by Turner, Ivan
Heron nodded. "Maybe. I hate her, too, you know."
Greg didn't know how to respond to that. Fortunately, the elevator car stopped and the door opened letting them out into the lobby. From down the hallway, Greg could hear his father chatting and laughing with the security guards. Good old Hank. He could make friends anywhere. Greg led Heron forward and then introduced him to his father. They shook hands. Hank smiled a friendly smile, but Heron didn't. He didn't have it in him just then. After thanking the guards and saying goodbye, the three men left the building and got into Greg's car parked just out front. Heron sat in the back.
They were in the car a few minutes when Heron said, "I'm going to take a few days off."
"I think that's a good idea," Greg responded.
Absently, Heron began ticking off the things he needed to do in order to prepare for his absence. Greg listened for almost a minute before interrupting. "Why don't you let me take care of that stuff, Lieutenant?"
Heron stopped speaking abruptly and looked at Greg through the rearview mirror. "Are you after my job?"
Greg laughed. "No, sir. But if you don't relax, I'm afraid that they might give it to me."
Heron took a moment to interpret that and then he laughed, too.
When they pulled up in front of Heron's house, Greg got out of the car and walked Heron to the door. Hank decided to wait in the car, uncomfortable with the whole scenario. Once inside, Greg took Alicia aside and told her that Heron should take several days. Probably a week. After that, he was going to a five day schedule. Of course, Greg had absolutely no authority to enforce any of this, but his first phone call was going to be to Captain Naughton. He hardly knew the captain, but he knew that he was sort of overseeing the whole Zombie Task Force thing. He also had a reputation for being a fair minded individual. Beyond that, he had a long standing friendship with Anthony Heron. He would do what was right.
Alicia thanked him over and over again and wished him a Merry Christmas. As he was walking out the door, she gave him a big hug and a kiss on the cheek. There were tears in her eyes. Hank watched all of this through the window of the car. When Greg finally got back into the car and started it up, waiting to catch his breath, Hank said, "I'm proud of you, son."
Greg looked over at him, marveling at the old man. "Thanks, dad," he said. Then they went home and enjoyed the rest of their holiday.
***
Naughton and Luco spent Christmas and Christmas Eve together. They invited Rudy Ludlow but he declined. In the past two weeks, the two doctors had made significant progress in battling the infection. She and Ludlow had discovered a combination of antibiotics and chemotherapy that was worse for the bacterium than it was for the patient. It wasn't much worse, but it was progress. Several patients who'd come into the hospital with early symptoms had survived almost a week. Some had died from the treatment. It had taken a long time for these people to reanimate because so much of the bacteria had been eradicated. Still, once treatment ceased, those bacteria that were still in the system began to reproduce and continue its reprogramming of the body.
In the wake of these advancements, however, Luco's attitude had improved considerably. She was no longer questioning the work she'd done on the zombies, but rather seeing the light at the end of the tunnel. She'd also allowed Naughton to take her out more and more often. On Christmas Eve, they went to his apartment and he cooked her dinner. It was good for a bachelor but not great. Of course, it was a better meal than Luco could have made. And the company was better than she'd ever had so there were no complaints.
Throughout the course of their evening and their night and their very peaceful Christmas Day, Naughton was thinking about whether he should ask her to move into his apartment or just take the plunge and propose. Every time he was with her, she surprised him by revealing a completely new facet of her personality. Whenever she opened up to him about her past, he saw someone that no one else had the privilege to see. Denise Luco had never been able to confide in anyone before. All of her relationships had been conducted at arms' length, but Naughton was different. He could see it, too. She was utterly comfortable with him and he was completely in love with her. He supposed it was just a matter of personalities that complemented one another. Or maybe it was just chemistry. Or maybe he was just finally ready to hang up his little black book.
They were just finishing up lunch when the unknown number called through on his phone. He answered it because he always answered his phone and was surprised to discover Greg Smith on the other end of the line. Smith was Heron's favorite as Culph's replacement. He was smart and reliable. Unlike Culph, he was also a stable individual with a family and a level head on his shoulders.
"What can I do for you?" Naughton asked as he took the phone over to the couch.
"Sorry to bother you on Christmas, sir, but it's about the lieutenant."
Denise looked at him questioningly and he shrugged. "Is Anthony okay?" He used Heron's name so that she would be somewhat privy to the topic of conversation.
"I don't think so, sir." Quickly, Smith related the events of that morning. As he spoke, Naughton chewed over what he himself had been observing throughout the past week or so. He'd gone into Heron's office regarding the containment of Linda. He'd made some empty threats. Heron had called his bluff. Naughton had honestly considered keeping a zombie at the headquarters a danger, but he hadn't anticipated this.
