Life After (Book 2): The Void

by Bryan Way

  Too heavy. To get back to sleep I have to… do what? I can’t remember. I just had it on the tip of my tongue, and I’ve done it before. Something about… circular breathing, relaxing the muscles in groups starting from the feet and working up. Was it in through the mouth and out through the nose? No, that doesn’t feel right. In through the nose, out through the mouth.

  My feet. I have complete control of them. I can override my brain and make them fall asleep. Total relaxation. Release the tension in three, two, one… much better. Calves, the same. I can release them into complete relaxation… there we go. I should slow down, or else I won’t do it right. Thighs, same thing, slower… take a few breaths. Calm down. You can release them slow, like watching a circus tent wheeze to the ground. Find the zero space… there is nothing. Not even consciousness. All is immaterial. Sleep, and fold into the nothingness…

  I can feel myself urinating. How embarrassing.

  Eyes open. Darkness. Still frozen, hot or cold? Hungry, or nauseous? Legs tense. Polygons slicing through shimmering black ether, thick geometric shapes… phosphorescent, gently invading the darkness with inexactitude. The headache is emasculating. Thick chunky dusk, shakes with tunnel vision… motor functions have ceased to respond, and faded memory beckons. I was not meant for this nothingness. It’s supposed to be quiet. I hear a sound, not inside the room. It was the murmur of someone else’s thoughts, transmitted through conductive means.

  Not words. Sounds. Sounds with emotion you can learn… extrapolate meaning from emotion. That one was ‘B’, the emotion of ‘B’. Is this a function one can hone? Is it real, or capricious forgery? Where am I going? Would that I were sitting still, not moving, but I’d know that I was leaving… so slowly… so slowly it couldn’t be seen… s…o… s…l…o…w…l…y… if I understood it I would go comatose with fear.

  This lasts for an eternity.

  Glow of faded orb shapes, loosely defined as three dimensional objects, so faint they can barely be intuited from the darkness. Fly by. Collapse, rebuild. Float through space without time or meaning. Stardust. Spirals. Shimmering slices of dark, stained glass, colored in a tapestry of poorly illuminated static. So faint… all of it so faint, barely distinguishable unless you concentrate. Freedom would liquefy like them, slide over everything else, defy time and space so beautifully. Slide into the gelatin warmth of a dark bed, no longer taut, cold high-tension wire, strung up… for some reason.

  One that doesn’t matter. You’re helpless. Worthless. Spasms again, terrified, depressing feint at dispelling intruders. It might be failing. What a horrifying thought… that quiet, soft, imperceptible takeover from within. Saps your will. You can feel yourself weakly trying to rebel against it, but you’re drowned in the current, pulled down by the undertow, and there’s nothing you can do but feel yourself lose control. Jules. Feel something else take control. Jules. Slowly… so slowly… so… comatose… slowly…

  Powerless in the face of death.

  I’m in an abyss. Left, right, center. Fear, apathy, death. Center. Eyes. Left. Windows. Right. Bus. Escape? No. Just feel. Left is fear. Used to be. Now infected. Unsame? Broken fear. How? Hurts to think about. How does fear break? It used to be… fear is hidden? How does fear hide? Homeostasis corrupted. Infection. Hate them… and left is anger. Right. Still apathy. Bus. Less safe. Fear. Center. Eyes. Theirs. Julia’s. She’s not here. Hard to look. Fear, again, and harder. Leaving myself behind. I am distinct from nothingness alone, but disappearing. Consumed in perilous affront. Having taken me, the void is no greater.

  The façade crumbles. I am the abyss.

  Heavy chunk. Squealing wedges, metal whines with the light, not very blinding, a silhouette in the door. This makes sense. I see my feet, my legs. Still so cold. Mouth crispy with dried fluids. Figure. Man figure. Breathing loud and fat, ignorant, repulsive. I wanna strangle him. Gun. Can’t move, don’t move. Fat, vile pig. Punch him in the throat until he chokes. I want you to die. I want you to die. I want you to die. Gun points up and the coward will shoot. Stop breathing, snorting. Click. Misted with blood as he falls. His flabby form rumbles.

