closed softly.
For a long time, the two zombies stood in the elevator, not moving, merely staring at the lighted numbers.
But then the car began to move after one of the lights above lit up.
With a soft jolt, the elevator rose silently while the two newborn ghouls waited patiently.
* * * *
"Come on, Rose, push, you can do it!" the doctor yelled while standing at the foot of the hospital bed in Room 232 on the second floor.
In front of him Rose Rodriquez was in pain, the baby in her body refusing to come out and embrace the world.
"Come on, Rose, I can see the head. It's almost out," the doctor said but in his mind knew if the baby didn't come soon, he would have to consider a C-section. The woman had been dilated for almost a day and he was growing more worried with each passing minute. And to top it off, the woman had refused an epidural, citing she wanted a natural, drug-free birth. He applauded her strength, but if he had been a woman, and in her shoes, he would have been screaming for drugs and as many as they would give him.
"I can't, Doctor, I can't!" Rose screamed, her thick Spanish accent making it almost impossible to make out what she was trying to say. She was all alone in this birth, her husband and family back in Mexico. Her eyes were closed and sweat covered her face in thin streams that dripped down her body, soaking the sheets.
"Yes, you can. You just need the proper motivation," the doctor said.
A naked man covered in blood and a security guard with half his neck gone and a large part of one arm missing stepped into the room, both looking like they'd been through a war together thanks to the amount of gore covering both their bodies.
The doctor stood, stari
ng at the two men. "What are you two doing in here? This woman is having a baby! Get out! Nurse, Nurse---where's the nurse? Someone call security. I mean, more security. These guys're obviously sick and wounded."
One of the men raised his arms and moved closer. The doctor brought his hands up to push him away.
"Do you know who I am? I'm the head of pediatrics. This is my floor. Now get out of here before I have you arrested!"
But his threats fell on deaf ears and whatever he thought might happen next, he never expected what did happen.
* * * *
Richard pushed past the man's hands and grabbed the doctor's head, shoving him to the bed right between the woman's open legs. Richard's jaw opened so wide it threatened to unhinge and came down fast. Teeth clamped on flesh. The doctor howled.
The security guard moved in and sunk his teeth into the doc's meaty thigh.
The doctor screamed and pushed Richard away from him, and as he stood up, the blood from his carotid artery shot outward, bathing the woman in warm blood.
She screamed in terror. A baby shot out from between her legs like a baseball fired from an automated pitcher.
The doctor was on the floor and the baby bounced on his stomach. The jolt caused the baby to animate and a high-pitched scream filled the room.
"My baby! Where's my baby!" the woman screamed as she tried to see her child.
But Richard saw it first.
Ignoring the doctor, the security guard now getting the screaming man to himself, Richard reached out and picked up the baby by one tiny leg.
The woman screamed like she was about to die, but first it was her baby's turn.
Richard never slowed, never halted. If he had still been human, he might have given a second thought to eating a newborn baby, but as a zombie, well, meat was meat.
Teeth clamped on small fingers and ripped them off like they were frog's legs. He grabbed both of the small legs, one in each hand, and pulled them apart, ripping the screaming baby in two. The screaming ceased and tiny organs and blood splashed to the floor. Richard ignored them, chewing on the soft flesh like it was veal.