"Captain, Lieutenant Heron told me he planned on taking some time off. I told him I thought it was a good idea and that I would take care of things for him. I don't really have the authority…"
"Don't sweat it, Smith. You did the right thing. I'll make some adjustments to my schedule and take over the operations while Anthony's out. You and I can work together."
"Thanks very much, Captain." Smith sounded relieved.
"No problem at all. Thanks for letting me know."
They wished each other happy holidays and then hung up. As he sat considering what he'd just heard, Luco came up over and sat next to him. He filled her in on the conversation.
She didn't say anything at first. She and Heron didn't get along. In fact, she thought he was a churlish bully. At first, Naughton had tried to change her mind about the lieutenant. In many ways, the day she had met him had been the last day of Anthony Heron as he was meant to be. On that day, he had lost his partner to a zombie bite. His entire reality had been thrown into flux. It would happen for so many people in the coming weeks, but for Heron it had been so poignant. He didn't bother to remind her that losing Stemmy had come just ahead of the news that he had cancer. Since then, Heron had walked around with the proverbial black cloud storming over his head. The more he thought about it, the more Naughton wondered how the lieutenant hadn't cracked so much sooner.
Somehow, he managed to put it away for the remainder of the day. He and Luco watched a Mel Brooks marathon that included Young Frankenstein, Silent Movie, and To Be Or Not To Be. Luco, a surprising fan, had wanted to squeeze in High Anxiety, but Naughton had an early morning and decided he'd better go to bed.
First thing on the 26th of December, he went down to Heron's headquarters and started pouring through the records of police activity regarding zombies. He imported records from hospitals all over the city and then all over the country. Finally, he got records from the rest of the world. When he saw what Heron saw every single day, his jaw hit the tabletop.
He couldn't believe it. He honestly couldn't believe it. As he sat in Anthony Heron's chair, drumming his fingers on Anthony Heron's desk, and staring at the numbers on Anthony Heron's screen, he felt a twisting in his gut. He knew the plague had gone worldwide. It had happened weeks before. He knew about the village in Africa and that hotel incident in New Zealand. Most of these large incidents had hit news and the incident almost while they were taking place. Ironically, the one thing he didn't know about was New York. In the week since the discovery of the fights in the Bronx, the zombie population had escalated by an estimate five percent. All of th
e infected people that had walked away from that scene had spread the disease outward. Five percent may have been insignificant in its own right, but that percentage would grow exponentially over time. What Naughton saw in the statistics didn't just represent numbers. It represented the fall of New York.
No.
No!
Reaching for the phone, he made a direct call to the Commissioner of Police. The Commissioner's secretary put him on hold for an excruciating ten minutes and then offered to take a message. Naughton told her to put him through to the Commissioner at that moment or he was going to come down there himself. The threat was irrelevant. If the Commissioner didn't want to speak with him then he wouldn't whether it was over the phone or in person. But Naughton needed to convey urgency. There would be no more time wasted. Heron had been diligent in his work. He'd been doing a good job handling situations as they arose, but he hadn't been proactive. Naughton would change all of that.
The Commissioner came on the line sounding only mildly put out. He was a decent guy, the Commissioner. Naughton had met with him several times and found him to be both competent and conscientious. When he asked Naughton what was so important, the captain told him. He forwarded all of the raw data he had spent the morning compiling and made sure that the Commissioner opened it while they were on the phone. Though it was likely unnecessary, he explained his predictions and recommended that the Zombie Task Force should be expanded into a full division. He wanted a whole building for his operation and he wanted the manpower to sweep the city and put down the threat.
He could hear the color drain from the commissioner's face.
"I'll see what I can do," he said to Naughton and Naughton left it at that.
As he hung up, he noticed Smith standing in the doorway. Whatever he might or might not have heard from his conversation with the Commissioner was irrelevant. Naughton was sure that the look on his face told the whole story. Only an hour on the job and he was already feeling the fatigue.
"Good morning, Captain."
Naughton nodded. "Good morning, Smith."
He held up a piece of paper. "I think you should have a look at this."
Naughton sighed and took the paper. He first scanned it, then realized the nature of the content and read it thoroughly. All the while, Smith stood patiently in front of the desk. The document was Mikael Seaver's last words. According to Smith, he had been discovered on the evening of Christmas Day with a copy of the document taped to his chest and the digital copy still loaded into the computer. He had already been dead and undead by the time the authorities arrived so they'd had to put him down. That didn't seem important since he would have been incapable of answering questions anyway. Naughton did not ask if the zombie Seaver had shown any signs of what would be considered abnormalities in the zombie world.