  Leviathan moves in the night, swimming out of the corner with a rifle and passing through the light, bringing darkness again. Light returns. Needles and wires in my arm. Pain seems real. Rancid breath drags into nostrils. Words words words. Makes sound but not sense. No response given. “Pain… are you in pain?” Words register, slipping through cracks into receptor bins. Nod. Bee sting in forearm… oh, filled with sweet cleansing euphoria, a body orgasm without pulsation, sunlight in dark veins. Warm, gelatinous ether wraps its arms around me, tears flood through a glorious ascent.

  Awake again. Dirty with clear thoughts. Smells bad. Does forever have an ending?

  Scorched retinas. Cold needles, make noise. Stop. Vibration rattles floor. Footsteps. Salty, rough fingers poke my ears and sound becomes real. “Are you alright?” Woman. Who? Eyes hurt. Who do I say? Bed. Water. Stop killing me. Please. “Jeff…” That’s my name. I have a body. “Help me…” I whisper. Murmurs. Will they save me? “Jeff… it’s okay…” Her voice is soft and sweet. “Mom…?” I hear a smile. Like being woken up for breakfast before school. Am I home?

  “Mom…?”

  “Jeff… it’s Karen.”

  “Me too…” Anderson says.

  “Water…” I mutter.

  Mouth like a raisin coated with pond scum. Cold liquid at my lips. I spit out the last bit. Still can’t open my eyes. “Am I home?” Can’t stop the tears, sobbing. “Please tell me I’m home…” A hand strokes my hair.

  “You’re in the keep… you’re safe.” Karen replies.

  “Too much light…” I groan as my eyes are wiped.

  “John, can you…?”

  Switches flip, making the room darker. I open my eyes. She wasn’t lying.

  “What happened?” I ask.

  “… you were bit…”

  “I… wh-as?”

  “Yeah… we had to be sure… you weren’t goin’ to change…” Karen continues. “I can’t… imagine what you’ve gone through… but you’re out of the woods now…”

  “How do you know?”

  “You’ve been in here two days.”

  01-07-05, FRIDAY

  Karen continues hesitantly. “But… you… you had to lose the hand.” My head snaps over to see bandages covering the stump at the end of my left wrist, and I wrench at the ropes and duct tape. “Get me out… get me out!” I hyperventilate as Anderson hunches over me with a knife and cuts the binding free, allowing me to sit up for the first time in two days. I hold up my arm and stare hard at the space above the bandage while my stiff muscles scream in agony. Time passes.

  “It hurts…”

  “What?” Karen asks.

  “My hand… it hurts…”

  “It’s not there…” Anderson offers.

  “I know that…” I spit. “But it hurts…”

  “…it’s called phantom limb.” Karen sighs.

  “I can’t believe I lost my hand.” I reply, ignoring her. “I can’t believe it’s gone.”

  “I know, Jeff… but it saved your life.”

  “What? How?”

  “You were bitten… and… someone took it off. The blood rushin’ out must’ve washed out the infection. If we’d waited any longer… it might’ve been too late.” As I sigh, she gives me a sympathetic look. “Other’n the hand, how do you feel?”

  “…fucking stupid.”

  “Don’t…” Anderson interjects. “We were scrambling… you bought us enough time to get under control. You probably saved someone’s life.”

  “So, you feel stupid…” Karen grins. “Anythin’ else?”

  “My back hurts… and I feel like… I’ve been pulled out of another dimension… I was lost in it… had to… make sense of the darkness…”

  “Dude… what are you talking about?” Anderson huffs.

  “You were dosed and tied up for two days… I can’t even imagine what was go
in’ on in your head.”

  “Yeah…” I mutter, breaking a stillborn silence. “It’s not important… is everyone alright?”

  They look at each other.

  “What?” I insist.

  “Rich… hasn’t come back.” Anderson replies.

  “Where’d he go?”

  “He tried to drag ‘em into the back roads… we had radio contact up ‘til yesterday morning.”

  Karen stares at the floor stoically while she listens.

  “And everyone else?”

  “Intact.” Anderson continues. “But they haven’t stopped coming. They know we’re in here.”

  “How?” I mutter, falling back to the floor and stroking the end of my stump to confirm that my hand is gone.

  “Three things…” Anderson starts. “First… fire at the college. Alarms stopped about a day ago… second… the helicopters… remember how I told you they were the 193rd?”

  “…no?”

  “SOW out of Middletown, near Harrisburg, about 75 miles that way.” He points toward the door, indicating west. “If those things followed the sound of the hooks…”

  “Damn…”

  “We figure that’s why our ‘friends’ from DC cubed ventured over as well…” As he clears his throat, I consider I’d had that thought. “Third… Steve.”

  “… Steve ? I thought they took him…?”

  “Nope. Notice how every time they show up in front they head directly for us? You said before he might be a beacon…”

  “I was…”

  “…right, probably.” Anderson interrupts. “We don’t make any sounds you could hear from the street. We moved him… put him in the black truck out front. But it doesn’t matter… they know we’re in here.”

  “What do we do?”

  Anderson and Karen look at each other again.

  “Isn’t this… sort of…” Anderson pauses. “…your area?”

  “Isn’t it yours?”

  “Well… yeah, but seek and destroy was always your thing…”

  “Not anymore.” I mutter, looking down at my stump. “I’ve done enough damage.”

  “Careful, lest in castin’ out your demons you exorcise the best thing in you.” Karen says with a weak grin.

  As Anderson frees my legs, I look forward to see a puddle of dried blood on the floor. “What happened there?” Anderson sheepishly scrapes his foot against the caked shell on the tile, turning away as Karen leans back on the desks.

  “I remember… something…”

  “…Nick.” Anderson answers. “He wasn’t very flexible on the whole wait-and-see thing once you got bit. After what he did at PSU and on the highway…”

  “So… what happened…?”

  “You don’t get three strikes around here.”

  Anderson, the sentinel, was on guard to stop the man who would’ve killed me. I only retain brief impressions of Nick in that moment, filling my body with the belated terror of my vulnerability. I nod solemnly before looking over at Karen. “Mel’s been worried sick about you.” She says, still getting away with that weak grin.

  “Yeah…” Anderson starts, warming to the topic. “She’s the reason you’re sitting here.”

  “…oh?”

  “She went postal when you started calling for help… I can’t even say I would’ve gone that nuts. Must’ve killed a dozen in a minute flat…” He snaps his fingers. “Barely stopped to sleep and eat since.”

  “Just what we need…” I respond blithely. “Two people missing a hand.”

  “I don’t think your Zombie killing days are over yet…”

  “That depends on this…” I say, lifting my stump in his direction. “When do I take the bandage off?”

  “I did my best to clean it up…” Karen sighs. “A week until that comes off… a few months, maybe, it’ll be like any other patch of skin. You’ll have a scar, of course.”

  “Hardly my biggest concern.”

  “I’m a little concerned about heterotopic ossification.”

  “…English?”

  “Your brain gets its signals mixed and starts growin’ bone where it shouldn’t be… it’s rare…”

  “Only if my luck changes.”

  “Jeff, you’ve got to take it easy. You lost a lot of blood, and we can’t exactly give you a transfusion… I’d like to wait at least a few more days before you go about your routine…”

  “I’ve gotta help…”

  “Not in this state…” Anderson pipes in. “I don’t need you passing out in the street.”

  “I put some iron pills with your allergy pills…” Karen starts. “And you’ll need to eat and rest more.”

  “Thanks Bones. Hey… you’re not sick?”

  Karen smiles, shaking her head as I shift to my left, preparing to rest my left hand on the ground to prop myself up. “God…” I mutter, completing the action with my right hand and standing slowly. “I need a shower.” Gaining no objections, I find a change of clothes and shuffle down to the girl’s locker room, but not before Karen provides me with a plastic bag and rubber band to keep my bandage from getting wet.