Seaver claimed to be an attorney who had represented the city against Candide Pharmaceuticals during the situation that had developed with their antiviral product Head Shot. He had met with four individuals, all of whom he named. One of those individuals was Denise Luco. Dr. Luco, in attempt to prove to them the seriousness of plague, had brought down into the complex beneath Arthur Conroy Memorial Hospital. She had shown them the Ward, the Butcher Shop, and the Zoo. Seaver confessed to using his cell phone to take pictures of the installation. He and an unidentified accomplice had posted those pictures on the internet. This had quickly resulted in what was now known as the Zombie Rights Association.
The confession was startling enough. It drove home the power of the internet. The ZRA was no small foundation at this point. Though its front offices claimed no responsibility for leaking sensitive information or having anything to do with collecting zombies for safe keeping, Seaver went on to name several people who he claimed not only knew about the zombie safe houses but had played a huge part in building them. Then he gave the addresses of each location and approximate zombie populations. The numbers were much larger than even the numbers in Heron's files. They eclipsed the missing persons reports which mean that entire families were going missing or people were hiding it when they got sick.
When Naughton had finished reading it twice, he looked up with a gleam in his eye. "Have you verified any of this?"
Smith nodded. "Lieutenant Heron had put me in charge of ferreting out the safe houses so a couple of those addresses were already on our list. Video records confirm Mr. Seaver's presence at Arthur Conroy two months ago. There are even a couple of captures of him taking the photos."
Naughton was shaking his head. "Are we that lazy that we didn't catch this?"
Smith shrugged.
"Okay. Verify the rest of these addresses and assemble your squad leaders for a meeting at one o'clock."
***
Ludlow had been away from home for several weeks and had no friends with which to spend the holiday. He had rented a small apartment in Manhattan but spent most of his time with Luco in the lab. He was also leery about engaging in relationships since his last sexual encounter had led to the zombie plague against which he was fighting. It was a reality with which he was having trouble coping. In contrast to his early days at Arthur Conroy Memorial Hospital, he visited the Zoo often now. He was particularly interested in Zoe Koplowitz, Todd Mayfield, and Yndra Mwabi. Each of the three of them received different treatment and each behaved differently as a result. Ludlow wasn't ready to admit that zombies had personalities but he couldn't deny his observations.
Zoe was reserved. Perhaps it was her underdeveloped mind or body that caused it. They never fed her. In fact, the only taste of flesh she had ever had was the bite she had taken out of Detective Johan Stemmy's leg months earlier. The blood around her mouth had dried and flaked off. Now she was just this wisp of a girl with a grisly pallor. She'd lost a tremendous amount of weight and her hair was almost totally white. Some of it had fallen out, but not much. It was a bit longer than it had been. Both her hair and fingernails had continued to grow albeit at a much slower pace. Apparently, the bacteria did help to regenerate the cells in the body. She spent most of her time huddled underneath the bed in her room. Hers was the only room with furniture. It had been there when they brought her in and they had left it when clearing out the other rooms.
Dr. Mwabi was timid. She wasn't docile like Linda, who had been transferred in that morning, but she walked around making furtive movements and sniffing at the walls as if she was looking for something. Ludlow had often seen Dr. Kitchener, the behaviorist, just watching her. Kitchener was a wiry little man approaching seventy years old. In a way, he was a lot like the zombie version of Dr. Mwabi.
Todd was the most interesting, by far. Ludlow had seen Todd attack live animals and eat his meals. He tended to kill his food before eating it while reports suggested that other zombies just tore bits of flesh from their victims heedless of the struggling. There was also something about the way Todd went about his business. He was almost…sinister.
But whatever he was, a zombie or maybe something more, he was a Rudolph Ludlow creation. The advancements they had made over the past couple of weeks weren't enough for him. Not for the first time, he was beginning to regret having come to America. Facing these things on a daily basis was almost more than he could tolerate. But he couldn't avoid them anymore. He had to face them and reconcile what had become of his research. Only then, would he know just what he should do.
***
Naughton had a very busy morning. After giving Smith his orders, he'd called Heron to see how he was feeling. He'd spoken with Alicia, who had taken the day off to see to her husband.
"Did you get rid of it, Lance?" She was referring to Linda. He didn't even have to ask.
"First thing," he said with a smile on his face. "If Anthony talks about working, you tell him that he's not allowed back until Monday."
She didn't sound terribly convincing when she thanked him. He knew what was going through her head. She wanted Heron to leave that job and do something else. Anything else. But she knew her husband well. As did Na
ughton. A few days off would set his head to rights and he couldn't survive another job. After they hung up, he thought about calling Eileen Stemmy. After her husband, Heron's partner, had been taken by the zombie infection, Heron had given her a lot of his time and attention in helping to sort out her affairs. She had abruptly cut him off, telling him that he reminded her too much of what she had lost. A call from her might go a long way toward elevating Heron's state of mind. Or it might not. Naughton left it alone. It wasn't his business to intervene anyway.