  As usual, I gain comfort from hosing myself down in the warm water. I manage well enough with one hand until I try to shampoo my hair. Pointing the bottle at my stump, I feel perplexed as to how I apply it and quickly get frustrated enough to throw it against the wall. I consider pouring some on my left forearm and rubbing it along my scalp, but I eventually realize I can just squirt some on my hair and go one-handed from there. Not that I have a choice.

  I spend the rest of my shower weeping. Everything I do from now on, except running, is going to be twice as hard as before. I feel this acutely when I attempt to dress myself; getting undressed wasn’t difficult, but with the exception of killing, doing something is never as easy as undoing it. The struggle to open my pill bottle endures until I realize I can push the cap into my forearm hard enough to turn and open it. Parsing the pills and getting it closed again without spilling is yet another ordeal. Once finished, I stare at myself in the mirror for the first time in a long time.

  When I’m clean and dressed, I begin to feel the pain in my absent hand acutely and wonder if whatever Karen doped me up with is beginning to wear off. When I make it back to the hall, I catch Jake running from the front entrance toward the cafeteria. “Everything all right?” I call after him, rushing to get into the intersection he just passed. “Finally broke the crowbar…” he calls back, his voice fading quickly as he rushes into a stairwell.

  I consider heading to the lobby so I can observe the onslaught, but all the windows have been painted on either side. I stop myself from rushing on my way to the security office, realizing that Karen’s admonitions about my blood loss must be taken seriously, lest I pass out in the hallway only to wake up in a panic.

  I arrive to find the office empty and dark, save for the glow of the screens. It looks like the remnants of Alpha and Beta are up for combat with Jack and Lada plugged into the absent positions, which must mean that Gamma is on standby. Since we never officially established what standby meant other than a state of readiness, they could be anywhere in the school right now. I watch Anderson attack the undead with his usual gusto and consider voicing my opinion over the walkie, but unless I have something urgent, I’ll probably only hamper their efforts. They seem to have things under control now regardless.

  Remembering Karen’s edict that I eat regularly, I amble out of the office and find my way to the cafeteria, coming up slowly so I can listen for anyone inside. It seems quiet, but I step in to find Gamma team, absent Karen, with both Andy and Levi added to the broth. “Hey guys.” I offer quietly. Mel and Helen leap up, shout my name, and rush over to wrap me up in a group hug. “Okay, okay… easy now.” Tears coat Mel’s intensely compassionate eyes as she releases me, and Helen looks at me kindly for the first time ever. While they search for something to say, I notice them trying to keep from glancing at my stump.

  “Hey…” I start, by way of re
laxing them. “Look on the bright side… They install the chainsaw tomorrow.” This joke, which neither of them understands, backfires horribly when I break into sobs, an infectious reaction that soon plagues both of them. Mel kisses my cheek and whispers something I can’t understand. The warmth of the interaction is scotched when Rob walks in the cafeteria and smiles at me. Much to my chagrin, Mel and Helen depart, leaving me with Rob while Andy and Levi linger at the table behind me.

  “I have something of yours…” Rob opens, unclenching a fist to reveal the two rings I used to wear on my left hand. I take them both. “Where’d you get these?” He seems reluctant to respond. Since I have no desire to expose the newcomers to this thinly veiled acrimony, I lead Rob into the empty hallway.

  “So?” I start.

  “I…we got your gun, too…”

  “The Colt? What about my hand?”

  “I mean… do you really want it?”

  “…I guess not.”

  Rob looks at the floor while I stare at him. “It was me.” He says softly. “I took your hand… I didn’t think…” I don’t bother to varnish my reply. “Well there’s a reliable disappointment.” His sigh at this packs a wallop of heartache to which I am indifferent. “I know… you don’t like me.” I can feel that he expects me to treat this pronouncement as a moment for humility, but I refuse to give him the satisfaction, choosing to let the silence fester.

  “I could see you were… unwilling to accept my apology at Christmas…”